Life moves so quickly that there’s rarely any chance for reflection. Each story captures public attention for a fleeting moment, before our increasingly short attention span searches for something new to fixate on.
A woman’s death has provoked shouting matches between ideological poles.
This sucks up the space and consideration for positive actions that we ought to have taken, and still should if we want to avoid a repeat of Paulina Dembska’s tragic fate.
There is a responsibility that every single one of us must shoulder for the death of Paulina Dembska.
Some will be offended by that statement:
Why should we all be burdened with the responsibility of one man’s act? What blame can be attributed to those who would never dream of committing murder? If he was mentally ill, what’s that got to do with me?
Nobody wants to share in the blame of something so horrendous. Our knee-jerk reaction is to wash our hands clean of guilt. The skeletons are kept in the closet where they belong, and the elephant sits with us in the room.
But Paulina Dembska’s murder was not just the doing of one man. It is a product of our poisoned public discourse and our indifference towards the ills of our society.
It is our failure to recognise the disadvantaged position of women in our society. Our failure to reform the drastically failing mental health care system. A failure to hold politicians to account and demand real change from them. A failure to deal with extremism, cults and religious sects.
Years of neglect have culminated in the brutal killing of an innocent woman. Not for the first time, but for the 27th time in 20 years !
If we choose to continue ignoring the pattern and sweep it under the rug as we have done in the past, we’re doomed to repeat our mistakes.
We cannot allow Paulina Dembska to simply be relegated to a long and heartbreaking list of women who died because of our inaction.
Paulina Dembska’s death should inspire real change, only then would she not have died in vain…….
until then, take a moment to mourn.
R.I.P Paulina Dembska