Rape is not a recreational activity
About Michael John ScottMr. Scott is the owner and publisher of Mad Mike's America. He is a U.S. Army veteran, career law enforcement executive, and dog trainer. He is a university professor, and criminal justice consultant, holding several degrees, including a master's in criminal justice and human services. He has completed the requisite coursework toward his doctorate, and is still working on his dissertation.
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Saint Patrick’s day was no celebration for two Steubenville, Ohio teenagers. Trent Mays, 17, and Ma’lik Richmond, 16, were found ‘guilty’ in juvenile court of raping an unidentified 16-year old girl at a party last August.
Trent Mays, 17, left, and Ma’lik Richmond, 16, sit at the defense table before the start of their trial on March 13.
AP Photo
The convictions, however, didn’t signal the end of the trial. Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine announced after the verdict that he is empaneling a grand jury in April to examine if anyone else should face charges in the small eastern Ohio town. State investigators interviewed 56 people — including the Steubenville High principal and its 27 football coaches, plus the district superintendent — and 16 of them refused to cooperate. The grand jury is necessary because Steubenville “desperately needs to be able to put this matter behind it and begin to move forward,” DeWine said, pivoting to the bigger picture:
Everything that has happened in Steubenville has been very difficult — very, very sad — and very tragic. But let me be clear — this is not just a Steubenville problem. This is a societal problem. What happened here is shocking, and it is appalling. But what’s even more shocking and appalling is that crimes of sexual assault are occurring every Friday night and every Saturday night in big and small communities all across this country. And there comes a point, where we must say, “Enough! This has to stop!”… Rape is not a recreational activity. We, as a society, have an obligation do more to educate our young people about rape. They need to know it is a horrible crime of violence. And it is simply not OK. [DeWine statement]
Rape may be way too common, but rape convictions are not, says Kathleen Geier at Washington Monthly. Quite the opposite. “Using statistics from the Justice Department and the FBI, RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network) reports that out of every 100 rapes that occur, 46 get reported to police, 12 lead to an arrest, 9 get prosecuted, 5 lead to a felony conviction, and 3 see the inside of a prison cell.” The other “97 lucky rapists”? They walk. So while “at some level, it’s sad to see two such young men” get sent into our awful prisons, these “prison sentences serve an extremely important purpose.”
It’s not even about them or their victim as individuals, it’s about the message that is sent…. We have to show that rape is never minimized, excused, or tolerated by a decent society, and that rapists must pay for their crimes. Yesterday’s Ohio conviction has probably prevented countless rapes from occurring, by unambiguously demonstrating the consequences. A powerful blow against rape culture has been struck. [Washington Monthly]
We don’t need any of these “What It Means sermonettes” from the liberal media, says Robert Stacy McCain at The Other McCain. This was one crime, committed by two teenagers, that the media and Anonymous transformed into “a bogus narrative that impugned the entire town of Steubenville and even the tradition of high school football.” The concerted effort to “turn this one incident into a symbol — something about ‘rape culture’ or whatever — is typical of how the media get it wrong with their ‘make a difference’ social-justice crusader mentality.”
This rape case was different, and there are broader implications for society, says Adam Cohen at TIME. And what made the case a potential game-changer is the outside role text-messaging and social media played. “It is a whole new kind of crime when teen sexual assault meets social media and goes blaringly, glaringly public.”
All of this documentation proved critical to a conviction. Sexual-assault trials often come down to “he said, she said” battles. Cases like the Steubenville rape, which the victim has few memories of, can be especially hard for prosecutors to win. Text messages from wrongdoers and viral photos and videos from bystanders can provide a robust record of what actually happened….
Social media is not going away. New technology is on the way that will further up the ante — like Google Glass, which will allow people to constantly videotape whatever they are seeing. As shocking as the images, text messages, and videos in the Steubenville case are, we should get used to them. They are likely to be the new normal — for good and for bad. [TIME]
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James Smith
March 18, 2013 at 9:49 am
“27 football coaches?” Even for a football-crazy town like Steubenville, that seems excessive. Perhaps it was 27 players?
As I see the problem, these were more athletes that never had to be responsible for anything in their lives except playing sports. Naturally, they had no reason to think ordinary rules applied to them, they never had before.
Perhaps they were good students, I have personally know star athletes that were. I have known far more that were allowed to slide through school without learning anything except their chosen sports.
It’s time people figured out the purpose of public schools is to educate out young, not to serve as farm clubs for commercial sports interests.
If they want to start grooming the top athletes and winnowing the mediocre at that age, let them sponsor teams and leagues independent from any specific school. Taxpayer money for schools should be spent on education. Physical education classes should be focused on those that need it the most, not further honing of the best players for a favored sport.
Michael John Scott
March 18, 2013 at 12:04 pm
That does seem like a lot of coaches. I need to Google that number. Thanks James.
Jess
March 18, 2013 at 10:15 am
They had a “rape crew” and people knew about it at this school. I made the error of going to a yahoo commenting board about this the other day and got into it when they started blaming this child for being drunk and not being a “good girl” Um, no, you do not get to do that, she is not to blame for any of this at all.
Then it was, well she wasn’t a virgin, like that is ok since you have had sex once, it’s okay for a woman to have her genitalia be used as a clown car. The fact that someone may have had too much to drink or is wearing what you think is not suitable clothing, does not give you the right to sex, without consent of the other person, male or female because we know men are raped also. No means no, especially if my ass is drunk and passed out somewhere where I don’t have the ability to say yes to sex.
Sadly, CNN had more than just Poppy doing this feeling sorry for the boys and now today I just was reading, this girl has been getting death threats for coming forward.
James Smith
March 18, 2013 at 10:25 am
You might be aware that in Steubenville, and other towns, football is more important than the rights of women or even being a decent human being. Hence, the death threats and blaming the victim.
Jess
March 18, 2013 at 11:33 am
AYUP and apparently one of the coaches knew about this, since those boys dragged that girl there and did nothing but tell them go away. NOTHING at all, when he is a person who should have reported it given his position. Blaming the victim has been going on for hundreds of years so I don’t see that changing any time soon till we stand up and demand it be changed. That and this whole mentality of, well women should not be tempting us with their sexy ways. That right there says, well gotta be all men are just pigs when we know that is so far from the truth.
Michael John Scott
March 18, 2013 at 12:03 pm
What is pissing me off is all the people who are blaming the parents of both victim and attackers. I’ve seen some of the best parents ever to end up with kids that do something stupid. That’s the operative phrase by the way: kids that do something stupid. That’s a daily occurrence for kids and blaming the parents, without knowing anything about them, is wrong. Now I do know the victim’s parents are big time Bible Bangers, but I won’t go into that right now….
Bill Formby
March 18, 2013 at 2:14 pm
This is a tragic occurrence by any stretch of the imagination. It is part of the feelings of entitlement that athletes have quite frequently these days. It is also part of the rhetoric that young people hear every day from the political arena. The lack of importance of women as anything but something to be used by men. Much like the Penn State debacle things have to change and change has to start with leadership from parents, school officials, and politicians.
Norman Rampart
March 18, 2013 at 5:46 pm
Rape is rape is rape.
Age is irrelevent.
You rape a girl or a woman you lose your liberty for a looooooong time.
Minimum 10 years for these kids.
It isn’t revenge – revenge is when the girls dad cuts off their balls.
Justice is when the law says ‘You’ve made a hell of a mess of this young girls life and it’ll take her a long time to come to terms with what happened to her and all we care about is helping her in any way we can’ – ‘You creatures, on the other hand, don’t count. Your life is deservedly ruined and, frankly, you would be doing the world a favour if you topped yourselves as the taxpayer is going to have to pay for your prison meals and your medical treatment when you get ass raped. Enjoy your minimum 10 years guys’
Now THAT would be justice.
Linh
March 19, 2013 at 12:13 am
This may or may not be irrelevant, but for some reason I remembered some reporter’s rebuttal to one of the justifications for thinking that women should not be in combat. I believe that the argument was that men would feel too protective of the women they would have to serve with and feel it more if they were injured or killed.
The rebuttal was that the main complaint filed by women in service was… sexual assault. So much for protecting women.
Michael John Scott
March 21, 2013 at 1:32 pm
Good points Linh.