The appalling story of Sarah Everard’s murder has touched us all, both men and women. Sarah was last seen alive leaving her friend’s house on the 3rd of March and is thought to have been abducted whilst walking across Clapham Common on her way home. Seven days later, her remains were found in a builder’s bag forty miles away in Kent. The irony is not lost on me that her alleged killer, Wayne Cozens, is a Metropolitan Police constable.
I think the reason that this story has inspired such an outpouring of rage and sadness, especially among women and girls, is because it is not one alien to us. Anyone of us could have been Sarah had we been walking Clapham Common that night. There is anger, of course, but for many women it has also renewed a strong sense of fear. Many of us have felt the intense panic that Sarah must have felt when she saw Cozen approaching. Many of us clutch our keys when walking home alone, as if that is going to offer us any meaningful protection. Many of us avoid eye contact when passing men in the street. We all tell our female friends to “text me when you get home safe,” because we know, that like Sarah, they may not. This is the female existence.
The failure of the police, a group supposed to protect us, is especially harrowing too—Cozen had been reported to the police for indecent exposure 3 days prior, yet nothing was done. How can it be that this clear warning sign was missed?
The Metropolitan Police failed not only through their inaction relating to Cozens, but in their disgraceful handling of the vigil on the 13th of March, held to commemorate Sarah on Clapham Common. Protests are not (currently) illegal in the UK, even with the Coronavirus pandemic—they are a human right. However, the Met decided that this would be an illegal gathering. They could have and should have let the peaceful vigil happen. They did so with the football crowds on the street a few days before, they did so with the Black Lives Matter protests in the summer too. It was obvious that men and women would still go to commemorate Sarah, whether legally or not; the lack of sensitivity and the manhandling of attendees only aggravated an angry, but peaceful crowd.
The case has also brought to light the true manifestation of misogyny. Male violence against women very often stems from sexism; a lack of respect for women breeds the culture in which such appalling violence is allowed to exist.
We must also remember the women who have been murdered, under very similar circumstances to Sarah, yet gain no press coverage whatsoever. It is no coincidence that these tend to be women of colour, such as Blessing Olusegun, whose body was found lying on a beach in September 2020. It is so unjust that white victims tend to get more coverage than their black counterparts; there exists a group of people whose struggles are never given the attention they deserve. This must change too.
It is often the case that when women talk about the struggles that they face due to their gender, men will counter this by citing that men are four times more likely to commit suicide than women. This is a hugely worrying statistic but should not serve merely as a form of rebuttal against the issue of violence against women. In fact, bringing up this point only in the context of a debate around feminism does not give this problem the individual spotlight it needs. The patriarchy is detrimental to both sexes, manifesting in sexual violence against women, but also enforcing the idea that men should not speak out. There must be a change in culture in order to combat male isolation.
I took offence to a lot of the early media coverage of the story, where women were told that in order to avoid becoming the next Sarah Everard, they should simply stay at home. This narrative was furthered by the Metropolitan Police who told women “to be careful and not go out alone”. Of course, women staying at home would reduce their chances of being attacked on the street, but this is like telling someone in a room full of poison gas to simply stop breathing. The problem is the poison gas, not their need to breathe. Metaphor removed; the problem is violence against women, not women walking on the street.
The backlash against this movement in the form of #notallmen is also very problematic. The phrase insinuates that all women are accusing all men of being perpetrators, this is far from the truth. We recognise that there are so many men who are not sexist and who do not make women feel unsafe. However, the fact of the matter is that despite this, atrocities against women are still being committed every day. People claiming “not all men” fail to realise that women do not have the time to differentiate between who are the ‘good’ men and who are the ‘bad’ men on the street. A male figure walking towards us could be either; we have neither the luxury nor time to discern between the two.
If there is to be true change, men should instead turn their attention to calling out misogynistic and sexist behaviour. Not only is it unfair for the burden to fall on women to be their own saviours, but it is also not as impactful. I believe that men calling out other men is the biggest driver of change in this area; after all, unfortunately for the rest of us, it is men who hold the real power here.
The death of Sarah Everard has thrusted a lot of these issues into the public sphere, at least there is one positive outcome from such a tragic event. Yet we, women, have been talking about this for our whole lives – why must it take the death of a woman for sexual violence to be recognised? These problems are not going to be solved overnight, perhaps they will never be completely eradicated, but we can work to encourage real systemic change: respect, accountability and education hold the answers here.
Most importantly, it is not just women who must lead the fight, nor is it men, but everyone. To truly keep women safe on the streets, we must realise that the argument is not men vs women, it is both men and women vs sexual violence.
