Beyond the individual and collective responsibilities in the specific case of „Bulai” at SNSPA, extensively discussed and, at least in part, indisputable, a fundamental question remains, and in the answers to it lies more than just a scandal that will eventually be abandoned. It lies in healing.
Why have none of the victims of the sexual predator, some with clear evidence, as shown in Snoop.ro’s investigation, spoken out? Because they did not trust the faculty and SNSPA leadership, convinced of the male fraternity there. It’s a credible answer. Alfred Bulai seemed so sure of himself that he described what now appears to be actions in a book.
But the deeds, being a matter of criminal suspicions, could have been reported to other institutions: the prosecutor's office, ministry, press. And yet, only now, after years, at least 10 have found the strength to speak up.
The Woman Is to Blame
Because, like many other victims of sexual crimes, they knew that against them was not just one brotherhood or another, one solidarity or another, but a widely spread mentality in which the woman is always guilty. Many of them learned this even from the Bible. If it weren't for the woman, the blissful primordial couple would have perpetuated peacefully in Eden.
That's how they saw it at home, where submissive and dependent mothers were always at the disposal of men, often aggressive, without considering it abnormal, but a natural condition of women. Rape between spouses is just an oddity from criminal law books.
From a young age, they heard that women are sluts, that even when raped, they must have done something to provoke the poor man, with their skirts too short, heads uncovered, lips too red, or neckline too deep. It must be the woman's fault. And Ceaușescu would have been a good boy if it weren't for his wife. She, the woman, is the source of evil.
When Luiza Melencu's mother, the first victim of Dincă in Caracal, went to the police to report her daughter's disappearance, the first response from the man wearing a hat was that the girl might have run off with a boy.
For many, only rape, and even then only committed with extreme violence, has value; refusal represents, at most, a bad deed. Otherwise: "but what did she do in the end?", "what is beautiful pleases God too", "she should be proud that she is appreciated," etc. The woman treated as a sexual object should, shouldn't she, feel flattered by the attention.
If they had gone to report the professor, a public figure with authority, especially those who had no evidence, who would have taken them seriously, who would have believed them? And what consequences would they have endured? How much would the humiliation have been amplified?
This is the main problem that needs to be addressed. And this should be the main objective of feminism. Not gender quotas, which I find insulting, not slogans, but a profound change in mentality regarding women, as human beings first and foremost.
Let's not delude ourselves that sexual predators are only found in universities or in the artistic environment, where scandals have erupted. That's just the environment where the inhibitions of the victims have been somewhat overcome. The phenomenon is widespread in the sexist and misogynistic society where men are taught and feel entitled to use any power argument against women.
Who Is Taught By Whom?
There is an elephant in the room – misogyny or at least women's complicity. Sexual predators, misogynists, sexists, shameless individuals, these monsters were raised by a mother. The way they behave with women deeply reflects the education received, explicitly or by example, from the first woman in their life, the first one responsible for teaching them how a woman should be treated.
Spoiled princes and/or witnesses of their mothers' submission, of their mothers' assumed humiliation, become the monsters of the future.
If ultimately adopted, the legislative change that would make it easier for victims to report abuse could help. But without a profound change starting from early education, the phenomenon will remain widespread, with a huge black figure of unspoken acts.