My daughter was a high school newbie when she argued with me one day about democracy and personal freedoms.
Her point was that she must be allowed to exercise her right to go where she pleases.
I agreed.
I told her it is her human right to walk freely anywhere she chooses alone, at any time of the day, wearing whatever she likes.
And then I invited her to put on her newly acquired short shorts and go walk in Hanover Park in the middle of the night.
We spent the rest of the time talking about the theory of freedom versus our reality.
We can demand our rights all we like, but the reality is our social circumstances make it impossible to exercise those rights.
So we can choose to stay alive in our reality, or put our lives at risk in a fantasy - a fantasy we crave.
Which brings me to the murder of eight-year old Tazne van Wyk, which has dominated both mainstream and social media this week.
We all know the heart-wrenching story and the anger-fuelled vandalism that went with the search for her and her kidnapper.
ANGER: Residents vent frustration in aftermath of Tazne van Wyk’s murder
And now there is the familiar finger-pointing and well-meaning people with plans to put a stop to the madness.
Yes, of course I am upset that yet another child has been murdered.
I can feel the salty sting in my eyes every time I think about how alone and afraid that beautiful little soul must have been.
It fills me with madness and sadness, so I try not to think about it.
But what did we expect?
We haven’t changed our behaviour as a society, so why should evil predators change theirs?
I remember reading a statistic late last year about how four children were being murdered in the Western Cape each week.
I give it a few weeks before all this anger over Tazne would’ve faded into distant memory.
I know this because we have become used to it.
We have learned to collectively move on to the next murder to be outraged all over.
If you don’t believe me, here’s a quick test: What do you remember about the murders of Stacey Adams, Minentle Lekhatha and Kim Abrahams?
How about Privilege Mabvongwe, Stacha Arendse and Uyathanda Stuurman.
Or what about Rene Roman, Kaithlyn Wilson, Iyapha Yamile and Jeremiah Ruiters, who was raped before being murdered at the age of 18 MONTHS by his mom’s
boyfriend?
And those are only the ones who were pre-teens.
We blame the justice system; the government, the president and the psychopaths responsible.
Jeremiah Ruiters
We refuse to acknowledge our own responsibility; our own complicity; the circumstances we create, that are within our control and that breeds these animals and allows them to rape and murder our children with impunity.
For example, we all lament the fact that the man accused of Tazne’s murder has a long history of terrible crimes.
TEMPORARY: Emotion over Tazne’s murder
But at no point did the community meet to put a plan in place that could mitigate his presence and prevent the tragedy that happened.
And that’s because we are scared and complacent and despite all the evidence to the contrary, we still believe it won’t happen to us.
The truth is, another innocent child will be raped and brutally murdered soon.
Our outrage will be lessened, because perhaps that murder will be far away from our own reality.
So that mother’s torn existence and that community’s broken sense of security won’t matter as much to us.
There will be a few mentions here and there and the same rhetoric will be cut-and-paste from last week.
And then we’ll move on again!
KILLED: Stacha Arendse
The hardest truth is that it doesn’t really matter whether the government won’t or can’t do anything about it.
Just like our circumstances don’t allow for my daughter to walk around alone late at night, so it also doesn’t allow for our children to be left alone at any point.
Whether it’s your child or not.
We all know what needs to be done; collectively and individually.
And these child murders cannot be seen in isolation.
If you tolerate any crime around you (big or petty), it will flourish.
If it matters enough to us, then we will give it top priority in our communities.
We will treat every stranger with suspicion.
We will stop a stranger with a child and ask questions until we’re satisfied.
We will listen to our instinct, instead of being scared to offend.
We will take a picture of that man walking off with that child.
We will pay close attention to our children’s discomforts around “uncle” this and “auntie” that.
VICTIM: Rene was murdered
We grew up running around freely late at night with parents not really knowing at which neighbour’s house we are playing.
And of course it would be nice to raise our children like that.
But we need to be honest with ourselves that times have changed for the worse.
In other words, we must look after our neighbour’s child as if they’re our own.
But sadly, it’s just a lot easier to blame after the fact, than it is to be proactive.