Dear Piers,
I remember on a brisk summer night in Brooklyn, New York I was walking home all by myself after work and a few drinks. Wasn’t drunk by any means, but certainly felt a buzz. As I was walking up Cornelia street back home, I noticed two black men were trailing me. I sped up faster and I noticed their pace quickening, too. So I sped up even more hastily, and they, of course, followed suit. At that point, I knew I was in trouble.
You see, even in the darkest of situations, your intuition still goes off and rings an alarm in your mind telling you to get the hell out of where you are as fast as you can. It’s the fight or flight response - and, before, they even said anything to me - I was fighting and most certainly flighting. Then my fears quickly became realized as I heard one of them say to me, “Give me your money, miss, or I’ll shoot.”
He had the indecency to threaten my life, yet the manners to refer to me as “miss” ..? That’s something I’ll never understand or forget. Anyways, he had a gun in his pocket and held it out for a few fleeting seconds, though he didn’t hold it directly at me, I saw it. It was probably the scariest situation I’ve ever been in.
So I quickly responded, “I don’t have any money on me I have to go back to my apartment and I’ll get it, I promise.” Which was, of course, a lie. I didn’t have any money on me nor did I have any in the apartment as I was completely broke during my year and a half long stay in New York - irrelevant, but worthy of noting as it shows the bout of trauma I was already facing, on top of this one. That said - no, I didn’t have any money for the drinks I had, they were purchased for me and I was pretty hot in the local restaurant scene in Williamsburg so the bartenders always hooked me up.
I digress...
And then he said, “Just give me your cell phone.”
I obliged, gave it to him, and the two men walked away and let me be while I sprinted home. The memory is a little fuzzy, as I try to block it out, but it was about 2 in the morning when all of that happened. About a few hours later, around 5 AM, I get a knock on my door and it was the NYPD - who, by the way, are some of the most beautiful angels!! I could not have been more grateful to them. They were so kind, supportive, knowledgeable, and sweet. And, of course, they did not arrive empty handed and had my cell phone on them!! How they retrieved it, found my apartment, and caught the guys who stole it from me is something that still remains a mystery to me, but it just goes to show their investigative prowess.
They requested that I come back to the police department to file a report and identify the guy who committed the deed, and I was definitely willing to do whatever they asked as they were so sweet. So - I went. I was there for hours waiting in an interrogation room. No, I was not interrogated, they just had nowhere else to put me. After a couple hours, they brought me to the line-up. It was exactly like you see in the movies!! I looked at all of the guys standing in front of the board that measured their height as I was standing behind one of those window-mirrors. You know, the ones where you can see through to the other side but those standing on the other side merely see a dark mirror. Well, I identified the right guy who stole my cell phone and that was that. I was summoned to court, and it was my choice whether I should put the guy in jail or not - I chose not to as I really didn’t want the karma of putting someone in the big house - which, now, I slightly regret, but hey.
The scariest parts of this entire ordeal were in those seconds that I was threatened with a gun and the moments after the fact in which I realized that I could have been mercilessly beat up or, worse, shot dead and even raped.
And so this brings me to why I’m writing to you today. Was it my fault that any of this happened?? Not at all. I refuse to take the blame for this and I will most certainly not apologize for walking home. I refuse to apologize for my right to believe that walking home from the subway to my apartment is supposed to be a safe journey and I most certainly will not apologize for thinking that Brooklyn is a place free of depraved hearts for the most part - plenty of people walk home at night without getting threatened with a gun.
Just as none of this is my fault, it is not Kim Kardashian’s fault that armed men robbed her at gun point, bound and gagged her, and locked her in her bathroom while they stole millions of dollars worth of goods. Though my trauma pales in comparison, it is still trauma and the victim is never at fault.
To insinuate that it is Kim Kardashian’s fault for the nightmarish incident is like saying that women who get raped were wrong for going out to that party, they were wrong for dancing with their friends so as to become a target for a predator, and that they were wrong for dressing up or looking attractive. Just because Kim Kardashian is such a public figure and has chosen to propel her own empowering image through social media, which has inspired many like myself to be a smart and savvy business woman who stands up to prejudice and for people in the world, it does not make her a willing target for a crime such as this. And, yes, by saying that she needs to tone down her own self-promotion because it makes her a target for a gross crime is EXACTLY like saying it is a victim’s fault for getting raped, attacked, or even killed. Yes, advice to stay safe is always welcome and common sense measures are always worth taking to prevent such atrocious invasions of personal dignity, but like, you said, “It doesn’t matter if you’re rich or poor, black or white, old or young” - they can happen to anyone. But what you’re saying to me, and to other women reading your views at least, in the rest of your open letter to Kim is that when a crime is committed against someone who is wealthy, beautiful, and has it all, it is still a crime, just less of one. You are saying that if it happens to someone who is less fortunate that it is a greater crime. You see, this is an argumentative fallacy as it falls under the realm of false equivalencies. But you’re right, it doesn’t matter if you’re rich or poor, black or white, old or young, these things could happen to anyone - but it doesn’t make it less of a crime when it happens to certain demographics and not to others, and good fortune most certainly doesn’t make it any more of a victim’s fault than if it were to happen to someone living below the poverty line. And, yes, by telling Kim to tone down her public image is insinuating that this is her fault.
Just as you are requesting Kim Kardashian to reevaluate her priorities in life, I request that you reevaluate yours and especially the messages you are sending to young girls.
Sincerely,
And with all due respect,
Eloise Banting
