Diana Yanet Vargas Carvajal is the first official victim of gender violence in Spain. She was 28 years old when her partner murdered her, throwing her off a balcony on Twelfth Night in 2003. On January 1 of that same year, the official registry of women fatalities of gender violence at the hands of their partners or ex-partners
From then until January 11, the fatal statistics numbered 1,185 women, and when this article is published it is likely, and tragically, that some more will have been added. Let’s hope that’s not the case. They are women of all classes and conditions, the majority Spanish, the majority middle-aged, between 41 and 50 years old, although on that fateful list there are women of all ages and from all social strata.
In 2008, 76 sexist murders were recorded, in 2022 there were 49, and there, in that fifty annual fatalities, the fateful census seems to have stagnated in the last decade.
If the first attack against sexist violence achieved a significant reduction, although insufficient -it will always be insufficient-, in the number of fatalities, that initial impulse has diminished and the effect of the actions that were adopted and that have been intensifying with the passage of time seems to have been neutralized.
And it will not be for insisting, nor for educational and information campaigns, for police measures and resources to support the victims. Let’s avoid denialist speeches and ideological debates. More can be done, more can be invested and vigilance can be tightened, and it is being done, but, with the data in hand, it is clear that this effort does not translate into an improvement in the situation. The figures are what they are, irrefutable.
For a decade now, the statistics have been frozen at around fifty fatalities a year
Perhaps the time has come to consider the search for new solutions, other ways of tackling the problem, to add them to the conventional ones. Perhaps more attention should be paid to the singularities of each case, to those of the victims and those of the aggressors. It is difficult to trace a common profile to one and the other and it is possible, why not, that this is where the stagnation of this deadly scourge that is sexist violence lies in part.
It has been shown that neither the cultural level nor the economic solvency work as an antidote to macho behaviour, neither in the small nor in its most lethal manifestations. In managing relationships and emotions we still have a lot to learn. Sentimental education continues to leave a lot to be desired and girls do not want to be princesses, but they long to be admired in the showcase of social networks. Gender violence is exercised, like any other violence, in a social context.
It will probably be necessary to review the management of available funds, redefine prevention and intervention strategies, coordination between agencies.
Honesty and humility are needed to face issues like these, and other more interesting and pertinent ones, and to put the interest of the public, and in this case of the victims and their families and entourage, before doctrine and policy cheap. You have to get serious, accept the criticism and accept it if it has a reason to exist, manage to unite wills and strive to find a vaccine against gender violence, there is no other.
