Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 10 Editor's Choice: 3
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Such Sadness
[Read the article: The saddest story ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It makes me so sad that this poor girl was hurt like this. Whether she knew why she had been brought there or not, whether she consented to having sex with all those men or not, what happened to her was dreadful. In fact, it might even be more dreadful to think than an 11 year old girl actually knows enough about having sex to consent to it. The fact that she had already been victimized in this way seems even worse to me.
The indignant quote from the neighborhood woman about the length of the sentences for men having sex with a girl who "knew what she was doing" reminds me of what Bill O'Reilly from Fox News said just a year ago. After Shawn Hornbeck was found, the young boy that had been kidnapped and held for 4 years, O'Reilly said that he believed that Shawn didn't escape or ask for help from police because he liked living with his kidnapper. O'Reilly claimed that he didn't believe that Shawn was affected by Stockholm syndrome, but rather preferred living with his kidnapper rather than his parents because he didn't have to go to school. Because being raped by an adult everyday is so much better than going to school?
I can't understand our tendency to blame victims for what happens to them - especially when the victims are children. Why must it be our fault when bad things happen to us? Why can't the person that hurts us take full responsibility for what he or she has done? And why don't we want to hold others accountable for their bad behavior? Are we afraid that someone might then hold us accountable for our bad behavior?