Facebook Avengers: How One Group Of College Students Made Justice Happen

The man in this picture is a piece of shit rapist.

And now, the whole world knows it.

When Morgan Shaw-Fox forced oral sex on fellow Lewis & Clark University student Helen Hunter, she had the option of staying silent. After all, he was a popular and well-regarded student. They were alone when he did it. And criminal rape cases – especially cases of date rape, or cases where the victim consented to a certain degree of sexual activity before saying the word “no” – are notoriously brutal and hard to win.

The burden of proof is always on the accuser, who is frequently subjected to vicious assaults on her character by defense attorneys and the media. Prosecuting a rapist can be nearly as traumatic as the experience of sexual assault.

So, yeah. For understandable reasons, many, if not most survivors don’t report being assaulted. Many, if not most rapists are never brought to justice.

But Helen Hunter did not choose silence.

She wrote an anonymous letter to her school paper. The letter got people talking, and several other women came forth to say that they’d had similar experiences. Helen Hunter gathered her courage and told her friends that she’d authored the letter, and that she’d been talking about Morgan Shaw Fox.

One of these women – specifically, an amazing human being by the name of Calli Bishop – figured that Morgan (whose Facebook profile listed “copin’ a feel” as one of his interests) did not deserve the gift of privacy. She wanted everyone to know precisely what he’d done, and she saw no point in going through any legal hassle in order to make that happen. So she created a Facebook group called, yes, “Morgan Shaw-Fox Is A Piece Of Shit Rapist.”

The students at Lewis & Clark started talking about the Facebook group.

The Facebook story was picked up by the local news.

The local news story was picked up by the Internet.

Morgan Shaw-Fox is now internationally known. There are literally thousands of know his name, his face, and his crime. He’s experiencing the sort of public shaming normally reserved for victims who take their rapists to trial.

Lewis & Clark eventually found Shaw-Fox guilty and handed out an insultingly lenient punishment – one semester of suspension, whereas rape survivors can deal with the trauma caused by their assaults for the rest of their lives – but that’s not the point. His chances of being alone with a woman again have substantially decreased, just because a few girls decided to speak up.

And, of course, as the story becomes more widely known, the odds become higher and higher that other survivors will use this tactic, thereby empowering themselves and making the world a much less cozy place for would-be sexual predators.

Calli Bishop and Helen Hunter are heroes. I do not exaggerate when I say that, at any moment when I am feeling hopeless or disappointed or just plain sad, I can think of these women and experience overwhelming, radiant gratitude and joy. They make me feel better about the future of the planet.

So many people fail to recognize the power of their voices and the strength of their communities. These women are examples of the victories we can win by supporting each other and using our creativity to set things right.

They’re living proof that it is not impossible, or even difficult, for ordinary people to speak out against injustice. Whether you’re blogging, staging an old-fashioned protest with your friends, or even using Facebook, you can make yourself heard – and, thanks to the Internet, you can reach a wider audience than ever.

So, what are you waiting for? Stop playing Scrabulous. Go out and save the world.