In the aftermath of the tragic death and suspected murder of Sarah Everard, a 33-year-old marketing executive from South London, the police made door-to-door inquiries reportedly warning women not to wander alone in the streets. In turn, many felt like such an approach only adds to the already flawed culture of victim-blaming.

Lucy Mountain, a personal trainer and Instagram influencer, is just like many women who tread those pavements day after day and think of the surrounding neighborhoods and streets in them as their home. So she felt an urge to use her Instagram platform of 463k followers to voice her views on how “a woman was not allowed to walk home” in light of Sarah Everard’s case.

Lucy penned a powerful message that shed light on what women go through every day as part of their auto-pilot defense mechanism. Perpetual fear of being approached, harassed, and hurt has penetrated our ways of going through our daily lives from the very core and since childhood, the author claimed.

So let’s see her powerful and heartbreaking message that has since gone viral with 2.6 million likes, that will make you pause and reflect.

Lucy Mountain penned this powerful message about women not allowed to walk alone in light of Sarah Everard’s tragic murder

Image credits: lucymountain

Bored Panda reached Lucy Mountain, a personal trainer and founder of Nobs Guides, whose heartfelt post on Instagram went viral, resonating with more than 2.6 million people. Lucy told us that she, just like many women, relates to Sarah since “Any of us could have been her.”

Image credits: lucymountain

“We have all done that walk after dark. We have all taken the precautions of wearing flat shoes, calling a loved one and sticking to main roads,” Lucy stated. She said that “these are all things women are ‘advised’ to do to protect themselves, and it’s still not enough.”

“‘Text me when you get home’ is a text which we all send and receive—and the relatability of this perfectly describes how normalized it is for women to not feel safe when they are alone. This is not okay.”

Lucy also said that the reactions she got from people were “extremely bittersweet.” “On the one hand, I am so proud of the conversations which have been opened up and the stories shared by extremely brave women. It’s given us time to reflect on our own past experiences of harassment—and help us potentially find closure on situations where we were victim-blamed.”

In the aftermath of Sarah’s murder, police reportedly warned women to be careful about venturing out alone

Image credits: LambethMPS

However, Lucy feels that “it’s heartbreaking that the post felt so relatable to so many women,” and added that “4 days on, there is still an influx of ‘whataboutism’ from people trying to derail the conversation.” But for the most part, the personal trainer feels that the feedback has been mainly support and self-reflection “from men by their own actions and women on their past experiences.”

“We need to stop teaching women how to better protect themselves from men and teach men how to stop harassing and attacking women. The conversation shouldn’t be telling women what type of clothing they should wear so as not to ‘provoke’ an attack. The conversation shouldn’t be telling women to not go outside after a certain time.”

This conversation “is about how we stop harassment from men being such a normalized part of a woman’s life experience,” Lucy concluded.

Lucy’s message tugged deeply at the heartstrings and touched 2.6 million people on Instagram

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