Let’s Not Make a Spectacle of Rape Victims’ Recovery Time

Last time I wrote about the two Antelope Valley girls who were abducted and later freed when their captor was shot dead in their midst, I noted that one of them appeared on TV the next day and spoke with “an eerie detachment.”

That demeanor, or flat affect, is common among rape victims, says Gail Abarbanel, director of the Santa Monica Rape Treatment Center. She refused to speak specifically about this case, but responded generally.

“In the immediate aftermath, victims are often in a state of shock,” she said. “You’re numb, and it’s very hard to foresee all the implications of having been raped.”

That is precisely why neither girl should have been on television, striking out on what has become a national publicity tour, regardless of whether they specifically discuss the rape. This week, they’re on the cover of People, and many of my colleagues in this business are congratulating them for coming forward, as well as suggesting the media should stop withholding the names of rape victims.

I think the wheels have finally come off the wagon.

“The decision ... to appear on national television last week to discuss their abduction by a sexual predator who raped them deserves applause,” the New York Times wrote in a daft editorial that never mentioned the girls are minors.

I wonder, first of all, how many parents on the New York Times editorial staff would push their children in front of a camera a day or two after they’d been kidnapped and raped. And did anyone in that august crew suggest the possibility that becoming a teen celebrity 10 minutes after a kidnap-rape might actually complicate recovery over the long haul?

If we’re changing the rules about protecting minors, where do we draw the line? Should 8-and 10-year-old rape victims hit the talk show circuit?

The same editorial noted the “spectacle” of the network battle to rush the girls onto the air.

Of course there was a spectacle. That’s one of the very reasons to protect minors from the glare. Television doesn’t illuminate or console; it numbs and alienates. It works on society like an undertow, dragging us, and our standards, down with it.

Among readers who roasted me for my earlier column, there was a familiar refrain. The girls shouldn’t have to feel ashamed about what happened to them, I was scolded. More power to them for speaking out. And I should stop blaming the victims, or else rape victims are always going to cower in the shadows.

Of course they shouldn’t be ashamed, and no one but an idiot would blame the girls for what happened.

But there are two issues here.

First, at 16 and 17, the girls are technically minors. Whether they want to go public or not, society and the media have an obligation to err on the side of privacy and protection.

Second, the crime was too fresh. The victims could not possibly have begun to come to terms with their brutal assault, and national television is not exactly the ideal place to have your first therapy session.

The fact that they didn’t discuss the rape is irrelevant. The self-promoting Kern County sheriff already blabbed it to Larry King, and before further exposing the girls, the media should have stepped back until we were certain they were in a reasonably healthy state.

Rape is a violent, controlling and brutal crime. The damage is deep and layered, and it spreads far beyond the physical and into the emotional and psychological.

“Victims often say a rapist killed a part of them, or I have a broken soul, or it was like torture,” says Abarbanel, who sees 100 new rape victims a month at her agency.

It is such a complete violation, victims often remain silent, failing to tell loved ones or even report the crime to police. That is in part because of the stigma associated with rape, and society has a long way to go in that regard.

But before we start publishing the names of rape victims and shuttling them between Oprah and Geraldo, we ought to keep a few things in mind.

“Talking helps, but that means talking to someone in a professional position, or someone you know and trust, so you get some relief,” says Abarbanel. “Talking to a therapist is different from talking to a reporter on national television.”

Abarbanel said there have been cases where a victim went public and not only helped herself, but also helped educate the public on the trauma of rape. But those victims were adults, first of all, and they didn’t speak out until months, or in some cases, years, after the assault.

“All the literature on trauma victims, including rape victims, indicates it’s critical in the immediate aftermath to provide privacy and safety, and to help the victims regain some sense of control. It’s so illogical to think that compelling victims to be publicly identified in the press is going to erase the shame and stigma, or comfort victims.”

Instead, it could render more victims silent.

Eighty percent of all rapes, by the way, are acquaintance rapes, not the sensational kinds of crimes the media get worked up about. I asked Abarbanel to again describe the demeanor of victims when they first walk in the door at her clinic.

“Technically, what we see is something called psychic numbing. They look stunned, dazed, numb, and they can sound almost as if they’re speaking about the crime as if it happened to someone else.”

That’s the teen I saw on TV, a day after she was raped.

My heart goes out to her.

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Steve Lopez writes Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at steve.lopez@latimes.com