‘If the reporting mechanisms worked, those women would be alive’
In the heart of Port of Spain, opposite to Trinidad and Tobago’s newly refurbished Red House, is a tree-shaded oasis that, thanks to its history of political oratory and protest, has long been known as “The University of Woodford Square” or “The People’s Parliament.”
On January 25, 2020, gender activists converged on Woodford Square to lend their voices to an issue that has been plaguing the country for some time — gender-based violence (GBV).
The event, a remembrance for local victims of femicide, took place on Orange Day — a United Nations observance on the 25th of each month to raise awareness about GBV.
Several civil society organisations and women’s rights defenders, including CAISO (which fights for sex and gender justice), the country’s Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Family Planning Association and the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at The University of the West Indies’ St. Augustine campus, came together to honour victims and call on the state to take action to protect the lives of women and girls.
Stakeholders also circulated an online petition demanding, among other things, increased effectiveness for preventing and combating GBV, better and more accessible support systems for victims, social reformation programmes to bring about a change in culture and amendments to the Domestic Violence Act to ensure non-discriminatory, timely access to justice and safety.
According to statistics shared at the event, 20 women were killed in Trinidad and Tobago as a result of gender-based violence over the last year alone. University lecturer and co-director of CAISO, Dr. Angelique Nixon, suggested some of these deaths could have been prevented, as “people knew” that the women had been threatened: “If the reporting mechanisms worked, those women would be alive.”
In her own address, Sabrina Mowlah-Baksh, general manager of the Coalition Against Domestic Violence, mourned the women “whose lives have been taken away from them by men whose notions of manhood are tied to the exercise of power and control over women.”
On January 21, just days before the protest, The Trinidad and Tobago Police Service (TTPS) launched a new Gender-Based Violence Unit, which will focus on cases of domestic violence and breaches of restraining orders. Noting that giving the police valuable information helps save lives, Commissioner of Police Gary Griffith encouraged witnesses to make reports about GBV.
Victim-blaming and the socialisation of young men
Sadly, a few days after the protest, the country lost yet another woman to intimate partner violence — and the Newsday, which headlined the story “Relatives: Killer was pushed over the edge,” was roundly criticised for how it chose to frame the incident:
In a public Facebook post, Kathryn Stollmeyer-Wight said:
Several social media users who identify as male weighed in as well. Ian Michado Royer posted a list of suggestions for “what do do when pushed over the edge,” adding:
Anthony Morgan Beach agreed:
One of the victim’s best friends, Christa Prevatt, also pushed back against the Newsday article and began to advocate in earnest for victims of femicide.
In her weekly Newsday column, Dr. Gabrielle Hosein, who lectures at the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at The University of the West Indies, quite fittingly wrote:
Meanwhile, in an interesting twist, some activists — including Nazma Muller, who says “we will not lie down and take this femicide” — have called for a sex strike to protest gender-based violence. The action appears to be spreading throughout the Caribbean, with Jamaica and St. Kitts and Nevis supporting the idea.
In her announcement of the strike on Facebook, Muller revealed that the concept was based on a successful sex strike that took place in Liberia, helping to end the country’s civil war. The regional manifestation of the sex strike, she said, is intended to “starve men into submission and put the cause of women’s rights on the front burner.”
The concept is simple, she explained:
Muller has proposed to impose the sex strike until March 8, International Women’s Day. While some social media users oppose the idea, fail to see what it will accomplish, or are against women’s power being whittled down to sexual favours, others believe it will have quite an impact if women band together in this manner.
Either way, the message is clear: women have had enough.
