It is estimated that about 4 million women are violently assaulted in the United States every year.
Assaults are unlawful attacks upon a person that fall into two categories: simple assault and aggravated assault. Simple assault is an attack without a weapon resulting either in minor injury (i.e., bruises, black eyes, cuts, scratches, swelling) or in undetermined injury requiring less than 2 days of hospitalization. It also includes attempted assault without a weapon and verbal threats of assault.
Aggravated assault is an attack or attempted attack with a weapon regardless of whether or not an injury occurred, and attack without a weapon when serious injury results. Serious injury includes broken bones, loss of teeth, internal injuries, loss of consciousness, and any injury requiring two or more days of hospitalization.
Depending on numerous variables, song lyrics that glorify or condone acts of physical violence against women may contribute to building attitudes of condoning and tolerance of violence against women or building apathy, indifference, and desensitization to abused victims, while in more very rare and extreme cases they may lead to actual physical acts.
In addition, these types of negative lyrics are not just localized and limited to physical violence against women, but because of the inter-related nature of the universe as a giant integrated system, the full extent and the total impacts may have much broader repercussions and ramifications (i.e., hidden, indirect, and latent consequences and impacts).
Although many listeners may not be affected to the point where it affects their behavior, lyrics that glorify or condone physical assaults against women, clearly contribute to increase directly or indirectly in the number of actual acts. Because there are so many variables that are difficult to quantify and measure, the exact number is not known, nor will ever be known. However, the real question is how many assaults are worth the price of entertainment with no redeeming value? 1 assault? 125 assaults? 3,500 assaults? 50,000 assaults? 800,000 assaults? or 6,000,000 assaults?
How much lower as a society can we go when we glorify the physical assaulting of women?