Walk on thin ice
Jun. 27th, 2007 12:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaYesterday, at the jobcentre, I had all my journalistic stereotypes confirmed.
First waiting area: Oxford Mail, tabloid, all pictures and giant text on the front page. Pages 1-n dedicated to the distressingly lenient sentence handed out to a Blackbird Leys man who raped a ten year old girl.
Second waiting area: Oxford Times, broadsheet, dense text on front page. Page 1 dedicated to the interaction of Seera, the local government, and various cabinet members over the problems of new-build housing in Oxfordshire.
I read the story about the rapist and thought that yes, 18 months for raping a child is pretty short. And the judge's comments that she dressed provocatively and "older than her age" were shockingly out of order.
Having checked up on the letter of the law (Sexual Offences Act 2003) any sexual intercourse with an under-13 is rape. Further hunting about in news stories online revealed that yes, the sex had been "consensual" and it was the above Act that made it rape. Further, the doctors who'd examined the girl thought she was in her mid-teens.
So, there are two stories here:
Man attacks and rapes child in park, child blamed for dressing provocatively.
Man has what he believes to be consensual sex with someone he believes to be of consenting age, but turns out to be wrong.
Both of these describe criminal offences. But it my mind they are rather different crimes, even though the offence with which the man will be charged is the same. So hey, tabloid reports sensationalist version of story, no surprises there.
News reports come complete with a series of outraged statements from local MPs, children's charity spokesmen, local mothers and critics of the judicial system, all along the lines of "there's no excuse for raping a ten year old, however she dresses". Which is, of course, the sort of statement it's impossible to disagree with. There is no excuse for raping a ten year old (or anyone of any other age).
What I have begun to wonder is whether it is impossible to avoid the sensationalism. I can't think of anyone who, if asked by a newspaper for comment, would be willing to say anything other than how dreadful it is. Even writing this I've been wondering whether it'll trigger a stream of comments from people who think that I'm excusing child rape.
In general, what a rape victim is wearing when attacked should be completely immaterial. However when an important issue is the perceived age of the victim, then dressing "older than her age" is actually relevant. It isn't simply a bigoted judge blaming the victim. It doesn't prevent a crime from having been committed; it might (and I presume it did) affect the sentencing.
I do wonder how the story would have been received by the media had it been accompanied by a photo of the girl. I'm genuinely curious to know whether a claim to have mistaken her for 16 is actually reasonable, whether people might have been more sympathetic towards the defendant. I appreciate that this can't be done without compromising the victim's rights, which take precedence.
I'll wait with interest to see whether the Attorney General does indeed conclude that the sentence was "unduly lenient" - and how many people will call for his resignation if he does not.
On a separate note, I was also somewhat baffled by comments from the BBC's report: "Judge Hall said in sentencing he faced a moral dilemma as the fact they had sex within 45 minutes of meeting was an absolute crime."
You what?
Surely, in such a case, either the girl is underage and it's a crime regardless of how long ago they met, or the girl is of age and it's their own damn business how long ago they met. Shagging people you met three quarters of an hour ago in a park may well be inadvisable, but I don't see how it can possibly be criminal. Does anyone actually understand what the judge might have meant there?
First waiting area: Oxford Mail, tabloid, all pictures and giant text on the front page. Pages 1-n dedicated to the distressingly lenient sentence handed out to a Blackbird Leys man who raped a ten year old girl.
Second waiting area: Oxford Times, broadsheet, dense text on front page. Page 1 dedicated to the interaction of Seera, the local government, and various cabinet members over the problems of new-build housing in Oxfordshire.
I read the story about the rapist and thought that yes, 18 months for raping a child is pretty short. And the judge's comments that she dressed provocatively and "older than her age" were shockingly out of order.
Having checked up on the letter of the law (Sexual Offences Act 2003) any sexual intercourse with an under-13 is rape. Further hunting about in news stories online revealed that yes, the sex had been "consensual" and it was the above Act that made it rape. Further, the doctors who'd examined the girl thought she was in her mid-teens.
So, there are two stories here:
Man attacks and rapes child in park, child blamed for dressing provocatively.
Man has what he believes to be consensual sex with someone he believes to be of consenting age, but turns out to be wrong.
Both of these describe criminal offences. But it my mind they are rather different crimes, even though the offence with which the man will be charged is the same. So hey, tabloid reports sensationalist version of story, no surprises there.
News reports come complete with a series of outraged statements from local MPs, children's charity spokesmen, local mothers and critics of the judicial system, all along the lines of "there's no excuse for raping a ten year old, however she dresses". Which is, of course, the sort of statement it's impossible to disagree with. There is no excuse for raping a ten year old (or anyone of any other age).
What I have begun to wonder is whether it is impossible to avoid the sensationalism. I can't think of anyone who, if asked by a newspaper for comment, would be willing to say anything other than how dreadful it is. Even writing this I've been wondering whether it'll trigger a stream of comments from people who think that I'm excusing child rape.
In general, what a rape victim is wearing when attacked should be completely immaterial. However when an important issue is the perceived age of the victim, then dressing "older than her age" is actually relevant. It isn't simply a bigoted judge blaming the victim. It doesn't prevent a crime from having been committed; it might (and I presume it did) affect the sentencing.
I do wonder how the story would have been received by the media had it been accompanied by a photo of the girl. I'm genuinely curious to know whether a claim to have mistaken her for 16 is actually reasonable, whether people might have been more sympathetic towards the defendant. I appreciate that this can't be done without compromising the victim's rights, which take precedence.
I'll wait with interest to see whether the Attorney General does indeed conclude that the sentence was "unduly lenient" - and how many people will call for his resignation if he does not.
On a separate note, I was also somewhat baffled by comments from the BBC's report: "Judge Hall said in sentencing he faced a moral dilemma as the fact they had sex within 45 minutes of meeting was an absolute crime."
You what?
Surely, in such a case, either the girl is underage and it's a crime regardless of how long ago they met, or the girl is of age and it's their own damn business how long ago they met. Shagging people you met three quarters of an hour ago in a park may well be inadvisable, but I don't see how it can possibly be criminal. Does anyone actually understand what the judge might have meant there?
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no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 01:04 pm (UTC)Here's an old photo of me (uh, obviously I'm not the 10 year old in the case ;) ....how old was I at the time?
(If people recognise the photo, and can therefore date it, they probably shouldn't answer this...since the point of the exercise is to guess apparent rather than known age!)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 01:16 pm (UTC)I'm going to guess about 12, for you, but I'm rubbish at guessing ages anyway.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 03:26 pm (UTC)Do I get to be a paediatrician now?
no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 06:34 pm (UTC)I don't know exactly how old all these photos are, so I'm having to guess a bit at ages, but here's some ones from about the age people thought I was, in contrast:
12? - http://the.earth.li/~neve/images/holiday2.jpg (certainly after top juniors, I'm wearing glasses)
14? - http://the.earth.li/~neve/images/secondaryschool.jpg
In contrast - I think this one must have been from when I was about 9-10 - it's before I was wearing glasses, but my brother doesn't have the utter puddingbowl haircut he did when I was younger than that: http://the.earth.li/~neve/images/holiday.jpg
/I/ certainly wouldn't have been mistakable for a 16+ year old there...that said, I remember a cousin of mine at age 13-14, who in terms of development, attitude & makeup etc could definitely have been assumed to be over 16.
10 is still really pushing it though...
no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 01:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 08:26 pm (UTC)That said, whenever someone tells me about something they bought and then says "Guess how much it cost!" I have the feeling it's going to be either surprisingly cheap or surprisingly expensive and I'm not very good at telling which. Same thing with surprising ages. (Case in point: when I play the "How old do you think I am?" game, I get more than half of people guessing mid-to-late 20s instead of 31, but occasionally I get the odd 40.)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 01:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-27 03:21 pm (UTC)