Project. Despite two weeks of promoting the event only the two speakers, the temple brotherhood president and two of his friends along with one member of the press showed up (Lank).Once people stop being afraid to talk about it then we can move on to the next step which would seem to be lobbying for changes and laws to protect the victims in these situations. Dr. Susan Holt, the director of the Stop Domestic Violence Program at the L.A. Gay and Lesbian Center points out that the same sex domestic violence issue is still 25 years behind the battered women’s movement (Leland). It appears progress is being made in some areas such as police responding more effectively to reports of domestic violence in same sex couples. Police in cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Seattle have now been trained to deal with same-sex domestic violence (Leland).In addition, a 1998 survey of the victims of homosexual domestic violence reported that 42 percent of victims said that the police had treated them respectfully while another 30 percent said they were treated with indifference. Only eight percent reported some type of abuse by the police (De La Cruz). This is only one small step to solving such a wide spread problem. In order to address the issue of same sex domestic violence, the silence surrounding the issue must be confronted. Awareness must be raised in the homosexual and heterosexual communities to ensure that the needs of the victims are being addressed. Until awareness is raised and a commitment is made to doing something about the problem then it is doubtful that little progress will be made toward solving it....
