A dad’s concern
On Sept. 2, Brock Turner, the former Stanford student who sexually assaulted an intoxicated girl after a party, will get out of jail after serving only three months of a six-month sentence.
This lowlife’s short sentence was a gift from tone deaf Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky, who ignored the prosecutor’s request for a six-year sentence because he didn’t want to ruin Turner’s life.
I’m a dad. I have two daughters. They are both blessed with smarts and beauty, which unfortunately garners them lots of attention, some of it unwanted.
As a father, it’s the Brock Turners of the world who worry me.
My oldest daughter is a junior at Chapman University in Old Town Orange, just five minutes from Disneyland. It’s a great school, truly.
They’ve got something special going in Orange, and she’s beyond happy there. Her mother and I are happy she’s so happy.
This year, our daughter moved into a house off campus with several other sorority sisters, and even though it is literally across the street from the dorms, we worry about her being outside the safer cocoon of campus living.
I wrote “safer” because in this world, nothing is unconditionally safe. Brock Turner’s victim is proof of that.
Judge Persky appeared to be less concerned with the impact of Turner’s actions on the rest of her life, which is why a Stanford law professor has been leading an effort to get him removed from the bench.
Yesterday, perhaps in recognition of his impending fate, the judge voluntarily transferred from the criminal court division to civil court. I hope that isn’t enough to save his job, though.
“Rape Culture” on college campuses is a thing, and it must be addressed lest it become normalized and accepted. I ask my daughter to text me when she’s in bed each night, just so I know she’s home, which often happens after I’ve gone to sleep.
On those rare mornings when I wake up and there’s no message, my stomach churns, and it doesn’t stop churning until I’ve confirmed that she simply forgot and fell asleep.
Some friends say that I need to let her go, but with guys like Turner on the prowl, I’m pretty sure I’ll continue to worry about my daughters’ safety until the day I die.
These situations aren’t isolated; they are commonplace. Just last week an 18-year old in Massachusetts named David Becker was given probation – and not jail time – after sexually assaulting two drunken classmates after a house party. They were asleep when he penetrated them with his fingers.
Becker’s lawyer thanked the judge, who like Judge Persky ignored prosecutors’ pleas for prison time, saying that the “three-sport athlete” could now enjoy “the college experience” without having to register as a sex offender.
Did I mention that these were sleeping high school girls he assaulted?
Our youngest daughter is a junior at West Ranch High School. She’s a cheerleader like her sister, and is a high achiever, also like her sister.
She’s reached the age when boys, and frankly men, start to pay her attention, and so I worry about her, too. She’s under my roof so it’s different, and while I know I’m not the first dad to worry, my worries aren’t about the usual things.
I worry about boys like Becker and Turner, and I worry about judges like Persky in Santa Clara and Thomas Estes in Massachusetts, who apparently feel no compunction in giving out these light sentences seemingly unconcerned with the effect they have on victims.
Statistics show that rape and sexual assault are already among the least-reported crimes; many feel it just isn’t worth it to come forward.
Some will say that alcohol played a role in these cases and that had these girls not gotten intoxicated in the first place, they wouldn’t have ended up victims.
I don’t believe in blaming the victim, in victim-shaming. People get drunk all the time, but that doesn’t give anyone the right to violate them, to assault them.
America doesn’t work that way. Or at least it shouldn’t.
People of all ages, including teenagers, end up inebriated on
occasion. If you don’t think it’s happening in Santa Clarita, just go to any local high school football game and sit next to the student section.
It won’t take long for you to change your mind.
My girls know that bad people exist in the world; they’ve been taught to protect themselves and their friends, to never drink from an unsecured glass at a party or trust anyone they don’t know very, very, very well.
Living this way sucks, but with study after study showing that approximately one out of every five girls will be sexually assaulted while in college, it is an unfortunate reality of life.
I don’t like those odds, so I will ask my girls to do everything possible to make it harder for the Brock Turners and David Beckers of the world to stalk and sexually assault them or their friends just because they may have enjoyed one drink too many.
And please, don’t forget to text me goodnight . …