Saturday, September 11, 2010

The Ultimate Immorality And Intense Hurt Of Blaming A Victim

Posted by Emma


Recent comments on boards frequented by supporters of Amanda Knox have taken an ugly turn. In desperation some have started playing the lowest game of all - the “˜Blame the Victim’ game. Not content with championing the murderers of Meredith Kercher, they now seek to denigrate the real victim of this crime after her death. Comments made about how she “˜messed up’, about how she must have let Rudy in to the house and, unbelievably, even about her family’s accent, have shown the real class of the Friends of Amanda, clearly frustrated at the recent publication of the damning Massei report. It cannot be emphasised enough what a powerful impact the Massei Report has had on public opinion. Meticulously translated over many weeks by a group of professionals at the Perugia Murder File, the Report has shown up the lies being propagated by Amanda’s out of control supporters. A number of previous innocenti journalists have privately admitted to now believing in the guilt of Amanda and Raffaele having read the report, distribution of which via all channels is more than 7,000 and continuing. The word is spreading; the evidence is overwhelming. All that is left now for the FOA is the empty rhetoric and tired arguments which have been repeated over and over. The desperation is showing in the latest outing of the hopelessly ill-informed ex-FBI “˜expert’, Steve Moore, who seems to be following a different case altogether. In his recent ABC interview he was not even able to name the victim, preferring instead to call her “˜the girl’.

But let’s consider the morality of those who post against Meredith in support of Amanda Knox. These are people who are not beneath smearing the memory and good name of a young girl who was brutally murdered. How did Meredith “˜mess up’? How is it that she, or any victim, can be said to be “˜responsible’ for what happened to them? All the evidence suggests that Meredith merely wanted to return home for study that night, prior to her lecture the following morning. She borrowed a book that she promised to return to her friend the next day. She was tired, having been up into the small hours having fun at a Halloween Party. She wanted a quiet night in. But if she had let Rudy into the house, invited him in, shared a drink with him? How does this show her having “˜messed up’? How would she be to blame in any way for what happened to her? The answer, as any card-carrying member of the human race will testify, is that she would not.

Victims are a favourite target for some. They “˜must have’ invited the attention”¦if they hadn’t been walking home in the dark alone”¦on and on. The fact is that Meredith was wholly innocent. She made no mistakes, she lived a good life. She was kind, warm, funny, studious, with a firm sense of her own moral boundaries and many good friends who were left devastated by her death. Recent comments about how she couldn’t have screamed, and she didn’t fight are deeply offensive. During a violent assault it is common for victims to freeze entirely. Perhaps it is a biological protective mechanism, as often seen in animals who sense overwhelming danger. Maybe it is simply the logical response to a situation where one is simply unable to fight back. Being physically restrained by another human being, and realising there is absolutely nothing you can do is an emotionally overwhelming experience. The brain is “˜flooded’ with sensations of terror and horror, which it is impossible to process at speed. Victims speak of an almost near death sensation, of “˜leaving their bodies’ and escaping into their mind during an attack. The instinct for many is to submit, in the hope that the pain will be over soon, that it is their best chance of survival. Often this leads to feelings of deep shame and guilt if the victim survives the assault. Blaming themselves for their “˜weakness’ in not fighting back deepens already severe mental scars. Perpetrators also use the victim’s inability to fight back as a form of defence “˜I had no idea!’ etc. This is why the victim blame game is so harmful. In order for justice to be done, and civilised society maintained, there must be a supportive climate for victims. Otherwise crime will not be reported and violent criminals will walk free, endangering everyone.

For a man to subject a woman to a violent assault is the most cowardly of acts, as the woman has no ability to fight back. For three individuals to attack a woman is utterly repugnant, particularly when one is a woman herself. The evidence is that Meredith screamed. The evidence is that she was unable to fight because she had her arms held behind her back while she was beaten and stabbed, for the amusement of others. Terrified and confused she must have felt a deep sense of betrayal and incomprehension as this attack escalated. Make no mistake, Meredith suffered in a way that is almost too distressing to contemplate. But to truly put ourselves in the position of the victim - the real victim - then we should perhaps, in a strong moment, make ourselves go there. It is only then that we can truly accept the full horror of this crime, and that the sentence handed down to the three convicted murderers is the only correct response of a moral society.

After the reporting of a crime it is essential that no blame be apportioned to victims, already struggling to recover from the trauma of assault. Suggesting that victims of violent crime are “˜to blame’, that they “˜messed up’, can only deepen the mental anguish they are feeling. In the case of a murder victim such comments cause untold distress to their shattered relatives. It is a cruelty of the highest order. A second assault.

What sort of person would blame Meredith for what happened to her? You be the judge.

Posted by Emma on 09/11/10 at 03:05 PM in Knox-Marriott PRMore hoaxers

Comments

By Storm Roberts (Innai)

No-one “deserves” to die at the hands of another, no-one “deserves” to be subjected to an assault - for any reason.  I wasn’t aware of this disturbing trend towards blaming Meredith - it makes me seethe, it is probably the most despicable thing I have heard in my life.

I have tears in my eyes at the mere thought of what Meredith suffered, she was innocent, not just blameless, but innocent.  These terrible suggestions can not hurt her, I must simply hope to the gods they don’t hurt her family - they have suffered untold torment already.

Posted by Nolongeramember on 09/11/10 at 04:43 PM | #

Innai, I could not agree with you more. I too sometimes fill up with tears when I read these comments. Many are not aware of them and the damage they cause to anyone reading who has suffered a violent attack themselves. They are an insult to ALL victims of violent crime, not just Meredith.

Posted by Emma on 09/11/10 at 11:33 PM | #

If you read the comments on the latest from Steve “Never Knowingly Impartial” Shay and his interview with Steve Moore, the comments section indicates Knox Groupies are very, very worried. Some of the stuff they come out with is…ludicrous.

Luckily, most of the abuse is directed at posters like Harry Rag, who I am sure can take it, Peter, who I KNOW can take it, and Peggy Ganong, who seems to me, from what I know of her, to be one of THE calmest, most measured people in the universe.

It is very clear that these Knox groupies are utterly desperate and I strongly suspect they will indeed turn on Meredith and her dignified, loving family, very soon. Let’s keep posting, keep getting up the Knox groupie noses, keep spreading the truth, and hope like hell that they manage to keep their bile focused on us, rather than that innocent and decent and blameless family.

Posted by Janus on 09/12/10 at 12:16 AM | #

No one can possibly imagine how horrible it is to have your throat cut open with a knife and watch as your life blood is spilling out. The horrific pain must be incredible . It would be a lie to say or even to hope that Meredith didn´t suffer, her final minutes must have been gruesome ,to say the very least.

It´s good to see that the Massei report is finally spreading the truth and that the world is no longer being fooled by FOA or the Knox/Mellas family. But I think that by now FOA has become a crumbling cardhouse anyway.

Injustice in Preugia, the pro-Amanda web page, appears to have no recent posts, no information on Amanda`s upcoming appeal, it seems to have stagnated in short. It cannot possibly be compared to TJMK or PMF , web sites that fortunately are more alive than ever as the world is finally heeding the truth and no longer blind to the depraved cruelty that was inflicted on Meredith.

Posted by aethelred23 on 09/12/10 at 04:07 AM | #

In all our many posts on Meredith’s final few minutes at the knifepoints of Amanda Knox and her cowardly sex-crime and murder accomplices, nobody has come closer than our new poster Emma here to explaining what would have been Meredith’s catatonic state of mind at the time.

One can imagine Knox in her drug-addled jealousy braying angry taunts to which Meredith would have been unable to reply which would have made Knox shout even louder. An escalation of rage and depravity.

Miss Represented told me a long time ago that Knox and Sollecito almost certainly took actual joy in killing Meredith and appeared pretty pleased with themselves for several days. Whether Amanda Knox can be cured or brought full circle to normality over a number of years remains an open question, but most of the time I doubt it. She was either born that way or made that way early-on, and nobody ever stepped in to give her the right help at the time.

As remarked by others above, the conspiracy theorists are clearly finally out of steam in light of Massei. They dont have even one heavy hitter or smart thinker to provide any leadership. Anne Bremner’s attempt to hijack the parade became a fiasco. So did Bruce Fisher’s attempt, and so now too is Steve Moore’s attempt.

If you want to know why the dwindling few FOA make the mistake of being increasingly nasty, it is in part because we have made them that way. Repeated experience of large change movements is that 95% of any population will move to the sensible middle when the facts are all out and clear, while the other 5% will rage on and cannot be bought or reasoned with. They can only be isolated by way of a consistently hard line against their false truths. Then as Stilicho just showed in his great conspiracy theorists post, their toxic unattractiveness causes everyone else to move on.

Meredith’s death was a terrible loss, but also, she continues to make the world a better place. Perugia has a good mayor as a result of her death and is becoming even more an enviable city now. Italian justice is more widely respected outside Italy and learned-from now. American parents and universities are insisting on more structure in study-abroad for their kids now.

And in this post Emma spreads the word about the true horror of women as victims, using Meredith’s example. The mental state of women under attack often renders them quite incapable of fighting back. And there are callous contemptible sleazoids out there who will jeer them for that.  As the world gets a better fix on these two mindsets, it becomes somewhat more attuned to making a stand against more violence.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 09/12/10 at 05:26 AM | #

Bit hard to fight back when you’re being viciously attacked by three people off their heads on drugs with knives, who are trying to rape you.

Let’s call it what it was here: a violent sex attack.

The horrific amount of injuries on Meredith’s body - a healthy, fit young woman who knew a martial art - show exactly what hell she had to endure, and show that one person could not have inflicted all these wounds.

Once people stoop to blaming the victim, it’s a sure thing that (a) they have run out of steam and (b) they are showing their true colours. A disgrace.

Posted by lilly on 09/12/10 at 02:06 PM | #

As I’ve said before, I pray daily that one of them - AK/RS/RG - finally breaks ranks and tells the truth, if only in an attempt to salvage their own soul.  The truth would silence the FOA camp once and for all, and show the Knox groupies up for the misled and misinformed fools that we know them to be. 

Even if none of them confesses, it will not be much longer til the appeals, and hopefully the appeals will confirm, and possibly extend, the original sentences.

Though none of the three can ever give back what they have taken, I have faith that karma will prevail and that the three will know nothing but misery until they do finally tell the truth.  Just being who they are, knowing that most of the world despises them for what they did to Meredith, and how many other lives they have damaged in the wake of their deeds and lies has got to be taking a toll on them, even if they appear to be unmoved. 

It is also only a matter of time before Curt Knox and Chris and Edda Mellas finally admit to themselves what a lousy job they did as parents, and no matter what lengths they go to now to try to defend their daughter, they cannot make up for the lack of discipline they provided her, and the lack of principles, scruples, and morals. The proof is in the pudding, and for the whole world to see.  Shame on them, a thousand times over.

Posted by Mo-in-Mass.,USA on 09/12/10 at 04:18 PM | #

One thing is absolutely certain: Curt Knox and Edda Mellas have behaved in a manner that is absolutely unprecedented for the family of a convicted murderer. When contrasted with the quiet dignity of the Kercher family, Knox and Mellas simply look like disgusting human beings. This is one reason I cannot help feeling a tinge of sympathy for Amanda Knox - I’m not sure she ever had a chance.

Posted by Janus on 09/12/10 at 05:37 PM | #

The contrast between the two families has been much commented upon. The failure of the Knox family to swiftly offer their condolences to Meredith’s family, and comments made about Meredith by Edda in one famous interview, was particularly saddening, and set the bar low for Amanda’s supporters. But rather than dwell on this aspect of the case I prefer to think about what good can come of this horrible crime. If it causes people to have deeper understanding of victims of violent crime and their families then I think Meredith would have been very glad about that. Mindfulness about the hurt caused by simple words written from behind the safety of a computer screen would do a lot towards achieving that goal.

Posted by Emma on 09/12/10 at 06:25 PM | #

By Storm Roberts (Innai)

“It has already been pointed out that it does not seem likely that Meredith would have opened the door to Rudy Guede; for that matter, if it had been Meredith who opened the door of the apartment, there would be no explanation - as has already been observed - for the staging carried out in Romanelli’s room.”

- The Massei Report - Translation v1.0 (08/08/2010) Pg 360

I was just reading the courts conclusions and noticed this paragraph - it is clear Meredith did not allow Rudy Guede into her flat - yet another talking point from the FOA disproved by the very thorough Massei Report.

Emma’s point about the impact of a crime going beyond the victim is very important; the impact on the family and friends of the victim, and even on society as a whole, is incalculable.  Society should be more willing to acknowledge this impact and should provide better support for those affected.

Posted by Nolongeramember on 09/12/10 at 08:11 PM | #

9/12/10

Peter Quennell,
Thank you again for the great work you do that provides us with this not-for-profit website. It is a valuable documentation of 3 years of history. Thank you for a labor of love.

I scrolled back through the site with awe and gratitude today. You have given us so much information with photos, videos, easy links.

It seems like only yesterday we saw pictures of blue-beret police officers escorting a blank but grinning Knox into her first court appearances. We were newly introduced to Carlo dalla Vedova, Ghirga, Maresca.

Giulia Bongiorno got sick during the trial. Mignini held on valiantly. The “Marie Claire” magazine featured Edda in red sleeveless low-cut dress in an article bemoaning Amanda’s woes as simply a product of her “having gone off script” in her libertine lifestyle.

All the irrelevancies were swept away by swift analysis. So much information was made prominent to balance the biased voices of the defendants’ families and friends who had not walked through the cottage like the jury did.

The Jury saw up close the views from the cottage, the layout of the bedrooms, upstairs downstairs, the front door, the sense of nearness to the street. Could a scream have carried the distance? They got the feeling inside the very house of murder, and could evaluate the size of the rooms, the distance to the ground below from Philomena’s room, the narrow confines of Meredith’s bedroom and the split wood of her doorframe.

Like an oasis you interspersed scenes of gorgeous Italy.

In the courtroom we see Raffaele’s short haircut after months of his long hair, Amanda’s different Beatles sweatshirts and tee-shirt, the changes in their faces. Crowds arriving along with media, the robed judges, it became very real to those of us across the ocean.

Body language of family members in court reveals more in a quiet look back than on first viewing.

Micheli, quiet and confident, the Knox/Mellas family first becoming used to the courtroom and seeming to mistake it for their living room, pass the popcorn; the plastic encased knife in cardboard holder, the $3,000 suit (?) on Dr. Sollecito, his short-haired daughter, Vanessa, having lost her police job trying to pull strings for Raffaele through unfair means, and finally the surviving Kercher family all 5 arriving from Britain for final verdict, somber in dark clothes, stressed but accepting as they heard the verdict of GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY on all counts.

In honor of Meredith’s memory, I believe this website evokes more than all the books printed on the case.

It has been a roller coaster.

And it’s not over.

Thank you Mr. Quennell for opening this website for free speech and truth from the beginning, and consistent as clockwork. Here readers can see facts clearly posted in a decent and orderly fashion free of profanity. Here are facts that support the courts of Perugia. This site is a service to people who support the police and the law, and resist criminal enablers.

No system is perfect, but the powers that are duly elected and hold office by decree of honest elections in any country have the right to decide matters, not hysterical mobs.

Thanks too for Kristian Leiontiou’s music video of Meredith coming down the stairs as he sings, “Some Say” (which went gold, Top Ten, 150,000 sales) a song which showed Meredith with snow falling on her hair and a faraway, inscrutable look in her eyes, the song ending, “But can you feel the love that I feel?” Meredith always connects us with music and love.

Posted by Hopeful on 09/12/10 at 11:17 PM | #

x Innai

This point, “... that it does not seem likely that Meredith would have opened the door to Rudy Guede ...” will be a point of AK appeal; in fact, Luciano Ghirga and Carlo Dalla Vedova write in their “act of “ appeal at page 88:

“ … Secondo i Giudici, anzitutto, Meredith Kercher non avrebbe mai aperto la porta a Rudi Guede.

L’argomento non è convincente solo se si consideri che Amanda e Meredith avevano lo stesso grado di conoscenza di Rudy.

Entrambe lo avevano incontrato solo in paio di occasioni. Le testimonianze sul punto sono assolutamente concordi.

A ciò si aggiunga il rilievo evidenziato dalla Corte che Amanda e Raffaele volevano stare in intimità.

Non si comprende il motivo per cui abbiano invitato Rudy nell’abitazione di Via della Pergola.

La prospettazione si rivela nuovamente solo una congettura disancorata da qualsiasi logica o verosimiglianza. … “

Luca Maori and Giulia Bongiorno write, in a different manner, for RS, page 234:

“ … 4 – e comunque, una simulazione operata da Rudy sarebbe verosimile solo laddove si ammettesse che lo stesso “sia entrato nella casa di via della Pergola 7 o insieme a Meredith o perchè Meredith gli aprì la porta” (p. 44 sentenza). Tale evenienza, sempre secondo la Corte, sarebbe difficilmente ipotizzabile in quanto la ragazza era sola in casa, in orario notturno e con Rudy aveva avuto solo saltuari incontri. ...”

page 235:

“ ...Infine, gli esiti della violenza sessuale sul corpo di Meredith, indipendentemente dalla presenza o meno di effrazioni che dimostrassero un ingresso furtivo, avrebbero certamente di per se stessi allontanato da Amanda Knox (donna e in quanto tale poco verosimilmente autrice di una violenza sessuale, ancorché di gruppo) qualsiasi sospetto senza necessità di altro. Da tutto quanto detto, quindi, può desumersi che non trovi alcun riscontro probatorio, né alcuna logica, la conclusione della sentenza che ha ravvisato in Amanda e Raffaele “i simulatori”. ...”

Posted by ncountryside on 09/12/10 at 11:23 PM | #

Hi ncountryside. Your long quote on this hypothetical point ignores the other 100 or more pieces of evidence that show that Guede was not alone in attacking Meredith on the night. Ghirga and Della Vedova are doing what they can with very little, but it still remains just that - really very little.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 09/13/10 at 01:17 AM | #

Peter Quennell. Sure, Ghirga, Dalla Vedova, Maori, Bongiorno and Rocchi are doing what they can; you know, i morti non si possono piu’ difendere.

Posted by ncountryside on 09/13/10 at 01:58 AM | #

In her post, Emma has concisely captured the depravity of those that continue to support the innocence of convicted murder Amanda Knox.

If anything could be added to Emma’s post, I’d like to include these words that appeared in the comments section of the September 10, 2010, West Seattle Herald.

Apparently it seems these comments were submitted by a friend of Meredith Kercher.

***********

But, once again, no…...it seems Amanda has to be THE VICTIM, the one who suffered the most in this tragedy. Amanda evidently was able to suppress those tears down at the Perugia Questura, where she was giggling and making out with Raffaele while on his lap. But, oh, that’s because she was….devastated?

That’s NOT what Amanda said about her behavior. How can you not know that?

Amanda said she “really wanted to get on with her life” after Meredith’s murder. And she admitted that she didn’t have much feeling for Meredith because, after all, she had “only known her for two months”.

So why all the tears? That’s very obvious. As she wrote in a letter to her friend Madison, Amanda realized how badly she had “F```ed up” and she was crying for the terrible mess she had gotten herself in.

Amanda has never, ever reached out to the Kerchers, the family of her “good friend”. Not in any way whatsoever.

She never found it in her heart to help comfort Meredith’s friends. Her choice words to Meredith’s REAL FRIENDS: “she f````ing bled to death”.

Yet, Amanda continues to claim to she was a good friend of Meredith’s.

But it is a lie, a cruel lie in the name and memory of Meredith Kercher.

And it is especially hurtful to all of Meredith’s REAL FRIENDS.

***********

Posted by True North on 09/13/10 at 03:09 AM | #

Hi Hopeful. Interesting framing of our past and future. Skeptical Bystander and Michael and Kermit and others had been in the fight for Meredith for more than half a year before I happened upon their moving and often brilliant forum, now PMF.  A month later I was in Perugia and returned with shots of Perugia needing an online niche for a home. The Machine arrived here about the same time, and Tara and Skep and Nicki did the first tone-setting posts. 

It was a very bad time then, in late 2008, with ALL the media claiming that Amanda Knox was innocent and that the Italians had seriously messed up. Meredith was almost invisible. Her family at the Guede trial in October were showing a haunted strain in their faces. The attitudinally ugly and dishonest Candace Dempsey was permitting sliming of the family and Meredith on her blog. And an opportunistic Frank Sfarzo was lurching his Perugia Shock away from Meredith over to the cause of Amanda Knox.

It was about time Meredith had an 80,000 pound gorilla in her corner. We really hit our stride as a counterforce from the start of the trial, and with Kermit’s Powerpoints and Brian on the Micheli Report and the Machine on the evidence and so on, we broke into the top 100,000 websites twice in 2009. And our seeing a noticeably encouraged Kercher family at the time of their testimony in June brought us all some real joy.

Immediately thereafter Amanda Knox gave us all her repugnant and callous performance on the witness stand, which turned off just about everyone in Italy who did not already despise her, and right after that came her mother, perjuring herself on the stand, and then four months of a feeble and halting defence. Those in cloud-cuckoo land missed all this, of course, but every normal watcher got the point. 

Subsequent huge pluses included the very qualified Italian posters Commisario and Cesare. The sustained stepping forward of new posters like Stilicho and Emma just last week. The large number of contacts we attracted. The way in which sock-puppet after sock-puppet fell silent after we exposed their rants as inaccurate - Doug Preston’s silence now is especially pleasing. And the wonderful way in which a world-class translation team came together at PMF at a moment’s notice after we got the Italian version of Massei.

Meredith wasn’t fully realised at the time of her death, but the process of her becoming was awesome, given her considerable talent, great warmth toward others, fine good looks, and very fierce drive to succeed. Such fine qualities matter, and they need standing up for. The world needs a lot more Meredith Kerchers, and a lot more Italies, and a lot more bonding and working together, if it is going to make it through this tumultuous century ahead.

And a lot fewer Lords of the Flies.

Posted by Peter Quennell on 09/13/10 at 07:29 AM | #

There’s a “benefit” for the “Amanda Knox Defense Fund” in Ohio on October 15th. I found out about it via Mr Fisher’s page, which directs people to a facebook page promoting the event (a grand total of seventeen - count ‘em - people are signed up to attend). I made a post, asking them to let me know when they do a benefit for Meredith Kercher’s family. My post was deleted.

Posted by Janus on 09/14/10 at 01:24 AM | #

IMHO the “core” Knox supporters exhibit signs of abuse and I believe AK was the direct result of their disfunctions.  They must defend themselves by all means and bashing is something they do very well.  Gotta hand it to them, they sure like to parade their sorry asses off to everyone and they are so stupid they believe their own lies.  Where’s Edda when we need a little entertainment to ease the pain they so easily generate?  Thanks for the article, Emma.

Posted by Professor Snape on 09/14/10 at 04:35 AM | #

@Mo-in -Mass: I also wish one of them would break ranks. The one most likely to do so, I think, is RG - but it seems that he has been told to keep his mouth shut or else (the beating up in jail, and why else would he not throw the other two under the bus?)

I don’t understand RS’s defence, which has been to stay silent and hope that there was not enough to convict him. (That didn’t work of course.) I think he still hopes, or his family does, that he can walk away from this - so he’s not likely to rat on AK, which would mean admitting he was there. The farthest he has gone is refusing to support her alibi.

Posted by lilly on 09/14/10 at 08:17 PM | #

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