(First published on 8 December 2024)

It’s not your fault. What happened to you was wrong and you did nothing to deserve that. Hear me: you did NOTHING to deserve that.

Schoolgirl, you are valuable and worthy of love, care, kindness, and respect. You have a right to that. You have a right to “grow, learn, play, develop, and flourish with dignity”. You have a right to be safe from violence and exploitation. These are your rights to assert and ours to protect.

But we have not protected you. You – and all the schoolgirls in Jamaica – deserve better.

We live in a society that does not very often tell schoolgirls that they have rights or teach them how important they are. In fact, we often criticise and victimise schoolgirls and treat them like mischief makers and trouble-mongers. I constantly hear people blaming schoolgirls for the abuse they face rather than upholding, protecting, and defending their right to be safe – in their homes, on the streets, in their schools and communities.

ENTITLED TO WOMEN’S BODIES

What’s worse, we live in a society where men and boys are still being taught – in obvious and subtle ways – that they are entitled to women and girls’ bodies, especially sexually. Sexual intercourse is presented as a vehicle through which to prove masculine prowess and dominance over the female body.

In contrast, very little is seen or heard promoting self-control, respect, consent, and choice. The negative messages surround us daily – in music, movies, and language across the wide spectrum of news, entertainment, and social media. They encourage the treatment of women and girls as body parts instead of whole human beings; they belittle women and girls’ right to bodily autonomy; they mock and trivialise violence against women and girls – making light of very serious, very pervasive issues.

We pretend that these messages do not matter or have any real impact. But they do. Clearly, they do. Built into these messages is an absolution of men and boys from accountability for the violence they enact on women and girls’ bodies and souls. Built into these messages is an age-old practice of blaming women and girls. For having bodies. For being beautiful. For being sexy. For being expressive. For wearing clothes. For not wearing clothes. For being loud. For being quiet. For being present. For being absent … for being.

Schoolgirl, there is nothing wrong with you. There is something deeply wrong with this society we live in. We punish our girls for being girls, for growing into adolescence, for daring to develop into mature bodies and going through the natural stages of human development. We punish them for being unsure and insecure – or outspoken and confident.

MAKE IT THEIR FAULT

And we find ways – incomprehensibly disingenuous ways – to make it their fault whenever they encounter any form of sexual abuse. Why was she there? Why was she wearing that? Why did she go? Why didn’t she say something? We ask questions that betray the collective responsibility we have to protect our girls from violence and abuse.

We even blame schoolgirls for the inappropriate approaches adult men make to them. The actions of these adult men – who prey on young girls’ developing bodies and sense of self – are often ignored by a society that would rather blame and shame schoolgirls instead of holding predatory adult men accountable.

My dear schoolgirl, none of this excuses what happened to you. None of this should be your burden to bear. It breaks my heart that the thoughtlessness and sheer brutality of a society that continues to visit trauma on generations of women and girls has, in so terrible a way, reached you.

Because we fail to correct these heinous and deeply entrenched cultural maladies, we continue to fail you – and many others like you. For that, and for what you have been through because of our silence, inaction, insensitivity and stupidity, we are deeply sorry.

Ruth Howard is an advocate and activist for women and girls’ rights; programme manager for the WE-Talk for the Reduction of GBV project, WMW Jamaica; and adjunct lecturer at Institute for Gender & Development Studies, Mona. It was originally published in The Jamaica Gleaner - Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024. https://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/focus/20241208/ruth-howard-dear-schoolgirl-were-sorry