Olivia Hassler is unquestionably a fine athlete.
A redshirt senior on the USC track and field team, the Allentown, Pennsylvania, native and criminal justice student has tossed a javelin over 150 feet in collegiate competition. In high school, she set her athletic district’s record in javelin and placed 13th at the 2013 U.S. Track and Field Junior Outdoor Championships. But those were the easier days.
Like thousands of other women across South Carolina, Hassler is a domestic violence survivor. For years, the state’s male-on-female homicide rate has placed it among the worst in the nation for violence against women. Many organizations on USC's campus are dedicated to fighting this trend and held events throughout October to observe Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Their goal is to raise awareness of abusive relationships involving young people, including incidents like Hassler’s.
In 2013, Hassler was brutally assaulted by her high school boyfriend as she attempted to remove her personal items from the man’s house for the last time. After being knocked unconscious, Hassler woke up in a bathtub, where the beating continued.
“I said, ‘You should’ve just killed me,’” Hassler told GamecocksOnline in 2015. “He had told me, ‘If I killed you, then you would be leaving me. And I told you that you’re not allowed to leave me.’”
When she woke up in the hospital two days later, doctors told Hassler that she had been mugged outside of her car. When it was mentioned that her boyfriend had visited her, her memory of the assault returned.
Still, she initially decided not to tell police or family members of the attack. She feared not only retaliation but also that members of her community would not believe her.
“Some of them thought it was ridiculous and they were like, "No, there’s no way, like, he didn’t do all of this, there’s no way,'” Hassler said.
ESPN picked up Hassler's story in October of 2015 after a GamecocksOnline video documented Hassler's recovery. Hassler's story is one of several high-profile incidents of domestic violence involving USC students and faculty in recent years.
In November of 2014, criminology student Diamoney Greene was shot to death in her apartment at Copper Beech by her boyfriend, Brandon Early. After killing Greene, Early turned the gun on himself.
Dr. Raja Fayad, a graduate director at the Arnold School of Public Health, was killed by his ex-wife in another murder-suicide in February 2015. According to The State, the incident was the first multiple killing on the USC campus in nearly 36 years.
Law enforcement agencies across the state field about 36,000 calls related to domestic abuse incidents every year, according to the South Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. Many more incidents, the coalition notes, go unreported.
In 2015, the 23 local organizations connected to SCCADVSA sheltered nearly 2,800 victims of domestic violence. Non-shelter assistance was provided to a further 19,000. But more alarming has been the rate at which violence between South Carolina couples turns deadly.
Each September, the Violence Policy Center, a non-profit that supports gun control, issues a report on male-on-female homicide in the U.S. Since 1998, South Carolina has never fared better than ninth-worst in the nation. From 2010 to 2013, the Palmetto State was ranked either worst or second-worst in the nation each year.
The 2016 report showed some progress. Reporting on 2014 data, VPC found that South Carolina’s male-on-female homicide rate declined from 2.32 victims per 100,000 women in 2013 to 1.73 the following year. The sudden change moved South Carolina to fifth-worst in the nation for the first time in half a decade.
However, the state's male-on-female homicide rate remained well above the national rate of 1.08 victims per 100,000 women in 2014.The report also uncovered a number of disturbing trends.
According to VPC’s 2016 report, 93 percent of male-on-female homicide victims in South Carolina were killed by someone they knew. Sixty-two percent had been intimately involved with their killer, and 82 percent were killed in connection with an interpersonal argument.
But why would a person seek to remain in a clearly abusive relationship, even to the point of fearing for their life? Shannon Nix, associate director of Sexual Assault and Violence Intervention and Prevention at USC, explains that the circumstances surrounding abusive relationships are often very complicated.
“When working with clients, I would be like, ‘They’re not a jerk 100 percent of the time,’” Nix said. “You’re going to hang on to or think about those times when they’ve been good to you.”
Nix began working with sexual assault victims while earning her bachelor’s degree in psychology at USC Aiken. She started at Student Health Services in June, 2015.
Within SAVIP, Nix works to “provide advocacy to interpersonal violence survivors” on campus. Her work during DVAM included coordinating the screening of a film about violence in LGBTQ relationships and several awareness events.
When asked about misconceptions surrounding abuse in college relationships, Nix said that students often cannot understand why abused partners are unable to flee.
“I think there’s a lot of belief … that people who are being abused like it,” Nix said. “Like, ‘Well, they must like it, they stay.’ I can promise you, no one likes being called names, or manipulated or battered. Again, these are complicated relationships.”
Nix also spoke about “gaslighting,” a common tactic by which abusers use mental manipulation to cause their partner to distrust their own memories and instincts.
“They will literally convince the abused partner that they’re crazy,” Nix said. “It’s like, if you see the sky is blue, they will wear you down until you’re like, ‘Fine, the sky is purple.’
“So it’s this really kind of wearing down, and so then the abused partner just begins to question almost every decision they make.”
One of the biggest misconceptions about domestic violence that Nix tries to fight is the idea that physical battery of a partner is the most common form of abuse in a relationship. Nix said verbal techniques such as gaslighting are far more common — and can be more effective.
“I’ve even heard people say, ‘I’d rather be beat than called names,'” Nix said. “You know, bumps and bruises heal … [Mental and psychological abuse] really takes a toll on their self-esteem.”
Nix commended Corey Ingram, the program coordinator for outreach and men's programs, for his work with the all-male organization True Strength. Formerly known as Gentlemen Respecting Interacting in Truth, True Strength meets monthly to discuss interpersonal violence and healthy forms of masculinity. Members of True Strength are also instructed to be leaders in the field of bystander accountability on the USC campus.
Ingram said he decided to work with male survivors of domestic and sexual abuse after working in a facility that housed male sex offenders. There, he found that most of the residents were survivors themselves, often of a physical or sexual nature.
“We just thought that it would be important to have an outlet for men,” Ingram said. “That was a missing piece here at the University of South Carolina.”
Nineteen to 31 percent of male college students experience unwanted sexual contact each year, according to a flier for male survivors. The brochure also states that because of the disproportionate amount of female survivors, there is a growing misconception that men cannot be abused by their partners.
While True Strength focuses mainly on male sexual assault survivors, some members of True Strength are victims of domestic violence as well. To commemorate DVAM, Ingram hosted a table event for True Strength during an October farmers market on campus and assisted with Stroll Out Stigma, an event designed to challenge common negative conceptions.
In the long term, Ingram hopes that True Strength’s tactics will help to increase reporting of domestic and sexual abuse on campus. He also aims for True Strength’s bystander accountability program to reach more male students in years to come.
Malcolm Bevel, an epidemiology doctoral student and member of True Strength, challenged USC students of all genders to seek resources if they are being abused. The problem of domestic violence, he said, can only be solved with action.
“No matter if you are male, female, whatever orientation you identify as, you are not the only one,” Bevel said. “But it takes one to step up and be that voice. So ask yourself, do you have the courage enough to stand up?"
And without question, the courage is out there. Just ask Olivia Hassler.