Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.
To say that 2020 has been a historically difficult year for the world would be a gross understatement, with the Covid-19 pandemic ravaging economies across the world. However, an often overlooked ramification of the pandemic has been the rise in violence against women.
Indeed, violence against women remains among the gravest problems that still persists in all societies, and it is an absolute shame that it never appears to get better, only worse.
Within Bangladesh itself, we saw a strong response from the general public this year with regards to the prevalence of rape across the nation, with people having had quite enough of the dehumanization women face on a daily basis.
However, we have seen this all too many times before, where there is an uproar for a few days on an issue, with promises of change, and then after the commotion dies down, things go right back to how they were before.
It is quite terrifying what women in our country continue to experience, and at the root of it is a general lack of awareness and lack of respect for the rights, consent, and the bodily autonomy of women.
Violence against women is just too significant a problem to keep pushing to the sidelines. It merits complete attention, and needs to be approached holistically. Harsher and harsher punishment for rapists only focuses on one small part of the problem while ignoring a much larger issue at the core. We can ignore these issues no longer.