Justifying Child Rape
September 30, 2009
by Denise Curd
|The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and not necessarily those of The New Agenda.
When is it acceptable to rape a child? When she’s almost at the age of consent? When she has a bad mother? When you’re an award-winning director?
The arrest this week of Roman Polanski by Swiss police generated an avalanche of support for the convicted sex offender. Among the arguments of prosecution corruption, time served and Polanski’s difficult youth, we found the apologists who can always find a way to blame the victim – even if the victim in this case was a 13-year old girl.
Huffington Post ran one of the most egregious such articles. Joan Z. Shore, co-founder of Women Overseas for Equality, laid out the arguments:
The 13-year old model “seduced” by Polanski had been thrust onto him by her mother, who wanted her in the movies. The girl was just a few weeks short of her 14th birthday, which was the age of consent in California (It’s probably 13 by now!)
We can begin with the factual inaccuracies – the age of consent in California both in 1977 and currently is 18. The California penal code also gives additional weight to cases where the perpetrator is more than 3 years older than the victim and over 21 – for example a 43-year old man and a 13-year old child.
Ms. Shore has an interesting definition of seduced, or perhaps that’s why she used quotation marks – I think drugging, forcibly raping and sodomizing a child is outside the typical definition of seduction. The transcript of the grand jury testimony is posted on thesmokinggun.com.
Perhaps Mr. Polanski’s defenders have spent more time watching his movies, than looking at the evidence against him.
I acknowledge that the prosecutors in the case agreed to a lesser charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a child, as opposed to pursuing a conviction for additional charges based on the grand jury testimony. Mr. Polanski entered a guilty plea to that charge prior to fleeing to France before sentencing. Under current law, Mr. Polanski is guilty of child molestation and required to register as a convicted sex offender.
In Ms. Shore’s defense of Mr. Polanski – she blamed the victim’s mother. We are all familiar with the overbearing stage mother, cliché – and the mother may well have been interested in having her “discovered” by Polanski. In what universe does this make it acceptable for a 43-year old man to have sex with a 13-year old? Perhaps someone should put out a memo that if you want your child in Hollywood, you need to accept that if she’s raped, it’s your fault. Does the same hold true for mothers who want their children on soccer teams or part of church groups? I mean how many victims were introduced to their predators by their parents?
There are many areas of gray in life, protecting our children shouldn’t be one of them. No matter the artistic genius, or wealth of the perpetrator, no one should be excused for preying on our children with the tired argument of “but it was her fault!”
I think Mr. Polanski should go to jail!
Why do famous and wealthy men, who supposedly have redeemed their dark sides by doing good works (think: Ted Kennedy), get off free, and remain revered? Are women and girls so devalued?? These men have abused women – sodomizing a 13 year old girl is an abominable crime. Men will continue to abuse women and children until it is taken seriously and punished, I don’t care who you are, how much money you have, or what supposedly good works you have made.
Blaming the victim or her mother is a ridiculous and pre-historic argument. I can hardly believe it is still posed as valid.
Thanks for the article– I was hoping this Polanski issue would be addressed. We should be outraged.
I hope he goes to jail as well. I was brutually raped from the ages of 8 until I was 11 years old. I still bare the scars both mentally and physically. This made it into court and I had to bare the trauma of the rape trail where I was asked by the Defense questions such as “Do you Believe in Santa Clause, the tooth fairy and the Easter Bunny?” This is meant to set the child up as a liar or else she is living in a fantasy land.
It took me years to get over it and I lived in a world of silence for four years after the trail. I literally did not and would not speak to anyone.
Sexual abuse and rape at any age is not something a woman just gets over.
IMV, he committed a heinous crime, and he needs to suffer publicly for it. Part of the reason to prosecute criminal behavior is to provide an object lesson for those contemplating similar crimes. There’s every reason to believe that he continued preying on children outside of the U.S.-it’s widely documented that most child predators seldom just stop-they have to be stopped. That never happened and as we know he continued to have relationships w/underage girls such as Natassia Kinski-who knows how many lives he has broken.
Instead he’s enjoyed a brilliant career abroad, feted and admired by artistic types who give what they consider “Genius” a pass for any bad behavior.
Society has reached a low point when sexual abuse of a child is excused because she had a bad mother or the perp is widely admired.
I hope you all have heard Hillary’s speech at the UN:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded
dianet – check out the home page.
Denise,
Thanks for writing this. My inbox is flooded today with thoughts on the topic. Folks are justifiably outraged. Great piece!
It’s okay to rape a child if you are famous, rich and part of the creative class. It’s okay to rape a child if that child is a girl who is starting to mature and is attractive.
It’s not okay to rape a child if the rape is committed by a priest because religion is tied in with all things conservative. It is not okay to rape a child if the child is a boy.
Gotcha, Hollywood class. You are so making me ill.
One of the aspects that prolonged this case until now was apparently the judge “lured” Mr. Polanski by agreeing to impose a lighter sentence, then it was learned that judge reneged on the lighter sentence. When the plea bargain deal already agreed to was removed just before sentencing, Mr. Polanski fled.
I would like to know why Polanski was offered a lighter deal to begin with. I am assuming that when it came time to sentence him, the judge realized he had made a big mistake by allowing a lenient plea bargain,
What about the District Attorney, did they also agree to too light of a sentence? Is this a case of men only determining the fate of another man and from that perspective diluted the sentence?
If the judge reneging on an existing deal is some sort of cause celebre for Polanski’s defense, could not a new motion be filed that because it was all men involved in the original negotiated settlement that the judge realizing his mistake and changing the sentence is actually not misconduct.
I find myself wondering if Eliot Spitzer and John Edwards will team up to be his defense team. They could call a whole host of prominent Republicans to be his character witnesses.
I should have noted above that I do not think that adultery is in the same bracket as rape of a child.
The left coast( where I live) all to often complain that the law favors the rich to the expense of the poor and black kids…Funny they are proposing to do just that for this rich white man- hypocrites all of them… Let’s see a 13 yr old girl,Qualudes, anal sex, and alchohol to me it does not equal seduction or “consensual sex” but for Whoppie Goldberg and Debrah Winger, The Weinsteins, Mike Nichols, Woody Allen( any surprise there) Martin Scorsese it does…How out of touch are these elite snobs.
Bruce – I did find Whoopi’s comment about it not being rape-rape particularly egregious.
I can’t get over how Polanski defenders keep saying that the girl wasn’t a poor defenseless girl.
Regardless of whether the girl was attempting to “seduce” him or didn’t appear to be defenseless, Polanski was still the ADULT in the situation and no greenhorn either. He knew what he was doing and I suspect he knew what she was about and showed his contempt for her in the most despicable manner.
He should go to jail.
Thanks to Denise for this article.
I realize that I have come to distrust Whoopi Goldberg, she and many like her
lack loyality to the cause of women and girls rights. I will reject her, and others who think like her. Women and girls, and families all around the world are and have been suffering from rape throughout recorded history. Hillary nailed it in her UN speech just days ago.
There are federal laws in place, and the term “minor” means any person under the age of 18 years, and sexually explicit conduct means actual or simulated.
Sexual intercouse includes genital, oral-genital, anal gential, or oral anal, whether between person of the same or opposite sex. This applies to any individual who employs, uses, persuades, induces, entices, or coerces any minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct, they shall be PUNISHED as
provided under the law.
With children there is NO issue of consent! We do not need further delays, bring him directly to jail.
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