Content warning (rape and murder).
I’m home safe. It’s not something I take for granted. I’m a single woman. I live by myself. I spend a lot of time going to activities, by myself; traveling home on public transport, by myself; walking to my parked car, by myself; arriving home, but there’s no-one at home, it would be a while before anyone noticed I was missing or hurt.
I’m home safe. I’m a single woman. I live by myself. At least when I walk in the door, I am safe. It’s not something I take for granted. For many women, it’s once they get home that things start to get dicey. More women die at a home, killed by some one they know than die in a park, killed by a stranger.
You know that expression, it’s a walk in the park. It’s easy.
It’s not. If you are a woman.
I don’t know about you, but today has been a day of heart-deep tears. Cry out loud, sitting in the lunch room, sadness.
In my hometown a young woman, from all accounts a glorious, funny, smart, loving young woman, Eurydice Dixon, was raped and killed when she walked through a park on her way home at night.
The police response has been less than stellar. They’ve called on women to have situational awareness. They’ve been reported as saying that education for young men about rape might backfire.
I’ve had situational awareness all my life. It started pretty early after I was flashed the first time before I was ten. And it continues now. Situational awareness doesn’t protect me from men who use their culturally mandated sense of entitlement that my body is theirs. Our culture steeps and stews in men’s sense of entitlement to women, and it’s killing us.
And I’ve been thinking about this in terms of continuums.
Because, I have gorgeous male friends who don’t fit the narrow confines of masculinity that heteronormative Australia establishes. And getting home is no walk in the park for them either.
And I’ve been thinking about the way that we don’t tell men to self-moderate their actions in public because of street violence. No, we have a dialogue about changing the term “king hit” to “coward punch”. We focus on the perpetrator. We don’t blame the victim. And doesn’t that say something LOUD about the gender and violence and entitlement continuum?
And I’ve been thinking about it in terms of a post on social media by a woman with a physical disability who gave an account of the added layers of complexity around her ability to be safe.
And I’ve been thinking about the death of Lynette Daley and the appalling failures of justice in her death, and the intersection of racism and sexism in Australia.
And I’ve been thinking about it in terms of continuums around everyday conversations. The other day I didn’t step up enough in an exchange I felt uncomfortable in. I regret that. Because, I do fundamentally believe that this is the change we need: these everyday conversations that shine a light on respect and consent, and ensure that we all can live full and glorious lives of great beauty, joy and meaning, regardless of our gender.
But we are not there yet. I read the social media and news outlets today condemning victim blaming responses, and feel like it’s an important change in the public debate.
But to be honest, a young woman has been killed, and her family and friends are grieving. The overwhelming emotion of today is around that.
Today just feels like one of those days when we are so far away from women being able to live lives of great beauty, joy and meaning. Today feels like one of those days when we’re all just that bit more scared to walk home. I know I was.
Margaret Atwood’s quote has been ringing in my ears: Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.
Stardust Becoming 