Okay not all of them, but the fact of the matter is that the news casters are more outraged about the fact that Americans are allowed to own guns (they leave out that Australians are allowed to as well although they do have stricter rules) then they are about news articles like this.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iXzsQlYCxnxgIuTTDDfSzTGlnz6g
People hear stories like this one and then think "Ah well at least you don't have it as bad as those girls" but the thing is that both their story and mine are of men trying to demoralize women, and treat them as inferiors or even just objects. I am very thankful that I have never and hope to never have to go through an ordeal like the women in the story, but the message these men send is the same. It's okay to treat them this way.
The Rugby league has started forcing its players to go to classes on how to treat women. These players are all grown men, why didn't they learn these lessons that women are their equals before this, and what does that mean about the men who don't take their classes. Is it just assumed then that the boys growing up in Australia aren't taught how to treat women? A news reporter this morning asked one of the rugby league guys who just finished watching a video what he thought of how to treat girls. His response was that after they have sex with them (consensual or not) that they shouldn't just get them a cab and call them a cunt or a bitch on the way out, and that a lot of these court cases could have been avoided if they treated them better after the fact. The news reporter responded with "they still have a long way to go".
Never once in any of these stories have they used the word rape. Lets call it what it is people, it's not just sexual assault, it's not just bad behavior or lack of knowledge, this is rape. It's group rape, it rape, its rape. Calling it something else gives the impression that it's not as bad as these girls say, that they are just drama queens and trying to get attention by trying to kill themselves. Some have reported that the sex was consensual, while others say that it was the rugby players who claimed that and not the girls. We may never truly know, but if at any time she said stop or no, then even if it started out as a consensual act, it turned into rape. The fact that the one guy apologized afterwards makes me wonder if she tried to get out of it during the act, and the interview she gave the other night makes me certain of it.
The last couple of days one of the guys took his family to a resort to "heal their wounds". After reading this abc article and watching their report I just don't know what to think about him, about rugby league, or about Australians. I know that not all Australians view women in this respect, but the fact that so many have been so quiet about this, that so many have let this behavior go on for so long, that so many have figured that the players need time to heal their wounds, that this is just a fact of life, means that I have lost a lot of respect for the over arching Australian culture. Any more the phrase "no worries" means turn a blind eye, or to live in willful ignorance, then what I use to associate the saying with which was relax, everything will work it self out.
In a sketch during their show they even make fun of these types of allegations and incidences. They don't seem to understand the seriousness of these actions.
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