I’m upset. I’m appalled. I’m scared. This is not the inspirational story you were looking for.
For the second time this week, I had to shut my office door to conceal the tears welling in my eyes after reading two letters digitally released to the public. The first instance, triggered by the letter of the rape victim in the case of Stanford student, Brock Turner, brought me to tears after reading the words of a strong, educated, and confident woman who fell prey to another individual’s false sense of entitlement and lack of humanity. The second instance, I shut my door after reading Joe Biden’s response to her bravery and courageousness that gave a nod to her anonymity in this media frenzy. Sexual assault is rampant and I am afraid.
I am a resilient, independent, perceptive, intelligent, intuitive young professional, and I am afraid. I am a 22-year-old young woman who works after dark many nights and I am afraid. I am physically defenseless and I am afraid because I know that it is a weakness. I have a small dog who I need to walk around my apartment complex alone and I am afraid. I have become afraid to live my life because I live in a culture where I am taught to and feel obligated to fear encountering individuals who do not value my intrinsic worth and humanity. I am taught to model different behaviors than many males my age. I am taught to fear, and I do. I have never been the victim of sexual assault, but the actions of Brock Turner towards an unfamiliar and incapacitated woman remind me that I all too easily could be. As she explained in her letter, his victim reminds us – as did Lady Gaga – that you don’t know what it’s like until it happens to you. There is such passivity in that phrase that frustrates me to the core – but that is reality. You should not have to actively protect yourself against unwanted violence like it is an imminent threat, yet we do.
Earning a college degree is a significant factor to succeeding in present day America. Few students, if any, have the exact same collegiate experience due to the numerous opportunities and paths that are posed to students in such a setting. At my university, accepting your admission to the University of Kentucky is coupled with the accepting threat of sexual assault. 5% of the student body reported being the victim of sexual assault ON OR NEAR CAMPUS in the past academic year. I have spent my entire life believing school to be a safe haven in which I succeed and am protected, but trusted campus officials tell me it is not the assumed beacon of security I have come to know. Of course, sexual assault and other related violence is not only present on college campuses, but it is the environment in which many of our future leaders, lawmakers, and professionals are being cultivated. Brock Turner claims the collegiate party culture as an excuse for his actions, and I have no choice but to believe it is a factor.
Under no circumstance should any individual feel like they are at fault for being victimized in any capacity. Further, Brock Turner’s and the actions of other rapists are the sole responsibility of the offenders, and I make no attempt to generalize or falsely attribute his wrongdoings as simply being the byproduct of a social experience. Still, I find myself grappling with the personal responsibility to keep myself in check at all times – meaning what I wear, how much I drink, the people I spend time alone with, who I let into my house, how I hold my keys when I walk to my car – because I still live in a society where this violence regularly occurs without severe or consistent repercussion. Whether a court ruling appears to favor a specific race, class, gender, or sexuality, we have set a precedent that certain crimes are excusable in the eyes of the law if the perpetrator has the potential for success, maintains certain connections, or possesses certain mainstream or perceived elite identities. Those crimes lately appear to center around women’s bodies which have come to be seen as hollow vessels in the wake of numerous campus sexual assault cases. We are more than our bodies, but our bodies are ours just the same. The appropriate sense of entitlement that should be felt is to make decisions regarding one’s own body, not the bodies of others. Likewise, perpetrators are entitled to equal persecution and accountability for their actions.
Brock Turner decided to rape a young woman. He must be held accountable for his actions in the same ways other criminals are because no crimes are more severe than those that strip individuals of their self-worth and pose harm to their basic, physical being. We must also eliminate the paradox that individuals, particularly current college students, must alter their behaviors to keep themselves safe when they are simultaneously inundated with ideology about freedom of choice, independence, and originality. The two messages cannot simultaneously exist because the former supersedes the latter and stifles individuality. I believe ideally that we could one day live in a nation that actually maintains a fair and just due process in which criminals are prosecuted consistently regardless of identity, and individuals no longer need to fear other humans – I don’t say strangers because a majority of violence and sexual assaults are committed by an individual well-known to the victim.
Alas, as the realist I am, we do not yet live in that world and college campuses continue to be plagued by a small population of loud voices that say violence is welcome and even encouraged. Words have not worked, figureheads speaking on this issue have not been heard. Media and social constructs continue to complicate pictures of consent and bodily autonomy. I believe individual voices matter and have impact, but those gathering in solidarity should find themselves in such circles because of positive, common interests rather than unity in victimhood. I’m not sure who has to say “Violence isn’t cool” enough times for individuals like Brock Turner to understand, but we must continue to make that message heard. Until our society acknowledges its shortcomings in teaching our citizens to be respectful and to demonstrate humanity in their actions towards EVERY PERSON, as much as it pains me, I too have bought into the mentality that such a violent culture will continue to exist and I must do everything in my power to protect myself. At the end of the day, we are alone.
Photo from the University of Kentucky.
