When I was younger, my mother sat me down and gave me that all-too-dreadful talk about the birds and the bees. We talked about things such as what constituted as sex, how to say no, and what certain terms, like rape, meant. I knew only a little about what rape was, and for the whole duration of the talk, I wondered if she would ever talk to my brothers about the subject. After talking to some of my friends, I realized that all of my friends' brothers—like my two—had never had the talk.
"Maybe it's because they should already know that it's unacceptable," we told each other. Assuming that everyone, especially perpetrators, knew rape was wrong was naĂŻve of us to think.
Time Magazine defines rape culture as "a culture in which sexual violence is the norm and victims are blamed for their own assaults." Case after case, especially in college, it is rape victims who are blamed for the situation that found themselves in.
The birds and the bees talk isn't enough. It is never the victims' fault for what happened to them because they were taken advantage and they did not "ask for it." It is time that all children get the talk because girls shouldn't have to learn that their choice of clothing or alcohol consumption is the reason they might get raped. If the majority of boys of committing rape, then why, as a society, do we not instill it in them earlier that rape is not okay?
Let's start with teaching boys that it's not okay to pull on their female classmates' hair if they like them. Let's instill in them that it's not okay to look up older girls' skirts. Let's teach girls that spaghetti straps and leggings are acceptable, and that they shouldn't be sent home just because their male classmates could possibly be distracted by their clothing. Tell everyone that intoxicated consent is not consent, no really means no, and unconsciousness doesn't mean yes.
Brock Turner and Austin Wilkerson's victims are left with emotional scars that are lifelong, and their perpetrators are given lenient sentences—Turner, three months; and Austin, two years of work release and 20 years' probation. What kind of society do we live in where victim blaming is all-too-common and rapists receive minimal sentences?
Let's make this world safer for everyone. It's so unbelievably upsetting that victims are still being blamed for what happened to them, and their perpetrators are not being charged accordingly for the crime they committed.
Rape is never okay.
