On a Sunday in July, in a run down motel room in Randolph, Missouri, a young mother was kidnapped, tortured, then abandoned on a street corner. Her assailants duct-taped her to a chair, beat her with a tire iron and large nail, shaved her head and eyebrows, burned her with a lit cigarette and even took the time to capture a sickening selfie, documenting the abuse. Everyone involved was allegedly involved with a drug addiction and the incident is said to have happened over a boy. The four suspects have been charged with multiple crimes related to this incident, but the victim's horror didn't end at getting justice. The selfie continued to get passed around throughout the community, used as a device to continue shaming and torturing the victim, long after the physical abuse ended. In an attempt to take back the power each suspect stripped from the victim, her sister posted the photo on her Facebook page, explaining the struggle to regain pride, dignity and self-respect after such an ordeal. The message of the post was that of overcoming a life-altering incident and of hope for others who may be in the same situation her sister was once in.
A few friends and family of the kidnappers didn't appreciate the post, however. They asked that it be removed from Facebook. The reasoning behind their protest is not only astounding, but the very thing that is wrong with society today. It's the kind of reasoning that led to the outcry in the Brock Turner case and it's completely morally and logically incorrect. The following are comments taken directly from the comments feed of the aforementioned post.
1. "Please respect [the suspects'] family and take this down."
This is the most understandable comment of them all. While I can only imagine the horror and disappointment I'd feel if it were my loved one who was revealed to be capable of such atrocities, those feelings frankly would have nothing to do with the victim's. This woman was tortured. That's something that will haunt her the rest of her life. Because of the kidnappers' pride in their handiwork, a picture of the abuse circulated throughout the community. That means this victim could be surprised by it any moment of her life, as was evident when her sister unexpectedly received it months after the incident took place. If taking back the power of that photo and sharing it shamelessly to the world is what will help her move passed this, then no one, especially not the suspects or their families, has a right to tell her otherwise. Whatever she went through is much worse than the broken pride and disappointment of being forced to own up to what your loved one has done. I'm sorry for the pain you must be going through as a mother, sister, friend, cousin, etc., but your loved one did this. Don't shame the victim because it's too hard for you to accept.
2. "[Victim] has gotten plenty of attention from all this."
Really? Do you really think the victim would have chosen to be tortured in order to receive 15 minutes of fame? Would you? This has nothing to do with attention and everything to do with a woman trying to put her life back together and move on. She could live every day with the fear that someone else would see that picture, that the picture would somehow be used against her down the road. By sharing it, she took the power away from her oppressors to bring her to her knees with a single photograph. She removed their power to continue torturing her, long after they went to jail. Instead of letting it defeat her, she used it as a means of strength to grow and overcome. I can guarantee you she would give up all the attention to undo that night. How dare you even insinuate otherwise.
3. "If [victim] wasn't methin around this probably would have neverrrrr happened to her."
Even putting the lack of basic grammatical knowledge aside, this comment is beyond ignorant. It's the equivalent of saying, "If she wasn't drunk," or "If she wasn't dressed like that," when defending a rape case. The fact that the victim and the assailants both did drugs is unfortunate. Addiction is a sad reality that our country does an awful job at remedying. I understand there is a certain risk to putting yourself into that situation and surrounding yourself with the kind of people who care more about a high and money owed to them than the basic dignity owed to all humans. However, I'm afraid there's an ethical code that should be unspoken, but many seem to have never learned:
UNLESS IN SELF DEFENSE, IT IS NEVER OK TO ASSAULT SOMEONE!
There is literally only one excuse for assault: You or a loved one would receive immediate harm if action is not taken. In no way does tying a girl up, beating her, burning her and shaving her head because your boyfriend isn't loyal fall under that excuse. Her being into drugs does not make what happened to her OK in any way. It also doesn't somehow remove her right to overcome the tragedy as she sees fit. Regardless of what she was doing, what she was put through is scarring. Even if she hadn't sobered up afterward, she still would have had the right to own what happened to her and remove the power from her kidnappers.
4. "[One of the suspects] was 17 and pregnant, hormones do crazy sh*t to people."
I can't even with this one. Just, the sheer stupidity. Yes, pregnancy hormones make women crazy. But in the, "I hate you, why did you do this to me?" then "I love you! Come back and hold me!" just a few minutes later kind of way. Not the, "Let's kidnap and torture a young girl!" kind of way. Like, really? Hormones make you crave crazy things like fried pickles with peanut butter and cry because the puppy on TV was just too cute or because Earnie lost his precious rubber ducky on the morning's episode of "Sesame Street." They don't make you smile while you pose with a half-shaven girl for a torture selfie.
5. "She made a huge mistake, that doesn't mean that she is a horrible person."
No, mistakes do not a horrible person make. Having the moral capacity to kidnap and torture a girl while smiling makes a person horrible. By the literal definition of the word, these suspects are horrible. I'll even throw in some more adjectives that define the type of person that can do something like this: callous, malicious, cruel, perverse, awful, monstrous.
I can only begin to understand how difficult this must be for friends and family on both sides. But let's all be adults about this, shall we? Something our generation has tried steadfastly to ignore is the fact that actions are followed by consequences. The victim's need to cope in whatever way she sees fit is simply one of those consequences. If the suspects didn't want to spend a good portion of their lives in jail, give birth to a child in jail and put their loved ones through the embarrassment and hurt of seeing it all happen, perhaps they shouldn't have committed the crime in the first place.
