BusterB: Ignored?

I wonder where people got the strange idea that Violence Against Women is somehow ignored or underrated. Looking about at my city and my country, I can't see any other form of violence—other than violence against children—that receives and has always received so much attention and so much sympathy.

My theory is that Violence Against Women has become an industry. It's not about violence against women any more. What it's about now is funding and ideology. It's about government grants for shelters and Eliminating Every Last Vestige of Bad Behaviour Toward Women, even though men have never had such a privilege and likely never will.

If you listen to the professional talking heads in the Violence Against Women industry, you'll hear that violence against women is an "epidemic" and that nobody, except for these dedicated souls, gives a damn. You'll also hear all sorts of statistics about how often women are beaten, raped, and murdered which, if they were true, would fill our hospitals and graveyards to overflowing. I'm not sure what kind of drugs these people are taking, but they must be pretty skookum stuff.

At the beginning of this year, I read in my local newspaper that such-and-so number of murders happened in my city last year. They then remarked with shock that a good number of these were women. They printed the number, too. The problem was that if you did the math, it worked out to about one third women. The article didn't bother to mention that two thirds of the victims were men, just that an unacceptably high number were women.

Every year in the Downtown East Side, an area that has the great misfortune to be the poorest, most scummy, most crime-ridden neighbourhood in Canada, a large group of women holds a candlelight march. They march to each place where a woman was killed the year before, and hold a prayer for each one. Nobody carries candles for the men or visits the places where they drew their last breaths, although there were twice as many of them.

In a way I understand this attitude, or to be more accurate I came across it firsthand in an on-line forum. Someone had started a discussion on sex discrimination against men. The women in the forum had (typically) turned the discussion around to the more important topic of discrimination against women, and then on to how frightened women are for their safety. I mentioned that at least in raw numbers, far more men are murdered, beaten, and robbed than are women. The response was saddening but not surprising. One woman remarked, "If a woman is killed this horrifies me; if one more drug lord is killed I couldn't care less."

The implication is clear, and I think it's the key to the whole Violence Against Women as-a-cause phenomenon. Women who die at the hands of men are innocent victims. Men who die at the hands of men must have been up to no good, and if a woman kills a man then he must have been threatening her. Women who die at the hands of other women go unnoticed because they don't fit the ideology. Men who are innocent victims are ignored or explained away. In a nutshell, murdered men probably deserved what they got; murdered women didn't.

The thought that some of those women might be drug lords killed by their clients doesn't enter people's minds. The thought that some of these men might have been innocent, homeless guys just trying to find a park bench to sleep on doesn't matter either. All women are innocent; all men are guilty of something. It's easier that way.

Some of the women in the forum acknowledged that a perfectly innocent man walking down a dark street can be murdered by some thug, just as a perfectly innocent woman can be, but said that in the man's case it wasn't as heinous a crime because the man had a better chance to defend himself. I retorted that obviously it wasn't enough, because he ended up dead. The women didn't get the point. I still can't see what's not to get.

At the core of my rejection of the whole Violence Against Women industry is the idea that if I were robbed and murdered while walking home, it would be an example of how violent our city has become. It would be a tragic event, although it probably wouldn't make page one of the local paper; it would be background noise in the buzz of big city life. If my sister were robbed and murdered while walking home, this would be a special and particular kind of violence, called Violence Against Women. It would deserve special attention and special resources to deal with such an awful crime. Her death, like mine, would become part of the statistics on city crime, but it would also be given much more attention because it would be considered more a more grievous wrong. I am enraged at the idea that somehow my life is less valuable, and my death less notable, because I have a penis.

Don't believe me? Right now the Vancouver Police Force is setting up a special task force to look into the disappearance of a number of prostitutes over the last decade. Some people think that a serial killer is on the loose; one that strikes sufficiently rarely that it doesn't attract much attention. The Violence Against Women mavens are blasting the "patriarchal" police force for ignoring these disappearances because the women were whores. I wonder how many of the homeless, shopping-cart-pushing men who frequent my neighbourhood disappear each year, and whether anyone even notices or bothers to tell the police.

In fact, if one were to plan a career as a serial killer, it would pay to specialize in men, particularly down-and-out men, drug addicts and the homeless. Strike only a few times a year. One could do this for a lifetime. No one would ever notice. You see, the Violence Against Women crowd compare the way that the police handle the disappearance of a prostitute—a rootless woman with an erratic lifestyle—with the way that the police handle the disappearance of a businessman. "See how little society cares about women!" they cry. They never compare how the police handle the disappearance of a prostitute with the way that the police handle the disappearance of one of the shopping-cart men because Violence Against Women advocates, like all people, don't notice these men and so wouldn't notice if one disappeared. The only social stratum at which violence against men is more noteworthy than violence against women is at the very highest levels. The death of President Bill Clinton would be more newsworthy than the death of Hilary Clinton. The death of Donald Trump would be more newsworthy than the death of his wife Ivana. However, when dealing with more ordinary and anonymous strata of society, the death of a woman always shocks us more than the death of an equivalent man.

Thus although it may be that violence against women is not given sufficient attention in our society, by the same measure violence against men is simply shrugged off as another of the troubling aspects of life in the city.

I'm not the only one who thinks this way. Donna Laframboise, in a 06 December 1999 article on the Marc Lepine shootings, says it better, but then she's a professional, whereas I just dabble.

Ignored? Up Human Punching Bags Ignored? Marc Lepine
	I wonder where people got the strange idea that Violence Against Women is somehow ignored or underrated. Looking about at my city and my country, I can't see any other form of violence—other than violence against children—that receives and has always received so much attention and so much sympathy. My theory is that Violence Against Women has become an industry. It's not about violence against women any more. What it's about now is funding and ideology. It's about government grants for shelters and Eliminating Every Last Vestige of Bad Behaviour Toward Women, even though men have never had such a privilege and likely never will. If you listen to the professional talking heads in the Violence Against Women industry, you'll hear that violence against women is an "epidemic" and that nobody, except for these dedicated souls, gives a damn. You'll also hear all sorts of statistics about how often women are beaten, raped, and murdered which, if they were true, would fill our hospitals and graveyards to overflowing. I'm not sure what kind of drugs these people are taking, but they must be pretty skookum stuff. At the beginning of this year, I read in my local newspaper that such-and-so number of murders happened in my city last year. They then remarked with shock that a good number of these were women. They printed the number, too. The problem was that if you did the math, it worked out to about one third women. The article didn't bother to mention that two thirds of the victims were men, just that an unacceptably high number were women. Every year in the Downtown East Side, an area that has the great misfortune to be the poorest, most scummy, most crime-ridden neighbourhood in Canada, a large group of women holds a candlelight march. They march to each place where a woman was killed the year before, and hold a prayer for each one. Nobody carries candles for the men or visits the places where they drew their last breaths, although there were twice as many of them. In a way I understand this attitude, or to be more accurate I came across it firsthand in an on-line forum. Someone had started a discussion on sex discrimination against men. The women in the forum had (typically) turned the discussion around to the more important topic of discrimination against women, and then on to how frightened women are for their safety. I mentioned that at least in raw numbers, far more men are murdered, beaten, and robbed than are women. The response was saddening but not surprising. One woman remarked, "If a woman is killed this horrifies me; if one more drug lord is killed I couldn't care less." The implication is clear, and I think it's the key to the whole Violence Against Women as-a-cause phenomenon. Women who die at the hands of men are innocent victims. Men who die at the hands of men must have been up to no good, and if a woman kills a man then he must have been threatening her. Women who die at the hands of other women go unnoticed because they don't fit the ideology. Men who are innocent victims are ignored or explained away. In a nutshell, murdered men probably deserved what they got; murdered women didn't. The thought that some of those women might be drug lords killed by their clients doesn't enter people's minds. The thought that some of these men might have been innocent, homeless guys just trying to find a park bench to sleep on doesn't matter either. All women are innocent; all men are guilty of something. It's easier that way. Some of the women in the forum acknowledged that a perfectly innocent man walking down a dark street can be murdered by some thug, just as a perfectly innocent woman can be, but said that in the man's case it wasn't as heinous a crime because the man had a better chance to defend himself. I retorted that obviously it wasn't enough, because he ended up dead. The women didn't get the point. I still can't see what's not to get. At the core of my rejection of the whole Violence Against Women industry is the idea that if I were robbed and murdered while walking home, it would be an example of how violent our city has become. It would be a tragic event, although it probably wouldn't make page one of the local paper; it would be background noise in the buzz of big city life. If my sister were robbed and murdered while walking home, this would be a special and particular kind of violence, called Violence Against Women. It would deserve special attention and special resources to deal with such an awful crime. Her death, like mine, would become part of the statistics on city crime, but it would also be given much more attention because it would be considered more a more grievous wrong. I am enraged at the idea that somehow my life is less valuable, and my death less notable, because I have a penis. Don't believe me? Right now the Vancouver Police Force is setting up a special task force to look into the disappearance of a number of prostitutes over the last decade. Some people think that a serial killer is on the loose; one that strikes sufficiently rarely that it doesn't attract much attention. The Violence Against Women mavens are blasting the "patriarchal" police force for ignoring these disappearances because the women were whores. I wonder how many of the homeless, shopping-cart-pushing men who frequent my neighbourhood disappear each year, and whether anyone even notices or bothers to tell the police. In fact, if one were to plan a career as a serial killer, it would pay to specialize in men, particularly down-and-out men, drug addicts and the homeless. Strike only a few times a year. One could do this for a lifetime. No one would ever notice. You see, the Violence Against Women crowd compare the way that the police handle the disappearance of a prostitute—a rootless woman with an erratic lifestyle—with the way that the police handle the disappearance of a businessman. "See how little society cares about women!" they cry. They never compare how the police handle the disappearance of a prostitute with the way that the police handle the disappearance of one of the shopping-cart men because Violence Against Women advocates, like all people, don't notice these men and so wouldn't notice if one disappeared. The only social stratum at which violence against men is more noteworthy than violence against women is at the very highest levels. The death of President Bill Clinton would be more newsworthy than the death of Hilary Clinton. The death of Donald Trump would be more newsworthy than the death of his wife Ivana. However, when dealing with more ordinary and anonymous strata of society, the death of a woman always shocks us more than the death of an equivalent man. Thus although it may be that violence against women is not given sufficient attention in our society, by the same measure violence against men is simply shrugged off as another of the troubling aspects of life in the city. I'm not the only one who thinks this way. Donna Laframboise, in a 06 December 1999 article on the Marc Lepine shootings, says it better, but then she's a professional, whereas I just dabble.