Tags
amanda todd, blaming the victim, online bullying, pitt meadows, rape, rape culture, rehtaeh parsons, teenage girls
…And another one falls.
I had to think for a while about what I could say about Rehtaeh Parsons. After all, what could I say about her that I haven’t already said about Amanda Todd, or the Steubenville rape case? What could I say that my fellow bloggers already haven’t?
So I’ve decided not to talk about her at all.
Instead of rallying around and calling for justice once the poor victim has committed suicide, let’s do it while the person is STILL ALIVE!
Because Rehtaeh wasn’t alone.
A very similar incident happened in BC, right around the time Owl was born.
A 16 year old girl went to a rave. Tsk tsk, I know, but teenagers do dumb things, like go to raves. This girl went with friends, and only had one or two drinks. She tried to be safe.
But the girl was drugged, and then gang raped. The rapes were video taped and photographed by onlookers, and by the next morning, they were all over Facebook.
The videos going viral seemed to be the focus of most of the news stories – not the fact that the girl had been raped, but the fact that PEOPLE POSTED VIDEOS.
There was immediate police action to take down the videos and photos, and charges were laid, and everything looked just fine.
Two and a half years later…
Only one guy was charged with the actual rape, and those charges have been stayed due to insufficient evidence. Sound familiar, to those people who know Rehtaeh’s story?
A couple of guys were charged with distributing child pornography – again a step up from Rehtaeh’s case, but wait:
The punishment for one Dennis Warrington was 120 hours of community service and a written apology. What is this, grade school? Say you’re sorry, hug and make up? That’s it? FOR WATCHING SOMEONE GET RAPED AND PHOTOGRAPHING IT?
Apparently the victim felt the same.
“Dennis can tell this courtroom, your family and your lawyer 100 times that you are sorry for what you did and you can apologize to me but I don’t believe you are sorry for one second,” said the girl, in a voice flush with rage.
“You are not sorry for what you did. You are just sorry you got caught.”
The other one just had to write an essay on the harmful impact of social media. WHAT? NOT ON RAPE? Is this really a “know the risks of Facebook” issue?
So… let’s recap.
- The rape happened while the girl was drugged. The police said from the outset that it had been medically confirmed (I remember the original news stories mentioning injuries and such, I’m pretty sure she even had a rape kit done).
- Lots of people watched/were involved.
- No witnesses have come forward to testify on her behalf.
- The people who photographed and distributed video and photographic evidence got slaps on the wrist for being so indiscrete.
- The Crown says there isn’t enough evidence to prosecute.
The girl has said that this rape ruined her life.
Surprise surprise – she is being bullied on Facebook and Twitter by the friends and family of those people who received those shockingly minor charges. And guess what? It’s making her miserable.
“Honestly, it’s like being tortured on a daily basis and I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy,” the girl said.
“People say that it will get better and that the pain will go away but it’s been two years and it still kills me.”
The bullying that followed caused the girl to drop out of high school. To this day, she suffers from panic attacks and anxiety. She even turned to drugs and thought about killing herself.
Does any of this sound familiar?
Look. I don’t have a photo of her. I can’t show you her face. I can’t give you a name.
But can we rally behind her anyway? Can you please share her story? Can you please demand justice?
Can we try to support this one, defend this one, SAVE this one… BEFORE the worst happens?
Please.
For Amanda Todd.
For Rehtaeh Parsons.
Let’s not wait until the girl kills herself before we share her story.
Let’s celebrate her for NOT killing herself. Let’s celebrate her survival. Let’s HELP her survive.
Let’s share now.
Let’s demand witnesses to come forward NOW.
Let’s fight now.
NOW!
I find this statement problematic:
“This girl went with friends, and only had one or two drinks. She tried to be safe.”
I’m not sure why you’re mentioning it – if she had been alone and drunk would she have been less of a victim? 100% of rapes occur in places and locations and are committed by other people. So to be safe we should stay in caves alone and never come out?
That said, I really appreciate your continued advocacy.
Ha, I said it because of the sickening responses I got to my sarcastic “let’s all blame the victim” post. If you go down on my Facebook a bit, you’ll find it. Victim blaming makes me sick, but considering how many people seem to think that girls deserved to be raped if they attend parties, go near men etc that I thought I’d just mention this little fact as a pre-emptive response to the inevitable assholes who will respond to this post with “she deserved it because she didn’t try to stay safe.”
…people make me sick.
I know exactly why you pointed out that she tried to ‘stay safe’ – this week a Facebook page called “The Real Rehtaeh Parsons” went up with pictures of her smoking pot. There was also a rally outside the Halifax police station today in support of further investigation and eventual charges… and there were other people there to protest the rally, saying that “there was more to the story”.
You know, I don’t know why people need to add “more” to “rape”. Whenever someone is murdered people don’t say there is “more” to the murder. No one ever argues that Jack The Ripper’s murders weren’t crimes because his victims were prostitutes.
“You know, I don’t know why people need to add “more” to “rape”. Whenever someone is murdered people don’t say there is “more” to the murder. No one ever argues that Jack The Ripper’s murders weren’t crimes because his victims were prostitutes.”
ILU.
Also, may I quote you? This is soooooooo true.
Go for it. Victim blaming makes me so angry.
Thanks.
Yeah it drives me nuts.
Someone earned an earful and getting blocked from me earlier today for dismissing sexual assault as “non rapey crimes”. Good grief, how incredibly patronising and UGH. From someone claiming there’s no such thing as “rape culture”, and that rape and sexual assault aren’t common or as big an issue as we whiny women make out.
Let’s just say he should be grateful this was on facebook so I couldn’t actually kick him in the nuts… <_<
Anyway, nuff said – love this post. Hope this girl gets all the support she needs and these assholes are brought to justice,
Amen
Holy crap.
You know how sometimes you click on a link, then on another, then on another, and suddenly an hour has gone by?
This is the link at the end of this hour that has me shaking my head:
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/x6yef/reddits_had_a_few_threads_about_sexual_assault/c5jtt3p
I was sexually abused as a child by an older boy, something I’ve really only started to talk about and come to terms with this last few years, but I’m fortunate enough (!) that the closest I got to being raped was when a guy broke I to mine and a friend’s hotel room in Lithuania, and our friend next door heard the commotion as the guy attempted to knock our heads together. Terrifying, and a close call, but we were incredibly lucky.
But I can also soooo easily see how this could have happened to me.
I went to a collegiate university, and my college was a Christian college. It had a high than usual proportion of decent guys and guys who didn’t cat around. Even then, I did some stupid things, like walking home at 2am along unlit riverside paths, but I was fortunate enough not to reap any consequences.
I know there were times when my (untreated, because I didn’t know what it was) depression had me pretty desperate for attention. If I had been approached and sweet talked by a guy like this? I could definitely have been taken in.
I’ve often thought that I was incredibly lucky to have the college experience I did, surrounded by the kind of people, and particularly the kind of men, who maybe weren’t the typical 18-25 year olds. (If I told you that we had a theological college tacked on to our college, and that my one college boyfriend was training to be a vicar, you’ll get the picture!) I’ve often thought, and said, that in a different environment, at that point in my life, I would’ve been some guys’ favourite kind of victim. And I probably would’ve blamed myself for anything that happened to me.
Reading this, I think it even more. If it had been more typical… If some guy even remotely as predatory as this had decided to force himself on me…
In short: this was a frightening read. And what is maybe more frightening is that this man apparently walked away from that anonymous post with nothing but a lighter conscience.
OK, it’s 1.30 in the morning here, and I feel I’m rambling, but that post… I had to share it. I’m kind of blindsided, and chilled to the bone.
Yes, I’ve read a LOT of that thread. It’s fascinating. Disturbing as hell, but fascinating because it gives you a glimpse of the sorts of mentalities that lead to rape. I’m sorry you stumbled on it, it must be a massive trigger for anyone who has been abused or assaulted in that way.
I was actually pretty shocked just how much it got to me. It usually takes a lot to trigger stuff for me, I think in some ways I’m quite thick skinned. Even when I’m moved, when I identify with someone’s pain, I usually just get weepy in a cathartic kind of way.
But I am actually still feeling literally nauseated today from it.
Wow. Was anyone else enraged at the journalist writing that last essay? I get that the rapist has not been convicted in a court of law, and innocent until proven guilty. I get the need for “alleged”s and trying to maintain neutrality. But the absolute least you could do, the bare fucking minimum standard of human decency, would be to give the same benefit of doubt to the victim, assume that she might in fact possibly be telling the truth, and not refer to her and her alleged rapist as “the couple”. And when the hell did this trend of newspapers refering to alleged rapes as “having sex” regardless of whether both parties were choosing to “have” it start? It used to be that if there was any question of consent, it was referred to as “the alleged assault,” or even the euphemistic “the incident”, not as when “they had sex”.
I guess talking about rapists just isn’t as, well, sexy, as talking about sex criminals when it comes to drawing in readers. Words matter.
Yes, there is no excuse for implying that this could possibly have been consensual. The cops said right from the first that it was clearly rape, since she had “injuries” that would not exist in consensual intercourse.
I. have. no. more. words. This makes me sick to my stomach. 😦
Thank you for sharing your outrage.
As a rape survivor I’m constantly disgusted by the fact so few people get it!! RAPE=VIOLENCE!!!! RAPE IS NEVER EVER THE SAME AS SEX!!!!!
Good grief, if only society would get that into their thick skull, so much EXTRA pain would be spared! We get raped and then we get raped over and over again by these idiots who just don’t see the difference between an act of brutality and sex! 😦
It especially infuriates me when women Don’t see the difference. When they assume that they are safe because they act demure, wear conservative clothing. When they assume that girls who are raped must have asked for it in some way.
Exactly! I was a 17 year old virgin wearing a tracksuit when I was attacked after school one afternoon. Old women, babies and straight men have ALSO been raped! What you look like and what you wear etc HAS NO BEARING on whether you get targeted or not!! 😦
It boggles my brain how any man rapes a baby – I mean, surely that should tell people that it’s just not so simple.
Exactly, Sarah. What people fail to understand is that it has NOTHING to do with sexual attraction at all!! Some of these monsters are “turned on” by fear and others actually employ objects such as bottles, broomsticks etc to do the damage!! 😦 Most babies are raped by individuals who want to punish the parents for some reason!
What I meant to say was that a baby can’t exactly dress provocatively.
Pingback: Sneaky Spam | If By Yes