In the wake of the Natalee Holloway case in Aruba, the St Petersburg Times recently interviewed US Ambassador John Rood, who, in answer to the reporter’s questions, admitted that more than 26 American women had been raped in the Bahamas in the past three years.
Although he told the reporter that the number was large enough to be of concern, it was not enough for the Embassy to issue a travel advisory.
The headline writer, obviously with the Aruba case uppermost in his mind, concluded in the headline that “Rapes often go unnoticed in the Bahamas.” The sub-head said that. “Protecting tourists, including kids on spring break, hasn’t been a priority here. Officials want that to change.”
Mr Rood told the Florida newspaper that he had been engaged in monthly meetings with authorities to discuss ways to combat the problem. “Aruba,” he said, “has raised everyone’s awareness of how criminal situations can affect countries that are dominated by tourism.”
Tourism PR director Basil Smith appreciated the ambassador’s concern for the safety of US citizens – after all wherever an ambassador is posted his citizens must be his first concern.
Mr Smith said that “anytime you have someone who commits a rape, it is cause to be concerned.” In fact, he said, the ministry has made a serious effort to improve safety conditions for persons visiting the Bahamas.
As a result the Bahamas’ first police tourist section – Visitor Safety and Security – has been set up to protect visitors from “pillagers, hawkers and other touristic leeches” while in this country.
On Tuesday Alabama Governor Bob Riley called for a travel boycott of Aruba until the authorities on that Dutch Caribbean island cooperate more fully with the parents of 18year-old Natalee Holloway who disappeared in May while on a graduation trip to Aruba with her classmates. She is presumed dead.
This is going to have a certain amount of fall-out for all resort islands in this area. But there is a certain callous attitude that some men have towards rape that only adds fuel to an already raging fire.
A Bahamian male was recently quoted as blaming a victim for being raped – because of her scanty dress. In other words she invited the predator.
This same attitude was expressed by one of the three young men who took Natalee out on her last night in Aruba, got her drunk – it was suggested that something had been put in her drink – and admitted he had sex with her because he thought she was a slut.
Again it was this same attitude that was behind the filing of a lawsuit three years ago in Miami-Dade Circuit Court against Sandals’ US operations. It was to have gone to trial before the end of this year.
The incident took place five years ago in Negril, Jamaica, when a 29-year-old New York travel writer was last seen walking on a Negril beach in a blue bikini. The young woman is presumed dead. Her parents believe that some of the employees at Beaches Negril know what happened to her. It is this information that the parents want.
The case is very similar to the Natalee Holloway case. Like the Holloway case the Kirschhoch family claim that important clues were lost because of sloppy investigation. According to the suit, log books showing who entered and exited the Sandals all-inclusive resort disappeared for the period that Kirschhoch was there, and security surveillance videos were recorded over. One of the claims against the hotel is that it should have had better security in place.
According to a Miami Herald report “although the family- was- initially on good terms with the hotel after Kirschhoch’s disappearance, that changed after a press conference in Jamaica five years ago when a public relations executive for the hotel tried to paint their daughter as a hedonistic foreigner only in Jamaica for “a good time.”
Nothing was further from the truth, the young woman’s parents said. Their daughter was in Jamaica with a group of travel writers to work and was an invited business guest of the hotel chain.
These are the insensitive remarks that make tragic situations even worse.
It is a shame that today many women throw modesty to the four winds by the way in which they dress. However, this does not give any man the right to assume that these women arc sluts. Nor is it a signal for men to take advantage of them.
What many men do not understand is that even prostitutes can be raped. And rape remains a crime – even against a prostitute.
Editorial from The Tribune – Nassau, Bahamas
