By the time I was a freshman in high school in the early 1960’s, I had heard rumors of certain girls who were known as the high school “sluts.” From what was whispered, these girls were the ones who would sexually take on about twenty guys or more in one evening. “How disgusting!” I thought. When I finally saw the girls in question, I was flabbergasted; these girls looked perfectly normal, or in other words, like everyone else. I just couldn’t imagine how they could sink so low as to have guys line up and have sex with them. It made no sense at all to me.
When I got a little better informed, I was told that these girls would drink so much that they passed out and that’s when the party began. I began to have a very sick feeling in my stomach when I got some of the details. Why is this girl being condemned for “pulling a train” because she was unconscious? And how on earth could boys line up and one by one have intercourse with her while she was unconscious? At this point, I never heard these actions referred to as rape. Talking to some people who claimed to have not participated (but only observed), when the young female passed out, the brutal vaginal, anal, and foreign object rapes would occur. After the rapes, boys took turns urinating on her. This was all very hush-hush and whispered about in 1960. I had never heard of anyone except the girl getting into trouble over it. The guys who participated in this nightmare were merely shrugged over. How horrifying and shocking by today’s standards!
About two weeks ago, in Richmond, California, a fifteen-year-old girl left her high school home-coming dance early. She joined a bunch of kids out in an area behind the school where they were drinking and probably smoking pot. What occurred in the next two hours is almost beyond belief. The girl was raped and sodomized by ten or fifteen young men, varying in age from fifteen to twenty-two. She was beaten. She had been penetrated with foreign objects. There were probably twenty onlookers cheering the rapists on. Nobody tried to assist her. Nobody called for help. Nobody dialed 911. She was left unconscious and bleeding. If she had not been found, she might have died.
At least now in 2009, we all know for sure this is a rape and a brutal assault. In 1960, it was the girl “pulling a train.” There are six young men who have been arrested so far, and it is quite likely there will be more. I will never understand in a million years how anyone could do this to another human being. Where does this deep soul sickness come from?
I can only pray that the young girl recovers her health. Her spirit may never recover from the acts of brutality that she endured. I thank God we are enlightened enough not to blame her for this episode. And, I hope that the boys who destroyed her spirit are dealt with in kind. Not very Christian of me, I know.
