You know, I meant to blog this way back when, but was just too upset at the time. Seriously. So upset I was shaking. No joke.

So I took a few screenshots of NBC’s SVU episode summary page to augment the planned post, uploaded ‘em to Flickr, and…nothing. Never came back to it. That is, until a fellow Flickrite (and feminist, from the sound of it), asked for an explanation. Knowing full well Flickr/Yahoo’s propensity for randomly deleting photos (and the pic’s comment threads, along with ‘em), I thought I’d copy the exchange here.

That, and I’m short on original material. What can I say, closing is less than two weeks away!

According to NBC, this is the face of a woman who was "asking for it."

Esabeau says:

I’m not sure if I get what you’re saying… “according to NBC?” While there are characters on the show (the abusers or criminals, usually) who might say that a woman is “asking for” this type of thing, every episode of this show I’ve ever seen has a very strong “the victim never deserves this sort of treatment, no matter what” message. This is often expressly stated by the detectives or other characters on the show. I haven’t seen this particular episode, but I’d be very surprised if it deviated from this general message– nothing in the other two screenshots indicates otherwise. Misogyny from characters within the show, yes, but hardly from the creators of the show or NBC.

smiteme says:

Esabeau – Actually, I’ve always been a huge fan of Law & Order: SVU, for the reasons you’ve stated. However, this particular ep. involved a woman who made a false accusation of rape against her husband in order to gain the upper hand in their divorce (and the ensuing custody dispute over their daughter). The detectives (and the audience) believed the woman – the "so-called victim" – throughout most of the hour. However, in the last ten minutes or so of the program, the husband made bail on the rape charge, confronted the wife in the street outside court, doused her in gasoline, and set her on fire. She subsequently admitted to the detectives in the ER that she made the whole thing up. Right before dying.

The implication – both implicit and actually stated (though not in so many words) – was that the lying slut pushed an otherwise nonviolent and decent man too far – she was "asking for it". A false rape charge apparently justifies murder. And a grisly one at that.

I was especially offended that the victim-blaming took place in the context of a "ripped from the headlines" show – remember the case of Yvette Cade, whose estranged husband burst into her workplace, threw a 7UP can full of gas on her, and topped it off with a lit match? AFTER Douchebag District Judge Richard A. Palumbo refused to extend the restraining order she had against him? AND made belittling remarks to her? I usually enjoy the "ripped from the headline" shows, but this was beyond tasteless. A woman who was abused by the court system, set on fire by her batterer, and is now disfigured for life….fodder for NBC’s shitty misogynistic fairytales? Talk about adding insult to injury.

And this seems to be the general direction in which the Law & Order franchise is headed. A few weeks ago, they aired a show based on the Shawn Hornbeck case…only this time, Ben Ownby wound up dead, and ("so-called") victim Shawn was later discovered to be his killer. Because Ben was competition for pedophile/kidnapper Michael Devlin’s attentions (!). Talk about blaming the victim. Bill O’Reilly ain’t got nothing on Law & Order!

Sorry, I meant to write a blog post about this when it happened (hence the screenshots), but I was just too upset. Worst. Episode. Ever.

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By the by, NBC invites viewers to leave their feedback here. Not that they give a shit what we wimmins think, being the misogynistic pricks that they are, but still. Blaming the patriarchy is fun!

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Tagged: feminism feminist law & order law and order law & order svu law and order svu special victims unit nbc misogyny blaming the victim rape murder pop culture shawn hornbeck ben ownby bill o’reilly the o’reilly factor flickr

Originally posted @ www.kellygarbato.com/blog/2007-05-20/
Filed under: Feminism, Entertainment — Kelly @ May 20, 2007 10:31 pm

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 20th, 2007 at 10:31 pm and is filed under a-pop-calypse now, bitches is crazy, vintage. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.