Sometimes pain is needed for change

Ethel Schultz Pittaway, Sedgefield:

How happy I am that my letter "Patriarchy uses words as weapons" caused Golden Girl, Wilderness, pain. Pain is what is needed sometimes for change. But what a pity that Golden Girl did not have the courage of her convictions and needed to hide behind a nom de plume, making her statement of being a self confident grown up woman questionable.

What I would like to suggest is that Golden Girl read her letter out loud to get the full impact of how her entire letter is about her situation, her happiness, her marriage, her feeling about being young. Living in a bubble is one way to avoid facing the fact that women are killed and women are raped each day in South Africa. Verbal, physical, economic abuse are the reality of the majority of women and as long as we continue saying, 'I'm okay Jack/Jane', this Golden Girl doesn't know what you are sweating about and considers it all petty stuff, these abuses against girls and women will continue unabated.

By the way, Golden Girl, ‘boys will be boys’ is no longer an excuse for men behaving badly and women bearing the brunt of it. The truth is that the corollary that is not said aloud is that as long as we continue to say 'boys will be boys', girls will be assaulted. My advice to Golden Girl is when next you read the George Herald, make a note of how many women and girls have been assaulted since the last time you patted yourself on the back for being such a 'happy, sexy girl' and ask what it is that you are doing to make a difference in their lives.