ABSTRACT
When considering hate violence globally, a particular fact stands out: violence against women, most of it committed by intimate partners, is pervasive in all nations, cultures, and communities. While there is a vast amount of literature on the problem, the issue of violence against women has been on the margins of hate crime scholarship and subject to debate about whether it can be conceptualized as hate crime. The World Health Organization (WHO)concluded in 2013 that violence against women is a global health problem of epidemic proportions requiring urgent action. Studies of sexual violence used for ethnic cleansing in conflict zones indicate the severe long-lasting trauma inflicted on female victims. Beyond conflict zones the news media generally only report the most brutal acts of sexual violence committed by strangers in public places. News media reporting of the most brutal acts of violence against women plays a valuable role in drawing attention to the problem. Such reporting, however, conveys a distorted picture.
