University of Virginia Library

Preventive Thinking

When assessing the public reaction to the
most recent incidents of violence around the
University, we find it most difficult to
understand why everyone is so surprised.
Shock, outrage, fear, anger, or dismay are all
emotions born naturally of the assaults which
have occurred around the University lately;
but how could anyone be surprised?

Rapes, assaults, and killings were inevitable.
The community is growing. The University is
growing. Lighting and security, like almost
everything else, have lagged behind the
growth. Both are areas upon which the
University has concentrated in an effort to
minimize the dangers to women of walking on
and near the Grounds unescorted. However,
even the most conscientious efforts to
improve lighting and security will not assure
anyone's safety.

There are limits to what public authorities
can do to provide for the security of citizens.
This is especially true in a University where
students live in widely scattered areas
throughout the community and are on the
streets (of necessity) at late hours. Lighting is
a deterrent to crime, and it should be
adequately provided by the University and
the city. Security personnel are also helpful
when they are abundant and available. But
the best defense against assault, rape, and
murder is foresight and good sense.

It has become increasingly common for us
to cry "cop-out" any time public officials
place the responsibility for our own
well-being upon our own shoulders. But it
should be getting clearer to us all that
administrative programs and bureaucratic
decisions will not suffice to solve the larger
problems that go with a larger University and
larger community.

Rapes and assaults, even killings, are evils
which we must attempt to minimize, and aim
to eliminate from our community. However,
they are dangers which we must also, as
individuals, take some precautions to avoid as
long as we know that they are occurring
around us with alarming regularity. There is,
as others have pointed out, no excuse for
paralyzing alarm or unreasoning criticism of
the University following the recent incidents.
The only sensible response is for each person
to consider more carefully his or her
movements in the University area at night.

It is a depressing footnote to the growth
story here that we must address ourselves to
the same sort of precautions which New
York city dwellers hear every day on the
local news. Even though the violence we have
experienced in Charlottesville is still sporadic,
there is no rationale which should allow one
to take unnecessary chances. Anyone walking
alone at night is vulnerable to mugging, and
should be much more careful than he may
have been in the more bucolic, less
metropolitan Charlottesville of a few years
ago.

Women, especially, should be prepared to
defend themselves by mechanical or manual
means. The Albemarle County Sheriff's
Department is offering instruction in
self-defense; coeds should seriously consider
attending these sessions if they wish to
transverse the Grounds unescorted at night.
For those who don't feel they can master
judo or karate defense techniques, there are
tear gas pens or pocket sirens.

Unpleasant as it may be to admit, the days
of unrestricted movement and personal
freedom that may once have made the
University an especially attractive place to live
are gone. That fact may elicit crying and
gnashing of teeth, but lamentation alone will
not change the situation. The University
should make every effort to adequately light
the University area, to provide adequate
security, and to fully publicize whatever is
known about the extent and domain of the
problem. But beyond that, the responsibility
for your safety falls wholly to you and your
friends. Be concerned enough to take the
effort to use your head to think about what
you are doing, not just use your mouth to
berate the University for not solving a
problem which it alone cannot solve.