The murder of Imette St. Guillen in New York has been getting a lot of coverage here in Boston because this is her hometown. Not unusual, especially since this is getting a lot of attention nationwide anyway. But there is one fucked up story, or angle, that they decided to run last week that is just so wrong. It was a story called Fearless In The City by a writer named Donovan Slack who seems to be an insanely sexist ass-hole. Basically, this article talks about how women in this day and age are careless about their safety and comes to the conclusion that it is the fault of the internet, cell phones and the TV show Sex And The City, because they've given women a false sense of security. And binge drinking. This stupid twit makes observations that seem to suggest that women get raped because they drink too much and are too young to remember the Central Park jogger rape and the movie Looking For Mr. Goodbar, which I haven't seen myself but I guess is about a woman getting murdered after (gasp!) drinking in a New York bar. And then he interviews emergency room doctors about how many women end up in ERs on the weekends from drinking too much. He also makes little observations of women at bars in New York doing shocking things like kissing men they met earlier that night. And all of this nonsense that he writes suggest an assumption that this is how St. Guillen was vulnerable to get kidnapped, raped and murdered, even though we don't know at all how much she had to drink or if she was, in fact, flirting with strange men.
And what the fuck if she had been? What is this, the 1950s? Didn't we stop blaming women for their rapes a long time ago? What, we've moved on from blaming them for wearing short skirts and low-cut tops (you know, dressing like they "want it") to blaming them for drinking a little bit and (god forbid) talking to men in bars? Women can't win with ass-holes with this kind of attitude. If they didn't talk to men in bars he would probably call them cold bitches. It's a lose-lose situation for women by his standards.
Not once in his story does he talk about the fact that the bouncer suspected in this crime was a felon who should not have been working in the position of the person responsible for the safety of the customers. It's against the law. So Mr. Slack, where is your story about the maggot bar owner who hired a criminal to be in charge of the safety and security of his place? It's not like this woman did a crazy dangerous thing like go to some dive bar full of crackheads for crying out loud. All she did was go for a nightcap at The Falls, a yuppie bar in SoHo.
What I can't figure out from this story is what this guy wants women to do. A woman gets raped and murdered and all young women are supposed to stay home? In what other situation would this kind of attitude be suggested? A guy gets shot in a bar and no one screams that men are being "too risky" by going to bars and drinking. Hell, car accidents kill a hell of a lot more people than rape/murders and you never see anyone write articles suggesting people should stop driving. Our government and a lot of newspaper writers told us after the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Madrid train bombings and the London Underground bombing that we should go right ahead and keep flying, taking public transportation and going to work in our tall office buildings. To do otherwise, they all told us, would be letting the terrorists win. I guess Donovan Slack wants the rapists to win.
Edit (3/13/06- 3:22 PM) - A comment to this post informed me that the reporter Donovan Slack is actually a woman. This is somewhat surprising, but I still stick by all of my points and opinions about her and her article. In fact, it is even more disappointing to find out that a female could write such an anti-woman article. She should be ashamed of herself. Women like her and the Concerned Women For America group (the right-wing religious nut-ball answer to NOW) do more damage to women's rights than any male chauvinist does.
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well writ, mon ami.
FYI, Donovan Slack's a woman.
Interesting....
She's quite the woman-hating female.
Definitely well put!
All this article is saying is that young women have a false sense of security when they binge drink. Maybe there is an expert of some sort who can say the oppostie is true but I doubt it.
My daughter's best friend from college, died the summer after she graduated (the first in her family to do so). She went to a party out in the woods. She drank and did drugs and then wandered off. She was declared missing the next day by her family and was found dead a little ways from the party site. She had passed out and choked on her vomit.
The risks from drinking too much are real. But, of course, alcohol abuse has a long tradition of denial.
Yeah, Deni! I'm with Anonymous!
You need to stop denying your alcohol abuse and wearing short skirts!
And lay off Donovan Slack! She's got it hard enough going through life with a name like Donovan Slack!
!
An interesting point to this whole story is that I know one of the ER docs who was quoted in the story. This doctor, who has done research on alcohol abuse, actually spent lots of time talking to the reporter, even going so far as to type up and fax her a list of tips for young women on how to keep safe while out in bars, all the while focusing on the public health message about alcohol. None of this was included in the article. Instead, she was quoted as remarking how many young women wind up in the ER drunk each weekend. My friend was actually very angry that the reporter failed to use this terrible incident as an opportunity to educate young people and instead turned it into a piece of sensational journalism.
-Lisa
Suffice it to say you know as much about Donovan Slack's journalistic integrity or all around character as you knew about her gender.
Sorry she wasn't the "insanely sexist ass-hole" you hoped for. Or is this one of the opinions you still stick by?
If it turns out she is an highly intelligent woman -- and she is -- then what?
donovan slack, while in college, was a hard working paper editor, and not sexist at all. female. me thinks you ass-umed it was male due to the name. how uncool was that?
Donovan Slack is a first-rate journalist, and I say this as someone who knows she's worked harder than 99% of the journalists out there to get where she is. She's tough, but she doesn't hate women.
This is coming from someone whom she'd never think would give such a testimonial. She doesn't deserve this slam.
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