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College Rape
There's a guy I go to school with who used to have a crush on me and flirted with me when we passed each other in the hallway. I just found out that he raped a girl named Ashley who I'm acquainted with, but I was sworn to secrecy by my friend, Allison who told me, not to tell anyone (mainly to protect Ashley, the victim's reputation and safety). The rape has been reported and the department faculty members are aware of it. I am very close with a teacher on that faculty and would like to discuss it with her. Do you think I'd be over-stepping my bounds? I did promise Allison (my friend who told me) that I wouldn't tell anyone about it but this teacher already knows about it anyway. Are there any bases I'm not covering that I need to be aware of before I discuss this with my teacher?
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Allison went out of bounds by sharing with you. Anyone you talk to, trying to pretend that you know nothing and are just curious and want to talk about a subject matter that is secret will automatically know that you found out somewhere. ANy info on the rape should remain between Ashley, the staff at school and any police on the case...thats it...no one else, even if you used to know him in school. For you to even try to talk to someone is a violation of her privacy. Try to be a good example for Allison who already made a mistake in telling you. Perhaps you are jealous the Ashley didn't tell you herself and you had to find out from Allison. It doesnt matter if shes your friend. If she chose not to tell you, then you Must go on as if you don't know anything about it and that includes talking to anyone else on the subject. YOu'll need to deal with your own thoughts, whatever distortion is leading you to feel its so important to talk to staff. So like Razhie, I also wonder why you feel so on fire to talk to someone, to what purpose? It wont make the fact that a rape occured go away. Perhaps reality TV has just got lots of people thinking they are entitled to know every little detail of how some action went down.
PUt yourself in her shoes, wold you like it if another student wanted to talk about your being raped, wanting all the juicy details? It would be unprofessional of anyone who is part of the group in the know to protect her from further attack and those seeking to get justice for her against her attacker, to discuss it with whomever wants to talk about it, and leaking details.
Unless you want to chance the embarrassment of having faculty telling you its none of your business and looking at you askance as if you have strange issues yourself mentally, then I would refrain from doing so. Everyone is going to wonder why you have this strong a feeling of needing to discuss it and that will bring negative attention on you.
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Why do you want to speak to this teacher about it? What is it you want to ask, or to say?
That really is the question.
Honestly, you have absolutely zero right to expect this teacher to share any details with you at all. That is 100% an overstep. You may be putting her in a very difficult position even bringing it up. You don't actually know anything here, except that you have heard gossip, and at this point you have no right to know anything at all.
If you are approaching this teacher in the hopes of learning more about the situation - don't. If you are approaching this teacher because you want to talk about her feelings, opinions or beliefs on the situation - don't. If you want to talk to this teacher just because you need someone else to talk about this terribly interesting thing with - don't. All of those are selfish, drama-seeking reasons.
The only possible, acceptable reason for you to speak to this teacher, would be if you had information that investigators may need (and it doesn't seem you do) or if you were need of a trusted adult's support for your own feelings—and honestly, are you in need of support? Are you fearful or anxious or struggling to make sense of this? You don't mention that sort of trouble in your question...
If you need to talk out YOUR feelings about what you heard, then maybe, perhaps, that is sort of a valid reason to bring this up with this teacher. But even then, you'd be better off taking advantage of counselling offered by your school, then you would be putting your teacher in a position that could be uncomfortable and unfair to her, and expose her to possible issues if it even APPEARS she may have shared information with you that she should not.
In short: Unless you have a legitimate reason to bring this up that you didn't mention here. Don't.
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The best thing i think you could do is keep quiet about it, the proper people know and it sounds likes its being handled.
Theres a chance if you try to talk to her about it that it will only make her feel worse because she knows others know, and make yourself look bad to your friend allison because you promised you wouldnt say anything. It might trace back to her ya know?
if you want to, maybe you could try to just support the victim and be friendly, and open to talking to her about anything so that if she feels eventually that she can confide in you then she will. If the topic comes up while your together, you can say how awful that kind of thing is and show (even though you "dont know" it happen to her) that you'd have lots of compassion for someone whos been a victim of that so she knows how you'd react if she DID tell you see where im going with this??
once i was friends with the girl and SHE or someone ELSE brought it up and she willingly admitted it happened to her i'd act like i didnt know, and be sympathetic. I'd ask her if she'd gotten any type of counseling because it might help and its not like it would be harmful even if she believed it wouldnt work, and at most it would have just been a waste of time. I would try to gently push her towards counseling or therapy of some type of it was offered to her, and let her know that shes the victim and that theres nothing to be ashamed up but its understandable that she'd feel like there wasnt a need to "broadcast it"
After someone is raped they should be watched closely, for their own safety. Some women (depending on how violent the attack was) can become self destructive and or start acting out or harming themselves like cutting or self medicating.
Maybe you can encourage your friend to watch her carefully and if it starts to look like shes not acting herself THEN say something, but for the most part i think people approaching her "randomly" or "out of no where" and trying to talk to her about it might make her feel like "well who ELSE knows??" dont make her feel worse.
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