This is probably a heavy-handed way to enter the conversation, but I was rather surprised when I found out how many countries until only recently updated laws on DV and rape to apply to married couples in the same way as unmarried couples. Society seems to have felt decidedly different levels of outrage about doing bad things to unmarried persons (usually women) vs. married ones, and persons in marriage could get away with doing some awful things to their partners.

See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_laws_by_country

This is the extreme view, there's of course many other forms of DV and laws across the spectrum are no less fascinating. Note also that there's a difference between legal frameworks and enforcement - I understand, for example, that Japan recently updated the laws to criminalize spousal rape, but it doesn't mean a court will rule on it.

So this is one way in which the definition of DV has broadened. To me it doesn't meet the implied negative connotations of "creep", however.

The parent is referring to a part of the broader notion that some people feel that some other people have over-extended the use of accusatory terms. It's a segment of the SJW/wokeness/cancel-culture/left-vs-right thing. E.g. the word "violence" was used by somebody (I forget the case, but it was not a legal usage of the term) to refer to something non-physical. "Words can be violence", or something like that. I think "poverty is a form of violence" is also something I've heard. I've seen this criticism made for over-usage of the term "hate speech" too, but only in a sarcastic, theoretical way. I've haven't seen the actual instances of the term's misuse. Similarly, I haven't seen cases where the specific term "domestic violence" was over-extended in any popular or legal context (though they may exist).

The old concept was 'it doesn't exist, and if it does it wasn't the husband's fault'