I just came across an article on MSNBC.COM about how students on spring break in Texas are avoiding Mexican border towns in light of increased drug-related violence.So here's a question: how many times in your life have you looked back on past events and thought, "what in the HELL was I thinking?" (And then later, my mother would probably still kill me if she knew I ever did that....)
Anyway, when I was a sophomore at the University of Texas in1988, my roommate and I agreed to go to South Padre Island for spring break with a group of her friends that I barely knew. They seemed OK and were in the marching band, so how much trouble could we get in to? (Come on, I was in the marching band in high school, I know the score.)
At the last minute, she dropped out of the trip and I was left to travel 6.5 hours by car to SPI with a group of near strangers (Thanks a lot, Jill!!). Her friends turned out to be fine, but unfortunately the weather was not--the cold, gray skies lasted all week and nixed our beach plans. The first night, the gang wanted to go to Matamoros, across the border in Mexico. We were early arrivals and the towns were still quiet--not yet flooded with UT and A&M students on break.
So, we crossed the Rio Grande and entered the first bar we found. It was like a scene from a movie--we walk in, the music stops, and everyone turns to stare at us. We're all dressed in our 80's pastels and big hair and the room is full of local Mexican workers, probably enjoying their last night in town until it's taken over by obnoxious American students. There was even a guy in the corner--I kid you not--playing a game which entails holding on to electrodes for as long as you can. I was freaked out--my New Jersey upbringing had not prepared me for this. We ordered some Dos Equis, drank our beer quickly and crossed back immediately thereafter.
Two days later, the town was COMPLETELY different--it was a tourist trap, with loud music, cheap goods for sale, and alcohol everywhere. The gang decided they wanted to go deep, deep, DEEP into Matamoros since the beach was not going to happen, so we hailed a taxi and told him to take us into the town to a decent restaurant. We ate lunch in a place with dirt floors and live chickens running around--it was a hoot. However, 20 years later I look at the satellite picture of Matamoros above, and think--MY GOD, that city is SO BIG--who knows where we were or what might have happened. And of course, we didn't have cell phones back then--no one knew I was there (they knew I was in South Padre, but none of my family members knew I would visit Mexico on the trip).
Anyway, we ended up having a fun time and the friends-of-Jill were pretty cool. We came back to Austin and got back to our studies.
The following year (1989), I stayed in Austin for spring break and slept late every day. Watching the news one night, I caught a story about Mark Kilroy, a UT student who was reported missing in Matamoros. He was a junior, as was I, and he had wandered away from his friends to take a leak in an adjacent alley. A few minutes later, he was gone.
They searched for him and questioned over 100 known criminals for weeks, until finally, someone picked up on a routine drug sting provided evidence to the police that led to Mark. He had been abducted and murdered in a satanic worship ceremony on a ranch outside Matamoros. The description of what they did to him is not for the faint of heart.
Perhaps the saddest part of this story is that many Mexicans were also killed by this Satanic group, few of which received any attention from the Mexican government until Mark. It took the murder of a U.S. citizen for them to recognize the dozens of murders that had already taken place and seek out the offenders. The "mastermind" of the group eventually committed suicide just as he was about to be arrested.
I didn't know Mark, but I've been thinking about how to tie his story to our field's study of risk and victimization. He placed himself at risk by visiting a border town, likely drinking too much, wandering away from his friends, and pissing in an alley. Natalee Holloway similarly took risks, purportedly leaving a bar with a man she had just met. How many hundreds (or thousands) of stupid, drunk college students make similar risky decisions and are luckily to survive to the next day? How many of those students are raped or assaulted as a result of their risky behavior? How many stupid risks have I personally taken in my life, and somehow have emerged unscathed?
Food for thought. Perhaps the ShockSpouse will share his thoughts on the Kilroy incident as well.
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This is a really thoughtful post, and raises such an important point: though young people on spring break engage in risky behaviors, it DOES NOT MEAN they deserve to be victimized.
Since we're sharing...
As The Trailing Spouse will attest, I was always the responsible one in college. Not being a big drinker, I was the perpetual DD and quite often the lone sober one at parties, spending most of my time wrangling up my drunk friends and caring for them when they got sick. But my junior year I decided to let loose and joined a group of my close girlfriends on a spring break trip to Cancun. Needless to say I was out of my drinking league: I have vague memories of standing, mouth agape, in front of waitresses brandishing tequila-filled squirt guns. To put things in perspective, this utter germophobe actually did a shot down an ice luge that HUNDREDS of other revelers had put their mouths on -- a stunt the sober me would never have ever even considered.
One night at around midnight or so I decided that my poor liver had had enough and that I should turn in early. My friends wanted to keep partying, so I set off to catch the bus back to our hotel. Stumbling drunk. By myself.
I made it onto the bus where there were only a few other passengers, a small group of fellow spring breakers. I truly was not coherent at this point. In fact, I remember one guy sitting down next to me to chat, and commenting that I was speaking some "serious Spanglish". Anyway, the group of students got off before me, leaving me sitting alone on the bus a few rows behind the bus driver. My head was swimming from the alcohol -- my senses were deadened and I couldn't seem to focus my mind enough to formulate a coherent thought...until I looked up and saw the bus driver making lewd gestures at me. Even amid the dense fog of my intoxication, an ember of panic ignited in my chest. It was like hearing the Saturday morning tornado siren from miles away: the alarm in my head sounded faint and distant, but I heard it nonetheless: I am not safe. Fortunately the next stop was my hotel, so I dashed off the bus and ran back to my room, furious at myself for being so stupid. I didn’t drink again the rest of the trip.
My little late-night excursion in Cancun is, without question, the most dangerous, irresponsible thing I have ever done – somewhat ironic considering that it was prompted by my rather responsible decision to stop drinking and head home early. Still, even now, my stomach clenches just thinking about what could have happened to me. And you know what? Had I been raped, or abducted, or worse, I can guarantee that people would have been utterly shocked that “someone like me” had been involved in such a situation: I was a Dean’s List student, worked two jobs, was president of my sorority and active in campus leadership, volunteered in the community, blah blah blah. And yet there I was, drunk and alone late at night in Cancun, Mexico, just as vulnerable as any other young woman.
Why did I make it back to my hotel unharmed? I have no idea. I just know that I’m incredibly grateful that nothing bad happened to me that night. And, while I take full responsibility for placing myself in such a risky situation, I resent the notion I would have “deserved it” had I not been so lucky.
And here's why I always stay in the conference hotel, if possible:
My very first ASC conference was in New Orleans in 1992. A group of us wanted to stay in the French Quarter rather than the conference hotel, so four of us split a room. For some reason, the others went back to the hotel before I did, and I was left to walk back by myself. The street our hotel was on was under construction and all traffic was blocked off, so it was kind of desolate. There was a small group of people I had met the day before walking ahead, but they were too far to catch up.
So, I'm walking back to the hotel and I see a man approaching. No big deal--I put on my best "don't mess with me, I'm from NJ" face and walk by him. As I pass, he gropes me and says "nice t*ts". I smacked his hand away and tell him to "f**k off", and he goes crazy on me. He starts yelling stuff like "who are YOU to tell ME to f**k off? Who the f**k do you think you are?" (Because obviously, he has the right to touch any woman he wants, right?).
Luckily, I remembered the name of one of the guys in the group ahead and yelled out them to wait up (I still remember--it was Vizza, rhymed with "pizza"). I don't even think they realized anything had happened--they just walked me back to my hotel.
Thankfully, I hadn't been drinking (yet) that night. My risky behavior was to walk alone down a deserted street in an unfamiliar city. Had I been drinking, who knows what would have happened?
I'm glad we're discussing this. I think a lot of times when young people -- especially young women -- have been drinking and are victimized, people have this attitude like, "Well she should have known better" or "A good/moral/smart/upstanding/etc. person wouldn't have been in that situation in the first place". In other words, there is quite often a value judgment about the victim's character based on her manner of dress, her alcohol consumption, her presence at the place where the attack occurred, etc. I think it is important to recognize that lots of people sometimes engage in risky behavior, not just the "bad seeds".
I went to South Padre Island with 11 other guys in college, and we made the (seemingly obligatory) trip into Matamoros. During the day, everything was fine - very touristy, drunk American kids, etc. It began to get dark as we made our way back to the border, and we passed a night club where approximately 30 very surly-looking dudes were on line. I am convinced that if there had been fewer of us that we would have been in some serious trouble.
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