A Facebook status posted last week has gained attention for calling out people for victim-blaming.
Translated into English, the post, which was written by student Guadalupe Acosta, reads:
Yesterday I was killed.
I refused to be touched, and they blew my skull with a sclub. I got stabbed and left to die bleeding.
Like waste, they put me in a black polyethylene bag, wrapped with duct tape and I was thrown to a beach, where hours later they found me.
But worse than death, was the humiliation that followed.
From the time they had my dead body nobody asked where the son of a bitch that ended my dreams, my hopes and my life was.
No, rather than that they started asking me useless questions. To me, can you imagine? A dead girl, who can not speak, who can not defend herself.
What clothes did you wear?
Why were you alone?
Why would a woman travel alone?
You got into a dangerous neighborhood, what did you expect?
They questioned my parents for giving me wings, let me be independent, like any human being. They told them we were on drugs and we surely asked for it. They told them they should have looked after us.
And only when dead I realized that no, that for the rest of the world I was not like a man. That dying was my fault, and it will always be. While if the headline would have said "two young male travelers were killed" people would be exptessing their condolences and with their false and hypocritical double standard speech would demand higher penalty for murderers.
But being a woman, it is minimized. It becomes less severe, because of course I asked for it. Doing what I wanted to do, I found what I deserved for not being submissive, not wanting to stay at home, for investing my own money in my dreams. For that and more, I was sentenced.
And I grieved, because I'm no longer here. But you are. And you're a woman. And you have to deal with them rubbing it in with the same speech "earn respect," it's your fault they shout at you, it's your fault they want to play / lick / suck any of your genitals on the street for wearing shorts when it's 40ºC outside. That same speech that says you're a "crazy woman" if you travel alone and that if something happens to you, if somebody trample upon your rights, you probably asked for it.
I ask you, on behalf of myself and every other women ever hushed, silenced; I ask you on behalf on behalf of every woman whose life was crushed, to raise your voice. We will fight, I'll be with you in spirit, and I promise that one day we'll be so many that there won't be enough bags in the world to shut up us all.
The post, according to the BBC, references the recent murder of two Argentinian women who were traveling in Ecuador.
The hashtag #ViajoSola (I travel alone), which existed before the murders, was soon used on Twitter by people defending a woman's right to safety when traveling solo.
I'm a woman and travel solo because... Soy mujer y viajo sola porque... #viajosola #NiUnaMenos
#ViajoSola si quiero, y si voy con más chicas, NO #ViajoSola . En cualquier caso, es nuestro derecho ir y volver sin que nada malo ocurra.
"I travel alone if I want to, if I go with other girls, I don't travel alone. In any case, it is our right to go and return without anything bad happening."
Dear world, Stop blaming victims! #Viajosola
Women across the world have been standing up for their right to be treated the same as male travelers, and to be able to experience travel on their own.
Backpacking solo in Colombia was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. #Viajosola #Colombia #scubadiving
Para que nunca, NUNCA más ocurra algo parecido al horror de Montañita #viajosola
"Never, never again happen something resembling the horror of Montanita [the town where the murders took place]."
#ViajoSola y pienso hacerlo hasta que no me dé el cuerpo. A pesar de los ubicuos misóginos. El mundo sigue sin ser vuestro. Jodeos.
"I travel solo, and I do not give up my body. Despite the ubiquitous misogynists. The world is still not yours. Fuck you."
Acosta told BBC News that she wrote the poem after witnessing people online blaming the two women for their own deaths.
"These kinds of comments are often heard in Latin American countries when the murder of a woman happens," she said. "There are hundreds of laws under which [women] are treated as equals. But while that's the law, the real world is something else."
