We all remember what happened when a whole lacrosse team was accused of raping a black woman at a party last spring. The feminist and lefties went into a rage that is still seething. They gathered with signs urging that the players be castrated. They banged pots and pans to “wake up” the system that was protecting the “rapists” from prosecution. The police lied about the players’ lack of cooperation, saying a “blue wall of silence” had been erected. District Attorney Mike Nifong threw gasoline on all of this with his 50 or so interviews with national media. And all this before anyone was even charged.
Compare that with the allegations that a white woman was raped at a black fraternity party on Sunday. The mainstream media has bent over backward to keep race out of this. Even those who first gave a description of the alleged rapist as a “black man” later redacted that from their reports. The News & Observer never printed it at all. And none has pointed out, as the Duke Chronicle has done, that the alleged victim was white, making this a mirror image of the Duke lacrosse case.
Some maintained all along last spring that their protests were not about race but about men’s violence against women. Still others tried to fan racial and class tensions by saying that if these were black men accused of raping a white woman, the man would be in jail. Well, now we know two things: it was always about race for the pot bangers and the Group of 88 professors at Duke, and it is demonstrably true, after Sunday’s incident, that a black man can be accused of raping a white woman and still be on the street.
One can’t help but see the contrast in the community’s and the national media’s reactions to this latest case versus the case last spring. Everyone who jumped to race-class-gender conclusions last year needs to search their hearts and ask, why am I not demonstrating, marching and covering this wall-to-wall like last year? Where is Victoria Peterson? Where are the Duke professors who signed the infamous “Listening Statement”? I’m not saying there should be a media invasion and protest walks and candlelight vigils this time. I’m saying there never should have been last spring.
As all should have done with the Duke lacrosse players, no judgments should be made until the facts are in. No one should assume the woman is telling the truth or that the accused man — whoever he is — is guilty. Let’s just hope the Durham Police handle this more responsibly than they did the lacrosse case. And let’s hope the prosecutor this time is acting out of a sense of justice rather than political ambition.
