Doing Feminism

Here’s another post from my blog for my sexual assault class. I feel much can be developed here, and I’d certainly like to develop the arguments here more at some point. The title, sadly, isn’t my creation, hence the quotations marks.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM). It’s also Domestic Violence Awareness Month (DVAM), though you wouldn’t know it after being swarmed with pink products and consumerism supposedly aimed at finding a cure for cancer.

So what’s the deal?

Breast cancer and domestic violence (which, as a category, sexual assault falls under) are both huge problems, but surely something’s amiss when grocery stores are decked out in pink and people are doling out money for donations Jingle Jugs, while DVAM barely gets a nod.

For starters, let’s consider that breast cancer has higher incidence rates in White women. Despite this, Black women have a 37 percent higher chance of death as a result of breast cancer.

Now, taking a look at domestic violence, 8 out of 10 Aboriginal women experience violence in their relationships, out of which 87% were physically injured and 57% were sexually abused, according to a study conducted in Ontario.

I know this argument is slightly problematic. Black women aren’t Aboriginal, and an American study isn’t a Canadian study. Nevertheless, I don’t feel issues of race can be ignored when it comes to addressing this problem.

With that said, even with the large number of White women affected directly by breast cancer, a larger number of White women are affected by domestic violence. (50 percent of women over the age of 18 experience some form of violence according to the 1993 VAW survey - you do the math.)

To say that DVAM gets barely any acknowledgment solely due to race would be a great simplification, but it can’t be ignored, either. Yes, other factors are at play, such as an unwillingness to openly discuss VAW and the fact that the organisations mobilising around cancer have a lot more funding. Nevertheless, ignoring race when it comes to VAW is an oversight, to say the least.

What’s the solution? We need to tackle the hesitancies people feel when dicussing domestic violence and sexual assault, in my mind. Not only that, but we need to remember about all of our sisters, and that White women aren’t the only women that matter in the world. How we go about doing that is a whole other discussion.