Domestic violence cannot be ignored

Congratulations to that growing number of men who have recently been moved to help end incidents of domestic abuse experienced by many of their employees or co-workers. The effort to help employees who are victims of domestic abuse may have started more than a decade ago with Liz Claiborne, a New York-based clothing company with 13,000 workers around the world, 70 percent of whom are women.

They set up several strategies, including posting a domestic-abuse hotline in every employee restroom. (Often, knowing where to call for help is the first step to getting help.) There are also domestic-abuse response teams made up of managers trained to look for signs of abuse even when bruises are not necessarily apparent.

If abuse is suspected, the person is asked if everything’s OK. She may not reply, or may not admit there’s a problem, but at least she knows someone cares. That, too, can lead to her making a decision to find help.

In recent months, efforts against abuse were strengthened when a number of male corporate executives, political leaders and major sports figures (such as New York Yankees manager Joe Torre) formed the Founding Fathers Workplace Campaign Against Domestic Violence, designed to help men who want to be part of ending the too-long-entrenched pattern of domestic abuse.

For more information on the group log on to its Web site at www.founding-fathers.org.