Ohio

The horribleness that is going on in Cleveland has really made me think about some things.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/08/us/ohio-missing-women-found/index.html

A few weeks back I reached out to an online friend because I felt like he was sharing way too much information on his blog.
It really panicked me.
He was giving names of places he hung out, gave the name of his neighborhood and posted his actual street name!!!!! I know!!!

But, he had no fear, he was fine with it and that's when it hit me. He's a he.

Yes, men are murdered and killed in heinous ways, but more often its woman and children who are truly brutalized. I personally know several rape victims. I myself had a very close call recently with a man I thought was a friend.

I know I have never gone on a blind date without letting at least one person know where I was going and the name of the person I was going to be with.

I would bet money that men do not do this.

I would also bet money that every women reading this does.

It's not paranoia, it's reality. Women know from a very early age that men can and do attack us.

I remember having a conversation with a group of friends. It was in Chicago, we were talking about being groped on crowded trains. The guys in the group were shocked, the women were like "well, duh, how could you not know this. Are you blind or something?"

Yes, we are all blind. We know this is reality but we don't want to look at it. I know when I shamed the man in the beautiful 3 piece suit on the N train for touching my bottom, the other people on the train heard me. Do you think anyone came to my defense, do you think anyone else shamed him...........no.
Everyone just looked away and he got off the train.

I have heard Ariel Castro's brothers saying they saw nothing, they heard nothing. They just knew that they could not go past the kitchen. Really!?!

For ten years you never saw anything, nothing seemed odd to you.

I'm not blaming the family, I'm not saying there is fault in any other place than Ariel Castro. He is the monster in this story but........nobody saw anything...........................

I know that people see and hear strange things everyday. I also know that out modern society tells us that it is not our business.
I say modern society because I believe that our natural human instinct is to step in, to stop it, to ask questions. It's the shift that our society has made to less connection that I feel has made us more complacent to "bizarre" behaviour and lack of involvement.

The saddest part about this story for me is, once again, it's women and children.
 It seems like an odd story, but it's not.
The human slave trade is alive and kicking and more prevalent than any of us want to admit.