How Many Women Were Abused in December?
The month of December is a month filled with festive preparations and people looking forward to spending time with family during the holidays. But for many women, this season didn’t bring any respite from the brutal reality of femicide as more women were victims.
Our monthly report serves as a vital data repository, shedding light on the extent of this societal issue. It underscores the urgency for comprehensive measures to combat this pervasive problem, pushing for increased awareness, intervention, and support for victims. The numbers within our report serve as stark statistics and a call to action for a world that must unite to protect its most vulnerable members.
Incidents of femicide made their way to the internet this month concerning women who lost their lives because they were not able to prepare food for their husbands. This indicates that no topic is too pedestrian to be addressed because women lose their lives over the tiniest reasons because of a man who has been inconvenienced in any way.
We need to ensure that we keep the conversation going even when there is a lack of media coverage to help shed light on the critical need to address the underlying issues that lead to such acts of violence. That way we continue to recognise and highlight the systemic problems that perpetuate violence against women and girls.
The focus must be on promoting gender equality, educating young individuals about respect, consent, and empathy, and creating an environment where everyone is treated with dignity and respect. Only through such comprehensive efforts can we hope to put an end to the devastating impact of gender-based violence and femicide.
The question remains: Do women cease being victims of gender-based violence, regardless of age? Can they find justice even in the grave? Why do their perpetrators still roam freely, unaccountable for their heinous actions even when evidence has been presented?
From December 1st to December 31st, an alarming total of 123 cases of gender-based violence surfaced in 12 countries globally. The United States took the lead with 59 reports, closely followed by India with 38. Intimate partner violence emerged as the most prevalent form of gender-based violence which affected women ranging from 4 to 109 years old.
The United Nations grimly acknowledges that we are far from achieving Sustainable Development Goal 5 (on female equality and empowerment) as we approach the halfway mark in the race to meet the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. In 2018, one in every seven women (13 per cent of women aged 15 to 49) reported experiencing physical and sexual violence from an intimate partner or husband in the preceding 12 months.
These figures do not even encompass the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has heightened the risk factors for violence against women. UN Women reported that during this pandemic, 7 out of 10 women reported an increase in domestic violence and 3 out of 5 women reported an increase in sexual harassment in public places. Also, according to the World Health Organization, approximately 736 million people have fallen victim to physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner or sexual assault by a non-partner. This statistic has remained distressingly stable over the past decade.
Most of the horrifying cases of gender-based violence reported in the United States were murder-suicides, women killed in front of their children and women whose children, partners and parents were also killed becoming casualties of femicide. In the United Kingdom, a Nigerian immigrant nurse was killed by her husband due to a monetary dispute. The incident of Nigerian immigrant nurses being victims of femicide has been prevalent in the news for a long time, especially for nurses in the United States.
The profoundly troubling pattern continued globally, from India to South Africa to Zimbabwe to Kenya to Thailand as these women met their gruesome death.
We must address the pressing question: When do we move beyond mere outrage and translate our empathy into tangible action? What do we do when there is no more outrage? When do we build a world where justice prevails, where every life is valued, cherished, and protected?
As the final embers of December fade, and the echoes of carols and laughter recede, we are left with a stark reminder. The celebration of life continues, yet for many women, the threat of violence never sleeps. Let this not be a mere footnote in the annals of the holiday season, but a clarion call to action. We must dismantle the systems that perpetuate gender-based violence, amplify the voices of the silenced, and build a world where December, and every month, truly becomes a season of joy and safety for all.
The time has come for us to transform our collective anguish into unyielding advocacy, to demand an end to the cycle of violence, and to create a future where every woman can live free from fear and violence.