When I was in high school, the state I lived in legally allowed you to drink at the age of 18. Even though I was several years younger than my peers, I attended parties in their homes. Sometimes the parents were there, sometimes they weren't. Sometimes the parents even bought the keg. I am certain I was not the only illegal drinker. There were other things going on in back rooms or outside. I naively stayed near the largest group of people inside. I had read novels, so I could guess what was being smoked or otherwise inbibed.
I didn't go to that many parties, but one surely stands out in my memory. Two boys from one of my classes were really, really out of it. One of them I suspected accurately as having taken some illegal substances combined with booze and was really whacked. Slurring and stumbling, he decided that he just wanted to lay down and sleep. Alarmed, I forced him to go outside and walked him around the large yard. He was hard to hold up and was furiously insisting he just needed to sleep. I figured if he passed out he'd never wake up. So we kept limping around the yard til the other buddy relieved me and at my insistence, kept walking him around. At school on Monday, the first guy somberly thanked me for saving his life. I do not recall any adults noticing any of this.
My parents never knew about this incident, and had not prepared me for what to do. Even though I didn't know God at the time, he knew me and was acting in my life. And I just remembered there were times when people should not go to sleep.
The other day I heard that the three boys who raped an unconscious 15-year-old girl last fall at a party were finally arrested. It seems that there was a co-ed slumber party and sweet Audrie drank until she passed out. Then three different boys each took a turn with her while other classmates looked on and took pictures. Audrie did not know what had happened until she saw the pictures online a few days later. Her friends had turned against her and she believed her life was ruined. Within the week she had hanged herself. Ever since then, her parents have been putting the pieces together trying to learn why their bright, beautiful, loving girl with her whole life ahead of her would suddenly take her life. The arrests are a huge step in some form of justice. Her parents want her name and picture public so that others can see and learn and stop another such horror.
I cannot fathom the behavior in that room - from the boys commiting such acts with no conscience - to the audience so intrigued they felt justified to capture this depravity for more to see. If these acts would have had an odor, it would have been so dank and insidious the entire street would have needed to be evacuated. In my mind they all go to jail. The onlookers might not have touched Audrie, but to watch and do nothing is criminal. They could have stopped what the boys were doing! But no, being part of a crowd watching and enjoying the torture of another human being was more important at the time.
And... What parent hosts a slumber party for both sexes? What parent lets their child attend such a party? We don't know what Audrie's parents knew. But you have to think at the very least the host home knew a number of people were there. The media will probably never fill us in on this part of the story because the rest of the story is so sensational.
Forgetting the parents for a minute, what has become of people who will watch a horror, treating another human as a disposable commodity of no value? People who will keep their mouths shut out of self preservation?
One of the hallmarks of maturity is the ability to move from concrete to abstract thinking. By the time our teens hit the age of 18, we hope they can navigate life in a balanced manner. Part of getting them there is to teach them to think ahead about what they might do in unexpected circumstances.
My parents did not prepare me ahead of time for the situations that required more wisdom than I possessed. It would have helped even more. I began to prepare my kids once they were about 4 to be stranger-wary. We even practiced what to say if someone said they had a puppy in the car or they had a little child their age. Next came what to do if they were at a friend's house and the dad's gun was brought out or an unacceptable video game or video was shown. By 13, we added details about alchohol, prescription drugs and sexual actions. In addition, we hit the whole "crowd mentality" thing pretty hard. We wanted our kids to think ahead and devise a plan so that if the unforeseen happened, they had an idea of what they would do. Rather than have them overcome with bewilderment or fear, we wanted them to have some sort of predetermined opinion along with an escape plan.
Both of our kids were very uncomfortable with these later discussions and I can be very graphic. I wanted them alive and safe more than anything and I think some of the imagery helped warn them. They knew they could make us the "baddest guys" ever in order to get out of any situation. We always told them they could call at any time, and we would come and get them no questions asked til morning.
I have never come even close to what Audrie's parents have experienced, although in my years of coaching parents have heard some scary stories - but the kids lived. My heart breaks for any parent who walks through such horrors on any level because if the child lives, a part of them has died. And if they die, a part of the parents dies with them.
This is a wake up cry to teach the next generation what it means to have a moral compass and what that looks like in every situation. We can't pick and choose as if life is some de-personalized video game or we will stand for nothing. And then we'll be just like those empty teens in the room that horrible night. Doing nothing.
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