Shaker "Fair and Balanced" Dave, who emailed me about this story, says, "[A]pparently if you're a professional football player, domestic abuse is OK if you do it for Jesus," and Vanessa at Feministing, who blogged the story over there , also notes the "good Christian" excuse. Quite obviously, that was part of the calculation when the Steelers organization considered "each incident … on a case-by-case basis," but what's also notable is that the man who was released from his contract assaulted his ex-girlfriend, while the man who was retained on the team assaulted his current girlfriend—and undoubtedly the still-pervasive attitude that domestic violence is "between a man and his woman" affected the decision. As long as she stays with him, as long as she's willing to suffer the abuse, that's "their" business.The ex-girlfriend, by virtue of her "ex" status, no longer belonged to Wilson, so it's easy to see why his hitting her was wrong. But things are always muddier, somehow, when it's a current girlfriend or wife, which signifies our collective belief that men still have some ownership of women with whom they're in a relationship, and therefore have more right to do ugly things to them than men who don't have any claim over them. We mask that belief with mumbled questions about "why she stays if she doesn't like it," pathetically substituting the inevitably compromised agency of a battered woman for an objectively principled stand against domestic violence, as if that's remotely reasonable. Of course it is not—but justifications for situations like this are thin on the ground.As well they should be.Perhaps you'd like to politely email the Steelers or call their administrative offices at 412.432.7800 to let them know that condoning domestic violence for any reason is not acceptable.