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BOOKS

The Furies

Journalist Elizabeth Flock 鈥�08 digs deep into what happens when women use violence to defend themselves.

When the journalist Elizabeth Flock 鈥�08 was still a student at 涩里番下载, she was sexually assaulted while on a trip to Rome with friends. Intimidated by the thought of having to relive the attack while testifying during a criminal case, she chose not to report the crime. But as the years passed, she was haunted by the question of what would have happened if she鈥檇 reacted differently during the assault itself. More than a decade later, she started searching for stories of women across the globe who had responded to violence with violence. She wanted to know what happened to them after they used violence to defend themselves. The result is The Furies: Women, Vengeance, and Justice, a meticulously reported examination of what happened when three women fought back against their abusers. The book received substantial coverage in the New York Times and the New Yorker, which had previously published some of Flock鈥檚 preliminary reporting that led to it. The Washington Post, meanwhile, praised Flock for withholding judgment about her subjects, finding that 鈥渉er work is richer and more troubling because of it.鈥� We recently sat down with Flock to discuss her new book.

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You write of the agonizing process of deciding whether to report your own sexual assault. What factors influenced your decision not to report it?

I didn鈥檛 report my sexual assault to the Italian police because I could imagine what would happen. I thought I would just re-traumatize myself and potentially go through a really horrifying trial.聽

One study found that women who claimed at trial that they鈥檇 used violence only in self-defense were twice as likely as men to be convicted of crimes. The disparity was even starker for women of color.

The systems are built against women. The criminal justice system is so broken in so many ways. And I think women know deep down that if they fight back, they鈥檙e up against that. And then if you do fight back, you鈥檙e criminalized for it. That鈥檚 what the research shows. Overwhelmingly, women take plea deals and go to prison after fighting back against abusers.

The women in your book come from very disparate backgrounds. One killed her rapist in Alabama, another was a freedom fighter in Syria, and another organized a gang to violently respond to domestic violence in India. Given that so few women fight back, what led your subjects to make a different choice?

They all told me similar things: 鈥淚 just didn鈥檛 want to die. I just wanted to protect myself or my community.鈥� Yes, they鈥檙e very different, but they are living in the same kinds of challenging scenarios, and they鈥檙e doubly vulnerable. They鈥檙e women and they鈥檙e poor in Alabama and can鈥檛 afford better legal representation. Or they鈥檙e poor and they鈥檙e Kurdish, a people who have been oppressed for generations. Or they鈥檙e poor and they鈥檙e low-caste, and so they don鈥檛 get justice for multiple reasons. Women who fight back in many cases are women who have nothing to lose.

All of the women you write about start to make choices that complicate the morality of their narratives. For instance, Brittany, the woman in Alabama, was arrested for arson while still on trial for murder.

In my own story, I was passive, and I wanted to understand what it looked like when women were more active. But of course, as any good journalist knows, the longer you follow something, the more complex it gets. With all vigilantes, there鈥檚 a moment where you鈥檙e cheering them on and then all of a sudden you鈥檙e saying, 鈥淗ey, this might not be quite as clean as I thought.鈥� For each of the narratives, there was a clear moment when things shifted. These are women who are fighting for justice, and they are also really flawed humans like the rest of us, and the situations are really complex. That鈥檚 why it鈥檚 important to follow these things long-term, because if not, you鈥檙e just getting a snapshot.

There are abundant examples from fiction of women seeking violent revenge, like in the movie Kill Bill and the Greek epic Medea. What has made these stories so appealing through the centuries?

I think we鈥檙e drawn to these stories because we want to be them. It鈥檚 partly because so many women have experienced some kind of violation and wished that they fought back. Heroes interest us because they鈥檙e extraordinary people, but anti-heroes interest us because they鈥檙e extraordinary yet also complicated like all of us. You add in the layer of sexual or domestic abuse, and I think it鈥檚 no wonder that women are interested in these stories, whether it鈥檚 Kill Bill or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It鈥檚 been an obsession of ours since the beginning of time, as far as I can tell.聽鈼�

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