Good afternoon. It is I Gigi the parti poodle and I must alert you to something most distressing. Demeter is missing! Demeter the fluffy white Persian cat who lives down the street with her sister Artemis is missing! Bernard D. Bunny alerted me of the news this morning. All the neighborhood pets are on high alert. We have a neighborhood watch here and yet our precious fluffy Persian kitty sister has disappeared without a trace. Bernard is terribly shaken about it and has hidden his sister Belle in the secret burrow. Even I do not know where the secret burrow is located. My novelist seems calm about the whole thing. She said Demeter is a curious cat and has a reputation for prowling around at night. She said she may just be hiding somewhere to get out of the rain. I am less convinced. I believe Demeter was kidnapped. I believe someone took her. But why? Who? I must know. I absolutely must. If they are willing to kidnap as beautiful a cat as Demeter, they are bound to have their eye on a gorgeous parti poodle such as myself. I will have to round up all the pets in the neighborhood and deal with this matter post haste. Until next week, I bid you adieu.

MY BOOKS

You can check out my books Chicane and all five installments of the Musicology book series Musicology: Volume One, Baby!, Musicology: Volume Two, Kid!, Musicology: Volume Three, Twist!, Musicology: Volume Four, Sweetie! and Musicology: The Epiquad on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback editions. You can also check out Musicology’s web site at www.musicologyrocks.com and vote for who you think will win Musicology!

STREAM OF THE WEEK: SPEAK (2004)-Paramount+

Based on the National Book Award finalist of the same name by Laurie Halse Anderson this film is a must see for all teens. The story is about a fourteen-year-old girl named Melinda Sordino (brilliantly acted by Kristen Stewart). It is the first day of her high school year, but something devastating has happened, and Melinda is not the same girl she used to be in middle school. Her former friends Nicole (Tyanna Rolley) and Rachel Bruin (Hallee Hirsh) have ostracized her. Other students are calling her a “squealer”, laugh at her face and behind her back. All because she called 911 at a party the summer before.

But Melinda didn’t dial the police without reason. Melinda dialed the police because while she was intoxicated, a senior named Andy Evans (Eric Lively) raped her. Melinda is visibly traumatized by the event and is frightened to tell anyone what happened. Her behavior is misunderstood by her well-meaning mother Joyce Sordino (Elizabeth Perkins) and father (D.B. Sweeny), her history teacher Mr. Neck (Robert John Burke), and her new naïve social climbing friend Heather (Allison Siko). What’s worse, Rachel Bruin has started dating Andy.

Melinda finds an outlet for her pain in her art class taught by Mr. Freeman (Steven Zahn) who encourages her to be brave in her art and an ally in her biology lab partner Dave Petrakis (Michael Angarano).

The film is realistic in its portrayal of Melinda’s PTSD behavior and the way victims are often treated by those around them. It is also realistic in how predatory rapists behave: they invade their victim’s space, they use alcohol and drugs to dimmish their victims, and they isolate their victims to attack them. A lot of predatory rapists are repetitive in their tactics. Many, though not all, will plan out their rape out well ahead of time such as college men who pick out a woman in a class, often in Fall semester or quarter, charm her, groom her, and invite her to a party where they get her drinking to carry out their rape. Andy Evens is a good example of a psychopathic rapist. He appears charming at first and then shows signs of narcissism, irritation and violence. It is important to note studies show approximately 50% of repeat rapists are psychopathic.

Psychopathy is hereditary which means a psychopath has a 50/50 chance of siring or giving birth to another psychopath. It is likely Andy’s father, brother and/or uncle are/were also rapists as well. Rapists, psychopathic or otherwise, may also have abnormal white matter integrity in their brains which also have hereditary factors. Thus, it is bizarre that society traditionally blames the sane victim over the mentally compromised predator.

You can read interviews with real rapists and the way they carried out their attacks in the book The Rapist File: Interviews with Convicted Rapists by Les Sussman Sally Bordwell, and Ellen Frankfort. I am particularly fond of this one because many books on the subject will chronicle women’s stories of their attacks. It is more difficult to find books that get inside the rapist’s head. Other books of note are I Never Called It Rape: The Ms. Report on Recognizing, Fighting, and Surviving Date and Acquaintance Rape by Robin Warshaw and Fraternity Gang Rape: Sex, Brotherhood, and Privilege on Campus by Peggy Reeves Sanday.