By Apryl Mock
Managing Editor
Rape. Just the word is enough to make the skin crawl. However female victims are commonly accused of lying, bringing it upon themselves or confusing bad sex with sexual assault. It’s a phenomenon known as rape culture, and it is prominent on college campuses and across the nation.
Rape culture is a view in society that blames the victims, obscures the definition of sexual assault, perpetuates misconceptions about rape and makes excuses for the perpetrators. Most know someone who has been the victim of sexual assault, and although we may not realize it, we likely know a perpetrator as well. According to the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network, 84 percent of sexual assault victims know their attacker.
Many people assume that only psychopaths are rapists, which just isn’t true. Society doesn’t want to believe that people we know and even admire could do such a vile thing to another person, and yet it happens everyday.
According to the most recent SE Clery report, there were two reported forcible rapes on campus property in 2012. This report may not be accurate because the majority of sexual assaults go unreported. Only 40 out of every 100 rapes are reported, according to RAINN. Out of the 40 reported, only 10 result in an arrest, four result in conviction and only three out of every 100 accused rapists spend even one day in jail.
The belief that only strangers and obviously terrible people commit rape is one of many assumptions that lead to the rape culture we have in the U.S. Many assume that there is only one kind of rape, and that a large portion of sexual assault accusations are false and used as a means of retaliation by women.
The blurred lines of sexual assault often result in men not even realizing they’ve assaulted a woman. According to the Lancet Global Health Journal, a study they conducted showed that many men did not recognize actions that legally constitute rape.
Any sexual penetration when a woman does not explicitly give consent is considered rape. That means if a woman is passed out drunk and someone has sex with her, they can be considered a rapist. Instances where a drunken woman is assaulted often lead to the assumption that women make false rape claims because they regret having sex.
But according to the Forensic Examiner, only 8 percent of reported rapes are false.Most are reported by vulnerable people, a large portion children. With such a small number of false rape claims reported, it is unfair to assume that most rape accusations are false.
According to RAINN, it is unlikely that women will falsely report a rape because society has trained them to fell ashamed and at fault. This victim-blaming only instills fear about reporting rape. In addition to blaming the victim when sexual assault happens, society also puts the responsibility of rape prevention on the shoulders of women.
There are certain rules a woman must follow in order to prevent herself from being raped. Don’t go out after dark alone, don’t dress provocatively, watch your drink and don’t drink too much, to name a few.
What makes these well-intentioned pieces of advice so harmful is they all suggest that it is the woman’s responsibility to prevent rape. If a woman doesn’t follow the rules and is raped, she is to blame. If a woman is too drunk to express that she is unwilling to participate in a sexual act, society blames the woman because the rules say she shouldn’t have gotten so drunk.
Instead of looking at the real problem, which is that rape is occurring, we make excuses for violent men, and tell women to be more careful. A common excuse made for violent men is that they couldn’t control their sexual desires. However, rape is not an act of sexual release. Rape is an act of power and humiliation. Rape has nothing to do with how attractive a man finds a woman; yet one in three people believe that if a woman was “provocatively” dressed at the time of her assault, she is partly to blame for it, according to research done by the University of Minnesota Duluth.
According to rapecrisis.org, the majority of victims were wearing jeans, sweatpants or pajamas at the time of their assault and 71 percent of rapes are planned in advance. This suggests that most rape doesn’t occur because of dress. Most rapists intend on raping someone before they even see how they are dressed at the time. Rape has nothing to do with passion or arousal; it’s used as a weapon to control and humiliate.
The bottom line is we expect women to protect themselves, when we should be teaching men to respect women as people and not see them as objects. Instead of living by “no means no,” we should instead think “only yes means yes.”