Ah, the women do it too thing has happened. Took longer than I thought.
Men commit 98% of all violent crime so, if aid workers were all women, you would rid aid work of 98% of the problem.
Is that better?
I do agree that there is a lot of anti-aid sentiment around and the level of it has grown enormously over the last couple of years. There's not a post by a charity on socmed or an article in the newspapers about foreign aid that isn't crayoned all over by the type of person who believes that charity begins at home, while simultaneously never having done a damned thing for home grown charity either.
There is also a case for scepticism as to why papers are reporting these things, many of which have been poorly kept secrets for years right now, but papers publish along with the zeitgeist and the increase in anti foreign aid belief in a vocal section of the social media commentariat has no doubt fuelled it.
NONE of this means that this shouldn't have been made openly public, that the way that Oxfam have dealt with it can be excused or that what has happened is in any way right or reasonable.
What we need to be pressing for is a continuation of the foreign aid budget, but better oversight and a different approach to what aid actually looks like. There are some utterly brilliant schemes happening all over the world, maybe now would be a good time to look at those and work out best practice? And to have a predominantly female led workforce as well, to make life safer for the women and children in those vulnerable areas.