Thursday, September 27, 2012

I wish women were more concerned for their safety.

It is true in the USA, too. The country mouse comes to the city to be overwhelmed by a world moving faster than a white water river.
The Buddy System. Women HAVE to assume they are not safe in late hours when few people are around and opportunity presents itself. Safety for women is to recognize 'opportunity' for placing themselves 'at risk.' Opportunity that places women at risk has to be mitigated with smart thinking. If there is no one around to walk home with then call a cab. A medallion cab. 

Please.

I don't care if she is going a block from the pub, call some kind of escort home. It is completely silly not to. I believe a women should trust her instincts when it comes to her safety and not 'be brave' when it is prudent to feel otherwise.


In both these cases, there was a closed door opened which caused their deaths.

On one side of the door they were safe, on the other side they found death and neither expect it.

Man arrested over Jill Meagher case (click here)


9:17 PM Thursday Sep 27, 2012


...Detectives had been wanting to talk to a man in a blue hooded jumper seen on CCTV footage with Ms Meagher moments before she vanished in the early hours of last Saturday.
Police have not said if the man who has been arrested is the person in the hoodie.
Detectives hold grave fears that Ms Meagher, a 29-year-old who moved from Ireland to the city three years ago, was abducted while walking home alone last Saturday from a Sydney Road bar in Brunswick....

When I was in college our Physical Education instructor gave us extra points on our grade if we took a self-defense course offered by the campus police. It was extremely helpful. The course was four six hour days of which only one was classroom to prepare for assault training, but, also to review how women are actually drugged in a bar resulting in date rape or worse. It was excellent. They taught me things I would never think of myself. The physical assault segment was excellent. It was two weekends and it probably saved lives. Young women being educated for careers to value. Smart girls.

In another case in New Zealand.



4:30 PM Thursday Sep 27, 2012


...Ms Portman, 33, has not been seen since she left a Mt Albert motel on June 20. (click here) She was four-months pregnant at the time of her disappearance. Her car was found about two weeks after she was reported missing. Police are treating her disappearance as a homicide....


I loved my work at UMDNJ in Newark. But, our employer didn't like the idea of anyone walking through fenced in and monitored parking lots alone. If it was dark and / or few people around the University Police required us to call for escort. They were always at every door when the most people were arriving and leaving for the day. Without fail. 

It was an odd feeling to be escorted when alone because so much of what work required was complete honestly and trust, but, their understanding was, "The best employees in New Jersey cannot be replaced because in one instance in time the odds turned against them."

It was about 'having guts, being prepared or being strong and confident.' It about BEING smart.