#uyinene

[zamateeshares]

It's been a rough 2 days. Emotionally, physically exhausted.

She didn't deserve this. None of them deserved this. We have to make sure there's less women like her.

RIP Uyinene 💜

[sanjiago]

zekher tzadik livrakhah

May the memory of this righteous one be a blessing.

Anene Booysen, Uyinene Mrwetyana, Jesse Hess, Leighandre “Baby Lee” Jegels, Hannah Cornelius, Precious Ramabulana, Franziska Blöchliger, Sarah Grossman and on and on and on and ON

“no need for geography now that we’re safe everywhere. point to whatever you please & call it church, home, or sweet love. paradise is a world where everything is a sanctuary & nothing is a gun.”

-  “Summer, Somewhere” by Danez Smith

[ponyoftheseas]

💧Don't go... it's not safe.💧 This is a message many girls grow up with. The implication being that you, a lone female, are a permanent target. As a teenager I scoffed at this. How can someone grow and become an independent human if they are locked up at home or being chaperoned constantly? 💧 The truth is that we as South African women are imprisoned by our own men's sense of entitlement: to our time, our bodies, our very lives. Every day as another woman or child is hurt this prison becomes ever clearer. Don't go out, it's not safe. And sometimes even then it's not safe. #endgenderbasedviolence. ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ #uyinene #ripuyinene #protectourwomen #aminext #justiceforuyinene #justiceforwomen #womensrights #southafrica #capetown #uyinenemrwetyana #takeastand #drawing #illustration #etching #pointillism #dotwork #blackandwhite #zine #blackwork #darkcomics #comicart #capetownartist #southafricanartist #vectorillustration #vectorart #adobeillustrator #digitalart #womxn #itsnotsafe https://www.instagram.com/p/B2AfQAEpmI1/?igshid=dk55nn45hloz

[adjective-object]

Trigger Warning: Femicide, Rape

On Monday, some news came out.

This is Uyinene Mrwetyana. She was 18. She was a university student. And she was raped and bludgeoned to death in a post office in Cape Town. 

Gender-Based Violence is a huge problem in South Africa. Femicide is rampant. According to the South African Police Service, a woman is killed every three hours in South Africa.

This is Leighandre “Baby Lee” Jegels, a boxing champion who was shot and killed by her ex-boyfriend.

This is Amy-Leight de Jager, who was kidnapped outside of her school (she has, thankfully, been returned to her parents).

And this was just this week.

This is Eudy Simelane. She was an LGBTQI+ activist and a soccer player for the women’s national team. In 2008, she was raped and murdered in an attempt to ‘cure’ her of homosexuality.

This is Reeva Steenkamp. You might know of her. She was a South African model who was shot to death by her boyfriend.

Anene Booysen, who was seventeen years old when she was raped and murdered after she said ‘no’ to a boy she left the bar with.

Karabo Mokoena, a 22-year-old model. A month after her boyfriend assaulted her, she disappeared entirely. Her burned and mutilated body was found in an empty field.

Hannah Cornelius, who was gang-raped, stabbed, and had her head bashed in with a rock in 2017.

This is Courtney Pieters. She was three years old when she was poisoned, beaten and murdered.

In South Africa, students protests against femicide are being shut down by tear gas and rubber bullets.

In South Africa, girls are left to wonder #AmINext?

In South Africa, girls are skipping tests because they’re scared to walk across campus after 7pm.

In South Africa, we are left to mourn women who were murdered because they were women. 

And across the world, we are left to spread Uyinene’s message:

[willsilvertongue]

no class since yesterday and for the rest of this week and I can’t even feel relieved about the extra time for my assignments bc of the absolutely terrible reason we’re taking time off. god