She wasn’t “dating a 19 year old,” she was being sexually abused by a 19 year old.
I think there’s a difference between blaming the victim and simply trying to understand how and why something so fucked up happened. No one is excusing the male perpetrators. No one is saying an 11-year-old should be blamed for something like this.
But, it’s easy and clear to understand: this girl was the neighborhood gang ho, dressed like a 20yo, and hanging out with the older guys.
Blame her? No. Understand how this happened? When your daughter is the neighborhood gang ho don’t be surprised when something really bad happens. What, are we saying 11-year-olds have a right to be the neighborhood gang ho and yet always be treated like proper little ladies? How’s that work?
Did you just call an 11 year old girl a “ho?”
Disclaimer: I have an 11 year old daughter and have extremely emotional opinions about this story.
I don’t have the pinpoint cite handy, but it is referenced in Warshaw’s book I Never Called it Rape if you want to take a look.
I’m sorry if this is personal for you.
It wasn’t her fault. Anyone who had anything to do with her hanging around a gang and people older than herself is wrong. I don’t blame her.
Really? I do. God knows that rape is incomprehensibly common, but I think you have to be wired all sorts of wrong to be able to get/keep it up in order to force sex on someone.
I don’t think that most guys are capable of violent/forcible rape, but I do think that an uncomfortable number are capable of rationalizing it as ok if the victim appears to be compliant, even when they know the compliance is coerced.
You have to differentiate blame from responsibility
For instance, if I walk around Humboldt Park (not a nice area) in Chicago with a bunch of money in my fist and I get mugged, is this my fault?
Of course not, I am a victim of a criminal act.
But most people would place some of the responsibility on me, or “blame” if you prefer.
You certainly don’t want to blame any victim, yet some responsibility can be assigned to the victim without blaming them.
In my example, a responsible person would not walk around with money in their fist, in a bad area.
It gets more complicated as we as a society legally shield minors by absolving them of any responsibility. For instance, minors can’t sign contracts (except for necessities of life)
Children don’t have the life experience to understand fully the consequneces of their actions so aren’t held resposible.
But that doesn’t mean it isn’t a VERY important point to look at this girl’s lifestyle.
Why?
To prevent it in others. So other mothers and fathers and people can say, “We need to look at what was going on to prevent it.”
No one is saying that if a little girl dresses provacatively she deserves to be sexually assulted but it’s worth looking at because, this behaviour has been associated with crimes in the past.
And remember though compassion can be misplaced, it isn’t limited. It’s quite possible to feel bad for this little girl as well as feel bad for the boys who ruined their lives as well.
OK I don’t feel it but some people do, and the two aren’t mutually exclusive.
This little girl has neither blame nor “responsibility.” She was kidnapped and gang raped. The rapists bear 100% of the responsibility for their crimes, and I don’t feel the slightest bit of sympathy for them. I will feel bad if their lives are not destroyed. I only wish we were still allowed to publicly peel the skin off of people.
Yes, and there are also many other circumstances. I would also modify my prior statement to say that ‘most men may think they have the capacity to rape, during some part of their lives’. Some of this may be a healthy fear of allowing their hormones to take control, and some of it may be the result of those hormones. Many of our concepts of right and wrong are also strongly rooted in culture, and many men may be honestly admitting their capacity to hurt others, something they do not do because of the cultural influence. These are only a few of the many reasons why reports of mens capacity to rape can show such high percentages, but at the same time lack conclusive value because of the disparate reasons for the individual reports.
If nothing else, MBTI is what it is. I’m asked questions that test whether I’m “Judgmental” or “Perceptive” and I click on the Perceptive answer.
Unless you claim those terms are meaningless, or that I misclick deliberately to achieve a “desirable” result, then I’m afraid I don’t understand your objection.
Perhaps I am missing something… who, other than the residents of the area, is saying anything that could be remotely interpreted as blaming the girl?
The fact that residents of the area are bringing up her clothes speaks to the deep problems there. Of course the article should include those quotes.
This wasn’t a random, could-have-happened-anywhere, men-are-evil-walking-time-bombs assault. This community appears to have long been rotten to the core. If anything, this should result in a wider net and harsher punishments, and strong efforts to change the culture so it doesn’t happen again. Pretending the culture of the community is irrelevant is harmful and irresponsible.
If nothing else, MBTI is what it is. I’m asked questions that test whether I’m “Judgmental” or “Perceptive” and I click on the Perceptive answer.
Unless you claim those terms are meaningless, or that I misclick deliberately to achieve a “desirable” result, then I’m afraid I don’t understand your objection.
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It occurs to me that this exchange may help illustrate the difference between “Judgmental” and “Perceptive.” 
And do you think that you, and you alone have a monopoly on ‘extremely emotional opinions about this story’ Dio? :dubious:
Why don’t you just get your hackles down for a little while, and actually read/listen to what people here are saying. Nobody is blaming the little girl. Nobody is claiming that she is responsible for what happened. She has suffered a series of abuses that evoke in us a sense of absolute revulsion and loathing for the perps. What they did was unconscionable, and they are not deserving of any consideration as human beings any longer IMHO.
However, and a *big *however, is that this crime did not take place in a vacuum. This was not a random event that just ‘happened’. This little girl was groomed to be a sexual toy of firstly one man, and then later the others. It’s important to understand the environment and the circumstances that allowed this to happen.
When my daughter was 11, I knew where she was every minute of the day. There is no way on earth she could have been engaged in a ‘relationship’ with anyone without my knowledge. So, where were her parents? How was this allowed to happen? Why weren’t they keeping tabs on their little girl?
When my daughter was 11, she too wanted to dress up in ‘sexy’ clothes, because it was so cool. So we had ‘dress-up’ parties with her friends where they could parade around in skimpy gear with badly-applied make-up. After it was washed off, it was back to normal. No child of mine would be going outside the front door in anything but conventional clothing. So why did her parents allow this?
I would also suggest that it was probably common knowledge in that community that this little girl was the local ‘bike’. Why was this kept secret? Why didn’t someone, anyone speak up? What makes this community so dysfunctional as to allow the ongoing and systematic sexual abuse of a young child?
THESE are the questions that need to be answered as well as why do some men rape women. This was a crime of opportunity, as depraved and disgusting as it was. These opportunities should never, ever arise in any society, but especially one that is purported to be as enlightened as 21st century America.
Oh, and I forgot to add that apart from the lack of parental concern/supervision and guidance, something else has gone badly awry with this young girl that would see her willingly engage in sexual behaviours. As I mentioned in a previous post, sex is not really all that high on the agenda for most 11 yr olds, and if they are sexually active, it mostly means that there has been some serious fuck-up in their emotional development along the way.
I know you read well, and have great comprehension, so you won’t missed
or
I have a six year old daughter. And an 8 month old.
You think reading stuff like this doesn’t scare me? I will be doing absolutely everything I can to keep the clothes, boyfriends and behaviour of my kids “age appropriate”. It appears (and I haven’t seen so I won’t go beyond appears) that this little girl’s behaviour was not “age appropriate”.
As others have said, that does not lessen the impact of what was done to her, nor the culpability of those who did it. What it does do though is raise questions as to why the community didn’t do something about it, why the parent? If anything it widens the culpability to address these questions.
To ignore them or pretend that they are not there doesn’t help anyone.
Let’s say, (god forbid) that your daughter was sneaking out of the house in slutty clothes and make-up, and your neighbours knew about it. Would it be the responsible thing for them to do to inform you? Would you want to know? I sure as hell would! (aside from the fact we live on the eigth floor and she can’t sneak out)
Well why didn’t the town act earlier to protect this girl if they knew what was going on, or did they
a) see her behaviour as normal?
b) believe that she deserved what was coming to her?
c) think that 11 year olds should be able to dress and act however they like without ever encountering any negative situations.
None of the above is palatable to me - I don’t know about you though.
We may be fighting a losing battle here **bengangmo. ** Once Doggy gets hold of a stick like this, he’s loathe to let go. Talk about tenacious…reminds me of a Kelpie we had when I was a kid.
Yep, it’s sad to me that a community could allow this to happen, both the rape itself and the (supposed) way that the girl was behaving (if it is really as bad as has been reported).
That DTC doesn’t seem to be willing to address the second part means that any solution is never going to work.
I guess that phrase about not learning from history damning us to repeating the mistakes would be kinda relevant to bring up here.
Heh, glad you fixed that!! 
Yeah…woulda been kinda a bomb to throw out…if seen by anyone else sincerest apologies…virtual flowers are in the mail. 