Where silent, we are complicit

[drwex]

Content warning: this post is about rape, and rape culture.

https://verdict.justia.com/2015/07/10/troubling-question-how-do-bill-cosbys-attorneys-get-away-with-it

John Dean (yes that John Dean if you are old enough like me to have watched him testify) has a piece up on Justia pointing out that complicity in protecting Bill Cosby from the consequences of his attacks on women extends to the bar association as a whole.

That is, Cosby is entitled to a vigorous and effective legal defense. As a rich man he can afford the best lawyers and unfortunately that already tilts the field well against the women who are trying to get out their truths, their stories, and to get heard.

But Cosby's lawyers have, as Dean illustrates, gone on the attack. They've gone so far as to draw defamation lawsuits and censure from a judge in at least one case we know about. These lawyers have been allowed to get away with this disregard of their codes of conduct by the bar associations they supposedly belong to. They hold their law licenses because no one is willing to step up and censure them for their offenses, despite public documentation.

I call that part of rape culture. The ingrained social attitude that "it's not that serious" and "all part of the job" that Dean highlights - how the legal profession itself (not just an individual lawyer) is protecting a serial rapist - shows that we have a very long way to go.

Comments

[mrw42.livejournal.com]

How does our community react to rapists and perpetrators of sexual assault? In the cases that I'm personally familiar with, we have (as a community) been slow to blame and quick to defend people who are accused of rape or sexual assault. Publicly, we cite articles about victim blaming, how few false reports there are, how poorly the legal system works in these cases, but privately we say "It wouldn't be right to unfriend accused rapists, or end my business associations with them, or stop inviting them to my parties because they haven't been convicted". We all "believe Anita", but fail to believe the victims we actually _know_, even in cases where there have been civil findings or rapists have admitted their misconduct in court. Does that make us complicit in the actions of those rapists?

We should remove the logs from our own eyes before we try to remove the speck from someone else's.

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I now know FIVE people who have committed at least one act of sexual violence. My community turned a blind eye.

[drwex]

What would you have had your community do?

(that's a serious question. I don't know of a simple single answer to it.)

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Stop inviting them to parties would be an interesting start.

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Or at least a direct "WTF" response.

[drwex]

Just out of curiousity, do you vote Democratic? Do you (at least given the field of candidates we've seen so far) plan to vote Democratic in the next election?

If so, please explain the difference between inviting a rapist to a party (which you say we ought not do) and voting for a political party that does this: https://verdict.justia.com/2015/07/13/tariq-ba-odah-and-the-choices-we-make

CONTENT WARNING: that article contains a very mild description of the continual torture of an innocent man perpetrated by our current Democratic president. It's not something to read if you have a weak stomach.

I don't wish to engage in comparisons of misery but I think it's unquestionable that a crime of violence is being done at least twice a day for eight years, and continuing to this day, against Tariq Ba Odah.

Where are the WTF? How can anyone remain friends with or support the party responsible for these daily crimes?

In your answer feel free to explain how it makes a difference that we know the victim of this rapist's violence and we do not know Mr Odah.

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Interesting.
In the case of Mr. Odah, like with Mr. Cosby, we are discussing macro-level complacency, in which thousands or millions of people are involved. I'm addressing complacency on a micro-level, in which maybe a hundred people are involved, a local community. Is complacency the same, regardless of scale? At least on a micro-level, it's easier to address said complacency. My personal "WTF response" is like this:
Step 1: Did someone you know rape or torture a fellow human being?
Step 2: If the answer to Step 1 is "Yes", re-evaluate said relationship with that someone.

In your answer feel free to explain how it makes a difference that we know the victim of this rapist's violence and we do not know Mr Odah.
OK. Our tendencies to handwave away, or being complacent in, the micro-level problems make it harder to address the macro-level problems, especially if the macro-level problem is made up of magnitudes of micro-level problems. (These problems don't exist in a vacuum.) After all, shouldn't a friend of Mr. Cosby at one point say to him, "Did you rape these women? If so, why am I still friends with you?"

[drwex]

I do not think of this as the same thing, nor do I think there is any comparison between Mr Odah and Mr Cosby. I don't see what you're bringing up.

I also don't care about how many people might be involved in responding to the crimes of (in this case) President Obama or Bill Cosby. The question to hand is how do you respond when someone commits this sort of crime? Your assertion is that one ought to question them and shun them. I would like to know how you can hold that view (categorically) and yet continue to vote for and support Democrats.

I do, but my answer in the case of an abuser in the community is "it's complicated."

[trowa-barton.livejournal.com]

Well technically Bernie Sanders is Independent, so I have no problem voting for him. I voted for my wife for governor.
I dropped someone I knew for 17 years as a friend when I found out that he raped someone. And I declined someone's friend request on Facebook because said person was associated with said rapist.
Not as complicated, other than "Better be a damn good reason."

[drwex]

I read this comment and understand. If you're comfortable with absolutist positions then that's good for you and we probably have nothing further to discuss. But I wanted you to know I'd read your comment and wasn't ignoring it.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

These are very different questions. In an election between one candidate who advocates torture and another who does NOT advocate torture, the choice might seem simple. More often, they both advocate torture, but in different situations. Or they would rather use their finite political power to oppose other problems.

I don't know if Elizabeth Warren advocates torture. I voted for her because I wanted her to go after bank corruption. Insofar as she votes the party line on non-bank issues, she facilitates torture...I don't think that means I should have voted for Scott Brown, who said straight out that he approved of waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation techniques."

The difference is not that I know one victim and don't know another. The difference is that I don't have to choose between 2 or 3 friends and put one of them in charge of something important. If a dozen friends turned out to be rapists, I could walk away from ALL of them. But if I walk away from an election saying, "All these candidates are horrible and I refuse to vote for any of them," then one of them will still end up in office.



Lesser evil

[drwex]

Which is to say, "It's complicated." I accept that. My point is that "it's complicated" is also my response to how to deal with an abuser within my community, and within my friend circle. The reason I brought up the example of Mr Odah is that I think it's a case where we can all agree a crime of violence is being perpetrated against him, and yet our response is not that simple.

[mrw42.livejournal.com]

I have two responses to the article you posted. (1) The article does not say "It's complicated". The article says "the public is simply fickle. Lacking firm convictions, it takes its cue from others." I doubt that you aspire to be fickle and lack firm conviction in your personal moral choices. (2) Asking how someone votes in a situation where there are only two viable candidates and both of them have undesirable traits, is not in any way related to the question of who you choose to be friends with in your personal life. Not even close.

I know of at least one case where the victim's mother has told you that she is upset that you and others continue to be friends with someone who raped her 13-year-old daughter, that you continue to invite him to your parties, that you continue to list him as a "friend" on social media, and that, in so doing, you continue to represent him as a trusted adult to the members of our community.

You know, because I told you, that my daughter, who was 13 at the time, reported that she was raped by a friend of yours when she was staying overnight at his house several years ago. Have you told your children never to be alone with him? Have you told your friends with children to protect their children from him? Would you say that your silence constitutes complicity in his crime?

Are you really claiming that you _know_ that a friend of yours raped a 13-year-old-girl causing her and her family to suffer considerable ongoing damage, even years later, including multiple suicide attempts, and that you have consciously _chosen_ not to let that affect your friendship with him because the situation is "complicated"? If so, I am apalled.

On a personal level, I admit to being hurt that some set of people have chosen to continue to invite my daughter's rapist to their parties knowing that his presence excludes me and my family. I spent years blaming myself for what happened, focusing on taking care of my daughter, believing that it was wrong to act in anger and that the anger would pass. But, you know what? I didn't do anything wrong by letting my daughter stay at the home of a man that had been my trusted friend for 25 years. Ongoing anger is appropriate in this situation, and the fact that I am angry should not stop me from telling people that he is a danger to the children of our community. Sadly, the reaction of the people I've told so far makes me think that it will do little good to make this more widely known, but perhaps some people will listen and try to keep him away from their children? Ironically, your post about how silence == complicity may be the straw that breaks the back of my silence.

This issue goes well beyond the personal rejection of me and my family. It causes me to question the judgement of the people who know what my daughter reported and continue to associate with her rapist. it makes me feel like we, as a community, are a bunch of hypocrites when we post articles about the danger of victim blaming, believing the victim, the infinitesimal level of false reporting, the pathetic failure of our legal system to deal effectively with these situations, our complicity when we remain silent in these cases. It also makes me question the value of being accepted by a community that clearly has no minimum bar for acceptance.

Are there any crimes that a person could commit that would cause you to end your friendship with them? Is there anything that someone can do that would cause us to deny them the acceptance of our community?

[drwex]

Points in order: I read the article differently than you. I read the article as being about the professional organization's laxity in enforcing its own rules of conduct and Dean's assertion that this made them complicit. If that's not complicated, I don't know what is.

I don't actually aspire to fickleness but I won't claim I'm not. I am also as clear as I can be that my personal moral choices are an evolving, learning, living thing. They are less graven in stone now than they were 30 years ago. A few years ago I made a self-commitment to live a more examined life, which has led me to explore where I might or might not be clear and to undertake learning where I can.

Asking someone how they vote (which is to say, support) is precisely relevant when the thing being supported is responsible for repeated, daily grotesque crimes. It's an analogy, and all analogies are imprecise, but I think it's not a far stretch. You are free to disagree if you like, and we can then discuss exactly what level of support for a crime-committer triggers your boundaries.

Now on to the specifics. I'd avoided mentioning them in an unlocked post because to my knowledge you had not mentioned them in an open forum previously and I didn't want to share someone else's information.

Also because this is a public forum I'm not going to discuss what I've said to whom within my family, nor what I've said to the person in question. Yes, I continue to be friends with him. Yes, he continues to be welcome at my house. That is not an unexamined nor careless choice. If you choose to speak, in anger or not, that's your choice and I'm certainly not going to tell you otherwise.

As we've discussed I'm comfortable arranging things so that you and he are never present at the same events I host. If that's insufficient for you I understand.

Are there any crimes that a person could commit that would cause you to end your friendship with them? Is there anything that someone can do that would cause us to deny them the acceptance of our community?

I take it those are rhetorical questions but in case not: I don't speak for any community - not even my family - but in the #2 case below I decided that I didn't feel safe nor did I want my family around the attacker and took steps to ensure that. I don't think I'm going to repeat the crimes that person admitted to, but they're a matter of public record.

[drwex]

I think there are two parts to your comment. One is whether or not we communally and as individuals respond poorly to situations of rape and assault within our community. I think the answer is that we're no angels and don't do perfectly or sometimes even well. Part of what I'm trying is to learn and understand so I might do better.

Separately, there's the question of how to respond to someone within the community who transgress. Whether we say "My friend assaulted someone and therefore they are no longer my friend" or "My friend assaulted someone and I am still friends with them" is a separate question from acknowledgement of the offense. How we respond individually is also challenging and a learning experience.

Without speaking names, I will refer to two cases that I know personally. In case 1, Victim1 has told me directly that they do not care if I am still friendly with Offender1. Victim1 is willing to be in the same space as Offender1 in most situations, with precautions they consider appropriate. In case 2, Victim2 has said they don't care if I'm still friendly with Offender2 but they absolutely cannot be in the same space and so I need to choose which of them to socialize with on what occasions.

What you seem to be indicating is that there is only one possible response to the knowledge that someone has offended, and further implying that because I haven't taken the response you see as the only possible way then I should be silent. If that's your implication then you're of course welcome to your opinion but I don't share it.