You’ve just gone through the most brutal and emotionally damaging moment of your life. Unlike many other victims, you gather up enough courage to go to the police to report this act of degradation. Sitting in the cold steel chair at the ER you clench your teeth to hold back tears. The doctor dismisses you, a sad look of pity in her eyes. You go back home and try to make your life normal again, before someone took advantage of your body. You’re sitting at home, perhaps baking cookies with your kids and spouse when the mail man delivers your Saturday morning mail. Wiping your hands on your apron you flip through the mail but halt suddenly at an ominous white envelope with a return police address. Tearing the letter open you are bombarded with figures as you suddenly realize that it is an invoice. An invoice for your rape kit. The police station, the very one you went to for help for the vicious crime committed against you, those same people are charging you for helping to gather evidence against the individual who raped you. Once again you find yourself a victim, this time your friendly police station is the perpetrator.
Don’t think this happens? Think again. When Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla the town charged individuals for their rape kits, a kit used to collect evidence from a rape victim. The chief of police of Wasilla was an adamant supporter of charging rape victims for the kits claiming it would affect their budget if the city paid for it. Statistics show that the rape rate in Alaska is 2 ½ times more than the national average. In a way, the chief of police was profiting from the rape of his citizens- other than a few towns that had the same policy as Wasilla, all other towns refuse to let rape victims pay for their kits and thus take the funds out of their own budget for this cause.
The chief of police fought a state law requiring cities to provide funds for the rape kits. It is difficult to believe that Sarah Palin did not know that this was occurring in her town. How could any woman, or any man for that matter, support the practice of charging victims for their rape kits. That’s a slap in the face, more degradation after an already humiliating and emotionally damaging act. It is unknown exactly how many individuals do not report rape each year but the estimations are staggering. Instead of providing hope and someone to turn to, the city of Wasilla victimized and alienated those who reported rape. Rape is a serious crime but how many people are going to report a rape if they know they have to pay for the kit- an examination that cost up to thousands of dollars? Where were you to defend these women (and men)? How could you let this practice occur in your town for years when you were mayor? Sarah Palin, do you care more about money than the welfare of rape victims?
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1 comment:
I hear there was emergency contraception in those kits. We can't have that now, can we?
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