Raping Asian girls worse than raping white girls because it 'harms their marriage prospects' :o

[OTheHugeManatee]

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A judge has just ruled that a man who raped Asian under-13s should receive a longer sentence, because the victims' families were now worried about their marriage prospects. In other words, damaging these girls' property value in the marriage 'market' actually counted in terms of assessing the damage done by raping them.

I think this is horrific. Not just because virginity should have no bearing on the value of a girl or woman, but also because implicitly it seems to support the notion that underlay the belief of the Rotherham rapists that white girls were 'trash' who could be abused freely because they were already devalued. Like it's OK to rape white girls because they have no trading value.

I get that feminism coexists quite uneasily with cultural diversity, and this is a very difficult area to navigate, but really feel like this needs a feminist response.

Yes, the judge does rather appear to be colluding with the underlying presumption which leads to rape in the first place - that women are fundamentally the property of men and, therefore, men can just take what they want.

Very strange verdict IMO.

I can sort of see what the judge was tryint to do here but ultimately they are valuing both sets of girls on their worth to men.
The white girls have a low worth, the Asian girls did have worth which has been diminished.

Reminds me of rape being viewed as a crime against the girls' father/husband. The girl is property.

In a way I can't see who is being lowered more here. The white girls who are assessed to have limited value but who are at least treated as if they have some agency, or the Asian girls who have value but no agency (in the eye's of the judge).

It's rare that I read a news story that has me really hopping mad but this one's left me wanting to take to the streets. How can a judge imply that one rape is 'worse' or more harmful than another? And because of assumptions about the girl's relative property value in terms of her cultural background?

Jesus fucking Christ.

It was a female judge who made the original ruling Scobberlotcher.

I agree, the thinking behind this judgment is so wrong, it's almost incomprehensible. The man has been given a longer jail sentence because his actions have damaged the material value of the girls he raped (to their male owners??) more than if they were a different colour.

This sort of thinking is completely absurd.

Exactly scobber. It's like the judge just said 'oh, go ahead, it's OK to rape white 13-year-olds because they're not so fussed about flogging their virginity to men on the marriage market. Just leave the Asian girls alone because their dads get upset about them being damaged goods'.

Horrific. Let's support FGM while we're at it, because that will improve the marriage prospects for some girls too.

It also supports the notion that white girls who are groomed and abused by gangs were more likely to have consented To the abuse by being from chaotic backgrounds, accepting alcohol and drugs, etc.

I disagree with this.

On the thinking - I guess if you disabled a person in an assault and damaged their ability to work/economic prospects, your sentence would reflect that., and I assume this is the same thing in the judge's mind, a prejudicial impact on the future of the victim.

But the judge's thinking should go further and acknowledge that "devaluing" a girl because of this is NOT part of law or anything law should be implicitly condoning in this way.

Fucking awful and yet another demonstration that so many people still believe there is some kind of sliding scale when it comes to rape and that some rape is better than others.

It's dehumanising - even if I screw my brain up really hard and say that the judge is viewing this from the point of view of the girls, then she's basically reduced those girls to a racist stereotype - the asian girls future depends on them getting married and being raped has made that future uncertain, the white girls future was stuffed anyway so being raped doesn't make it any worse for them.

Horrible, unbelievable, any way you think about it.

I am shocked and very saddened by this

To me it is not about who is valued more white or Asian girls but how children in care are not valued as other children the most vulnerable of all children if these girls were in care the attitude would be different

In the article it said that the sentences were longer as the asian girls' fathers were upset about their marriage prospects and this fell under the assessment of the psychological damage to the girls. WTF? So if I get punched in the face and my pimp feels that will damage my future earning as a prostitute should my attacker then get a harsher sentence?

Basically, the girls live in culture where they are sold into slavery by their fathers. In a just society, IMO, this should be seen as an abusive situation - a situation in which the girl is not given her full rights as a human being that should not be traded. However, this judge has openly endorsed the practice of selling young girls to men as life-long slaves by saying that the fathers are right and justified in feeling the girls' value as slaves has been damaged, and not only that but the attacker that damaged their saleable value should be punished more harshly.

It makes me feel sick.

I agree with you Calindana. It is wrong.

Came looking for a thread on this as I just read the story and I am appalled on so many levels.

I can sort of see what the judge was trying to say, but cannot believe that she voiced it and used it as a determining factor in her sentencing.

Once child's body is more important than anothers.

I don't think it is about that Exit. I think it is the fact that men's feelings about rape are more important than the women who are raped.

quite sickening.

The flipside of course is that she's saying the non-Asian girls have no saleable value, and there's no one that really cares about their future prospects so in that case the crime against them deserves less of a punishment. The actual psychological damage to the girls is really not the determining factor - what matters is the value men place on them.

Exit, the child's body is only worth more if a man deems it so. So the father and the inadequateperson who the girl is effectively sold to.

Absolutely sickening that this opinion is given any credence in law.

I think as well part of what's making me angry here is the way in which, where there is a conflict between the rights of women and the rights of another protected/minority group, somehow women's rights always seem to lose out. If there's a conflict between the right of some religious nutters to spout nasty misogynistic guff and the right of women to be treated like full human beings, religious freedom must be supported. If it's a conflict between the right of women to be described by words that accurately reflect our embodied experience and specific biology, and the right of gender-nonconforming people to not have their feelings hurt, then gender diversity must be embraced. And if there's a conflict between the right of all women to have their rape and sexual abuse recognised for the horrific violation it is, and the right of some cultures to be treated as special snowflakes because of how the women's fathers see the situation then cultural diversity must be respected. And every single time, women's rights are discounted. I'm fucking sick of it.

Well said HugeManatee.

Can we protest somewhere against reasoning of this verdict?

It's so wrong!!!!