Humanitarian Evidence Program Manager Roxani Krystalli has been quoted in Alice Driver’s piece in the Texas Observer about femicide. Driver argues that, contrary to an emerging narrative, femicide in Mexico is not a myth and it is significant to understand gendered patterns of violence.

Krystalli notes, “the reason it is important to preserve the label ‘femicide’ and not just ‘homicide’ is because there are qualitative differences in the ways in which violence is targeted and carried out.” She continues: “Certain types of violence against women (such as sexualized torture, paradigmatic displays of women’s naked bodies in public spaces after their deaths and others) are deliberately feminized in order to send messages to other women or to men associated with the female victims,” wrote Krystalli in an email. “These are often linked to threats to cease perceived activist or oppositional activities.”

You can read Driver’s full piece here.