Are we asleep at the wheel?
Many of you will know I am recovering from my second knee replacement this year so not in full work flow at the moment and maybe watching more news than I would normally allow myself to do and I am beyond angry even after only a week!!
Why?
How about this….
Google staff walk out in protest as boss Andy Rubin collects the final pay out of his $90 million for an alleged sexual harassment case where he co-erced oral sex from one of his junior female employees. Yes you heard me right, rather than prosecute him he was bought off? No mention of the victim and reading between the lines he is not the first senior Google male employee to do this and accept cash as opposed to marring Google’s reputation??
Or this….
The debate rages on about The Gender Recognition Act. This allows trans gender people to self declare their gender and not have to provide any evidence to the panel as they do now, along with no medical evidence of transition or proof that they have been living ‘full time in their recognised gender for a minimum of 2 years. How can anyone just decide they would rather be known as a woman? I am trying to understand this but have a right to express my concern. It would appear women are being silenced by this issue and branded angry, out of touch feminists or homophobic monsters if they dare to express an opinion about the very real safety issues this creates for the women and girls and in some cases boys too.
Or this…..
London Metropolitan Police have a thought police unit staffed by 900 officers who sit watching twitter all day to observe trolls and keep people in the public eye safe? Seriously? Can’t people just switch social media off or block people so we can direct those 900 officers to working on real, violent crime against women or the rising knife crime in our cities? The stats on female deaths from abusive partners and the rape stats are NOT improving, in fact when it comes to rape, convictions are at an all-time low so why are we directing finite resources to this charade?
Or this……
The rise in modern day slavery, I have watched several TV documentaries telling the horrific stories of the Maid Slaves – women trafficked into the Middle East to take up paid positions as House Maids only to get there and have their passport and mobile phone confiscated, work 21 hour days with no rest days, be abused, raped and caged by their employees (owners) and then to be discarded onto the street if they get ill, pregnant or through sheer exhaustion cannot work at the same rate anymore.
RAPE – IT’S YOUR FAULT FOR WEARING SEXY UNDERWEAR/FAKE TAN OR USING CONTRACEPTION
However, the one news item that really made me angry was this one. The case of 17 year old Lindsay Armstrong who was raped by a 14 year old boy in Southern Ireland and at the court trial the Defence Barrister cited and displayed her underwear as alleged proof of consent? Basically the fact she was wearing a thong meant she was game for anything? Seriously? This young girl went through hell by being put on the stand and a comment she made whilst on the stand made me weep. She said she could not fight back because she had a weak spine, as if it was her fault that she was being raped in the first place?? Basically she felt so disbelieved at the end of the trial that within 3 weeks she took her own life. In her words ’Being on that stand was like being raped all over again.’ Job well done eh? It appalls me that we are still dealing with this level of misogynistic ignorance in the 21st century and how strong do you need to be to report a rape if you are going to be put on trial?
And for the record I do not care about the political, religious or cultural issues at play here. This level of abuse and violence against women is a human rights issue and we need to keep that front and centre.
Please, let’s wake up and smell the coffee and stay vigilant. If we allow this level of behaviour to become normalised how are we ever going to make this world a place for young women to shine.