It was Melissa McEwan of Shakesville who first pointed out the HIGHLY disturbing trend of reporting stories of violence against women in “odd news” section fronts. As if the murder and terrorizing of women is something novel or interesting and not a sad commentary on a violent, patriarchal society.
Today a lump caught in my throat at seeing this.
The attacker, 28-year-old Thomas Lee Rowley was described in the article as a “spurned lover” as if this was merely a spat between boyfriend and girlfriend and not a vicious attack. In fact, I’d go so far as to classify this as a sexual assault.
This man was convinced he had ownership of this woman’s breasts (which he undoubtedly associated with sex). I don’t care if he paid for 100 breast agumentations for this woman. He never OWNED part of her body.
Thankfully she survived 6 stab wounds and the punctured implants were repaired. Sadly, the story was filed here.
Thanks MSNBC
PS: Rowley is on trial in Superior Court in Victorville for attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, stalking, burglary, and false imprisonment.
HOW WEIRD!
1 comment:
I landed on your blog and immediately became blissfully engaged in your arguments-- I just wanted to say that I do normally agree with you to a certain degree, but I just wanted to point out something in this post:
I think what the news was reporting as "weird" wasn't the violence itself-- spousal abuse is hardly weird, sadly, though it SHOULD be abnormal and shocking, it occurs too often to be so. I don't even think it was necessarily the attack on a woman's sexuality-- again, both in physical form and in ideological form, that would hardly be anything new. The "bizarre" for these people was the simple fact that somebody would try to remove a surgical implant because they felt they owned it. Am I naive and sheltered that I haven't read many stories of people trying to get their donated blood back? Or carving out a tattoo because they paid for it?
I actually hope that one day, violence against women WILL be considered weird. Hell, I hope violence in GENERAL will one day be considered weird-- something that only happens in horror movies.
Was it a bit belittling to the poor victim of that case to label her story as "weird"? Definitely. But I think that was an accidental byproduct of seeing the story like someone carving out a tattoo or asking for their donated blood back.
One of the strongest feminists, in my eyes, are those that aren't shooting off their guns wildly, and I feel that for the most part, you are incredibly intelligent and pick battles that make sense-- I actually landed on your site curiously on your thoughts on family guy, and I feel you hit the nail on the head when you say that even when you laugh at that show, if you are a half-decent person you immediately feel guilty, as I have felt many times. But I do think that your specific example is a bit of a misfire.
Granted, I'm sure there is plenty of examples out there that prove your point rather than misfiring, which still leaves me saddened.
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