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None of Us Are Safe Until All of Us Are Safe
by Barbara Kasper and Barbara Moore
Originally published as "Women are Victims of Fear"
in the March 5, 1993 Times Union (Rochester, NY)
Imagine
this. A couple of years ago you read the headline in your
morning paper: "Architect's nude body found near Hamlin Beach." You
feel shocked and angry. Several weeks pass. You turn on the evening
news and hear, "Another architect was found brutally murdered today,
apparently strangled to death." This time you feel more alarmed,
remembering the fairly recent murder of another architect.
Two months later, driving home from work, your car radio tells
you that police found a third architect's body along the barge
canal. "My God," you think, "what is going on here? This has got to
stop!" your brother is an architect and all architects are
vulnerable right now.
Change the occupation of the above victims to anything you want
-- college professors, Kodak workers, mail carriers. Imagine that in
the past two years, 16 people with the same occupation have been
murdered. How would the community respond? Now change the occupation
that these 16 victims share to that of "prostitute." How does this
affect the above scenario?
Few of us know prostitutes or have friends or relatives who are
prostitutes. And since prostitution is generally thought of as a
dangerous and despicable lifestyle, the murders of prostitutes give
us some sense of insulation against these killings. It's not "us,"
it's "them."
But there is something else the 16 murdered prostitutes have in
common besides their occupation, they were all female. When was the
last time you heard of a string of unsolved murders where all the
victims were male? Can you even remember a time when males in this
community lived with the threat of a serial killer?
This fear is very real to women living in Rochester. It's no
longer "them," it's us.
In our city, a great deal of media attention and public debate
have been devoted to an extremely pressing and emotional issue.
Special studies have been commissioned to examine this issue.
Elected officials have held meetings to discuss it. Public
television devoted a community forum to debate it. And legislators
want to lobby Albany for funds to devote to this project.
What is this community so terribly concerned about? The location
of a new baseball stadium. Where are our priorities, when a
stadium's location causes citizens to spontaneously organize rallies
and picket the mayor's house, while the murders of 16 women fade
quickly from the news?
We could easily argue that these 16 women placed themselves in
vulnerable positions, making them easy prey for a killer or killers.
That is one key distinction between "us" and "them." But does any
woman really have immunity against violence in her life?
Violence is the No. 1 public health risk to women ages 15 to 44,
according to U.S. Sen. Joseph Biden's 1992 report on violence
against women. More women in this age group will be injured or
killed from a male attacking them than from automobile accidents,
muggings and cancer deaths combined.
Women who fall outside this age group do not fare any better. One
out of every four girls will be sexually abused by the time she
reaches age 18. Men rape and attack women of any age. Local
headlines have told the stories of women in their 90s being raped in
their own homes.
The media have drawn our attention to the appalling numbers of
rapes committed against women and girls in Bosnia as a form of mass
terrorism. yet where is the public outcry regarding the mass
terrorism being committed within our own borders against women? And
why are rape, incest and battering continually referred to as
"women's issues?" These are men's issues. After all, it is men who
commit these hideous crimes.
It appears that as women we are always vulnerable; one needn't
get into a stranger's car on Lyell Avenue to experience the
potential for violence. The daily possibility of rape and other
forms of violence restricts women's freedom and causes us to
consciously structure our lives so as to defend against it. Even a
woman's own home is not a safe place for many women.
The mere threat of violence victimizes all women. To be a female
means to live with some level of fear on a continual basis.
As women, we are all vulnerable to violence, whether on the
street, at work, or in our homes. This community has lost 16 women
and 27 children have lost their mothers. We believe that these
women's deaths were more a result of their gender than their
lifestyles. None of us is safe until we are all safe.
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