Brock Turner is Right About One Thing
When voicing an opinion on an extremely combustible topic that millions have opined on, it’d better be divisive. I don’t have a new reaction on the Stanford rape, either, but I’ll immerse myself into hot waters with a takeaway I haven’t seen mentioned much.
This sleazebag Brock blamed, among other things, party “culture.” He’s right in part. Obviously not the one where he puts his sorry part where it doesn’t belong, which should have remained an extra tight Speedo, but the mindless, classless binge drinking in an institution typically associated with mind and class. Drinking yourself into stupor, to the point of memory loss which, to many, is the point, can lead to, yes, sexual assault, killing or maiming by driving a car or tottering on a road or jumping into an empty pool or operating a chainsaw (all examples personally known to yours truly.) In the very best scenario, you’ll barf your brains out and spend the next day in filth and misery, probably with online photos to show for it, or, if worse, you could die from alcohol poisoning, as it occasionally happens at places like MIT, where some kids are smart enough to get into but not smart enough to know when one shot is one too many.
All this despite persistent campaigning on the evils of alcohol starting around junior high. So I’m left to wonder if that may be a teeny tiny bit of said “culture?” By keeping drinking illegal until 21, years after the age limit for other momentous actions (driving, voting, marrying, going to war), we don’t keep young people from consuming alcohol, we glamorize it. There is, of course, nothing the least bit glamorous about guzzling beer upside down from a bucket hose til any of the above happens, but with just cursory knowledge of adolescent behavior it’s plain that it’s the thrill that counts, not the potential repercussions, however well laid out and understood. Understanding is a ways from implementing.
So what to do? I am scared to the core, while at the same time trusting my kids and their friends. Blindly? We tell them that we respect the law, that we don’t want trouble that’s unnecessary and low rent, and that anyone who comes into our house needs to play by the rules, too, or they will not set foot here anymore. What we try to model isn’t teetotaling, but enjoyment in moderation, by adults.
On the awful issue: Other than teaching my son that No means No, even for playful pinching and pummeling since he was a toddler, and when there is no capacity to say No he should just assume it, I absolutely am advising my daughter to watch her vibe. Not just her booze intake, when the time comes, not just her company; the two should go without saying, but look what happened here, and too many others.
What’s also important are attitude, outfit, time of day and route to take. I don’t care if that makes me a reactionary or an antifeminist. Labels aren’t my priority. I am NOT saying anyone asks for it because the skirt’s too short or it’s past goody girl curfew. That is disgusting and demeaning. But there’s a line between asking for it and making yourself an all too easy victim, and that line gets blurry after a couple Jäger shots. Just as there’s a line between victim-blaming and common sense.
It may not be fair, it may be atavistic patriarchal society that dares to impose stricter comportment rules on females than males, but until we change the world, I’ll pay the price to increase the chance of keeping my body, and that of my daughter, intact. Lucky for us, in a Western democracy that price isn’t unaffordably high. Making a point of owning your sexuality by flaunting it at any and all times, as messaged from certain celebrities, seems like risky business when you are the only one you can control.
