Modifying behaviour will never be a long-term solution as women daily walk a tightrope of trying to feel safe and claim their space, writes Joy Watson.
The about the shutdown of Rhodes University following the failure of university management to meet student demands pertaining to high levels of sexual violence on campus got me thinking again about the recent rapes of Sinoxolo Mafevuka and Franziska Blöchliger.
Much has been written about, and rightfully so, the different responses to these two rapes.
Both were raped and murdered in March Nineteen-year-old Mafevuka needed to use the toilet at night. She lived in Khayelitsha where she had to use a communal facility because her family could not afford a house with a private toilet. She was found the next day, half-naked, with her head shoved into the toilet bowl.
A week later, 16-year-old Franziska went for a walk with her mother and sister in Tokai Forest. She decided to jog on a different path and meet up with them later. When she failed to reappear, her mother sounded the alarm and her body was later discovered, hidden in bushes.
Less than 36 hours later, three men were detained, a special pathologist was brought in to determine the cause of death and police offered her family counselling and support.
By the time that Franziska had been murdered, police had still not taken a statement from Mafevuka’s family, they had no idea what was happening with the investigation, no counselling had been offered and no one had been arrested.
The police response was markedly different in the two cases, and shows how race and class negatively impact on the ability to access justice. Yet, the thread that binds both stories is how violent a place the world is for women and girls. Both stories send out a subliminal message towomen and girls.
We read or hear about these stories with a sense of horror and internalise deep-seated fear and a notion that danger lurks at every corner and that we must adapt how we navigate our way through public spaces. Consequently, much of the response to addressing sexual violence is about how to keep women safe.
This approach is underscored that women should be cautious about being out, that they should not be in certain places at certain times; that they should dress in ways that don’t draw attention; they should not consume alcohol, must avert their gaze, etc.
Intrinsic to this way of thinking is that rape is something that happens to women who “ask for it”, and that a concern with sexual virtue and safety will keep us from being subjected to such violence.
Yet, in reality, most acts of rape and sexual violence are perpetrated by someone known to the victim. and many occur in private spaces such as the home. Even women who have adhered to all the “rules” have been victims of sexual violence.
Confining our movements and thereby curtailing our freedom is not a long-term solution to addressing sexual violence.
It is not a solution because we have to engage with public space as a matter of necessity - as was the case for Mafevuka, who needed to use the communal toilet, and as it was for the two women who recently responded to an advertisement for employment and were subsequently raped by the person who placed the ad, and as it is for the university students who need to engage with public spaces on and around campus.
We have the right to be out in public and to engage with the associated pleasure that is derived from this.
We have the right to do so without the anxiety associated with being a woman and what may happen to us. Imagine the freedom of living in a world where there is no agoraphobia for women, where we are free to use public transport safely at night, where we are free to use a toilet, take a walk in a forest and occupy space on university precincts.
This is the world that we must create. The focus should be on how to bring it about, as opposed to how we should hide from it.
The starting point for creating this world is in thinking about and challenging the gendered social order in which we live.
The reason why more blatant forms of violence such as rape is rampant in our society is because there is a social order within which it operates that creates the space for misogyny to thrive.
In this social context, we often tend to ignore the “softer” ways in which this violence presents itself, such as catcalls and harassment on our streets and at our workplaces. Or we turn a blind eye to the lower-level violence in our homes, our places of worship and our communities.
At times, there is no choice but to turn a blind eye as patriarchy is a powerful thing and dismantling it is not easy. This is the normalised violence that women and girls experience on a day-to-day basis and are largely encouraged to “suck up”.
Yet, they are acts of intrusion which normalise harassment. It is only by challenging this social order and the everyday forms of harassment that we gradually begin to create a society where there will be less brutal and extreme forms of violence. In the aftermath of Mafevuka’s death, a community leader talked about how residents were living in fear as the perpetrator had not yet been brought to book. Young girls were cautioned to not use the toilets at night, but at times their need to do so dictated otherwise.
This is not a long-term solution to the problem. It must be dealt with at its root - at the level of unequal power relationships between men and women in our homes, at our places of work and study, etc.
I am not suggesting that we throw caution to the wind and start claiming public spaces in ways that are unwise and where we put ourselves at risk unnecessarily.
We need to find a way of walking the tightrope of feeling safe and claiming space - of living our lives and claiming the right to do so, whether this is in taking up public spaces or feeling safe in our homes.
In so doing, we all need to be part of a transforming our society.
This means being prepared to claim power for ourselves as women, and being prepared to challenge situations where women and girls are being treated unfairly.
Change is a long-term thing.
There is a long, winding path to creating the kind of social order that is less tolerant of misogyny and violence against women.
Yet, when I look at pictures of the smiling faces of Mafevuka and Franziska and think about the senseless loss of young life, I think that we (men and women alike) owe it to them to invest in this process and to walk this path of questioning, subverting and transforming.
The response of students at Rhodes University gives me hope that we can do this.
* Joy Watson is a feminist researcher and writer. Her work focuses on women and service delivery.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
Cape Argus