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sorayachemaly:

Castro, Zimmerman, Racism, Sexism and #VAW as a Canary in the Coal Mine

The media’s relentless coverage of their case and highlighting of the vulnerability of girls and women in general is a kind of propaganda, doubly effective for its sexism and racism. In addition to news coverage focusing disproportionately on light-skinned girls, it also fixates on harm at the hands of strangers, even though we all know that far greater risk is found at home. Because of our history, “Those strange men might get you,” is coded to include, “Especially, you know, the darker ones.“  This is known in dense-speak as a “justificatory narrative rooted in apartheid practices that legitimated violence by the dominant group against the disempowered.” Charles Ramsey, the dark man who helped the women held by Castro to escape, succinctly summed all of this when  he was interviewed: “I knew something was wrong when a little, pretty white girl ran into a black man’s arms.“ He summed up entire Ph.D. theses in 17 words.Finally, of course, what all of this does is reinforce some people’s need to be protected by big, strong, real, men. With guns. Another seminal narrative. Which brings us to George Zimmerman. While these examples are complex in their unique ways, and differ tremendously, they share the quality of their perpetrators’ aggrieved entitlement. This is a term, coined by sociologists Rachel Kallish and Michael Kimmel, that should be part of every media pundit’s and analyst’s lexicon, but isn’t.We do ourselves a disservice by avoiding an analysis that recognizes the degree to which intimate, gender-based violence is often the surest indicator of later dominance-based-on-difference-violence at every level of human organization. As long as intimate partner violence is marginalized, we will never stem of greater violence.  How’s that for making every thing a women’s issue?

Read entire piece here.