After the show I wrongly quoted Les Gray, Chairman of the Scottish Police Federation of saying that the message of this march should actually be that women should "wear more and drink less." It wasn't actually Les who said this, it was a clip from a caller, so I sincerely apologise for attributing the comment to him when tweeting about it later.
Despite this, I am still extremely concerned by other things that Les said, as well as the way in which he reacted to this comment and questions related to it.
The debate was supposed to be about whether or not the aims of the Reclaim the Night movement are fair and sensible, which are to raise awareness of the issue of violence against women and empowering women to work towards feeling safe in their own communities.
The crux of the argument is that societal attitudes and behaviours need to be addressed in order for women (or anyone else for that matter) to feel that they are safe on their own streets. No one is saying that as a result of this march we'll all be out and about in places that we judge to be unsafe, but that society must to start working to change this so that women do feel safe at night.
Most importantly of all, the fear of violence and/or becoming the victim of violence is always the fault of those causing that fear and perpetrating those crimes, not of those who are subjected to it.
So what was Les Gray's reaction to all this?
1. To paraphrase, he said that the Reclaim the Night march will not get us anywhere. Women should feel safe, but they're not, so we should just use our common sense.
This clearly misses the point. We are well aware that there are places in which it is not currently safe for women to walk around at night. That's precisely why Reclaim the Night exists. Just because we can't at the moment go where we want when we want does not mean we should not be able to.
2. A text message was read out implying that women who go out dressed in revealing clothing are asking for it, since some men can't control their "biological urges" to procreate. Host, Kaye Adams said she expected Les's head would be about to "jump off" at hearing a view of that nature, to which Les replied he "[couldn't] comment."
Kaye gave Les the opportunity to condemn this disgusting attitude, which lays the blame at the door of the victim if she's raped while wearing a mini skirt and excuses the actions of the man who simply can't control his apparently understandably and totally natural "primeval urge" to be a rapist. Les did not take this opportunity. Someone in his position should be working tirelessly to tackle this dangerous societal attitude and certainly has a duty to challenge it, but he failed completely to do so.
3. The organisers of the Reclaim the Night march should ask the police to give out leaflets to women on the march giving advice on personal safety.
How is this any different to asking women to "stay indoors at night" which was precisely the advice given in the seventies which started these marches? Of course women should be made aware of how to keep themselves safe, but this is not where it ends. The police and the government should be working to eradicate violence on the streets, not just handing out literature and leaving it to us. Why didn't Les acknowledge this?
4. Les said, "if you take anything away from this session today at all, it's the drink awareness."
Well, Les, as Chairman of the Scottish Police Federation, I think you are letting down every woman in this country with your sheer blindness to the point.
Drinking alcohol to excess makes you less able to defend yourself, yes, but you are conflating two issues. I may well be less able to defend myself if I'm drunk, but I should not have to fear being attacked in the first place and this should never have to be the focus of a campaign against violence and sexual assault against women. If people in Les's position could see that, then something might actually be done by the powers that be to effect the change that we so clearly need.
Worst of all, Les finished by saying, "you're as well just carrying a big placard saying, 'come and attack me'" and if that's a fair position to be taken by the Chairman of the Scottish Police Federation then we might as well all chain ourselves to the kitchen now.
But if you do lock yourselves indoors, ladies, don't drink while you're making that trifle. You might break a nail, and who's fault will that be?
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I'm incredibly disappointed in him as such a senior figure in the Police Federation.
ReplyDeleteWe have a 4% conviction rate for rape in Scotland, and instead of condemning rape and violence against women he chose to make women feel responsible for the vile things that happen to them because of the vile sexism, misogyny and rape culture that pervades in our society.
I was out last night, very drunk, does he think I would have had it coming if I'd got assaulted? What a vile little man.
He didn't come out as a rape apologist, but he came across as someone who is standing by and allowing this shit to happen. What a disgrace, to both the Police and this beautiful country in which I live.
Why isn't Les Gray telling men not to venture out after dark because as we know men too are subject to violent attacks by other males? Why isn't Les Gray telling men not to imbibe alcohol because it is a well known fact that drunken men do engage in assaulting other sober men.
ReplyDeleteWhy not Les? Because after all men as well as women are responsible for their own safety not police or even society as a whole.
So message I take from Les Gray is that men have the innate right of venturing wherever they wish but women must continue to be subjected to male curtailment and male-centric warnings which hold women and girls responsible for male sexual violence committed against them. Yet all the while the real perpetrators - men continue not to be subjected to accountability and rightful blame.
Furthermore the police forces do not exist to protect women's and men's right to venture out in the public sphere without the risk of being subjected to violence, rather police forces exist to protect men's property - including men's female property such as wives and children.
Extract: 'societal attitudes and behaviours need to be addressed in order for women (or anyone else for that matter)' Who precisely is 'anyone else for that matter?' Oh you mean men well it would be good to name the sex because commonly men are never named instead they are referred to as 'people' but we women are always named. Also there are only two groups of individuals recognised by our male supremacist system and that is women and men not 'anyone else for that matter.'
That is repeating male supremacist language because male supremacy only recognises men as the default human and hence it is never necessary to refer to men but because we women are not male, our sex is commonly mentioned in malestream articles and news reports.
Lastly the state and this includes the police have a duty to safeguard all citizens' welfare and yes that includes women. This means prevention is the key and when I say prevention I mean we must challenge misogynistic claims that men's sexual organs supposedly rule their rational minds. Odd is it not that men are supposedly more rational and logical than women and yet when men choose to commit sexual violence suddenly they become victims to their sexual organs. But of course this is just another male-centric excuse/denial of men's accountability because men supposedly have the innate right of sexual access to women and girls 24/7.
Instead of repeating misogynistic lies this phone caller should be looking at how male supremacy absolves men of their accountability as well as constantly promoting the lie that men and boys have the innate right of sexual access to women and girls. Now that Les is something which you must know in detail given you are chair of the Scottish Police Federation and last time I checked police continue to believe the innumerable rape myths and lies men tell each other about women and girls being responsible for male violence committed against them.
Hi Jennifer,
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting. I just thought I should clarify that the reason I specified women was because the Reclaim the Night movement is a feminist one. Some Reclaim the Night marches don't allow men to attend (whereas the one in Edinburgh on Saturday does.) The reason I didn't specify men was because I didn't want to suggest that people can only be either men or women, since some people do not identify within the gender binary.
I don't believe that extract perpetuates male supremacist language, I think it does what I meant it to do which is to imply that it makes absolutely no difference who you are, what your gender is or how drunk you are, you always have the right to feel safe, wherever you may be and whatever you may be doing, whenever you may be doing it.
Sorry if that didn't come across!
Stevie