Recent events in Santa Barbara bring up these memories. Readers can Google for the facts, I don’t want to glorify any thing about the events I wish to reference.In my previous post, I talked about the culture of rape/ slut-shaming/anti-slut-shaming and the whole gamut of how much is too much.  I have a natural aversion to young girls dressing provocatively– it might be my growing up in the 70’s, it might be my small town prudence, it might just be my own moral compass, but I struggle with the boundaries of “what sends a message….what sends an open invitation”.  Don’t get me wrong, when someone says “No”, it’s a hard limit, I don’t care what went on prior. Sure, we are all held hostage by our baser instincts at some point, but our higher-level thinking should always bitch-slap us into doing what is right.

So what happened in Santa Barbara? I hear shouts of, well, the same-old, same-old…. Elliot Rodger saw women as annoying objects for his own pleasure, and got frustrated when he was consistently turned down. And so he justified his actions.

Marc Lepine walked into a college one evening in early December and began opening fire on female students. That day, almost 30 years ago, stays with me, still.  I think of those women–my peers, as I was just in my first years of Uni at the time–and, even though it does happen again, and again…  I don’t forget.

I don’t have the answers, obviously, but I have to believe the deaths of all those bright an beautiful young women were not in vain.  I have to.