...Rape Culture Views: Attitudes and Practices in our Society that Normalize or Excuse Rape. Brianna Burke Sociology of Women Dr. King June, 20, 2013 Abstract Rape Culture views are based on attitudes and practices in our society that normalize or excuse rape. Society excuses rape because it has come to the belief that sex is an act of male domination and female submission. Although we have laws against rape they do not appear to be a main focus point. Society seems to minimalizes rape to the point of not caring, in some cases making the victims seem to be at fault. Because it seems that the repercussions of the rapist are not as tough as they should be, rapists repeat their actions without fear of severe punishment. The average sentence for convicted rapists was 11.8 years, while the actual time served was 5.4 years. In the US because of our rape culture, rape in the military became a major problem in recent years, even up until this problem was publicized. When first brought into the public’s eye the military didn’t seem to be taking rape seriously. Rape is not just a nightmare for military women but for men as well. Rape seems to be more main stream than some might think. Society more often than not are blaming the victims, the proof is in a recent 12-minute video of young men in Steubenville, Ohio, joking about the brutal, extended gang rape of a 16-year-old girl. According to one study of 16,000 Americans, 17.6% of women report having been victims of rape or...
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...Rape culture, hysteria, epidemic, or whatever the currently preferred terminology be, is a feminis t myth that refuses to extinguish itself. The effect of social awareness of rape and general sensitivity in our culture has shifted our society into an anti-male, anti-free speech, and anti-American entity. In modern day, alternately “third wave” feminism, members propose a concept of “a rape culture”, suggesting that sexual assault is celebrated and a cultural norm in this society. “Third wave feminism” doesn’t have an exact definition, but can be best described as modern day feminists that believe women are being oppressed in the western world by a patriarchy. These misandristic groups blame men for rape with little evidence to support their...
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...In Rape Culture Is... the video discuss the difference between consent and and coercion. Lynn Philips describe rape culture as people making fun of women who have been abused, the video further discusses how woman are usually taken advantage of, and how the word rape is often thrown around. In our society, when someone comes out saying they have been raped, there are always those questions asked, like what were you wearing, how were you acting, and even more. Those questions make a person feel like it was there fault but in reality it wasn't, no one is asked to be raped. In Campus Rape Victim: A Struggle for Justice, they discuss how rape victims first intent is to be quiet when they are first assaulted. They often blamed themselves and don't come forward when it happens. The text went into detail of the stories of those who were a victim of rape. They talked about the Jeanne Clery Act, that would make campus a safer place to be. In Valin and Auleb's Sexual Violence and Abuse, the slides covered facts and statistics about rape. One of the slides mentioned that silence means no, I feel like in most cases, the abusers think that it was ok because the person didn't say anything, when in reality it's not okay. In the Band Back Together, the text covers some myths regarding male sexual assault. The whole text talks about how males can be a victim of sexual assault, but society always sees men as people who can defend themselves, even though that is not true. And in...
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...Over the last few decades, the recurring rape cases in India has emerged rapidly. Every day as I open the newspaper, turn to news channels on televisions or open news sites such as those of Times Of India or The Hindu or DNA, I always dread reading that piece of article which again and again stops me from stepping out of my house undeterred by the dangers of the city and the country I live in. Rape culture as a concept is not easily defined. We can maybe explain it as a high amount of occurrence of rapes which condones physical and emotional violence and torture against women as the norm. Rape culture results in creating a belief amongst men and women that sexual violence is a fact of life and that the only way to curb this menace is by “controlling women”. We see it in the way that most members of society have begin to accept it as “just the way things are”. Rape culture is when all activities in a society are carried out in a manner which accepts hegemonic masculinity. “Hegemonic Masculinity”– according to Wikipedia- refers to a belief in the existence of a culturally normative ideal of male behavior. It is said to be marked by a tendency for the male to dominate other males and subordinate females. I would like to approach the topic of “rape culture” in our society by first talking about the basic freedom and rights the women in our society, and in fact, all citizens are provided by our constitution. Though we all have equal rights and the freedom to exercise these rights...
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...Teaching Boys/Men to not rape Rape is a serious crime that happens to one out of every five girls. Rape leads some girls to getting brutally beaten or killed just so men can have sex with them. Rape is sex without the other partners consent. One question that is brought up when talking about rape is, “Can sexual consent be taken back?” I believe that people have the option to change their mind, and yes consent can be taken back. I believe that it is the man’s job to respect the girl’s choice. Even if the girl agreed to having sex earlier, NO means NO! The media is also another reason why rape is high. The media portrays women as sex symbols. For example, when a Victoria’s Secret commercial comes on; most of the commercial is half naked women trying to market a product, and they aren’t trying to persuade women to go out and buy that product, they are trying to persuade men to going out and buying these products. Even in movies, the media portrays girls as sex symbols. In the movie “Tomb Raider” the main character “Lora Croft” is a strong independent woman, but she is barely dressed, which is always appealing to male audiences. There are even magazines such as “Sports Illustrated” that use images of half-naked women to increase their sales. I believe the way the media portrays women as sex symbols has given men a mixed message about rape. I believe that some men think that rape is ok because almost everywhere they look, they can see a women that is half naked, from watching...
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...During a courtroom ruling while convincing a man for raping a young lady, Judge Lindsey Kushner QC said "Well, if you drank you are more likely to get raped, we are not likely to believe you and you have been disinhibited so you've rather brought it on yourself then that guilt is just going to get worse” (Lister). This is an example of rape culture. Rape culture is a society or environment whose prevailing social attitudes have the effect of normalizing or trivializing sexual assault and abuse. Promoters of rape culture would often blame the victims for putting themselves into that predicament by their suggestive body language. It is not justified to turn down accusations because both parties were intoxicated at the moment. If the victim...
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...Up until today, when it comes to rape, most people still lack knowledge of the subject and tend to assume they know plenty about it. They believe it is only about the victim not giving consent, and for the defendant to act still act upon their desires even though the victim did not agree to it. While that is relevant to the subject, there is still much to know about it especially when it comes to consent. Based on the scholarly articles that I have found so far, it has been revealed the true meaning of consent, and under what circumstances is it still considered as a sexual assault and when it is not. When a person is sexually assaulted, everything plays a very important role and it will overall come together to decide if it will be considered...
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...Rape culture, as defined by UMass Amherst Department of Communication lecturer Lynn Phillips, is “a culture in which dominant cultural ideologies, media images, social practices, and societal institutions support and condone sexual abuse by normalizing, trivializing, and eroticizing male violence against women and blaming victims for their own abuse”. I have come across numerous articles (and the dreaded comments section) that debate whether or not rape culture actually exits in the United States, and I agree with many points coinciding with the presence of rape culture in our society in regards to victim-blaming and slut-shaming, however to some degree, I do not believe song lyrics, TV shows/movies, and jokes that seemingly promote rape actually causes rape to occur....
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...) Rape Culture on College Campuses and Why it Prevails Rape has become a taboo topic. Sexual assault is sugar coated into something less disturbing and brutal than it actually is. But rape is rape: the act of male or female taking sexual control or dominance over a nonwilling participant. It does not matter whether or not people feels comfortable discussing the topic of rape. Uncomfortability does not make a problem disappear. It is possible that rape culture is ignored because no one knows a permanent solution for it. But not talking about it will not fix it. An environment where rape culture prevails is on college campuses. 1 in every 4 college students admit to being raped or sexually assaulted on campus, this number fails to include the thousands of rape victims whose stories are never heard. Rape culture prevails on college campus because only an estimated 35% of these victims’ abusers are dealt with. Of those, only an estimated 20 30% percent are dealt with severely. Colleges ignore the severity rape culture on campus because it is a problem that is extremely difficult to remedy, but ignoring a problem will not solve it. “Culture is vital to the human species, but some cultural patterns are destructive” (Herman 45). Rape culture occurs when a set of values or beliefs create an environment that is conducive to rape. Rape culture does not refer to an actual place or setting, but to a culture that directly and indirectly surrounds and supports rape. ...
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...that victim are four times greater for a college female student than for any other age group. The phenomenon of date rape is not new, however it has evolved into a communication phenomenon, in which communication about sex and rape, the negotiation of consent, the rape itself, the aftermath of rape and the reaction to date rape, are central to defining a rape culture on campus. Women have been muted in a multitude of ways, including the methods in which women tell stories, through male-controlled media, in ways women’s bodies are portrayed and analyzed, and through censorship of women’s voices. Rape is a horrible experience, so why would women keep quiet about it. Campus cultures perpetuate the `culture of silence` that exists among young men and women by fostering a culture of rape which silences experiences and advocates victim blaming (self blame) that is set ablaze by the social acceptance of rape myths, experiences not being defined as rape, secondary rape, and the absence of deterrence, all of which create an underlying tolerance towards rape. In this paper I will examine how women are affected by the rape supportive culture that exists on campuses and creates an internalization of self blame are muted before, during, and after the experience of date rape. Both male and female students contribute to muting women, thus perpetuating a rape culture in which rape becomes an expectation, or part of the social milieu. Only a male dominated society that trains men to use women as...
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...A prominent example of this issue was presented by the fraternity, Phi Kappa Tau, of Georgia Tech University. They were found singing lyrics to songs that described explicit ways to rape the women who were at their parties. Not only did these songs contribute to finding humor in a dehumanizing act towards women, but also to the normalization of rape. The actions of the fraternity went unchecked and the members did not face any consequences, which led to the sexual assault of at least two women (Chemaly Paragraph 2). Eventually, when emails sent between fraternity members instructed the men on how to sexually assault females at their parties, these songs were used to support the case against them. However, the Phi Kappa Tau’s lawyer claimed in their defense that the rape victims were “‘exploiting the hypersensitivity of today’s college campus environment toward sexual assault”’ (Chemaly Paragraph 2). While some people in modern society tend to overhype current issues in the world, sexual assault is a recurring and prevalent concern among college women who have triple the chance of getting raped than their male peers (Angelone 188). Desensitization of such songs leads to a greater proclivity for the incidence of rape or sexual assault. Furthermore, at an off-campus fraternity at Amherst College in Massachusetts, students were found with t-shirts depicting a woman clad in her bra and panties who was bruised and tied to a stick with a an apple...
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...Throughout the years rape culture is something that has been in the news, daily lives, online, and in the media pretty regularly lately. Rape has been defined as, “Unlawful sexual activity and usually sexual intercourse carried out forcibly or under threat of injury against the will usually of a female or with a person who is beneath a certain age or incapable of valid consent. Medical professionals have tried to categorize rape to legitimize it. The first category is Gift-From-God-Rape which means that if the rape resulted a pregnancy then it was meant to happen. The second category, Legitimate Rape states that if the rape was legitimate then the female body cannot become pregnant because it shuts down during the attack. 32,000 women get pregnant from rape in the United States each year. In cases where the woman did get pregnant her rapist can now obtain custodial rights to the child, even if he was convicted of the rape. Our culture has begun to place more importance with the parentage of a child than the safety of the child and the mother. The last category is by far the worst; Enjoyable rape is the notion that if a person is going to be raped, then they should lay back and enjoy it. Recently it seems that we see or hear someone talking about rape culture at every turn, but this is far from a new problem. It is, however, being talked about for the first time. With the internet changing the way that people can network over great distances, more people are speaking out and...
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...Why do you think that occurs? Well, there's a simple answer for that, they don't want to feel be belittled, as though nobody believes them or pushed aside. Some feel embarrassed, can you believe that, embarrassed about something they had no control over. Again, why might you ask, merely because the culture we live in today tries to rationalize why these are things are occurring. When in actuality there is no justification for why sexual assault is ranked the fourth highest crime in America. Our culture glorifies sexual assault, it's in our music, movies, it's everywhere with the slightest admiration for people who have been a victim. Instead of them feeling secure, they feel even more threatening to know someone can speak or rap openly about doing it and there's no...
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...society, need to fight the decadent, patriarchal culture that considers women merely instruments of reproduction. Violence against half the population of the largest democracy is touching new heights, shaming the entire society. The recent horrific incident of rape in Delhi is not an isolated one. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) says rape is the biggest crime in India with 24,206 cases registered in 2011 (22,172 in 2010). The dismal conviction rate at a mere 26 per cent between 2008 and 2011 explains the increase in rape cases. According to the NCRB, approximately 10 per cent of rape victims are below 14 years, 15 per cent are between 16 and 18 and 57 per cent are between 18 and 30. The Constitution guarantees to all women equality, prohibition of discrimination by the state, equality of opportunity, and equal pay for equal work. It also provides for making special enactments for women and children. It renounces practices derogatory to women’s dignity and provides for just and humane conditions of work and maternity benefit. But till date, these guarantees remain a distant dream for Indian women. Women-specific laws, namely, the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act, the Dowry Prohibition Act, the Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act, the Commission of Sati (Prevention)Act, and the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act have not acted as a deterrent. The Indian Penal Code deals with offences such as rape, kidnapping and abduction, dowry deaths, torture...
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...Rape is such a traumatic life event from which many victims never fully recover. Dr. Resick explains that “many victims develop problems with depression, poor self-esteem, interpersonal difficulties, and sexual dysfunctions” (4). Even though rape is a life-threatening attack, most cases go unreported. The psychological aftermath of a rape victim is something that is hard to understand when not experienced. It is important for one to learn how to address such psychological issues, because it is shocking how often rape crimes occur. Rape is an act of sexual intercourse by force against a person’s will. The use of force is key in the determining of a rape crime. By using such force, the predator can claim to feel powerful and in control. “Control is a constant and dominant factor in the overwhelming preponderance of sex offenses, regardless of the type of act or the age of the victim” (Prendergast 33). The victim is ultimately left helpless and powerless. Often times the victim is faced with having to give cooperation for their survival. Even though the act of rape may only last minutes, the victim is left with nightmares, flashbacks, and intrusive memories of the experience. One might wonder why so many cases go unreported when the affects of rape on the victim are so traumatic and long-term. Reporting rates of rape vary from 5% to 9.5% (Resick 3). Many women do in fact have experiences that meet the legal definition of rape, yet they do not define themselves...
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