What difference does it make how old she was?

[question everything]

I am talking about the young woman, or a girl, who was raped and then murdered, with her family, in Iraq.

What difference does it make if she was 14, or 20, or even if she was a prostitute (I am not saying that she was, of course)?

A rape is a rape and a murder is a murder and except for killing others to defend oneself, these are severe crimes to be punished.

[The_Casual_Observer]

1. It adds that certain extra special sense of evil if the victim is a child.

It's sort of a crime heaped on another crime.

[redqueen]

2. $&*(@)#&#)(@&$(@

How can this still be a topic of confusion? Around HERE even?

The issue is NOT her age... the issue is the PRESS refusing to honestly and clearly STATE her age!

:banghead:

In an age when a 19-year-old woman is referred to as a "girl" and a 15-year-old teenager / girl is referred to as a "woman"... I really do fail to see how this is SUCH a puzzling point to ponder.

[uppityperson]

23. thank you for your succinct explanation.

[Uncle Joe]

27. I agree redqueen, the real issue is an MSM

that distorts reality to the American People instead of enlightening them as to the truth. Rape is rape but spin is just a warm fuzzy word for brainwashing.

[BOSSHOG]

3. It is incredibly sad

to think that we were told she was 20 because that would make us accept the atrocity? Total nonsense. And if she were a prostitute? So what? It is just plain wrong, illegal and immoral. It is also an action which I sincerely believe is just fine and dandy with "conservatives" in this country.

[burythehatchet]

4. Would it make a differece if she was 4?

[BillZBubb]

5. It makes a difference to a lot of people.

To those of us on the left it is a horrific crime no matter. But to rightards, the fact that she was just a child makes it harder for them to excuse the behavior or rationalize it.

I must admit, I find crimes against children to be particularly reprehensible. I have no problem with harsher sentences for such crimes just as I have no problem with harsher sentences for hate crimes involving race or sexual orientation.

[ThomCat]

7. Some fucktards demand innocense before they'll care.

A child is presumed innocent. An adult is not, and presumably deserves whatever happens. :grr:

[question everything]

17. Ah, but only white Christian women (or girs) are presumed innocent

not Arab or Muslim ones :puke:

[madmusic]

12. Are you suggesting something harsher than death?

Do you wish you could kill them more than once?

What about the poor 5-year-old who wasn't raped?

"Special case" indeed.

As admitted before, this is a "tactic."

[uppityperson]

16. It is a tactic by the military to write it off as "one of those things"

The problem is NOT that she was special over her little sister but that the military has tried to cover it up.

[bettyellen]

6. all things being equal, it would be more traumatic the younger you are.

absolutely.

[bettyellen]

11. i think the issue is the press made her seem old, married maybe....

because they knew there's be more outrage the younger she was.

[question everything]

14. But when I hear on the news a comment like "she was 20"

it almost sounds as if this is an excuse. And it should not be.

For me the events preceding it: seeing her at a check point, finding out where she lived, killing her parents, first - are horrific enough without even the last "details" of her rape and murder.

[bettyellen]

18. i know, it is insulting to grown women, like the italian rape laws.

i have a feeling the pentagon was pushing that 20 bigtime, and it sorta came out heavy handed in the press as a result.
they knew it was BS from the start. but lies stick sometimes.
i agree, the details are horrible, the age shouldn;t matter. but it's like a kid would be extra bad- if you are a parent or had a kid sister anyway, you'd probably feel it was much worse.

[smirkymonkey]

38. Exactly, If this was a case of one female raped by one of our soldiers

I could see the outrage about the mis-reporting of her age. However, this entire family was MURDERED, brutally murdered and all anyone can focus on is the rape of the older sister (however old she was.) Why does the murder of this family not outrage anyone?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. From another thread...

Person 1: "I hope that Steve Green fellow gets what's coming too him."

Person 2: "Who's Steve Green?"

Person 1: "He's the guy who raped that 15 year old Iraqi girl.

...

...

Oh, and btw, he also killed her and the rest of family."


I think it's got to do with some sort of weird fascination with teens and sex.

[NNN0LHI]

9. Ever notice how our media loves using the term "accused child murderer?"

That term doesn't fit in with the propaganda we are used to getting from Iraq very well.

We are supposed to imagine our soldiers giving high fives and passing out candy to the little Iraqi kiddies.

Not raping and killing them. Thats doesn't sound to good to the flag waving apple pie crowd.

Don

[Cleita]

10. The difference is that she was a child and the bushbots are

trying to make it look like she was much older, a woman. It's true it shouldn't make any difference, but it shows how far they will go to cover up what is happening in this war and what they can't cover up they try to make look like less. Remember what they said about the Abu Ghraib tortures? I believe Gonzo said there was nothing wrong because they stopped short of organ failure.

[question everything]

24. That's horrible. And the MSM goes right along

next they will talk about the "spoils of war" - and of "collateral damage."

On occasions, the MSM would highlight the "tactics' of the barbarians in Serbia and in Darfur, even now, of raping women of the other tribe to force them to propagate their genes.

Perhaps if we have been horrified enough by that - raping of yes, grown even married women - we would not even try to distinguish between a virgin girl and a mature woman.

[uppityperson]

13. Coverup. They tried to cover it up to make it not so bad

They tried to pass it off as not so bad, they lied, they are covering it up hoping it will go away.
Many people, and laws, are aimed at better protecting children, minors, than adults. Hence a crime such as this against a child is worse than against an adult. Bigger issue is that they lied about it to avoid having people be outraged due to her age.

[LaurenG]

15. If child is raped it makes it that much more heinous

A sexually experienced adult would have been bad enough. A virgin child would make it that much worse.

[AndyA]

19. Rape is a horrendous crime, but if a child is involved, it's even more so.

There's a big difference between a 14 year old girl and a 20 year old woman. What happened is inexcusable no matter what the age, but the fact that such a thing was done to a child is something that should be reported factually, which it has not been by much of the media.

[RufusEarl]

20. Here's the difference!

When this story was first printed the press knowing her age made it a point to say (Woman)It was printed as a woman was raped & murdered, and the MSM kept saying a woman was raped and murdered even after it was revealed she was a teenager.

Allot of folks here on DU were rightly upset with the fact that the word (woman) kept being used instead of the correct description for the young girl.

I agree it's just as terrible for a woman to be raped and murdered as a girl, but this had to be pointed out to the MSM. I believe the story is being properly reported now, and the 14 year old girl is being identified as a (Girl)


I think allot of folks were taking the MSM to task over this, and like i said rightly so. When a child is murdered in this country our by americans anywhere, the MSM should report it correctly..

[gatorboy]

21. In prison not even the child molesters are safe.

Men who have beaten, robbed and even murdered still have a strong contempt for child molesters in prison. The case being, that nothing is worse than a pedophile. So the victim being a young girl does elevate the crime in people's mind.

Which is why the military has taken great strides to confuse the matter.

[bdamomma]

22. no difference at all

she was a innocent victim, singled out, raped and brutally murdered, with her family.
again she was innocent.

[liberalmuse]

25. It makes a difference...

Rape is heinous, no matter what. It would be heinous if she were a prostitute, or a mother of 5, or a college student. However, the fact that this was an adolescent somehow makes it even more heinous for some reason. With the girl being 15, that puts her under mother/father protective instinct for many of us who are parents of children this age. I feel sickened when I hear of any rape, but some of us tend to want to especially shelter the young and innnocent from such unspeakable atrocities. It is hard enough for an adult to deal with rape, never mind an adolescent who is not as physically, mentally and emotionally developed as an adult.

[LostinVA]

26. Because it makes a difference to The Cadre, so their spin is odious

I think most people feel that victimization of a child (whether 5, 10, 15) adds an extra layer of evil to certain violent acts... as also evidenced by her little sister's arms being broken (defensively?). It just gives your gut that extra squeeze of horror. THEY know that, and want to try to strip away a layer or two of vil... 'cause it's all just going swimmingly over there, you know....

(also, I think that a large segment of people -- even on here -- confuse rape with sex, so adding a sexual element to the rape of a minor makes it a unpalatable to those on the Right who might excuse this because it was "just about wanting sex."

THEY know what they're doing... and it's truly evil.

[electron_blue]

28. If it made no difference, they would not be calling a 14 year old girl a

woman.

They are hiding the fact that she was 14 years old. If it made no difference, they wouldn't hide it. This is a lie, actually.

Would you say it makes no difference if they raped a 4 year old instead?

[fordnut]

29. Exactly

[dogday]

30. If this crime happened in the US

They would being calling this guy a pedophile of extreme proportions... The fact that the press does not address the age of the victim is telling...

On the other hand understanding that no matter the age, Rape is a violent act against a female.. The age of the victim does not determine the amount of fear and desecration that person feels... 20 year old can still feel fear as well as a child...

[lectrobyte]

33. Exactly. Why aren't all the "for the children" folks up in arms? Oh wait

I forgot, they only care about white middle-class 'merican children.

[leeroysphitz]

31. People are outraged by acts of violence like rape.

And rightly so but people feel varying degrees of outrage over such news stories. The rape of a child understandably elicits a higher level of outrage among most people. It just does.

By refusing to report a pertinent fact, such as the victim's AGE, the MSM is trying to downplay and/ or minimize that outrage. In other words they are covering for the administration and for this illegal war.

It's important for that collusion to be stopped and the only chance to stop it is for concerned americans to relentlessly call the media on it every time we see it.

At least that's my opinion.

[Skidmore]

32. It matters because it allows the lie machine to function without a hitch.

It contributes to a great evil. The crime itself is horrible beyond belief, but those who would dissemble and hide the facts are complicit in the crime and need to be held accountable.

[Arkansas Granny]

34. Her actual age really doesn't make much difference. She was the

victim of a brutal attack and she was murdered. My question is why so much attention is focused on only the girl that was raped? As hideous as that crime was, has anyone learned the names of her parents or her 5 year old sister who were also murdered? In all the news reports I have seen and in the threads I have seen posted here, the rest of the family is mentioned, more or less, as an afterthought. Were their murders any less brutal because they were not raped first? Seeing your child shot in cold blood, or seeing your parents murdered must be just as traumatic as the rape endured by the older daughter.

[uppityperson]

37. The age focus is on the military and media misinformation.

They lied. Or at least misled, and were caught at it. The age of the victims does not matter in that it makes any one of them less of a crime, but the age focus is because the media/military were deceptive and were caught at it. This incident is no less horrific than any other incidents that have happened, but we were lied to, and we caught the manipulation and so are running with it.

Edited to add, to simplify, why did military and MSM feel the need to say a 14 yr old was a woman?

[fishwax]

35. assaults on the youth, the elderly, and the handicapped are often easier

to sensationalize, because they are perceived as less able to defend themselves.

I don't think it's just about sex, though. I think many people would have the same response to stories of a gang beating and robbing a young male. If a group of men beat and robbed a college student, it would be perceived differently than if they beat and robbed an 8th grader.

If a 14-year-old girl were raped in the states, I very much doubt the msm would present the story as the rape of a woman.

[Disturbed]

36. There was confusion about the age.

Initial reports stated "woman, age 25". Then "woman, age 20". "Girl, age 15" and now "girl, age 14". Instead of puposeful misinformation it is possible that it was incomptetence of info collection.

[fishwax]

39. even after I had learned she was 14 or 15, I still saw reports that said

"woman." Incompetence is always a possibility, of course, but I doubt it's the full explanation here.