The Children's Advocacy Center of Jackson County

Tag: victim blaming

  • Judge blames rape victim for not “keeping her knees together”

    By Tammi Pitzen, Executive Director of the Children’s Advocacy Center of Jackson County

    That day is not today.

    Remember in my last blog that I yearned for a tomorrow where people understood trauma and what consent is?  Well, after reading a story in the news and doing a little research on that story…that day is definitely not today!

    A judge in Canada is facing removal from the bench for his conduct when he asked a woman in a rape case why she couldn’t “just keep her knees together.”   Yes, let that sink in for a minute.  Think about how those five words uttered by a man charged with upholding justice will impact the young rape victim he was speaking to in open court.  She is 19.  Imagine being 19 and being raped in a bathroom over a sink and then the judge presiding over your case basically tells you that you could have prevented this if you would have just kept your knees together, or if you would have pushed your bottom to the sink he would not have been able to penetrate you.

    Please take a minute and re-read that last part and fully appreciate what he has done to this victim.  And what he has done to this Rapist.  The victim will forever live with those words and wonder if she could have prevented her own rape.  If she somehow could have stopped him from robbing her of what her life could have been like without rape being a part of it.

    He went on to give the rapist the following advice, “I want you to tell your friends, your male friends, that they have to be far more gentle with women. They have to be far more patient. And they have to be very careful. To protect themselves, they have to be very careful.”

    He acquitted the rapist because he felt his story was more credible.  This has been overturned and this case is set for a new trial.   If you were that 19 year-old rape victim would you go through the ordeal of a trial again?  Saying she was re-victimized in that courtroom by that judge is an understatement.

    The judge is facing removal from the bench.  There are proceedings going on right now.  I am anxious to hear the outcome.  I will be shocked if he is not removed.

    His excuses?  Well, he said that he received little training on sexual assault cases.  He said most of his legal career he handled bankruptcy cases.  He then went on to blame others.  He said that his colleagues knew he had limited knowledge of Canadian law.  He even went so far as to say it was non-existent.

    Let’s ponder for a moment what some offender behaviors look like.  In my experience, they blame others for their behaviors and choices.  In my experience, they express their helplessness in what happened.  In my experience, they minimize the consequences of their choices on their victims.  I am going to leave that right here without any other comments.

    Do you know what else bothers me about this whole scenario? In some news accounts his remarks are referred to as “off-color”.  What does that mean?  They are not off-color.  They are demoralizing.  They are humiliating.  They are victim blaming.

    There are reports that Robin Camp, the Judge in this case has undergone sensitivity training and has apologized publicly several times.  Sensitivity training?  This is not a case of saying something that hurt someone’s feelings.  This is a case of potentially sentencing a victim of rape to a life of self-blame, feelings of unworthiness of protection, of self-destructive behavior…of a life-time of therapy to just process the trauma caused by the judge’s remarks, not even considering the amount of therapy to heal from the original trauma of the rape itself.

    Do you remember the old saying- sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me?  Words do hurt.  They leave wounds that are both deep and disfiguring.  They can kill a person’s soul.  Professionals who are charged with upholding the laws and doling out justice have a special and unique power of defining what is acceptable behavior in our society and defining what is of value in our society.  What they say impacts a victim’s recovery and healing.  They should be very careful with their words.  Whether they have specific training in sexual assault — they should have common decency and kindness.

    I am still hoping for better opportunities for healing for victims of sexual assault, but more than that, I am still hoping for a world where a judge advises a rapist that he should not rape a 19 year-old over a sink in a bathroom at a house party.

    I am still hoping for a world where a 19 year-old woman is not responsible for her rapist’s behaviors.

     

     

     

  • New Oregon laws and justice for victims

    By Tammi Pitzen, Executive Director of the Children’s Advocacy Center

    This week I was asked about some new laws that passed in Oregon and what they mean for victims. One extends the statute of limitations for sexual abuse. One increases penalties for people who video record or take pictures of victims during private moments and one makes it a crime to post “revenge porn”.

    For years our laws have provided more protection and more rights to offenders.

    This has allowed offenders to find refuge…a safe haven if you will. They did not have to go into hiding. They find it right under our noses. By the time the victim could find healing and could understand that the assault was not their fault; it was too late to find justice or to hold the offender accountable because the statute of limitation had run out. It could no longer be prosecuted.

    These laws are steps in the right direction. These laws help to find some balance of the justice scales for victims, but there is still much work to be done.

    Until our societal views on sexual abuse change, our laws will continue to put limits on what justice the victims can find.

    Many of you are probably questioning what I am talking about. Society is against sexual violence. Well, not really. We want to be, because that is the right belief to have. However, we still victim blame. We still unfortunately believe offenders are innocent even in the face of some strong evidence in some cases. We still really think the victims are making it up, that they are lying.

    Again I am sure you are asking yourself, what does she mean?

    Let’s for moment examine some recent cases that have been in the news. Yes. I am going to bring THAT one up. Bill Cosby. See.

    You are thinking that case is different. Immediately you begin to say the victims are lying to get money. Immediately you begin to say, if it were true, they would have reported before. There would be prosecution.

    That last one gets tricky because he has been charged now and there will be a prosecution unless he pleads guilty or it gets dismissed because of too much pressure from society on the victim.

    What about the two Duggar girls? What about the young girl who was sexually assaulted by the Notre Dame Football player? She committed suicide, after she made a report. Are we sure she was lying?

    A sexual assault is an event. Sometimes more than one event.

    BUT healing and recovery is a process.

    It is difficult to find strength to report to authorities if you know no one will believe you. It is difficult to stay the course when at every turn someone is questioning whether or not you are telling the truth.

    So you stay silent. Maybe you get into therapy and begin to realize you have inner strength. And maybe you continue your therapy and realize you were not to blame. You find the strength to make a report. To you, it has only been a few minutes. In reality it has been years. Sometimes a life time. Does that mean that your offender should not be held accountable?

    Let’s look at the Revenge Porn law.

    Basically it says that it is now illegal to disseminate an intimate image. This is looking at how common it has become to send intimate pictures to someone you are in a relationship. This law says that you cannot disclose an intimate picture to a website with a specific intent to harass or humiliate another person. Some of you are saying that the picture should not have been taken and sent in the first place. You should be asking why it has taken so long to make this a law.

    See…societal views determine what happens and who is protected.

    The third law makes it a felony to photograph or record someone in a state of nudity without consent and in a place where the victim expected privacy. Prior to the passage of this law it was a misdemeanor. You may remember a case in Oregon about a man who “up-skirted” a young girl and it was only a misdemeanor.

    Many people will say, “How does it impact the victim if she/he does not know the pictures/video is being taken?”

    Think about it this way. What if your daughter, granddaughter, niece, son, grandson, googles their name and up comes pictures taken in the gym locker room changing clothes? What if you found out those pictures had been sold to someone who sexually abuses children? What if you found out those pictures were posted on a porn site? What if you found out that someone was using your child’s image to satisfy some weird perversion?

    Seems pretty devastating to me.

    I am hoping for a shift in the way we, as society think about sexual crimes.

    I am hoping that not only in Oregon but across the Nation we begin to balance the protection of the victim with the protection of the offender’s constitutional rights.

    The next time you hear about a sexual assault, I hope that your first thought is not that the victim is lying. I hope your first thought is not that the victim is trying to ruin the offender’s life.

    I hope in my life time we balance the scales of justice for victims.