Two teenage girls in Ohio have been arrested for threatening the Steubenville rape victim on Twitter and Facebook.
A girl who was raped by two high school football players is being victimized by threats against her on Twitter, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said Tuesday as he demanded an end to such postings.
Oh? He didn’t call her a professional victim or a drama queen? How odd. It’s just Twitter, after all. If she doesn’t like it, she shouldn’t have decided to be a public figure.
Two girls, 15 and 16, were accused of posting the tweets Sunday following the conviction and sentencing of two boys for raping the 16-year-old West Virginia girl after an alcohol-fueled party.
The older girl was charged with aggravated menacing for a tweet that threatened homicide and said “you ripped my family apart,” according to the attorney general’s office. The girl is a cousin of defendant Ma’Lik Richmond, attorney general spokesman Dan Tierney said.
I saw that one on Sunday. I was browsing the hashtag and I saw that, along with a lot of tweets saying they’d reported it to the cops and the feds. Ugly, ugly stuff.
A Twitter message from the younger girl threatened the accuser with bodily harm, leading to a menacing charge, DeWine’s office said. One of the messages was later reposted on Facebook.
Such threats have to end, DeWine said.
“People have the right to express their point of view, and they have the right to be stupid, and they have the right to be wrong, but they don’t have the right under Ohio law to threaten to kill someone,” he said.
This is not the first time the girl and her family have been threatened through social media, DeWine said.
“What’s sad particularly to me is that the victim has had to go through the rape, the aftermath of the rape, the trial, and she continues to be victimized on the social media,” he said.
And on blogs, by people like “Judgybitch” Janet Bloomfield. Ugly, ugly, ugly stuff.
Hear! Hear!
It shouldn’t need saying, but at the same time it’s exactly what we should expect any AG to say (in fact any politician, prosecutor, police officer…hell, any decent person).
So why am I actually quite surprised that AG DeWine made those statements without equivocation or dissembling? Could it be ‘cos rape culture is a real thing? Yeah, I think that might be it.
“you ripped my family apart”
No, I’m pretty sure that was your rapist cousin.
I know so many personal stories from girls and women who were blamed for the abuse they were made to endure. I know others who will never tell on the rapist/child molester who hurt them, because they know full well that they’ll be blamed or even if they aren’t, they will feel guilty for the pain the knowledge would cause their families.
This is not surprising. This happens all the time. I’m so glad this is being talked about. I’m so glad to see this topic dragged into the light. It has to change.
To do harm to another, for no other reason than that the opportunity presented itself, is simply wrong. So much so that I feel a little silly writing down something so self-evident. Those boys had a choice to either act like men, or act like subhuman monsters. They chose wrongly. How they choose to face to consequences of that choice is up to them. Any culture that would make excuses for that type of behavior is broken.