Our Purpose
Why being Unstable is part of the answer
We started Wildly Unstable Women, LLC to provide a platform to encourage the voices of women and our allies. We are all survivors. We are working to survive sexism, sexual assault, harassment, violence, and systematic misogyny on a daily basis.
The patriarchy is in every aspect of our lives keeping women from achieving their highest potential. Wildly Unstable Women, LLC was created out of righteous anger.
Our inspiration is to Honor women and our experiences, encourage women to express our righteous anger, and support women to speak our truth to power.
Here in the United States, we have seen an increase in patriarchal authoritarianism. Male-dominated state and federal legislatures have been passing laws to control women’s bodies, diminishing female autonomy, eroding women’s reproductive rights, and thwarting progress for gender and gay equality. Every day the War on Women is escalating and women are experiencing increasing misogyny** in day-to-day life as well as on social media.
For facts about why women around the world have justified reasons to be angry about how dangerous it is to be female in a misogynist world please see below.
~Owning Our Anger ~
Women have a right to be angry, we have a right to be defiant and refuse to cooperate in our oppression. Honoring our anger is healing, empowering, and transformative. We won’t be silenced we will become louder. Our merchandise is not only a form of activism and protest but is meant to empower women by encouraging women to have a voice, express opinions, and TAKE UP SPACE.
Co-founder, Wisa Wahosi Trudell is currently in an ongoing court case having been taken to court by one of her abusers in an attempt to control, silence, and isolate her. Her court experience is a classic form of DARVO. ( Deny, Attack, Reverse Role of Victim Offender).
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Women are still encountering damaging and sexist stereotypes when they ask institutions and individuals for accountability. Since the MeToo movement, there has been societal backlash when women have come forward to accuse powerful men and their enablers. Many victims who have tried to use the judicial system to receive justice have found that their mental and emotional health is weaponized against them as a way to deflect from the action of their abuser. The gaslighting of uncontrollable women has been refined. Psychologist, researcher, and founder of Sexual Violence & Institutional Courage, Jennifer Freyd coined the term “DARVO” to explain a common manipulation strategy of abusers. First abusers Deny the abuse ever took place, next they Attack their Victim. Lastly, they Reverse their roles and lie, claiming to be the legitimate victim, with the victim falsely accused of being an Offender. ​
Wahosi Trudell learned that she was “unstable” when her
abuser in court documents continually referred to her as “unstable”. Like many women before her the term “unstable”, a pejorative, is being used to denigrate, discredit, and undermine her credibility with the judicial system, her family, and with 3rd parties.
Being continuously referred to as “unstable” was so ridiculously sexist and such a common and predictable retort of sexual predators, that we felt driven to create merchandise in the tradition of political satire to mock its absurdity.
~Women Who Refuse to Conform ~
Historically, before uncontrollable women were referred to as “unstable” by misogynistic societies, women were burnt and hanged as witches. Later on, women were deemed “hysterical and disturbed” and thrown into insane asylums.
In the 19th Century, psychiatry decided that female independence was madness. Women were accused of suffering from “hysteria”; or being mentally disturbed if they were disinterested in marriage, didn’t conform to the traditional image of womanhood, or dared to advocate for the right to vote or receive an education. Many women labeled as suffering from hysteria were institutionalized, where they were abused. If the “unstable” women resisted treatment they were force-fed, and female patients were forbidden to speak, read, write, or even sew.
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Calling women “unstable”, “crazy”, “hysterical”, and “mental” is a form of abuse and is DARVO. We have been DARVO’d long enough! Wildly Unstable Women LLC took back the patriarchal code word that is meant to hurt us, gaslight us, steal our power away from us, and we transformed the term “Unstable” to represent our empowerment. We are Wildly Unstable Women, who will not be controlled, and who will not comply with the misogynistic rules of the patriarchy. We will take up space and use our voices. We rebel and resist, we are defiant, we object and hold opinions, and we challenge. We are unstable to the patriarchy because we exist.
Come be Unstable with us…together we can harass the patriarchy.
***Doctor Julie Suk, the author of “After Misogyny: How the Law Fails Women and What to Do About it”, defines misogyny as; “not only hatred of women but the systematic undervaluing of women and not just undervaluing but undervaluing in ways that benefit everyone else and particularly a society controlled by men”.
5 Essentials to know about
Femicide
Gender-related killings (femicide/feminicide) are the most brutal and extreme manifestation of a continuum of violence against women and girls that takes many interconnected and overlapping forms. Defined as an intentional killing with a gender-related motivation, femicide may be driven by stereotyped gender roles, discrimination towards women and girls, unequal power relations between women and men, or harmful social norms. Despite decades of activism from women’s rights organizations as well as growing awareness and action from Member States, the available evidence shows that progress in stopping such violence has been deeply inadequate.
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With the aim of galvanizing global action against this all too pervasive crime, in line with the vision of the Generation Equality Forum action coalitions, UNODC and UN Women have joined forces to produce the second edition of a report on gender-related killings of women and girls. Released ahead of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence, the report’s chilling findings add heightened urgency to an existing global emergency.
Women and girls are most likely to be killed by those closest to them.
In 2021, around 45,000 women and girls worldwide were killed by their intimate partners or other family members (including fathers, mothers, uncles, and brothers). This means that, on average, more than five women or girls are killed every hour by someone in their own family. Current and former intimate partners are by far the most likely perpetrators of femicide, accounting for an average of 65 percent of all intimate partner and family-related killings.
Femicide is a universal problem.
Like all forms of gender-based violence against women and girls, femicide is a problem that affects every country and territory across the globe. According to the new report, in 2021, Asia recorded the largest number of female intimate partner and family-related killings with an estimated 17,800 victims; followed by 17,200 in Africa; 7,500 in the Americas; 2,500 in Europe; and 300 in Oceania.
Adjusted for total population size, the available data shows that, in 2021, 2.5 women and girls per 100,000 were killed by an intimate partner or family member in Africa; compared with 1.4 in the Americas; 1.2 in Oceania; 0.8 in Asia; and 0.6 in Europe.
The true scale of femicide is likely much higher than reported.
While the numbers presented in the report are alarmingly high, they are the tip of the iceberg. Too many victims of femicide still go uncounted: for roughly four in ten intentional murders of women and girls in 2021, there is not enough information to identify them as gender-related killings because of national variation in criminal justice recording and investigation practices.
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In many cases, only gender-related killings perpetrated by an intimate partner or family member are counted as femicides—yet we know that gender-related killings take place in many contexts beyond the private sphere. They can be related to rape or sexual violence by someone unknown to the victim; linked to harmful practices such as female genital mutilation or so-called “honour”-based violence; a result of hate crimes linked to sexual orientation or gender identity; or connected with armed conflict, gangs, human trafficking and other forms of organized crime.
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Ensuring the availability of comprehensive disaggregated data is critical to strengthening femicide prevention, protection and response measures, as well as access to justice. To help move beyond the current limitations in data collection, UNODC and UN Women recently developed the Statistical framework for measuring the gender-related killing of women and girls (“femicide/feminicide”), approved by the United Nation’s Statistical Commission in March 2022.
Femicide CAN and MUST be prevented.
Gender-related killings and other forms of violence against women and girls are not inevitable. They can and must be prevented through primary prevention initiatives focused on transforming harmful social norms and engaging whole communities and societies to create zero tolerance for violence against women; early intervention and risk assessment; and access to survivor-centered support and protection as well as gender-responsive policing and justice services.
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National experiences, for example in South Africa, strongly suggest that substantive and sustained decreases in femicide can be achieved through comprehensive laws and policies aimed at preventing gender-based violence against women, firearms control legislation, and activism of women’s rights and community-based groups.
More research is required to better understand what is driving increased femicide in certain contexts, and what factors have enabled decreases in others to better inform prevention strategies.
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Women’s rights organizations play a crucial role in preventing violence against women and girls, driving policy change, holding governments to account, and providing critical survivor-centered services. Strengthening financial support to and partnership with women’s rights organizations is critical in reducing and preventing gender-related killings and all forms of gender-based violence against women and girls.
In the face of a global pushback against women’s rights, protecting women and girls from violence is getting even more challenging. From regressive laws exacerbating impunity for domestic violence perpetrators to the use of force against femicide and gender-based violence protestors and the growing marginalization of women’s rights organizations, women and girls are often being denied justice, protection, and support.