Women's safety

[Oxfordcomma]

I don't think you need to have all of the answers before you protest? Sometimes just getting it into the public awareness is enough. I have seen a couple of horrible stories this week on my FB feed from women that are actually my friends, these are not random quotes or things that happened to a friend of a friend of a friend. These are women I've known for decades, choosing this time to share these episodes. If all women start to speak up, well, that's a decent "purpose" in my middle-aged, middle-class, white guy opinion.

 

[SaintHacker]

It’s wrong that the response to violence against women requires women to behave differently. In Clapham, police told women not to go out at night this week. Women are not the problem.

.

And this is the bit that gets me. Everyone knows that women are not the problem, the murdering psychopath is the problem, so until he/she's been caught be sensible?
If someone got eaten by a shark at their local beach and the council advised them to stop swimming would they all get together and say swimmers are not the problem?

 

[SocketRocket]

I don't think you need to have all of the answers before you protest? Sometimes just getting it into the public awareness is enough. I have seen a couple of horrible stories this week on my FB feed from women that are actually my friends, these are not random quotes or things that happened to a friend of a friend of a friend. These are women I've known for decades, choosing this time to share these episodes. If all women start to speak up, well, that's a decent "purpose" in my middle-aged, middle-class, white guy opinion.

Stop making generic comments.
What do you want to hapien?

 

[SocketRocket]

There were two purposes tonight. To remember Sarah Everard, the victim, and then secondly to raise awareness of just how common it is for women to feel scared, for women to be attacked, for women to limit what they do because of fear? With the actions of the Met tonight, I'm not sure the first was truly achieved but I think the second has been.

These are the original 4 tweets from just a few days ago that kicked off this vigil/protest, the purposes seem fairly clear.

We believe that streets should be safe for women, regardless of what you wear, where you live or what time of day or night it is. We shouldn’t have to wear bright colours when we walk home and clutch our keys in our fists to feel safe

It’s wrong that the response to violence against women requires women to behave differently. In Clapham, police told women not to go out at night this week. Women are not the problem.

Come to the bandstand on Clapham Common at 6pm on Saturday the 13th of March to reclaim these streets and our public spaces. This event is for and about women, but open to all. Bring a light to remember those we’ve lost.

We’ve all been following the tragic case of Sarah Everard over the last week. This is a vigil for Sarah, but also for all women who feel unsafe, who go missing from our streets and who face violence every day.

People get murdered almost every day in this country, Women, Men, children, we don't hold vigils every time it happens. What's different this time, they are all tragic and wasteful loss of lives.

You can't just say things like 'Women should be able to walk anywhere at night in safety' and think this will happen, that's naivety in the extreme. Of course we would like anyone to be safe walking the streets but it has never been so and never will.

How do you propose these murders be stopped, that's the question that needs resolving. Vigils and lights on phones will change nothing.

 

[Oxfordcomma]

Stop making generic comments.
What do you want to hapien?

All men to stop being obnoxious idiots to women. We all know that a tiny minority of guys are dicks, but it's becoming clear through this episode that if you're a woman, it's vastly more common than non-idiot men were aware of. No idea how we achieve this, but let's start talking about it.

 

[Hobbit]

An appalling statistic!!

20% of women will experience some type of sexual assault.

Ah but the vast majority of men don't behave badly towards women. Or an alternative(uncomfortable) thought, how about reading that as the vast majority of men do nothing to stop it? To quote Blake, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." We (good) men do virtually nothing to stop what happens. We bump our gums about right and wrong, about protecting the fairer sex but just what do we do? We're careful about what we say and do and, occasionally, when a man crosses the line from decent behaviour we might jerk his chain, whilst many laugh(some embarrassingly).

Ah but there's laws in place! Well whoopee-doo, there's laws in place. The 20% suggests those laws, whilst there are either not enforced strongly enough or just plain aren't good enough. But is it just about those laws? How about having respect, how about giving some support and how about at least having a positive discussion about change.

If it was our wife or daughter we'd be at the front of the parade banging the drum. Do we have to wait till its through our front door before we join the parade? Have the discussion now, and ask the difficult questions. Broaden that debate amongst friends. We're only the little people in the great scheme of things but when enough people join the parade, things will change. Those changes might only be small, but each change is a step in the right direction.

A few extra Bobbies on the beat in risky areas at the right time is a win for all of us. There's areas I wouldn't walk in, especially at night, but just saying there'll always be crime and we should risk assess does what to stop it or curtail it? And when the next block of streets are written off and our comfort zone grows ever smaller...

 

[funkycoldmedina]

There a 2 different but connected threads to this discussion. The murder and and general violence to women are things that are deep rooted and much more difficult to stop as there will always be psychopaths etc.
But also this is all about listening and understanding a rare commodity nowadays. After an event like this it's always women that are told to modify their behaviours, generally by men. As can be seen on this thread men become tone deaf and belligerent. Maybe a more appropriate reaction would be to listen and have empathy to the fears women deal with on an almost daily basis and if they have ideas as to how they can generally feel more safe maybe awful incidents like this murder wouldn't resonate as strongly with them.
My wife and I spoke about this the other day and she, like Amanda, is a runner. She has so many stories of when she's felt scared and maybe just men taking the time to listen helps.

 

[Lord Tyrion]

PR carnage last night. The vigil still happened, speeches given, crowds assembled. The police tried to move people on, they refused to leave. The police started to arrest people, the women kicked off. Now you have pictures of women, at a march against violence towards women, face down with cuffs on ?. One of the pictures had the cuffs being applied by a female officer but that won't be how the story is played out.

Who would be a police officer there?

 

[hovis]

An appalling statistic!!

20% of women will experience some type of sexual assault.

I have a problem with this number. It was gathered on a stop and ask servey. So your asking a woman a question in which she knows her answer effects potential changes. At work we got asked if we've even been burnt through our fire kit. Almost all of us said yes because the stuff we had was rubbish and was likely to happen at some point.
I don't know one women that has experienced sexual assault. I do know women that would say yes because some blokes elbow brushed across their boob on a night out. I remember one occasion when I popped a bottle of champagne and a little spilt on a woman's top. I instinctively wiped it and realised after I was very close to some boob. Definitely touched some side boob. That doesn't make me a criminal. It's just means I lack situational awareness. For all I know I could be in that 20%
I'm not saying it doesn't happen. 20% is 1 in 5. If that figure is correct then I wouldn't let my daughter out the house

 

[Rlburnside]

If the people holding the vigil were more sensible there would be no criticism of the police today, to hold a large gathering and to put themselves and the police at risk is totally irresponsible in my eyes.

Sometimes I get the impression that some of these protesting are “ all about me “ what do they really think standing holding a light is really going to achieve.

Much more constructive ways to try and alter things like joining community groups and try and put pressure on government to get more police on the streets etc.

 

[Rlburnside]

PR carnage last night. The vigil still happened, speeches given, crowds assembled. The police tried to move people on, they refused to leave. The police started to arrest people, the women kicked off. Now you have pictures of women, at a march against violence towards women, face down with cuffs on ?. One of the pictures had the cuffs being applied by a female officer but that won't be how the story is played out.

Who would be a police officer there?

Exactly it’s been handled very badly, but the police on the ground I’m sure wouldn’t want to be there to put themselves at risk.

 

[harpo_72]

Hate to say it but laws are pointless if there is no enforcement of them. Strangely the bad behaviour takes control when the laws are not enforced.
The need to argue about a perpetrators rights when the evidence is too compelling has overwhelmed the system.
Problems are like onions you peel it back to root course, the root course here is human behaviour needs to be controlled because irrespective of gender there are people who are dreadful.
I would also point out that I would not walk around London after dark, I wouldn’t let my son, and my wife doesn’t need me to tell her it’s dangerous... so in the end we have not invested enough in prevention and the bad behaviour has got control.

 

[PJ87]

Hate to say it but laws are pointless if there is no enforcement of them. Strangely the bad behaviour takes control when the laws are not enforced.
The need to argue about a perpetrators rights when the evidence is too compelling has overwhelmed the system.
Problems are like onions you peel it back to root course, the root course here is human behaviour needs to be controlled because irrespective of gender there are people who are dreadful.
I would also point out that I would not walk around London after dark, I wouldn’t let my son, and my wife doesn’t need me to tell her it’s dangerous... so in the end we have not invested enough in prevention and the bad behaviour has got control.

The soultion is far too policitcal really

But trying to keep it as netural as possible

Fully fund the police

Don't cut police number

Increase police numbers

Stronger sentencing

Police are the solution but they need far better support , funding and guidance from above

That's as netural as I can go

 

[Rlburnside]

Interesting difference between the Mets response and the response of the police in Glasgow who not only didn’t try and break up the gathering but even escorted them to the city Centre.

 

[Blue in Munich]

There a 2 different but connected threads to this discussion. The murder and and general violence to women are things that are deep rooted and much more difficult to stop as there will always be psychopaths etc.
But also this is all about listening and understanding a rare commodity nowadays. After an event like this it's always women that are told to modify their behaviours, generally by men. As can be seen on this thread men become tone deaf and belligerent. Maybe a more appropriate reaction would be to listen and have empathy to the fears women deal with on an almost daily basis and if they have ideas as to how they can generally feel more safe maybe awful incidents like this murder wouldn't resonate as strongly with them.
My wife and I spoke about this the other day and she, like Amanda, is a runner. She has so many stories of when she's felt scared and maybe just men taking the time to listen helps.

Indeed, and quite ironic.

A lot of this has stemmed from Baroness Jones suggestion that men should be curfewed in order to prevent these sort of crimes against women, in light of the suggestion that women stay off the streets in that area for their own safety, and the predictable outrage. At the time that suggestion was made, the initial stages of the investigation, the police did not know who or what they were dealing with apart from the fact that they or it represented a danger to women. Initial first safety step; suggest to the potential victims that they do not put themselves in harm's way. Solid, sensible advice at that stage of the investigation, and not so much of a hardship at the time in my opinion, given that the leisure industry is shut & we are supposedly in lockdown. As someone else said, if you've got a shark eating swimmers, don't swim in the sea because it's your right, change your exercise habits until the problem is dealt with. Instead of accepting that advice in the spirit in which it was intended, it has been seized upon as further evidence of women as second class citizens and turned into a political football. As a long term solution to the issue, telling women to keep off the streets is a wholly unacceptable solution and I'd join the march protesting about it; as a short term solution to the immediate problem I don't have an issue with it, and if there was something that made me more likely to be a victim of crime I'd be happy in the short term to take myself out of harm's way; I've done it for long enough to avoid a virus.

As to the solution, first we have to address the problem, and what, or possibly more pertinently who, exactly is the problem?

We know very little about this case apart from the name of the victim & the alleged perpetrator. However the reports of this crime that I have seen are all at this stage missing something; any suggestion of a link between the victim and the alleged offender. This would appear to be a stranger attack, and all the narrative I have seen infers how dangerous and unsafe women are on the streets and in public at the hands of strangers and what needs to be done in terms of new laws, bobbies on the beat, etc. I would urge you to research the statistics from the ONS to see exactly what risk strangers present to women, compared to the risk from partners, ex-partners, family members and other known acquaintances. This is not a stranger issue; it is a societal issue that is so deep-rooted that it will never go away without a major societal shift in parenting, education and awareness. I'm not going to pretend I know the answer, it will take a better mind than mine, but I do not believe the answer lies in knee jerk reactions to this incident however tragic and unacceptable it is.

 

[Swinglowandslow]

We're all talking about it, that's a step forwards surely?

The scrotes who attack women and hurt them, both indoors and outdoors, are not talking about it. They probably don't even know, and certainly don't care,
that we are talking about it.
This problem needs action, proper action by legislators and Courts, not by light waving lawbreakers putting people's lives at greater risk from Covid.

And, btw, the "regulations at short notice not subject...."?
I think you'll find the laws were passed by Parliament.
IIRC, presented on Monday and voted on Wednesday.

 

[Deleted member 15344]

There are lots of pictures and videos of the vigil last night and it’s quite clear that it’s not a good picture from all sides

The peaceful vigil appears to be have been hijacked by people and there are plenty of videos showing it was far from peaceful, looks like a good number went over the line and the ACAB placards were out in force - looks like it was used as an anti police demonstration from some - and then the police have reacted which is right if it’s getting to public disorder levels but the pictures don’t make it look good at all and then certainly remind me of this

 

[Rlburnside]

There are lots of pictures and videos of the vigil last night and it’s quite clear that it’s not a good picture from all sides

The peaceful vigil appears to be have been hijacked by people and there are plenty of videos showing it was far from peaceful, looks like a good number went over the line and the ACAB placards were out in force - looks like it was used as an anti police demonstration from some - and then the police have reacted which is right if it’s getting to public disorder levels but the pictures don’t make it look good at all and then certainly remind me of this
View attachment 35584

What does ACAB mean

 

[Deleted member 25172]

What does ACAB mean

All cops are bastards.

 

[Blue in Munich]

There are lots of pictures and videos of the vigil last night and it’s quite clear that it’s not a good picture from all sides

The peaceful vigil appears to be have been hijacked by people and there are plenty of videos showing it was far from peaceful, looks like a good number went over the line and the ACAB placards were out in force - looks like it was used as an anti police demonstration from some - and then the police have reacted which is right if it’s getting to public disorder levels but the pictures don’t make it look good at all and then certainly remind me of this
View attachment 35584

Or this one Phil?