Anyone who's ever parked a bicycle on campus and later returned to find his or her treasured vehicle-of-choice sans tires, rims, gears, handlebars, seat, streamers and ding-a-ling bell is all too familiar with the overriding rule of the times: in order to keep something safe, you must lock it up.
The rule is applied to everything these days: cars, houses, computers, dogs and aged relatives. But Florida businessman Cliff Yandell has taken the rule one step further. He's applied it to -- rape prevention.
"It seemed like a logical idea," says Yandell of the impetus for him to invent the Escort belt, a product that some have jokingly referred to as "the chastity belt for the 90s."
"It's basically just a normal, leather belt -- except for one feature," he says.
That feature, which differentiates Yandell's belt from the waistwear one might see at a department store or belt bazaar is a Lilliputian lock-and-key mechanism hidden beneath the buckle.
The lock, which features a key Yandell estimates as "the size of your thumbnail," corresponds with an adjacent, secondary set of belt holes on the belt's backside. If someone, for example, fastens their belt on the fourth hole, the lock can be adjusted to go through the fourth hole of the second set of holes, then snapped shut and locked.
In determining the amount of time a belt-wearer would take to snap the lock into place, Yandell put employees to work repeatedly locking and unlocking the belt over periods of several hours. In the end, the average time needed to engage or disengage the device is only five to 10 seconds. As stated on Yandell's web page http://www.rapeprotection.com, "getting raped will absolutely change your life; it is clearly worth a few extra seconds to protect yourself from something really bad."
"You don't even have to look at (the lock) to put it on or take it off," claims Yandell. "But everyone loses keys, and this is one key you don't want to lose. Keep an extra in the bottom of your shoe or whatever."
Throw in a flexible cable embedded in the Escort belt that makes it impervious to cutting from most any instrument short of the Jaws of Life, and you've got yourself a higher-tech belt than Batman -- plus, one doubts the Dark Knight could choose from black, brown or navy leather with a brushed nickel-, satin gold- or bronze-finished buckle.
One might worry, though, that a disillusioned attacker, upon finding his goal so cleverly barricaded, could inflict bodily harm upon the belt-wearer.
"We do have concerns about that," concurs Yandell. "But our philosophy about this situation is that it's no different than a policeman or airline pilot with a gun to his head. Do what the bad guy says. In a case like that, we recommend that the woman do whatever necessary to avoid injury.
"However, 80 percent of cases are not like that, fortunately," continues the inventor. "Those 80 percent are women having too much to drink, or whatever, and often knowing no way to even prove she got raped. It goes well beyond a question of consent if (the attacker) is looking around for a key. It's first-degree sexual assault at that point."
Instances of "date" or "acquaintance" rape are especially high on college campuses. Advertisements for the Escort belt, which have run in The Daily Californian and more than 20 other student-run college newspapers, claim "(College women) have a 1 in 4 chance of being raped, usually by someone you know." That statistic would be more accurate if it used the term "attempted rape," but regardless, the numbers are staggeringly high. As Yandell's web page claims, "an Escort belt can protect you."
Yandell is currently taking orders for the belt, even though it is not yet on the retail shelves. Yandell has not decided on a definite price for the belt, but says it will be about $30 plus shipping and handling.
Some, however, are less than enthused with the Escort concept. Paula Flam, UC Berkeley director of social services, couldn't help but dissolve into laughter upon hearing about the device.
"It gets me thinking to medieval times, to chastity belts," jokes Flam, a counselor for victims of sexual assault. "I think it's a too simplistic answer to a very complicated problem. I don't think we solve date rape by putting women back in chastity belts or the modern equivalent thereof. It puts the responsibility back on the woman, and I don't like that."
Rather than putting themselves under lock-and-key, Flam advocates that female party-goers use the buddy system.
"In general, if women decide to buddy up when going out to a party -- to arrive, travel and come home together -- that's probably a more humane way to go about it than locking one's self up."
But if the device catches on, wearers of an Escort belt may prove themselves more interested in deterring a date rape than stamping out the problem altogether. As writer Ben Edlund penned about street violence, "I don't want to stop crime; I just want to fight it."
And what better way to fight crime than in a belt with a brushed nickel-, satin gold- or bronze-finished buckle?
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Page last updated 97-Oct-24 by: Altairboy@aol.com