When women in sport report sexual abuse....

I have so much respect and admiration for the girls who stood up and spoke. Given the whole Hollywood metoo campaign these gymnasts demonstrated such courage in speaking out.

The judge also set the tone that his actions were deplorable. While judgement has already been passed I thought her question regarding his plea of guilty was a vital question to ask as it sums up his attitude and it closes the door to any chance of an appeal. He knows full well he is guilty and there is no chance of rehabilitation. That's why he got a 100+ year sentence. Listening to the lives he has ruined he should be thankful he is allowed to live after taking away the lives of so many young girls.

My cousin's cousin 'Jane', who I count as a friend, was one of those brave women who spoke in court (but wished to retain her anonymity, so the cameras didn't record her). I'm so proud to be able to say I'm one of her friends.

As with many of Nassar's victims, after the Indy Star first broke the story, Jane was in denial at first. She had been manipulated to believe it was treatment. It took several months for her to come to terms with the fact she had been abused. Nassar did such a good job on these girls and young women, that Jane knows some fellow gymnasts who received 'the treatment', yet still believe Nassar has done nothing wrong.

Aside from the horrific abuse, one of the things I find most disappointing about the Nassar case, is it took the Olympic gymnasts like Aly Raisman and Simone Biles coming forward, for most of the media (and public) to start giving a damn. The incredible Rachael Denhollander, whose bravery it was that started this whole tidal wave (as the judge called it), first did so back in 2016. Yet it was only really the Indy Star, and the local media in Michigan, that were reporting it for at least a year. It seems women's voices only begin to matter, when famous women speak out, and that shouldn't be the case. Yes it's a good thing the case ended up receiving wider media attention, but it's a shame it hadn't done so since the beginning.

Following on from that comment about the media, a 'The New Yorker' writer wrote a piece yesterday, praising Aly Raisman for leading this charge. I sent a very strongly worded e-mail, reminding them it was Rachael Denhollander who led this charge.

Denhollander was the last to present her statement before sentencing yesterday. Her speech was one of the most powerful I have ever seen. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend watching it, when you have 40 spare minutes.

Nassar's sentencing should only be the beginning though. People like Rachael, and Jane, and all those whose assaults took place at Michigan State University, will not rest until the relevant people there are held accountable.

Yesterday was a huge step, but there is still a long way to go, until there is full justice.

This case is utterly horrific. The women’s testimonies were incredible, so many amazing women.

The judge was amazing giving the women their voice in court.

I wept at the one where the woman talked about being 14/15 and her mum was in the room but at the head of the treatment table and faced away from her when Nassar assaulted her. She knew she was being violated but didn’t think she could speak up because she was ‘lucky’ being treated by such a well regarded doctor.

He is utterly fucking evil, so much getting off on his position of power it actually made me sick to my stomach. So much misogyny

When I think of my little girl and all the safeguarding i do of her, all the things I tell her, your private parts are yours and no one has any right to see them or touch them etc etc, but in the face of this, my daughter might still not be safe... he assaulted young girls while their mother was in the same fucking room.

He can rot...

Yes, the judge has been wonderful. Those poor girls and women, being brushed off when they talk about their assault. People are trained to dismiss women and girls, society gaslights them all the time. Don't make a fuss etc. We are in trouble if we report and it is our fault if we don't report. I am sick of it, our whole society is built on not trusting women and it doesn't look like things are going to get better anytime soon.

The judge during the sentencing has been amazing. She should be person of the year for 2018.

She has let victims speak and put that man where he belongs. His letter was a disgrace and she called him on it.

I know this isn't AIBU, but YANBU.
NAMALT covers a multitude of sins, and I despair when it comes so often from women.

I've been following this case for some time now - so many brave women speaking out, like Simone Biles, and the judge was fabulous.

But yes, horrific that victims' stories were disbelieved. I think there are a number of issues at play here, the major one of course being a misogynistic culture which doesn't take women's testimony seriously, and patriarchal medical practices ("doctor knows best"). Coupled with this is the fact that his victims were mostly very young - teenage girls. And also a medical culture in the USA which has far more routine vaginal examinations, making it harder to say "but this one was wrong" (as far as I can tell, it's routine to start smears round about age 18, 20, even if a woman is not yet sexually active - a friend of mine was left utterly traumatised by this, and also to perform many more internal exams during pregnancy - I think, for instance, an internal exam would be considered routine at a 12 week booking-in visit, which was a real WTAF moment for me. I think I had one in total at 41 weeks - when the midwife very quickly had a feel, said "cervix completely closed, not a hope in hell of getting a sweep", and we went straight to CS.)