Six months. Half a year. Less time than it takes to finish two quarters at UW. Also, the amount of jail time Brock Turner got for sexually assaulting an unconscious and intoxicated woman behind a dumpster. Brock Turner is a name I am sick of hearing in the media. I hate when we give so much attention to a person who is so undeserving of it. That being said, the one thing I can thank Brock for is the fact that he brought a huge issue in America to light. That issue is white privilege. This is nothing new, as we hear about white privilege all the time- so what makes this time different?
When I see the judicial system partake in white privilege, no matter how drastic or slight, I can’t help but get frustrated. Typically, the jail time for sexual assault is MUCH longer than half a year. Any other reasonable judge would have known that Brock deserved prison time, as the prosecution had recommended. Let’s take a look at a similar case, that of a former football player of African American descent. Within a day, the young man was sentenced a minimum of 15 years in prison. This raises a question of why Brock is only being held in a local jail, and might even be released three months early. Why did Brock not receive a minimum of 15 years in prison? Is it because of his race? Both men who assaulted young women had been athletes at colleges—and their cases should be treated the same, yet they have been as different as night and day. As mentioned by Gabby Bess’ article, ‘How Racial Bias Influenced Stanford Swimmer’s Rape Case’, she says the following, “Abrams notes in his study that though 13.2 percent of the population is black, in 2008, 38 percent of sentenced inmates in the United States were black. That same year, black males were incarcerated at six-and-a-half times the rate of white males”. These are numbers, and they are true facts. Black males are subjected to harsher, more fitting punishments, whereas white men seem to get a slap on the wrist and sent on their way.
Something else that has come up is why Brock Turner’s mugshot was hidden for so long, and why the photo attached to all of the articles was his school yearbook photo. With any other criminal of any other race, the first photo to be attached to any article is their mugshot.
To put this into perspective, here is the photo that surfaced when Cory Batey, the African American man I mentioned earlier was convicted.
convicted.
thought of why Brock Turner got such a small slap on the wrist and why Brock Turner had his glowing school picture showcased, when Cory Batey got a long sentence and his mugshot plastered in the news. White privilege has become a huge widespread issue in America. This needs to come to an end. When looking at a crime, we must look at the facts and at the information rather than the standing of someone’s swim career or color of their skin. Rape is rape, assault is assault.
