Steubenville, Ohio Rape Case [TW: Rape and Rape Culture]

[foxgrl 496]

this is a post more about the serious side of things, i guess if nothing else to inform. this case touched me more than most and i want to hear your thoughts/opinions.

 

 

 

 

If you haven’t heard the story yet…it’s a story that scares me for the present/future of young women everywhere and that 

should be shared from all parts of the internet and news outlets

. It’s sadly predictable. It’s what movies are made of. But in those movies, it’s clear who’s in the wrong and how justice should be served.

But then we come back to planet Earth and away from Hollywood and somehow most people struggle with what a victim is. Drunk girls can be victims too.

The scoop: 

16yo gets drunk around star football players. They decide to use/urinate/rape her in front of others (it was funny to them). They take videos/pictures of the assault. Other people tweet it, FB it, etc. No one helps or calls cops. Case gets tossed under SHE’S NOT A VICTIM VILLE, SHE WAS SEXUALLY ACTIVE. SHE WANTED THIS.(See 

New York Times

 article)

That was until a 

blogger 

wouldn’t drop it, since there were pictures/videos/screenshots or as we would otherwise know it in non-bizzaro world SLAM DUNK CASE against the perpetrators. But these are star football players in a football town. So instead blogger gets defamation suits against her.

But Anonymous was on the case and so they leaked a 

video

that has not only, apparently, put the case back on display but now on the national level. And so start the Occupy rallies at Steubenville.

From 

NYT

 article:

“Afterward, they headed to the home of one football player who has now become a witness for the prosecution. That player told the police that he was in the back seat of his Volkswagen Jetta with Mays and the girl when Mays proceeded to flash the girl’s breasts and penetrate her with his fingers, while the player videotaped it on his phone. The player, who shared the video with at least one person, testified that he videotaped Mays and the girl “because he was being stupid, not making the right choices.” He said he later deleted the recording.

The girl “was just sitting there, not really doing anything,” the player testified. “She was kind of talking, but I couldn’t make out the words that she was saying.”

At that third party, the girl could not walk on her own and vomited several times before toppling onto her side, several witnesses testified. Mays then tried to coerce the girl into giving him oral sex, but the girl was unresponsive, according to the player who videotaped Mays and the girl.

The player said he did not try to stop it because “at the time, no one really saw it as being forceful.”

At one point, the girl was on the ground, naked, unmoving and silent, according to two witnesses who testified. Mays, they said, had exposed himself while he was right next to her.

Richmond was behind her, with his hands between her legs, penetrating her with his fingers, a witness said.

“I tried to tell Trent to stop it,” another athlete, who was Mays’s best friend, testified. “You know, I told him, ‘Just wait — wait till she wakes up if you’re going to do any of this stuff. Don’t do anything you’re going to regret.’ ”

He said Mays answered: “It’s all right. Don’t worry.”

That boy took a photograph of what Mays and Richmond were doing to the girl. He explained in court how he wanted her to know what had happened to her, but he deleted it from his phone, he testified, after showing it to several people.”

From the NY Times article

 

At a hearing in early October, prosecutors told the judge in the case that the defendants treated the girl “like a toy” and “the bottom line is we don’t have to prove that she said ‘no,’ we just have to prove that when they’re doing things to her, she’s not moving. She’s not responsive, and the evidence is consistent and clear.”

At a hearing last month, the girl’s mother said her daughter remained distraught and did not want to attend school. The girl’s friends have ostracized her, and parents have kept their children away from her, the mother said.

The girl does not sleep much, said the mother, who testified that she often hears her daughter crying at night.

The mother said the obsession with high school football in Steubenville is partly to blame. It shocked her that Saccoccia testified as a character witness for the defendants last month, she said.

strong>

 

 

 

apparently Trent Mays texted the 16-year-old girl he raped and begged her not to press charges for fear that he would be kicked off the football team. In one text, he wrote, “

I’ll just never do anything nice for you again.

”

If that’s not emblematic of our seriously perverse rape culture, then I don’t know what is. 

 

 

 

 - this video is CNN's view point, basically giving you pity and backstory on the two main rapists and barely, if at all, speaking of the girl and victim.

 

[Monicker 3,035]

Oh man, i spent like an hour earlier today reading like 5 different stories on this even though it was really hard and upsetting to read. I was just seething the entire time. What an enraging and depressing story. Trent Mays seems like a straight up sociopath. But, the thing is, there's a whole town--the school, teachers, football coach, parents, store owners, etc.--behind this as well, and that's what makes it horrifying. In addition to everything that was reported happening that night, it's insane that the people who video taped the crime were given immunity.

 

Oh and then the defense attorney, god. There's a video where he speaks briefly to a news source and he is claiming that the victim was, like, trying to get with Trent Mays that night! He looks like a bad actor playing a nervous part, his eyes are wandering all over the place. How do you live with yourself defending cases like this? Fucking sociopath too. 

[YUNGATA 14,955]

This is so nauseating to read and I just don't get it at all. Rape culture and all its problems just seem so obvious to me. It's really one of those things where I can't understand why anyone can't see it the way I do, and you know for the most part I'm willing to see an issue from both sides. How little empathy do these boys have to have to not stop for a minute and think, "if this was happening to me would I be 100% okay with it?"

[Viva 3,169]

Honestly reading this made me sick. As a girl, as a person, as a human being.  The rapist is a sick bastard and the guy's that just saw everything happen and did nothing are equaly guilty. Just sick tbh. I wonder how much alcohol she had drank because to get to the point of been that unconcious is quite hard. Maybe they give her the rape drug? Poor girl hope she gets the help she needs and can somewhat find  peace. 

 

Sometimes I think US has more sick people than any other place in the world. It's just sick the things they do to girls and boys and get away with it. Hello Chris Brown doing only community service? Not even 2 years later he was dancing and singing at the grammies? The only punishiment he got was giving by the Brtits who denied him a visa. He almost killed Rihanna beating the shit out of her and got out free as a bird.

 

That university coach Sandusky that raped (they call it molestation in US in Brazil what he did is called Rape) all those boys through all those years? The fact that NBC news simple edited his interview in the middle to hide the part he basically confesses to rape boys amuses me. Was in the papers here the fact a news station would do such thing in US only a gossip site called TMZ shamed NBC. That was a coach of a famous university and some university officials cover up for him for years.  No wonder why those football guys in US think they can do whatever they want.

[foxgrl 496]

This is so nauseating to read and I just don't get it at all. Rape culture and all its problems just seem so obvious to me. It's really one of those things where I can't understand why anyone can't see it the way I do, and you know for the most part I'm willing to see an issue from both sides. How little empathy do these boys have to have to not stop for a minute and think, "if this was happening to me would I be 100% okay with it?"

 

the most disgusting part is that in the video someone says something like, 'Dude, what if it was your sister?' and he replied, 'But it isn't' and they all moved on. excuse me? i highly doubt that, and intoxicated or not, you knew how to pick her up and drag her, make jokes about it.  in my opinion, the entire town, like Mon said; 

 

Trent Mays seems like a straight up sociopath. But, the thing is, there's a whole town--the school, teachers, football coach, parents, store owners, etc.--behind this as well, and that's what makes it horrifying. In addition to everything that was reported happening that night, it's insane that the people who video taped the crime were given immunity.

 

is biased. none of them want to hurt their precious footballers, no matter how disgusting the crime. and after all this, all they got was a year, pity, and when they get back they'll probably be welcomed. thats how small towns work, and it's beyond fucked up.

 

Sometimes I think US has more sick people than any other place in the world. It's just sick the things they do to girls and boys and get away with it. 

we aren't taught about rape culture or anything on this topic growing up, in fact, its completely avoided. 'slut' is a free term, women are taught to be pety and small and conform and even hate on other women, and rape is simply a no-no to bring up, unless its a 'tasteful' joke. if we want to change anything, we have to start with the generation thats going to do the changing. and as for your CNN comment, you can sign this petition in hopes that the nation, and the girl specifically, will get an apology for the way they sympathized with her rapists and molesters. 

 

--------

 

 

on a side note, i'm really proud to say i'm part of this community. before i was, but it's nice seeing that you aren't only talented when picking an artist, you're opinionated and i'm just very happy that this is being addressed with so much maturity, its giving me if no one else some closure.

 

[lola 6,641]

Sometimes I think US has more sick people than any other place in the world. It's just sick the things they do to girls and boys and get away with it. Hello Chris Brown doing only community service? Not even 2 years later he was dancing and singing at the grammies? The only punishiment he got was giving by the Brtits who denied him a visa. He almost killed Rihanna beating the shit out of her and got out free as a bird.

 

I don't think this is true. It's just that if something happens in the US, the entire world finds out about it because idk...people around the world seem to be really interested in American media. If that happened in some tiny town in the Ukraine or something, we wouldn't read about it.

[Viva 3,169]

I don't think this is true. It's just that if something happens in the US, the entire world finds out about it because idk...people around the world seem to be really interested in American media. If that happened in some tiny town in the Ukraine or something, we wouldn't read about it.

 

I think you're wrong. This cat is only out of the bag because ONE blogger didn't let the thing go blank because if it depended in the justice system or the actual news no one WOULD EVER KNOW just like that little city in Ukraine you talked about.

 

The rape is only half of the craziness in this whole thing. The fact that all those people are there laughing, making jokes and after posting such things just shows how sick their mentality is and how not afraid of any kind of pusnishment they are.. THEY VIDEO TAPED IT. The whole town was helping the boys. That is normal?? POST SUCH THING??? That is the most amusing part. It's not because it happened in US particularly or because people are interested in the US media is because of how careless and natural such thing seems to be for those guy's.

 

By the way things happen in US and no one knows about it because their major news channels don't report news. You probably know more about their economy reading your newspapers international section. The newspapers in US is basically a bunch of ads combined. As someone who is studing journalism I find outrgeous the way they treated this case. Their news are a joke tbh. For a so called democratic free country even a news channel like CNN is controled delivering to people not even half news.

[lola 6,641]

I think you're wrong. This cat is only out of the bag because ONE blogger didn't let the thing go blank because if it depended in the justice system or the actual news no one WOULD EVER KNOW just like that little city in Ukraine you talked about.

 

The rape is only half of the craziness in this whole thing. The fact that all those people are there laughing, making jokes and after posting such things just shows how sick their mentality is and how not afraid of any kind of pusnishment they are.. THEY VIDEO TAPED IT. The whole town was helping the boys. That is normal?? POST SUCH THING??? That is the most amusing part. It's not because it happened in US particularly or because people are interested in the US media is because of how careless and natural such thing seems to be for those guy's.

 

By the way things happen in US and no one knows about it because their major news channels don't report news. You probably know more about their economy reading your newspapers international section. The newspapers in US is basically a bunch of ads combined. As someone who is studing journalism I find outrgeous the way they treated this case. Their news are a joke tbh. For a so called democratic free country even a news channel like CNN is controled delivering to people not even half news.

 

I just mean that I don't think Americans are any more cruel than people from any other country.

[Viva 3,169]

I just mean that I don't think Americans are any more cruel than people from any other country.

 

Maybe not but for sure they get away more easily with rape, phedophilia and beaitng up women than in most countries. The fact that so many people cover this up and a network as CNN did such outrageous remarks of the subject just proves that. Also the fact that all those people pictured laughing ON CAMERA and that where there when the rape happened , TAPED, recorded in a available video, got away free with not even a day in jail also proves that. My theory is that oportunity and impunity most times creates/makes the thief.

[Viva 3,169]

 

we aren't taught about rape culture or anything on this topic growing up, in fact, its completely avoided. 'slut' is a free term, women are taught to be pety and small and conform and even hate on other women, and rape is simply a no-no to bring up, unless its a 'tasteful' joke. if we want to change anything, we have to start with the generation thats going to do the changing. and as for your CNN comment, you can sign this petition in hopes that the nation, and the girl specifically, will get an apology for the way they sympathized with her rapists and molesters. 

 

What rape culture means? I never heard such expression/ term before. Blows me away the word rape associated with being a culture. Such words should never be combined in the same sentence.

 

IWhat you mean with bringing up rape is a no no?? Women taught to be pity and small? Don't they have a womens police station in US?? Like a place where womens get special treatment in case of aggression?

[foxgrl 496]

[extreme TW rape culture]

 

What rape culture means? I never heard such expression/ term before. Blows me away the word rape associated with being a culture. Such words should never be combined in the same sentence.

 

IWhat you mean with bringing up rape is a no no?? Women taught to be pity and small? Don't they have a womens police station in US?? Like a place where womens get special treatment in case of aggression?

 

rape culture, in my understanding, is just about as disgusting as it sounds, unfortunately. peoples idea that 'she wanted it', 'she asked for it', 'did you see what she was wearing?' and thoughts like it spin around the head without pity, and create a sort of understanding in the person reading the stories mind. rape culture is how the favorite is picked, and its not victim vs attacker, its female vs male(depending on who is raped), outfit vs alcohol. often, a minority figure who raped will be looked down upon harsher than a white male. rape culture in this situation is that the girls town wanted her to shut up, that it took the video to go nationwide for anything to be done, and that the girls own police force didn't want to look into the case because the town was a football town, and the rapists were the stars, essentially. 

and no, actually. women are taught to keep an eye out, be careful what we wear because it might be deemed revealing and someone might get the wrong idea. instead of them teaching men (and women, but im focusing on men rapists) NOT to rape, they teach the victims not the GET raped. to my knowledge, we don't have any kind of police unit like that. there's no special treatment.

[VegasBaby 895]

Rape culture is all around us and it's scary.  This makes me feel absolutely sick and that some people are [inevitably] defending them. That's rape culture at work. Some people believe that it's the guys right to violate a woman's body when she is inebriated and that "no means yes". Disgusting. We are apparently fair game and a man's property, they can do what they like with us.

 

And smh at people saying they don't have to prove she said/didn't say no. How could she say anything in that state? No means no, if a girl doesn't say yes or CAN'T say yes, then it's still NO. They saw an opportunity to take advantage and they did. Simple as that.

 

 

Trent Mays seems like a straight up sociopath. But, the thing is, there's a whole town--the school, teachers, football coach, parents, store owners, etc.--behind this as well, and that's what makes it horrifying.

Absolutely. Makes me feel physically sick.

 

 

I don't think this is true. It's just that if something happens in the US, the entire world finds out about it because idk...people around the world seem to be really interested in American media. If that happened in some tiny town in the Ukraine or something, we wouldn't read about it.

True in a way. I think people are more shocked when news incidents like these come up in America as America is supposed to be a civilized country. As we are reporting more and more news articles and incidents all across the world on social networking sites, it's easy to see now how prevelant the problem is. It's sad.

 

Rape culture is a problem everywhere, not just America or the UK or India. It's just all too easy for people to brush the problem off by saying it's "feminist" and people don't like that word so they devalue the problem in itself. Really really sad.

[PrettyBaby 2,220]

Has anyone seen ModPrimate's videos? I like how he explains the problem (generally, but also the problem of rape culture in particular) and encourages each of us to be part of the solution.

 

 

 

 

[TrailerParkDarling 5,693]

i guess one way to figure out who is a fuckin asshole in your life is check their status updates about this case (i don't have fb/twitter but i creep  )... for instance, my idiot teen mom cousin was saying that the girl probably consented and forgot ..sigh. a guy i once knew told me he didn't really believe in rape because he thought most of the girls lied about it to get attention.

 

 where do ppl get these ideas!!!??!  and those rape apologists, jesus fuckin christ. "they looked so sad, they were crying" 

[Viva 3,169]

Rape culture is all around us and it's scary.  This makes me feel absolutely sick and that some people are [inevitably] defending them. That's rape culture at work. Some people believe that it's the guys right to violate a woman's body when she is inebriated and that "no means yes". Disgusting. We are apparently fair game and a man's property, they can do what they like with us.

 

And smh at people saying they don't have to prove she said/didn't say no. How could she say anything in that state? No means no, if a girl doesn't say yes or CAN'T say yes, then it's still NO. They saw an opportunity to take advantage and they did. Simple as that.

 

 

I never even heard about rape culture before. In Brazil you can get away with things that would blow you away but rape is not one of them. Rape, pedophilia, hurting a pregnant women or a child are actions here that screws your life forever.

 

It's a unbailable crime on every standard which means is considered a capital crime. If the person you rape is under 18 than my friend you got 2 capital crimes one against youth and children and the other one for rape. That means you gonna spend long years in jail.

 

All over Brazil has the women's police station which is a police department dedicated exclusively to such situations towards women, can be any type of aggression. They are connected to another government organ called The House Of Women which provides house, food, money and transportation for womens victims of abuse.

 

Also the tube has a special subway wagon that is exclusive for women and children. Most public bathrooms have personal security.

 

In the sexual classes in school they bring such subjects up and tell us girls to not drink too much or walk at street at night in certain places alone. Not because rape is your fault since is seeing as a capital crime in Brazil which is considered so extreme that your right of bail is revoked. To have the right to respond to a rape trial in liberty, not from jail, you have to get a petition from the judge. Is very rare to get one of those.

 

We are also incentivaded to get personal defense class. Any gym, doesn't even have to be a fantasy one, has personal defense and fight classes. And Rio has more bars and gyms than people.

 

 I can't imagine a guy in my school doing such thing and being able to go to school on the next day. The football team would probably break his jaw and ribs in several places and throw his body in a police station door. I am not even exagerating. If they post and pass such video through a school here they would be fucked to the point the police would be the last of their worries.

 

I am not saying in any way that things don't happen here because they do obviously. Is just the way people see such action as rape is what shocks me.

 

Off course rape  unfortunately happens all over Brazil just like any other country. That is not what shocks me so much the rape itself I mean. What shocks me is what people say about such thing being taught like is ok and is nothing major when we are taught here that such thing is one of the most shameful thing a men/boy can do.

 

What shocks me is that they taped and show it in school. You have no idea my jaw droped with that one.

 

[Monicker 3,035]

The girl received death threats from people in town when it became evident that she was going to prosecute. That mentality that fights to normalize this kind of thing is very real. Also, that CNN clip that foxgrl linked to really should be seen. Right there is as concrete of an example as you can get--in this case of a major news network--framing the rapists' verdict as the real tragedy (“What’s the lasting effect on two young men being found guilty in juvenile court of...rape, essentially?”) That was the focus of the entire segment. Sign that petition and pass it along. CNN apologizing for the way they covered the story would be huge. It would bring awareness to many Americans who don’t think about this stuff, who don’t even have it on their radar. Sure, if CNN goes through with it there will be a huge backlash. They and those who signed the petition will be criticized and ridiculed by those who want to discredit any movement that challenges the status quo. But any kind of progress begins with that kind of dismissive backlash.

[NamiraWilhelm 5,043]

That picture and everything else about this case is so heavily disturbing... as well as the pathetic sentence passed onto them. How is it that tax dodgers are punished more severely than paedophiles or rapists? Ok fine there's a psychological element in there... but who the frak would you rather be locked away? 

 

When are we going to evolve beyond these heinous crimes and these primitive attitudes? I'm sure I'll be reading plenty of 'she shouldn't have done this' or 'worn that' over the next week. They call it 'rape culture' but given the fact it's a staple of human behaviour throughout our entire history I'm starting to think we'll never evolve beyond it

[Poison Ivy 1,588]

All this is so wrong on so many levels. The case itself is disturbing, but it doesn't shock me as much as knowing so many people from that town and from NATIONAL TV support and pity the rapists. That just leaves me speechless and disgusted. 

[PinUpGaloreLana 1,399]

Rapists. Where do i begin.

I could not care one little bit for the rapist. Throw them into a fire, I wouldnt care. Drown them, I wouldnt care. Kill them in the most painful way possible, I wouldnt care.

Monsters such as themselves do not deserve care. Where was the care shown when they raped the poor girl? It wasnt.

Rip them up. Let them see what it is to have their dignity also stolen from them.

And I signed that petition. CNN have no business sympathizing with such sick bastards.

They can all go to hell. Regardless of why they did it. There is absolutely no exscuse.

[Chocolate Eyes 548]

This is so disturbing.

Rape is unwanted, force, and/or non consensual. Even if a victim was in a "shady" place, it's still always the rapist who has the control so he/she should have known to control themselves. It's unbelievable that something like this is so hard to understand for some people.