Submitted By Lawrence Rafferty, (rafflaw), Guest Blogger
I actually thought that I had misread the article when I first read it. It described the horrific gang rape of an 11-year-old in the Texas town of Cleveland. Eighteen young men and teenagers have been charged with the rape that is alleged to have started in a house and eventually moved to a deserted trailer nearby. I am sure that this kind of vicious crime occurs all too often in our country, but there is one thing that makes this crime a little different. Many of the townspeople are blaming the eleven year old girl for her own gang rape!
“The video led the police to an abandoned trailer, more evidence and, eventually, to a roundup over the last month of 18 young men and teenage boys on charges of participating in the gang rape of an 11-year-old girl in the abandoned trailer home, the authorities said. Five suspects are students at Cleveland High School, including two members of the basketball team. Another is the 21-year-old son of a school board member. A few of the others have criminal records, from selling drugs to robbery and, in one case, manslaughter. The suspects range in age from middle schoolers to a 27-year-old. The case has rocked this East Texas community to its core and left many residents in the working-class neighborhood where the attack took place with unanswered questions. Among them is, if the allegations are proved, how could their young men have been drawn into such an act? “ New York Times How can a newspaper like the New York Times ask the question “…how could their young men have been drawn into such an act?” when the victim is an eleven year old girl?
Has society returned to the day that a female victim cannot say No to forced sex? Have we returned to the day when an 11-year-old girl is berated in public forums for allegedly enticing these adults and teenagers into threatening to harm the young girl if she didn’t have sex with them? “A meeting Thursday night that was billed as a way to discuss concerns some have about the investigation into a series of alleged sexual assaults on an 11-year-old girl turned into a forum that many used to blame the girl police contend is the victim of heinous attacks. Many who attended the meeting said they supported the group of men and boys who have been charged in the case. Supporters didn’t claim that the men and boys did not have sex with the young girl; instead they blamed the girl for the way she dressed or claimed she must have lied about her age — accusations that have drawn strong responses from those who note an 11-year-old cannot consent to sex and that it doesn’t matter how she was dressed.” Houston Chronicle
The fact that an 11-year-old girl was victimized had no effect on many in the crowd. Lost in their attack on her was the legal issued raised above. A minor cannot consent to sex and her mode of dress is irrelevant to the crimes alleged against these 18 different students and adults. How can a society even suggest that a young girl can consent to anything, let alone forced sex with at least 18 different individuals? One writer, quoting a definition of rape culture from the book, Transforming a Rape Culture,(WomenandChildrenFirst) suggests that we are fostering a new rape culture in America that actually encourages this kind of behavior and violence against women and in this case young girls. “A rape culture is a complex of beliefs that encourages male sexual aggression and supports violence against women. It is a society where violence is seen as sexy and sexuality as violent. In a rape culture, women perceive a continuum of threatened violence that ranges from sexual remarks to sexual touching to rape itself. A rape culture condones physical and emotional terrorism against women as the norm.” ShakespeareSister
I am not sure that we have ever gotten past the day when women are blamed for being raped by their attackers. If we have, this incident and the town’s reaction to it indicate that we are returning to a violent past or creating a new rape culture. Could there be a connection to this “rape culture” and the War on Women that we have highlighted in past articles?
OS,
Good response to mr./ms. weeks.
c weeks sez: “….you get a group of young shiftless black men together…they turn into beasts.
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Yup, kind of like the three shiftless young black men who tied James Byrd behind a truck and drug him three miles. Oh wait…you say they were not black? They were white? Well, I guess that doesn’t count, does it?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_James_Byrd,_Jr.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25008925/ns/us_news-life/
And you c. weeks are an Agent Provocateur…yes?
This is what happens when you get a group of young shiftless black men together…they turn into beasts.
Blouise,
I am shocked that this idiot ran unopposed! Wow.
Stamford, I hope she doesn’t have kids either. I can’t imagine what kind of childhood someone would have with this braniac as a parent.
rafflaw,
I hope Passidomo doesn’t have kids, particularly girls.
Kathleen Passidomo ran unopposed in her Naples district and this is her first time serving as an elected representative. This isn’t an unusual situation in Florida where there appears to be very little interest in holding office in some areas.
I suspect that after this bit of vomit she coughed up, next time she might have to actually work to get elected.
Stamford,
I had the same response as you when I read the ridiculous statement from the Rep. in Florida. Projectile vomiting comes to mind.
It is all about them girls. They dress like that and they are just gonna get it. I do not know of any honkeys that do them anymore.
Da Bitch asked for it I tell you. She is the problem that causes all the damn confusion on fathers day. That is why they all say, Whose ya Daddy. They don’t know either. It could be anyone of them. They all have the same dna.
“There was an article about an 11 year old girl who was gangraped in Texas by 18 young men because she was dressed up like a 21-year-old prostitute. And her parents let her attend school like that. And I think it’s incumbent upon us to create some areas where students can be safe in school and show up in proper attire so what happened in Texas doesn’t happen to our students.”
Please excuse me – I need to pick my jaw up from the floor while I’m throwing up.
Elaine,
Thanks for the link. I just saw that story on Think Progress and I think my head exploded. This is a woman spreading this kind of crap. The only evidence of how the girl dressed was from the alleged rapists and it has no bearing on her being allegedly raped by at least 18 teens and adults. She was 11 years old. Someone needs to sit this Rep.down and explain a few things to her. Remind me to stay out of Florida. AY will be happy that Texas has some company on my do not visit list! 🙂
From Think Progress (3/16/2011)
FL GOP Rep. Says 11-Year-Old Was Gang Raped ‘Because She Was Dressed Like A 21 Year-Old Prostitute’
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/16/gop-gang-raped-prostitute/
A Florida state house subcommittee passed a bill — the so-called “Sagging Pants” bill — that would require state school districts to adopt a dress code that prohibits students from “wearing clothing that exposes underwear or body parts in an indecent or vulgar manner.” “This would make for a better school district and more productive students,” said the bill’s sponsor Rep. Hazelle Rogers (D). Referring to a horrific story of an 11-year old girl in Texas being gang raped by as many as 17 men and boys, GOP florida lawmaker Kathleen Passidomo — taking a page from Fox News host Bill O’Reilly’s book — applauded the measure with an offensive justification:
There was an article about an 11 year old girl who was gangraped in Texas by 18 young men because she was dressed up like a 21-year-old prostitute. And her parents let her attend school like that. And I think it’s incumbent upon us to create some areas where students can be safe in school and show up in proper attire so what happened in Texas doesn’t happen to our students.
“Whoa!” wrote the Broward/Palm Beach New Times’ Brandon Thorp, of Passidomo’s blame the victim approach. Thorp added, “Blaming the rape of an 11-year-old girl on her parents’ sense of fashion — and to do so out loud — smacks of rank amateurism.” A St. Petersburg Times blog reported that “No one commented on that line of reasoning” at the subcommittee hearing. The young Texas girl is currently being held in foster care and her parents are living in an undisclosed location fearing for their safety.
SL,
Like I said, the American Taliban is getting closer.
OS,
Thanks for the link. Life rafflaw, I heard about this a few weeks ago.
Do you know what I find so sadly ironic? These states think they are savings lives and saving money. However, the state governments, while seeking to restrict abortion and access to birth control, are only guaranteeing that the number of women seeking welfare and other social services will go through the roof. But, these states are also cutting funding for social services. So, what happens next? Homeless shelters become overcrowded with women seeking food and shelter, the court systems become overwhelmed with child neglect and abuse cases and these kids end up becoming wards of the state thus, it ends up costing far more than the morons thought they were saving in terms of money and lives.
And you know what the GOP will then do? Call the women brood mare, welfare queens and the kids juvenile delinquents, further victimizing the victims. It’s the GOP’s m.o.
OS,
You are right…it isn’t pretty.
raff: It makes sense to me either way. Remember, we are discussing people who live in an alternate reality. It ain’t pretty.
OS,
I wish I had proofed my last posting. I was trying to suggest that unmarried women may be banned!
Raff, when the going gets weird, the weird get going…or something like that. The truly sad part about this story is that there is no dearth of material to illustrate the point. Unfortunately, you do not have to look very hard to find people who seem to think this kind of thing is just fine.
BTW, Happy St. Paddy’s day, laddie. Erin Go Braugh!
OS,
I saw that story about Virginia’s latest attack on women. I think maybe one of these crazies is going to just unmatched women. Taliban time!