Bec Sparrow challenges the notion that it’s victim blaming to teach your children to take care of themselves. We need to take care of ourselves – because the world is broken…
Close to twenty years ago I spent my time travelling the world alone. It was my job as a travel writer. And so I was paid to wander the streets of Kuwait City, Alice Springs, New York, Wellington and Borneo alone – visiting monuments and landmarks, eating in cafes and striking up conversations with locals and fellow travellers along the way.
I loved that job but in truth I was always just a little on edge. Because I was alone. Nearly always alone. And I felt that made me an easy target.
READ MORE: Masa was a student. She was a daughter. She was a friend. She could have been any one of us.
So I took precautions. I took care of myself.
I removed the hire-car swing-tags and signage out of any hire cars before I drove them out of the airport car park.
When walking I studied where I was going BEFORE I left my hotel and tried as much as possible not to walk the streets with my face in a map or guidebook.
I left the DO NOT DISTURB sign on my hotel room door whilst I was out.
I read up on notorious ‘dodgy’ spots and steered clear. At different times and in different places I avoided walking anywhere alone at night
And always in the back of my head was the advice I’d heard from a self-defence expert: opportunistic attackers need the element of surprise on their side to succeed. So they’re looking for the easiest target, the person who’s drunk or stoned or pre-occupied and won’t see them coming.
I’ve never forgotten it.
Yesterday, like many, my circle of friends was consumed with conversations about the random brutal murders of two women and one man. All of them out alone. All of them minding their own business. All of them doing what they have a RIGHT to do. LIVE THEIR LIVES. But when I went on to mention that I planned to teach my sons and daughter to be smart, to be vigilant when out walking alone at night or in secluded areas (at any time of day or night) I was accused of victim-blaming. I was told I was part of the problem.
Me saying that I would tell my kids to pay attention to their surroundings should they be walking home from a train station or a bus stop at 11pm makes me part of the problem?
ARE YOU JOKING? HAS THE WORLD GONE MAD?
Why should WE change our behaviour and live in fear? One friend said to me, “Why should WE have to be vigilant?”
For the counter argument: The one safety tip that will stop women being killed.
I’ll tell you why.
Because we live in a country that is woefully inept at providing adequate care for society’s most high-risk mentally ill citizens.
Because we live at a time when our judges and parole boards seem breathtakingly incapable of taking crimes of male violence against women anywhere near seriously. A history of sexual violence against women or children isn’t enough to keep a man behind bars, it seems.
Because some men, men who are narcissists or psychopaths or sociopaths, could not give two flying f%cks about why violence against women is wrong. They cannot be rehabilitated and to think they will be is naive.
Because the world is broken.
I’m not telling you or any other man or woman that they can’t walk home alone at 2am.
You can.
It’s your right.
I did it myself countless times in my 20s.
But here’s what I am telling you. When you find yourself in a secluded area – day or night – be smart. Keep your wits about you. Be alert to your surroundings. Do not take your safety for granted.
The danger with these conversations is that by nature they occur on the back of a heinous act of violence. And so it can be misconstrued that they come with a subliminal tut-tut to the recent victims. An insidious whisper of ‘Why was she alone? Why was he drunk? Why did she take that short cut? Why did he have headphones in his ears?”
There is none of that here. NONE.
No victim is ever EVER to blame.
But it is ludicrous to take better care of your car than of your own personal safety. You won’t leave your car unlocked in a dodgy area of town but you’ll walk those streets alone a little bit drunk at 1am?
It makes no sense.
It is also RIDICULOUS to be told that it is impossible to make yourself less of an obvious target in certain situations. Walk home blind drunk alone at 4am and you may as well have a target drawn on your back.
READ MORE: An open letter to women, from a man who is concerned about their safety.
Men need to stop beating and raping and stalking and harassing and assaulting and murdering women.
Agree. Agree. Agree. Agree. Agree. Agree.
But get back to me when that’s been achieved. Okay?
Get back to me when all the blokes have signed on the dotted line.
Get back to me when the world is no longer broken.
Until lots of things change – our patriarchal culture, our woeful care for the severely mentally ill, the out-of-touch attitudes of our judges and parole boards – the truth is we need to walk through this world with our eyes wide open.
Take care of yourself. That’s all I’m saying. Man, woman, young, old — take care.
Top Comments
We need more of the community to use public spaces, not less.
As we continually seclude ourselves away we essentially thin the herd. This creates more opitune targets of those that do go out.
The same applies to free range kids. I want my children to be able to go out on their own riding their bikes around the neighborhood. However with so few other kids about they will stand out and draw so much more attention.
We as a society need to take back our spaces and protect each other by just being there.
I do think you're right Bec, and I appreciate that you addressed your article to both men and women, because I think that's important. But I think the current anger is about what the detective said after Masa's murder - that women should not walk alone in parks. Even in daylight. So women's worlds are getting smaller and smaller, and yet violence continues.
Masa went for a walk in a park near her house in daylight hours. The detective said that women should stay away from parks unless they are in a group. Even in daylight. So now parks are off limits for women who are alone (or with their children). What next? Do I need my husband to walk me to work in the morning? Do I need to take a colleague with me when I go out to get my lunch? Is this what the police are suggesting is necessary now?
Meanwhile the rate of violence against women continues unabated, and the reality is that the majority of victims will be attacked in their home, by a friend or family member. There is NO safe space, despite the illusion the police would have us believe. The detective is approaching this from entirely the wrong angle, and has offended a lot of people in the process.
Police see things that your average person does not see. I am privy to some of this because my husband tells me about the some of the cases he is working on and some of the goings on during his average shift. It would be enough to make the average person very paranoid about their surroundings. As I posted in this thread earlier, there is a massive increase in drug use, particularly ice. There is also many, many mentally ill people in the community that used to be in secure facilities. Ice users are violent and whenever there is a police pursuit or some other incident involving severe violence reported on the media, my husband's first reaction now is to assume that ice was involved. Do I still go for walks alone? Yes. Would I walk in a remote area by myself? No. Would I walk by myself at night? No.
Do not blame the messenger (police). Blame the forces that have allowed the drug epidemic to get out of control. Forces like Outlaw Motor Cycle Gangs, lenient courts, the government.
I do understand that the police see a lot of incidents that never end up on the news. As you said, though, you still go for walks alone. And of course you should be able to continue doing that.
If the police really want to advocate that no one goes out alone, they'd be better addressing that towards both men and women, since an ice user could easily attack either.
Saying that women need to stay out of parks is still missing the issue, I think.