Letters: The behavior of men & women

IN HER July 15 column, Christine Flowers concentrates on the whirlwind response to a recent article in the Broad Street Review by its editor, Dan Rottenberg.

Rottenberg's column was in response to one in BSR that I wrote that urged women all over the world to speak up, breaking an entrenched code of silence that correspondent Lara Logan bravely pierced, as have members of the Peace Corps, where sexual violations and even death have been ignored. My column for BSR documented unsettling, graphic examples of sexual abuse including rape, as well as other horrific and terrifying sexual violations that I know of through clients and others.

Any discussion of the way women dress or don't dress is a "coverup" for the abuse that women endure all over the world, in families rich and poor. This irrelevant focus perpetuates the "blame and shame" mentality that's been used to terrify and silence women through the ages.

Blogger Ana Mardoll wrote that she hoped my article would be "a wake-up call" of either the "thank God I'm not alone" or "Dear God, this must stop."

I wrote it for precisely that reason and stand by my closing sentence: "Violent, sadistic men behave the way they do because they can."

SaraKay Smullens

Philadelphia