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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMen See Themselves In Brock Turner—That’s Why They Don’t Condemn Him
http://www.theestablishment.co/2016/06/07/men-see-themselves-in-brock-turner-thats-why-they-dont-condemn-him/Most of the discussion has centered around two letters. The first is the impact statement written by the victim herself, which she read out loud in court on June 2 and which was subsequently published by Buzzfeed on June 3. The other is letter written by Turners father asking for leniency in his sentencing; Stanford law professor Michele Dauber brought this one to public notice when she tweeted a portion of it. The former letter is as gutting as the latter is tone-deaf. The woman that Turner attacked speaks of what it felt like to wake up in the hospital with pine needles and debris inside her vagina. Meanwhile, Turners father laments that his son no longer enjoys pretzels, and argues he has been forced to pay too high a price for 20 minutes of action.
To read Turners fathers letter is to feel an immediate rush of pure fury. Its tempting to just go full snark on it, because there is lot here to snark here: from Turner Seniors lyrical description of Brocks lost love for steak to his obstinate refusal to actually name his sons crime, the letter reads like a bad parody of how someone might talk about a rapist. Its much harder to read the letter earnestly; it feels almost impossible to comprehend that this man truly believes his son is the one deserving of pity. Its more comfortable to mockbut we cant just mock. We have to look atreally look at, unsparingly and in detailall the ways in which Turners fathers letter exemplifies how rape culture works.
Rape culture is the idea that sexual assault does not happen in a vacuum, but rather occurs because we are socialized in a way that normalizes and even celebrates sexual victimization of women. In my experience, most men have a twofold reaction to that definition: first theyll ask how it can be true that rape is normalized if rape is also understood to be one of the worst crimes a person can commit, and second theyll swear that they, personally, would never. When they say these things they will absolutely believe that theyre speaking the truth. And then a case like Brock Turners will come along and present some very uncomfortable challenges to those ideas.
Pretzels? Maybe he chokes on them, like his presumed idol Dumbya.
dchill
(38,594 posts)Highly offensive.
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)But his "20 minutes of action" dad, Judge Aaron "Six-Month" Persky, and far too many others do not.
hfojvt
(37,573 posts)who want to see their child go to prison for twenty years, or even ten. You think that makes him a horrible person?
Why is it though when SOME men do the wrong thing they are described as "men" and yet when some men do the right thing it is necessary to note "this is only some men"?
Dorian Gray
(13,516 posts)I think referring to Brock's assault on that woman that night as "20 minutes of action" makes him a horrible person. Stating that Brock should tour college campuses to educate about underage drinking and "sexual promiscuity" rather than face consequences for his actions makes him a terrible dad.
bloom
(11,635 posts)Absolutely. What he wrote is despicable.
The father's letter is epitome of horrible advocacy. "20 minutes of action" - IOW sexual assault / rape.
How stupid can somebody be?
lapislzi
(5,762 posts)Sorry for the shouty caps. These men do not view their actions as rape. Rape is something that happens when a BHS (bushy-haired-stranger) jumps out of the bushes and forces a person to have intercourse at gun or knifepoint. That's the "legitimate rape" they like to cite.
When college kids get drunk at a party and a boy sticks things inside an unconscious girl, that's just bad judgment on everyone's part. Oops. When a date goes wrong and one person won't stop when the other person says stop, that's a misunderstanding.
Putting things inside girls is something well-off college men are permitted to do at virtually any time.
That is rape culture in as few, nasty words as I can reduce it to.
The father can't call it rape because that word means something very specific to him, and what his son did doesn't fit that narrow definition.
Note: I'm using mostly male-on-female pronouns because this is how it goes down most of the time. Boys rape boys, girls rape girls, girls rape boys. But that's a lot less common.
raccoon
(31,130 posts)Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)There are countless cases of serial rapists, murders, mass shooters, child abusers, animal abusers, even folks on death row whose parents will tell the judge/media "Have mercy on him, he's a good kid, he didn't mean nothin' by it!" -- So that's nothing new, sadly...
BUT while "understandable", I still wholly condemn him, the son and the judge in this farce...
Xithras
(16,191 posts)Even my ultra-right, Trump supporting brother in law condemned him. Actually, he went off on a bit of a tirade about how "p***ified" liberal judges were, and that we need to go back to "hanging rapist bastards like him".
There are a million trolls on the Internet, but I have yet to meet one actual person who supports the rapist.
Quantess
(27,630 posts)Title should have specified "some men"
LanternWaste
(37,748 posts)Your historical and consistent oppression by the entrenched matriarchy is noted and pitied. Either that, or your epidural layer is likely much less than one milometer in thickness, and additional layers of stratum corneum may be needed for your long term viability in our culture.
Initech
(100,129 posts)And how is it that fundies accuse innocent trans people of rape, and an actual rapist practically gets off the hook because of cronyism?
PatrickforO
(14,602 posts)Because I read Brock's father's letter and was disgusted and read the victim's letter and wept. As a father of three daughters and grandfather of two beautiful little girls I DON'T FEEL THAT WAY AT ALL.
Dorian Gray
(13,516 posts)The dad and the judge are the only two men I've heard make excuses for Brock. Most of the men in my life are horrified about this.
bloom
(11,635 posts)Where he did not accept the fact that there was a problem other than drinking and 'promiscuity'
You can find other stupid statements by people online if you look for them.
Dorian Gray
(13,516 posts)Anonymity can bring out the worst in some people.
Response to KamaAina (Original post)
Mosby This message was self-deleted by its author.
NightWatcher
(39,343 posts)Hell, I think the judge should do 6 months after he is disbarred and removed from the bench. I think the rapist should do a lot more time.
Rex
(65,616 posts)However I do not doubt some men are just like Brock and his father, they don't just appear out of a vacuum.
FrodosPet
(5,169 posts)Young men need to be taught at the earliest age that it is unacceptable and inexcusable.
That does not mean every man, or even most men, support it. But it is real, and it is sad, and it needs to be opposed until the end of time.
mythology
(9,527 posts)The article is written from an agenda that assumes most if not all men are rapists.
The most recent research I'm aware of (a study of two U.S. universities) found that about 10% of men had raped. And while yes that is about 10% too high, it also means that in discussing rape the author shouldn't accuse most of us from being similar to Turner.
Trying to link Turner claiming it was consensual to a larger point about rape being a cultural norm is a little silly in my opinion. He was trying to convince a jury that he wasn't a rapist. What exactly was he supposed to say? "Yes I raped her, but don't convict me anyway." The fact that he ran when confronted is a pretty good indicator that he knew what he was doing was wrong. The fact that the two guys chased him down indicates they didn't participate in rape culture.
The author isn't just using too broad of a brush, she's openly letting her biases let her conclusion and then claiming the evidence supports it, rather than looking at the evidence and then forming a conclusion.
Do we as a society have a long way to go in terms of dealing with rape? Absolutely. But we have also come a long way. The fact that this case and it's poor resolution has generated such an outcry is in fact evidence of that. We as a society do recognize as a whole that rape is wrong, it's part of why rapists have to come up with so many "justifications". It's not like a thief goes out of their way to justify why they are stealing.
Kentonio
(4,377 posts)ProfessorGAC
(65,334 posts)And i agree with you. 10 seems too high. Do we have a problem with some guys thinking it's their privilege to do whatever they please with women? Yep. But, that problem can be huge with far less than one in ten guys.
Kentonio
(4,377 posts)If that 10% had been something like 'had carried out some form of sexual harrassment or assault' then sadly I'd have believed it, but 10% carried out an actual rape just seems ludicrous.
Bucky
(54,087 posts)If you think of it in terms of an average of three assaults per perpetrator, 10% makes sense.
Kentonio
(4,377 posts)Unwanted sexual contact or harrassment then sure, but actual rape?!
Bucky
(54,087 posts)The National Sexual Violence Resource Center says 20% of all women
http://www.nsvrc.org/sites/default/files/publications_nsvrc_factsheet_media-packet_statistics-about-sexual-violence_0.pdf
I had heard 1 in 3 among college women during their time in college were victims of sexual assault (which would include failed rape attempts). But that number was incorrect. It's only 25%. 90% of those incidents involved attackers they knew personally and only 5% of those incidents get reported to the police.
http://www.nsvrc.org/saam/campus-resource-list#Stats
www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs239/en/
35% of women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime.
Kentonio
(4,377 posts)bloom
(11,635 posts)Not that most had been arrested or convicted, of course.
harrose
(380 posts)... I wouldn't be surprised if EVERY Rethug were a closet rapist.
Response to harrose (Reply #10)
mdbl This message was self-deleted by its author.
dilby
(2,273 posts)I don't have first time sex with intoxicated women and I definitely don't have sex ever with an incapacitated woman. When I look at this little creep I see someone who might take advantage of my daughter when she goes to college. He should have gotten 10 years, I don't care about his life or what he feels. What I do care about is the next guy who will say it's only 6 months if I get caught.
TeamPooka
(24,286 posts)ProudToBeBlueInRhody
(16,399 posts)I'm curious if she glossed over that or assumed it was a man.
melman
(7,681 posts)She deliberately left that out because it's inconvenient.
ProudToBeBlueInRhody
(16,399 posts)But it would certainly put some more spin to the story.
The bottom line is, we are tribelists (I know I spelled it wrong) who protect our own. We never think our friends or family could be bad people. And gender doesn't change that.
Skittles
(153,261 posts)most guys, when they read the details of the case, are absolutely sickened
Logical
(22,457 posts)Dr. Strange
(25,928 posts)mdbl
(4,976 posts)First thing I thought was, "well now I see where the son gets it"
Iggo
(47,586 posts)Matt_in_STL
(1,446 posts)You should be ashamed of this post and delete. Absolutely disgusting and divisive.
Logical
(22,457 posts)Quantess
(27,630 posts)Of course there are vague situations that could be construed as non-consensual sex, depending on where you draw the line.
What Brock Turner did is a pretty heinous rape, above and beyond drawing any lines of vagueness. On the ground behind a dumpster. That was pretty bad.
Response to KamaAina (Original post)
bloom This message was self-deleted by its author.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)I assume you're referring to Reddit comments or something?
GOLGO 13
(1,681 posts)11 Bravo
(23,928 posts)until the police arrived "see themselves" in Brock Turner?
This kind of broad-brush bullshit is reprehensible and counter-productive.
Adrahil
(13,340 posts)hatrack
(59,599 posts)This is probably the most disgusting miscarriage of justice I've heard of in years, and the recall campaign can't happen quickly enough for the judge who perpetrated this travesty.
NaturalHigh
(12,778 posts)It's basically saying that all men sympathize with a rapist.
lapislzi
(5,762 posts)It says that many men have found themselves in similar situations. And that the ethics of these situations are questionable at best. If you feel like you're being "bashed" every time there's a thread about rape culture and what it looks like, then YOU are the problem.
Not particularly interested in your "feelings" about how men are being badly treated.
NaturalHigh
(12,778 posts)KamaAina
(78,249 posts)Why was everyone so quick to assume she meant "all"?
NaturalHigh
(12,778 posts)but then you already knew that. Your decision to post this man-bashing piece of shit blog entry is very telling.
Paladin
(28,281 posts)The kid's father is an idiot, and lots of men (myself very much included) view rape with absolute revulsion.
onethatcares
(16,204 posts)instead of the Swedes.
DemocratSinceBirth
(99,719 posts)Out of all the fantasies I ever harbored I can honestly say none included sex with someone against their will.