After a Memphis marathoner was murdered on a run, some on social media tried accountable her for operating alone earlier than daybreak.
DALLAS — Natalie Merrill will get a little bit jealous when she sees males operating with earbuds.
“I can’t run in headphones,” she mentioned. “I need to make sure I hear everything around me.”
In her proper hand, she carries mace.
In her left, she carries a pouch with a small knife.
“It’s sad that I have to constantly do that, that I have to think about that. I have to be constantly on the lookout,” she mentioned.
Merrill considers operating an escape.
But even when she runs, her thoughts has to remain centered.
It’s a unique story for Kevin Roberts.
“I think nothing about getting up at 4 or 5 in the morning. I don’t have to carry mace. I don’t have to think about what I’m wearing. I just take off and go run,” he mentioned.
Roberts is without doubt one of the leaders of the White Rock Running Co-Op, a Dallas-based operating group.
So are dozens of girls who watched protection of Eliza Fletcher’s abduction and homicide in horror.
Fletcher was kidnapped whereas she was on a 4:30 a.m. run in Memphis, Tennessee.
A 38-year-old man is charged within the case. Police imagine it was a random assault.
But on social media, some folks have blamed Fletcher – questioning her for being out on a run alone earlier than daybreak sporting a operating bra with no shirt over it.
The feedback have angered loads of runners – particularly feminine runners.
“In 2015 I had a gun pulled on me when I was running and one of the first things people said to me was, ‘why were you running so early alone?’” Merrill mentioned. “She was just doing something she loved.”
“They’re talking about what hours she was running, what she was wearing. It’s crazy,” he mentioned.
Fletcher graduated from Baylor University in Waco.
Conrad Vickroy is a runner who has been instructing self-defense lessons to feminine runners for 20 years.
He desires those that take his class to return away realizing a number of martial arts strikes, however he mentioned it’s extra about empowering girls.
“We are not teaching you to become fighters, we are teaching you to remain runners,” Vickroy mentioned.
He preaches consciousness, telling girls to know their environment, have an escape deliberate, at all times run with a telephone and by no means run with headphones.
“We want to give them all those pointers, but we also want to recognize the fact that it’s always the attacker’s fault, it’s not the runner’s fault,” he mentioned.
Female runners face a troublesome reality, however nonetheless they run.
And for that, they ought to by no means be shamed.
“We should be able to do that without having to worry every morning,” Merrill mentioned.
story by The Texas Tribune Source link