Dear Brock Turner, your father, men like you and your father, generations and beyond:

"20 minutes of action." That's what you're going to define the harsh moment that led to your time in jail. 20 minutes of what? Of being just as drunk as she was and assuming that yes, she wanted to have sex behind a dumpster? Or was it the naive behavior of a freshman in college that constitutes this as 20 minutes of action?

Brock, like you, I was a freshman in college. I finished my first year this past May. So I know the behaviors that take place on a college campus. I have lived them, I have experienced them, I know exactly what you are talking about in your statement. So I understand why you assume that party culture and alcohol in college is what caused such reckless behavior.

I see where you are faulted. I see where you mistook drunk smiles and a back rub as a go ahead for more moves. I understand why a stumble into your arms could have been mistaken for a chance to hook up, I get it. But, with no intentions to take someone to your dorm, but all the intentions to hook up with someone, you played predator in a field that you thought and assumed you had control over as a college kid. I have seen friends in my first weeks of college stumble into a stranger in a fraternity house and those boys (frat or not frat) will assume this is them trying to hook up, but the respect of a light tap and a shake of a head meaning no was held to the highest degree most nights. A swaying of the body sideways doesn't mean "I want to dance," but rather, "I'm too drunk and I should probably sit down but momma didn't raise a quitter so here I am, in front of you, too drunk to talk, move, listen to you, but you kinda seem safe." Sometimes they're not safe.

On the nights that it wasn't the case, that someone tried to get someone to go upstairs, or back to their dorm, it was the most terrifying experience of my life. Imagine this: You, Brock, or you, other men I'm addressing, are really drunk. Really drunk. Like, you should really be at home, but here you are, not at home. Some girl, or boy, takes your hand, starts making out with you, and then next thing you know, boom. You're in a hospital bed and you've just been told you've been sexually assaulted? That's what happened to this victim. I've had friends try to call me in the middle of the night because they don't feel safe. I've spent hours on end sitting with my friends in their dorm rooms because they don't feel comfortable in their own skin. And you can say that it's their fault for being drunk, but what if the table was turned and it was you?

Your statement to a judge can read that you wish you never touched alcohol and that you just want to be the athlete you once were, but if it was me that was assaulted, I wouldn't even go back to my athletics. You didn't consider the other party, Mr. Turner, and I don't think you had intentions to. She's a human being, just like you. She has a family, a job, she went to school, she had a life before all of this, and here she is restarting, just like you. Except, she is going to live knowing that she was sexually assaulted with zero knowledge of the event, while you get off the hook with only 3-6 months of time behind bars, because that's enough to really let it sink in you were wrong, especially when you and your father believe you did nothing wrong.

I'd like you to take a look at some facts, Mr. Turner. An academic paper published in 2016 by the University of South Florida states that male intercollegiate athletes are at a greater risk for perpetrating sexual violence. Now, by "at greater risk," they really mean that they are more likely to. This means athletes like your son, and probably you, and men like you, are more likely to push sexual actions onto someone. How interesting. Did you also know, Mr. Turner, that one in three sexual assaults is committed by a college athlete? So where does that place you? Oh, and what else? That attitude of going out and hooking up with someone? Is directly related to being a competitive athlete. Isn't that what you, Mr. Turner, are?

There have been plenty of open letters written to you, but they often missed the point of addressing every issue that has been brought up since the letter from your victim was released. But, that's not even the biggest problem. Your friends and family have stated that this is a "you" issue when really, it was never a "you" issue to begin with. You did not lose your scholarship or school, you threw it into a raging fire. You did not lose happiness and gain sadness, you opened the door to a life changing event that just so happened to be a bad one. You and your family have taken the blame and put it on what everyone sees is wrong: the victim, and people like the victim.

You are the reason rape culture exists, and you are the reason that white men get away with so much more than they should. You are the reason that girls are taught to not drink too much in college and that girls are taught to not push the limits. But isn't it time that you and men like you learned that only one of you committed assault, and only one of you put a girl behind a dumpster, and only one of you roofied a girls drink, and only one of you took a girl to your room when she didn't want to, and that only one is always a guy like you.

I am ashamed of our culture, but more ashamed of the fact that an athlete like yourself, with potential, has proved yet again to American and the world's society that we are faulted and we are not making anything great again. You are a prime example. You are the reason we have women and men go to therapy, the reason people leave the lights on at home, the reason they have to move or can't continue with life. You are a prime example of what makes this country not great.

I just wish you could realize it too.

Sincerely,

A girl who is tired of hearing about people like you get away with ginormous issues like this one.