Nineteen young women have been sexually assaulted after partying in Wellington’s central city this year, with most too drunk to remember what happened.
Police say the number of attacks on drunk young women is growing. “They are binge-drinking, make poor choices and can’t keep themselves safe,” Detective Senior Sergeant Paul Borrell said. “That’s a worry and that’s the preventable part of it.”
I won’t even try to compete with Queen of Thorns ability to express (out)rage, so this is after several deep breaths.
Is Detective Senior Sergeant Paul Borrell seriously intending to say that women are responsible when someone sexually assaults them? And that addressing rapists’ behaviour is not the way to prevent rape?
To be fair to him, he does go on to say that
“It’s up to friends of victims and potential offenders to do something about it. In my view, if something does happen, all of us have failed that person.”
So apparently it’s not entirely the young victim’s fault, it’s also the responsibility of her friends and (yay) the rapist’s friends, oh and pretty much everyone except the rapist (whose behaviour is apparently unpreventable).
I’ll leave the final words to Helen Sullivan, Wellington Sexual Abuse Help Foundation general manager, who says what the Police should have
“Why should the whole responsibility for a situation be put on women? The bottom line is we should be able to walk down the street or do anything without the threat of sexual violence.”