Every now and then, there are stories circulating the internet that do not necessarily have anything to do with video games that strike my interest and need a place to be written about. If you’ve been reading articles on the internet lately then you may have heard of a story that is re-gaining attention, almost 15 years after it was first published, and that is of R. Kelly and the multitudes of young black women who have been hurt by him and his pedophiliac ways.
At first I didn’t even want to write about the subject, but instead continue to abstain from purchasing anything that would support him in any way. I just didn’t think that my voice, as a white female who knew little about the situation prior to this past week, would have much to offer. I quickly came to my senses because I realized that the reason why this monster continues to make things for people to purchase/support is because there aren’t enough people reporting and talking about the horrific things this man has done. It does not matter age, race, or gender. This is about a man who has ruined the lives of dozens of young women who continues to walk freely on this Earth.
The reason why this has become a hot topic is because Jessica Hopper of the Village Voice recently sat down to interview Jim DeRogatis, the man who originally breached this story 15 years ago, and provided digitized copies of all of the lawsuits against R. Kelly. This article combined every piece of damning evidence that the courts had against R. Kelly into one easily accessible page on the Village Voice website. Because of this people are learning things about this Grammy award winning, platinum-selling, R&B artist. And people are disgusted. I’m disgusted. The stories that the young girls involved in the lawsuits told are enough to make your blood run cold and to lose faith in all humanity.
There are many things to discuss about a story like this one, and while I would love to see this man receive the justice he so fully deserves I think there is another portion to this story that deserves an equal amount of discussion. And that is the treatment of rape victims. I first read about this story via an article I happened to click on Buzzfeed. It was the heartbreaking story of a young woman who had an encounter with R. Kelly at the very young age of 7 years old. At the end of sharing her encounter, the young woman makes a very profound statement that will stick with me for a long time:
“When you ask, ‘Why didn’t they tell?’ you’re not asking the right question. We don’t tell for a myriad of reasons. When you ask, ‘Why didn’t they think they could tell?’ you’ll be asking the right question. My silence was a symptom of various fears. In this, I am not alone.”
Our society does not allow for stories like these to be told. Women are the ones at fault, they should have dressed more conservatively, they shouldn’t have been drinking in public, they should have kept their legs shut, they didn’t know that they actually wanted it, etc. There are so many excuses to why the man is not at fault and why the woman could have done more to avoid being raped. To avoid having her innocence taken from her, to avoid the pain that follows a woman throughout her life after events like this. Why should a woman who has been hurt, physically and mentally, ever feel fearful to tell her story? Because our society does not support women who have been raped. This is evidenced in a myriad of ways throughout our culture, one that is extremely prominent in the college football realm of the world. Jameis Winston, the young man who recently won the Heisman Trophy (one of the most prestigious awards in college football), was accused of sexually assaulting a young woman but the charges were dropped just nine days before his winning the Heisman.
While Jameis Winston rises to fame and popularity, the young woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her has to squander in obscurity for even considering speaking out against such a beloved figure. This is what’s wrong with not only the R. Kelly case, but every rape case that has ever seen the light of day in courts. RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network) published a statistic that only 3 out of every 100 rapists will ever see time. Is it just me, or is that absolutely insane?
There is much more to discuss concerning this issue and I hope that it is a topic that comes up more often in much more public areas of discussion than just this blog. Maybe the “re-discovery” of the R. Kelly lawsuits will help bring this discussion to light and help more justice to be served, but until then we need to make our voices heard.
