Topic for debate: do you believe rape culture exists?
There are certainly problems with how our society deals with rape. However, I think part of the disagreement is about what people define as "rape culture."
From this link:
Examples of Rape Culture:
Blaming the victim (She asked for it!)
Trivializing sexual assault (Boys will be boys!)
Sexually explicit jokes
Tolerance of sexual harassment
Inflating false rape report statistics
Publicly scrutinizing a victims dress, mental state, motives, and history
Gratuitous gendered violence in movies and television
Defining manhood as dominant and sexually aggressive
Defining womanhood as submissive and sexually passive
Pressure on men to score
Pressure on women to not appear cold
Assuming only promiscuous women get raped
Assuming that men dont get raped or that only weak men get raped
Refusing to take rape accusations seriously
Teaching women to avoid getting raped instead of teaching men not to rape
I'm going to disagree with the two in red, particularly the last one.
Rape is illegal. People know it's illegal. In addition, students (of an appropriate age) need to be taught which actions qualify as rape/sexual assault. If we're not teaching them that, then there is a societal problem. (I was taught which actions were illegal when I was in high school. I assume that kind of teaching has become more common in the decades since.)
However, when there's a rash of burglaries in the area, police and reporters start informing homeowners how to make their houses less of a target. When visiting certain cities, visitors are informed how to avoid being targeted by pickpockets and con artists.
This isn't because we live in a "theft culture."
The burglars, pickpockets and con artists know what they're doing is illegal. They just
don't care. You can "teach" them that it's wrong as much as you want, but it's not going to solve the problem. They
want to steal.
Similarly, the rapists
want to rape. They're not raping out of ignorance. They're raping because they
don't care.
Whether it's theft or rape, we educate the potential victims, because the perpetrators
don't want to change. Educating the perpetrators is
pointless.
How do we all respond to sexual violence?
The problem goes beyond how society views rape. It also involves how society views sex.
Less than a month ago (March 13th) in Houston, a man heard a noise coming from his teenaged daughter's bedroom. He entered and found a teenager in the room with his daughter.
The father asked his daughter if she knew the young man, she said she didn't. The father ordered the young man to stay still. The young man reached for something, and the father shot him.
The wound was fatal.
The daughter later admitted that the teenager was her boyfriend, and she had snuck him into the house. The young man was unarmed.
It's horrible for all three of them (father, daughter, boyfriend), and the death wouldn't have happened if the daughter had been unafraid of truthfully telling her father that she'd been fooling around with her boyfriend.
Tying this back to the topic:
I believe that false accusations of rape are rare. However, that story shows us a scenario where a young woman lied about consensual sexual activity. She did so out of fear of the consequences.
If there were no consequences, there would be no reason for her to lie.
Rape is under-reported. False accusations are rare, but they do exist. In addition, there have been multiple cases where men convicted of rape were exonerated years later (or decades later) by DNA evidence.
The criminal justice system has to protect people who are falsely accused. Since the system isn't omniscient, it has to protect the rights of
everyone accused, even if they're horrible people.
The situation is made more difficult due to the nature of rape cases. Unless the victim reported it immediately, there's probably no DNA evidence. The entire case hinges on the victim's testimony. Even if there is DNA evidence, the case requires testimony that the acts were not consensual.
Rapists target vulnerable people. People who are unwilling or unable to make good witnesses (children, troubled teenagers, mentally retarded, mentally ill, elderly, drunk, drugged, illegal immigrants). I don't know that we'll ever find a way to make rape cases simple or easy.
What society can do:
Get rid of the stigma around rape. People are ashamed/afraid of what people will think. There shouldn't be any shame attached to being the victim. The shame should be attached to the person who
committed the rape.
That is a change we can
all actively create.
