Dear Editor,
Please allow me space in your newspaper to address the concerns that young women, like myself face when sexist comments are made to justify rape.
The rape culture is saddening, more so when publicly endorsed by powerful men in high places. Rape is not visual; my skin is not made of a magnet and neither is anyone else’s; I am not ‘asking for it’ because I have legs, breasts or buttocks. I am not at anyone’s disposal; my body is not their playground.
The clothes I wear do not make me a ‘slut,’ ‘bitch,’ or ‘whore’; the clothes I wear are most definitely not an invitation, acceptance or by any means a means of seduction.
For every 50 rape cases reported, 50 women are crying silently at nights because they are being raped by their husbands; 50 students are forced to drop out of school because they are being raped by their teachers; 50 young women will become young mothers because they were raped by an uncle, cousin, father or friend; 50 little girls will have the weight of the world to carry their whole lives because they have once felt the weight of a grown man.
Tell me, Mr Clifton Hicken, how should these women dress?
Yours faithfully,
Guneshwari Preiya Methuram