"How fitting that Lara Logan was “liberated” by Muslims in Liberation Square while she was gushing over the other part of the “liberation.”
Hope you’re enjoying the revolution, Lara! Alhamdilllullah [praise allah]." ~Debbie Schlussel (Conservative political commentator, radio talk show host, columnist, and attorney)
This after Lara Logan, reporter for CBS, was raped in the 'freedom celebration' in Egypt.
First of all...I was shocked to hear this happened. My first reaction to Ms Logan even being there? "How brave of this female reporter." But to have this horrible, horrible thing happen to here is unimaginable.
Then the sickening realization of this Ms. Schlussel was saying "You deserved it."
The feeling swirled in my abdomen, like the time my sister and I were trapped on a carnival ride. Turning in a circle in a cage that turned on its own axis. Doubling the centrifugal force that brought the vomit up to my throat.
I remember when our high school band went to Mexico to perform in our sister city's Carnival parade. We were gathered up and warned, "No girls go anywhere alone. Blonds especially. Keep them in the middle of the group. You will have a lot of attention on you. Guys...keep close to the girls."
It was my first time, in my very 'strong female' upbringing, I felt vulnerable as a girl. I was raised to hold my own, stand my ground. Any guys that had bothered me, up to this point, with taunts of my weight, or my height. I dealt with them in two ways: I danced around their hurtful words and ultimately shamed them with my verbal/comedic expertise or I knocked the shit out of them with my fists.
Scarlet O'Hara I ain't.
My second realization was a date gone wrong in college. The voice of my mother in my head, "If you could just meet a nice boy....". I tried to block my lust for the girl on the college swim team and went out with a guy in my art class. He seemed like a nice boy, till his mom left us alone in his house.
The 'date' ended with him on the ground, a foot print on the crotch of his jeans and the threat of me putting the end table lamp through his skull, very real.
He never came back to class...I gave up looking for a 'nice boy'.
Fast forward to my pro football days. One of my team mates was a female soldier. She was about to be shipped to Iraq. Things had been going on for a while there. Long tours and bad conditions we were just learning about in the states.
She came to a practice after having gone through an orientation, getting her ready for life in the Middle East. She told us they took all the female soldiers through a separate class, from the men.
What she told us was so shocking, it made my gut turn.
They were basically warned that the AMERICAN troops had been there for a while now. That the female troops were in danger from their own male counter parts. That there was a good possibility they would be sexually assaulted. They wanted to give them the proper way to combat this:
1. Issue a warning that you don't want the sexual advance by stating clearly, "NO!"
2. If they ignore this, inform them you will draw your fire arm if they do not stop their advance.
3. If he continues, draw your fire arm and shoot the male.
So you see Ms. Schlussel, in your glee to prove that Islam and Muslims are animals and don't deserve freedom, you've missed the point.
Rape isn't political.
1/3 of the women in the AMERICAN military are raped. A woman is raped in AMERICA every 2 minutes.
Rape is the worst thing that could happen to a woman. The WORST. It takes your soul, your strength, and your dignity. It steals the peace of your loving relationships and the trust of everyone around you.
Death would be a welcome and easy choice over rape. When would you EVER think dying would be a choice over anything?
Ms. Schlussel, I hope you never have to make that choice. But if you play the odds and think about the percentage of a chance....you might just end up knowing first hand.
And you'll never have to be as brave as Lara, by standing as a woman, in the middle of a revolution, in the middle of Egypt. You can stay right in America, wrapped in the flag and the constitution where every two minutes there is a new victim you can let know she "deserves it".
