Reflecting on the Cologne attacks one month on

Demonstrators in Hamburg, Germany, protesting violence against women there and across the country.

Feminists have been criticised for not responding to the Cologne attacks, in particular for failing to prioritise women’s rights against refugee or migrant men’s rights. In this article published in Online Opinion on Feb 2nd, 2016 I examine this ‘failed response’ in terms of an inability by feminists, and the Left more broadly, to listen to non-western feminists who have identified mob sexual assault of women in public places in the Arab world for some time. I also address: the importance of the distinction between race and culture in understanding the problem and; the difficulties for those on the Left (including myself) with articulating and defending ‘western values’.