Femicide In The Local Context
The murder of Bernice Cassar happened just a few days before the “International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women”. Instead of talking about what happened, I want to talk about the bedrock of femicide and its implications.
Roderick Cassar is the first person to be charged with femicide after shooting his wife on her way to work.
Femicide was introduced to Malta’s Criminal Code early this year after the death of Paulina Dembska. It can be defined as the murder of a woman because of her gender. Femicide can be an intentional crime or it can be unintentional, such as a fatal lack of reproductive care. These killings are often done by an intimate partner or family member, usually rooted in power dynamics. What binds one case to another is that femicides are typically committed by men, the victims would have experienced some sort of abuse in the past & the rate of killings remain steady depending on the societal & economic foreground.
During the peak of the pandemic, thousands of victims had to go into lockdown with their
abuser, ultimately with no escape. In terms of the law, femicide is different to homicide as it cannot be excused through “passion”, meaning that it’s a harder crime to be excused.
When the bill was first discussed many believed that it belittled the number of male victims and saw it as preferential. Some argued that the differentiation between femicide and homicide was futile as those charged with homicide already received the highest form of punishment available. I argue that coining the term isn’t useful for the sentence per se but is there to help notice a pattern. If these crimes are labelled as such, it will be a lot easier to see why the rate is what it is, especially since the data on femicide are so incredibly low. The struggle to accept this term could reveal society’s hidden reluctance to acknowledge that gender inequality still exists and affects lives every day.
Femicide Study and Implications
This can be seen in a study conducted on 33 EU countries. The data showed that women who lived more traditionally were less at risk for violence than women who lived differently. Femicide is about control. Ted Bundy, a notorious killer, claimed that his murders were never about lust or violence but about possession. It can start from a simple catcall to show prowess but it can also manifest into something a lot worse. Certain behaviours have become normalised and are only given the time of day when they turn into severe circumstances, such as femicide. Women are so used to these instances that we tend to shift the blame onto ourselves and so does the general population.
Why were you in that area so late? What were you wearing that night? Are you sure that you didn’t lead him on? I know him well he would never do that!
Regardless of who what or where, the focus is always on what the woman did and what she could’ve done better. In cases where children are put in the mix, the situation is aggravated.
Current Protocols and The Required Amendments
Alongside this skewed mindset, we also struggle with processes that fail victims. Bernice Cassar did everything that she was meant to do. She reported him several times, sought support, told the people around her and even had a protection order and yet her case was going to be heard in November of next year. 500+ individuals are scheduled to be arraigned in court by 2024 and the number will inevitably rise. Additionally, there is just 1 magistrate (Lara Lanfranco) who handles these proceedings. Over 1,429 hearings were in the hands of a single person. That is simply not just, not sustainable and certainly not effective at reaching each victim at an appropriate time.
New systems and protocols must be created but a new mindset should also be implemented. Society must accept that the world is not yet gender-neutral, hence the policies put in place cannot be either. So far there’s a proposal for people to be able to check their partner’s police conduct for domestic abuse. Although it can be valuable to protect oneself, it also hints that victims should be responsible for their fate, in the sense that they can predict whether their partner will be abusive or not. Instead of seeing the matter as a male aggressor and female victim, we should consider everyone including ourselves as a bystander and we all have the same obligation to call violence out, no matter how small it may seem. At the end of the day, isn’t our silence some sort of societal acceptance?
Conclusive thoughts
I hope that Bernice Cassar’s tragedy and that of other women don’t go forgotten. To do this men must be at the forefront of these issues. Highlighting the struggles of a certain group doesn’t have to undermine the struggles of another. There is more than enough room in this discourse to have compassion for all. That being said, if a marginalised group is finally given the space to speak up, someone joining that conversion just to speak in favour of another cause is missing the point.
This uproar is not about misandry or partisan politics. It’s about the lives of women and I am sure that all of us have a mother, daughter or friend that we wish to protect.
This article was written by an independent writer whose views are not associated with The Third Eye. The Third Eye strives to be the student’s voice, and that entails giving them a platform to voice their opinions.