Before the ink dried on the lawsuit, which singer Cassandra Ventura, better known as “Cassie,” filed against her former employer and the person with whom she was involved in an involuntary romantic relationship, Sean Combs, he settled a day later.
There are currently no transcripts detailing the arbitration, but its swiftness led to many people understandably speculating that Combs, aka P. Diddy, had many dark secrets he did not want to come to light. Others, who may just suffer from excessive guilt under their fingernails, were quick to judge Cassie for settling for monetary damages in a civil case, saying that she was only in it for the money. I imagine that P. Diddy, a man who is notorious for stealing from his artists, never has money as a motivation, and is somehow the victim here. Because civil suits are not punishable by jail time, people assumed, out of the thinnest of air, that she was not interested in pressing criminal charges (*cough cough* Jason “chasin a story,” Lee) or that both were not possible.
The state and the federal governments are who decide to file criminal charges based on evidence; rape is a crime whose evidence can easily disappear in the shower, a shower that many rape victims instinctively run to, hoping that it will wash away the emotional trauma first.
Cassie claimed rape yesterday. Settled and thanked her fans and attorneys for their support. WTF. She’s going to get dragged for filth.
— Jason Lee (@theonlyjasonlee) November 18, 2023
The framework of how society views sexual assault is most definitely skewed. According to the Department of Justice, 90% of sexual assault victims are female, which is probably why so many victims are not believed or taken seriously. About 1 in 4 women will have experienced a completed or attempted rape in their lifetime. Violence against women is so common, some would almost think it is supposed to belong. According to the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, rape costs a victim on average $122,461 but it is completely free for the rapist and usually scot-free, in fact. The costs associated include but are not limited to loss of productivity, medical treatment (including hospitalization), unwanted pregnancy, therapy, property damage and long and short-term health conditions, but as long as the victim is incurring the damages, it’s fine.
Many people view rape from the purview of the rapists, and as a survivor, I can attest that survivors do too, which probably contributes to why so many rapes go unreported. Physical trauma is tangible. It leaves a mark, or bruise, or a body. Emotional trauma is much more enigmatic: it is loud and it is quiet. It is weeping and it is stoicism. It is a mind defending itself from attacks from its own memories. Most victims of rape know their attacker; sometimes they are our friends, sometimes we live with them and even love them, but no victim of rape wants to be a victim. So, you tell yourself it didn’t happen; you rock yourself to sleep with a hushing lie; you comfort yourself with denial; you dry your tears with your own perjury. You make attempts at your normal routine, save whatever vulnerability that your rapist saw. For me, it took me almost exactly two years to realize why I had stopped drinking. The rape occurred days before my 28th birthday; I did not drink again until my 30th. It wasn’t a conscious decision. My brain just sort of shut off the idea of drinking, as if I had never drank before, as if to erase all bad things associated with drinking, including being raped. To this day, I still don’t drink much. The rapist grew up with the father of my best friend’s children, making the situation that much more complicated. I rationalized it as simply a misunderstanding amongst friends, as if ‘no’ has multiple meanings. I felt it was my responsibility to mitigate the fallout. It’s funny how you can rationalize not wanting to ruin the life of someone who had no regard for yours, especially if you know them. I guess I should’ve run to the police to report the longest two minutes of my life, but I found little comfort in the idea of having to explain why I left in a vulnerable state with someone I trusted, or rape kits, or not being believed by authorities but especially by people I cared about. You don’t open floodgates that will drown you too. If I could get financial compensation for it, I surely would, but I know that the world thinks that taking money because you were raped is much more of a violation than the attack itself.
Absolutely. Whatever Cassie settled for pales in comparison to the satisfaction she has in knowing she was finally able to tell her story. Even if for only one day. Diddy is ruined forever. No amount of fame or money can get his name back, not even a new name change. https://t.co/5WGoYfVeod
— Sandro Pay Travel Concierge (@hartofamerica76) November 18, 2023
Sexual violation is the only type of violation in which there is such a large dissent about whether the victim should receive financial compensation. Malpractice, police brutality, negligence, car accidents, carcinogenic products and dumping, defamation and discrimination are just some of the things that people have successfully sued over, and there has never been a public outcry that those victims are just in it for the money.
Hell, some of those examples don’t even involve acts of violence or deliberateness, and still there is no uproar about compensatory damages.
Maybe because none of those things are far more likely to happen to women than men, and because violence against women is so pervasive, there are probably a lot of men who are concerned that they, too, can be sued. I guess you would also have to believe rape victims are truly harmed for you to feel that they should be compensated. Some men view rape as a casual act with no causalities, but that feeling of dying on the inside is far too common. Rape victims report higher levels of PTSD and suicidal ideation. Almost every woman knows someone, not even including herself, who has been sexually assaulted, and yet men seem to know no one or very few men who have.
If Cassie pursued criminal charges they’d be criticizing her for trying to throw a Black man in jail. She sues civilly then they say she only wants money. If she tells us now they say why wait so long. If she told us then they’d say she was using his name for a come up. pic.twitter.com/3VTNmzXJG1
— Olayemi Olurin (@msolurin) November 19, 2023
God forbid you have been sexually assaulted more than once. You are only allowed to speak up about one rape that they still won’t believe even occurred. No one asks about the responsibility of victims of other crimes; no one asks what a murder victim was wearing, or why a robbery victim was walking alone at night, or why the victim of a break-in had such a nice house or car. In fact, many car owners who park their cars in high crime areas leave their cars unlocked for someone to break in without breaking the glass. After already being violated, the world feels like rape victims owe them something. Rape victims don’t owe anyone a detailed recounting of their trauma, don’t owe them their silence and don’t owe them their healing in a carefully constructed timeline and pathway.
If the average rape costs a victim $122,461, then rape victims definitely do not owe their rapists the dignity of not being sued.
