Re: Steubenville High School football players found guilty of raping 16-year-old girl
Not evidence of rape culture. These kids are dumb jerks who believed they can do whatever they want because they're local sports stars. I had to deal with the same kinds of arseholes in high school who loved to torment the "nerds". You still have not produced proof that we live in a culture that gives tacit approval to rapists. That some punk athletes think it's ok to rape women, as well as pick on other people they perceive as weak or inferior, is not an example of rape culture; it's an example of jock culture.
I think national media outlets focusing on the pain and suffering of the rapists is an example rape culture.
I think people (who are not even part of sports culture) who are calling the victim a slut and saying she was asking for it is an example of rape culture.
The witness who saw them raping the unconscious girl and just left because it 'didn't look like rape' has nothing to do with sports culture, and everything to do with the belief in our culture that the only kind of rape is when you attack a woman, force her down, and take her against her will while she is screaming and fighting. I think that is also evidence of rape culture. I absolutely think they were overly arrogant about their immunity because of their sports program. But that is not all that was at play here.
Here are some other examples:
Heartbreaking: 7th Grade Girl Raped Twice, Blamed and Punished By School Officials Both Times | Alternet
7th grade girl in Springfield, MO reported being raped. No one believed her, she was forced to write an apology letter and deliver it to the boy who raped her. She was also expelled for the rest of the year. And was raped by the same boy again the following year. And before anyone calls her a liar as well, the boy plead guilty the second time, and the rape kit proved he did it.
Why rapists in military get away with it - CNN.com
Here’s an article about rape in our military. Interesting statistics, and cases like a CO telling a Marine who was raped that she shouldn’t get a rape kit done, superior officers using their authority to make women have sex with them, and superior officers telling women to essentially get over it when they are raped.
Do I need to say anything more than, “all of the people who protected Sandusky”?
How about congress nearly refusing to pass the Violence Against Women Act?
How about all of the statements on this thread and others about this case talking about how these boys are going to “get it” in jail. Drop the soap jokes, anyone? When was the last time you heard about a prison rape case going to court? Just because someone goes to jail does not mean it is legal or morally acceptable to rape them.
States treat spousal rape differently, but the extreme case is South Carolina, where spousal rape is only considered a crime if it is accomplished through aggravated force, and women have only 30 days to report such rapes.
That whole Todd Akin “legitimate rape” business.
When I say we have a rape culture here, I do not mean that across the board we uniformly tolerate and excuse rape, and I sure as heck don't mean that most men are rapists. What I mean is this. Victims are still commonly blamed here and many women don't report rape because they don't want to be "raped again" by the media. This girl was violated, and now she's getting threatened, being told she's a slut, and that she was asking for it. We have a culture that is permissive of prison rape. We have a culture in which a heck of a lot of people think men can't be raped, or that a woman can't rape a man. We have a rape problem in the military, where the behavior is sometimes tolerated and victims are shamed. And we also have people covering up for jocks and priests when they rape.
