Post 1-Rape culture in today's society-By Blogger Soma

If you follow the Daily Beast, or even the Gawker Twitter account, you might have seen an opinion piece by one Rikki Kleiman regarding a rape allegation recently raised against Greg Kelly, a local NYC TV anchor and son of NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly. In the piece, Kleiman asserts that the real victim of this case is Greg Kelly, not the accuser. The comments made by Kleiman are surprising to say the least, especially if you consider her history - she used to prosecute rape cases in Massachusetts and is currently a member of the board for the Rape Treatment Center in Los Angeles, California. Her whole theory is that there is no way to know what happened when Kelly and his accuser went up to the accuser's office (where the rape allegedly occurred) and that all of the recently published "evidence" (published mostly by tabloids, hence the quotations) points towards a consensual relationship. So what is this recently published "evidence"? Sexual texts between Kelly and the accuser before and after their date, an alleged abortion of a pregnancy caused by the alleged rape, and the three-month delay in reporting the crime. Kleiman then goes on to bring up other high-profile rape allegations in which the defendant was falsely accused. In this same piece, she says things like "even a prostitute can be raped," but that there is no doubt that this woman who aggressively pursued Kelly and is just upset that he spurned her advances. She ends all of this with a statement on how we have to create an environment in which victims need to feel comfortable about reporting rape. 

It's a bit confusing, isn't it? To have a someone with a background like Kleiman's say these things. Her comments about how Kelly's accuser is just doing this out of anger and spite because he didn't like her - comments like that are exactly what create an unwelcoming environment for rape victims. By writing something like this, she and the Daily Beast have just stoked the flames of insecurity that so many victims experience. It would be one thing to derive a judgement if the published "evidence" was presented in a trial, but to take the words of numerous tabloids as fact is highly irresponsible. This case is only about a week old, and for anyone to question the accuser's character at this point is premature. Why don't we all wait to see if this even goes to trial, which will be a whole other unsettling issue if it doesn't.