On Friday, September 2, Brock Turner, the Stanford rapist, will be released from jail.

This will be just in time to start a new academic year at a new college. In light of this, and after much consideration of whether I should write this or not, I decided now was a good time to openly express my frustration and disgust with this case.

During my summer break, this case seemed to constantly pop up on my newsfeed and eventually in my mind. It seemed that every other day I was ranting to my parents or anyone with ears about how upset I was about this. The upsetting part about this is not just the actual assault, but the fact that even though the jury unanimously found Brock Turner guilty on three felony charges, Judge Aaron Persky was negligent in his duty to fairly adjudicate the case and gave Turner a “slap on the wrist” sentence. Now, after just three months of sitting in a county jail, Brock Turner is a free man despite the fact that his victim will never be free of the atrocities she faced.

No one worded it better than the survivor herself. In her ten-page long victim’s statement, which she read aloud to the courtroom after the sentencing, she eloquently and maturely speaks the words of every sexual assault survivor. Even after being failed by the justice system, she holds onto hope and paints herself as an anonymous representative of every woman in the world who has experienced the horrors of sexual and gender violence. It breaks my heart to know that, even though the victim requested a formal apology, Brock Turner will never truly apologize to this woman for his horrific actions.

Why is that?

It is because Turner’s father, in his equally problematic statement, minimized his crime by calling it “twenty minutes of action”. Another article very clearly and accurately broke down why this sentence elicits outrage from many, so I figured I would add on to this and pose a question to Turner’s father and anyone who agrees with him: It takes only two seconds to pull a trigger and kill someone, so how is it that twenty minutes of deliberately raping an unconscious woman somehow unintentional? The length of the crime is completely independent of its severity. By saying this, his father has actively supported his son in denying that he did anything wrong and that he is not responsible for his actions.

I am by no means saying that Turner’s parents should hate their son. However, parents do have a responsibility to encourage their children to be accountable for their actions. You can still love your child unconditionally when they make morally reprehensible actions, such as this case. The only thing Turner’s father did in his statement was desperately attempt to convince the public that his son is the real victim by having to endure the criminal justice system and pubic disdain. He made absolutely no mention of the fact that his son was responsible for the rape of a 22-year-old woman. He even went as far as to completely deny the existence of the violent nature of this crime and to state that Brock “has never been violent to anyone including his actions on the night of Jan 17th 2015”.

Also, the only thing that Brock Turner has apologized for is for drinking in excess. In his own two-paged statement, he has apologized for participating in “sexual promiscuity”. He has apologized for falling under the peer pressure of his fellow class and teammates. Through his own words, he has rejected any kind of responsibility for his own actions. Instead, he blames peer pressure and alcohol. That is his excuse for raping an unconscious woman behind a dumpster. He even has the gall of wanting to start a college program about, as his father put it in his statement, “the dangers of alcohol consumption and sexual promiscuity”.

Two things:

1. Alcohol is NOT and should NEVER be an excuse to commit any crime whatsoever, including rape and sexual assault.
2. The definition of rape is not “sexual promiscuity”, the definition of rape is “non-consensual sexual intercourse that is committed by physical force, threat of injury, or other duress”. That is all I will say on that.

To be quite blunt, I am angry.

I am angry that the criminal justice system has failed this young woman and that her rapist will now be a free man and will most likely be able start his college life over again somewhere new. I believe in redemption, but Brock Turner has shown no signs of remorse. Instead, he only seems to pity himself and blame external influences (alcohol, peer pressure, etc.) rather than accepting the fact that what he did was utterly immoral and criminal.

I am angry because there are people, mostly men and women of color, who will die in prison because they committed nonviolent drug offenses. Brock Turner is a rapist and he is the face of white privilege in that he gets off easy for committing the second most, after murder, violent crime. This is a whole other issue in itself that cannot easily be summed up in a paragraph, but regardless it is just plain wrong.

I am angry because society keeps using alcohol as a tool to victim-shame assault survivors (“They deserved what they got because they drank so much, how reckless of them!”), while they use it as a way to defend rapists (“Oh, but he was drunk he did not know what he was doing”).

But most of all, I am angry because this case could have gone so much better. There were two strong eyewitnesses, who were two grad students who were biking when they came upon the scene, saw exactly what Turner was doing to the woman, and stopped and held him down until police came. There was physical evidence taken from the survivor’s rape kit. There was a unanimous agreement among jury members that Brock Turner, who was found guilty of three felony charges, deserved to sit in prison for far, far longer than three months.

I am, however, hopeful. I always try to be even when I hear about things as awful as this. I am hopeful that, since this is such a high-profile case, that it will create more of a dialogue on sexual assault and rape on college campuses and beyond. A few days ago, the state of California haspassed a law requiring that those convicted of rape against an unconscious person must serve a mandatory prison sentence. I take it as a sign that the ball is rolling and that people in higher positions, like these California lawmakers, will take action to prevent things like this from happening again.

Lastly, I want to express my deepest condolences to the survivor, but also just how inspired I was by her statement and her request to remain anonymous as a way to be a representative for all woman who have been in her position. Her words were the epitome of strength and to know that she read that to her rapist is even more incredible.

It is my greatest wish that society will recognize the strength and bravery of survivors, and will continue the dialogue so that justice will always be served.