YCLSA Press Statement February 8, 2013
YCLSA appalled by the gang rape and mutilation of Anine Booysen The Young Communist League of South Africa [uFasimba] joins government, labour and civil society in condemning the brutal gang rape and mutilation of Western Cape teenager Anine Booysen. The details of her horror are stomach churning, not least because this is not an isolated incident. South African women and girls are brutalised daily with a statistic claiming that a female is raped every four minutes. We must unashamedly state that rape is a male issue. The vast majority of rapists are male and while experts attribute the rape pandemic to various factors in South Africa including socio-economics, this should never be seen as a justification. Rather, an attempt to understand and change the underlying causes that have created a society in which women are not safe. Historically, in South Africa, black women have been triple oppressed by class, race and gender and while women of all races and classes are sexually violated, poor black women make up the highest number of rape statistics. For 350 years, the colonial and apartheid system sought to strip black men of their dignity while creating a brutal capitalist system that measured people’s worth by their labour power. Women, unable to do hard labour were not judged worthy of pass books and remained in the impoverished rural areas while their partners were emasculated under the inhuman migrant labour system. The struggle against capitalism and exploitative practices is thus a struggle for gender equality. While women are viewed as physically weaker and sex is seen as a right for men who are stronger or provide economically, gender violence will always be high. We call, as an immediate measure, for a police officer in every police station nationwide to receive extra training around rape and sexual violence. It is abhorrent that women reporting rape are often met with incredulous smirks by police. Police must be seen to be taking rape very seriously. To this end, our structures will be working together with the police at various levels to take this forward. Furthermore, progressive forces in South Africa should join the struggle for an end to exploitative practices and towards an economic system that values the working class, particularly women. It is through a more equitable economy that women will be safer from the sexual violence and high levels of patriarchy that plague our communities Issued by YCLSA Head Office For more information contact: Khaya Xaba YCLSA National Spokesperson Cell: 071 115 4619 Tel: 011 339 3621 Email: [email protected] Twitter: @chedetachment Sent from my iPhone -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
