So I know that I just wrote about the De Anza gang rape yesterday. And I know that everybody else is blogging about this, too. But because of the fact that everyone is talking about it, I just can’t get it out of my mind. I was reading the comments over at feministing while I was at work and honestly started feeling physically ill.
One of the alleged rapists, Chris Knopf (remember that name for your own safety) said: “From the beginning, I kind of felt like it was a witch hunt and the De Anza players were victims, and not really this girl.”
One of the witnesses quoted one of the rapists (no, I am not going to separate the ones actually doing the raping and the ones watching/encouraging it. They are all fucking rapists) as saying: “This is her fault. She got drunk and she did this to herself.”
A girl who dates a De Anza baseball player said: “The people in the room obviously were cheering the guys on or something like that. But I didn’t think of it as a rape situation.”
A recent commenter on feministing (full disclosure: I told him to go to hell) said: The DA Dolores Carr stated that there was “insufficient evidence” to pursue any charges. Perhaps we should take Dolores at her word – there wasn’t enough evidence to prove a crime occurred. It could be that something happened and some crime of some sort was committed but they just can’t prove it. On the other hand, it could be that young men were once again falsely accused. Scott Righetti, one of the students at the party stated “Someone can lie about you and ruin all the good decisions you’ve made in your life with just one comment..” and also stated that “the whole situation came out in the media completely, completely different than what actually occurred.” Sounds eerily similar to the Duke Rape Hoax and if there is anything we have learned from that case it is that media reports can be wildly sensationalized, inaccurate, and often fabricated.
A bunch of jackasses at talk left are saying things like maybe she DID consent while passed out and covered in her own vomit, like it is theoretically possible to consent under those circumstances.
Someone who claimed to be a De Anza player posted the following comment on Twisty’s blog: sounds like you sure do buy in to the way the media twists a case in a girls direction…ever thought about what happened before the girl went in that roo…what she was doing…..saying….acting….perhaps when the truthful story comes out after all this dies down you will lower your chin a bit and look in the mirror…..the media is not the accurate source of info. they were not there in that room…i was….justice has been served.
I have no clue if this person is who he says he is. But does it matter? The fact is, someone was willing to write it.
The only way I can reasonably look at this is to say that American society has failed women. Society has failed women in teaching them to respect other women’s bodies and their own bodies well enough to know when rape is rape. Society has failed women because it teaches young men that this is okay. It’s okay, society says, to rape women when they are passed out and drunk. It is okay to invite your friends to watch. It is okay to ask them to join in. And nothing bad will happen to you. Society has failed women because cases like this, which are so clearly cut and dry, where witnesses are present, are not prosecuted. Society has failed women because there is no shortage of rape apologists to try to justify what these men did.
This makes me terrified of the world we live in and terrified for the future. I have two brothers: one 19 and one 15. And though I think that I know them well enough that they would realize how incredibly repugnant, wrong and unforgivable this is, how do I know? If this is the society that has raised them, how do we truly know anything? How do we know who to trust when men will crowd in a room to watch a rape and wait their turn? How do we know who to trust when others ignore the situation when it’s “none of their business?” How do we know who to trust when we even have to have this fucking conversation?
I feel like my heart has been broken. I have never been raped, but I have been sexually abused. I have several very close friends who have been raped. I feel betrayed on behalf of myself, on behalf of all of them. So imagine how this girl feels. She was repeatedly raped while others watched and would have been raped again if someone hadn’t stopped it. There were more accomplices than you can count on both hands and three eye witnesses willing to speak for her. And still no one will believe her.
I agree with Lya, who said yesterday in my notes that rape is not illegal in this country. It’s not. Our justice system is broken, our moral standards are broken, this entire fucking country is broken.
Buggle left a note on feministing with the contact information for the DA who decided not to prosecute. Speak for yourself, speak for this victim. Tell her that we and she deserve an answer, that “lack of evidence” is not a reason to drop a case when there are eye witnesses. Please, tell her what you think.
Contact info:
Office of the District Attorney
70 West Hedding Street, West Wing
San Jose, CA 95110
Phone: (408) 299-7400
Email: webmaster@da.co.santa-clara.ca.us
Website http://www.sccgov.org/portal/site/da/
Her numbers are: 408-299-3099 and 408-299-7500.
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I wrote.
I can’t believe this is even controversial. That there is even discussion and disagreement rather than completely universal outrage.
What did you write to her? I want to write something but I don’t know how to say anything about this right now that isn’t expletive-filled and extremely angry. It feels hard to do anything, after reading about this case, other than sob and wish I could just move to another planet or something.
Leeann, this is what I wrote
I would like to express my extreme concern, disappointment and anger towards the decision to not prosecute the De Anza rape case. I do not live in the area, but you must realize that this case is having and will have repercussions nation-wide. It is imperative that rapes are prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, lest rape survivors stop coming forward and more men learn that rape is “not a big deal.”
You have sighted “lack of evidence” as a reason to drop the case. In a case that has three eye witnesses and surely has at least some DNA evidence, that is incredibly difficult to believe. I believe that you owe it to the victim of this attack, the other girls who attend this school and might come in contact with the attackers and women and rape survivors everywhere to say what this lack of evidence is. This case is causing me to lose whatever faith I had left in our legal system. A part of your job is to protect the public. How can the public feel safe when a gang rape that has eye witnesses is dropped without reason? How can we trust our legal system when no evidence is every enough to convict a rapist? Please, reconsider.
Very articulate, thank you for sharing it with me! I’ll write something along the same lines now that I’ve calmed down a bit…
Just fyi, though, I’m pretty sure that that first sentence in the second paragraph should say “cited” rather than “sighted.”
Ha! Oops :)
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