Written by Adalee Hobson

Photo by Greyson Brough

As a 16 year old girl who just recently got her license and now has college to look forward to, the recent hot topic in today’s news about Cornell University has me thinking about how this will soon affect me and how different things are for me now.

Whether I am 13 walking with my mom or 16 and walking to my car alone I should always feel safe. I shouldn’t have to pretend to be on the phone when someone passes me while I’m walking by myself; or if what I left the house wearing covers me up enough because what happened to me is not my fault; and what happened to you isn’t yours either. These are things no woman should have to worry about just because someone’s son didn’t learn consent and respect.

Imagine walking home and realizing that the only thing you can hear is the sound of your own footsteps; and suddenly, the street that felt ordinary becomes a place filled with questions: Who is behind me? What was that sound? Are my shorts up too high? Am I safe?

For many women, fear has become something they carry with them everyday – not because we have been taught that danger is something that we must be prepared for, but because somewhere along the way, protecting girls became more common than teaching people to respect them.

A woman should be able to walk alone on the street without fear. She should be able to wear a dress, shorts, or whatever makes her comfortable, without wondering if someone will blame her appearance for another person’s behavior.

Why should we have to live in a world where when something goes wrong, we have to give women another rule to follow. Why should she have to watch her drink, share her location, pretend to be on the phone with a male figure, worry about how much she drank, carry some sort of weapon with her, and worry if what she put on this morning says that she’s asking for it.

She shouldn’t have to say no to going out with friends because she is worried something might happen to her. Mothers and fathers shouldn’t have to worry if their daughter is safe when she goes off to college. Why do women have to be the ones taught to protect themselves?

In 2023-2024 the CDC found that at least half of the women in America had some kind of contact sexual violence during their life time. That is millions of women whose lives have been changed for something that they cannot control.

One in three women experience verbal sexual abuse in their own work place or even in a public place. Why should a woman be scared to go into her own work place due to sexual comments?

Women are sexually assaulted every 68 seconds; which leaves women to ask – When will it stop? When can we walk on the street alone without questioning ourselves? When can we stop teaching our daughters the “rules” of being a woman?

Women shouldn’t have to live their lives changing the way they do things every day due to someone else’s actions. When will we start teaching our sons how to be a man? Because it isn’t an act of love if you make her.

Two thirds of women who have been sexually abused have reported being revictimized. Women shouldn’t have to go through this a first time, so what makes them more likely to be targeted again? What does the history of something traumatic that happened to her have to affect if it happens again? It shouldn’t.

Instead of teaching our daughters to leave their locations on, why are we not teaching our sons accountability, consent, and respect? Why should we have to teach our daughters to not leave their drinks unattended? What we should be doing is teaching our sons that another person’s drink, body and boundaries are not theirs to violate.

This is a real problem because a woman could do everything right and someone would still ask what she was wearing. She could wear sweatpants and a sweatshirt, watch her drink at all times, follow every “rule” her mother taught her and someone could still choose her as the one they want to hurt.

So no more “well what were you wearing?” No more “what did you do to provoke him?” No more “she was asking for it.” These are all reasons women don’t come forward about their assault.

Seventy-three percent of women do not come forward to the police about their assault. This could be because only 8-9% of reported cases result in a felony charge and the majority of perpetrators get away with no consequences.

These statistics just show women that they have a small percentage of getting justice; so why can’t we live in a world where a woman can walk alone without looking behind her, say no without worrying about retaliation, change her mind without feeling guilty, meet someone without worrying about the dangers of it, or even go out alone without being told that she should have known better.

This shouldn’t just be a dream for women. It should be the reality. The world we live in isn’t always something we can control. We can dream for perfect weather all the time or for our first pet to never die, but those are all fantasies. This is not. It starts with you.

Inform your daughters about the possibilities of danger, but teach your sons respect, consent, and boundaries. Teach your children to intervene when something isn’t right and to support and believe in survivors.

Now I’m not saying parents are the reason for their son’s actions; because you could do everything in your power to raise him right, teach him consent and accountability, and how to maintain boundaries, and something like this could still happen. But don’t you want to be able to say you did everything you could?

The goal here isn’t to teach women to always be exceptionally good at avoiding danger. The goal is to build a world where women don’t have to be.

Every girl deserves to grow up believing that the world is hers to explore, not a place she has to constantly protect herself from. She deserves to walk home without fear, to say no without guilt, and to simply exist without wondering if her kindness was mistaken for an invitation.

But it doesn’t end there. Every boy deserves to be taught that being a man means listening, respecting, and understanding consent – not taking what he wants. Inform your daughters. Teach your sons. Because someday, we should be able to look at the next generation and know that we gave them a world where our daughters were taught to dream, and our sons were taught to make her dreams safe.