18 February 09

Newspaper comments are a "hothouse of horror"

I came across a link to a story about three women in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago who were sexually assaulted by seemingly the same attacker. This information is enough to make my blood pressure (which has been described as being “cancer patient low”) to rise. I don’t like anyone being sexually assaulted. But I hate hearing the “woman alone at night attacked at knife point” because it reiterates the stereotype that rapists attack strangers when in reality almost 3/4 of women who are assaulted know their attacker.

And as if that wasn’t enough to leave me angry, I made the mistake of reading the single comment on the Chicago Breaking News page. I have a personal rule of never reading comments. But this one snuck up on me, and before I realized that I was unnecessarily causing myself stress, I’d already things like “Why was she alone at night? Why wasn’t a man with her? Nobody should be out at night. She should have been in bed. Be careful, ladies!”

And the last line is what pushed me into crazy-making territory. “Be careful, ladies!” Cause if you’re careful, you won’t get attacked. Only people who are uncareful get attacked. Only women who are in bed at 2:30 am instead of walking home from a train station are safe from being attacked (which is actually the opposite of statistics, actually), and if you are unlucky enough to get attacked, its your own damned fault for getting attacked cause you did something you shouldn’t have done.

This isn’t new. This isn’t news. But this is still ridiculous. And it still makes me angry.

Comments

  1. Comments on news type sites are the worst. I’m sure the comments in the article above are on par in vileness with the kind that accompany cyclist-related fatalities: “Why was he riding a bike on a street? He should have been in a car!” That level of stupidity.

    People are always quick to be holier, better, smarter and it’ll-never-happen-to-me. Remember compassion and caring for your fellow person?

    — Naz Hamid on Feb 19, 07:10 am

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