When will it all end …

Last month I provided an in-depth analysis of my beautiful Taylor Swift concert experience but sadly this month, I’m compelled to write about the appalling news from Southport, where young children, presumably girls, were about to finish their Taylor Swift dance and yoga class before they were brutally stabbed by a 17 year old boy.

Why such a rampage which involves the killing of innocent people is often hastily declared by Police as ‘not a terror incident’ is beyond me. I immediately thought of how I took my daughter recently to an amazing Taylor inspired drawing workshop in Cardiff. How beautifully fun and tranquil the session was, how happy we both were, how hard to fathom that moments later, we could possibly have encountered a murderous attack. Just as you were collecting together your drawings, looking with pride at the work you had done, or getting your water bottle and yoga mat together to be picked up by your mum or dad, as you were sparkling from all of the fun you just had, for everything to then be completely and brutally massacred.

If that isn’t an incident of terror, I don’t know what is.

I run an informal Gender Based Violence group at Cardiff University which I started in the pandemic when I was outraged that, just when we were in the middle of what we were all dealing with, Sarah Everard was raped and murdered, by a policeman.  At around the same time, Wenjing Lin, a 16 year old girl in the South Wales Valleys was strangled by a “family friend”.  A woman is killed by a man every 3 days in the UK, it’s not like we’re not all used to it, but there seemed to be something particularly outrageous to me about these deaths which happened at a time of national crisis when, quite frankly, men, men who were meant to protect us, should have had other more pressing matters on their mind.

I know that that doesn’t make much sense, I should feel the same fury every three days when a woman is killed, but anyway, I was moved enough to post outraged tweets of desperation at the injustice, a miniscule attempt at solidarity which screamed into the void of desperation. And then a few days later on International Women’s Day I tweeted:

Janet Wademan, who I first met at an event that we had invited her to at the Business School, where we shared our approach to ‘Co-Creating Public Value’, replied:

We sent a few tweets back and forth and it’s made me quite emotional looking back at them. As Janet points out, none of the things that I wish for my daughter are things that should be a wish list, they should just be ‘a given’.  Janet then posted:

“We have a mandate, shall we get to work …”

She immediately followed up with a brilliantly purposeful and empowering direct message. Gently, yet extremely persuasively, she encouraged me to a build a coalition across the University to see what could be possible.

Nobody has ever triggered such spontaneous action in me ever! And I’m someone that prides myself on my ‘ability to get stuff done’! She met several times with me to discuss how to go about things, giving advice gleaned from her immense experience, suggesting approaches that would have more impact, attending meetings and clearly demonstrating her advocacy.  She is a genuine ‘champion’ and mentor, someone who didn’t have to help me with anything, but she stood beside me, helping me to take action, and I’m tremendously grateful for her support.

David Morpeth, who I first met at another Business event (networking is amazing!) has also shown me the same level of support on this issue, attending meetings, sending messages of support and offers of help and advice, again, with the objective of catalysing action. David’s contribution is precious because most of the people who try to do something about violence against women in girls, are women. How I long for more men to rise up and take action against the scourge.  It feels, too often, a lonely female pursuit to attempt to do something about it.  And it’s not our problem to solve.

I’ve learned a tremendous amount since starting this work. I knew nothing about gender based violence except that I didn’t like it very much and wanted it to stop.  I’ve been privileged to meet many hard-working experts in this field who have gracefully shared their expertise with me, for which I’ve been really grateful, because I’ve felt at times like a big footed oaf stomping into territory that I really didn’t know much about.  I’m so grateful to brilliant humans like Janet and David, to Alison Parken OBE from the Business School, Johanna Robinson the National Adviser for Violence Against Women, Gender Based Violence, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (VAWDASV), Sheree Jones, VAWDASV Blueprint Project Delivery Manager, and so many more … all people who have taken the time and trouble to guide and support me. That’s the ‘business’ element of this blog I guess, the power of individuals who inspire and motivate you into action, who share their knowledge open and willingly with you, who aren’t looking for anything in return, just the ability to coalesce around a common purpose. Thank goodness for these souls to help counterbalance the terrible ones.

Moving into this new area has been hugely enlightening to me and we’re now trying to help Cardiff University to be as safe a space as it can possible be.  My main problem within my Gender Based Violence work however is that I regularly get confused about what I am fighting for.

Am I fighting for an end to rape and murder?  An end to being groped on a night out? An end to being heckled by a man in a white van for being too fat to be out jogging?  An end to the assumption that you will no longer be interested in your career when you come back to work after having a baby? An end to being talked over and not listened to in meetings?

I get so bewildered about which part of the horrible, slippery, misogynistic spectrum I’m railing against. Yet at the same time, I know that all of these things are somehow all related – a lack of respect, a pervasive assumption that women are ‘less than’.

None of it is right.  The sheer horror of what happened in Southport is just too much to bear however. I simply cannot fathom how the parents of those innocent children will cope.

It’s all I can think about.