gang rapes

[The_Fuel]

Somehow i get the feeling that people here don't care to post their true thoughts on the issue for fear of not going along with the bandwagon on peace and love. (and tree huggin hippy crap etc etc)
Life is about good and bad. Love and war. for fucks sake. Be politically correct or be down right racist when its called for. You can't go through life ignoring half of it. You would not know what the ecstacy of happyness feels like without feeling the horror of sadness. You can't love if you don't know how to hate.
Don't get me wrong, im not some sort of satanistic bastard.... i used to go to a Roman Catholic church every Sunday until i was 13. I just feel that i should not be labaled an idiot or a fool for holding opinions that to me and many people i have met are greatly validated each and every weekend.
Sure my previous post could be taken as racist. I understand that just because of these guys actions its no reason to slander the whole lebanese community. I have had some great co-workers who lebanese and absolute champs. But how can one not be racially tainted when the majority of things he sees is bad.
[ 20 August 2002: Message edited by: The_Fuel ]

 

[nezo]

I like tabouli.

 

[SupaspeeD]

I think there a couple of things that need to be clarified in this thread. Actually more than couple, a LOT of things from both sides (the "racists" on one hand and the "hippies" on the other ).
1. The perpetrators have been put in solitary confinement, there will be no poetic justice. Solitary confinement is fine by me. They were placed in confinement because of fears of reprisals against them. Funny that, they are "the man" while pack raping someone, yet need the prison authorities to look out for them when they have to play with the other big bad boys.
2. I think there was a racial element to the attacks, whether anything was said or not. Adding the aforementioned insults of "leb style", "aussie pig" etc made it even more so. 14 or more guys of the same descent (whatever it may be) pack raping a girl of different physical and ethnic appearance reeks of a racially motivated attack, taunting with racist comments makes it blatantly obvious. If you cannot see that, i suggest you take a dose of the real world.
And please people, don't try and spin bullshit about "if it was 14 white guys raping an asian girl" type crap, you may not think the legal system is not just and fair, and the media is making this a lebanese-bashing, but if 14 white guys pack raped her, called her derogatory, racist names in the same manner as this attack, they would receive equivalent sentences. Don't kid yourselves.
3. The sentence of 55years included a non-parole, let me just repeat that non-parole period of 40 years. Guess what that means? no parole for 40 years at the least. Funny that. Not "out in ten" probably.
4. The amount of blanket statements in this thread is phenonmenal. Claiming any racial motivation for the attack sees you branded a "racist", which just so happens to be a very PC way of defeating an argument without actually attacking any of the points made. Sure opinions are like assholes, everyone's got one and most of them stink, but if YOU don't want to be the one who appears close-minded and illogical, don't just blanket-state things without any justification or counter-argument. Use your noggin and show us all why YOUR opinion is better, not just because you can call someone a bad name and express your disgust.
5. What would have happened in Lebanon doesn't mean shit. They are all first or second generation Australians. They are as Australian as most of this board, some probably more so. My heritage doesn't have anything to do with my punishment, unless i make it a part of my wrong acts - in this case bringing the racial element into it.
6. Why should anyone care about protecting the lebanese society when arguing in the same breath that it wasn't a lebanese thing? If i was a member of say a soccer social group, very close knit, a lot of its members related by blood, and 14 members of the group pack-raped a young girl, would you all be standing by my little soccer club and its good name? FUCK NO. People have argued that race isn't an issue, yet seek to uphold race and protection of racial groups as somewhat important when their members commit heinous crimes. That is totally stupid, why has race become something that people value over everything else, my soccer group would be guilty by association (the families too), yet we must PROTECT against any possible HARM to the group's good name? I'm not anti-lebanese by any measure, i just find it interesting that this is the way people's brains work.
7. The story on ACA about the girl held her up to be some kind of hero - personally i think the message should have been, "girls, stay the fuck away from dodgy fuckers you meet on the train who offer you drugs... this girl didn't and paid the ultimate price". BUt then again, that wouldn't tap into the public sentiment of "hang the bastards".
Oh well, wish i had more time but uni calls.

 

[cAmmAc]

A lot of you have the idea that this person is going to walk out of jail some day. Let me just say again, for those that missed it - HE'S A DEAD MAN. The courts know this, the police know this, and the prison guards know this. I'm sure even Mr 'X' knows this. Gee I'd love to be in his shoes at the moment *with a hint of sarcasm*.
A bloke that's in jail already for life is gonna walk up to him one day, whether it be 5 weeks, months, years, whatever, and is going to slit his throat. What's going to happen to the bloke that did it? Solitary for a while, but he's going to earn the respect of the other cons in there - which is all he really cares about anyway, seeing they're the only people he's going to see ever again. I suggest you people either read some literature on prison life, or get to know someone that's spent some time behind bars. Your eyes will be OPENED.

 

[Mr. Horse]

Supa: You think I should defend my blanket statement? I will... not for your satisfaction, or any others in this thread, but for myself.
Everyone else: I never denied this was race related. It was, there is no doubt in my mind. I just think its bullshit that people are so quick to blame a nation for the act of a small, fucked up group of boys.
The question being asked is, after the boys, who is to blame? Where did they get their beliefs from? Do you blame the country? The social system, the parents, the religion, the peers? yes... all of the above. I don't know enough about the social fabric of Lebanon to pass judgement on the entire race, therefore I wont. I'll do everything in my power to question, and make informed decisions based on facts, not emotion.
Its not about being "PC or not", its about being fair & compassionate. Its never EVER "ok" to be racist. Fucking use your brains. QUESTION EVERYTHING. Don't be so quick to say "fucking lebos". Ask WHY this happened, get angry for the right reasons, and don't use a thread like this to convey your stupid predjudiced views. Its almost as if some of you are sitting back thinking "I told you THEY were cunts", waiting for a crime such as this to happen.
A crime like this makes me sick. It fills me with anger, and a want to do something. But it also makes me question everything about the issue, and it presents me with ethical & moral delemmas. Any issue like it will.
Any topic like this will devide people down the middle. The "hippies" vs. the "racists". yeh, nice one.
All I ask is for you to use your brains, present an argument that makes people think. Convince us one way or another, and if you're not smart enough to do that, then dont post, cos its gonna make you look like an idiot.
[ 21 August 2002: Message edited by: Mr. Horse ]

 

[Raving Loony]

Originally posted by SupaspeeD:

6. Why should anyone care about protecting the lebanese society when arguing in the same breath that it wasn't a lebanese thing? If i was a member of say a soccer social group, very close knit, a lot of its members related by blood, and 14 members of the group pack-raped a young girl, would you all be standing by my little soccer club and its good name? FUCK NO. People have argued that race isn't an issue, yet seek to uphold race and protection of racial groups as somewhat important when their members commit heinous crimes. That is totally stupid, why has race become something that people value over everything else, my soccer group would be guilty by association (the families too), yet we must PROTECT against any possible HARM to the group's good name? I'm not anti-lebanese by any measure, i just find it interesting that this is the way people's brains work.

Disagree with you there about the soccer club.
The notion in sport is that no player is bigger than the club and including any of the acting players. Players come and go. But the club is essentially something that lasts generations. If the soccer team did such an act, then the team gets the sack and prossecuted accordingly. No doubt the club would be investigated to see if the crime was in any way associated with the board.
Similarly at work. We've all seen the work cover ad where two people lit a tin full of paint thinner and slid it under a toilet cubicle where it left the victum with horrendous burns. That was an actual case. Work cover prossecuted those individuals, not the company. So I'd say the same applies to this case!

 

[sinntress]

this thread has become very contraversial
Can i just remind everyone that the point of this thread is NOT to get into heated arguments with others?
We all agree (i hope) that rape is a horrible thing that no-one should have to go through - FULL STOP
Anything other than that is just politics...............
Love each other - dont fight!
*********************
Sorry nezo, but i prefer potatoe salad!
[ 21 August 2002: Message edited by: sinntress ]

 

[SeveredPsyche]

Originally posted by Mr. Horse:
Its not about being "PC or not", its about being fair & compassionate. Its never EVER "ok" to be racist. Fucking use your brains. QUESTION EVERYTHING. Don't be so quick to say "fucking lebos". Ask WHY this happened, get angry for the right reasons, and don't use a thread like this to convey your stupid predjudiced views. Its almost as if some of you are sitting back thinking "I told you THEY were cunts", waiting for a crime such as this to happen.

By saying "fucking Lebos" could people not be simply acknowledging the fact they were Lebanese? You talk about parents, peers, social system, religion etc. as all possible contributors to the actions of this gang. All those things worked together to create this particular group of people. I don't think everyone is blaming a whole nation, rather the product of circumstances that created what turned out to be people of Lebanese descent living in Australia. There may be other paths to similar results, but every one is unique.
If you want to go into the deeper causes for these actions, that's fine. Most don't, for better or worse. They aren't all "blaming" the Lebanese, they are labelling this group (and similar ones I guess) as such.
Not wanting to trivialise what is a very serious issue, one example I can think of is with computers. On a daily (hourly even) basis I abuse them, call them all sorts of names under the sun and threaten physical violence. I don't want to know what line of programming code caused 2000 emails to be lost or caught in a mail loop, I just want the stupid thing to work. But I also am very glad of computers and get a lot of productivity and enjoyment out of them. I still say "fucking computers!" on a regular basis.
SP, playing Devil's Advocate. My true opinion (seen earlier in this thread) is much more simple.
Mr H: "stupid predjudiced views"...I don't disagree that some are, but I don't think this will convince those to change their ways. Maybe you're not trying to.
[ 21 August 2002: Message edited by: SeveredPsyche ]
[ 21 August 2002: Message edited by: SeveredPsyche ]

 

[Mr. Horse]

SP: the first line of my post was for supaspeed... most of his post i agreed with.
the rest of it was for everyone else, it has now been edited
peace
[ 21 August 2002: Message edited by: Mr. Horse ]

 

[SeveredPsyche]

^^^^
Oops! Just worked that out as I was reading back through the thread.
It all makes sense now!
I'll leave what I've written anyway as I believe it kind of argues for people to "question everything" and keep an open mind.

 

[*chaoscat*]

Originally posted by SupaspeeD:

6. Why should anyone care about protecting the lebanese society when arguing in the same breath that it wasn't a lebanese thing? If i was a member of say a soccer social group, very close knit, a lot of its members related by blood, and 14 members of the group pack-raped a young girl, would you all be standing by my little soccer club and its good name? FUCK NO. People have argued that race isn't an issue, yet seek to uphold race and protection of racial groups as somewhat important when their members commit heinous crimes.
I disagree with this comparison. If members of your soccer club did that, and people said "fucking soccer players", and blamed all soccer players in australia, that would be similar to what some people are saying about all lebanese people in australia.
It isn't a "soccer thing" just as it's not a "lebanese thing". But rather that there may be problems within that soccer club, just as it is fair to say that there may be problems with a certain section of the lebanese community (or even a problem with a certain area of sydney).
One letter sent to 60 minutes (I wasn't really watching it!) objected to it being called a lebanese problem, since the boys in question were islamic lebanese, while most lebanese people in australia are christian. That could be seen as just as narrow minded, but reminds us that the most obvious difference between "us" and the perpetrators may not be the cause of their actions. There are many factors that influenced their upbringing and values, it is all these factors which are to blame, not simply their racial background.

 

[SupaspeeD]

Point 6 of my previous post probably wasn't very well explained, and i concede i used a poor example. I was trying to bring out the question - when did race become something that must be protected above everything else? The attacks were to some degree racially-motivated (that degree depends largely on your particular sentiments), but i just find it interesting that if something is racially motivated, people jump to protect the race of people committing the act. Just looking through the posts, more people jump to the defence of the lebanese community, rather than expressing sorrow for the girl/s who have been attacked. I find that interesting, because my first thoughts were "that's horrific, no one should have to endure that, the people who did that are scum", considerations of the welfare of their particular community (here the lebanese community) didn't really come into my initial thoughts, matter of fact, who they are and where they come from have no bearing in my mind that they are scum. Its interesting to see how other's minds work.
To use the reverse analogy here - if 14 white, christian, blue eyed, blonde haired boys pack-raped a muslim lebanese girl - would there have been a protection of their religious and ethnic group? I doubt so, it seems to be open slather on anything christian related (note - i have no personal religious demoniation). While they may be a a majority societal group - how are the boundaries changed? Sure the catholic church has a lot to answer for both in historical and present events, but so do muslims.
While i support protection of minorities, i find it interesting that this protection sometimes takes precedence over protection of the real victims. Portions of the sydney lebanese community really haven't done themselves any favours, i still have the images fresh in my mind of the large gathering of lebanese muslims dancing around and celebrating the 11/9 attacks. There are only so many things people in your community can do before everybody gets a pretty hard to shake pre-conceived notion about you. While it may be nice to try to remain open to all possibilities, you can't start to help those who don't appear to want to help themselves.
Please keep the dioscussion coming, its threads like these where u see some of the most intelligent things on BL.
I have a question for consideration - do you think that people convicted of particulalry harsh and heinous crimes have forgone their rights in prison? Ie do you agree with the removal of the offfenders from the prison population, or do you think they should be thrown in the deep end with the big boys, that they have forgone their rights to be protected?

 

[The_Fuel]

good posting SupaspeeD ... you have been able to put into words what i have not.... (never did like english class) and in a very thought provoking way....
anyhow.... towards your question... i believe yes
they have forgone their rights.... i'm a very eye for an eye person and also believe that if you do something wrong, which you know is wrong they you must be prepared to have wrong done by you...another way to look at it is that these people who break the law then look to it later on to save them.... ironic no??
eg everyone has heard of that case in the USA -where a person who broke into a house, slipped over cutting himself on a knife left on a bench and successfully sued the owners of the place.... its stuff like that and many other storys from friends living there (esp about minor car accidents costing heaps and heaps due to people sueing) that make me glad that im not living there...
Back to topic though.... there is no way that these people could have believed that they were not doing a very wrong thing. As soon as they took advantage of that girl, they waived their rights in my opinion....
And yes i would expect no more or less for myself if i were somehow in their situation...
(10 mins later after above..) Although now thinking about it (which movie was it?) its said that the greatness of a culture is shown by the way it treats its criminals....
[ 22 August 2002: Message edited by: The_Fuel ]
[ 22 August 2002: Message edited by: The_Fuel ]

 

[SeveredPsyche]

Originally posted by The_Fuel:
i'm a very eye for an eye person and also believe that if you do something wrong, which you know is wrong they you must be prepared to have wrong done by you...another way to look at it is that these people who break the law then look to it later on to save them.... ironic no??
Not really (well, it should be from the crims' perspective). Simply because we have to be consistant in the way we treat people. You can forgo your rights in society, but you can't forgo your rights in law simply because you don't follow the rules.
Think of it as the rules of a game where one of the rules states "if you break any of these rules you will miss 2 turns and have a shot of tequila". It is expected by the other participants that the rule-breaker will follow that rule and accept their punishment. If not, they are probably chucked out of the game (out of society) for good. Which is what I believe should happen here.
"An eye for an eye, making the whole world blind. " I can't remember who said it, Gandhi maybe, but I don't believe in an eye for an eye. However, I do believe what goes around should come around. They have done something horrible and hopefully something will happen to them, but I'm not going to be the one to poke their eyes out. Not just because it is illegal, but because we have to follow the rules in the way we treat them. We would be hypocrites if we didn't..."hey, I got locked up for raping these girls, how can you rape me and get away with it?".
On the other hand, if we had an "eye for an eye" law....or is this what you are talking about...the law needs to be changed?
[ 22 August 2002: Message edited by: SeveredPsyche ]

 

[jakoz]

Originally posted by SeveredPsyche:
"An eye for an eye, making the whole world blind. " I can't remember who said it, Gandhi maybeThe Dalai Lama said that when he was last in Australia, but I have no idea whether he quoted it.

 

[SeveredPsyche]

Yep, it was Gandhi, however apparently we "misinterperate the Biblical phrase an eye for an eye".
Getting way off topic here, but regarding being judged by the way we treat our criminals (kind of), there was an old science fiction story in which aliens come to Earth and sample some of the local flora and fauna. A human is locked up in a sort of bio-aquarium thing in which it is constantly raining. The aliens have no way of knowing which species has any intelligence because it can't communicate with them. The human builds a kind of cage to keep one of the other species as a pet. The aliens release the human, concluding only intelligent beings lock others in cages.
Or something like that.

 

[anfalicious]

Just another point to add. 55 years is a long time. The guy is only in his early 20s. That means that the court believes that he will not change in the next 40 years. Do you expect to be the same person in 40 years time you are now? TO hold the same beliefs? I dont. I'm not the same person I was 40 months ago.
Yes the crime is horrendous. But does this man really have no chance of rehabilitation?
IMO the best criminal system would be one that can most successfully rehabilitate the criminal.

 

[Donny Don't]

It doesn't matter if he's rehabilitated in less than 40 years. This man deserves severe punishment for what he did, and the severity of punishment with our legal system is measured in years.

 

[wHiTeBoY]

I believe rape and any sexual crimes of this kind to be the worst type of crime, even worse than murder itself. In cases like these, I see the flaws in capital punishment. I mean just giving this fuck a lethal injection would be a quick death with no pain, would be an easy way out. That's why I am happy that Australia doesn't have capital punishment. Now this fuck gets to spend the next 40 non-parole years in jail, getting raped every day. What goes around comes around....

 

[SeveredPsyche]

Originally posted by anfalicious:
Just another point to add. 55 years is a long time. The guy is only in his early 20s. That means that the court believes that he will not change in the next 40 years. Do you expect to be the same person in 40 years time you are now? TO hold the same beliefs?.
I hope not. He needs to change and understand the nature of what he has done...and still be locked up. Being aware of how horrific his actions were, not being able to change the past and not being allowed into society is true punishment. I don't believe anyone who's actions are as cold and calculated as these are capable of rehabilitation to the point where they are fit to join the rest of the human race.