I was planning on commenting on Eyman’s latest lame-brained initiative, but after being rudely awakened today by what seems to be an increasing number of news items related to abduction attempts, that commentary must wait.
Maybe I need to ease off on the A & E programming (I so enjoy Bill Kurtis…), but what in the hell is going on around here?
Dru Sjodin, Jennifer Lai (the Mercer Island girl) and many, many more local and national accounts of women and children being grabbed at bus stops, on sidewalks, or in parking lots seem to fill newspapers and take up air time on a regular basis. How many times was the Amber alert enacted last week in Washington alone? At least two? Three?
What a sad statement it is when so many women and children are taken, used and thrown away like fast food wrappers. And what about all of the attempts that go unreported? I bet most women you and I know have had at least one (if not many) encounters where they questioned their personal safety, fate changing the instant a car drives by or by unwittingly walking into a building or driving off in a car.
I don’t think too much about my personal safety, I’m not sure why. While my neighborhood feels relatively safe, it is adjacent to what the police have called the “crack triangle,” and while they generally keep to their side of the street (and me to mine), we are not separated. I’m frequently out in the dark, in the early morning hours and late at night to walk my dog. (On a side note, when I first moved there, my Dad expressed his concern over this. I explained to him that with a 75-pound dog attached to one hand and a bag of poop in the other, I wasn’t expecting too much trouble from anyone. I still don’t.)
Until this morning, I had long forgotten my refusal at age 19 to heed the warnings given to all women at American University in Washington D.C., located in a nice area near Embassy Row and Chevy Chase, Maryland. NEVER walk anywhere alone at night, we heard.
I was not about to have my lifestyle dictated by fear or by “what ifs..” (a city girl, I’m not). So I didn’t listen. Even after an incident where I felt very vulnerable, I would still walk home from the library late at night or insist on taking the Metro and walking home alone after meeting friends across town. It all turned out okay, but I don’t feel quite as fierce about that principle now as I did then.
Perhaps that is the same attitude that the woman in Kent had until yesterday when she had to mace a man trying to pull her into his car. Well, at least she was carrying mace and was able to use it.
Something is seriously wrong when there seems to be so many predators on our streets.
I don’t know who needs to address this or what measures should be taken (within the confines of our laws, anyway) but something needs to be done. It is not good enough to simply instruct women to always look over their shoulders and train our children how to avoid being abducted.
It makes me sick.
Maybe I need to ease off on the A & E programming (I so enjoy Bill Kurtis…), but what in the hell is going on around here?
Dru Sjodin, Jennifer Lai (the Mercer Island girl) and many, many more local and national accounts of women and children being grabbed at bus stops, on sidewalks, or in parking lots seem to fill newspapers and take up air time on a regular basis. How many times was the Amber alert enacted last week in Washington alone? At least two? Three?
What a sad statement it is when so many women and children are taken, used and thrown away like fast food wrappers. And what about all of the attempts that go unreported? I bet most women you and I know have had at least one (if not many) encounters where they questioned their personal safety, fate changing the instant a car drives by or by unwittingly walking into a building or driving off in a car.
I don’t think too much about my personal safety, I’m not sure why. While my neighborhood feels relatively safe, it is adjacent to what the police have called the “crack triangle,” and while they generally keep to their side of the street (and me to mine), we are not separated. I’m frequently out in the dark, in the early morning hours and late at night to walk my dog. (On a side note, when I first moved there, my Dad expressed his concern over this. I explained to him that with a 75-pound dog attached to one hand and a bag of poop in the other, I wasn’t expecting too much trouble from anyone. I still don’t.)
Until this morning, I had long forgotten my refusal at age 19 to heed the warnings given to all women at American University in Washington D.C., located in a nice area near Embassy Row and Chevy Chase, Maryland. NEVER walk anywhere alone at night, we heard.
I was not about to have my lifestyle dictated by fear or by “what ifs..” (a city girl, I’m not). So I didn’t listen. Even after an incident where I felt very vulnerable, I would still walk home from the library late at night or insist on taking the Metro and walking home alone after meeting friends across town. It all turned out okay, but I don’t feel quite as fierce about that principle now as I did then.
Perhaps that is the same attitude that the woman in Kent had until yesterday when she had to mace a man trying to pull her into his car. Well, at least she was carrying mace and was able to use it.
Something is seriously wrong when there seems to be so many predators on our streets.
I don’t know who needs to address this or what measures should be taken (within the confines of our laws, anyway) but something needs to be done. It is not good enough to simply instruct women to always look over their shoulders and train our children how to avoid being abducted.
It makes me sick.
posted by kerrymac @ 4:53 PM
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