A girl was drinking, and instantly it’s her fault for being sexually assaulted. A girl was wearing anything other than a turtleneck (or even was wearing a turtleneck), and it’s her fault for being sexually assaulted. Anyone could be wearing anything, saying anything, and yet according to the world, it would be their fault for being sexually assaulted. What year is it? What decade is it? What kind of society do we live in where the victims of crimes are made into the villains for speaking up?
In January 2015, Brock Allen Turner, a former Stanford swimmer, was found raping an unconscious woman. Recently, on June 2, 2016, Turner was sentenced to six months away in a county jail. His victim read the court and her attacker an extremely moving letter on the day of his sentencing.
In 2016, it absolutely boggles my mind that people of authority are allowing rapists to continue on with their lives and obtain a six-month sentence (rather than the at least 14 years that the rapist was able to be sentenced to) because the judge doesn’t want this experience to have, “a severe impact,” on the rapist’s life and supposedly spectacular swimming career.
Why is it that the victim, in the eyes of authority, seems to always be thrown by the wayside? Why is it that a person (regardless of their gender) who was outside or inside their own house, wearing any form of clothing, bearing any kind of face, dawning any kind of expression, walking any kind of way, drinking any kind of drink, eating any kind of food, saying any kind of thing, and being near any type of person can instantly turn into a victim within a matter of seconds just because they decided to walk to the library at night or not be accompanied by a large group of people when wanting to visit a friend or just travel anywhere that could be deemed unsafe?
Why is it that all the people of authority seem to care about is preserving the life and sanity of a criminal who decided that the person going for a walk definitely was asking to be groped and assaulted? Why do they care about making sure someone with, “so much potential,” for a swimming program keeps up his sanity so an Ivy League school can get their hands on a measly championship?
Why don’t we care about justice? Why don’t we care about maintaining the sanity and wellbeing of the victim? Why are their thoughts and their needs so often pushed away like they’re dirt, they’re untrue, or they paint a bad picture on someone who was once thought of as a ‘golden child?’
According to the Rape Response Services, “rape victims are four times more likely to have contemplated suicide after the rape than non-crime victims and 13 times more likely than non-crime victims to have attempted suicide.” To push a victim’s assault away and neglect the mental and physical implications of the assault on the victim only continues to belittle their pain and belittle the horrors of the attacker’s actions. By belittling the actions of the attacker and ceasing to talk about the victim’s side will only allow these crimes to continue and allow attackers to believe there will be no consequences for performing sexual assault.
To say, “Oh the victim is probably making the whole thing up,” is such a tired expression used by people who don’t really know their facts and need to get their ‘facts’ from a much more reputable source. I’ll gladly point you in the direction of some facts that you should actually base your opinions off of.
In reality, only 2-8% of reported sexual assaults are determined to be false. When you think about that in the larger scope of things, that means that out of the estimated 293,000 yearly REPORTED (‘reported’ is a very important word here because about 68% of sexual assaults are not reported to police) sexual assaults, about 5,860 have been determined false. That means about 287,140 sexual assaults are considered to be real and to have happened. That number is one that is way too large for society to continually jump to the conclusion that a victim of sexual assault is making a false accusation.
We’re the generation that is supposed to be changing the world and making it a better place for the ones that follow us. This is our time. It’s time we do a better job at raising our children (both boys and girls) to not rape, instead of teaching them how to avoid being a victim. It’s time we don’t let people believe there aren’t consequences for their actions.
If someone doesn’t take the time to wait to pursue someone when they’re conscious, able to give consent (without being under the influence of alcohol or drugs), and are able to give consent verbally by saying a definite “yes”, and instead takes advantage of the victim without waiting to get those crucial confirmations, they don’t deserve the time of day. They don’t deserve to walk away after six months in a county prison because the judge doesn’t want the sentencing to, “have a severe impact,” on them. They don’t deserve to have someone sympathize for their supposed, ‘lost talent,’ and they sure as hell don’t deserve to be able to walk away as if nothing ever happened.
Because, for the victim, what happened is something of which they can never completely let go.
Photo credit: Joseph Kaczmarek/AP Images for The Atlantic