Most everyone by now has heard that the Steubenville rape trial has resulted in the conviction of the young men indicted in the case.
The story started ominously when someone posted a gruesome video on the internet showing an unconscious high school girl being dragged about like a piece of meat,
and then raped.
Strangely enough, the case had already been noted by the authorities, since the victim had pressed charges, but the same authorities declined to intervene and press charges, since they thought it must have all been some sort of 'football party' gone wrong in which some excesses were to be expected. Some say that the authorities were protecting the football team.
This mentality alone should bring shivers to anyone who reads the news. For a long time now, parties both in high school and college end up this way, and authorities are not always ready to act because they feel that the women must bear some responsibility, since they became inebriated, or other lame excuses.
After going viral, the video caused a potent backlash, which resulted in the authorities having to act on what they had previously decided to ignore.
After the trial, one of the young men offered an apology, and so did one of the fathers of the perpetrators. But what is at stake here is why, in the United States, in this new century, there are young men so willing to dehumanize women in this way?
And that is exactly what the trial revealed. That the young men before and after the rape had absolutely no moral conscience of their act, and the dismissal by the authority did nothing but reinforce their heinous beliefs.
What was worse, if that can be said after such a vile act, was the incredible amount of texts, comment and other expressions that were made by the perpetrators, without the slightest hint of guilt or remorse. Indeed the victim was re-victimed when she returned to school in the fall, because the authorities failed to act.
Why are some youths so callous? Or have they always been this way and the internet has just revealed, in bold colors, what these kind of people thought then and think now? What have we done to our children for them to be so callous? Is it the influence of television? Is it movies? Is it videogames? There is somewhere a disconnect, where parents, teachers, the media, the world, is not teaching our children what is right and wrong, and that human beings of any sex, creed, color, faith or sexual orientation cannot be treated like object and abused or violated.
The great thing about the guilty verdict in Steubenville is that is sends a message to all those little punks in high school and college who think that the human body is an object, and who think they could do such things and get away with it. What it has not done however, is assuage the fears of women, 20% of whom will be raped at one time or another in their life, nor will it dispel the notion that we are not a violent nation, with violent dispositions.
But another dark cloud hovers over this verdict. Is it really enough to curb the current scourge of bullyism, of joining in the fray when violence erupts, when boys decide to take advantage of a 16 year old girl who is unconscious?
Ultimately, only a system that fights back, that speaks loudly against it, but chiefly parents who teach their children proper values can stop this scourge.
Op - Ed 3.18.13
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