"Rape isn't rape if you're white and educated"

A white American teenage boy, with a private school education, a Stanford University degree, raised within an extremely well-off family, not to mention a phenomenal athlete aiming for the Olympics is not the imagery in mind that society has installed when associated with a rapist. Far from it. Society has created this imagery of a rapist to be an outsider within society, with a strange nature, being somewhat socially inept. However, my discovery of this story manages to challenge these stereotypes, whilst also providing the undertones of severe American institutionalized racism. This "golden boy", who took full advantage of an incoherent drunk young women, raped her with malicious intent behind a rubbish dumpster, inserting objects inside her, and completely violated this poor helpless girl to all extents… was charged with 6 months in the county jail with probation, which is less than what has been defined as the minimum sentence. If this isn't screaming institutionalized racism and white privilege loud and clear, then I don't know what is.

Obviously there are large and countless problematic concerns with this story, that make you truly question the justice system. The victim quotes, "When I read the probation officer’s report, I was in disbelief, consumed by anger which eventually quieted down to profound sadness," as everything that she has gone through, and regardless that the jury has said that 100% this boy is guilty, the young white American boy was still given a mere slap on the wrist. Disbelief, anger and sadness are accurate in my perspective. Disbelief in the sense that we supposedly live in a world that is reliant on the justice system to serve equally, and that the law is there to maintain a moral structure for society, and for humanity as a whole. The disbelief lays in the harsh hitting reality that this supposedly ‘equal’ legal and justice system is far from fair - with the privileged lives getting privileged penalties. The anger is derived from the lies, and the manipulation from the attacker’s high paid powerful attorney, expert witnesses, private investigators whose intentions were to make it look like the incoherent young women was "wanting it", "liking it" and "never saying no". This type of trial, and the hiring of top court lawyers is a privilege that Brock was given due to his demographics; white skin, wealth of support and his status within society; an opportunity that many lower class, black American’s do not share. The anger in knowing how surface level demographical representations of a human being can dictate and determine the sentence to a serious crime leaves an extremely bitter taste in my mouth, not to mention hers; "I didn't speak, eat or sleep for months".

You can’t help but think about how money, regardless of how criminally insane one is, can foreshadow any horrific criminal offense. A “sugar-coating of privilege” to the white folk is very real, and extremely problematic. American’s justice system referring to this sick and twisted man as “confused”, and “intoxicated” – almost to suggest and manipulate that the attacker was victimised and helpless. This type of behaviour within the justice system would be unseen and unheard of if tables were turned in the demographics of the attacker.

Sadness is the final emotion the victim refers to, and it is sad. It is completely heart breaking to listen to her personal account of the night, and the following year after the attack. But the large scale of sadness lays in this final quote, “The fact that Brock was an athlete at a private university should not be seen as an entitlement to leniency, but as an opportunity to send a message that sexual assault is against the law regardless of social class.” The saddening reality that trials such as this portray that rape is on a spectrum, and the criminality and prosecution of the rape depends on who you are, your wealth, status and most importantly skin colour. This is pure institutionalized racism, and still a severe and prominent flaw within society. The victim believes this example of institutionalised racism is a “mockery of the seriousness of his assaults, an insult to me and all women.”

I will end with saying - Please. Stop. What. You're. Doing. And read this powerful letter that the victimized women read aloud to her attacker. And have a box of tissues with you, as her powerful words, "You bought me a ticket to a planet where I lived by myself", show the severe impacts that this night have had on her, her family, and her entire life perspective. She reveals in passion the anger she is forced to live with, under this corrupt and unlawful justice system of America.

READ HERE - https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/heres-the-powerful-letter-the-stanford-victim-read-to-her-ra?utm_term=.wn2qoKxGe#.dwxwGkn30