Me, July 24, 2003:
I’d have to admit… Kobe Bryant is in pretty big trouble. When taking into account the woman’s story about the assault, well, it matches her actions afterward very well.
She was only in the room for a couple of minutes. Hotel guests heard the hubbub in the room. She came out crying. She immediately told co-workers what had happened. She went to the police that night with her parents. She had bruises and torn clothing consistent with a sexual assault. Finally, she’s made no effort to come out publicly and make a spectacle of herself.
She’s either telling the truth, or the most cold, calculating liar ever. But that’s not my point.
Tom Leykis, a shock jock often referred to as a misogynist, actually aired the name of the accuser on his nationally syndicated radio show. That’s right folks, her name is out there. Somewhere…
And the activists are not happy about it. You see, activists would love it if a woman could make charges, true or false, in complete anonymity, so as to avoid “being raped again,” a saying often used to describe what happens to women they “come out” and accuse someone.
But while it may be true that a woman who is asked to prove that she was raped may be suffering and might have a legitimate reason to not have her name plastered into the paper, what protection is afforded the man?
What protection, for example, existed to keep Kobe Bryant’s name out of the papers? Off the radio? Off the evening newscasts? Within a day of the charge, we knew the whole story, and the nation became fixated on what Kobe did or didn’t do. He will lose endorsements over this, true or otherwise. He will have this clouding his character for years to come. In fact, whether he’s guilty or not, this case is well on its way to being decided in the court of public opinion.
And we still don’t know anything about the accuser. Her name. Her personality (although we know about the drug overdose, that’s pretty much it). In fact, there are laws in place that keep her name off the wires.
What about Kobe?
Let’s assume for a minute he’s found not guilty. Now what? He has the term rapist applied to him for the rest of his life by organizations like NOW who will claim in perpetuity that Kobe got off because he was a star. Nothing will ever satisfy them with the exception of the wholesale destruction of this man.
What if he’s guilty? Well then, I hope they throw the damned book at him.
The fact is, the law protects the accuser. But the law should protect the accused also. If these accusations are false, the damage done is still irreversible. The stigma of Kobe being a rapist will never go away regardless of any decision any court in Eagle County makes. And while Kobe’s character is being dragged through the mud, we don’t even know who his accuser is, or anything about her. It’s completely unfair.
And with all due respect, if you don’t think a PR advantage that huge in the so-called court of public opinion is unfair, then you’re probably one of the people who’ve already made up your mind that Kobe is guilty anyway.
You know you wrote something good when it remains as true a year later as it was when you wrote it.