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By Hank Shaw
A speech given at Toronto’s “Walk A Mile In Women’s Shoes” event
August 26, 2006
Hi. My name is Hank Shaw, I’m a writer from Rochester, and it’s a
pleasure to be here with people who understand that violence against
women and girls isn’t a woman’s issue. It’s a human rights issue that
affects everyone.
I want you to know that I emailed George Bush, who, unfortunately, is
the President of my country, to see if he would join us today. He sent
me this telegram in response:
“I think it’s great what you all are doing. It takes a real man to
wear a woman’s shoes. Maybe someday even women will be man enough to
wear them!” If anybody from the international community would like to
trade their leader for Mr. Bush, please see me after this event.
Let me start out on a more serious note by sharing something personal
with you. This is the first time in my life that I have ever set foot
in Canada wearing pink women’s slippers. It’s enough to make me ask
the question, “Why the heck am I here?”
Here’s the answer.
The journey that led me here started in Rochester when a couple of
middle-aged guys launched a popular cable TV show that gave a big
thumbs up to statutory rape and other forms of misogynism.
Here’s what they said about young parochial school students. “If
they’re dressed like a Catholic school girl, you want to eff ‘em, the
younger the better.” My wife was a member of a small group of
feminists who protested the show. And I was recruited to write a flyer
that included statistics they gave me about violence against women.
In the U.S., a woman is raped every two and a half minutes. More than
2 million women are beaten by their partners. A million U.S. women are
stalked by men every year. I wrote it up and printed it out. There was
just one problem. I didn’t really buy it. After all, if the problem
was as big as these stats suggested, EVERYBODY would be talking about
it. And since everybody wasn’t talking about it, those whopping stats
had to be wrong … right?
But what was the real story? I decided to look into it. And over the
next few years, I spent hundreds of hours reading every report I could
get my hands on, including hundreds of sickening newspaper stories
about crimes against women and girls.
All that research proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that violence
against women was a huge problem. But I also knew that most men didn’t
have a clue about it. So I decided to create a booklet filled with
statistics, headlines and a little attitude to get ordinary guys to
care.
My wife and I paid to print 5,000 copies. And I started sending them
out. One thing led to another, and before long we had 50,000 copies in
circulation in the U.S. and Canada, largely due to help Toronto’s own
White Ribbon Campaign.
After that, I continued to research disturbing topics like sexual
assaults on college campuses and child sexual abuse. And I learned
some things that took my breath away. For example, I found that 40,000
to 80,000 kindergarten-age girls are sexually abused each year in the
U.S. Every time I cite that statistic it makes me want to throw up.
These statistics were so outrageous! Why weren’t we talking more about
it? Why weren’t we all doing something to change them? I was
determined to do what I could to put the spotlight on this issue until
more men gave a damn.
And then something happened that made me even more motivated. Women
began to tell me their personal stories. And suddenly those monster
statistics were knocking on my door. I found out that one of my seven
nieces—only 17 years old—was gang-raped at a party.
Another niece, just out of college, was sexually harassed at work.
When she complained, her boss offered to transfer her to another site.
She quit instead. There was no penalty for the perpetrator.
After years of keeping it a secret, my sister told me about the time a
nice college football player gave her a ride home from a bar. As soon
as they were alone, he morphed into an Aspiring Rapist. Somehow she
dodged the bullet, but the violent memory remains.
Just a few months ago, a woman I met in the business world told me how
she had been sexually abused by her father for years.
After years of therapy, she came to terms with this terrible past
until her own children were born, and then suddenly she couldn’t sleep
at night, worried about bringing another generation into a world where
some men view their own children as sexual prey.
I now realize that the crime of child sexual abuse is human history’s
darkest secret. I think about this woman’s story every day. I think
about a young college student I met who was sexually abused as a child
by the son of her daycare provider. Ever since, she has fought a daily
battle with a powerful sense of worthlessness despite her many
achievements.
I think about my wife, who worked at a college 20 years ago where the
department chair liked to stick his hand under her skirt when she was
walking down the hallway. She complained to the dean, but at the end
of the year, her contract was not renewed. The department chair kept
his job.
I think about my mother who had the courage, intellectual curiosity
and sense of fairness to be a great leader in business or government.
But when she took an aptitude test in college, she learned she was
qualified to operate a gum-wrapping machine. I now know that test was
designed by men of deep-seated gender prejudice.
All of these stories circle around me. And they bring the terrible
statistics about gender violence home to me in a way that is both
maddening…and motivating.
In the US, government research says that 1 in 5 women will be sexually
assaulted in their lifetime. I have seven young nieces. One has been
assaulted. One has experienced life-changing sexual harassment. And
the rest are still in high school, with 70 years to go. What will
their odds be?
In Canada, half of all women will be victims of physical or sexual
violence after age 16. And there are reports of domestic violence on
the rise in Toronto with five women murdered already this year by
their partners.
Around the world, the UN says that one-third of all women are
physically abused by a partner. Which means that there are roughly a
billion female victims of this particular crime. Demographers say that
there are 60 to 100 million women missing on the planet. They should
be here, but they aren’t. . .due to violent discrimination in
countries like China and India.
These statistics are mind-boggling. They’re grotesque. They’re
completely insane. And now I know their sobering implications. With
numbers this big, some of the women and girls I care about will
inevitably be caught up in this global gender crime wave.
That’s why I keep working to do what I can —as little as it may be—to
fight for their right to a life free from violence and discrimination
and fear. And that’s why I’m here today…walking around in these funky
pink slippers.
I’m here for my wife and my seven nieces and my mother and my sister
and Marilyn and Jenna and Angela Shelton and the amazing
Ophelia, who organized this event, and all the other women I care
about.
And I promise you one thing. My journey won’t end here. Because we
need every man whose eyes have been opened to pick up a load and carry
it forward. So that we can make a vital contribution to a movement—a
movement launched by courageous women—that will, some day, make the
world safer and fairer for women and girls. That will truly be one of
the greatest social transformations in history.
Of course, the number of men who really care about this issue is still
embarrassingly small. And it’s easy to get discouraged by the
challenge of making progress. But when you consider that women and men
are literally risking their lives to fight for women’s rights in some
parts of the world, being discouraged is not a luxury we can afford.
Besides, our numbers are growing in virtually every country. And if we
all keep working to reach out to other men, we will help change the
world—one man’s mind at a time.
So let us keep raising our voices. So that more men will hear us. And
let us win them over with our conviction and the justness of our
cause. And let us never forget the faces of the women and girls we
care deeply about. What more inspiration do we need to do one more
thing…talk to one more man…organize one more event…produce one more
project…and walk one more mile in women’s shoes?
That’s really all I have to say.
So thanks for coming out to support Oolagen Community
Services…Ophelia’s Love…and the great cause we all believe in…ending
violence and discrimination against women and girls. And thanks for
your upbeat energy and wonderful sense of humor. I want you to know
that you have all definitely made my day.
Thank you.
For more information,
contact Hank Shaw at (585) 325-4772 or email
Time4guys@aol.com. To get copies of both brochures, send $2 to:
Hank Shaw, 14 Franklin Street #1007, Rochester, N.Y. 14604.
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