LINCOLN, Neb. — Brenda Tracy stood in front of Nebraska coach Mike Riley’s football team Wednesday afternoon and told them the story of that night nearly 18 years ago when she was gang-raped by four men — two of whom played for Riley’s Oregon State team in 1998. And then Tracy told his current players there was a time she absolutely despised Riley. “I told them, ‘At one point I hated this man more than my rapists,’ ” Tracy told a small group of reporters Wednesday evening. “You could literally see the whole room turn and look at Coach Riley. … It was intense. I saw them all look. I could feel it. Not too long after that, I started talking about the idea that he didn’t have to bring me here. Even under those circumstances, he didn’t have to bring me here. This is what accountability looks like. This is what transparency looks like. This is how we get things done, and (they) should be appreciative that they have a coach like this as their mentor, their example of how to deal with something like this.
Imagine carrying the psychic equivalent of a piano strapped to your back for 18 years. Brenda Tracy has carried with her the anger, frustration, and rage from being raped by four men in 1998, two of whom played for Oregon State University’s football team. Compounding the agony and injustice was that the players involved were suspended for all of one game each by then-Coach Mike Riley, who said the players had made “a bad choice.”
If by “bad choice,” you mean “felony sexual assault,” then sure, they made “a bad choice”…and the university excused and enabled their behavior. They were football players, and therefore held to a different- and much lower- standard than non-athletes. Thus were young men taught that “boys will be boys” and that women were objects existing largely for their sexual gratification
Eighteen years later, Riley is now the head football coach at the University of Nebraska, and he brought Tracy to campus to speak to his team as a rape survivor. It’s a sign of the times we live in that young men very often need to be taught that women aren’t objects to be used for sexual gratification and then discarded. As much as I hate the term “rape culture,” it accurately describes what’s happening today on too many college campuses. Athletes sexually assault women…and the victims, who should be treated with care and respect, are treated as if they’re somehow responsible for being raped.
Why were you dressed like that? Why did you go to the party? How much did you have to drink? Why did you accompany the players(s) to a private residence? What did you do that led them to believe they had your consent to have sex with them? When did you say “no?” Why didn’t you say it sooner? And so it goes….
An athlete sexually assaults a woman…and too often the response is to blame the victim and soft-pedal the rapist’s actions as “boys will be boys.”
Tracy said her meeting with Riley’s players was rewarding, with players asking her questions and suggesting ways Nebraska can raise awareness about sexual violence. She also spoke to them about consent and how, unfortunately, many sexual assault victims blame themselves for the violent crimes that happened to them.
When Tracy described her rape, she made sure to be extremely graphic. She said she needs listeners “to be uncomfortable” because if they’re not uncomfortable, things won’t change.
Tracy said she believes every college football team in the country should have a rape survivor come speak to them for that exact reason.
Despite our collective advancement on so many issues, when it comes to sexual assault, the default response is too often to blame the victim. If only she hadn’t dressed that way, had too much to drink, and/or [insert preferred excuse for felony sexual assault here]. If women would just be more careful and responsible, they wouldn’t have to worry about getting raped.
That this presupposes that men aren’t responsible for their behavior with women is uniformly offensive…as in, what part of “rape is wrong” could possibly be difficult to understand?
That talented athletes grow up being treated differently, their talent being used as a reason to hold them to lower standards of conduct, is hardly newsworthy. Athletes have always been allowed to skate through life, often with adults coming up behind them to clean up their messes. That’s no reason for excusing those athletes (or any man) for raping a woman, for taking something that a woman should only give of her own free will. Until we teach men not to rape, there will be more Brock Turners.
Rape is never acceptable. If it takes more rape survivors sharing their experiences with college athletes, then perhaps more young men will come to understand that women deserve to be treated with respect, not as sexual objects. Brenda Tracy is fortunate; she’s been able to find a measure of peace and use her experience to help prevent other women from suffering a similar fate. Perhaps someday, young men will understand that treating a woman with respect isn’t just a nice thing to do; it’s a minimum social expectation. Perhaps they’ll come to understand that rape is serious. Not only is it a felony that will leave them branded as a sex offender, likely for life, but it can also do extensive damage to the victim.
Maybe someday, there will be no more Brock Turners, no more “boys will be boys,” and no need for women like Brenda Tracy to share their experience as rape victims. That should be a basic expectation, but we clearly have a long ways to go.
