Police advising women not to walk alone at night

[Bubbinsmakesthree]

I’ve seen a lot of friends outraged at the Met police locally advising women not to walk alone at night in the days following the disappearance of Sarah Everard. I’ve seen a posts along the lines of ‘how about telling men not to attack women instead?’

I absolutely agree with the wider point that we should be asking the question “how do we make it safe for women?” not “how do women stay out of danger?”

But in this case, was the police’s advice not just the equivalent of advising people to stay out of the water following a shark attack?

I’m so upset and angry about Sarah Everard but I cannot get incensed about the police advising women to take precautions when an unknown attacker may have still been in the area.

@Carycy

Why don’t they put a curfew on men when there is a suspected attacker in the area? Then a perpetrator would stick out like a sore thumb? Because they couldn’t possibly mess with men’s freedoms?!? If they did maybe more would be done about it.

Well said

'Rural life is safer and better, but ultimately there are too many people for that.

I know I don't feel safe in a city like London, in the day time.'

So what's your point then overall? I understand how you feel but what does it add to the topic at hand?

@NiceGerbil

'Rural life is safer and better, but ultimately there are too many people for that.

I know I don't feel safe in a city like London, in the day time.'

So what's your point then overall? I understand how you feel but what does it add to the topic at hand?

How can cities be made better? I guess, would be my point. Sorry I've had a few by this time of night.

There has been some work done on this around the world.

This sort of thing-just googled
www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/dec/13/what-would-a-city-that-is-safe-for-women-look-like

Thing is that women just adjust their behaviour if they don't feel safe and so it's not noticed let alone addressed.

Googling more shows that a lot of the use of this type of app is to advise women of 'safer routes' - when the original plan was to address the unsafe areas because women were spending more time and money avoiding places. So maybe backfiring a bit!

I really think that social change and institutional change is the answer.

It can be done.

The fact is, there isn't appetite for it in society or in our government, legal system etc.

Which is pretty depressing.

Well. Here we are. Still. The 21st Century, apparently. Well. Here we are. Still. The 21st century, apparently.

I repeated those words, because nothing has changed.

When I was raped at aged 17, I crawled, on my hands and knees, to the local police station. When they finally found me, they asked me if he had any witnesses. My Dad had already told me that "you're asking for it, dressed like that". I was wearing jeans, a long cardigan, and a roll neck jumper. I had no skin exposed, as far as I'm aware.
Dad, I hope, died in prison. Don't know. The person who raped me, so the police told me, didn't have any witnesses either. I'm not sure if that helps me or not. Sorry. It's a man's world. I am SO bored with that!!

LOL!! Rural life is safer and better?
I wonder where you get your information from?

Does anybody think that if we were tackling this right, nobody would ever attack or murder anybody else? That those behaviours could be stamped out of human existence altogether?

Statistically, a large number of Mumsnetters husbands/sons/fathers/brothers will have committed some sort of violence against a woman at some point in their lives. It's a statistical fact. I find it amusing the number of women wholly convinced that no men in their family would ever be violent to a woman.

Read the relationship board. Those men are somebody's sons.

@Haspotential

I find it amusing the number of women wholly convinced that no men in their family would ever be violent to a woman

Amusing?

Most of those women are right. The alternative is that most men are violent.

Some may never experience violence in their lives. I've experienced it on about 6 occasions in my life.

Clapham Common has been a hot spot for rape ever since I was a child (a long time ago) and still is, yet nothing in that common has changed to make it safer.

@Haspotential

Some may never experience violence in their lives. I've experienced it on about 6 occasions in my life.

That's horrible for you. I'm sorry that that's happened in your life, and I'm sorry that anybody is ever a victim of violence. I used to watch my dad beat my mum up - it's just awful that these sorts of dynamics even exist.

Many women are victims of crime against men, and this needs to be being dealt with better. But that's not by responding to it by tarring all men with the same brush. The vast majority of men are not violent, so if you're throwing statistics around, use that one too.

@Eckhart

Does anybody think that if we were tackling this right, nobody would ever attack or murder anybody else? That those behaviours could be stamped out of human existence altogether?

But if you could get make violence down to the level of female violence. If it was seen as totally unacceptable that they were violent or aggressive.

Can you even imagine. That’s the Israeli/Palestine conflict stopped in its tracks, the famine in Yemen turned around , drug wars, gangs kidnapping girls for hostages. Women could walk where they wanted and live in their homes abuse free.

Eckhart, I was awake during the night and watched a bit of a programme on Sky News about what's happening in Syria now. Watching little children (two were videoed being rescued from rubble and then in hospital with horrific injuries to their faces and tiny bodies. They were the only survivors, their parents were killed. They now live with grandparents). I only had a half eye on it. I think they said that it was Russia (please don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong on that) who was bombing. What they do is, they bomb once, and then everyone rushes to help (including volunteers called the white hats) but then they come back again and bomb a second time. It's bloody awful. The reporters are brave. I can't remember their names, but a blonde woman maybe mid 40's and a man about the same age. The blonde woman you'd know as she reported extensively on that fucker who killed Riva Steinkamp?

Violence is so fucking shit. Why can't we cop on and stop it? I really don't know the answer. It has to start maybe in schools or something.

@ERFFER

A week long curfew for men might give them all a little taste of our every day lives Buck up their ideas. Start pulling up their creepy mates. Supporting anything that would help us.

Yes, some work odd hours- but so do plenty of us ? And no one gives a shit? ( I work nights and it’s a f*cking disgrace the complete lack of care from my workplace or council or bus drivers or taxi drivers )
So yeah - you finish at 2:30am ,Dude? Pay for a taxi- same as I have to cos I can’t walk anywhere

I have been literally shaking with fear going to my work on many many occasions , waiting on buses and taxis - keeping on the phone to DH or DM incase I go missing - they at least know where I was last.

I know it won’t happen, but it’s nice to fantasise....

No it won't happy. Despite the fact it would be better for the innocent men (if they were home when a crime was committed they could never be accused falsely. That can be quite a fear for men, being falsely accused, especially when it comes to rape.)

But it won't. Not even a week curfew in placed while the crime is being investigated. It's just not acceptable to expect men to change their behaviour. Remember the outrage over a razor advert which suggested it would be more manly for men not accept boys will be boys and to pull up their mates when they were being sleazy.

@Haspotential

Eckhart, I was awake during the night and watched a bit of a programme on Sky News about what's happening in Syria now. Watching little children (two were videoed being rescued from rubble and then in hospital with horrific injuries to their faces and tiny bodies. They were the only survivors, their parents were killed. They now live with grandparents). I only had a half eye on it. I think they said that it was Russia (please don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong on that) who was bombing. What they do is, they bomb once, and then everyone rushes to help (including volunteers called the white hats) but then they come back again and bomb a second time. It's bloody awful. The reporters are brave. I can't remember their names, but a blonde woman maybe mid 40's and a man about the same age. The blonde woman you'd know as she reported extensively on that fucker who killed Riva Steinkamp?

Violence is so fucking shit. Why can't we cop on and stop it? I really don't know the answer. It has to start maybe in schools or something.

I watched that, too - it was just after a neighbour had been ranting on about how hard the lockdown was and what an awful time she was having. (She and her DH see their family and babysit their two grandchildren, so aren't totally isolated). I'm sure she does feel it, but she's hardly suffering the way many had.

I came in from her socially-distanced rant to watch that on the news - it broke my heart. I said to DH, we're feeling so badly done to, but what we are experiencing is nothing - NOTHING - compared to what people in war zones are going through, and they have been caught up in conflict for years!

There are teenagers who have never known any thing except war.

And of course, they also have the pandemic to cope with.

If people put a tenth of the cash and ingenuity into caring for each other and protecting the planet as they put into killing each other, we'd live in a much happier world.

@Haspotential

Some may never experience violence in their lives. I've experienced it on about 6 occasions in my life.

I have, too.

I'm sure I read somewhere that some people are "natural victims" which I thought seems harsh, but I suspect that if you have been assaulted once, then you give off an anxious/cautious/ frightened vibe that predators hone in on. They recognise the vulnerability.

And of course, if your first experience of abuse occurred when you were a child, you'll possibly have that aura all of your life.

@DimidDavilby
Go and support a curfew for men if you think one gender staying indoors is the answer.

Haha, really interesting to see how the excellent idea of curfew for men when there's a male assailant on the loose has ruffled feathers.

And yet advice for the whole female gender to stay indoors is considered sensible advice.

Brilliant illustration of everything that's wrong.

@SnackSizeRaisin
That's disproportionate. You can't blame a whole group for the actions of one person. Most men do not murder strangers.

Yet it's proportionate to tell all women to stay at home at night because of actions of one man?

it was mentioned by someone that if girls go out in very skimpy outfits then some men, not all but some, may find this provocative, in my teens , in the sixties, i wore mini skirts, never a problem , and my daughter did the same , what do others think i wonder??

[quote JonSnowIsALoser]@SnackSizeRaisin
That's disproportionate. You can't blame a whole group for the actions of one person. Most men do not murder strangers.

Yet it's proportionate to tell all women to stay at home at night because of actions of one man?[/quote]
But it isn't one man.

@earnshaw47

it was mentioned by someone that if girls go out in very skimpy outfits then some men, not all but some, may find this provocative, in my teens , in the sixties, i wore mini skirts, never a problem , and my daughter did the same , what do others think i wonder??

Absolute horse shit.

The majority of these crimes happen to people wearing 'normal clothes ' or in their own house.

The outrage over questions about what they were wearing and if they were drinking, while not acceptable, come from defence lawyers trying everything they can.

Not that im excusing it, but it doesn't come from the population.

Clothing does not affect whether you get attacked or not.
Even women in the full niqab get raped as men know it's a woman.

When I got attacked I was wearing a loose coat, a loose tunic, baggy trousers, trainers, a ponytail & no makeup.

Yet other times I've been out in little white dresses in the summer and not even been harassed.

"Why don’t they put a curfew on men when there is a suspected attacker in the area? Then a perpetrator would stick out like a sore thumb? Because they couldn’t possibly mess with men’s freedoms?!? If they did maybe more would be done about it."

So much this. Women aren't the ones who need curfews. This whole issue is being looked at from the wrong angle. Time to reassess how this is reported in the media, how it reflects on every woman, how boys need educating from an early age about not attacking women. It's not our problem but the patriarchy makes it so. We need a seachange and much harsher penalties for violent offenders. The fact that hardly any rapists are ever prosecuted speaks volumes - women don't matter. You can bet your life if men were the most frequent victims of rape, there'd be a maximum sentence of life and not a handful of months, if they're ever brought to justice at all.