We've all seen the articles flooding our Facebook feeds about the recent trial of Brock Turner, the Stanford rapist who got a measly six-month (or less) sentence for assaulting an unconscious woman. There have been many articles posted in response to this verdict. However, one particular letter from the website To Save a Life made its rounds across the Internet over the past few days, and it caught my eye.
This letter differs from most of the other ones I've seen because instead of being written by a woman, it is written by a man. In fact, that is what the letter's point seems to be: that there are men out there who do care about the sexual safety of women. Although this letter is probably well intentioned, when examined more closely, it's problematic in many ways.
Let's look at a few lines below that exemplify problematic attitudes toward female survivors of sexual assault.
Dear Girl by the Dumpster at Stanford
This is the first line of the letter, addressed to the survivor of sexual assault at Stanford. Reducing the survivor to the "girl by the dumpster" is quite degrading. She is being defined by her assault, and instead of a woman and a survivor, she is merely a "girl" next to a dumpster where trash is disposed, which is less than empowering.
I'm so sorry it wasn't me who found you by the dumpster instead of him. I would have called for help while trying to get you to eat some bread. I would have gone to your phone to try and call one of your friends to come get you. I would have given you my coat, not removed yours.
Disregarding the fact that eating bread doesn't actually sober up drunk people, calling for help when someone is unconscious doesn't make you a great guy. Yes, it certainly makes you better than Brock Turner, but he's a rapist, so really, that's not saying much. Rather, calling for help is the absolute minimum that any decent human being should do when seeing someone in a dangerous situation.
You are not some girl at a party.
Saying she isn't just "some girl at a party" implies that there are other woman who are just "some girl," which is a very damaging attitude. Every woman is someone--someone's daughter, or someone's friend, or maybe someone's aunt, or sister, or girlfriend, or wife. No woman is just "some girl" even if she chooses to drink, to party, or to wear skimpy clothing. Everyone deserves respect.
I can't tell you how proud I am of the way you're handling it.
There is something very condescending about a survivor being told by a random man that that he's "proud" of how she is handling her own rape. After all, he has never met her and in truth has no idea at all how she is doing.
The goal of a relationship isn't to get to the moment where you get "the signal"--the goal is to get to the "I do." Keep it in your pants!
And this is where things get especially problematic. It's as if the writer only sympathizes with the survivor because she wasn't deemed promiscuous. In her letter to the court, she wrote "My own boyfriend knows me, but if he asked to finger me behind a dumpster, I would slap him. No girl wants to be in this situation." Her assault was a complete violation, and Tuner's actions should be punished to the full extent of the law. However, there are some girls who do hook up behind dumpsters or who go home with men they aren't going to marry, and that's OK. Both someone who has a lot of sex and someone who doesn't have any sex can be assaulted. Neither one of them deserves it more than the other.
I'm a Christian, so sex and love go hand in hand in my world. I've loved people who didn't love me back and that sucked, so why would I want to force someone to share such a moment of intimacy when they don't want to be there?
Being Christian and believing that sex and love go hand in hand has nothing to do with rape because rape isn't about sex or love. The author is missing the point here--rape is often an act of power; it's an attack on another person's body for one's own pleasure or sick entertainment. It isn't "sex" at all because sex is consensual and rape is not.
Maybe because I have sisters I have a soft spot for women--or maybe it's just because I'm not a pig and my dad would beat the crap out of me if I ever touched a girl with violence instead of defend me.
Having sisters or a threatening father shouldn't be the main reason that someone isn't a rapist. Not raping others because someone is too afraid of getting physically assaulted doesn't make him or her a good person. An individual shouldn't rape others because it's a terrible violation of another human being.
I suspect that the author of this article was trying to show support for the survivor in his own way, and I respect his attempt. However, as a society, it's important that we all examine our own preconceived attitudes about sexual assault, and we must think about how our attitudes can be harmful to survivors. Survivors don't need these "heroes" to tell them how they can be saved. They aren't fragile or weak. They are strong. They are fighters. What they need is support. Instead of feeling sorry for survivors, we should do something like encourage rape to not go unreported; advocate for a better education on what consent means; or adopt a more accepting attitude that rejects the notion that rape survivors were "asking for it."