débats Do toi think this was justified? Part one: The cheerleading scandel that went to court.

pandawinx posted on Feb 02, 2011 at 04:31PM
I read a real life article in a magazine once about a 16 year old high school cheerleader named Hillary.
She was head cheerleader for her schools basketball team: "The tigers" and was very passionate about her high school career.

One friday after a game, the tigers won the match. all the cheerleaders and basketball-ers decided to celebrate at a pub/bar.
However, that night one of the tigers- Nathan* (Not real name) caught her alone in the back room, and- with a few of his friends to hold her down- raped Hillary and molested her.

Dumbstruck, the next Monday Hillary reported it and took it to court.
Nathan was proven guilty and charged with 100 hours community service and a suspension from school.

After his suspension, Nathan* was welcomed back to school and back to the basketball team.
Hillary stayed in the cheer-leading team and cheered until Nathan scored, in which she just sat down and look at her trainers.
Due to this, the cheer leading coach kicked her off the team, saying: "You cheer for him, or you don't cheer at all!"

Hillary claims the cheerleading squad was very important to her and that her high school has been ruined.
Do you think this was justified?

Things to take into consideration:

FOR: Yes, she deserved to be kicked off the team:
1. When you join a cheer leading team you are specifically required to cheer the whole way through. If she agreed to this, why change her mind now?
2. Joining the squad was voluntary and no one was forcing her to join.
3. Nathans sentence had already been served. So, can't Hillary just forget about it now?

Against: She shouldn't of been kicked off the team!
1. 100 hours of community service is being put off lightly for what Nathan did to Hillary. He shouldn't of been let onto the basketball team again, yet alone at school.
2. Hillary shouldn't of had to choose between her dignity and her high school career. they are both important.
3. It is natural to feel a resentment to someone--- Especially one who molested you! Hillary had the right not to support someone like that.

What Do YOU think? Was this justified or not? Please comment to tell me what you think and why. Please take in mind this is real life.
-Pandawinx.

débats 11 réponses

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il y a plus d’un an pandawinx said…
Should she of been kicked off the team?....Hmmm, well, let me think.....HELL NO!
Nathan shouldn't of been allowed back in school anyway, and making Hillary praise and cheer for someone who should be in prison, is nothing less than injustice. If not sick.
il y a plus d’un an sapherequeen said…
I think that all of that is utter bullshit.

Kick a girl off the cheerleading squad because she wouldn't cheer for her rapist?

I'm sorry, but I have a lot of points to address in this story;

1) He raped a girl...actually gang raped if a group of his friends assisted him in this heinous act. He completely abolished her trust in not only himself but in people in general, destroyed her innocence, disrupted her sense of security, basically destroyed her life in general. And what does he get as a punishment again; 100 hours community service and a suspension from school?
As if he only set a stink bomb off in her damn car!
I'm sorry for my offensive language, and I don't know where these series of events have taken place.
But where I come from, rape is considered a tremendously serious offense (Not trying to belittle any country) and a person gets a large number of years in prison in most cases. Even high school boys who are the stars on the football team. Rape is a serious crime that should require a serious consequence; not something like community service or suspension from high school (Like, no shit he's not going to be in school!). Prison, in my strong opinion, suits that crime. Nothing less.
Nor should he have been welcomed back on the football team, but I could go on forever about how I detest the ways in which this case was handled, so I'll move on if I've made my point clear.

2) That coach is simply ignorant and insensitive.

I'd understand if all Nathan did was play a small prank or disrespect Hillary in mior ways. But the thing is, what happened was not at all minor.

Again, rape is a serious crime. One of the reasons for that is its tremendously deep effects on the victim.

I've heard about numerous stories about rape victims, and they share these common characteristics after the event; They lose their self of security, often their sense of self. They often feel dirty and humiliated, and carry the impression that what happened was their fault, not the rapist's. They wished that they could have done more to stop it. They can easily become depressed, isolated from others, traumatized to an extreme point.
I have a long list of other effects of rape, but I won't dwell into them too much. If anyone knows a good deal about rape and how one is affected, we know what damage it can do. To a young child and teenager especially.
To reach my point, Hillary undoubtedly was greatly harmed by what happened. I can only imagine the turmoil, the hurt, and the misery she had to deal with afterwards.

How could anyone in her shoes fully fogive the one man who has done something that awful to her, even if they've tried?

I would admire Hillary for even staying in the squad and having the decency to root for Nathan's team! I'm aware of plenty of rape victims who wouldn't even want to see their offender ever again. Hillary is brave enough to stay even in the same room with Nathan, let alone stand there and having to cheer for him.

Yet that coach had the audacity to place Hillary's well-being and Nathan's horrendous actions behind one' duty as a fucking cheerleader!?!

No. That's not right at all.

Nathan shouldn't have even been back on that football team, in my opinion. And if we were harmed tremendously by anyone and a large group of people were well aware of it, we have the right to remember what we've went through, and refuse to do something positive for those who put us through that hell.


To summarize my points;
The punishment for the rape was ridiculous. The coach's actions were ignorant to a far, far extent.
And rape is a crime that needs to be taken seriously.

Rape destroys. It destroys the victim's life, the victim's family's lives, the offender's family's lives, and in some cases the life of the offender himself!
It's a cycle of violence, horrible violation, and damage that should be stopped.

And any person who is a victim of this has the right to not completely forgive and show it.


That's my opinion :)

il y a plus d’un an sapherequeen said…
*I apologize for my ranting, inappropriate language, and strong emotional reaction in my previous comment if it offends anyone (unless you're the coach or the rapist I'm talking about or anyone like the rapist I'm talking about, of course) or disrupts any sense of comment could've made. If you wish for me to restate my points, you can let me know in response or leave a post on my wall. Thank you.
il y a plus d’un an pandawinx said…
Don't worry, i agree.

When i first read about what Nathan did, i thought he'd serve 10 years in the slammer. Which i wouldn't object to.
But 100 years of community service and a suspension? well.....i'ld hate to be Hillary.

As for what you said for admiring her if she decided to cheer for nathan and stay on the team, well, not so sure about that one....On one hand, if she choose that she would be pretty brave, but if it was me, i wouldn't give in to Nathan. it just doesn't seem right. like saying: "OK, you just violated my *ucking human rights, but don't worry: I'll still support your team!"

I'm not an expert on the subject of rape, but i do know that it's never right. no matter why, how, when, where and who you do it to.
no exceptions.

-pandawinx.
(PS and sorry, i have no idea where this happened.)
il y a plus d’un an sapherequeen said…
I know what you mean, I'd hate to be her too. I would probably take justice in my own hands, which right then and there, doesn't even sound correct at all.

Oh, I wasn't saying that she should have cheered for him. I thought she was already cheering for Nathan's team or for him for short period of time. But once he scored, she didn't. I was saying that I admired her for even being there and cheering his team on. Sorry if I've stated that in a wrong way :/

And I agree, it's never right. At all.
il y a plus d’un an SG1-090 said…
Castrating him. Now that's justified. This? This is messed up. You've both pretty much covered it all :D
il y a plus d’un an bri-marie said…
This is so eerily similar to something that happened my junior year of high school it's not even funny. And I have the same reaction now that I did then:

That's fucking bullshit (sorry for the language).

In my case, though, the school wouldn't let the boy come back (although that's not for lack of stupid people protesting to let him come back). But he still didn't get any jail time - I don't even think he was marked.

Rape is rape, it doesn't matter how much money you have or how fancy your lawyer is. It is the violent, undignified act of sexually violating someone. It's mentally, emotionally, physically, and sexually destructive. The boy should have had jail time. They could have easily proved that, even at sixteen, he knew raping someone was wrong and he should be tried as an adult. Even if he didn't know it was wrong, they could still argue that he's not mentally stable enough to be let back into a public school, much less unto a public basketball team. He got off with nothing, except a lighter wallet.

The arguments that are for her being kicked off are, again, utter bullshit.
1. Have you ever been to a basketball or football game? The cheerleaders don't cheer the whole way through. I was in color guard (marching band) and never missed a football game. I can honestly tell you that the cheerleaders (on both sides) didn't always cheer. Plenty of times they just stood there, regardless of what was going on in the game. I seriously doubt the rules for basketball cheer leading are different from football cheerleading. And if it's okay for perfectly healthy girls to stand around, why isn't it okay for an abused girl to not cheer for the boy who raped her?
2. True, no one forced to her join. But someone had forced her into a disgusting act and got away with it. If she should leave the team, so should the actual guilty party.
3. The fact that the option is "get over it" makes me sick. You don't "get over" the fact that you were raped.
il y a plus d’un an Darkshine said…
I completely agree with the answers above.
Why the hell would she cheer for him, he raped her!
He wasn't thrown off team for making a scandal and raping his colleague but she got thrown off team for not cheering?
Does anyone else smell some sexism?
il y a plus d’un an pandawinx said…
^ Yep, and it smells like deep fried shit. ^-^
il y a plus d’un an ivoryphills said…
angry
Ugh, where are my diarhea pills?
il y a plus d’un an PlayingWithFire said…
angry
Just community service, what the fucking hell were those sentencing people thinking?! That rapist guy should've been castrated and put in prison with a bunch of burly men who haven't have good time in years and years! See how that little cockroach likes it!
last edited il y a plus d’un an