Murder on the Appalachian Trail

Off Our Backs, Jul 1996 by Mantilla, Karla

That this is a society-wide norm can be seen in the more benign case of street harassment. Street harassers never harass women when they are with a man. On some level, other men, and even women like the one who says she feels safer with a man, do not feel women have the right to live their lives unaccompanied by men. The supposedly "deranged" killer is doing no more than responding (more violently) to the cultural imperative. Until more women and men come to believe that women have an inalienable right exist on their own in their homes, the streets, and the woods, these "deranged" killers will somehow keep cropping up. And it is no coincidence that their "deranged" worldview bears a mighty strong resemblance to the ideology of patriarchy.

Why random attacks are more political than other kinds of attacks

Random attacks are in fact a far more effective strategy for controlling all women than targeted attacks, although patriarchy employs both -- battering is targeted at specific women while stranger rape is more random in nature. When a woman is battered, it does not strike fear in the hearts of women whose husbands do not batter, because they can still feel that they are safe. But no woman can feel safe from rape.

Random attacks work by affecting a larger group than their immediate target. The Tylenol poisonings of a decade ago were phenomenonally effective in influencing the behavior of all drug manufacturers and consumers for many years hence. Because no one felt safe, the standards for drug packaging were changed in a dramatic way for everyone. Thus only one incident of poisoning, because it was random, effected a change in everyone's behavior.

This is how terrorist attacks work. When the perceived threat of terrorist attacks in the United States increased several years ago, the primary emphasis was not on the psychological condition of the terrorists. Instead, the government spent a lot of money erecting large cement barricades in front of government buildings in order to prevent the possibility of a terrorist success. No one suggested that government workers should merely "be more careful," or perhaps stay at home.

However, in the case of random attacks on women, instead of finding ways to make the world safer for women, individual women are advised to "be careful," and to stay at home. Random attacks on women are not seen for what they really are -- political acts of terrorism that serve to scare women into their place.

A Feminist Version

I am furious about these murders. But I am also furious at the thought that some of us won't see them as political. I hate the thought that our reaction might be, "I guess I'll circumscribe my life more, I won't go camping, I won't go out at night, I won't live without a man." What if blacks had a similar reaction to the burnings of all those churches? What if their response was "Well, I guess it's just too dangerous to have black churches"? It is clear that those burnings are political and the appropriate national response is to show solidarity with the congregations by condemning not just the burnings, but all racism, and by offering material support in rebuilding the churches.