By now, many have heard of the rape case and ultimate conviction of a Stanford swimmer (if you want to catch up to speed on this, check it out here). There has been a lot of uproar about the six-month sentence for "20 minutes of action." As a domestic and sexual violence advocate, it makes me happy to see other people outraged and actually talking about rape and our rape culture. In addition to the happiness of how open this conversation is becoming, I have thought about a few take-away points we can learn from this particular example.

1. White privilege exists.

The Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s did not end racism. Racism is still alive and well. Brock Turner and his father are prime examples of white privilege. I cannot say this for certain, but I would bet if he were black, his sentence would have looked a lot different. People of color are disproportionately incarcerated compared with their white peers. I wonder if he would have gotten the same sentence if the color of his skin was darker.

2. Alcohol does not cause rape.

Contrary to popular belief instilled in us by this rape culture in which we live, alcohol does not cause anyone to be raped. Apparently, one of Turner's arguments was alcohol played a part in the night he raped his victim, but that is not a solid argument. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, intoxicated individuals do not have the capacity to consent to any sexual activity. This girl stated she was drunk, so that should have been a cue to make sure she was safe and got home without any incident.

3. Healing from sexual violence is not easy.

This starts the minute an individual reports a sexual assault to law enforcement. They are thrown into this never-ending spiral of questions about every detail of the incident. Most of the questions are asked in ways that blame the victim - what were you wearing? How much did you have to drink? Are you sure...? If you noticed in this story, it took over a year to go to court for this case. Over a year. Sadly, this timeline is not uncommon. So for over a year, this girl walked around with an open wound waiting for it to be healed.

Speaking of open wounds and trauma, sexual violence is a leading cause of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in women. This is where someone like me, a trauma therapist, comes in. There is an opportunity for great work to be done in a therapeutic setting once an individual is ready for it. But it is not easy work. The best analogy I have heard about it is this:
Did you ever fall off your bike as a kid and scrape your knee? Remember how painful that was? Then maybe someone comes to help clean you up (thanks, Mom!). But in order to clean up the scrape and make sure it can heal properly, you have to get those tiny little rocks out of your skin. For me, that hurt even worse than the actual fall did. If you don't take those things out, your knee can get very infected and never heal completely. That's what we do in therapy - remove those rocks to keep you from getting infected and reminded of this fall in the future. It hurts at the time, but soon it feels better and you are left with a little scar rather than an open infection.

4. This can get better.

The Stanford rape is only one story. This happens every 107 seconds in the United States. If the nation can be outraged over one story, we can certainly ban together to fight against it happening so often in other parts of this country. You have a voice - do not be afraid to use it. Join advocates in the fight against rape culture. We can use all the help we can get!

Now that this case has been "resolved," this girl has the right to move forward with her life as a survivor, no, a thriver. This is her story that now a nation has come to witness. Stand with her and everyone like her. Let's make this better, together.