I can't even
Jun. 8th, 2016 09:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
puppetmakerI am putting this behind a cut and warning for a frank discussion about rape and the effects on the people. Along with a lot of rage about the whole situation of again proving how our justice system is broken and if you are male, white and privileged, you can get a pass that will send a poor minority to prison for years.
There has been a lot of talk on the net about the Stamford student who was convicted by a jury on three counts of sexual assault which the penalty recommended was 14 years in prison but the judge decided to be lenient and give the rapist 6 months with three served so three to go.
Now this might have been one of those blink and you miss it on the 24 hour news cycle but the victim gave an impact statement that resonated with a lot of people and created a lot of discussion and rage.
You can read her very well worded statement here and have a tissue handy.
She was lucky that two gentlemen from Sweden happen to be biking by and saw what was going on. They tackled the rapist and made sure that the victim was OK. They talk about what happened and what they saw to the Daily News which you can find here.
Carl-Fredrik Arndt and Peter Jonsson are heroes who saw that something was wrong and stepped in to help. If they hadn’t, he would have gotten away with the rape and probably gone on to continue this behavior because he has shown no remorse for what he did. He blames everyone but himself for his behavior. It was his attorney’s fault that they called up the victim’s past blamed her for drinking during the trial.
Now let’s say that again, the rapist has shown NO remorse for what he did to this young woman. He’s sorry he was caught and that’s is. One wonders how many times he has done this sort of behavior before and not gotten caught.
The rapist’s father tweeted that his son is depressed and not his ‘happy go lucky’ self anymore. The kid doesn’t enjoy steak or other foods the way he did. The father is upset that for the rest of his child’s life, his son will have to register as a sex offender thus making life harder for him. The father doesn’t think his son’s life should be judged for the twenty minutes that his son assaulted the women behind a dumpster. His son had promise. He was on track to go to the Olympics but now he is being judged for his actions.
Bloody right he is being judged for his actions. He raped someone and only seems to be upset that he was caught.
Now here is the disconnect I am seeing that both the father and son seem to share in common so maybe it’s genetic.
It’s all about how 20 minutes affected HIS life. At no point in any of this does either the father or son acknowledge how the actions of the son affected HER life. It’s not about her and the damaged that he caused her. It is about him and how this is affecting him.
And that’s where I really get even angrier than I was about this whole situation.
It’s is all about this white kid who had all the breaks and had probably been told that he was going to go on and do great things because he was a star athlete. He had hopes of being on the Olympic swim team and go for gold for the good ol’ USA.
He got caught and is being told there is a price for his actions and he doesn’t want to pay it and doesn’t seem to understand WHY he had to pay it.
Rape is wrong.
And I really don’t care how much she had to drink. That is not relevant to what he did.
You know what one should do for someone who is impaired by drugs or alcohol? Get them safely home unmolested or somewhere safe where they can get help if needed. That's it. Full stop.
I have not said the name of the rapist on purpose. I am not giving him more google clicks by saying (OK typing) the rapist’s name. If you want to know more, you know how to use the Internet.
I pray for the young woman who had her entire life changed in those 20 minutes. It will probably color what she does from now on. I wish her health and healing and the best in her life. She was very brave to write the statement that she did and give voice to what is many times the voiceless.
I am grateful that her words are being heard.
There has been a lot of talk on the net about the Stamford student who was convicted by a jury on three counts of sexual assault which the penalty recommended was 14 years in prison but the judge decided to be lenient and give the rapist 6 months with three served so three to go.
Now this might have been one of those blink and you miss it on the 24 hour news cycle but the victim gave an impact statement that resonated with a lot of people and created a lot of discussion and rage.
You can read her very well worded statement here and have a tissue handy.
She was lucky that two gentlemen from Sweden happen to be biking by and saw what was going on. They tackled the rapist and made sure that the victim was OK. They talk about what happened and what they saw to the Daily News which you can find here.
Carl-Fredrik Arndt and Peter Jonsson are heroes who saw that something was wrong and stepped in to help. If they hadn’t, he would have gotten away with the rape and probably gone on to continue this behavior because he has shown no remorse for what he did. He blames everyone but himself for his behavior. It was his attorney’s fault that they called up the victim’s past blamed her for drinking during the trial.
Now let’s say that again, the rapist has shown NO remorse for what he did to this young woman. He’s sorry he was caught and that’s is. One wonders how many times he has done this sort of behavior before and not gotten caught.
The rapist’s father tweeted that his son is depressed and not his ‘happy go lucky’ self anymore. The kid doesn’t enjoy steak or other foods the way he did. The father is upset that for the rest of his child’s life, his son will have to register as a sex offender thus making life harder for him. The father doesn’t think his son’s life should be judged for the twenty minutes that his son assaulted the women behind a dumpster. His son had promise. He was on track to go to the Olympics but now he is being judged for his actions.
Bloody right he is being judged for his actions. He raped someone and only seems to be upset that he was caught.
Now here is the disconnect I am seeing that both the father and son seem to share in common so maybe it’s genetic.
It’s all about how 20 minutes affected HIS life. At no point in any of this does either the father or son acknowledge how the actions of the son affected HER life. It’s not about her and the damaged that he caused her. It is about him and how this is affecting him.
And that’s where I really get even angrier than I was about this whole situation.
It’s is all about this white kid who had all the breaks and had probably been told that he was going to go on and do great things because he was a star athlete. He had hopes of being on the Olympic swim team and go for gold for the good ol’ USA.
He got caught and is being told there is a price for his actions and he doesn’t want to pay it and doesn’t seem to understand WHY he had to pay it.
Rape is wrong.
And I really don’t care how much she had to drink. That is not relevant to what he did.
You know what one should do for someone who is impaired by drugs or alcohol? Get them safely home unmolested or somewhere safe where they can get help if needed. That's it. Full stop.
I have not said the name of the rapist on purpose. I am not giving him more google clicks by saying (OK typing) the rapist’s name. If you want to know more, you know how to use the Internet.
I pray for the young woman who had her entire life changed in those 20 minutes. It will probably color what she does from now on. I wish her health and healing and the best in her life. She was very brave to write the statement that she did and give voice to what is many times the voiceless.
I am grateful that her words are being heard.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 01:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 03:10 pm (UTC)You are a upstanding example of what a man is.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 01:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 03:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 03:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 03:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 02:13 pm (UTC)And it"s not just the son you have to wonder about. How many times has his dad raped? That is a shockingly cavalier attirude for a middle aged adult to have, let alone make public.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 03:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 04:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 04:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-09 05:58 am (UTC)All this talk about safe bathrooms juxtaposed next to this headline has made one thing clear. As a woman, I'm not afraid of a trans* person in the next stall. The worst they will do to me is leave a messy stall behind them. I'm afraid of "All American" privileged monsters all around me, because they leave messed up lives behind them.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-08 07:39 pm (UTC)Good point. I think we need to stop saying to these male defenders "what if it was your daughter or mother, sister?" and start saying "what if this happened to YOU?" And make it clear it's not a PC or joke question.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-09 05:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-06-11 01:26 am (UTC)Yes, I believe that asshattery and douchebaggery are genetic. (The douchebag originally was from Oakwood, a hoity-toity area of Dayton, the biggest city near where I live, so his face is in the virtual paper just about every day. What's interesting is that they originally published the "nice" photo of him in articles discussing the case, but now they always accompany it with the unflattering photo from his booking. It's a shame they keep writing about him, but at least they don't flatter him any. Heh.)