There Aren't Words

Stories like these ones are why I don’t watch the news or read the papers. I don’t want to live in a world like this, and I certainly don’t want my daughters to know that they live in a world like this. I won’t be taking the advice of any of the talking heads currently guiding shocked parents through the process of how to explain Pennsylvania, Colorado, and Quebec to their children. I won’t be taking it because Diva Girl has no idea those events occurred, and I intend to keep it that way.

Maybe that’s selfish of me. Maybe I’m avoiding a moral responsibility here. Maybe it’s unfair of me to shield my daughter from this world of hers. Maybe I should be preparing her for this world we apparently live in–a world where women and girls are lined up and shot, execution style, in front of their classroom blackboards.

But how do I explain to her that there are men in this world who hate her simply because of what she is: a bright, beautiful, bubbly little girl who will grow up to be a breathtaking, brilliant, vibrant woman. How do I explain to her that while it’s true that all people are equally valuable in this world, there are men who will resent her for her value (and the value of every other woman) and who will use any means necessary to take it away from her and every other woman in the world?

We’re up in arms over female circumcision practices in Africa. Afgan women sporting burquas cause a political outcry. The idea of “throwaway daughters” in asian countries leaves us incensed. And yet, we’ve somehow accepted that we live in a world where this happens.

We live in a culture of violence. First person shooter games. Casually violent song lyrics. A government bent on war at any cost. An entertainment industry that glorifies murder and mayhem.

We have a news media that has taken the axiom “if it bleeds, it leads” to a whole new level of lurid. The coverage of these tragedies becomes so all encompassing that it loses all meaning. We become numb to the images and the horrific becomes the mundane.

School shootings, once a terrifying aberration, have become almost commonplace. It’s only a matter of time until “columbine” joins “going postal“ in our vernacular.

Dateline becomes “All Predators, All the Time” and what was once a shocking expose on internet predators becomes a weekly exercise in the ridiculously pathetic.

School shootings, accidental shootings, snipers, all routine occurrences on the evening news. And every attempt to stem this tide of violence by curbing access to the guns that allow it to be perpetrated with such distanced ease are met with the rallying cry, “guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” As if that makes it ok. As if that makes it better.

More so even than gun violence, the thing that terrifies me about these instances is the focus on female victims. Maybe this lack of randomness in the choice of victims shouldn’t make these crimes all the more chilling to me, but as a woman, and the mother of daughters, it does. Somehow, it’s easier to accept that some madman simply opened fire than that he methodically and deliberately chose out his victims, separating the boys who would live from the girls who had to die. And I wonder, what does that do to those young male survivors? What message is imprinted on their young pysches?

The rage at women, the power structure that fosters that hatred, the society that allows it to fester, I think these are the issues we need to be looking at. We need to take our heads out the sand and really look at the gender politics of our society.

It’s all well and good to be raising strong, confident, independent women, but are we doing so at the expense of our men? How do we balance the needs of both sexes? How do we create a world where my daughters’ sense of their worth and confidence in their choices does not leave someone else’s son feeling disenfranchised? The "hapless hubby" jokes and the "dumb blonde" jokes. The absence of positive, nurturing male role models in our popular culture today. The lingering image of the shrill, manhating feminist. All of these things contribute to the seething societal stew that allows this type of aggression to breed and grow and eventually to explode.

Today I no longer feel confident that my daughters will have the place in this world that they deserve. I don’t feel confident that anyone’s daughters will. But I still have a fierce belief that they do deserve that place. Every person does, regardless of gender. But until we figure out how to support one without failing the other, we are continuing to create the type of society in which exacting wholesale vengeance on young women, while still unthinkable, is, sadly, not undoable.

Comments

Wow... you seriously brought tears to my eyes. Wonderfully written.

You always write so well. This time you've really done an exceptional job.

Thank you. Thank you for putting into words my frustrations.

I often wonder the same things. I look at my son and I am so afraid and sad for him sometimes. I don't ever watch the news, I can't. It fills me with such anger and sadness. I am trying my best to raise him to be a strong man who values and respects a strong woman. It's so hard, like you said, do we shelter them so they can be kids, or do we face them directly into it so they can be prepared to live in the world as adults. I don't know that answer and I don't know if I ever will.

How well written K! I also wonder about how much to tell my little one about what is out there. How do I keep him safe and keep his innocence? The stories you mention are too frequent it seems and worry me! I hope and pray no one I love will ever have to be IN such a story!

That is so very well written. Wow. i honestly dont know what else to say. im like speachless (and you know that does not happen much with me)>>>

Do you remember when your first child hit her first milestone? You have to have the faith that she will know what decision too make. Back off peranoid mom.

Very interesting comment on the news of the day. I was raised by a single mother in the 50's. i can relate to the some what. Some reasons for behavior of this type is whats out there in the media, and whats being protrayed as acceptale behavior. language and actions. look at some of the shows childern whatch after school and the behavior patterns taught. BINGO! as the sapling is bent so it grows. Great article, now for the method to correct such actions.

that was beautifully written, and you voice some really interesting ideas that have been floating in my head about this. what is it about women that is somehow so terrifying or threatening that someone whould want to execute them?! it scares me, partly because it is on some level acceptable in society, somehow women are "less than". i have been weary of the idea of having children at all, questioning how i could bring them into this world when it is in such a state of atrocity, and having girl children is by far the hardest thought to bear. but your stories of your daughters, and how you deal with these kinds of shocking events, gives me some hope. maybe they will be the ones to make a difference, and do something good for this world, make it better somehow.
thank you for your beautiful words

I can't argue with your feelings, but keeping your children ignorant is deadly. How will things change if we keep our children living in a makebeleive perfect world? Maybe one of your daughters will be part of the change. There is a middle ground to the information we share and the means by which we do so. Ignorance is never an answer. It may make you feel safe, but it will backfire.