In perhaps the most bizarre possible twist to the Steubenville rape story the rapists have become seen as these bright, excellent young men who have sadly had their lives destroyed. Why did they have their lives destroyed? Why do they have to suffer this way? Why can’t they go on to great colleges and play football and just be great, like tigers?
Because they raped someone.
People seem to forget that they are having their lives destroyed because they raped someone and made a videotape laughing about it, which is traditionally something that has a great tendency to destroy lives.
Here is the video, so you can remember why their lives are being destroyed:
Right, their lives are seemingly being destroyed because they are pretty horrible people.
Though CNN correspondents Paul Callan and Candy Crowley and Poppy Harlow don’t seem to think so! Harlow remarks:
I’ve never experienced anything like it, Candy. It was incredibly emotional, incredibly difficult, even for an outsider like me, to watch what happened as these two young men that had such promising futures — star football players, very good students — literally watched as they believed their lives fell apart…when that sentence came down, [Ma'lik] collapsed in the arms of his attorney…He said to him, ‘My life is over. No one is going to want me now.’ Very serious crime here, both found guilty of raping the sixteen-year-old girl at a series of parties back in August. Alcohol fueled parties; alcohol is a huge part of this.
Well, yes and no, Yes, alcohol does cause people to make some poor decisions. However, having a few beers does not generally cause people to decide to rape someone and then laugh about it remorselessly. It’s astonishing the number of drunk men I’ve been around who have not attempted to rape me. If that were the natural consequence of drinking alcohol, parties would be very different affairs, and ones that no one woman in the world would attend.
Crowley then sadly ponders:
You know, Paul, a sixteen-year-old now just sobbing in court, regardless of what big football players they are, the other one just seventeen, a sixteen year old victim, they still sound like sixteen-year-olds… The thing is, what’s the lasting effect, though, on two young men being found guilty in juvenile court of rape, essentially?
How sad that he is sobbing! Seeing people cry is upsetting, except when it a reasonable response to the fact that they raped someone.
Paul responds:
Well, you know, Candy, we’ve seen here a courtroom drenched in tears and tragedy…. The most severe thing with these young men is being labeled as registered sex offenders. That label is now placed on them by Ohio law…That will haunt them for the rest of their lives. Employers, when looking up their background, will see that they’re registered sex offenders. When they move into a new neighborhood and somebody goes on the Internet, where these things are posted, neighbors will know that they are registered sex offenders.
Yes. They are being labeled sex offenders because they are sex offenders. That is because they raped someone and took photos of the event. That is not because we are engaged in a conspiracy to unjustly persecute football players and good students. That was not a clerical error on the part of the judicial system.
