Empowerment For A Gentler World: Charlene Smith's Antidote to Sexual Violence
By Judith King, HIVAN Media.
It might be fashionable - and stereotypically, feminine - for women to wear pink, but having seen South African journalist, author and gender activist Charlene Smith wear it very well during her two-day visit to the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban during March, one is reminded of just how powerful this gentle colour can be.
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Charlene Smith speaking at the 2nd Harold Wolpe Memorial Lecture
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The metaphysical energy associated with rose quartz is that of unconditional love, and this attribute reverberates through the intellectual and intuitive courage inherent in Smith?s words and work.
In 1999, Charlene Smith was raped in her home by an intruder, an event which - by her own design and through her position as a media-worker - became highly publicised. She used her own experience of serial violation, beginning with the assault itself, followed by a frustrating quest to obtain Post-Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP) for possible HIV infection, as a personal and professional catalyst to investigate and highlight the plight of millions of women, men and children facing similar trauma and peril.
Since then, Smith has tirelessly engaged with survivors of rape and abuse in every setting - at schools, clinics and police stations, in Africa?s war-zones, and through multi-sectoral intervention projects. She has constructed a public platform from which to relay the personal accounts of countless souls whose voices are muffled by a shroud of injustice, woven from the co-epidemics of poverty, sexual violence and HIV infection and held fast by the stigma associated with all three of these.
However intense and unflinching her purpose and expression around these issues might be, her stance is always measured, in an equilibrium weighted by the wisdom of meticulous research, and the compassion evoked by the human suffering that is so often diffused by the data.
Smith?s sense of humanity, while it has a clear focus on the particular powerlessness of women and children, does not exclude or demonise men, despite her own encounter with rape. At the UKZN?s Harold Wolpe lecture hosted by the Centre for Civil Society, Smith questioned how we as a society might help men to respect themselves and women, and come to understand the gravity of issues such as male rape and the sexual abuse of prisoners.
She consistently appeals for our political leaders, both male and female, to use their positions as change agents in promoting healing and wholeness in our society. ?How do we transform negative gender assumptions and behaviour? ? Violence against women is increasing because those in power fail to act to prevent harm or punish those who harm.?
She views democracy as being ?the child of Freedom? and as such, dependent on diligent nurturing, love and protection. For her, freedom is endangered by the notion that democracy begins and ends at the ballot-box, while the rights of those most vulnerable to predators of all kinds are systematically contravened worldwide, and women and children are robbed of their very identity.
Citing unchecked domestic abuse and unprecedented levels of global trafficking into sexual slavery as evidence, she said: ?Imaginative, constructive change is imperative in a globalised world, where the lunatics appear to have taken over the asylum?. Women and children tend to be seen as less than human, either ?nothing? or ?owned?, she noted. ?All rape is serial rape ? it has gone on for centuries, so what does the 21st Century really mean to humanity if we allow it to continue??
Smith?s accounts of horrific gang-rape and multiples of women being infected by lone HIV-positive men who regard such practices as their biological right, were balanced with examples of many concerned men and repentant abusers who have little support and few positive role-models.
She recognised the growing and positive influence of masculinity programmes in the struggle against gender discrimination, sexual violence and HIV/AIDS, and that compassion and care should be extended to men who wish to stop harming others and themselves. Challenging those in power to address decisively the social conditions that allow the spread of sexual violence, she re-committed herself to sustaining social protest in this regard: ?We cannot afford to be silent,? she said.
Answering a question from journalist Kerry Cullinan, Smith was adamant that she does not take personally President Mbeki?s comments through the media, maligning her stance that a rape crisis exists in South Africa and associating her activism with racism. ?When he attacks me, he attacks all women,? she said. For this reason, she has no intention of responding to the President directly in her private capacity. However, she had lodged, and won, a defamation suit against the SABC which failed, during the broadcast of a current affairs programme, to counter reports of the President?s allegations with her input or from those supporting her position.
Another question raised was related to the spread of HIV infection being exacerbated by the movement of refugees. ?HIV comes from everyone and spreads everywhere,? Smith replied. ?Our concern regarding refugees should not be about their signification as carriers of HIV, but rather about their statelessness, and they deserve our compassion.?
Smith reiterated that material poverty is inextricably connected to the emotional, psychological and spiritual degradation that spawns sexual violence, child rape and incest. She urged parents and teachers to stop actively and passively colluding in the dismissal of rape charges for lack of testimony, and in offenders being reprieved by virtue of their status as breadwinners.
?The solution to this state of harm is respect,? she said, ?- how much I respect myself and the degree to which I regard others as a reflection of myself, and as such, equally worthy of dignity. In our traumatised world, we must create social structures to support everyone who needs love, listening and laughter. A fine example of this attitude is that set by Tata Mandela ? when he comes to a place, he is respectful to everyone, whether they be cleaners or statesmen.?
Responding to a query as to whether, as a rape survivor, she fears for her own safety, Smith replied: ?I see people as people, and not primarily intent on causing harm, and I believe there are angels everywhere. I don?t trust every ?respectable-looking? person, and I don?t regard homeless people as evil because of their unkempt appearance. I expect the best from human beings ? but I will fight back if they show their worst side.?
Might she be accused of wearing rose-tinted spectacles? Perhaps, but the world Smith is fighting for is one empowered by love, without conditions.
The full text of Charlene's speech, as presented at the 2nd Harold Wolpe Memorial Lecture held at UKZN during March 2005, can be downloaded here
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