Announcement

**Mr Beast** · 12-03-2021, 10:13

It is an appalling case. The Met police are also trying to ban a Reclaim The Streets vigil, threatening arrests and thousands of pounds worth of fines, under the guise of COVID despite assurances from the organisers that social distancing would be enforced. Absolute scum.

**Jah Womble** · 12-03-2021, 10:18

Ms Everard's disappearance occurred just up the road from where I live and has understandably affected a great number of people around here. As Mr B says, a vigil planned for the Common tomorrow night is set to be scuppered by lockdown restrictions, which in turn has prompted a High Court challenge from its organisers.

The whole scenario is beyond shocking - not least of course because of the position held by the arrested man. There appear to have been a number of referrals received by the IOPC regarding this case and also an accusation of indecent exposure against the same individual just a few days previously. (Which leads one to wonder whether he was being in some way protected by peers. But that of course is purely speculation on my part.) The head injury 'suffered' by the accused appears to have been self-inflicted.

Above all else, one can only feel huge sadness for this woman and her family, if events play out as we now imagine that they will.

**Balderdasha** · 12-03-2021, 10:19

The only positive I can find from this is that back in 2004ish when I was at university and arguing that women shouldn't be told to modify their behaviour whenever there was a flasher / rapist / murderer on the loose, I felt like I was the only person banging that particular drum. Now, most of the coverage seems to focus on "women should feel safe on the streets at all time". I haven't seen a single article blaming Sarah for walking home on her own at 9pm, or telling women not to walk alone. Which, of course, they shouldn't. This case feels very close to home for me as I lived in Clapham for 3.5 years and regularly walked those same streets on my own in the dark.

**Mr Delicieux** · 12-03-2021, 10:40

It would be far harder for certain types of men with favorable connections to carry out such heinous acts if they weren't enjoying perverse levels of protection in the first place.

**diggedy derek** · 12-03-2021, 10:49

In the spirit of the maxim "don't protect your daughters, educate your sons", which I agree with, I'd welcome a discussion on how that might be done. Maybe it would be good to have a thread on sexual harassment, I don't know. Anyway, this case is so awful and if we don't consider these ideas now, then when.

I've tried to start a discussion with my son on what harassment is, and, about why that might be done more by men than women. I've done that because I want him to fix this one idea in his head, which is how I think he's generally best at learning stuff, and then we'll apply it to over stuff, micro aggressions and such like. The idea of harassment is an important one to internalise in many ways anyway, including to himself.

What I think I'm wondering how to go about teaching is the limits of touching people and when to detect that it's not welcome. He's not always very touchy feeling generally (although he's very affectionate sometimes). The idea that some people call upon of "you just intuitively KNOW when someone is happy to be touched, and when they are not" is not one that will work with him. And I'm not sure it's a particular constructive way of thinking anyway. So I'm dreading that a little bit.

Anyway, if we can internalise the idea of what harassment is, maybe that'll be a start.

**Jah Womble** · 12-03-2021, 11:43

Absolutely, I'm also down with the 'educate your sons' maxim, but one has to wonder in this instance exactly just how much more 'education' a fully-qualified and highly-experienced member of the Met might actually require.

(Charges pending, of course.)

**MsD** · 12-03-2021, 12:04

I’m encouraged to see men joining in the “how do we change the culture?” discussions, but it’s an ingrained and seemingly universal thing that men feel entitled to approach or comment on women. Even the song, Pretty Woman, which I love (and sing to my cat as “Pretty Kitty, walking down the street”) is kinda creepy. All those films that show a guy getting the girl if he just persists and wears her down.

There’s a lot to try to undo.

**My Name Is Ian** · 12-03-2021, 12:32

Well yeah. It's deeply culturally ingrained (like, thousands of years), so unpicking all of that isn't going to be done in the blink of an eye.

I've got two boys, aged 5 and a half and 3 and a half, and I can't reasonably expect them to understand what consent means in this particular context, but I'm like a stuck record on telling them that no means no, and that if one of them is doing something that the other doesn't like, they have to stop immediately and without question. I suspect that if there is an answer to this, it lies in education. Make teaching about consent in a way that they can understand compulsory throughout school, from 5 to 16.

There should be plenty of space in the curriculum to be able to fit such lessons. When we came across that bloke who was being shitty about my older boy wearing a skirt to school, the school arranged extra lessons on diversity quick sharp. There's no particular reason why half an hour (or an hour, or whatever) per week couldn't be set aside for a term a year to teach this sort of thing. When I was at school, they taught nothing about basic social skills or life skills.

Of course, we should talk to our friends about it and call out bad behaviour, but I think that much of the conversation about this is as much about feeling a need to do something about it immediately as anything else. I was surprised that grown men didn't understand about keeping a distance, crossing the road, and all those other things we can do which may let women feel safer at night, to be honest. That was drummed into me as a kid, and as someone who is pretty much a lifelong pedestrian (and, under normal circumstances, quite often late at night) it's been in the forefront of my mind when out for as long as I can remember.

Much of what we're talking about here, though... I don't know how much difference it would have made in the Sarah Everard case. We don't know any of the details of it yet (and we should all be treading carefully with what we say about it now, considering that the case is now sub judice), but I almost think it's missing the mark if it starts focusing what we can do about murderers who pick off victims at random, late at night, because that type of incident does remain rare.

If we're serious about reducing the number of women killed by men every year, then we have to start in the home, because women are far more likely to be murdered by their husbands, partners, fathers, sons or care-givers than anybody else. Would this particular murderer have paid any attention to lengthy talks about consent and harassment? Would they have made any difference to him? I'm not convinced, based on the little that we know about the nature of the attack. That doesn't mean that there isn't a broader issue that needs to be resolved at the same time, though.

**diggedy derek** · 12-03-2021, 12:34

Indeed there is MsD, a huge amount just in music culture alone.

A reckoning on songs which reference girls specifically as sexual objects, and any song which invites a little girl to come home with someone, would be a start. I don't think there's a good reason to play these on the radio anymore. People can go on Spotify and listen if they wish. Sure, it might require a detailed look at various playlists, but that is or should be necessary and standard editorial work.

**jwdd27** · 12-03-2021, 12:54

It seems strange that this case has provoked such a large and important conversation, when so few specific details have been released.
I'm guessing that this is one of the extremely rare cases of murder by a stranger, otherwise the police would have leaked or revealed that they were known to each other, as is the case with the vast majority of murders.

The suspect's prior alleged indecent exposure and presumed self harm in custody suggests a mental breakdown defence in the future, which might be hard to pull off with all the publicity surrounding the case.

**Jah Womble** · 12-03-2021, 13:01

I'd wager that that would prove a much harder defence to put forward given that he was supposedly permitted to carry out his regular work up until the same morning.

**Mr Beast** · 12-03-2021, 13:04

I’ve found women crossing the street to avoid me more often recently*. The first time I noticed it I was quite upset. Not for me, but for the woman thinking that she had to.

The number of women killed every year in this country is absolutely horrific.

*I’d normally joke about this but not on this thread.

**MsD** · 12-03-2021, 13:11

Originally posted by diggedy derek View Post

Indeed there is MsD, a huge amount just in music culture alone.

A reckoning on songs which reference girls specifically as sexual objects, and any song which invites a little girl to come home with someone, would be a start. I don't think there's a good reason to play these on the radio anymore. People can go on Spotify and listen if they wish. Sure, it might require a detailed look at various playlists, but that is or should be necessary and standard editorial work.

I’d have to surrender a lot of my favourite music! I think we just have to be aware that it’s of its time. Women can cover the songs and make them sound ridiculous. If people write songs like that in 2021 it’s a different matter. (Even Blurred Lines does sort of acknowledge female agency but let’s not go over that one again.)

Perhaps the most helpful thing is to call out your male friends and colleagues if they’re objectifying women and teach your sons to do the same.

**MsD** · 12-03-2021, 13:30

As I said on Twitter the other day, we don’t even report the near misses. I’ve run for my life a few times, until recently I was a fast short distance sprinter and would run if I felt even slightly uncomfortable. The guy that chased me (him running, me on my bike) down the towpath at night still makes me feel shaken - he very nearly caught me, and I could easily have ridden into the canal. I avoided the towpath at night after that. I’ve been going out at night since the mid 70s, was used to walking home from gigs in Hackney, used to cycling home late, too. So am used to men kerb-crawling, calling out to me, falling in step beside me etc. right into my late 50s. Sometimes (when I’m waiting at a bus stop or for a cab) it’s because they think I’m a sex-worker, I guess. Most of the time, I’ve walked home without incident. If I was dressed up with heels, dress and expensive handbag then I’d get a cab, partly because I look more of a mugging target and partly because I can’t run like that.

One of the bar staff at Underworld was murdered cutting through Finsbury Park two Christmases ago, she had many mutual friends with me and that shook us all a lot.
Edit: 2017. So, three Christmases ago.

**MsD** · 12-03-2021, 13:40

This was Julia, she took a short cut across the park.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/i...park-psxxdgkj5

**NHH** · 12-03-2021, 13:51

In this context, this seems worth mentioning:
https://twitter.com/STUFFitsocial/st...13428014137348

This person started tweeting before the arrest of Wayne Couzens; the chilling thing was their reference to a blacked-out windowed black estate car, just like that removed from Couzens' house. I don't know what's worse - if this is connected, or if its not.

**My Name Is Ian** · 12-03-2021, 14:04

She also claims that her attacker was black, though, which would seem to indicate that - if it does turn out to have been Couzens - this wasn't the same person, unless the implication is that there was some sort of gang involved, and we're unlikely to find out much about that for a while unless they make further arrests, I'd have thought.

I note all the journalists up in her replies asking her to DM them.

**laverte** · 12-03-2021, 14:51

Originally posted by diggedy derek View Post

I've tried to start a discussion with my son on what harassment is, and, about why that might be done more by men than women. I've done that because I want him to fix this one idea in his head, which is how I think he's generally best at learning stuff, and then we'll apply it to over stuff, micro aggressions and such like. The idea of harassment is an important one to internalise in many ways anyway, including to himself.

One of the difficulties with this – in addition to the hugeness of the phenomenon – is that, when i think about how it feels to be harassed, often it is just like being a child again: less than a person, someone whose will and opinions don't quite count, a breachable body. i think a lot of parenting and schooling continues to be, at least indirectly, based on a model of undermining the child's agency and ignoring (or actively repressing) what they say they want. In that context, it's difficult to make a child understand what is exceptional or demeaning about being ignored and prodded and talked about as if they weren't present. That's why i like your holistic approach to discussing harassment: at root, it is about disrespecting an Other, belittling and dehumanising, making them feel silly and awful.

Gender in hetero-patriarchy is founded on this principle. The supposed weakness of women means they need protecting and patronising, like a child. Anyone who thinks she is smart enough to be able to pick and choose when to accept or reject this protection gets treated as an outlaw, a troublemaker, when in reality she should be feted as a superhero. Harassment is undermining a person's ability to make decisions freely for themselves, weakening the connection between what they want and what they judge to be feasible or safe; it takes place, for the most part, after the event, in the mind of the person who is harassed; it produces anxiety, timidity, a shrinking of horizons. For children, i think the distribution of space can be an entry point into recognising how gender affects us unequally. But because so much of the effect of harassment is internal, invisible, i think the most important skills to learn are how to listen (ie, what to listen for), and how to make ourselves available and helpful to those in need.

What I think I'm wondering how to go about teaching is the limits of touching people and when to detect that it's not welcome. He's not always very touchy feeling generally (although he's very affectionate sometimes). The idea that some people call upon of "you just intuitively KNOW when someone is happy to be touched, and when they are not" is not one that will work with him. And I'm not sure it's a particular constructive way of thinking anyway.

i agree with that. i don't have any ideas, but i do think it's vital to allow young people some space to get this stuff wrong, which means thinking in advance about how the other person might react, learning how to apologise effectively and how to invite and act upon criticism, and doing what we can to allow the person we've wronged to learn to feel at ease around us again. i do also think it's essential to talk to your lad about touching and being touched, together, not least because it helps dissolve the dynamic that boys do and girls are done to, which fuels the excuse that it's impossible for men ever to know what is and is not okay.

**Antepli Ejderha** · 12-03-2021, 15:20

https://twitter.com/ThisisDavina/status/1370302344575995904?s=19

Insensitive at best.

When women protect men like this this isn't going to be solved easily.

My daughter is 2.5, I worry about her being out of my or my wife's care. I worry about the things she'll experience at school because from my experience as a teacher so much is allowed to happen.

**Tactical Genius** · 12-03-2021, 15:31

Some good point Laverte, especially this:

Originally posted by laverte View Post

do also think it's essential to talk to your lad about touching and being touched, together, not least because it helps dissolve the dynamic that boys do and girls are done to, which fuels the excuse that it's impossible for men ever to know what is and is not okay.

With regards to approaching women in a ahem, sexual nature, as a very young man, my older brother taught me some interesting points:

Be observant
Listen
Understand verbal and non verbal communication
and if you are not sure in any situation, err on the side of caution
Not to take rejection personally, it's all part of the game.

This was mostly for my protection to prevent being put in difficult situations, it has always surprised me when in social or work scenes with other men and watch how clumsily and dangerously they interact with women to see they they didn't learn the same lessons.

**Tactical Genius** · 12-03-2021, 15:42

Originally posted by Antepli Ejderha View Post

https://twitter.com/ThisisDavina/status/1370302344575995904?s=19

Insensitive at best.

When women protect men like this this isn't going to be solved easily.

My daughter is 2.5, I worry about her being out of my or my wife's care. I worry about the things she'll experience at school because from my experience as a teacher so much is allowed to happen.

She is referring to most men who are not potential rapists or sexual predators and should not be demonised due to their gender.
I even heard of a Baroness Jones who advocated a 6pm curfew for men.

This is complete nonsense.

**DCI Harry Batt** · 12-03-2021, 15:46

Bloody hell, laverte, that's another excellent post, making me think.

I really hope people don't get involved in some awful #notallmen diversion on here.

**Balderdasha** · 12-03-2021, 15:58

While I would agree that the majority of men are not rapists / sexual predators, I don't actually know what the proportion is.

Partly this is due to how statistics are gathered. According to rape crisis 20% of women and 4% of men in the UK have experienced some type of sexual assault since age 16.
https://rapecrisis.org.uk/get-inform...xual-violence/

Does that mean that 20% of men are perpetrators of sexual assault? Or is there a small minority of men who are committing a disproportionately large number of assaults? Statistics on this are harder to gather as people committing assaults are not going to willingly answer a question on it and this is an area where crime statistics are useless because the conviction rate is so woefully low.

And this is just actual assault. If you're talking about street harassment, then 97% of UK women report having experienced this.

https://www.openaccessgovernment.org...the-uk/105940/

Again, how many men are perpetrating street harassment? Surely it's got to be pretty high, or is there just 1% of arseholes continually driving around harassing as many women as possible? I don't know.

**diggedy derek** · 12-03-2021, 16:12

Thanks indeed a lot for that laverte.

One issue with understanding of the rights and wrongs of physical contact of kids with other kids is that that is, essentially, on hold indefinitely at the moment in history.

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