Molly Molloy: The Story of the Ciudad Juarez Femicides Is a 'Myth' Christopher Hooks - The Texas Observer
go to original January 11, 2014

For years, a specter hung over Ciudad Juárez. In the 1990s, the largest city on the Texas-Mexico border became infamous for its gruesome “femicides” - the murders of hundreds of women. The murders, held to be predominantly mysterious and sexual in nature, grew in the public’s imagination. Juárez developed an international reputation as a place of horrific violence against women, a reputation that has become an internationally dominant narrative about the city

... Some who write about the femicides speculate wildly about the source of the violence, suggesting the killers “belong to street gangs, organized crime syndicates, powerful families, a satanic cult, an underground snuff film industry, the police - or all of the above.” The killings, they claim, are sexual, brutal, commonplace, and above all, inexplicable.

That’s a narrative that Molly Molloy, a research librarian and professor at New Mexico State University, finds deeply troubling.

... In recent years, she’s become increasingly convinced that the commonly accepted story of the Juárez femicides is a myth. While violence has extracted a horrific toll in the city, Molloy says, the proportion of homicides with female victims in Juárez is less than it is in many American cities. What’s more, she says, the sensationalistic narrative of the sexual murders of young women in Juárez distracts Americans from the real social dysfunction experienced by Mexicans living near the border.

Read the rest at The Texas Observer

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