The Disappearance Of Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei: Tyler Clementi's Bullies Have Gone Into Hiding




All I can think is, that pair — Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei, the two Rutgers students who sound like they were the flash point for Tyler Clementi’s suicide — must have really good lawyers. Because alleged bulliests (bulliers? or just bulls?) Dharun and Molly have done what most Americans find almost impossible to pull off: shut up. It’s been a long time time since a such purposeful vanishing act took place on the national stage. And they’ve managed to do Monica Lewinsky (“I’m kind of known for something that’s not so great to be known for”) one better.
I kind of admire how Dharun and Molly have both evaded photographers and simultaneously resisted the urge to speak. Their free speech, I imagine, would encompass defensive denial (Ravi, most likely, I’d bet) and irritated statement / apology (Molly’s M.O., I think.) For 18-year-olds to exercise such restraint is … remarkably mature. Each day Dharun and Molly remain silent, the more difficult it is to believe their cruelty, however indirect, really had anything to do with Tyler Clementi’s death. Oh, wait. That’s not a magic trick. It’s called an act of self-preservation.
Right now, there’s probably not a lot for Dharun and Molly to do, wherever they are. I imagine Dharun’s playing foosball and Molly’s combing her hair. I’m sure they both hate being unable to go on with their lives, resent the fact that they’re not at school and feel singled out for behavior that’s really — given all the gay boys who are killing themselves — not that uncommon.
Except.
Except ten years from now, when all this is over and Dharun and Molly have been prosecuted (or more likely, their lawyers have cut a plea deal), and appeared on 20/20, written a book, and gone on with their lives, Tyler Clementi will still be dead. Obvious, right? Not so much. I keep thinking how our country’s deluded belief in reinvention (THANKS, MADONNA), means believing every act, even death, DOESN’T REALLY HAPPEN. Maybe it’s reality TV, or our collective viewing of too many ABC Sports opening sequences (of the skier who flipped up, off the snow, and spectacularly out of control.)
Rewind, edit, recut.
Like, Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei, there’s a do over in their future because they’re both still alive!
Meanwhile, I keep thinking about that video campaign, “It Gets Better.” I’m not totally buying it. I realized why yesterday when I left my house at 9 a.m. and spent six hours writing a new essay, chatted with the barista at Om Cafe about poetry (and the new issue of Bust), hung out with my friend Kylie, and saw my friends Joao & Tom who were out on the Boulevard having a bite to eat. I thought, “it” (life) gets more interesting. Better, eh. Sometimes.
But for Tyler Clementi, for Asher Brown, for Jayron Martin, for Billy Lucas, for Seth Walsh and for Jaheem Herrera – the LGBTQ youth who killed themselves, there’s no do over. They are dead, finally, and forever. There’s no getting interesting, better, or an apology, even a half-hearted one.

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