Overview of Are we fueling violence against women?
This NPR It’s Been a Minute episode examines femicide—the targeted killing of women, often by intimate partners—and asks why so many cases in the U.S. are treated as isolated tragedies instead of part of a larger pattern of gendered violence. Brittany Luce speaks with reporter Avanay Clayton (The Guardian) and sociology professor Cheryl Neely about high-profile killings, how guns intensify domestic abuse, why femicide is difficult to track, and how cultural attitudes toward women help sustain the problem.
Main Examples and Why They Matter
High-profile cases discussed
- Nancy Metayer Bowen: an environmental scientist and South Florida politician who was found dead in her home; her husband was charged with first-degree murder.
- Dr. Serena Fairfax: a dentist and former second lady of Virginia who was killed by her estranged husband, former Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, who then died by suicide.
- The episode also references several other Black women killed by partners in a single month, emphasizing how quickly the news cycle moves on.
Bigger point
These cases are presented not as rare anomalies, but as part of a broader and recurring pattern of violence against women.
What Femicide Is
Definition
- Femicide = the targeted killing of women and girls.
- It is often rooted in control, especially in intimate relationships.
- Cheryl Neely describes it as violence used as the “ultimate means to control another human being.”
U.S. context
- In many countries, femicide is a distinct legal category.
- In the U.S., these killings are usually charged under general homicide laws, which makes them harder to identify as part of a specific social problem.
Why Femicide Is Hard to Track
Weak classification systems
- There is no official U.S. national category for femicide.
- Crime data is often delayed, inconsistent, and incomplete.
- Police departments report to the FBI voluntarily, which means national data can miss cases.
Public vs. private framing
- These killings are often treated as “family matters” or private domestic incidents rather than public safety issues.
- The guests argue that when women are killed by partners, the danger is broader than one household—it reflects a social threat to women generally.
What Makes the U.S. Distinct
Guns and domestic abuse
- Clayton emphasizes that firearms make abusive relationships far more lethal.
- A gun that is framed as protection can become a tool of terror when a relationship turns violent, especially if a woman tries to leave.
Persistent intimate-partner violence
- Even as overall murder rates fluctuate, killings of women by male partners have not meaningfully declined.
- The guests connect this to power dynamics and, in Neely’s view, women’s growing economic independence threatening male dominance.
Cultural Beliefs That Normalize Femicide
Women as property
- Both guests argue that American culture still treats women, in subtle and overt ways, as possessions.
- Neely points to marriage rituals and language like “Who gives this woman?” as evidence of that mindset.
Normalization of disrespect and violence
- Clayton discusses how girls and women are often socialized to accept harassment, control, and humiliation as normal.
- Small acts of misogyny are framed as jokes or rites of passage, but the episode argues they sit on the same continuum as more severe violence.
Pop culture and media reinforcement
- The conversation touches on:
- harmful stereotypes of Black women in media,
- entertainment that laughs at violence against women,
- and messaging that encourages women to protect male power rather than their own safety.
What the Guests Think Could Help
Cheryl Neely’s view
- She is skeptical that meaningful systemic change will happen soon.
- She argues that many institutions benefit from existing power structures and are therefore not strongly motivated to solve the problem.
Avanay Clayton’s recommendation
- Have direct conversations with boys and men.
- Challenge casual misogyny immediately:
- jokes about hitting women,
- treating girls as property,
- or defining “respect” as something owed only to men.
- Her core advice: “Get comfortable getting uncomfortable.”
Key Takeaways
- Femicide is not just individual violence; it is a pattern rooted in gender power imbalances.
- In the U.S., guns, weak data systems, and cultural normalization make the problem more lethal and harder to measure.
- The episode argues that how society talks about women matters—in homes, media, politics, and everyday conversations.
- Preventing femicide requires naming misogyny early and treating violence against women as a public crisis, not a private matter.
Notable Insights
- “Women are still seen as property.”
- “The tip of the iceberg is femicide.”
- “Get comfortable getting uncomfortable.”