Failed Justice in the Heart of Silicon Valley — Santa Clara County
By: Gena Vazquez
Tags: Silicon Valley, Sexual Assault, Rape, Brock Turner, Social Justice

Growing up in Santa Clara County, I can honestly tell you gives some of us, I admit, a superiority complex. We give the impression that bad things rarely happen here. It is the heart of Silicon Valley. The birthplace of technology. Social Justice isn’t even on the radar. We’ve got bigger fish to fry like leading the world in technological advancement! Right? Looking back through the eyes of an adult, and also as a survivor of sexual assault myself-in Santa Clara County-I see how I was so wrong!

Yesterday, I got caught up in the media storm of the Stanford Rape case. The crime perpetrated by the clean cut 22 year old Stanford University athlete, Brock Turner who was convicted in March 2016 of raping a young woman in January of 2015. A judge had handed down a light sentence of only six months in jail. Another case of white privilege getting you everywhere your Signature Visa card gets you these days. A friend and mentor in social justice read the letter of the victim to me. Following every thought written so eloquently by the victim, conjured up resident anger inside of my soul.

Rape happened again in an affluent community I call home.

After reading the victim’s letter, my friend and I tossed legal arguments back and forth about what the right course of action should be now that Brock Turner was convicted by the jury and sentenced by the insensitive, and in my estimation, corrupt, Judge Aaron Persky. It’s been my first hand experience seeing some of Santa Clara County’s wealthy community leaders, legal system and law enforcement agencies engage in activities and corruption that would deem it the most corrupt in the state of California. The best that we can hope for is that the pressure will be put on him to step down from the bench he has put in such a dishonorable light.

Aside from the injustice of the sentencing, the bigger issue here is rape. Sexual assault occurs every 107 seconds in the US. Another horrific statistic from the nation of freedom and justice for all? 32,000 pregnancies each year are a result of rape. Sickening isn’t it?

What can we do as a society to bring about change to end the rape culture? Best advice came long ago from the San Francisco based hippie, Graham Nash:

Teach your children well.

Children need to be taught at a younger age about what sexual assault/rape is and the consequences for committing such a horrific crime. Teenagers need to be taught about boundaries and what the consequences are going to be if they do not respect their own and someone else’s boundaries. Women need to be trained in physical defense and retrained cognitively to deal with a perpetrator in case they are ever assaulted or about to be assaulted. Assailants need to be prosecuted harder and harsher sentences need to be imposed upon them. We can all work within our own families and communities to end the rape culture through education, information, awareness and reformation.

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