Interwoven Dimensions
Yet these attitudes have undeniable impacts on human rights.
For instance, Ecuador:
One thing is for sure: The murders have sparked outrage in Latin America, where there is a widespread crisis of femicide (the deliberate killing of women) and sexual violence. Central America has some of the highest rates. The 2012 Small Arms Survey, often cited by United Nations, surveyed murders of women around the world in the years 2004-2009. At a rate of 12 per 100,000, El Salvador is the country with the highest femicide rate, followed by Jamaica (10.9), Guatemala (9.7) and South Africa (9.6). Many of the deaths are related to gang violence that rages throughout much of Central America: In a recent series, NPR investigated the brutal effect gang violence has on young women, who are seen as sexual trophies and are targeted in sexual attacks.
Central American women who choose to leave the region and head north to the U.S. face a grim reality. Amnesty International estimates that 60 percent will be assaulted on the way. Activists report that many take birth control before the dangerous journey, in preparation for possible sexual assault.
And it's a problem that extends far south. According to Argentine NGO "La Casa Del Encuentro" in 2014 nearly 300 murders in Argentina were considered hate crimes against women. All of this has led to a growing women's rights movement, with the hashtag campaign #niunamenos (#notoneless) protesting the killing of women. It's also led to femicide laws in several Latin American countries, including in Brazil, where the U.N. estimates that an average of 15 women a day are murdered in acts of gender violence. The new Brazilian law imposes jail sentences of up to 30 years for convicted offenders and longer sentences for criminals who attack girls under 14, women over 60 and pregnant women.
The outrage over the fate of the Argentine tourists goes beyond the killing itself. News articles about the murders are filled with reader comments like this one: "It's terrible, what happened to them, but how irresponsible of their parents to let them travel alone, backpacking." Another commenter writes: "the world is tough and their parents clearly didn't teach them well ... What did they expect?"
That line of questioning has launched a twitter hasthag #yoviajosola (#Itravelalone).
(Garsd↱)
How about Australia?
Take the environment, for example. Why has Ian Kiernan's Clean Up Australia Day been such a success? Because we care about the postcard playground in which we live. China's pumping of noxious gases into the atmosphere will not stop because 100 of us decide to scoop up a Paddle-pop wrapper on Maroubra Beach. But, it will make a difference here. And if we're lucky, it will have a flow on effect elsewhere.
It was Christmas recently. The Wayside Chapel brimmed with people who could not afford to provide a simple celebratory dinner for their children. So, charity stepped in. It was an inspiring example of the better side of our society. Did this prevent one Angolan child suffering starvation due to famine? No. Did these meals metamorphose into protein packs that could be sprinkled down on the African continent like manna from heaven? No. But it helped here.
Yet, when it comes to a woman's right to walk unharmed through a city street, our understanding takes a nose dive.
'Of course we're not rapists!' we say to ourselves. We condemn the pack-animal mentality in India. 'My mother is a woman!' It's as predictable as a 90's Demtel commercial. But then, we'll go home and watch The Footy Show or maybe Jersey Shore, both of which reduce women to empty vessels at best and objects of sexual derision at worst. Some of us may go to the pub - even joined by A Woman, because we're evolved - and they like to joke along too! It's all part of the fun! Lighten up! (Nice pins, by the way).
If, God forbid, a woman is attacked here in Australia, the inevitable questions about where and with whom she was before it happened convince me more than anything that we are embroiled in dangerous times. In 2012, our postcard playground is still smeared with this retrograde thinking. Jill Meagher, even in death, was maligned by the protectors of female chastity for daring to venture out by herself at night time.
(Tedeschi↱)
We can work our way through press archives anywhere in the world. In Africa, there has long persisted superstitions about having sex with virgin girls and curing diseases, like HIV infection and AIDS. So, you know, governments tell women to stop tempting men. In the U.S., it sounds like Tedeschi's Australia ... well, on our good days. On other days, we're supposed to feel sorry for a convicted rapist because the conviction will disrupt the rapist's life. In Italy, the priest says merry Christmas by blaming women for domestic and sexual violence.
She travels alone? It should not need a hashtag campaign. To the one, it's not so much to ask. To the other, we might propose there is a problem if she should have to ask in the first place.
The attitudes denigrate her human rights. Part of the problem with correcting this outcome is that enough people seem unwilling to acknowledge that she has human rights in the first place. This, in turn, is also a social attitude. But those of us who don't seek a reason to refuse those rights? What are we doing to
secure them?
Analogously, firearms: It is one thing to say we have a Second Amendment right, but we argue much over ideas including whether that right is abridged for prohibiting extraordinary firepower, or even by holding shooters accountable for accidentally killing the wrong person.
How about free speech: Consider
Griswold. This old Supreme Court decision has been haunting social conservatives lately. There is an added layer of irony because we wouldn't have that decision if women could have opted out of Barnum's Law (yes,
that Barnum) for conscience. So here's the thing, though, because we all have a "First Amendment right to free speech". But should it be illegal for you, me, or anyone else, to discuss birth control in the presence of a woman?
With the current issue in Ecuador, and the longstanding question derided as the Guardians of Female Chastity, this comes down to basic freedom to move around and exist in the world without chaperone. And as long as the social attitude is, "Well, why did she drink alcohol?" or, "Why was she traveling alone?" a woman's right to conduct her own self is under siege.
It is easy enough to say, even to the point that it starts to feel condescending: She is a human being and has human rights. At some point, she will get sick of hearing me say that.
Because the living praxis we witness in the world around us suggests this notion, this seemingly simple, easy thing to say, is somehow controversial and contested.
____________________
Notes:
Garsd, Jasmine. "What Did You Expect? The Question That Women Are Sick Of Hearing". National Public Radio. 19 March 2016. NPR.org. 21 March 2016. http://n.pr/21CgivS
Tedeschi, Simon. "We must face up to our own rape culture". The Drum. 1 January 2013. ABC.net.au. 21 March 2016. http://ab.co/1NmvWdk