Thoughts on Spring

"Someone's rape may be another person's bad night," writes Katie Roiphe in her controversial book, The Morning After: Sex, Fear, and Feminism On Campus. Her words have been picked up by both the media and university students, opening a whole new debate on rape and violence against women.

Take Back the Night needs to become more inclusive if it is succeed.

A 1991 graduate of Harvard-Radcliffe, Roiphe claims that the focus on violence against women in our culture has led to a redefinition of women as victims, passive vessels against the potent force of male sexuality.

She asks a question that cannot be easily dismissed: wasn't the women's movement originally concerned with ridding itself of heavy Victorian standards, instead of cloaking itself in them? Doesn't the fight for equality mean women standing up for themselves and taking responsibility for their own bodies?

This April, in the wake of the controversy unleashed by Roiple's book, the annual Take Back the Night will be held at Harvard-Radcliffe. Originally intended as a weeklong series of events designed to educate the community about violence against women, Take Back the Night has more recently been tagged with a radical feminist agenda that offers no place for more mainstream views. Women are unwilling to embrace an event they fear will cast them in the role of victim. Men are hesitant to become involved for fear of being labeled as evil aggressors. Thus, a vast majority of people who could benefit from Take Back the Night are lost.

Take Back the Night was not created to promote victimization. The controversy over issues such as date-rape has obscured the fact that every year Take Back the Night deals with a wide range of topics, ranging from campus safety to domestic violence. The key to a successful Take Back the Night is that it not only address issues of concern both on Harvard-Radcliffe's campus and beyond, but that it also offer strategies for both women and men to work toward solutions to these issues. Despite claims to the contrary, violence against women is still epidemic. Take Back the Night needs to encourage the empowerment of women by emphasizing ways to minimize vulnerability.

Topics such as campus safety, abusive relationships, date rape--all these need to be addressed in this year's Take Back the Night, but the emphasis needs to be on positive change rather than on negative reinforcement. For example, the recently-created Safety Walk, the walking escort service on campus, offers a way to walk deserted streets late at night with minimal fear. In addition, Safety Walk, originally sponsored by the Radcliffe Union of Students, is geared to both women and men, emphasizing that safety concerns are not gender-specific.

The controversial issue of date rape also needs to be addressed during Take Back the Night, but with a panel that includes a variety of different positions. The argument that women are responsible for their own actions is a valid one, but it should not imply that men don't have to be responsible for theirs. Instead of shifting blame squarely on one sex or the other, there must be, in certain cases, a middle ground which rests not on traditional stereotypes of men and women but on the notion of sexual equity.

The rally and subsequent march are two of the most difficult parts of Take Back the Night to evaluate because while they can be viewed as encouraging victimization, they also can be seen as incredibly empowering. Marching with a group of women up to the Quad, through areas such as the Cambridge Commons which are notoriously dangerous, can be an exhilarating experience. It's knowing that for one night during the year, something can be done to eradicate the darkness--that there is safety amidst a crowd of women who otherwise may have no connection with one another. It's the knowledge that there are women who have been survivors of incest, sexual abuse, violence--and have been strong enough to emerge victorious from it and share their experiences with others.

Yet there is a darker, more problematic side. A male friend last spring mentioned to me that he heard the sounds of women chanting as they made their way from the MAC quadrangle up to the Quad, passing through the Cambridge Commons. Sitting in a section in one of the Yard classrooms, he admitted to feeling overwhelmed--and frightened--by the chorus of female voices.

There are those who argue that such fear is good for men to feel, as it "reverses the roles," so to speak, and puts them in the role of victim as opposed to oppressor. Yet there's a fine line between asserting collective strength and identity as women and putting men so on the defensive that they stay away from a cause that they, too, can do much to help. There is no underestimating the crucial importance of the march, but perhaps more of an effort to include men during the preceding week would allay the popular misconception that Take Back the Night is a diatribe against all men. Let this be the year that both female and male students work together to make the march an inclusive rather than exclusive--event.