feminist yap sessions 004: the diddy verdict
how more than money comes into play
Diddy has been found not guilty on 2 counts of sex trafficking and 1 count of racketeering. He has been found guilty on 2 counts of transportation for prostitution. His charges have a maximum sentence of 10 years each with no minimum. The dream is he will be sentenced to the maximum for each count, which will land him 20 years in prison. The reality? He may walk away with time served.
The knee-jerk reaction to this verdict is to blame his money. Blame the rich and powerful and their fancy team of lawyers. Maybe throw in a conspiracy theory that he has blackmail on half of the country and that’s why he was let off.
Yes this was actually said to me and it has 3 likes:
The proper reaction is understanding that a mixture of shortcomings within our judicial system as well as the societal structures we exist under came into play.
He is rich. He can afford great attorneys and he can afford to pay people off.
He is a man. We have a less than 6% imprisonment rate for rape cases in this country. If you look into how many people are serving sentences for human trafficking per year, the numbers are less than 2,000. The average sentence for human trafficking of children is 169 months.
His victims were women, and the crimes were sexual. Pay attention here, this is in my opinion the most important factor. Men are not punished for sex crimes. Women are viewed as holes to fuck, not human beings. When this is the prevailing view of women within a system, sex crimes against us will not only be minimized they will be justified.
Black women are not protected in this country. Black women are hypersexualized in our society. Misogynoir comes into play.
Do you remember what I said his guilty verdicts were for? Transporting prostitutes. This means that legally his victims have been labeled prostitutes. Not victims, not sex workers, not escorts, prostitutes. Do you think this is a coincidence?
In order for Diddy to have been found guilty of sex trafficking the jury would’ve needed to accept that sex trafficking is not only women being kidnapped and kept in dungeons as media has led us all to believe. The jury would have to accept that sex trafficking can and does happen to women who have a public career, a reputation, and access to things that should keep her safe from abuse. They would’ve needed to accept the ways our patriarchal society has absolutely failed women.
Let’s be clear, these jurors watched hours of these women being forced to have intercourse with other men. They watched Diddy get off on it and they saw video evidence of Cassie being beaten and dragged when she tried to escape. The best they could come up with was: “yeah looks like a prostitute to me.”
A common response to this is something along the lines of “you just don’t understand the legalities and how this works.” I simply say that’s why feminist analysis is so important because who designed this system? Why do we still have a law that is capable of declaring that victims are actually prostitutes? Why has the verbiage of these laws not been updated? Why are we continuing to accept the results of a legal system that was designed for women to lose?
It is much easier to simply call women whores and move on with your day than it is to analyze and confront your ingrained misogyny. It is much easier to tell yourself there are no victims here or that they’re only victims of domestic violence than to accept that you view women as fuck toys. I believe that is a major contributor to what happened here.
I am not saying his money had nothing to do with it. I am not saying his status had nothing to do with it. What I want to get across is that we need to look deeper into this. To say patriarchy, misogyny, and sexism had nothing to do with this is a joke. To say misogynoir more specifically had nothing to do with this is an absolute joke. To even claim the prosecution didn’t make their case after hours of video evidence is a joke.
They made their case. The sex trafficking was evident, but victims were not up to par under patriarchy. The victims were too famous, not beaten enough, too rich, not white enough, and not dead enough for the jury to convict.
