First off, let me say, this isn’t just for the Stanford victim or for Brock Turner, it’s for anyone who has been raped, knows someone who has been raped, or has been put in an uncomfortable situation by someone else.
Brock Turner and his victim have been in the news constantly right now. It’s just about all I see. For those of you who don’t know this story, Brock Turner goes to Stanford University and he raped a women behind a dumpster at a party. The disgusting part is that the women he was raping was unconscious. She’d been drinking a lot and he took his chance to take advantage of her. Or as Turner’s father says, “20 minutes of action.”
This entire situation is absolutely repulsive. The victim is completely anonymous which is understandable considering her situation. That being said, I look up to her. She wrote a letter to read aloud to Turner in court. I read this letter and it broke my heart.
She starts off by saying, “You don’t know me, but you’ve been inside me, and that’s why we’re here today.” This one sentence is terrifying. Brock Turner doesn’t even know this girl's name or what she looks like, but he’s raped her. He even had the chance to take a picture of her breast to send to his buddies, but couldn’t ask a simple question like, “What is your name?”
The heartbreaking part of this entire story is that the first article the victim read, Turner’s swimming times were posted at the bottom. It seems like some people seem to care more about his swimming scores more than anything about her. The judge gave Turner a six month sentence in fear that it would “severely impact” Turner’s swimming career since he wanted to go to the Olympics. The real question shouldn’t be about Turner’s ruined career, but if this young women is OK. Turner ruined her life, period, but the judge only cares about Turner’s career. There’s definitely something wrong with that. Her entire life has been changed.
During her letter, she reads part of Turner’s statement. He blames the entire night on drinking alcohol, but he can’t really think that’s what the problem is, right? It wasn’t the drinking, what she was wearing, or anything other than him solely wanting to “hook up with someone” that night. He couldn’t have been that drunk because when the two bicyclists that found and stopped Turner’s actions with his victim, he got up and ran away. So alcohol doesn’t have anything to do with it.
One thing I’ve heard the most is, “what were you/he/she wearing?” I really don’t understand why that matters. People see it as, “oh, she shouldn’t wear skimpy clothes because she was asking for it.” This statement makes me so angry because no one is asking to be raped. I could be running around naked and that doesn’t give anyone the right to rape me, cat call me, or anything. It doesn’t matter what the victim is wearing, no one deserves to be treated like that.
Turner will now be released after three months from his six month term. The victim said she doesn’t want Turner to rot in prison, but I think he deserves the maximum amount of time (14 years). She wants him to admit to what he’s done and to say he’s wrong. He changed her life and caused her to be scared of a lot of things that she used to not be afraid of. She’ll keep this with her forever as he sees it as just “20 minutes of action.” I think he deserves prison.
I just want the Stanford victim and any other girl who has been in a similar situation to know that I stand beside them.
I believe you and I’m thinking of you. You didn’t deserve this.
