Boys Will Be Boys April 6, 2006 Jill And we all know that boyish pranks include fantasizing about killing bitches and skinning them for sexual pleasure. Those silly lacrosse guys!
I want to make a clever and snarky remark but I can’t. It chills me and saddens me to be reminded yet again of just how much misogynistic rage lurks in so many “nice young men.” I read things like this and I think about what I’m trying to do with my own life and work, and I think “Damn, how are we ever going to reach these guys?” If I weren’t naturally inclined (as an evangelical) to believe in miracles, I’d be flirting with despair.
The apologists are all over this one, too. “Haven’t you ever written something to a personal friend over email that you would be embarrassed should it be taken out of context and published next to your picture?” I’ve written things that I wouldn’t want published, however I’ve never written such a detailed fantasy about murdering a human being and finding such sexual pleasure from it. I may be going out on a limb here, and maybe it’s because I don’t possess a penis, but I think that’s a little beyond the pale.
What I love most is how the defense attorneys are painting this. According to at least one of the defense attorneys, this email makes it less likely that a rape or sexual assault occurred that night. How’s that again? Less than an hour after the alleged assault occurred a lacrosse player sends out an email that he wants to violently assault a stripper and that this would give him sexual gratification, and that makes the alleged victim’s account less true? Wow. The twisted reality of someone fighting for his client.
As an attorney, I can’t believe that someone would actually attempt such an argument. A vigorous defense is one thing, but to suggest that this e-mail somehow makes the report of rape less credible is just asinine. Damn, you gotta want the fee BADLY to defend someone like this.
I’ve seen this twice on the national news, but I saw one channel only print the part about killing them, then the today show about skinning them. Then proceeded to give the attorneys’ statements that the email further proves there was no sexual assault prior to the email. They didn’t even include the sexual element of the email. They showed this asshole’s face on the today show this morning. Square-jawed, good looking, all-American jock. Just the kind of boy every parent wants their girl to bring home. Eyeroll. This whole thing makes me sick.
Damn, you gotta want the fee BADLY to defend someone like this. Well, part of the problem is that you’ve got to say *something*. If you’re a defense lawyer worth your salt, you can’t let statements like those stand if you’re doing your job. The fact that this is the explanation offered just serves to tell us that it’s as bad as we think. Having said that, e-mails like this make me want to cry.
I’m a little confused about the dates given. It says that the e-mail was dated 3/14/2006, but that the Sgt. was contacted on March 7th, 2006. Am I just not reading this right?
True, a defense lawyer does have to respond. A GOOD defense lawyer would have come up with something a little more plausible. Something that wouldn’t prove to us that things are as bad as we think.
The same kid has a sign in his vehicle that says, “Suckie suckie in vehicle $5.00.” What a charmer. Sounds like sexual extortion was so normal to them that they blatantly make the crudest of jokes about it.
A GOOD defense lawyer would have come up with something a little more plausible. Sadly, I fear there isn’t anything more plausible. I mean, “My client may be a vile human being with homicidal, mysogynistic fantasies and an appalling sense of judgment in drafting e-mails, but he’s not a rapist.” falls flat too. Still nauseated beyond words.
Apparently this is what Rush Limbaugh meant when he declared that the Abu Ghraib torture was just like fraternity pranks.
Think now, ye women over 10 years old. If we had a dollar for every asshole we’ve encountered who would fit neatly into this personality type, there’d be enough money to take over the world! And that indeed is the sorriest part of looking at this person’s behavior/profile. So, so typical.
Joe: There’s a marginal note explaining that the date of 3/7 is a typo. The actual date was 3/27. Oh, woops. Shouldn’t skip those I guess. Thanks.
I heard recently at a writers’ conference: “Don’t write anything unless you want to be talking about it for the rest of your life.” Words for those sick jackasses to consider that are cowering behind the “it was taken out of context” meme. I’m too incoherent with rage to write anything else about this right now.
It seems to me this e-mail may be a case of success breeding ambition. I.E. that stupid waste of DNA and bio-resources, though probably still drunk, seemed to think such a plan was feasible — that he/they would get away with such a thing — following the gang rape of the stripper. Such ideas may have lurked in the back of his mind before, a mind likely conditioned by culture/media promoting brutality against women, (WHY WHY WHY my mind screams) but he did not share this idea/plan with his ‘friends’ until he had proved to himself, that yes, you can take over the body of a woman without her consent, in full view in public and not only get away with it but be supported in doing it by the ‘gang.’ It is hard to imagine a culture in which a young man would send such words out in a CC e-mail and think it was O.K. Hard to imagine until I pull my head out of the sand and look around. So sad. And yes scary.
Wendy Frog sez: “until I pull my head out of the sand and look around” Bad news. You’re head is up your ass, which is a noticably tighter fit than beach sand. Good luck extracting it. When you’ve managed to do that, then tell us which lacrosse player gangraped a stripper, since the police investigation appears to have found evidence (namely, the lack of evidence needed to convict any team member of said crime). We (meaning the hegemonic power structure currently oppressing every known living person in hellish slave-prisons for oil profits and personal kicks) won’t wait up.