In recent events concerning rape culture in our own country, there is a way to get involved and fight back the big name media companies like CNN, ABC news, NBC News, and USA Today. As many may have seen in the news recently in Steubenville, Ohio, two 16 year-old teen boys, who were promising football athletes were accused and convicted of the rape of a fellow 16 year old female classmate. What was so controversial about this particular case is how the media covered the issues at hand. When the nation heard about the bus gang rape in India, the general consensus was that it was a horrible act against women and people started to band together all over the world to stop violence against women. However, in this particular case, as with many that go under the media’s eyes, major news networks like CNN were sympathizing with the accusers, instead of the victim, which ended up causing a public outcry to rethink how we portray rape culture in our own country.

In the Steubenville case, the teens were at a party where alcohol was involved.  According to reports, the heavily inebriated high school girl was publicly and repeatedly sexually violated by her peers, particularly the two boys where were eventually charged, several other students documented the acts in social media. The victim was transported to various parties, undressed, photographed, sexually assaulted, and orally penetrated. She was also penetrated vaginally by other students' fingers, an act defined as rape under Ohio law. The victim testified in court that she had no memory of the six-hour period in which the rapes occurred, except for a brief time in which she was vomiting on the street. She said she woke up the next morning naked in a basement living room with Mays, Richmond and another teenage boy, missing her underwear, shoes, phone and earrings. The evidence presented in court mainly consisted of hundreds of text messages and cellphone pictures that had been taken by more than a dozen people at the parties and afterwards traded with other students and posted to social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, and which were described by the judge as "profane and ugly."

This particular case was so controversial, not because what happened, but how the media covered the proceeding case. News networks like CNN, ABC, NBC and USA Today have been reported to report “the boys were promising students”, making excuses for the rapists, emphasizing the boys “promising football careers,” and stressing that the victim was drunk. As stated before, this brings in the question as to what is the rape culture in our own country. How can we have such contradicting views concerning rape in other countries and our own? The India case caused such a stir-up that people thought that was incredibly tragic for the victim, however in our own country because alcohol was involved, the media put the blame on the victim.

To take action, I went to Change.org - https://www.change.org/petitions/cnn-apologize-on-air-for-sympathizing-with-the-steubenville-rapists and signed the petition to have CNN apologize on air for sympathizing with the Steubenville rapists. The petition states:

“To:
CNN 

Your coverage of the Steubenville rape trial's verdict Sunday morning was a complete disgrace and a breach of journalistic ethics. To have three of your personalities blatantly portray the rapists as the victims in this situation while not so much as acknowledging the actual rape victim and what she has had to put up with since — death threats and the hostility of that entire football-crazed town — is nothing short of disgusting.

I request that you apologize on-air, several times over the course of the next week, at the start of every hour, for your shameful coverage that only served to perpetuate a culture in which young people will grow up not understanding the concept of consent and in which rape victims are blamed, ostracized and threatened. Start with Candy Crowley, Poppy Harlow and Paul Callan themselves issuing their apologies several times, then extend that to the rest of CNN's staff and Jeff Zucker himself. Admit that your coverage was extremely off base and tell us why it was off base. Use the content of this letter as a starting point if you need to.

A culture that sympathizes with rapists and encourages them while shaming rape victims can no longer be considered socially acceptable, and that change must start with you. As journalists for a major network that reaches millions of households in the United States and worldwide, it is your responsibility. Accept it.

Sincerely,
[Your name]”

In the petition you fill find many different reasons why people have signed it.

            This type of action connects with different type of democratic values because we all have a voice and generally, the media shows the popular voice of all the people, however when we disagree with what is being said across the nation via different media forces, we have the right of freedom of speech to fight back. In regards to teaching about social justice, it’s definitely important because if we are unaware of what is going on in our world, how can we grow up to make it better? Knowing what is out there, and knowing that you have a chance to change someone’s view on something can be all the difference for your community and your nation, as you can control the media, morality, ethics and federal law.

            In this whole current events process, I really learned more about how much influence the media has in controversial topics, especially rape and women’s rights. From what I see, there is progress in equality of men and women, but we still have a long way to go. There seems to be so many double standards and hypocrisy in the media and how violence against women is viewed, not only in our own country, but throughout the world. Teaching using current events is definitely important to social studies as a whole. Usually when we think social studies, we think history, and when we think history, it’s usually followed by something in the past that we no longer have control over, or something that is “dead.” By teaching using current events, we know that is not the case. When we teach using current events, these are topics that are hot in the media at the time, that can have an impact on everyone, and with keeping up with what is going on, you have a chance to become apart of the history, instead of just learning about it.

 -Kathy