I could write angry paragraphs in reply to this, but really all I need to say is: Yes. Everyone should be able to go out to a public gathering place and 100% expect to NOT be assaulted.
:smack: We’re not talking about a speeding ticket here, we’re talking about Sexual Assault. I’m imperfect and I’m sure I break rules and laws all the time (knowingly and unknowingly) and yet, somehow, I manage to keep my hands to myself unless I have express invitation. Please do not lump this guy’s actions in a category of “Oh, well, we’re all human and make mistakes, we should show him mercy for not being perfect”. It’s insulting.
By the way, I’m frankly a little (not a lot, but a little) offended by the use of the term “groping” in the headline of the article - a drunk off-duty cop put his hand up her skirt and ran his fingers across her genitals, which to me sounds more like “sexual assault”. “Groping”, IMHO, is when some asshole pats your ass or grabs at your boobs; it’s almost a “boys will be boys” word.
Exactly. We’ve been very good at culturally raising girls to believe that if they look too sexy or go to a bar it’s at least partially their fault if they get assaulted; wouldn’t it be better if we were as good at teaching the boys that they bear the responsibility for NOT ASSAULTING PEOPLE?
This reminds me of one of thse “We need feminism because…” photos that went around a while ago. It read “We need feminism because we teach women ‘Don’t get raped’ instead of teaching men ‘Don’t rape’”. I think this judge and OMGaBC just proved this point.
Un-goddamn-believable. I have no words to describe the rage I feel at this statement.
I was at a concert at a bar in a different city about 2 hours away. I was wearing what I call my “concert-going pants” - leopard spotted spandex jeans - and I am a 5’ 4", 108 lb female. On my way to the coat check after the show some asshole literally SMACKED MY ASS - HARD - and said “Fuck those pants are sexy, man!” IT FUCKING HURT. It even left a mark. Lucky for that guy I immediately went calm - not ballistic like I should have - because all I saw was the 2 hour road trip home late at night and didn’t want to make it any later by getting into a bar fight.
According to this crazy judge’s logic, if I hadn’t been at that concert wearing those awesome pants I wouldn’t have been physically assaulted? What the hell planet does this whackjob live on? I’m going go to whatever the hell concerts I want and wear whatever the hell pants I want.
I don’t understand why the victim in this case decided to go through the hassle of calling the cops and pressing charges, etc - why not simply cuss the guy out, kick him in the nuts and carry on? There seems to be no point in getting the courts involved anymore when they’re only going to blame the victim. This guy got off because he’s a cop, plain & simple. Happens all the time. He should have been dealt with when the offense occured.
Isn’t it interesting that some of the most conservative places, the ones that rant the most about “shariah law” seeping into America - those are the places that seem to want to treat women in a similar fashion as they are treated under Islamic law?
Can’t go to bars, not alone, nosirree. And certainly not dressed like that … you better have a veil on, sister! Cover those ankles, you might get the good ol’ boys all het up, and then there’s no stopping them. All in good fun, you see. And you should have known better!
I realize some of the similarities between our religious right and Islamic fundamentalists (whom they hate so much, they see them even where they don’t exist) have been pointed out before, but damn.
I was a legal secretary in Seattle in the 70’s. My boss and her client came back from a court hearing where they’d applied for a restraining order and they were both livid. The judge had said to the client “Maybe you shouldn’t have married a black man.”
The comments by his friends are just as bad. They’re whining he might lose his hunting license. Maybe if he didn’t believe that everything within his reach is fair game this would not have happened in the first place.
That the judge said it is probably outside of her duties and certainly the way that she said it was, but I think there’s validity to the underlying point that I think the judge was trying to make. At least from my perspective, it is by no means the a victim’s fault when they are victimized, but there are lessons to be learned about awareness of one’s situation and ways that the entire situation could have been avoided.
For instance, I had a few friends who, when we were in high school, were really into the whole goth thing. When we’d go places, they’d get stares, and going into stores and such they’d get followed around and watched because, presumably, they thought they might be shoplifting. One of them complained, and I pointed out that you can’t dress like that and then be surprised when people stare or watch you closely when you’re in the store or whatever. It’s not their fault so to say, since they weren’t doing anything wrong, but it wasn’t exactly unexpected responses. One of them stopped, the other didn’t really care and kept with it for a while.
This case is different though, I think it’s a bit unrealistic to try to draw attention to that because, while it’s certainly not a huge surprise that someone at a bar might touch someone else inappropriately, there aren’t really any reasonable precautions one might take to prevent that from happening that doesn’t also fundamentally defeat the purpose, like simply not going as it seems the judge suggested. Hell, the woman could completely avoid ever being touched against if she just never left her house. But what happened to this woman is well outside of any reasonable expectations and couldn’t have been avoided without unreasonable precautions, and it was said in a pretty crude way, so… yeah, quite poor…umm…judgment on the part of the judge to lecture the victim.
I agree, Blaster. There is never an excuse for sexually assaulting someone else, but everyone does have a responsibility to look after themselves as much as they can. There was a story in Calgary last week of a woman who was sexually assaulted while she sat in her car texting at night (the perpetrator jumped in her passenger door). My initial response to the story was, who sits in their car at night without locking their doors? Yes, we should be able to do that without being sexually assaulted, but in the real world, I lock my car doors every time I get in my car.
