She’s Someone’s Daughter? Why That’s Not the Point
Why every survivor deserves to be seen as a whole person
But she was someone’s daughter. She was someone’s sister. I’m going to stop you right there. Why does a sexual assault victim has to be anyone’s anything for her not to be raped? Why is it that we have reduced women’s importance to her relationship with others? Isn’t she a person of her own? Doesn’t she have any identity of her own? Do we mean that if she didn’t have any family then it was okay for her to be raped?
Of course not.
You are telling me that I shouldn’t rape anyone because she or he has got a family? So you are saying that it’s more about the family’s honour than the victim’s trauma? That’s absurd, but then again, humanity has descended into absurdity and madness. Family members kill off their own daughters and sisters because they have been ‘violated’ and made ‘impure.’ Women’s bodies thereby become a receptacle of honour and when perpetrators violate it, the body has been defiled and needs to be discarded. Of course with changing times there have been moderations and improvements in these views, but the fact remains that women are still considered as objects, as extensions of the patriarchal code of conduct, perpetuating the cycle of “honor” killings (in places like India, Pakistan etc., though it had been significantly reduced) and victim-blaming.
In a world where identity has been reduced to external markers rather than people’s individuality, we are left to ask ourselves whether these margins really matter? Based on people’s gender, community, religion, ethnicity, we make a judgement in our mind about whether that person is good or bad (bad being the more common conclusion). Reducing people to external relations strips them of their own humanity. This rhetoric is deeply problematic when a woman’s worth is tied to her roles within a family structure rather than her autonomy and humanity.
“She was someone’s daughter!” I’m aware that people don’t necessarily mean any harm when they protest with these types of slogans, but it’s of utmost necessity to understand the implications. When we use these terms, we are reducing the victims to roles rather than seeing them as individual persons of their own. These phrases carry harmful implications that need to be dismantled for a more equitable and empathetic understanding of justice and gender. It’s about creating a culture where everyone’s autonomy and humanity are respected, regardless of their identity or relationships.
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