Recently in Sexual Assault Category

Facebook Group: “Become a fan” of “Not Getting Raped By A Huge Black Guy.”

I wish I were kidding.

I would like as many people as possible to report this group. Not only is this page racist by implying that large black men are an instant threat to people, but it also makes a joke out of rape – which is NEVER a laughing matter.

They also use Mark Henry’s photograph to represent the group (most likely without his permission). He is a wrestler in the WWE for those who don’t know, and as far as I know, he is NOT guilty of rape.

Please send the message to all the 40,000 thoughtless followers that this type of group, along with the disgusting comments in the “Just Fans” section, is NOT acceptable.

Let’s see if we can actually get Facebook to take this group down. I believe in free speech, but not when it becomes hate speech.

The report button is on the lower left-hand part of the page.

Thanks in advance to anyone who helps out!

Cross-posted at She Says All

(Cross-posted at SAFER's blog, Change Happens )

The government works in mysterious ways. For example, you wouldn’t think that the Coast Guard Authorization Bill of 2010 has a whole lot to do with sexual assault. But you, like me, would be oddly wrong.

The bill, HR 3619, was passed in the House on October 23 (votes: 385 to 11), and is now on the Senate’s legislative calendar. The bill authorizes the Coast Guard’s $10 billion 2010 (fiscal year) budget, and two thirds of the budget will reportedly go to “financ[ing] core missions such as searches and rescues, combating drug smugglers and defending the U.S. coast against terrorists.” The bill also “increases Coast Guard personnel by 1,500 positions to a force of 47,000.”

But there is another story here :

Hello fellow feminists,

My first post ever! I am sad it must be such an angry one, but I am extremely angry with one of my campus newspapers today.

The Badger Herald has a regular "shoutout" feature which allows students to send a shoutout (or an anti-shoutout) to people/places/events on campus. Today, the following shoutout ran in print:

"ASO to the girl who not only passed out while we were fooling around, but then woke up and asked, "is it gonna hurt?" then proceeded to pass out again. i'm still wondering, does that count as consent?"

Please take a moment of your time to contact the editor at editor@badgerherald.com to explain that by making the egregious decision to print this shoutout, his organization chose to condone flippant attitudes about rape, sexual assault, and the degradation of women on the University of Wisconsin campus.

Many thanks,

An Angry Feminist Badger

If there was ever a doubt in anyone's mind that sexual assault, READ RAPE, is a very real thing in America today, then you might be surprised by this story. If you are, however, one of the many men and women who acknolwedge, understand and seek change to the accepted standard of violence against women and children in all forms, then you won't be shocked by this story, which is a heartbreaking reality.

A 15 year old girl was raped and beaten by several individuals for two hours outside of her high school, after leaving her school dance to meet her father for a ride. People watched, people walked by, people jeered AND people did NOTHING. They watched as a 15 year old girl was dehumanized, and they did nothing - no one called 911 until several hours later.

Is this how we value women and children in America today? Apparently it is. Is this what we have come to as a society, watching as a child is raped outside of her school and decide to take no action? I am so angered by this story that I cannot accurately articualte what I want to in this post, as I know there are many issues to comment on, and I know this is not the first time a story of this nature has occurred, but I will say one thing: I can already see the rape apologists swarming. She had alcohol in her system they will say, she probably acted in a suggestively seductive way they will retort, she ASKED FOR IT they will argue.

And since we all know that child rapists get a free pass (at least in the minds of many) in America, if they're famous, I wonder how the public will react to this story. Here is the story.

P.S. Don't you love how the link uses the gang rape angle? I find it digusting, but that's just my personal opinion.

There is a short article on MSNBC about a girl who was gang-raped outside her Homecoming Dance.  And despite the fact that multiple witnesses saw what was happening, no one stepped into help.

From the article:

"Police said the [15-year-old] girl left the dance and was walking to meet her father for a ride home when a classmate invited her to join a group drinking in the courtyard. The victim had drank a large amount of alcohol by the time the assault began, police said.

Officers received a tip about a possible assault on campus and found the girl semi-conscious near a picnic table."

""She was raped, beaten, robbed and dehumanized by several suspects who were obviously OK enough with it to behave that way in each other's presence," Lt. Mark Gagan said. "What makes it even more disturbing is the presence of others. People came by, saw what was happening and failed to report it.""

"Two suspects were in custody Monday, but police said as many as five other men attacked the girl over a two-hour period Friday night outside Richmond High School."

I am a seventeen year old senior at an all-girls' Catholic high school in suburban New York.  It's been a pretty nurturing environment where I've met great teachers, administrators who know what they're doing and (gasp!) a body of faculty and students who know, beyond a doubt, that girls will excel in math, science, history, sports, English, foreign languages and the arts so long as they are told "Hey, screw what the patriarchy tells you, just do."

And we have a gender studies class!

But on Thursday, something happened that shocked me. I am so very horrified, that I'm trembling.

Our administrators only let us off the ground at dismissal, when you march to your bus. Some school districts send public buses for us.

It's a lovely day in law enforcement history when a war we can all agree with is waged and won. The War Against Child Prostitution or Operation Cross Country rescued over 50 children, the youngest being 10 and arrested well over 700 suspect and pimps arrested and charged.

Why wasn't this something plastered all over the news? When FBI busted a big drug pin it's all over the place, non stop coverage, pictures of pot or heroine everywhere. Now that they have actually done something not only commendable but something that needs the media attention for the awareness factor it's but a blip on the news radar.

I'm hoping I'm wrong and that somewhere there is someone who has reported this and I'm just late to the scene.

I wanted to bring up the Issue of Drink Spiking. Here in Australia it is a big problem, although the media don't really like to talk about it. I don't know the actual statistics, but listening friends and peoples stories it seems to happen alot. It has happened to four friends of mine and one was a guy, his drink had been spiked on two seperate occasions the second time left him hospitalised for 3 days.

I really believe that more should be done to stop drink spiking and really start to prosecute the perpetrators of this horrible act. Its bad enough that when we go out night clubbing we have to put up with rude/sexist comments, inappropriate touching and grabbing. But on top of that we have to watch our drinks like hawks, so we don't end up being sexually assaulted or seriously injured while being drugged and unconscious.

Friends that have shared their experiences with me, have total memory loss of the events that took place having never remembered what actually happened. And unfortunatly alot of the time these women just end up as statistics with the police not wanting to know about their ordeals.

I understand that the process of stopping drink spiking can be quite difficult as it hard to catch people as it is such a sneeky act, but im certain there must ways that this crime can be combated. Things like education and public awareness with government funding and community support should be more prevalent, and there should be more care and support for the victims of sexual assault.

Roman Polanski isn't the only sex offender to go unpunished. I am taking a risk by posting this, which I have previously only shared with friends, but I think it's important.

What follows is my account of my family's own experience with a sex offender, and why the people supporting Polanski's "liberation" send not just the message that wealthy people can evade crimes, but that any sex offender can evade a crime.

Polra?tski from Alexandria Brown on Vimeo.

Polra?tski from Alexandria Brown on Vimeo.

Hey everyone, I want to get some opinions from a feminist community about a conversation I recently had with a friend.  We started talking about prostitution, sexual assault and rape.  A mainstream myth is that a prostitute cannot be raped or sexually assaulted (* as a feminist, I completely disagree with this assertion).  During the conversation, my friend presented a scenario concerning rape and prostitution:

Let’s say a prostitute and his/her customer mutually decide on a particular transaction (i.e. X amount of money for sexual acts X, Y, and Z).  This is an agreement made by two consenting adults, of course with the expectation of proper payment in exchange.  After the sexual acts are over and its time to pay, what happens if the customer refuses payment?  I seem to remember reading that from a legal perspective, it would probably fall into the category of theft and not sexual assault or rape (*I’m not saying the law is right here, we all know the law does not always have women’s best interest in mind, and rarely considers sex worker’s interests).  The classification as theft bothers me because, although it is technically a business transaction, it seems to objectify the woman and her body as nothing more “things” meant to be bought, or in this case stolen.  However, since the original sexual acts were decided upon consensually, could this fall into the category of rape/sexual assault? 

I think this is a complex issue and I would really appreciate your opinions!  If the above scenario were to take place, which I’m sure is probably common, would you classify it as sexual assault/rape or theft or something else all together?  Thanks for your comments and opinions!  

Emma Thompson has become an activist against human trafficking and sex slavery. This would suggest an attitude that is generally against the rape of young girls, no?

So why did she sign that abhorrent "Free Polanski" petition?

Excuse me while my head explodes.

TRIGGER WARNING 

So I have a history of abuse I’m trying to deal with.  There were several abusers, and the first was my father.  I’ve posted on my experiences before.

I never had a relationship, never had consensual sex and never had an orgasm.  I’m in my early 30s.  I’m trying to figure these things out and one of the things

And what did I find?  Basically, a complete lack of empathy and lots hostility towards survivors.  In her site, Dodson:

- Promotes the idea that non-sexually repressed women don’t do anything as stupid as freeze when sexually assaulted but rather would sort of go with the flow

- Complains about an ‘industry’ that grew around sexual abuse and “chronically kept victims wallowing in their past”.

- Shows an attitude of “get over it already” – “Some rape or incest survivors are unable or unwilling to move on, to sexually heal themselves with therapy and masturbation.” “

Another gem is a debate where Dodson’s web partner, Ross, and another writer on her site criticize Polanski’s arrest with arguments along the lines of “13 year olds are women”:

I don’t think Dodson hates survivors or anything, but it seems as if, like a lot of other sex positive writers I’ve read, she refuses to actually engage with what abuse means.  And honestly, it makes me tune her and anyone who endorses her out.  Why should I listen to someone who would obviously never listen to me?

I have to say this conforms to my anecdotal experiences:  the most sex-positive friends (one works in Babeland) I have reacted negatively to my disclosures about my father, going so far as to stop talking to me, while friends who were a little more reserved were much more supportive.

I have a theory of why that is – they are so invested in their identity as sex-loving people that they need to block out anything negative.   Another theory I read on an abuse-survivors website was that American society is very invested in the Virgin-Whore paradigm, and now that virginity is not so fashionable in some circles, people go to the other extreme.  Or maybe, I have to wonder, they’re not as comfortable with their sexuality as they’d like you to believe…

What do you think?

I rarely post on this community. I want to say it was just once, to gather information and win a bet about something that wasn't too important. I love feministing, and enjoy reading the posts and comments and rarely find the need to add input as there is a diverse group here with many different opinions, beliefs and experiences. But now I find myself needing support more than I think I ever have.

When I was 18 I found myself trapped in an abusive relationship. I can now recognize my own responsibility and naivety involved in that situation, but for lack of a better way to put it, I was a messed up kid. I clung to him the way I imagine I clung to my father before I was allowed to cross the street by myself. I convinced myself that he was my rock. I needed him to keep from spiraling out into a world that my teen angst and manic depression had found cold and uncaring.

Cross-posted from Yes Means Yes Blog

I said in the Shroedinger's Rapist post that it was part of a larger idea and might be Part I of two. Here's Part II.

It's all about boundaries. The Shapely Prose post started with a discussion of women's fear of rape, and moved from there to public spaces, interruption, intrusion and boundaries. My post focused on public transit as a particular case of public spaces, and staked out the position that bothering a woman whose activities and body language are not inviting interaction is a violation of her boundaries. I'm saddened to see pushback on that.

In comments, AJ wrote something that made me think about how this comes full-circle:
I felt like this article was good in that it helps het/cismen to realize that most female-bodied-people are terrified of rape and do a lot of weird things to try to lessen their "risk." Its the "risk" thing that worried me.
1) If a man rapes a woman, it is not her fault because she had somehow put her self at risk.
2) Because most rapists are someone the victims knows well, I dont like the perpetuation of the stranger-rape story.

And I wrote back:

Really, really good points.

(1) should go without saying. That it needs to be said at all is the product of rape culture.

(2) I totally agree that there's a wild imbalance in the discourse on rape where stranger rape and rape in public places are overrepresented -- but I see this post as not so much talking about the threat of the archetypal stranger rape, but the more general issue of boundary transgressing, which I can see from the comments here and at Shapely Prose are everywhere.

This isn't about walking to the car with keys in hand and checking the back seat. Those are narratives that have little to do with the rapes that have happened to so many of the women I know.

This is about whether men understand women's boundaries to be real.

And that has everything to do with how rape happens.

This is my first time posting.  I am so outraged, though, I wanted to get the word out about this.

The story begins in July when Anchorage Police Officer Anthony Rollins was arrested for sexual assault.  He came to APD's attention when Standing Together Against Rape received a phone call from one of Rollin's victims.  APD did an investigation into him and found a total of SIX victims of rape by Anthony Rollins. 

In August, despite having over $100,000 in assets, the judge allowed Officer Rollins a public defender!

It gets worse. 

Evidently, Rollins wasn't content to just rape six women.  He also had to stalk them via phone calls and emails. 

So what does a good judge do to a stalker, police officer, serial rapist?  He lets him out, of course!  Granted he has a little electronic device on his ankle, and a 3rd party custodian who happens to be wheelchair bound. 

The courthouse was also packed with people.  Oh, they weren't there for Rollin's victims.  Oh no!  They were there to support their fellow Christian, Officer Rollins. For the full story , read AK Mudflats Blog.

Rollins is currently on suspended leave with APD.  But Rollins' wife, also a police officer, is fully supportive of her husband!

Today, Standing Together Against Rape is organizing a protest at the Nesbett Courthouse at 825 W. 4th Ave from 12-3 to show the six, strong, courageous Survivors that Alaskans care about them. 

The King County Council, which serves cities such as Seattle, Bellevue, Redmond, and Kirkland, has proposed an 80% slash in the budget for the Coalition of Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence is made up of seven organizations: King County Sexual Assault Resource Center , Eastside Domestic Violence , Domestic Abuse Women's Network , YWCA , Refugee Women's Alliance , Harborview Center for Sexual Assault and Traumatic Stress , and the Children's Response Center. The budget cut will most likely shut-down some of these centers, which will have a devastating impact on refugee women and victims of sexual assault and domestic violence in King County. As a survivor of sexual abuse who has utilized the services of the Children's Response Center (CRC) and the King County Sexual Assault Resource Center (SARC), I understand firsthand the positive impact that these services have on our community at large. These programs serve a vital role in our community in both helping individuals become survivors of sexual assault and educating the community about ways we can transform our society into one free of sexual violence. I received individual and group counseling that helped me find my desire to live and move forward with my life. I know 100% that if I had not received support from the CRC and SARC in King County, I would not be living today. Today I am a college student, and I could not be happier. Cutting these programs will be a sure way to ensure that stories like mine will not end pleasantly. Please help save our programs by writing to the King County Council and asking them to re-consider the budget cut to the Coalition of Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence. These programs that support sexual assault survivors are absolutely essential. I hope that one day we will not need to provide programs for survivors of abuse because sexual violence will be non-existent but that is not today. Please help the residents of King County!

***TRIGGER WARNING***

This post will talk about some legal details of rape and rape cases, and is primarily focused on America.

I have been thinking recently about the ways that rape is discussed in the media, triggered by the Polanski case.

Specifically, Whoopi Goldberg's statement that it wasn't "rape-rape".

What is "rape-rape"?  From her tone, I feel what she is saying is that it's a questionable sexual act, but not actually rape .  Certainly something is not quite right, but it's too far to be called rape .

The details of the Polanski case are not really the issue, though.  What really matters, for the purpose of this post, is how the issue is discussed.  How the media and people we know view rape, and talk about it.

This is important, because these are the people who will judge rape victims, in courts of law and in their lives.  They will make these judgments on the people around them and help to form others' opinions.

Rape, in most people's minds, seems to be a violent act.  It cannot be "rape" unless the victim is young, female, alone (unless it's a multiple-perpetrator rape), not sexually promiscuous, sober, dressed properly (and not a sex worker, even if she is dressed properly), generally white, the perpetrator is unknown to them, and she fought as hard as she could, and never spoke to the perpetrator again.  That's "real" rape.

But clearly, that isn't the only scenario in which rape is committed.  Anyone can be assaulted or raped.  It doesn't require age, sex, sexual preferences, experience, clothing or prior knowledge to negate what really matters: consent.

There are situations in which the victim knows his or her assailant, has previously had sexual relations with them, didn't receive any visible physical injuries, or may even try to remain friends or partners with the assailant.

These kinds of details make a difference in how the rape is committed.  Some rapes are planned in advance.  Some are spontaneous.  Some are committed with the intent to harm and humiliate a specific victim, and some are committed just as an outlash of misogyny or hatred.

In my last session with my short term counselor at the women's center, she told me that since it's been so long since my assaults, that the best thing for me is to continue to work on grounding and reminding myself that I'm safe now. (because I have PTSD frequently)

But when these things come up for me, I want to do something about them.  I said to her, what about if I'm picturing one or two of the guys who attacked me?  I said, I'm so angry I never got to press charges or do anything to stand up for myself.  I wanted to know what I could do now about it.

Instead of letting me talk about that, she asked me if I was feeling angry with myself at all.  That got me really upset.  I said that most women feel angry with themselves and it's the job of the counselor to get them to realize it's the attackers who are to blame.  I told her that she was making me feel like it was my fault what happened.  She said that's not what she meant - she said it's good to be angry at the perpetrators and not at oneself.  She just wanted to know because most victims do experience that. I did used to be angry at myself a lot, but this was long before I was ever assaulted, and it stemmed from my childhood. I cried/shouted about this issue for awhile and she thought it was good for me to deal with that, but that was something that I'd already known about, and I resented someone else bringing up a topic that was so painful for me (being angry at the guys was a position of strength, and admitting that I'd had all that self-hatred from my childhood which was a totally different thing put me right back in a position of feeling awful and unloved.)  It took me years to realize that it was because of the way that I was treated as a child that I felt that way - that I wasn't a "rotten kid" and a bad person - and here I was feeling those emotions all over again.  Anyway...

Crossposted from Yes Means Yes Blog.

The Polanski arrest has everyone talking, and Lauren has again revisited her personal story, which can't be easy.

Lauren's a friend, and I'll say publicly what I've said privately before. If a girl or a woman gets raped, that's the rapist's fault. If she doesn't know who she can tell or if she can tell or whose side people will be on or if she'll be blamed or if she can get the support she needs ... then that's everyone's fault. The whole system, the whole country, the whole culture failed Lauren. And Samantha Geimer. And every other girl and woman both who have survived and who have not. We failed and we keep failing and that's a shit sandwich that we all get a bite of.

Slate has a new article up about false rape allegations. The piece discusses attempts to quantify exactly now many rape allegations are in fact false, and makes occasional good points including some about the police and how their default setting is often 'this woman is a liar', however, it fails on several levels.

Firstly, its title is this: 'How Often Do Women Falsely Cry Rape'? I have a problem with this phrase 'cry rape'. Rape seems to be the only crime that is characterised by such language. The word 'cry' implies childish, it implies emotional, it implies lack of seriousness. Would it make sense to say that people 'cry burglary'?

Secondly, the article seems to accept this figure of '8-10%', however unreported rapes are only mentioned very briefly, at the end of the article - and these would seriously skew this '8-10%' figure.

Also, the article does not mention on what grounds the rape allegations studied are decided to be false. If those compiling the statistics are relying on the victim retracting her story as a measure of falseness (as in the recent Hofstra case), then this is rather dodgy for all kinds of reasons (victim intimidation, fear of going to trial, etc). We don't know, though, because the article doesn't elaborate.

This is hard for me to post. There's a risk that the people involved with all see this, and I could get in a lot of trouble. But it's time for me to tell the story and come out about what happened.

***Trigger Warning***

- Names have been changed to keep people anonymous -

It was Valentine's Day, I had a protest that day. It had become a tradition, especially when the NYC guys were in town, to go party afterwards. I didn't go the month before, for reasons I can't really remember - I probably just didn't feel welcome, didn't have a ride, something like that. But in February my friend David talked to the host, I got a ride, and I was going.

We got to the party a little late since we went to dinner first. People had already been drinking; some seemed a little drunk already. Katie, who was dating the guy I liked at the time, went into the bathroom, and came out wearing a very glamorous dress. That's right, I thought, the Facebook event said to dress up. Fuck. There she was, with her red hair and giant boobs, looking absolutely stunning in her dress; and there I was, with my bad skin and imperfect body and dirty jeans and a Skelanimals shirt that probably had sweat stains, I was average at best. Feeling like shit about myself, I sat in a corner and watched the people around me play video games and slowly get hammered. I curled up under an end table at one point. Then Patrick came over. I opened up to him, about my insecurity. He assured me that I didn't need to look like her to be beautiful. Wow, I thought, what a nice guy.

I'd forgotten that the first thing he said when I arrived at the protest was "It's [my nickname], rape her!" The week before, at the NYC protest, he'd dry-humped me. I had no idea it would only get worse.

I am so overwhelmed by the several attacks that I had years ago that it affects nearly every area of my daily life even though I have individual counseling once a week with a caring person.

Due to the fact that I didn't recognize the attacks for what they were, I didn't seek help for them specifically at the time and my fears morphed into PTSD symptoms that gradually got worse, and then finally since about two years ago, I've been more afraid of the symptoms than of the attacks that actually occurred. 

I find that I'm triggered by everything from TV shows to song lyrics, to conversations with my friends about things I find frightening. 

Before I realized I'd been attacked, I was a fierce advocate for women's rights, and especially for women who'd been assaulted.  Once I gained that knowledge, it seemed I couldn't be hearing the word "rape" all the time and especially in casual conversation. I felt like I wanted to advocate, but the topic was just too overwhelming.  (Some time this past year I was advised by a counselor to make a time line of traumatic events in my life and I found it disturbing to think about all of them all at once, to see it visually like that.  During the process I'd remembered other things.)

I haven't even been able to read the posts on this site in several months, because every time I read about a rape or other assault it triggers me.  It stinks because I really like the conversations with like minded people who are good advocates. There were times when I found it helpful to look at some of the posts and write to Congress, I felt like I was helping, but then I'd feel worse about my own situation and get triggered more.  I wish I could be as strong as most of you - I've been to take back the night marches when I was in college and always admired the people who could get up and speak - I've had the courage to do many things in my life but this I find make me so disturbed and angry and frightened and upset that I just don't have the right outlet to deal with it.

I'm not sure what type of a site would be good for me right now until I'm strong enough to be on here more regularly.

I have a disability which makes it nearly impossible for me to get out to support groups and therapy sessions.  My PTSD lately has been really bad even though it's been years since I was assaulted.

I have to resort to calling my counselor on the phone for our sessions because she is 45 mintues away from me and she doesn't make house calls.  I have to pay out of pocket because she doesn't accept my insurance.

I've been also working with a counselor from a temporary crisis counseling type of a place but since it was only temporary, I'm looking for another resource to help me with my flashbacks.

I feel like there are a lack of resources for disabled people like myself.  Places are wheelchair accessible, but if someone is too weak to leave the house they can't get there.  If I am able to make it somewhere, I'd have to lay down - like on a couch or something.  Also, a lot of these programs insist that you "make a commitment" of a certain amount of days per week.  I understand why this is important, and I would love to make a commitment, but my health is so unpredictable that I would be lucky to even get somewhere just sporadically.  Even the counselor at the women's center, who knows my condition tells me that I may not be eligible for their group sessions if I can't make a commitment.  This is so disheartening and depressing.  I want to work on this more than anything and just be free of this and be able to feel safe again in my life.  I don't even feel safe in my own house anymore, even though I know that I am safe I just don't feel it.

There is an outpatient place for women who've experienced trauma in my state, but they don't let you stay for residency, and I can't do the traveling back and forth for each session.  Other places outside my state have resdiency but clients have to pay out of pocket, and I can't afford that. 

I wish there were more resources for people who have a very painful time traveling.  I've tried calling the national clearinghouse of self-help groups, and it's just too far to get anywhere.

I'm not sure what would be the best plan of action for me.  Even trying to find an additinoal counselor is impossible on my insurance, because I'd have to travel too far.  There's a woman in my town who counsels people with PTSD but I'd have to pay out of pocket and I'm on a fixed income.

Because I've had so many traumas in my life, it's going to take a long time for me to recover from all of them, so the short crisis-intervention counseling was great (even though it was years after the fact), but I feel I could go through the counseling a few more times to deal with the other attacks.

I wish I could increse the sessions with the regular counselor (not the crisis one) but since she doesn't take my insurance, I just can't afford it.

I'm just not sure where to turn.

** Trigger Warning

This is exactly what it sounds like.  No kidding.

The artist has constructed a long tunnel that gets narrower and narrower toward the end designed to make the person entering get into a "submissive position."  Once they reach the space at the end of the tunnel, he's explained, he says he will "try to the best of my ability to overpower and rape the person."

We are all familiar with controversy of when it's art and when it's just done for shock.  In most cases, we can can conceive of both sides, even if one seems radically more likely or reasonable. In this instance, though, I have to ask -- how is this art?  

The idea of the act of rape as art is in itself incredibly upsetting.  I believe that rape can be the subject of art, but this can't be the way to do it.  

Thoughts?  I live in Columbus, by the way, and the local reaction so far seems to be mostly confusion.

After seeing so many mainstream news organizations completely (or almost completely) ignore the fact that Roman Polanski raped a child, I was happy to see The Onion take it on this morning.

I'd say they did a good job of getting back to the issue at hand.

I heard on the BBC this morning a story about a man who had raped a girl decades ago but was only now being prosecuted. Curious about why he was being prosecuted so much later, I looked him up online.

His name is Roman Polanski. He is a famous director who years ago allegedly raped a 13 year old girl named Samantha Geimer while photographing her for a magazine. On the first photo session he asked her to undress, and she felt it was an inappropriate request. Still, she later agreed to a second session. I can practically feel her trying to justify his previous actions-- "I probably imagined it. He did not mean anything by it. After all, he is a professional and is used to models being in various modes of dishabille. Many models pose nude. I was just being silly."

At their next session, Polanski plies Geimer with alcohol and quaaludes and makes her undress. She begged him to take her home as he allegedly assaulted her.

In my search, the first thing I came across was a blog that was very sympathetic to Polanski. One part read, "One night Polanski found himself in actor Jack Nicholson’s hot tub with a delightful, nude 13 year-old girl, Samantha Geimer. A lot of champaign had been consumed by both and there was sex. In most American states that’s considered a somewhat serious crime but in Europe they are more cavalier about such things."

It made me angry. No where did the author use the word rape, not even just to mention what Polanski was accused of. On top of that, the language completely downplays the nature of the crime.

He "found himself" in the hot tub makes it sound like he didn't have anything to do with getting in the hot tub or coercing a young girl into it with him, like it was some miraculous act of God. Nor does he mention that the girl was only nude because Polanski directed her to undress or that she has consumed champagne as part of Polanski's shoot. The author completely ignores his agency. It also reeks of the idea that if a woman did legitimately consent to those activities, then she also implicitly consented to sex.

Then, his description of Geimer as "delightful" and "nude" seems to be used to justify Polanski's actions, as though he is trying to suggest that it is a perfectly natural reaction for a man to take advantage of an attractive nude female who happens to be in his vicinity, as though the man had no control and it was only the qualities of the female that led to the act. It implies that the female has the power to control the man by inhibiting her own "delightful" qualities.

The author does not address the fact that Polanski was in a position of power over the girl. Not only was he the much older "professional" who was in charge of the photoshoot, he also had control over her ability to leave since he was, according to Geimer's testimony, responsible for bringing her home. Neither does he acknowledge that 13 years of age is extremely young, just barely more than a child. Instead, he says this "is considered a somewhat serious crime," as though only uptight, puritanical americans cannot understand that having sex with young girls is natural. If 13 is considered normal by him, I shudder to think of what the age cutoff would be in his mind for it to reasonably be a crime. (As a fun side note, while he seems to be hailing what he perceives to be Europe's "more cavalier attitude," he also has the tasteless Obama-as-Joker picture up over the caption "Socialism" leading me to believe he is one of the people who would be up in arms if it was suggested that the U.S. imitate Europe in other ways.)

I can accept arguments being sympathetic to Polanski. I can understand sympathy and arguments in favor of pardoning the now elderly Polanski. What I cannot get are suggestions that it is acceptable to exercise one's authority over someone to obtain "sex," to use drugs to induce someone to have "sex," or that "sex" via coercion or intimidation is natural. The more people try to suggest that these are normal sexual behaviors or natural byproducts of male desire, the more truth is brought to Catherine MacKinnon's idea that heterosexual norms are implicated in sexual violence.

(Cross-Posted from Change Happens )

First things first: PLEASE CLICK HERE AND VOTE FOR SAFER TO WIN $10,000!

You might remember that we entered a contest at the beginning of the month and, thanks to our awesome supporters, made in into the finals. Well as of today the final showdown has begun! All vote counters are turned back to zero, so if you voted the first time please vote again, and if you didn’t get a chance before, we need your help now more than ever! It takes only a couple of minutes to register and open the confirmation email (you can use your old login info if you already registered) but those couple minutes can help us win $10,000 we so desperately need. If you have a few more minutes to spare, and can email your various friends and networks asking them to vote as well , we would be forever thankful.

But why is this worth anyone’s time? What will the money be used for? Let me tell you! SAFER has a new project in the works, involving a partnership with VDay , that will vastly expand the number of college students engaged in sexual assault policy reform and challenging rape culture on campuses nationwide. Tentatively titeled, “The Campus Accountability Project: Demanding Sexual Assault Policy Reform,” the project will connect SAFER with VDay’s huge network of student organizers who each year put on benefit performances on hundreds of college campuses to help eradicate sexual violence.

I'll just come right out and say it: I was raped.

Eight months ago, I was raped by my ex-boyfriend, and I have spent eight months in complete denial. I struggled with it every day -- nightmares, flashbacks, and other psychological problems afflicted me. Yet I still couldn't identify it for what it was: rape.

I think that's partially because of my ignorance. Even though I consider myself to be a feminist, and I KNOW that rape is not usually done by a stranger in a dark alley, I still couldn't believe that what happened to me was rape.

But I couldn't ignore my problems any longer. Two days ago, I went to the sexual assault counseling program at my college. And that very same day, I reported my rape to the police.

It happened so suddenly. One minute I was talking to a counselor, and the next minute she was suggested that I make a confidential report. And then I said, no, I think I want to report it to the police.

It came as a shock to everyone involved, including me. But I was firm in my decision, and when the detective walked through the door, I gave my story without any doubts.

Reporting is a personal decision, and I understand very well the desire not to report. I spent eight months not wanting to report. But let me tell you that for me, reporting was one of the best decisions I could have ever made. I felt SO MUCH BETTER afterward -- as if a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

It was also one of the hardest decisions I ever made: talking to the police and the detective and having to answer their questions was horrible and traumatic. But afterward? It felt RIGHT. It felt like something I should have done all along.

I guess what I just want to say is that reporting a rape is incredibly difficult, and sometimes it's just not the right choice for a particular person. But if you think that it might be the right choice for you, at any point in time, by all means, do it. Maybe you're not ready yet. I know that feeling. I waited eight months before I was ready. But it's never too late.

And it's worth it.

Even though I already have a series of outlets: a great partner, a few friends who listen, and my own blog I need to expel my frustration to a community that is more responsive.  I love feministing and I just can't think of a better place to rant, cry, and get some good feedback.

~

This past August, just a week before classes officially started in most colleges in the U.S., I was sexually assaulted by someone I had once considered a friend.  He had been drinking and I was totally sober.  We were hanging out at a frat party making fun of the horrible music that was being played and just catching up since we hadn't seen each other in a while.  I actually ended up storming out of the party because this other guy was being a total asshole and tried to whip out his dick on me.  So I left with my middle fingers in the air, yelling at him and all that.  And my assaultant followed me saying stuff like,"Yeah that guy's such a douchebag!"  Totally agreeing with me on every issue and just being cool.

So we both agreed that it would be awesome to hang out at my place to listen to some music and catch up some more.  As soon as we get to my place he's all over me like flies on shit.  I tell him, "Look, if I wanted to have sex with you I would have invited you over to have sex not to listen to music."  So he starts huffing and puffing and tries to guilt trip me into hooking up with him.  I let him know that I'm not hearing it, and he still pins me down anyway and forces me to kiss him.  I eventually wiggle my way into a position where I can push him off, and while he runs to the bathroom I IM the only friend who happens to be online at 2 a.m. and tell them to stay around just in case things get worse.  This guy comes back and forces me to kiss him again.  I push him off and he demands that I give him a "goodbye" kiss.  I say no, get the fuck out of here.  He tries to sneak another kiss from me, so I wrap my fingers around his throat, choking him and staring him down.  "I don't want to hook up with you.  Get out of here now."

The next morning I confront him in a public place with professors and friends chillin' in the park where I'm at.  I recount the story for him from my perspective and tell him that whatever "hooking up" he thought we did wasn't consensual and that he will never hang out with me again.  I also use this time to remind him of my past - as we had already talked extensively about it before - that I was stalked and raped by a man 12 years older than me throughout my entire junior year of high school.  Being sexually assaulted again thoroughly shook whatever stability I had been working so hard on.

Some Turkish women and girls responded to an ad for a reality TV show in the format of Big Brother, and instead they were being filmed for internet porn. They moved into a luxury villa and had signed contracts saying they would have to pay a fine if they left the house. It was only after a while they realized they weren't on a TV show but none of them could afford to pay the fine and had to stay there for a two month period until the police arrived. Some of these women were only 16.

This is an appalling reminder of the way that some men fail to see women as people with their own rights and minds, and think they can use them like inanimate objects for their own pleasure. I'm disgusted.

There's been considerable reaction to Gemany's recent ads that feature Hitler and Stalin having sex with women -- all for the cause of AIDS awareness.

So what is the message exactly? That women having unprotected sex is like having sex with Hitler? Or that unprotected sex perpetuates death?

Majority of the controversy over the images has focused on the fact the use of the dictator, but I'm not sure what to make of the sexualization of women within this context. There are so many layers and issues going on here I'm not sure where to begin.

More here and here.

Hi everyone. Just wanted to reach out into the internet ether to ask for some help. SAFER (Students Active for Ending Rape) is a national nonprofit dedicated to helping college students reform their schools' sexual assault policies and challenge rape culture. This month we are part of an online contest to win $10,000. The contest is entirely voter-determined, so if you could vote for us, we would be incredibly appreciative.

VOTE HERE!

It really only takes a couple minutes, is free, and shouldn't result in tons of spam, but you do have to register, open up a registration email, and then vote.

The money will help us with two major projects we're working on, including launching our online student resource library, which will contain all of organizing tools for campus activists, as well as provide students with a space to connect with activists at other schools, and share the work their doing with one another. We're also in the process of expanding (and re-designing) our College Sexual Assault Policies Database , so there is an online record of school policies that students can mine for ideas and hold schools accountable.

Thanks for your time and support! Please reach out to contact@safercampus.org if you'd like to talk to us about what's going on on your campus.

SAFER

I am an almost-twenty college woman.  I am just starting my third year as an anthropology major at a teeny-tiny liberal arts university.  I know six women, including myself, who have been sexually assaulted; four of us during our college career.  None of us have reported our experience to any division of the Department of Justice.

Somehow, I think the good ol' D-o-J's numbers are slightly skewed.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately.  I haven't really addressed my own experience with sexual assault because in lieu of my friends' experiences, mine seemed--seems--so inconsequential.  It was so long ago and I was so innocent at the time that even now I have trouble remembering that in eighth grade a classmate dry-humped me in front of a group of his friends during P.E.  Compared to the different stories that other women have confided to me...getting a full-on crotch grab, inside her pants, by an anonymous hand at a campus party.  Being nearly raped by a friend of a friend while they were both drunk, then getting blamed and shamed for it over the next few weeks.  Fighting off someone she thought she could trust and still having nightmares about it, two years later.  Having some stranger give her his number after fucking her despite her constant NO's .

Every member of the incoming freshman class at my university is required to attend a seminar on sexual assault.  The seminar goes a little something like this: You sit in a room with about 40 other freshmen.  You've known them for a little less than a week.   Two presenters, one male and one female, talk you through a power-point presentation on sexual assault.  They define sexual harassment, sexual assault, and rape.  They give you statistics about sexual assault on your campus (which don't seem too terrible, actually).  Then they tell you how to keep from getting raped.  Don't drink, use the buddy system, never go anywhere by yourself with someone you don't know.  If it does end up happening to you--well, you shouldn't have been drinking and you shouldn't have left your buddy, but it happened, so--here's what you can do about it, especially if you don't want anyone to know about it, because God knows getting raped is a horrible and shameful thing to have happen to you.  OK, so long!  Have a good year!  Try not to get raped!

Three glaring problems with this little seminar:

I feel compelled to post about this because I need to share it with someones who can understand from a feminist perspective.

I'm a second year university student, last year my roommate (potluck) [referred to as C] and I became very close friends. From the minute she walked in the door of our little room, we were friends. And within the first 7 hours of knowing her, she was fighting with her boyfriend (who was several years her senior).

He was mad because she had left her phone on vibrate in her backpack and didn't answer when he called (I was showing her around campus because she'd only been there once before, whereas I'd spent several days just roaming around). That fight lasted about a week, and shortly thereafter he was mad because she didn't pick up the phone fast enough when he called.

Can you see the set up? As we got closer, and I listened to C's conversations with this guy (and held her while she cried because he told her that she was letting her sisters down by being her high school valedictorian and coming to one of the most prestiguous schools in the state), I slowly realised what was going on.

C's boyfriend was a manipulative, possessive, and verbally/mentally abusive ass. He constantly wanted to know where she was, what she'd been doing, and who she'd been with. He got angry when she needed to take a student loan because he believed they were going to get married and she was putting him in debt. He disapproved of her considering becoming a dentist rather than a dental hygienist. He even objected to her participating in student organisations and doing anything but spending all her free time studying (when he was okay with her being at college at all).

I one day stumbled across a message board site called Teen Spot and it is pretty much a place for teens to talk. I went onto the advice column out of curiousity and see a post about someone being raped by her boyfriend. The person didn't sound too convincing that they were raped but I wasn't quick to jump to conclusions that the person was obviously lying, some people express things differently about what happened to them. What disturbed me as the thread was the OBSESSIVE amount of victim-blaming that was going on through the message boards.

Here's post one:

"Nobody on Teenspot gives a shit if you've been raped. If you really want to do something about it, and you weren't a troll, I would say to tell an adult you trust....you would think at 17, that would be instilled in your brain....since that's what you learn in 1st grade."

My response to this is that yes they do tell us to always tell an adult but if this person had any sense on rape and rape victims, it's hard for a rape victim to tell someone. I didn't tell anyone about my sexual abuse until a couple years after it happened and I still didn't go to the authorities about it. Many rape victims don't.

The second post was outright victim-blaming and it made me throw up in my mouth:

"I agree with the girl above, You should have known what to do since firstgrade.

You, an obvious troll. You Probally deserved it.

Keep your legs shut."

I hate when people say idiotic comments like this because rape-victims, espcially teenage girls, usually get blamed when they get raped. And the comment where the poster ended with keep your legs shut, shows how disgusting the victim-blaming has got it. How can you keep your legs shut if someone is forcing them open? And what does that have to do with rape is the better question.

The same poster had even posted more about rape:

"Most girls, will Ask for it... beg and tease a guy.

Then when their done, Oh! You..raped me! I'M TELLING! / They break up a week later and she wants revenge.

It's girls like YOU, who gives the rest of us a bad name."

I love how the person felt the need to victim-blame twice. I don't know about you but I never heard of a girl screaming rape because she broke up with the guy. I personally have had some bad experiences with guys considering that I'm in high school and it happens but I never pinned rape on a guy to get revenge. I don't know any girls that have and I hate the comment about begging and teasing a guy. It's one of the top things that people use to defend rapists.

I feel no need to post anymore posts because the whole thread was truly disgusting. There were people that called her an attention whore, people that kept repeating on how if she didn't want to be raped, she should have kept her legs shut, and even people that agreed with the second poster that if a girl leads a guy on or makes him think he's interested than it's okay for him to rape her.

The sad thing about this entire thread was that majority of the posters seemed to be teenage girls or girls in their early 20's and sadly only one girl on the thread defending the fact that there was no excuse for raped (and then she got attacked and debated against). It says something to my generation. Why is it that teenagers feel like rape can somewhat be acceptable and how is the next generation going to be when it views things like rape, abuse, and other things?

The New York Times has a news story up about some new problems in the Congo. Now in addition to women and girls, men are being raped brutally by armed militants. This is horrible because I think this means everyone is now a target for sexual violence.

Trigger warning.

Community member cunegonde wrote a blog post recently about her experience being psychologically coerced into having sex with a male peer.

Since we live within a rape culture, and we operate within an unequal social system (patriarchy) that certainly affects and sometimes causes our interpersonal experiences, this happens to women all the time.

To a certain extent, this happened to me twice as a teenager, and cunegonde's brave post inspired me to open up about the experiences.

Incident #1: I was hanging out at my best friend's house with a couple friends. We were 17. We were drinking and smoking pot, listening to music, gossiping and laughing those head-thrown-back, invincible teenage girl laughs. She invited an old friend of hers over. She told me he just got back from boot camp and he seemed different, strange. He came over, and so did a couple other boys. We got wasted, like 17/18 year olds do. We started flirting. I gave him a lap dance because he asked me to. I drank and smoked more because he told me to. I was very easy to order around and treat like a doormat at the time.

Touchy subject, probably triggering.

I was raped last September. (Or if I'm going to phrase it actively, a rapist raped me.) Sort of.

Mine is one of those gray-area cases that are tragically common, yet don't get much attention in the culture at large. I'm using my own personal experience to frame the issue.

I think the perpetrator thinks I gave consent. I did say "I can't," but I never explicitly said "NO." I never physically resisted. The perpetrator was even going to walk away at one point and leave me, but I eventually did say ok, let's just do it, for fear of the "cocktease" rumors that I thought would abound among our mutual circle of friends. I realize now that that "reasoning" is extremely fucked. We were both very, very drunk.

I feel like I was raped. It's been almost a year and I'm still afraid of most heterosexual men. I still get flashbacks and cry every now and then, though I have been able to enjoy consensual sex.

I think the perpetrator thinks it was just a stupid thing we did.

So who decides?

I'm leery to use the R-word when talking about... IT, not because I don't feel like it was rape but because I think the people I'm talking to don't think it is. I started seeing a therapist after the incident and she never used the word either, after I told her the details. I get the vibe that people think I'm being a drama queen. I think the perpetrator may be right in that it was just a stupid thing we did one night, and it just hit me extra hard because it was my first time and whatever, and with my feminist background I'm just touchy about the subject of violence against women in general. How can it be rape if the "rapist" read my actions as giving consent?

A professor and a mentor of mine says that its not the intentions that matter, it's the outcome. For example, if someone tells a racist joke and someone else is offended, just because the joker wasn't intentionally being racist doesn't mean the offended party's feelings aren't valid. So by that logic, if I think I was raped then I was.

But I did give consent, sort of. I'm afraid I'm almost cheapening the R-word to use it for my stupid drunken mistake, and I'm somehow making it less effective for the people who were "really" raped.

So. In a rape or sexual assault case, does the perpetrator's intent matter? Are potential perpetrators supposed to hear the trepidation in our voices as we finally relent, and be smart enough to stop when we are too afraid to? Is there another term we can use to describe an unwanted sexual experience for which consent was eventually, reluctantly, sorta given?

Or have I internalized all the victim-blaming language I've been hearing my whole life and being horribly irrational?

The idea that by default womens bodies are available for sexual use and that women have to revoke consent every single time is Fucked .

This should be common sense, yet for some reason people have this irrational fear that if their partner doesn't have to say "no", that they might accidentally rape them.

You don't accidentally rape someone. How can you not notice when your partner freezes in fear? Or when they are totally unresponsive? When they put their arms in front of their body to shield themselves from you ? When they stare at the ceiling the entire time? When they're in pain?

Maybe you don't care because neither your partner's pleasure nor consent is important to you. In other words, you don't care because you're a rapist .

Sex is a mutual, shared experience. It's not a conquest. It's not some fucked up game of aggressors and gatekeepers. It's not a prize to be won, or something that's owed. It's not a rite of passage. It doesn't mean you love each other (even though it can be a way to express it if you do). If you're male it doesn't make you a man, and if you're female it doesn't make you a slut.

But how do we create enforceable laws that shift the burden to obtaining positive consent for sex, rather than simply requiring a lack of revocation? Requiring that a partner verbally say "yes" every time is neither practical nor sexy, and it misses the point. Someone will say "yes" if they fear violence for saying "no", or are otherwise not empowered to say "no."

Of course, when you're actually there its obvious when the sex was mutual. When you look into their eyes, they look back. When you lean towards them, they mirror you. When you put your arm around them, they pull you closer. When you kiss them, they kiss back.

Hell, they might even initiate something themselves!

But in the courtroom, what behaviors should be accepted as proof of consent?

U.S. citizens condemn Middle Eastern countries for jailing rape victims but our justice system does that every day. Here, the average age a girl becomes a prostitute is 12-14, and the average age for boys is 11-13 (http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/ceos/prostitution.html ). Child prostitutes are victims of statutory rape, yet a perversion of the law says that when a rapist pays money to rape a child the child becomes a criminal who can be arrested, prosecuted, humiliated by the justice system and imprisoned no matter how young they are. They have suffered enough; these children don’t deserve to be punished for being raped.

Strangely, anti-trafficking laws grant more protection to foreigners raped in the United States than to our own citizens. For example, if a 12-year-old Sudanese girl is trafficked into the United States and forced to work in a New Jersey brothel the law would not view her as a prostitute. They would classify her as a sex slave. The police would give her federal protection under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000. In contrast, a 12-year-old U.S. citizen forced to work in the same brothel would be treated like a criminal, thrown in jail, probably fined and get a criminal record.

A feminist and activist friend of mine alerted her facebook subscribers to this story (trigger warning), about a young person whose sexual history was put on public display by her mother and radio hosts and producers, despite the fact that she was a) a minor, and b) a survivor of sexual assault.

The radio hosts were obviously unaware of the fact that this girl was raped at the age of twelve, and we can assume that the same goes for producers of the show.  However, I'm not sure that this is as simple as blaming the mother for bringing her child onto the show and asking questions when she knew about the assault, which is what many commenters of facebook seemed to do.

I also don't think that it is acceptable to simply assert that the radio show is awful and that they should be taken off the air.  The fact that anyone thought that interviewing a child about her sexual history is okay is a massive problem, not just for the individual who thought it, but for society, since they also thought that it was okay for that information to be broadcast.

I don't listen to this radio station (for obvious reasons) and so I don't know who else has been interviewed with a lie detector on them, but I wonder how many people were asked questions that they did not feel comfortable in answering.  Would their requests to refuse to answer a question be respected?  And did this young person consent to the lie detector in the first place?  It surely doesn't sound as though she did.

I hate to think what might have happened if she hadn't had consensual sex had denied the fact that she had - something that could be entirely accurate, since she was raped - and the lie detector had shown a lie. Would she have been subjected to mockery, jokes, anger... when would it have stopped? I imagine that it would be only when she released the information that her sexual experience occurred without her consent.

What a stunning example of people forgetting that rape exists, and contributing to rape culture by assuming that people's sexual history has any bearing on how much privacy they deserve.

So yes, the parent is to blame, but the fact that someone thought it would be appropriate and would garner public interest to discuss a child's sexual history is symptomatic of a far greater problem, which is that we are all judged and treated as though we are our sexual history.

What do others think?

Crossposted at AMPLIFY.

Trigger warning.

"The Land Where Rapists Go Free"  is part of a series called Global Diaries that the journalist Mariane Pearl does for Glamour magazine. (Marianne Pearl is the wife of Daniel Pearl who was killed in 2003 by terrorists in Pakistan, she wrote the book A Mighty Heart that was later adapted into film). Global Diaires are amazing peieces written profiling women in the US and around the world. In the series Pearl usually focuses her attention on a problem that is disproportionately affecting women and then profiles a local female leader trying to make a difference.

Recently, there have been a lot of posts in the feminist blogosphere about rape jokes. I'm someone who long ago came to the conclusion that no topic should be universally excluded from humor, including topics that are serious and painful. I suppose this belief comes from the fact that humor is often used as a way of coping with pain.

When I became aware of the fact that most other feminists regard rape jokes as inherently wrong, I struggled to understand why.

Here I think a bit of background information is necessary. I grew up very sheltered from rape culture. I grew up around people who recognized the horror of rape, regardless of whether it was perpetrated by a stranger in a dark ally or by ones spouse. There was never any victim blaming. Rape was understood as an act of violence where "sex" was a weapon that had nothing in common with consensual sex. These understandings were considered self-evident and non-controversial. I was totally unaware of rape culture until I began actively researching rape, domestic violence, and the history of womens rights in the US. (This is not to imply that women are the only victims of rape or domestic violence, only that they are disproportionately impacted by it.)

My friends all grew up as sheltered as I did, and occasionally would make rape jokes. The only particular one I remember was "It's not rape if you yell 'surprise sex!' first." When we laughed, we were laughing at the absurdity of the idea that yelling "surprise sex" makes any sort of difference. Of course its still rape, how could anyone possibly be stupid enough to think otherwise?

My best friend is a guy. He's been my friend for over 15 years now. He's great in many ways and I love him like a brother. I know that I can tell him anything and he'll always be there for me. That said, he, of course, like any human being, has his problems.

I am a rape survivor. It happened just over 8 years over. He is aware of this. He was one of the first people I told. He's tried to be there for me as much as he can but really he doesn't know how to help and I really don't know what I want from him other then the occasional shoulder to cry on or person to talk to about it. For the most part, he's really great about it. But there's one thing he does that's just horrible:

He tells rape jokes.

They really really upset me and I've told him this many times. I've told him calmly and politely and I've also yelled at him about it. No matter what he doesn't seem to "get" it and even though he says he'll stop, he often forgets and out comes another rape "joke" a month later.

One of his favorite "jokes" is to lean in and whisper to me "I'm going to rape you later." This sends chills down my spine for obvious reasons. I don't know why he finds it humorous, maybe because he likes seeing my horrified reaction? I always tell him "That's not funny and no you're not" in a very serious tone to make sure he knows I don't find it amusing and I'm not joking in any way. To which he usually responds something along the lines of "Well it won't be rape if you agree to it" or something like that. I think in his mind he somehow thinks he's giving me some sort of compliment.

Now, most of the time when he says a "joke" he's been drinking but I still don't buy that as an excuse, nor does that make it hurt any less. And he's not always drunk when he says them. He always seems to fall back on the whole: "This is how I've always been. You've known me for 15 years, I can't just change now." Granted, it's true that probably when I was younger I laughed at these stupid kinds of "jokes." I wasn't always a feminist and I wasn't always a survivor. I was immature and stupid and didn't understand why those kinds of "jokes" were NOT FUNNY. Even if you're not a survivor of rape they are NOT FUNNY.

These "jokes" used to be few and far between which made them much easier to deal with. But lately, for whatever reason, they've become more frequent. It all came to a head this Saturday night when we were out drinking and he told one "joke" too many and we got into a huge screaming match. He was supposed to stay over at my apartment (I live in the city and he lives in the suburbs so he usually stays with me after a night of drinking in the city seeing as it's a long, expensive cab ride home for him) but I ended up locking him out. He called me several times and I didn't pick up and I can only assume he hopped in a cab and went home. I tried to call him yesterday but he did not answer. I assume now he's made at me for "throwing a fit" and taking things "too seriously."

I don't really know what to do. Like I said, I think of him as a brother. I love him to death. I know this post makes him sound like a crappy guy and a bad friend but really he's not in almost every other aspect of our relationship. But these "jokes" just really piss me off and I can't take it anymore. I don't know how to make him understand and stop. Part of me thinks that I just need to take some time away from him for a while, but that won't help him stop telling those "jokes," it'll just help me not be as angry. I really want him to understand why rape isn't at all funny and why his "jokes" are completely inappropriate. I never thought it would be so hard to get him to realize this but it is!

Hi Everyone!

I want to invite all of you (in NYC) to a couple of upcoming SAFER events, as well as plug some fundraising opps for us...

--On July 25, Cara of The Curvature will be participating in the 2009 Blogathon on behalf of SAFER. She'll be spending 12 hours posting about sexual violence on her blogathon sub-blog. You can still sponsor her , and because all donations go directly to SAFER's programming and upcoming projects, sponsors are beyond appreciated.

--On July 29, SAFER will be hosting a happy hour at the Village Pourhouse Bar in NYC (64 3rd Ave. at 11th st). For $5 at the door there will be an open bar from 6 to 7. Come have a drink and say hi! The facebook invite is here. 

--On August 3 SAFER will be holding a FREE Teach-In at the NARAL Pro-Choice NY Offices (470 Park Ave South, 7th floor) from noon to 2 p.m. This teach-in is a great introduction to the work we do with students on campus , and all interested college students and their advocates are encouraged to attend. Please RSVP by July 29th to contact@safercampus.org. You will need a government-issued ID to enter the building.

This is going to be an exciting year for SAFER as we expand our College Sexual Assault Policies database and launch our SAFER Info Shop, an online resource center for student activists. You'll be hearing from us a lot more soon and I thank ya'll in advance to listening and reading...

For a while now I've gotten my daily giggles at the site FMyLife.com. Sure, it's not always in good taste, but schadenfreude rarely is. In case you've missed out on the FML goodness, people submit very short stories which begin with the word "Today" and end with "Fuck My Life" (abbreviated as FML).

I was pretty disturbed today to come across not one, but two stories that clearly described sexual assault. Below is the letter I wrote to the FML administrators:

Dear FML admins,

Thank you,
Lily

TRIGGER WARNING: I'm reposting the FML's here for reference.

Today, my boyfriend decided to come clean. Apparently last week when I was drunk and asleep, he decide to wank all over me. Then laughed when I said I felt 'sticky' in the morning. FML

Today, I woke up with my boyfriend next to me, with his knob in my face. Apparently I'm a heavy sleeper, and he'd been shoving it in my mouth for months. FML

CNN today reported on the story of an 8 year old girl in Phoenix who was gang raped in a shed in her neighborhood by 4 boys who live nearby. The girl, and her four attackers, were Liberian, which I wouldn't feel compelled to share, except that that's where CNN went wrong.

The girl's family is blaming her, and describes the shame they feel that the crime has brought on their family. That's hard to swallow, but not necessarily an uncommon reaction. CNN had a Liberian man on via telephone to explain to all of us Americans how rape is dealt with in his country and community- are we supposed to believe that there is one response to rape in the Liberian community? While the reporter repeatedly made statements about how rape is treated in America, most absurdly after mentioning that since the family and perpetrators are here on refugee status, they needed to follow our rules and approach to dealing with things. CNN managed to make them sound like aliens and us like the world champions of rape victims. America's brilliant response to rape may not ring true in the memories of many victims/survivors in this country.

This article (actually, it's a blog entry) discusses the difficulties faced by female sportscasters, pointing out the negative attention they often attract.

However, many of the commenters on this piece argue that voyeurism is not assault.

What do you think?

So, I've been reading some community posts lately that have to do with sexual assault. I have thought about this a bit and I'm not quite sure what to do about it. My ex-boyfriend was not what I would call a high quality human being. He lied about a lot of stuff and generally didn't treat me with much respect. He often continued to ask me for sex after I said no and one time, after some alcohol consumption, we ended up in a really scary situation that would legally be sexual assault, but I don't know that that is what I want to call it.

So my question is this...would it ever be okay to tell someone that he is in a relationship with (he recently got engaged) about his behavior or should I let her figure it out on her own? My gut instinct is to just let it be...but maybe that's just because I am somewhat bitter and think getting engaged after nine months means you get what you sign up for...? And who knows, maybe he's not like that with her...?

Any thoughts or advice from others who have encountered this situation???

When I was fifteen years old I was violently raped by a man eight years my senior. Since that time I have also had other sexual assault experiences, which were not nearly as traumatic for me, though these experiences still made an impact. In the nine years since my first assault, I have been consciously and unconsciously trying to heal (by which I mean, at certain times my healing processes have been more purposeful then at other times, when I'm more or less ignoring the need to heal). I have also become an activist and done as much as I can to support survivors. I've learned a lot and grown and found strength - even if at times I'm still plagued by bouts of fear and depression.

Recently I started therapy to address these issues of sexual violence (as well as a few other things). I've only been with my therapist for a month or so now but I'm glad I made the decision to do it. The other day during our session my therapist asked me to try to imagine what I would say to my perpetrator if I were face to face with him. She wanted me to take the knowledge and experience that I have gained in the 9 years since the rape and use that to say whatever I wanted to this man who violated me.

I couldn't do it.

I have a very difficult time using my voice in response to the assault I experienced - in addition to every day life. I just generally have a rough time expressing myself. So I sat there thinking, trying to imagine how this scenario would go down. But I was stuck.

If I shut my brain down and followed my gut instinct.... If I shut down and just let my purest, raw emotions take route.... Well, I think I would yell and scream at him. It would probably go something like this,:

I was perusing my facebook last night when i came across a status update by a guy i used to go to High School with in the USA when i lived there. I have not seen this person in probably 2 years, we were not close friends but more like friendly aquaintances.

His status report was as follows...

"chelsea vs seattle...prepare the ass rape"

Now im not sure what sport this is referencing but im almost certain that he was talking about some imminent event that he was looking forward to. Obviously we all at feministing are aware of using such terms to describe something that has nothing to do with 'ass rape' in general. I was not furious, but understandably irked by such insensitivity.

So trying to approach this situation with a good heart to try to shed some light i replied to his status report, which can be seen by his friends on their wall (for those who are not familiar with the site). My response:

'with all due respect, words like 'ass rape' shouldn't be thrown around as a joke, it makes a mockery of the people who are actually affected by such things.'

to which he replied about 10 minutes ago

'then i'll be sure to walk on egg shells and follow the soft culture political correctness.'

So now im lost as to what to do. Some may say that i should not have replied in such a public forum so as to embarass him or cause him to be defensive. However if he is so willing to post something like 'ass rape' which is also public, do i not have a right to consequently voice my concerns if it is offensive. Also, he has approx 1000 friends, now im not going to go and count how many female friends he has, but assuming loosely that half are female half are male, and statistically speaking according to the UN 2/3 of women will be sexually assaulted at one point in their lives, is it not highly likely that at least one of his female friends has been raped or sexually assualted and may have been upset by his status also?

I have since sent him a private message saying that if he wants to discuss it further i would be happy to. I have yet to recieve a reply, but im not really sure how i would go about explaining myself without getting the common 'angry feminist, stop being so politically correct' response.

Any suggestions?

PS. this is my first post on feministing, and i'm not highly familiar with blog format or anything like that so if i messed up with grammar etc i apologise.

Recently I have been fuming at the videos Onision (a youtube comedian) has been making about rape and sexual assault. This video has truly angered me on every level:

Before I get into my reactions to the video I want to go over some brief points.

First off I am a survivor of sexual assault and domestic abuse. I did not report what had happened to me for various sound and valid reasons. For example, mentally I was incredibly unstable. It took me months to be able to socialize and to even be able to leave my sister's house. I could not be around any male, period. Due to that talking to a police officer was out of the question. Also, I new it would be his word against mine as I had no proof. He was very careful not to leave bruises and furthermore when he tried to kill me he did so by strangling me. This is not difficult to do as you simply have to take your thumb and push the person's esophagus over, which then blocks airflow to the lungs. If you are then able to restrain a person by say sitting on their chest, very few if any marks will be left. Truthfully, I do not think nor do I feel the need to explain my decision to not file a report. If certain people want to think I am selfish for wanting my life back and to be able to move on, then so be it.

Do I think or feel that I owe society by reporting what he did to me? No. If society really cared then in my state (Ohio) the laws would be more prone to helping survivors then hindering them.

Do I think or feel that I owe it to other women to report what he did to me? Honestly I am not sure. I recognize my own autonomy to have the right to live my life pursuing a state of eudaemonia. Reporting would have not allowed me that chance as I have no doubt it would have damaged me to a point that was beyond repair. On the other hand I would hate to know that something awful had happened to another person by his hand. In truth I may even feel partially responsible if anything ever did.

Obviously by not reporting I have placed myself in a moral grey area. However that was my choice and I stick by it as I have the right to make the choice for whatever reason I see fit. I had given serious thought to reporting after it was all said and done. I spoke at length with my sister who was a pre-law minor in Uni and a survivor herself, so somewhat an expert on the subject. This of course took a few weeks after I got out of the situation and had been living with her since I got out. To illustrate how bad I was at the time: she told me months after the fact that when I first walked in her door I was like a wild animal. I did not trust anyone or even my surroundings. I did not speak or do anything except watch teevee as reality was too much for me to deal with. At the time disappearing into the television and dealing with one thing at a time was my dime-store therapy. When she had male friends come over she would tell them to keep their hands where I could see them and to sit at the other end of the room.

A few questions I wanted to explore and am hoping the community will help out here.

1) Why do we blame women?

2) Why are women held responsible for the actions of men?

In light of the Telegraph article which disgustingly misrepresented a scientific study regarding men who rape, I've been trying to formulate a post about blame. Why is victim-blaming so tenacious? No matter the logic, the studies, the facts, it is repeated over and over.

One conclusion could be that we feel safer if we can say a victim deserved it. We can think "Well I wouldn't dress/act like that so I'm safe" This attitude to me is not only callous to the victim (kind of a "I told you so") but also dangerous thinking. I say dangerous because it offers a false sense of security but actually does nothing to protect us.

It would seem that a campaign which was aimed at men, telling them not to rape would be more effective. For example, instead of telling girls "Don't drink, don't party, don't go out without a friend" etc., we could be telling men "If you sleep with a clearly intoxicated girl, you may be accused of rape, so think twice!"

One more thing regarding this. Does anybody else hate when rape apologists use the analogy that if we were walking in a bad neighborhood flashing cash, we should expect it to be stolen?! Come on...classist much? <Sarcasm> Those poor people just can't stop themselves from stealin'. </Sarcasm>  Also this analogy basically says women's body = wads of cash.

Anyway, thoughts?

Full article here

Beginning as an article quoting sexual assault stats for Wellington central city, this article goes from dancing precariously on the edge of the victim blaming precipice, then decides to leap right in.

Police say the number of attacks on drunk young women is growing. "They are binge-drinking, make poor choices and can't keep themselves safe," Detective Senior Sergeant Paul Borrell said. "That's a worry and that's the preventable part of it."

It does redeem itself later on, however:

"Why should the whole responsibility for a situation be put on women? The bottom line is we should be able to walk down the street or do anything without the threat of sexual violence."

However, in a flagrant display of stupidity on behalf of the Stuff.co.nz staff, the article was opened up to comments, enabling the victim blaming champions to have an absolute field-day, with the small, plaintive voices of reason being drowned out by a throng of privileged males (and a few females) screaming "She asked for it!" and "She was dressed provocatively!".

I am not a usual contributor to the Feministing Community. While I read the blog & articles every day, I never really participate in the discussion. However, today I decided that I would reach out for the first time because I'm faced with a situation that is difficult to navigate and I believe this is a situation many other people probably go through as well. (In fact, there may be past posts on it but I'm not sure?)

Anyway, to get to the point... Sunday July 12th will be the nine year anniversary of the day I was raped. Every year I try not to focus on it, to forget about or ignore it. Unfortunately I can't help it - the date glares at me something awful and I dread its approach. I've spent a lot of time these past nine years working on both healing myself, as well as trying to help others and I feel like I've come a long way. I am so much stronger and consider myself a survivor. And yet, still, every year when the date approaches I feel scared and vulnerable again and I fear the memories and feelings that I have found are inevitably associated with this date.

So my question to all of you is, what do I do? How should I cope and get myself through this day in a positive, useful and progressive way? What would you suggest? If any of you have ever experienced something like this, what do you do?

Thanks in advance for reading and commenting! The Feministing Community is incredibly righteous.

Trigger Warning

Why couldn't have my local newspaper used the title of this post as the headline for this article? I think that "Man jailed for sex act with sister in park" suggests that the sister may have been a willing participant, when in fact she was unconcious the entire time. They later do say in the article that the man "performed oral sex on his unconcious sister", which could be worse I suppose, they could have said "engaged in oral sex". The words "sexual assault" or anything like it do not appear in the article.

I also have a seperate issue with this: "The mother of the pair told McFadden [defence lawyer] she hopes her son didn't realize the woman was his sister." Because what her son did would have been okay if he wasn't related to the unconcious woman?

Apparently the man pleaded guilty to "committing an indecent act" which is definitely a lesser charge than sexual assault, and I do wonder whether it was a plea agreement or they just didn't think it warranted a sexual assault charge.

I suggest not reading the comments on the article either, some of them are really bad (like one that says both the brother and sister should be locked in a mental hospital for life--I'm not sure they actually read or understood the article)

Thoughts?

This story is actually about my old elementary school. I was in a different 4th grade class during Mr. R's first year of teaching, and I am shocked that anyone can think that what he did was perverted. He was just having fun with his class. That's the type of teacher he is.

It's a shame that our society has been programmed to be afraid of any sort of male caretaker, or that any physical contact seems to have a sexual connotation. Of course we need to fight sexual abuse, but I feel that we've taken it to an extreme.

What do you think?

This weekend there was a post asking where to draw the line between not-quite-rape and rape. Another poster replied that she had trouble including her experience in the same category as even worse experiences lived through by other women she knew. I too have had trouble including my experiences of rape with more violent experiences.

The message behind rape is that the victim does not count. My, and others', response has been to question whether our experiences count. I've noticed that the more I've questioned whether a certain experience counts as rape or if it's in some category of not-quite-rape, the more difficult it was to move on. I realized that I felt more shame over that incident than the ones where I had no doubt in my mind what happened.

It was quite eye-opening to realize that my response to being discounted as a person (through rape) was to discount my experience (and in doing so, myself as a person).

From Ben Goldacre's excellent "Bad Science" column:

'There’s nothing like science for giving that objective, white-coat flavoured legitimacy to your prejudices, so it must have been a great day for Telegraph readers when they came across the headline “Women who dress provocatively more likely to be raped, claim scientists”. Ah, scientists. “Women who drink alcohol, wear short skirts and are outgoing are more likely to be raped, claim scientists at the University of Leicester.” Well there you go. Oddly, though, the title of the press release for the same research was “Promiscuous men more likely to rape”. '

I recently participated in a webinar about false allegations of sexual assault and thought I'd share a few things I learned. There has been some discussion about false allegations over the past few months and it seemed like a great time to write a post on the subject.

One thing that was mentioned that really made sense to me was the language that is used when referring to crime data collection. The FBI collects crime data and compiles it into a Uniform Crime Report. One category used in this report is "unfounded," which refers to those cases that were determined to be baseless and/or false. Baseless means it doesn't fit the definition of a crime, but could be true. False means an investigation proved the crime never occurred. Whenever news headlines mention "unfounded" allegations of sexual assault, they don't usually make the distinction between baseless and false, whcih can lead to a public perception that false reports are more common than they actually are.

Another important issue raised - the use of outdated, very flawed "scientific data" to cite false report statistics. There's one infamous "study" by Kanin, which took place at one police department in the Midwest, and the "false reports" were based on the opinions of detectives. Anyone who knows anything about statistics or research knows that this study could never be used in any field as reliable scientific data, yet people continue to cite the 41% of false sexual assault reports that the researcher supposedly found.

This ridiculous data, along with very little discussion about why someone might recant/make a false report, and about the feelings, emotions and reactions related to being a victim/survivor of sexual assault, likely makes it even more difficult for those affected to come foward.

Recent, valid scientific research has found that the number of false reports is most likely somewhere between 2 to 10%.

Thanks to the Sexual Violence Justice Institute at the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault for the information.

Any thoughts, comments or questions?

Possible trigger warning

What is the broadest definition of rape?  For instance, if there is one thrust of penetration and then you kick him off of you - was that rape?  What if the penis does penetrate the vagina but only gets part of the way inside and then you kick him off of you - was that rape? 

I used to define it as attempted rape, and then partial rape, but recently I've begun to think that it was actually rape.

What I want to know is at what point does sexual assault become rape?  The definition says forced sex, but what defines sexual intercourse?  Is the broadest definition for sex when the head of the penis can be felt in the vagina?  When the penis is half-way through, when the penis has completed a thrust?  Or after at least two thrusts? 

The reason I ask is because I want to know if I've been raped or sexually assaulted.  I've recently remembered an experience of feeling a penis inside of me and screaming/pushing/kicking him off.  I felt like I had stopped him from raping me at the time because it did not continue, but since I did feel the penis enter my vagina I'm thinking it's possible that it was rape.

(cross-posted by Nora at Change Happens, SAFER's blog)

Karen Carroll, Associate Director of the Bronx Sexual Assault Response Team, was kind enough to talk with me last week about the basics of sexual assault forensic exams. You can listen and/or download part 1 here and part 2 here . (The podcast is not that long, under 30 minutes total, but for some reason our server refused to upload it as one file even though it let us upload the previous ones. No explanation. If it ever gets its act together, I’ll replace the two files with one file.)

Carroll helped dispel some of my CSI/NCIS fueled uncertainties about whether sexual assault forensic exams always produce evidence—they don’t—and how fast they provide that evidence—depends on the state and it’s current backlog at the labs, but it won’t be tomorrow like on TV.

She also made a recommendation, which I heartily endorse, that colleges and universities have a sexual assault response team, composed of campus police, medical professionals, student services administrators, counselors, etc., that meet regularly to keep up-to-date on sexual assault crisis responses on campus. Evidence collection and analysis techniques change, and everyone needs to be aware of both the best practices and how to correctly interpret any results. She mentions Montclair State University as one school with such a team in place , and you can get a good sense of how such a program works from their website. She also offers a helpful reality check on the possibility of getting nurses trained to perform sexual assault forensic exams on staff or on call at campus health centers. At the end of the day it seems like it is more a question of will then insurmountable cost—not that that surprises me in the slightest.

On a positive note for New Yorkers, it turns out the New York City offers better crisis services and evidence processing than many other places in the country—no L.A. backlogs here —but there is always more to do to make sure that everyone has access to the best possible services. Carroll collaborates with the New York City Alliance Against Sexual Assault, which runs an extensive set of programs to increase access to highly-trained, survivor-sensitive crisis services across the city; check them out.

I hope this interview will answer a lot of your questions—if more pop up for you, leave them in the comments [at SAFER's blog] and I’ll see if we can get answers for them! Thanks again to Karen Carroll, and I hope you all enjoy what she has to say.

Students Active For Ending Rape provides training and mentoring to college students who want to change how their school prevents and responds to sexual assault. For more information, please visit our site or look for your school on our College Sexual Assault Policies Database .

Trigger warning

So I just made a note on facebook letting off a little steam while informing my fellow peers at the same time.  I pretty much have an idea how my friends and others will react (I have a little inkling it won't be very positive...though maybe I'm wrong).  However, I would like to know what the feministing community thinks.  Here it is:

Ok, I've been silent about this for some time, but some recent events have forced me to speak out about this. A friend of mine was sexually assaulted and didn't even know. She still doesn't know. Let me go out and say this: THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS GRAY RAPE/SEXUAL ASSAULT!

If he forces you to give him oral sex (forces your head down) and you gag and do not like it...THAT'S SEXUAL ASSAULT

If he forces himself (any part of himself) inside of you without you knowing...THAT'S SEXUAL ASSAULT...even if it happens for just a second

If he tells you he loves you and then FORCES you to have sex with him, THAT'S RAPE!

Don't ever let your emotions, friends, media, or family tell you differently. A boyfriend who "loves" you or a husband who "loves" you can rape you. YOU ARE NEVER OBLIGATED TO HAVE SEX WITH HIM!

And word to the wise...if he tells you he loves you but doesn't provide the two of you with protection, chances are he doesn't love you. If he cared about you, well, he'd want you to protect yourself now wouldn't he?

I am not judging women out there (or men), most definitely am not. I'm judging SOCIETY and the lies it has taught us. We have to stop thinking to ourselves that rape can be "complicated," in that there is some kind of "gray rape." Trust me, it's either rape or it isn't. And most importantly, if someone ever makes you do something sexual you do not feel comfortable with either by emotionally making you feel obligated or using physical force, that's sexual assault.

And by the way, this goes for the guys too. Because let's face it, while most people who experience sexual assault are women, there are men out there too that go through the same thing. I really hope I haven't offended anyone, but seeing that I'm so fed up with how we've been taught about sexual assault in this country, I just had to speak out!

Lots of love and be safe!

I am doing a research paper and presentation on rape and rape culture for my human sexuality class. While doing some research, I was perusing a book called "Men Who Rape" and one of the chapters in on the psychodynamics of rape from the authors clinical viewpoint. The list, in order, was

1. Anger rape
2. Power rape
3. Sadistic rape

While I definitely understand these three psychodynamics, the book seemed to mostly focus on "stranger rape" and not much else. What about the psychodynamics involved in date/acquaintance rape or marital rape? I would say that power certainly comes into play but is that really all? Where does societies objectification of women come into play? Does it even matter? (According to this book, no social aspects were even really considered - just the perpetrators individual cases which identified with each psychodynamic). I'm new to feminism but I've been in an all male environment for the last 5 years and have heard it all. Rape culture is definitely alive and kicking and I see it every week but in what way can you give that a psychodynamic label into why men rape? (Going off the statistic that the majority of the perps are men) I just feel like something is missing from this list but I can't put my finger on it. Any input or opinions would be greatly appreciated. (And if anything comes across that I really feel is appropriate to a research paper I would like to quote it but I will do my best to get permission from the poster)

I've been thinking lately about the stereotype/cliché that frat boys are date rapists, and it's been bothering me.

I'm not concerned for the frat boys' sake. I've heard awful things about many of the frats on my campus, so if the reputation keeps girls away (or at least keeps them conscious of the dangers at frat parties) that's definitely a good thing. And denouncement of date rape is always a good thing.

I've been feeling, though, that the frat boy cliché is just an easy way out of the issue. If the campus date rape problem is limited to frat houses, then it's quite a simple problem: girls just shouldn't go to frat parties or date frat boys. I don't worry about people thinking that all frat guys are date rapists, but I do worry about people thinking that all date rapists are frat guys.

An example: a male friend of mine, when the issue of sexual violence came up, said "I'd say that at least 75% of the rapes on campus are committed by frat guys." I immediately disputed that, and he just said "Well, *I* still think that's true."

I'm Canadian, and Greek culture isn't nearly as big at our universities as it is in the U.S., so his statement bothered me even more. Regardless, in either country, date rapists are not just the obviously obnoxious guys who have "girls drink free" parties. The people committing sexual assault are not a specific type; some of them are frat guys or athletes, others are nerds, others are indie kids, others are musicians, others are in student government, and many don't fit into any easy category.

Date rape doesn't just take place in frat houses, it takes place in non-Greek student housing, campus bars, parking lots, classrooms, libraries and really any other location where someone can sufficiently isolate their victim.

I think that using the Frat Guy as the stereotype of a date rapist continues to obscure these difficult, uncomfortable, frightening realities. What do you all think? Do you think the frat guy cliché is an easy out, or do you think it plays no role in obscuring the facts?

This post will be fairly long and likely pretty dramatic. So, fair warning.

Hello all, I am a man, 23 years of age, in Colorado. This summer I decided to take my first Women's Studies course. I am on the ground floor, I guess you could say, of this grand structure that is feminism. I have relished the learning experience. I have taken comfort in thought and there is so much thought to be had in this experience.

But I am facing some conflicts. I'm not exactly sure where I fit in with this movement. I am the spitting image of privilege. White, male, upper-middle class (dad's a doctor), college-bound. There is the obvious fact that I can't really know what it's like to be a woman in this culture, but the readings for this class have thrown more and bigger wrenches into the works. Recently we read a speech that the venerable Andrea Dworkin gave to a "Men's Movement" in the early 80's (link ) in which she, in no uncertain terms, places the blame for all sexual assaults at the feet of men like myself, particularly the "sensitive and aware" ones. She contends that our bad feelings are evasions, and the continuation of our current culture is evidence enough of our failure to commit to doing the right thing.

I think a lot of men would balk when faced with rhetoric like this. A lot of women would as well. But I was receptive of it, to a point. I have intensely connected with this class, moreso than any other class I have ever taken. I have even considered switching my major to WS (a thought my friends and family and even I find somewhat ridiculous, but it's really appealing to me) and I have always put a great deal of stock in the idea of moral truth. When I read Dworkin's piece I recognized that moral truth instantly.

I am referring to one of the articles fromWhat We Missed, June 8, 2009. (I am assuming it is okay to create a new thread to discuss one of the issues from the "What We Missed" thread.  If there was a more appropriate way to do this, feel free to let me know.)  This article dealt with the gang rape of a 15-year old, where there were pictures, and where one of the perpetrators had made a slight admission.

There were some interesting opinions on the What About Our Daughters link, such as this seems like a case where the victim may be being coerced by the perpetrators or the perpetrators' families to not press charges.  Or that she may not be getting enough counseling and support to be brave enough to have to relive the experiences through trial.  Also, there were several people who noted that Broward County is known throughout the community for being corrupt - such as an incident of a mother leaving the police station with a head injury that wasn't there before she went to the station.

Here is the information that was posted on What About Our Daughters about how to contact the office to put political pressure on them:

"If anyone is interested in contacting the State Attorney’s Office, be prepared to be transferred 3 times to a recording for a FOI request. The Broward State Att’s office is 954-831-6955

I was very clear with each person that I spoke with. I specifically asked, “Who do I need to speak with regarding the State Attorney’s REFUSAL to charge James Hunte and Ryan Johnson?”. As I stated before, I was transferred 3 times to a recording to submit a request for information regarding the case.

You can either mail in your request to:

A woman at University of the Pacific was gang raped by two men and then by a third. 

The university refuses to expel and permanently ban the rapists from the university.  I believe one was expelled but the other two were only temporarily suspended.

The spokesperson for the university said they do not consider this to be rape, but date rape.  According to him, rape is when someone jumps out of the bushes. Somehow, because they knew each other, he thinks it's a lesser crime and not a real rape.

Post here from Cara.

I would like to write in to the University about this.  I haven't figured out who to contact yet, but here is the link to their homepage: http://web.pacific.edu/.

I was in a bar with colleagues (and I thought, friends) the other evening, as I felt like a few drinks after work. Sadly, the evening was ruined.

A male colleague, who I will refer to as Moron, decided to joke about 'ghosting'. This is where a couple are having sex, and the guy is replaced by another guy, without her knowledge.

That would be rape, then.

Would Moron like it if his female partner did that to him? I am sure he wouldn't. We can't imagine such a thing, of course, because men are supposed to take the active role in sex.

Not to mention, the misogyny inherent in the idea that women are too stupid to realise it is a different partner.

I don't believe Moron would actually do such a thing. However, chances are at some point he's made a similar joke to a guy who would rape - or has raped.

That guy thought Moron was on his side.

 Hi guys I been reading this blog for about 1-2 years I have been a feminist since I was 9 (I'm 19 now) and I wrote this article (More of a p.s.a) to encourage girls to report sexual harassment. and it got published in the school newspaper! So here your go!

 Decency by me

I understand a lot of girls have problems saying "no," but it’s your body and no one is allowed to touch it without  your permission.   Speak out  not only for your sake but for the sake of others who may lack  the courage to speak out .  Keep in mind there is a law against it, so the law is on your side.  I know it's scary, say "no" or "stop", say no be assertive.   Tell  the person who is hurting yout to stop, sometimes that may work.   Fortunately we have the Wellness Center to help you or, possibly, talk to ( and I know this sounds like a  cliché) an adult or a friend .   As for the boys who think is funny to do such things, do society a favor, stop it.   If you don’t stop it, someone else will make you stop it.  Women are not toys and when they say "no" you should listen.    Do not think you can pass through life treating people like property.  Granted, American pop culture is misogynistic, but please do yourself and  the human race a favor and behave like a decent human being.  I do not want to change the way I do things just to avoid someone who believes they have rights over me.

TRIGGER WARNING

I came across this troubling article on ABC News, about a man named Jonathan Hock whose girlfriend of 2 weeks passed out at his home after a night of heavy drinking. He then allegedly used a webcam to live-stream a video of himself having sex with her unconscious body.

His girlfriend learned of this after receiving numerous text messages from people who had supposedly seen this video.

The incident itself is disgusting, terrifying, and vile, but equally disturbing is the fact that the owner of the site where the video was posted (Stickydrama.com) says that he would not have a problem with later reposting the images from the assault (he has taken them down for now because of the investigation).

The owner of the site, 30-year-old Chris Stone, has this to say: "On my site we repost other people's screen recordings about controversial things that happen on sites like Stickam.com and then we blog and post about it."

As if it wasn't offensive enough to refer to posting the video of an alleged rape as "controversial", he goes on to engage in a little victim blaming.

"I follow the letter of the law and I think it's a good thing over time for teenagers, in particular, to see what's happening and what the consequences are of meeting people and getting drunk with them off the Internet" (the victim supposedly met Jonathan Hock through MySpace)

Chris Stone says that he has not yet decided whether to post the full-length video on Stickydrama.com, but says that many of the site users have asked him to.

I'm absolutely sickened.

This is actually a post about sex, specifically the "kinky"/BDSM stuff. Great. Prepare for tons of comments.

Anyway, I've been wrestling for a long time about the fact that I am very feminist and yet enjoy playing "submissive" in bed. Nothing super-kinky, IMO, but there it is. It's been tough to grapple with, and especially hard to take a stand mentally against rape culture while feeling like a complete hypocrite really.

Until I realized something important: there's a difference between a roller coaster ride and a car accident. I LOVE roller coasters, and thrill rides generally. I mean that literally, as well as figuratively. I loved the ride "Earthquake" at Universal. But the reason I love these things so much is because I feel absolutely safe. The safety makes it so that I CAN enjoy it. That's what's ultimately important.

And I can understand why someone else would not like that kind of ride. Maybe they actually experienced the trauma of a real earthquake or car accident. Or maybe it's just not for them. Totally reasonable. Doesn't mean they "hate" theme parks, right?

But how would I respond to someone who says "when you enjoy riding on the earthquake ride at Universal, you're basically saying you don't give a shit about real earthquake victims". And it's just so not true.

I'm extremely concerned about rape and sexual assault. Intensely fearful for my daughter even more than myself. Men who fail to question rape culture (or even worse, encourage it) completely turn me off. I could never feel safe with them.

I feel so upset, disgusted, sad, etc. I just found out that an ex-boyfriend of mine has been getting women drunk and then raping them. He recently reconnected with me via facebook (we hadn't spoken since we dated when I was 19 and he was 22; I am now 23 and he is 27).

We had been messaging back and forth and it seemed to be going quite well. He apologized for being such an asshole to me when we were dating. He was my first sexual experience and we did it once and then I never heard from him again. I felt super used as you can imagine. He seemed really apologetic, asking me if I hated him and that if I did he would understand. Now I just feel dirty for even talking to him. Maybe he was just trying to gain my trust or something.

I'm so angry. I feel like writing on his facebook wall for all to see stating "____ _____ is a rapist!" I know this probably isn't the right way to go about it, but I'm SO angry right now I don't know what to do with myself. Apparently one of the girls he raped has gone to the police, but I'm worried nothing will happen to him. Does anyone have any advice/suggestions on what (if anything) I can do? I'm having a lot of trauma right now as well because I feel like I could have been in the position these women were in. He lives in the same city as me, again, and I feel uneasy.

Is there anything that I can do?

I have been following this community for a long time, but I have never been brave enough to make a post.  I have sat here looking at this empty text box for over an hour, trying to put together what is in my mind.  I hope that what follows does not offend or upset anyone, but it is my story.  I have been so inspired by all of the corageous women on this site who have come out to tell their stories of survival.  So I hope to add my voice to this chorus.  I am half sick of silence, I need to speak out. 

When I was very young, my mother said to me “the greatest gift a woman can give to her husband, is her virginity.”  Those words haunt me still.  They nag at me, disrupt my thoughts when I least expect it, and have caused me more anxiety than I can express. 

I did not have a normal childhood, my father was an alcoholic and a drug user.  My first memory is of him chasing my mother around the kitchen table, because he wanted to “take my little girl on a ride”.  My mother was so concerned for my “purity” that I was never allowed to see my friends outside of school.  Unless of course they were at our house.  I had alarms on my windows in case I tried to escape in the middle of the night.  I was chastised when I asked why I could not go have fun with my friends.  “There might be a boy there, and you might end up in the bathroom with him”  As if I would just sleep with anyone who looked at me.

I remained a virgin until I was fourteen years of age.   As a gift for my upcoming fifteenth birthday, I was sent around Europe, and then New York.  The trip to Europe was wonderful, I loved every step of the journey.  My grandmother and my aunt accompanied me until we arrived in New York.  I have a large amount of family there, and I was to stay with them.

After not having seen my relatives in a while, I was ecstatic to meet with them again.  These were people that I had frequently been to visit as I was growing up.  I loved them, and I still do, all except for one.  My great uncle, who I loved dearly put me up in his daughter (my cousin’s) room.  Whenever I stayed in New York, I stayed with my great aunt and uncle.  My great aunt, who still had yet to retire, worked long hours, and had to leave me alone in the house.  This had never caused me anxiety, not once.

It was different this time though.  My great uncle came into the room after his wife had left, and stole everything from me.  I never said anything, I didn’t even cry.  I still haven’t cried, not since I was very young and the only stable person in my life died. 

I stayed in New York for a week.  When I came home, I wanted to tell my mother, but I was afraid.  Afraid I was worthless now, despoiled.  What in me could drive a man who had seen me grow up, to do something like that?  There was no conclusions I could draw that did not end with me being at fault.  So, after much thought, I came to the conclusion that I would tell my mother only small things about what had happened.  I wanted to give her a glimpse, in the hopes that she would ask me more.

It did not go as I had hoped, and I cannot get her words out of my head.  I told her that my great uncle had behaved strangely towards me, that he had rubbed my legs, and told me I was a beautiful girl.  I hoped that maybe she would get outraged, maybe, just maybe she would comfort me.  I was wrong.  She told me that men when they are older sometimes become “weird”  and that they can’t control themselves.  She told me it was because I was a pretty girl, and that pretty girls did things to otherwise normal men. 

“You’re just such a pretty girl”  She said it to me, and I died inside.  Then she told me never to tell my aunt, because it would ruin the friendship between my aunt, and my cousin.  So I locked it up, and pretended it never happened.  These words were too ugly for my mothers world, I could not tell her anything more.  I was sure it would destroy her. 

I have ceased to want anyone, ceased to feel any excitement, the only thing left is fear.  Fear when I am touched, fear of crowds, and fear of people.  I hide it well, but my studies suffer.  For a while I thought I had overcome it all, but a recent event has proved me wrong.

A man at the starbucks I frequent was making very disturbing advances towards me, so I left.  When I got home, I told my mother about it.  She chuckled and shook her head at me, as if my disgust was amusing. 

“You’re such a pretty girl, you just call them out, like bees to honey!”

I am a feminist, I know it is not my fault, I know men can control themselves, and I know that she is wrong for what she has said.  Still, still when I hear those words, the fourteen year old inside me dies a little more. 

I hope one day I can become strong, that I can hear the word “pretty” and not shut off.  I must hope, because I must, because I have a pair of sisters who need me.  Because I will not let this kill me, because I have dreams I want to see to fruition.

It’s hard though, damn hard.

Cross posted from the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault (TAASA) blog.

Recently a Houston television station ran a story about a rape victim who was billed for her own rape exam. The news piece implied this was a common practice in Texas despite being told by several sources, including the Deputy Director of the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault (TAASA), that this was not the case. This news story, riddled with inaccuracies and half truths, was picked up by other news outlets and blogs and it took on a life of its own. Activists, advocates, survivors and other concerned individuals from around the country were justifiably angry and began to demand answers and action. The problem is there isn't really a problem, just the perception of injustice that is spiraling out of control.

TAASA is concerned that this misinformation will have a chilling effect on a rape victim's willingness to report the crime and get a forensic/medical exam (rape kit). We want to assure everyone that the cost of a forensic exam is not billed to the victim. This is always the responsibility of law enforcement and they in turn can be reimbursed for up to $700 though the Crime Victim's Compensation (CVC) fund. If the cost exceeds this amount it is absorbed by the law enforcement agency or hospital, not the victim.

Additional medical treatment is not part of the forensic exam and billed separately. All crime victims, i.e. rape, gunshot, mugging, etc. are billed for medical treatment. They are eligible to apply for reimbursement of these costs through the CVC fund. The CVC fund is statutorily the "payer of last resort," so if a victim has medical insurance it will be billed first. This is to assure the fiscal integrity of the CVC fund and make certain that funds remain available to crime victims who are uninsured or underinsured. Rape victims are not singled out in this process for reimbursement, it is consistently applied to all crime victims and this process is replicated with few variations across the country.

As with any system there is the possibility of human error. A victim could be misinformed or struggle to make sense of the process. This is the principle reason TAASA believes rape crisis advocates are so valuable to rape victims. Rape crisis advocates are not formally part of the systems or institutions that rape survivors must navigate, but are a valuable ally to victims when they encounter barriers or inconsistencies. I wish the rape victim in the Houston story had an advocate to help her through this very difficult time. Our only interest in this situation is that rape victims are supported and assisted. I encourage rape victims to access the services they so desperately need and not be deterred by the perception that they will be charged for their rape exam.

Respectfully Yours,

Annette Burrhus-Clay, Executive Director
Texas Association Against Sexual Assault

(crossposted from Amplify )

Jamie Foxx’s “Blame It” has been the no #1 Billboard R&B/Hip Hop song in the country for the last 14 weeks, beating out records by Mariah Carey, Deborah Cox and R. Kelly for longest reign at that spot in Billboard history. So far, only Mary J. Blige’s “Be Without You” has had a longer run, and current momentum has Foxx beating out the Queen of Hip Hop Soul for those honors next week. The club banger is also the number #2 pop song in America, jumping two spots in one week.

I thought I’d take a peek behind this musical sensation sweeping our land and major shows like American Idol , Jimmy Kimmel and—rather curiously un-critiqued on—the Tyra Banks Show . Imagine my surprise when I discovered that recession-weary Americans are groovin’ to much more than the idea of escaping their hard knocks life through the bottle, but we are in fact bouncin’ to a one man’s stealth plot to take advantage of a woman he purposely gets drunk for sex. Have you actually read the lyrics to “Blame It”?

So, this is an issue I'd like to hear about from other people. It involves the language we use for perpetrators of sexual assaults, and how we use that language, and how we should use that language. I'd just really enjoy the input others have on this issue. I'm in a student group at my University that uses facilitation techniques and a bit of theater to educate our peers about the issues surrounding sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking, and this was a bit from a journal I wrote for the class.

It’s hard to find a balance between perpetrator accountability and recognizing that rapists are still people who commit terrible acts. I don’t know that a person should be defined solely by an act if that person is willing to grow out of it, grow from that experience. But, could calling someone who raped another person a “rapist” put that person in the mindset that “rapist” is all they’re going to be, and that they’ve no chance of changing? Furthermore, is a rapist really always a rapist? If a person has committed a rape, but regrets it, changes, expects and accepts the repercussions, grows from that experience, and never does it again, is it really fair to still call that person a “rapist” twenty years later? When does the language change, if it should ever change?

Friday afternoon, five minutes before our last orgo exam, I heard a friend of mine say to a group of young women that he had gotten a "funny" text from a friend. Its content? "I just took [a professor's] exam, now I know what being raped feels like." The other girls laughed. I tried to find a way to express my anger and emotions but was interrupted by the rush of students heading into the now emptying lecture hall. I managed to put my stuff down in a seat and ran outside to call a friend who knew what I was going through.

I made it through the exam (eventually) and did fairly well but I'm still left with an unsatisfied feeling. I want to scream at this boy and his friend, "No, you don't. Not at all. How much time have you spent in therapy because of this exam? How much time have you spent hating yourself and self-medicating?" And this boy probably didn't know that he was hurting anyone (though arguably, I'd say he should know better) because he doesn't know anyone who's been raped (i.e. no one he knows has admitted it to him) and he doesn't have to think about it as a straight white male. Not all of us have that luxury and not all of us are as lucky. His "joke" felt like a punch in the stomach, it brought up all the bad memories and feelings that I have worked so hard to cope with and hold back.

A major problem with telling rape jokes is the same as telling any other offensive jokes, you don't know your audience.  You can't tell who has been raped just by looking. We don't wear special signs or inform every acquaintance who crosses our path. Plus, there are plenty of allies who don't find rape funny either. Rape is not a synonym for anything difficult in your life. I don't feel the same when I fail a test or hit my funny bone, I don't spend years recovering and healing from a tough exam. If you want to be hyperbolic about it, why not at least be original and find a way to express yourself that doesn't bring down others?

Yes, it's old news - people don't know what to call rape when it wasn't prosecuted.

A New Zealand woman says a night of group sex involving former rugby league star Matthew Johns when she was 19 has led to significant trauma.

Mr Johns has admitted he and some other Cronulla Sharks players had sex with the woman at a Christchurch hotel while on a pre-season tour in 2002, but he insists it was consensual.

Police investigated the incident but no charges were laid.

Now, I don't know the legal requirements of reporters - I assume that they can't use the word "rape" when the subject has not been charged or prosecuted of sexual assault.  However, the headline - "Matthew Johns in group sex scandal" - does not really do justice to the woman who described her experience as traumatic.

She has told Four Corners (an investigative program shown on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation; also known as the ABC) the incident was degrading.

"Every time I looked up there would be more and more people in the room and there's lots of guys in the room watching - maybe two or three were on the bed that were doing stuff to me," she said.

It is clear to me that describing this as a group sex scandal really doesn't describe accurately the incident, but does this story - and the hundreds of others like it that have been covered here on Feministing on this very same issue - highlight a larger problem?  I would argue that there needs to be a shift in reporting, or at least some way to distinguish consensual sexual acts from rape and sexual assault without the reporter being at risk of being charged for defamation.

Does the Feministing community have any ideas to prevent this kind of reporting (which I am sure is legally appropriate)?  Or do we think that the term "sex" is as close as we can get to a term without the association of consent or lack of consent?

Been lurking for a while, first-time post, yadda yadda.

I was reminded of this situation by a post several pages back about surprise male stripping, and how the woman for whom the stripper was purchased was groped and embarrassed by the stripper in question.  I have a similar experience to share, which I almost left in a comment, but decided should just be a new post since it's kind of long.

For the last four years I have been attending Pace University in Lower Manhattan. Paying way too much for not enough, the only thing keeping me here has been the amazing professors and feminist activists I have met along the way. And it was here I found my feminist roots!

Over the past year there has been a lot of attention brought on by concerned faculty and students about Pace's sexual assault protocol/policy, or lack thereof. What the University has told students to do in the past is to report a sexual assault to the security guards on campus. Well, fuck that. The security guards at Pace are notorious for sexually harassing students. I brought this concern (along with the concern that our President, Stephen Friedman, had been asked about the policy in a meeting and his response was, 'does rape even happen here?') to the Dean of Students last May who talked around me and assured me that Pace was able to handle the situation. I left the meeting insinpired and reached out to blog for SAFER to try and get more tips on how to get Pace to respond to this issue.

Then, in September 2008 an article surfaced in our school's newspaper, The Pace Press, stating that a security guard had been re-assigned (note:he was not fired) out of Pace because he had sexually harassed/assaulted a 13-year old girl while she was at Pace for the Summer Scholars program.

This has been in the back of my head since the post about non-survivor friends. Sometimes our first line of support are our friends, these are the first people we tell but these friends can cause harm as well as help, especially if they aren’t informed or if they’ve bought into the rape culture in our society.  This my own story about what happened to me when I told people about my attack and a friend who helped completely destroy myself esteem with her efforts to help.

When I was attacked I was very young. Nine years old. My attackers were two teenage boys who had befriended my younger brother, and I now wonder why two sixteen year olds would want to hang around with a seven year old boy but to me it’s clear as I grow older either they had paedophilic tendencies or they wanted to pray on targets that were weak and unable to fight back.

My attack was cut short because I did fight back. For a long time I found it hard to talk to people about what happened to me, because I didn’t have the words to describe it. When I went to school we didn’t have any information about sexual assault or abuse, no information on how to explain what happened to an adult.

I turned instead to friends. Aged eleven after a sex education class I finally understood what had happened to me and was able to confide in my friends. I waited for the hugs, the kind words, people who would make me feel better.

“You’re so pretty, of course you’re going to be raped” was the sympathy I got.

In her mind sex was about love, and love was about beauty, so if someone tried to have sex with you, even two people together at the same time, it was because you were too beautiful for them to resist. Now, doesn’t that make you happy?

Those words had more impact on me than the attack. For years I didn’t want to be a ‘pretty’ girl. I dressed in baggy clothing, ignored my hair or skin or anything really that would make me conventionally pretty like make-up. I refused to wear dresses. On their own, as competent decisions, these choices would have been fine but I wasn’t doing this to make a point about myself, I was doing it to keep myself safe.

If it was my fault for being pretty then it was my duty not to be pretty.

It moved to a point that if someone complimented me on the way I looked I would snap at them, make snide suggestions they were only interested in attractiveness.

Recently, I’ve been coming to terms with what happened to me and what my so-called friend said and I’ve come to realise that I really, really love make-up – all the little, stupidly expensive pots of glitter, and dresses – I like the way I look in dresses and I feel that because of one person’s stupid comment I prevented myself from enjoying all these things.

I was made to feel guilty for something I had no control over and because I was too young to understand that this was rape culture and victim blaming. So I would like to say a big fuck you to that friend – she might have been young, but she’d picked that stupid idea up from somewhere and what she said that day made me frightened to be the person I really am.

What I’d like to say to her now, if I ever got the chance, would be something like this “People don’t attack children because they’re beautiful. They attack them because they’re paedophiles.”

I posted the letter to my non-survivor friends which received a lot of attention. Thanks for all your support. (And thank you to all of my friends, if you're reading this!)

But it also received some criticism, especially this post which cast doubt on the validity of my 'recovered' memories.

Look, everything should be open to debate. And there have been, especially in the 1990s, some horrific cases of false accusations. But:
• The science - it's definitely true that it is pretty easy to convince people that something happened that didn't, in fact, take place. That is particularly true in children. But for false memories to happen, someone has to plant them there. No reputable therapist would ever 'lead on' their patient. The individuals I've met who also recovered memories did it outside spontaneously. And there's plenty of science to support the idea of recovered memories. For a good summary see this site. For some very interesting imaging studies see here.
• Why would so many people invent such a thing? Ask yourselves, would you invent such a horror story about YOUR parents? At the beginning, when my memories started (spontaneously) to surface I didn't want to believe. I desperately went through the thoughts in my head and tried to convince myself that my father's hand didn't in fact go there; if there was any manipulation, it was me trying to forget what I had just remembered. It took me a long time to talk to people who knew me, to reexamine my life and reach a certain peace with the truth. And the truth is that my father sexually abused me.
• The main organization pushing the 'false memory syndrome' idea, used to have sketchy characters such as Dr. Ralph Underwager as members. For more about him, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Underwager and http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/NudistHallofShame/Underwager2.html. This organization is spearheaded by people accused of sexual abuse. Don't you think they have other interests?
• This is purely anecdotal, but the people I know who recovered memories of sexual abuse didn't do so after their therapist said to them 'I think you were sexually abused'. Something external triggered them outside of therapy, and they managed to various details. Like one woman who found that her cousin was abused by the same person, who then apologized. And the mother who confirmed to her daughter that yes, the mother's then-boyfriend had touched her when she was a child. When I started remembering, I wasn't even thinking about sexual abuse - I was thinking about my past, yes, but honestly it had enough fucked up things in to justify my emotional problems without the incest.
• Allegations of false accusations are a regular phenomenon when people talk about date rape as well - you always see 'men's rights activists' posting angry responses about the 'epidemic' of false rape accusations. Well, guess what - that's not true either.

There really wasn't enough information in my post for anyone to conclude that my memories were false. I'm actually kind of shocked to see the response, especially on Feministing. It was completely inappropriate, to say the least. It were one thing if the author had raised the subject generaly - but to accuse a specific individual, without any information whatsoever?

Luckily for me, this is the first time anyone has cast doubt on my memories. My brother (to whom I was never close) believed me immediately. So did my friends. Why? Because they knew the context. They knew me, they knew my father, they knew the kind of life I'd lead. There was really no reason to doubt.

This week [April 26-May 2] is National Crime Victims’ Rights Week and this year, for the first time, the President has issued an official proclamation recognizing April as Sexual Assault Awareness Month.   The increased attention to sexual violence and crime victims is important – and it should cover all survivors of sexual assault, including people who were sexually assaulted while incarcerated.

Sexual assault is devastating in any setting. People healing from such abuse in a prison or jail face extreme challenges. Incarcerated survivors are unable to move about freely, lack privacy, and may be forced to share living quarters with the perpetrator.

Inmates brave enough to report sexual assaults tend to be viewed with skepticism and are often subjected to punishment instead of support. Many corrections officials isolate inmates who have been victimized, claiming it is for their protection. In the worst facilities, prisoner rape survivors are disciplined for participating in sexual activity. Retaliation by other inmates or staff, including further sexual violence, is not uncommon. “When I was assaulted the first time, I was afraid to ‘snitch’ because I was in fear that my life would end,” says survivor Shakria, who did not report her first rape . Shakria is a transgender woman, currently housed in a men’s facility.

(I'm reposting this from my own blog. Here is the original post.)

I was reading PostSecret and one of the postcards really struck me. As I read it, I realized that it was my secret, something that has been at the back of my mind, always lurking and nagging, for a very long time now.

I was molested once, when I was 12. I didn't tell anyone until I was a bit older -- just before turning 17 actually. By that point, it was too late. The person who should have believed me didn't. I've learned to live with what happened, and draw strength and wisdom from it. Maybe one day I'll feel strong enough to write about it in a public forum. For now, I want to discuss something else.

I'm not sure if anyone's already posted this, but I'll just quickly mention it.

Apparently, not only is Anna Farris's character, Brandi, crazy messed-up from slamming shots the night Seth Rogen's character rapes her, Seth also gives her his medication for bipolar disorder.

Which is just even more fucked up.

Video review link

Thoughts?

Today is Denim Day and for those of you who don't know what Denim Day is here is a little info:

Italy, 1992

An 18-year old girl is picked up by her married 45-year old driving instructor for her very first lesson. He takes her to an isolated road, pulls her out of the car, wrestles her out of one leg of her jeans and forcefully rapes her. Threatened with death if she tells anyone, he makes her drive the car home. Later that night she tells her parents, and they help and support her to press charges. The perpetrator gets arrested and is prosecuted. He is convicted of rape and sentenced to jail.

I was just browsing the New York Times Health section and came across an article by Tara Parker-Pope interviewing Trisha Meili, also known as the Central Park Jogger.

The article focuses mainly on health and wellness issues, such as Trisha's return to running and how she recovered from her brutal attack. It's an interesting read and I certainly feel for Ms. Meilli, but the comments on the website were appalling.

First of all, many readers were frustrated that Ms. Parker-Pope did not include information about the young men of color who were arrested in relation to Ms. Meilli's attack 20 years ago. These teenagers ended up going to jail for a crime they didn't commit.

I agree wholeheartedly that people need to know the truth about this case and that perhaps Parker-Pope should have included information about the wrongfully incarcerated men in her introduction. But the comments often tangled up frustration over racism and justice ("How could you not include this in the article?") with blatant victim-blaming. A few comments clearly made it sound as though Ms. Meilli asked for it by jogging late and by herself. Many commenters were upset that Ms. Parker-Pope did not ask Meilli about the innocent boys, or even that Ms. Meilli did not admit her own culpability in their incarceration. [Example: "I would respect and admire Ms. Meili even more if she would acknowledge that her reckless actions (I am a lifelong female runner and ex-NYC resident who even in my youth would not have considered running alone in Central Park that late) led to 13 years in prison for completely innocent young black men." ]

Excuse me??

Luckily, feminism literature and blogs have given me the tools to recognize this as victim-blaming and I am astounded by how often I see it. I am so grateful that I can identify it as such, whenever I see an article that discusses what a rape victim was wearing or how much she drank or how late she was running in the park.

Listening to the stories (or reading them) online of those who have experienced sexual assault, I also know that it's up to the survivor to decide how he/she wants to respond and heal. Prosecute your rapist? It's up to you. Share your story to many people or just a few? It's up to you.

Parker-Pope made it clear that Meilli has no memory of the event and no firsthand knowledge, so she doesn't feel its appropriate to comment. "I have to leave it to the justice system," she said, "It's part of my own healing to accept that I'm never going to know."

If people want to work on addressing our racist, classist, malfunctioning justice system, believe me: I am in full support. But it's not the responsibility of the survivor to take this on. Their job is to heal and move forward with their lives.

Doing violence prevention work in middle and high school for over a year now, I have seen many scary, inaccurate stereotypes about sexual violence going around, but never like today I realized to what extent the schools are perpetuating false information about rape as part of the educational curriculum. During a break between two classes today I was looking at one of the Health class book for the 7th grade and stumbled upon the chapter on sexual violence. I took pictures, but I am transcribing it for clarity.

Protecting Yourself from Rape

My brother is a decent kid, and I love him, but that doesn't change the fact that he's homophobic.

To his credit, he doesn't want to be a homophobe...he's a good, progressive boy raised by a progressive mom, living in a progressive area (San Francisco), and he has a lesbian sister (me) that he loves. He'd never beat up or tease a gay kid--he's stuck up for a gay kids, or kids that were perceived as gay/effeminate, at school and boy scouts, even--he's totally supportive of civil rights for the queer community and voted against Prop 8. I'm not saying he should get a medal for this; treating gay people like, well, people, is the bare requirement for being a decent human being, in my book. But I say this to establish that he doesn't hate gay people or wish us harm.

But he's still homophobic.

I use homophobic in the literal sense, not the general usage of the term. He is afraid of gay people. Well, gay men. Like many 19-year-old, heterosexual boys, he's a product of our porn culture, and really likes lesbians. At least the "hot" ones. (But that's a different rant, for a different time.) Gay men freak him out. Though he's known several out gay boys, he's never had a gay friend, and doesn't want one. He'd never dream of interfering in the lives of gay men, but he doesn't want to be a part of their lives, either.

"Men to Save Her" is the title posted at a well known Men's Rights forum board.

The article in question is this:

RAPE VICTIM: SUBWAY WORKERS' INACTION 'DEPLORABLE'
By WILLIAM J. GORTA

The woman raped in 2005 inside a desolate Queens subway station, as two NYC Transit workers did nothing to stop the violent attack, said today that what happened to her is part of a "deplorable state of affairs" underground.

---------

Ah yes. Why WOULD any woman expect for someone to come to their rescue when they are being assaulted and raped? What are we - the womenz - thinking?! Expecting people to come to our aid as one of our own (a woman) is being brutally raped and present transit workers sat by and did nothing. It's this very same attitude why I became a feminist. Thinking it's "ok" to sit by and watch a woman get raped. Rape is about control. As soon as a rapist realizes he/she has no control over the situation, they have lost. Gawd this shit pisses me off. I'm too angry and upset to even formalize my thoughts at the moment. I would appreciate it if others could contribute to this. I'm fuming and am close to beating my computer with my keyboard. I know that won't resolve anything.

This is definitely why I am a feminist. I have been lurking over at www.mens-rights.net . It's like a bloody train wreck. The carnage and craziness is just too much to comprehend.

This is a fairly short post because I've got very little to say; however, I wanted to pass along this website and organization, that aims at putting the responsibility of stopping rape on men.

Along with posters, it also has radio ads and other resources to talk about consent and date rape.

Surely, there will be some feminists who will debate the overall message of the campaign, not being entirely comfortable with its content of being almost "chivalrous," (much like the "Real Men Don't Rape" campaign, it essentially defines what makes a "real" man or man) but it gets the message across.

There are also other programs that do a good job at talking about rape from a feminist perspective, to include "May I Kiss You?" and "Sex Signals," the latter of which the Army now uses.

A lot of times, it seems, while we can clearly state our feminist visions of date rape within the feminist community, we have trouble getting the message across to those who have not been lucky enough to have stumbled upon feminism. This organization effectively does that communication for us - and from the looks of it, isn't just limited to one month a year.

Sometimes, I wish the conversations about sexual assaults and consent aren't just limited to April, during Sexual Assault Awareness Month.

Too often, it seems, when the candles lit for Take Back the Night have been blown out, the stories of the survivors have been told and everyone has dried their eyes and gone home, we forget that sexual assaults take place everyday, on college campuses and on dates across America. The way I see it, conversations should be taking place throughout a year - and especially at the beginning of a college semester.

Thoughts on that?

Also, a good item to report: the military is holding a conference here in Baghdad next week to talk about sexual assaults and how we can prevent it within the military. I've contacted them and received permission to take time off work for that conference. Hopefully, it'll give me a chance to talk about rape from a feminist lens, and at the same time, find out from the senior leadership where the breakdown in communication lies. I'll write more on it after it happens.

If there are issues you'd like me to bring up, let me know.

My rape did not occur because I didn't communicate. My friends and I, without going into too many details, communicated; we kicked and screamed. The men involved all had a sense of entitlement; they believed they had the right to our bodies. Communication won't work if one person isn't listening or doesn't think you deserve a voice. The fact that so many men would rape if they could get away with it is revealing. How many men would physically hurt someone if they could get away with it? If that number is lower, I'd say it shows how highly some men think of women's bodies.

It has taken me a lot of time to be okay with what happened to me, to stop blaming myself for someone else's decision to put his sexual wants over my psychological and physical health and some days I still question myself. I have gone through that night over and over asking what I could've done differently. The impression I got from your class today was one of judgment, the idea that women are as much to blame as the men who victimize them, and it hurt, but more importantly, it lets victimizers off the hook for their actions.

(cross posted from my blog)

So, I admit it. I watch VH1's "Tough Love". It is a reality show so that means that the people are hard to believe as real, they are emotionally stunted and more than a little bit psycho. However, I like the show, even though it perpetuates the worst types of gender stereotyping available.  (all the women are referred to as "girls" and they have names like Miss Gold Digger and Mis Fatal Attraction).

Steve Ward, who is a professional matchmaker in his mommy's business, has taken on the role of straightening some "hopeless case" women out so that they will meet their match. Now, a lot of his advice is good advice, but most of it basically boils down to this: "Don't be crazy." These women have special ares of craziness so the advice and tasks differ from week to week.

This latest episode showed Steve telling one of the women that if she didn't stop acting this way (i.e. promiscuous) then she was "going to end up raped." For a more detailed analysis of what led up to this comment check out this blog.

Now, when watching this sort of tripe, expecting it to be more enlightened is a probably a little bit too much.  However, since the show features women and is about trying to relate to and understand women, you'd think Steve Ward would be a little bit less of a clueless dickhead.  He's not.

"End up raped."
This phrase is lovely.  It seems as if women just go outside and on their own they end up raped.  "Whoops, I slipped on some ice and long story short, I ended up raped."

I have previously blogged about comments I received on a vlog of mine about women being unfairly blamed for unplanned pregnancy and rape. I have since disabled the comments on that video but that hasn't stopped some people from messaging me about it. I'm not going to respond to this guy either but I'm getting it off my chest.

"Blame? It's not about blame, it's about personal responsibility. Play with matches and get burned, you don't sue the manufacturer. Rape not a woman's fault? Certainly it can be. "

There is no comparison to playing with matches to being raped. "I was walking down the street and I was raped. I guess I should have just stayed home," or "I was out with my guy friend and he raped me. I should never be in the presence of a male so I don't get raped." This is the kind of thing you are saying rape victims should be thinking.

And it's about rape, so this is the warning.

Specifically, it's about drinking and rape. Recently, I had begun watching the first season of Veronica Mars. For those of you who don't know it, it's about a girl named Veronica Mars in high school whose best friend died a year before the show starts and she tries to figure out who murdered her. Veronica is quite a strong character and I like her a lot.

From the beginning, Veronica has recounted the story of how she lost her virginity - she was drugged and raped at a party. She's always very clear on this point, that she was raped. She never calls it anything else, never blames the drugs she was slipped or herself for being stupid. (Though she does regret going to the party.) The point is that she remembers nothing after a certain point at the party until the next morning when she wakes up alone and raped. 

But then (SPOILER ALERT)

I'm a rape victim.

There, I said it. Victim . Not survivor.

Victim seems to have become a dirty word for a lot of people (particularly feminists) these days. But I don't think that it needs to be. While I understand that many people feel empowered by thinking of themselves as survivors, I don't think that it's necessary (or right) to entirely do away with the term 'victim' when referring to people who have experienced sexual assault.

To me, the term survivor has powerful connotations. When I think 'survivor', I think of someone who is strong. Someone who has battled a powerful force and won. I think of people who have lived through natural disasters or horrible diseases. But I can't think of myself that way.

When I think 'victim', I think of someone who has been victimized. Someone who has been brutally hurt by someone or something else, with absolutely no justification. I think of a victim as someone who has had a horrible injustice done to them by someone else. When I think of a victim, I can see that there is a clear perpetrator.

When discussing rape, it is absolutely essential for victim/survivors to refer to themselves in whatever way makes them most comfortable. I have no issue with people who consider themselves survivors. But I am not going to give up my victimhood any time soon. For me, it is extremely important that I identify as the victim of a perpetrator . Oh sure, I'm still alive, so it wouldn't be inaccurate to call me a survivor. I did survive, after all, and I'm actually doing pretty well now. I don't think about it often, I'm capable of having consensual sex without crying (and I even enjoy it now!), and I can talk about sexual assault calmly and rationally. I've learned from my horrible experiences, and I'm pretty much fine now.

But I digress. Rape isn't something that just happened to me. It wasn't just bad luck or a coincidence or genetics or geography or anything like that. It isn't even anything to do with me, really. It was done to me by another person. And the more I recognize this, the more I realize that the most empowering thing that I can do for myself is recognize that the blame lies firmly with the men who raped me. I feel that just "getting over it" and calling myself a survivor would in a way negate my experiences and their crimes. I need to stay angry so that I can continue to be passionate about the issue of sexual assault. I need to remember so that I can continue to help other people recognize what a sick, twisted thing it is to commit assault of any kind.

What do you folks think of this? If you have experienced sexual assault, do you prefer to think of yourself as a victim or a survivor? Why?

This post was inspired by an obnoxious beat down I got recently at another blog when I dared to refer to myself as a rape victim. Apparently there was nothing wrong with my post except for my "offensive" use of the word victim when referring to myself. :P

...Oh, and this whole post is a big fat "fuck you" to the patriarchy, and I rock. You folks all rock too.

Sometimes, The Times publishes columnists that are so awful I have to take a step away from them, go and clear my head and think about all the lovely things there are in the world and how the Times is a conservative Newspaper but today they published a column that goes past even their brand of misogynistic tospotness.

India Knight's charmingly titled "Face it, Girls - A drunken Romp isn't Rape" in which the author doubts the validity of date rape and uses her column to publically shame a woman who reported her rape by a drunken friend. Despite the fact that Indian Knight acknowledges there was no consent, and that the woman was too drunk to know what she was doing, and that there is a law in place to prosecute these type of rapes her argument is that the woman just didn't like the guy she woke up with.

I used to like India Knight when she moonlighted at the Independent. Now I realise she didn't deserve my attention at all.

This is not unusual for The Times, today it's leading Lifestyle article is about sex - "Are Women Sexually Liberated or Just Confused?" I don't think you need to guess what they think.

I think we need to stop demonizing rapists.

I feel a little strange saying this, especially when violence against women is an under-addressed issue, and most rapists go free because no one will believe that they could have committed sexual assault. Women are typically blamed while men escape any consequences for their actions.

But I think a big part of that problem is that we demonize rapists too much.

Everyone pictures rapists as psychopaths, hiding in the bushes with knives. As feminists we've worked really hard to dispel that myth, explaining over and over that most rapists assault someone they know - friends, acquaintances, dates, and partners.

A big part of the reason that people aren't catching on to what that really means is that they are still picturing men who commit sexual assault as evil or morally corrupt. If their friend isn't evil or morally corrupt, he couldn't possibly commit sexual assault.

Some rapists are just master manipulators, and hide the fact that they are vicious predators, as evil as any real human could be. I don't really believe in evil, and I've known men personally who were certainly not anywhere near it, yet still committed the horrible crime of rape. A lot of guys who commit sexual assault actually do have a conscience, and actually don't want to be sexually assaulting women.

We need to become more effective at separating the act from a good vs. evil judgment of a person. We can't be naive and think that having a polite chat with a rapist will necessarily stop him, but we have to acknowledge the complexities of individuals. There are a lot of men who need a lot of education, but we need to find a way to talk about rape that places the responsibility for rape squarely on the perpetrator's shoulders without *necessarily* condemning him forever.

We need to show people that they can reconcile their belief that their friend has a good heart with the reality that he has committed rape. Rape is a terrible crime with terrible consequences, I know this personally. But when so many men think that the whole sexual assault discussion doesn't apply to them or their friends because they aren't knowingly, intentionally, maliciously committing sex crimes, we're losing an audience that might actually want to change.

Just as we need a performance model of sex (as articulated brilliantly by Thomas Macaulay Millar in Yes Means Yes), we need a performance model of sexual assault. The crime is about the actions of an individual, not the goodness or evil in his or her heart.  

The supposedly popular site, CollegeHumor.com is full of troubling content, but this video is downright upsetting.  The caption: "Jamie Lee finds a way to make sexual harassment fun again."  (What could they possibly mean by again ?!)

This female comedian suggests that women have some kind of desire to be sexually assaulted. Excuse me?!  Women do not want to be raped.

I realize that she is attempting to be humorous.  It seems to me that she is using one of two approaches to solicit laughs:

A) The idea that a woman somehow wants to be raped is entirely absurd, and therefore, comical. 

B) There is some sort of truth to her claim, and it is her presentation of this truth that is comical.

If A, then she must be living in an entirely different reality, for the mindset that women want unsolicited sexual encounters is all too prevalent in our society and contributes greatly to the culture of rape and assault.  The idea that a woman wants to be raped is not absurd in our world, and that fact is revolting.  Therefore, put lightly, Lee's joke is in bad taste.

If B, then Lee is blatantly bolstering the fucked up perceptions that excuse and promote rape and sexual assault.

(Also, what could possibly make this woman suggest, even in sick humor, that she desires to be raped?  Desperately seeking external affirmation of her sexuality/beauty?  How warped...)

About a year ago, an acquaintance from college raped me at a reunion. I filed charges, but as is sadly typical in cases of acquaintance rape, the authorities chose not to prosecute him. I've gone through a lot of anger, fear and a spectrum of other emotions that will be familiar to any victim of violent crime. Then, last weekend, I ran into him.

I work at a college that's in the same athletic conference as the one he and I attended, at this happened at an athletic event. Before, I went over the possibility that he would be there and decided that it was a long shot and not worth my anxiety. But now, there he was. First, I saw him from a distance. I flipped out and called my mom (one of the few family members who know about this). She told me that I probably wouldn't run into him, but even if I did, not to be afraid. "He doesn't have any power over you," she said. "You're the one with power over him."

We finally crossed paths in a hospitality suite, of all places. As soon as I saw him there with his family, I ran out. Sure, I had fantasies of heading back in and dumping a plate of shrimp salad on his head, but that wasn't going to happen. But still, something wouldn't let me leave. Deep down I knew that if I left without confronting him, I would regret it. So I sat there in the lobby - heart pounding, hands shaking - waiting for him to come out.

When he did, I called his name. He turned, and when he saw me - okay, it took me until then to realize that, along with my fear that he would come after me or hurt another woman, the main anxiety I had was this: did he even understand what it was that he'd done? Would he know me if he passed me on the street? Did it affect him even slightly as much as it affected me? Did it matter to him?

He did recognize me. Now here's the part that I can't get my head around. He could've kept walking; he could've screamed "stay the hell away from me, you crazy bitch!" But instead he came over to me, and the look on his face was sad, ashamed - and scared. That's right, he was scared of me, and scared of what I would say or do in front of his family and friends.

I said, "Do you remember me?" And he nodded. When I rehearsed this in my head, I'd been not quite screaming, but loud and firm, only now my voice was barely a whisper. "I just wanted you to know that I haven't forgotten what happened," I said. Then he said, "I know, and I'm sorry." I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't that. I told him that I didn't think he was a bad person, but that when he drank as much as he did that night, he became something else. "Please, just please don't do that again to someone else," I said. He said that he wouldn't, apologized again, and then I left.

I was telling all this to another survivor, and she said she didn't think that she'd be strong enough to confront her abuser. I don't think strength has anything to do with it. I realize how incredibly lucky I am to have had the opportunity to confront my rapist in a relatively safe space, and especially to have him respond the way he did. Very few rape survivors will have that chance. It answered a lot of questions for me - namely, that I feel he's genuinely remorseful and (fingers crossed) will be less likely to get drunk and force himself on another woman. At least, it helps me to believe that.

I'm still not sure how I feel about it. Do I have justice? If one believes that justice is about restoring balance, than I have more than I'll ever get under the law, certainly. Do I forgive him? My religious tradition teaches me that forgiveness is more about the person doing the forgiveness than the person receiving it. Part of me healed when I heard him say "I'm sorry," and right now that's what I've got.

This is just a story I have decided to share here in the community. It's about a friend of mine who was assaulted on Sunday, her birthday, actually. 

I am currently studying abroad in a medium-sized city in the south of France. The university I'm studying in is very small, only a branch of a bigger institute because it's a more intense curriculum. There are 13 students, all American, only one of which is male. 

Sunday, my friend was walking home from the train station after dropping off a friend who had been visiting. A young man, about our age, approached her and asked to use her phone. (This was all in French, by the way.) She allowed him to call his friend and when he hung up he said that he could tell she had an accent and if she wanted, they could walk and talk a while and he would help her with her French. 

As many of you on here know, I was raped a little over 8 years ago. It's been a struggle every day but I'm a survivor and am doing my best to move on with my life and make the best of things. But right now I'm having a really hard time and here's why:

I recently (about a 1 ½ years ago) moved back to Chicago. This is my home, where I grew up. I had not lived here since I was 18 (the time of my rape). It was weird because for the past 5 years or so before I came back I had not thought about the rape too much. I wasn't around the place that it happened (my parents' house) and I wasn't around the people that were there (my high school friends). So for the time period that I lived away from home I was able to move on and not totally forget about it but put it out of my mind a bit.

Now I'm back here and I've been thinking about it a lot more. I burst into tears about it for no reason when I've been drinking sometimes. I've told a lot more people about the incident than I ever intended to. Part of it could be because it's been 8 years and I'm finally ready to talk about it. But I think a lot of it has to do with because I'm back here.

The biggest issue for me, however, is that I was raped by someone I know and someone my friends know. We had hooked up a few times before my rape, and he was in my circle of friends in high school. So talking about it around them has always been a tricky situation. Thankfully, he's since fallen out of favor with most of my friends since high school. It's not because I've told them about the rape (a lot of them don't know, only the ones I'm really close with) but because he's an overall douchebag (surprise surprise).

On Wednesday, May 18, the Washington College of Law Federalist Society hosted libertarian columnist Cathy Young to present a talk which she titled "Presumed Guilty? Rape, Feminism, and False Accusations." 

Ms. Young is not a lawyer.  She is a long-time columnist for The Boston Globe and Reason Magazine , libertarian publication extrodinare.  Ms. Young has written extensively on both feminism and false rape accusations:  here , here , here , here , HERE , here , etc.  Her general premise seems to be that First Wave Feminism was a boon to women, but now that we can all get jobs and stuff, shouldn't we look out for the menz?  I realize I am oversimplifying her argument, but I will get to the substance of her speech in a moment.

The Women's Law Association got wind of the event and staged an amelioration, during which we tabled the entire day of the presentation, distributed teal ribbons in support of survivors of sexual violence, passed out information regarding the myths of false rape claims, and urged any and everyone to attend the event well-informed and ready to question her position. 

Coming back here to the desert - as awful as it is, is like visiting an old lover. The moment I got off the plane, I was hit with the memories long forgotten, since I was last here in 2004. With the memories also came the scents and sounds that made me remember the old days - a natural high that I couldn't have gotten from anything else.

But just like meeting an old lover, I also sense there is something extremely wrong - and there is. When last we gathered, the F-words I was most concerned with were freedom, fucking and football. Now, with the discovery of feminism, things have changed a little bit.

Just this week, a report came out that sexual assaults in the military is on the rise - no surprise there. Where it gets surprising is that, rather than talking about effective ways of preventing sexual assaults, military spindoctors are talking about the military's effectiveness is getting victims to report. In a sense, rather than worrying about preventing the problems, the military is patting itself on the back for getting accurate numbers of victims.

This, too, isn't surprising. For all it's done correctly - and there are many, the military failed at preventing sexual assaults. Oh, believe me, it tries - but the preventative programs for sexual assaults it employs consists of telling Soldiers how not to get assaulted rather than telling potential rapists not to rape.

Dan Savage's column this week really struck a nerve with me.  One of his readers sent in a question about one of his "all-time fantasies" - rape.  (see here )

First off, how can raping a woman be one of someone’s lifelong goals?   And why he ONLY concerned about the woman possibly turning on him – going to the police and reporting it as an actual rape rather than consensual sex act.   This type of encounter seems like it could very easily turn ugly – someone who wants to rape a woman clearly doesn’t respect/care about women (how could he?) and to me, seems like exactly the type to ignore any agreed upon safe word, do exactly what he wanted and then claim it was all consensual because she had agreed to it in writing up front.    Clearly he knows that this type of thing is wrong but wants to get around the legal ramifications by participating in a so-called consensual rape (which in reality there is NO SUCH THING otherwise it wouldn’t be called rape).

The advice?   See "Oliver Jovanovic,” a case where a man was imprisoned for 15 years for the exact same thing – a ‘consensual rape’ fantasy gone bad.  Getting consent in writing and even better yet videotaping, consensually of course, so that he could prove that there was no foul play.  This, to me, totally plays into the stereotype that women falsely report rape on a regular basis (where in reality it is an EXTREMELY rare occurrence) and only serves to protect the attacker (except for video which might protect both.. but I wouldn’t count on it).

I also wonder if both parties have a similar idea of what rape entails, if they have a misguided understanding of what rape actually is or if either of them were abused in the past and are fetishizing/reliving.  

I totally get why someone would want to hook up with a complete stranger or participate in some form of bondage/s&m but rape?  

What do you think?

I caught the post by "Riotgirl" yesterday, right before my partner and I were going to go see Watchmen. Instead, I told him about Riotgirl's review, and how I'd really not like to see it, and he agreed. So instead, we went to go see the 1972 remake titled, "The Last House on the Left."

If there are any other posts done reviewing the movie, I apologize... but I felt like the main female character (who was supposed to be 17 years old in the movie) was sexualized, from closeups on her in her underwear and bra, to a disturbing rape scene. 

It may have been the audience that I was sitting with, as most of them were laughing when there was violence against the two characters, Mary and Paige... But I could not stand to finish watching the movie. Supposedly the film is about seeking revenge after what happened to Mary (her rape), but as a survivor of sexual abuse, it was painful to watch. I got up and left the theater, and sobbed... it just triggered a lot of emotions for me.

And then, after posting Riotgirl's review of Watchmen on my facebook, I just had ridiculous comments about how I was "missing the point" about the human condition, and that sex sells, and it's entertainment and all that bs.

So, for those of you who have seen the film, or have thoughts about this insane justification of exploitation of women and sexual violence in film... thoughts??

Not raping someone.  Accusing someone of raping someone.

Some of you might remember the post I made about my recent sexual assault trauma.  Although it has been about nine days since the incident occurred I had not yet filed a police report (mostly due to the fact that I was confused and distraught, which is apparently my bad).  Today I tried to do anything I could to make myself feel better about this situation:  I went to my gynecologist, I saw two advocates from WEAVE, I called a rape crisis hotline, I took emergency contraception (which my ob/gyn told me doesn't always work after the first week but might still be effective), and I even went to file a police report.  Here's where things get a little fucked up.

At first I thought I wouldn't need to file a police report until after I had had an exam to see if any evidence could be gathered.  Unfortunately nobody told me, but at that hospital you have to get an OK from the county before giving this kind of an exam.  First off, what kind of rule is that?  Secondly, read on.

A policeman and a WEAVE advocate were called to help me file my report.  They sure helped a lot.  When the police officer first got there I was relieved since I thought he would help me, the victim of a crime, since that's sort of his job description.  He proceeded to interrogate me in a rude manner which suggested he didn't really give a shit about my sexual assault, including such important and pivotal questions as:

• Have you had any sexual partners since the incident?
• How do I know you're telling the truth if you keep changing your story? (This in retaliation to my stumbling over the previous question.)
• Have you had any sexual partners before the incident?
• Who were they?
• Why didn't you report this sooner?
• Did you say no more than once?
• Do you understand the severity of the charges you are bringing up?

Apparently since I didn't say no more than once, had a sexual partner since the incident (when I was drunk at a party for about fifteen seconds, and also rape victims often will act out sexually after they are assaulted Officer Fuckneck), consented to sex with the rapist before he raped me, and stumbled over my story several times as a result of it being fucking traumatic, I don't deserve to have my body examinated to look for any remaining evidence.  And according to this police officer the punishment for sexual assault doesn't fit the crime.

I will be speaking to a lawyer and I do have this officer's badge number... thanks rape culture, and fuck you very much.

Last November, my sister was raped.  My beautiful, sensitive, innocent, baby sister.  Every single day I find myself fuming at whoever did this to her, and every single day, I find myself fuming at the people who covered it up.  Everyone clammed up when questioned by police, said that they didn't know anything.  I knew the people who threw the party, I called and asked them if they knew anything and why they weren't cooperating with the police.  Again, silence from most. 

"Ugh, my LIFE right now!"

I've gone through difficult times before.  My mother has battled depression for years, since before I can remember.  I know how to handle myself.  I've been a feminist for -- well really my whole life, but my click moment happened about a year ago when I found this site.

Since then though, I haven't had a boyfriend, until very recently.  And here's where my problem is -- I'm too nice.  If someone is being degrading, I don't tell them unless it's completely heinous.  And sometimes I will put up with someone, no matter what they are doing or have done to me, because I want them to like me.  That's the way I am, and sometimes it's wrong and I know I should change it.  But that's not the point.  I am supposed to be telling a story here.

This is about a guy.  I met him online, on a site where I thought I would meet nice people.  I agreed to meet him in a public place, and we could talk.  He seemed nice, not the best kisser ever but it was fun and he seemed like he listened to what I had to say.  I had a problem later though, when he would call me "sweetie" and "babe" and I couldn't tell him it made me feel small.  Possibly because of how small I felt.

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month! This year's national campaign focuses on preventing violence in the workplace. Visit the website for more information and resources for planning your own SAAM events.

I've been trying to put this experience away, but I can't.  I can't put it away because I can't figure it out.  I can't figure it out because I can't talk to anyone about it.  I don't like sharing my personal life on the internet because I'm terrified someone will recognize something about something I've said and know who I am.  But it's the only way I can think of right now to get this all out.

I don't know if what happened was rape or not.  Sometimes I think it was, sometimes I think I was just stupid and don't want to take responsibility for bad decisions I made.  It really depends on the day. I don't know if putting it in one box or the other will actually help me deal with it, but I have to try.

[Backstory: Female student was raped and abandoned off-campus after accepting a ride from a man outside of a bar.]

I was relieved by the wording of the title of a Diamondback article about a sexual assault. “Man rapes, abandons student off campus.” For the second time in my college career, I saw a headline where the emphasis was on the actions of the perpetrator instead of something that just “happened” to a victim. Then I read the subtitle, “Female accepted ride from stranger during walk home,” and I knew that I was going to be hearing a lot of victim-blaming around campus this week. I heard a number of people talking about the incident and saying they weren’t sure how to feel about it. My question is: why should that fact change anyone’s response?

Former Israeli president Moshe Katsav is being indicted for rape and (from what I read) sexual harassment.

And of course: obstruction of justice.

*puts on political scientist's hat* Note that the term president can be somewhat confusing: the highest political figure (comparable to a US president) is the prime minister. The president is a somewhat ceremonial head of state.
*puts off political scientist's hat*
But it's still great they're actually prosecuting him!

For my high school english class, I'm writing a synthesis paper on whatever issue I choose. I'm planning on discussing rape and rape culture, only I'm not certain as to where to start. I feel overwhelmed. There's so much to talk about; I need to narrow things down. (At the moment, I'm leaning towards writing of victim-blaming and the like.)

So I'm asking you, my fellow feminists, what are the most pressing or relative issues regarding rape? And also, if you have any articles specific to these issues, I'd appreciate if you'd let me know of them.

Thanks.

Trigger Warning

I didn't know that I'd had sex been assaulted until two days after the fact. I knew that I'd blacked out, but I didn't know for how long, and I had assumed that nothing had happened.

I was at a house party when it happened. I was a freshman in my second semester of college, and I'd only just started drinking a few months before. I didn't understand my personal limits, and was still getting over the dissolution of one of my first semi long-term relationships. I had never had sex before. I assumed that because I was among plenty of friends, nothing bad could happen to me if I had as much as I wanted to drink.

The next morning, I woke up next to a guy I considered somewhat creepy but harmless. It didn't trip any warning bells. It was a house party - people were practically passed out on top of each other. I didn't think anything of it, except that we were the only two people in that room, which probably would have made me uneasy had I not woken up so late, after many of the party-goers had already left.

Up is down! Black is white! Bill O'Reilly speaks at fundraisers for rape survivors!

Oh, wait.

O'Reilly is going to be speaking at a fundraiser for the Alexia Foundation, which is a group founded to offer support to rape survivors in the hopes that more people will go through with prosecuting their attackers. Did somebody tell the person who invited him what he thinks of people who get raped?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200608040004

On the Upcoming Events page, it talks about O'Reilly and his numerous acheivements: /p>

Oh man, Limbaugh's going to be pissed off when he finds out. He just said that he wanted to pander to women, and then Bill goes and does this!

(Placed in the "sexual assault" category for lack of a "you're doing it wrong" one.)

I. was. not. raped. A RAPIST RAPED ME.

Trigger Warning

This is dedicated to all the jackass rape deniers and rape apologists out there:

For years and years I thought that what happened to me when I was 17 at my parent's house was rape. I guess I was wrong...

I was not a virgin. So there is no way that the man that forced himself on me could've raped me. Because you cannot rape someone who has had sex before. She is no longer pure and that one act of sex has told men everywhere that she is open and up for sex all the time. So I guess I was not raped.

I was drinking. So there is no way that this sick gross disgusting man could've raped me because I was not entirely sober. It must be assumed that I was drunk and actually wanted to have sex with him. Obviously any girl that has had a few beers when she's under the age of 21 and isn't a virgin isn't someone trustworthy anyway. She must just be a lying drunk slut who wanted it. So I guess I wasn't raped.

I was fooling around with him. So there is no possible way that that piece of shit man could've raped me because I started it all by kissing him first. We had hooked up before so it's no one's fault but my own that he was expecting more this time around. I had never said "No" before to his other advances so he was obviously not familiar with what the term meant. I led him on and then he obviously couldn't stop himself and that's no one's fault but mine. Men cannot be expected to control their actions when aroused. So I guess I wasn't raped.

What a relief it is to finally be free of this horror! All these years having nightmares of this despicable jackass pushing himself on top of me...gagging as he shoved his penis deeper and deeper in my mouth...crying in shame and confusion after he finished and left...good to know none of that was rape.

An article today in the Cincinnati Enquirer about a Xavier student who was raped last spring and has been in a he said / she said fight since reporting.

A few questions:
1. Why do readers need to know that her hair was long and dark and her nails were painted red that night?

2. Her advocate talked to the paper about this case???

The comments from readers are a serious trigger alert... don't even go there.

Props to Emily for being brave enough to report her assult, and I hope she continues to find strength as this drags on. Today is not a day I'm proud to live in Cincinnati.

Or at least think very little of them.

You see, people who blame rape at least partially on the victims operate under a few assumptions. One, that rape is about sex, two, that women can drive men to rape by provoking them, and three, that rape should be something that is expected as a risk.

Examples:

"When it comes to rape the rapist is absolutely the criminal. However, girls that are drunk and dressed provocatively act like bait for a rapist. Being drunk and sexy is like walking through the ghetto covered in jewelry. Girls that are not dressed scantily and are not intoxicated have every right to complain if they are raped. Although provocatively dressed drunk girls are not the criminals, they have absolutely no right to complain if they are raped. When girls dress to get the attention of guys, getting raped is a risk they are aware of ahead of time. They know some guys are rapists and they know they might attract the attention of those rapists. The sad part is that girls continue to feel looking sexy is worth the risk. "

"Rape is an appalling crime, but we need to realise the basic instinct on the man's part that drives them to commit such an act. There will never be an antidote for it, and although it is unfair on women, it will continue to happen. Women need to be aware and take steps to make sure they don't become victims. If this means dressing modestly or drinking in moderation, so be it; it is no good women's groups claiming this is unfair - that is the same as saying it's unfair to get wet in the rain because you don't have an umbrella! "

I got this from that appalling Daily Mail Study.

Okay, so now to crush those two stupid assumptions. One: Rape is about sex.

First post, this Canadian news story pissed me off so much I had to post.

A quick summary: Man pokes holes in girlfriend's condoms in attempt to get her pregnant, girlfriend gets pregnant, finds damaged condoms, has an abortion, has now ex-boyfriend charged with aggravated sexual assault. Judge finds him not guilty of all charges. Judge is a prick.

I live in this city, and I felt compelled to respond to the story via the following letter to the editor:

This ruling disgusts me. The definition of sexual assault in the Criminal Code presumably includes the unwanted insertion of various body parts or other items into a bodily orifice. The plaintiff in this case chose to use condoms, and therefore did not consent to have sperm willfully inserted into her. In Canada a woman has the choice to do what she wants with her uterus, including the decisions when and whether to give birth. Apparently, to the judge, an unwanted pregnancy is simply an 'oopsie' that can easily be fixed by just carrying on with it. Obviously that opinion cannot be shared by all, especially by those who actually experience pregnancy.

Sure, childbirth mightn't have seriously disabled the plaintiff; but seemingly the physical pain and discomfort of pregnancy and childbirth, the permanent physical changes which often occur as a result of it, and the mental distress of life plans suddenly being derailed are of no concern to Judge Moir. We can then also assume that the the pain and distress that has been caused by the abortion the victim felt it necessary to have are truly of no concern to him. This ruling sends a message that women have no bodily autonomy and if a man takes liberties with their personal reproductive choices, it's no big deal - certainly not criminal. This is outrageous and wrong.

I had to edit the letter quite a bit to try to fit within their 200-word limit. For instance, I took issue with the use of the word "dastardly" to define the man's actions. A Google search of 'dastardly' quickly tells me that "Dick Dastardly" was the name of a TV cartoon villain from the 80s. Somehow I don't think that any of Dick's "dastardly" schemes involved taking away a women's right to reproductive choice.

I tend to agree, however, that a charge of aggravated sexual assault was not applicable here - if you disagree with me, feel free to pipe up.

Long time reader and commenter, first time poster.

SO I was having a conversation with a classmate on Wednesday, and she began to tell me this story of how a coworker (bartender) of hers invited her and a few other coworkers over to his apartment after a party one night.  There were three of them, and they had known the guy for a year or so, so they went.  He mixed them some drinks and they all sat around drinking and talking.  My friend (we'll call her Jen) started to get really tired- so she went to a bedroom and laid down. 

Well, she was starting to feel really messed up.  Dizzy, fuzzy, and half-asleep, she tried to get a little sleep.  About an hour later, he slipped into bed with her and started to rub her back- she expressed her discomfort and dragged herself out of bed.  She stumbled into the front room, and saw her friend screaming because she had woken up with her pants around her ankles and her bra undone.  All the girls left and somehow got back to Jen's dorm. and slept.  Jen says she was still messed up days later (couldn't walk, stand, see straight).

The worst part is that they still have to see him on a regular basis.

So I asked her if she made a police report about the incident. I mean, the guy drugged them and sexually assaulted them.  She said "well it's too late now, and what difference does it make anyway? We can't prove it. None of us were sober."

It's so frustrating that she feels there's nothing she can do to stop this guy.  What about the next girl?  What if he rapes her or kills her? THEN will she come forward?

I don't know what to say to her.  It's not too late to make a police report.  It's not too late to make him pay for what he did to them.

I've recently noticed that when girls my own age (16) are sexually harassed they just seem confused about it. They don't tell a teacher, their parents, the police, they just tell people their own age, with puzzled expressions on their faces as they tell their friends about the creep.

The first example of this comes from listening to a friend of mine in Geology. It's a class of 5 so we're all really friendly with each other. She was telling us about how on the way to her mums car after a night out there were these two 40 year old guys outside and one of them grabbed her saying something like "come here beautiful", she shook him off and went straight to the car.

If this had been me I'd have screamed my head off, ran back to the car and demanded my mother call the police. The girl didn't seem to register these guys were potential rapists.

The second example was today when I overheard a girl in my class telling friends about the boy a few years down school who has been touching her and a friend inappropriately, he even dragged her outside once, and he says it's okay because they've known since he was 3 and they are friends, according to her (and I totally believe her) they are not. I'm thinking of going up to her tomorrow and saying "I couldn't help overhearing about that creepy kid yesterday, I really think you should tell a teacher about how he's behaving because what happens when he starts picking on girls who AREN'T bigger than him?"

The thing is, they don't get they are being violated, and now I think about it nobodies ever been into school and told us what to do if we are sexually assaulted, be we female or male. (I'm British by the way so it might be different in America.) I think it's really important we get educated about this sort of thing, we have Anti-bullying programs so why no Anti-sexual harassment programs?

After yesterday's Dexter Yarbrough posts, a discussion ensued at Feministing and here about campus rape reporting.

Now, there are a lot of reasons that college is not a universal experience: the university experience is much more prevalent among the affluent, denizens of G-10 countries, white folks, etc. It is an over-discussed and over-analyzed set of experiences. But in discussing sexual assault, the university experience is one of several that throw a high concentration of young adults together in the presence of stress and alcohol -- the military, in nations where women serve in large numbers, is another. So it's worth talking about for that reason alone.

For a few years now I've wondered how many women are pressured into silence. I've heard stories anecdotally, and I feel like there's a lot more under the surface.

One thing that stands out to me is that American universities have a motive to suppress women's stories. They are subject to the Clery Act, which requires that they report the number of violent crimes, including rape, on campus. I can't prove it, but my gut tells me that the Clery Act is, as lawyers sometimes say, "honored in the breach," that underreporting is systematic and routine. It's not as if nobody pays attention to it: Security On Campus seems to deal almost exclusively with Clery Act compliance. But the fine for failure to report is only $27,500, so the penalties for nonreporting are not stiff enough to deter, in my view, a school from trying to dissuade survivors from reporting. And the numbers just seem so low. To unfairly single out a school, at Penn State's University Park campus, the Clery Act reports show an average of about 8 forcible rapes, and not a single non-forcible sexual assault, for 2005/6/7. Does anybody believe that's the number of rapes on campus there? That that's the number reported to rape crisis services? Obviously, it's artificially low, reflecting massive underreporting. And I'm not trying to single out Penn State here, I just needed an example.

I don't believe any rape survivor owes it to anyone else to report. Some of the underreporting has to do with cultural forces far beyond the University. But given universities' reporting obligation, I wonder if women are encountering patterns and practices that dissuade them from making complaints to campus police.

What are your experiences? Anybody know anything?

I was winging my way to work this morning, reading the free newspaper that we get on public transport here, and saw this article on the front page. (Trigger warning)

It just utterly appalled me that not only did these men carry out such a brutal rape and get such lenient sentences, but that the attack was against an especially vulnerable member of society. What kind of message does this send? After all that girl has been through - not only at the time of the attack - but after, during the trial and for the rest of her life, and these men will be back walking the streets in four years or so?

I am absolutely shocked and very, very sad.

Last week a small $500,000 lottery to help raise funds for Stand Together Against Rape (STAR) was won by a sex offender. With Alaska leading the nation in domestic violence against women the odds of this happening are quite good.

The events after the winner was identified have been pretty well covered by KTUU TV news and the Anchorage Daily News. Once the winner's name was announced a member of the public notified KTUU that he was a registered sex offender for assaults against minors (extemely common in the Native Alaskan community). The TV news folks found him collecting his payout check at the lottery office, where he admitted his criminal history and stated that he would give $100,000 of his $350,000 in take home winnings to STAR. Has he done this yet? It has not been announced by anyone. No one is saying how much STAR will make directly from the fundraising lottery event.

In later interviews, the winner admitted that he had a difficult childhood filled with physical abuse and became an alcoholic while still a teenager. He now relies on religion to see him through difficult times.

The father of the first two victims thinks he should pay restitution for all the therapy his daughters have had to go through. They would have to sue the winner and the legal fees would eat all the money up leaving all parties where they started. Since all the crimes were over 8 or more years ago the statute of limitations might be in effect making a civil suite not likely to move forward.

On Tuesday the winner was attacked by a man from California who appears to have been up here hiding from recent felony warrants back home. Did he fly up here just to beat up this guy? Not likely. Alaska is well known to be a safe haven for folks on the run.

The ADN has a good synopsis of the events as they have occurred over the last week.

I do realize that most of you ladies are young feminists, but can any of you relate to the crime of gang rape that occurred long before you were born? I had a horrible experience:

I would like so much like to hear your feedback. Thank you.

So goes the lovely headline of a story about a 23 year-old woman who fell to her death from a 12 story-window after being sexually assaulted. Nice.

I was sexually assaulted today at work.

I've written before about the men that I work with on my blog, the cooks at my restaurant, here. 

Today, I was washing my hands at the sink in the back, when one of the cooks came up behind me, pressed the front of himself to my back, and pinned me against the sink. I froze up, and I couldn't think of anything to say, but I turned around to see who it was and I'm pretty sure my face was just as disgusted and as violated as I felt. 

Luckily, one of the other waiters was walking by, and he yelled, "Get off of that woman!" at the cook, and then he backed up. One of the other fry cooks saw it and just laughed, crowing "Did he just do that? Did he run up on you like that?" 

Some might cite the use of the word "assaulted" as being too strong a word, but I hardly think so. No, thankfully, I wasn't attacked. But OED says that assault is to "bombard someone... with something undesirable or unpleasant" so shut up. (Not you all here necessarily, but I posted this on my blog, too, and God only knows what sorts of people are going to run across it.) 

I'm upset by this. Angry, too. Angry that someone would think that it was acceptable to invade my very personal space to press up against my body. MY body. And angry at myself, as well, that I didn't say anything-- to either the cook or my manager. 

But what do you say? When I was first hired, the manager defined verbal sexual harassment as beginning the moment someone asks you to stop (telling a story, asking personal questions) and you don't. Touching, he said, is a zero tolerance game. 

But how do you go to the manager and say, "The skinny black cook with the glasses held me against the sink?" (No, I don't know his name). 

Besides, I don't want to cost someone their job. I don't even know if he knew what he was doing was wrong-- though that's not an excuse by any means. 

This is MY body. This is MY woman's body. My beautiful, curved and sloping, soft, strong, vital and necessary and exquisitely, personally made woman's body. It. Is. Mine. And you do not get to touch it, in any way, without my express permission. 

So why couldn't I think of anything to say? Why couldn't I defend this self of mine? Why did I need someone else to come along and break the silence that had been too tight and shocked for me to handle on my own? 

Maybe others have experienced it, too, a hypersexualized atmosphere in a restaurant workplace. Maybe it's because most people who work there are young and single. Maybe it's the only way the cooks have to entertain themselves. And to say anything would be to question the entire workplace's culture-- not that this is a bad thing, but I'm sure I would be seen as a bitch for not playing along like everyone else, and I wish I could handle that, but I don't know if I can. 

But I think I have to. If any of them touches me again, I'm going to the manager. And if he doesn't do something about it, then you better believe that I am. 

(Crossposted in an edited form at UneFemmePlusCourageuse )

(Note: this is not anti-male.  This is anti one male and others of his particular ilk.)

I gave a speech today on Take Back the Night marches (something I've been involved in for the past few years) in my notorious speech class , and wow, pardon , I didn't define rape for the uninformed entitled twenty-two-year-old men of America! Quelle horreur ! Because nobody could possibly know what that word means unless I, Gen Dusquesne, widely-renowned legal expert, informs them. I mean, Gott in Himmel , maybe all of his forays into the rooms of drunken girls who would never give him a second look sober were rape! Maybe that time he jumped out of the bushes and proceeded to fuck a girl was rape! He couldn't know! Because I never told him, in the one speech I gave on the topic. So he can't set boundaries for himself, he can't be expected to change if we uppity women won't give him exact instructions on what rape is and how not to do it.

Yeah, it was this guy . And here's his exact words,

"There is a lot of ambiguity in your speech. One of the greatest problems with sexual assault crimes is actually identify [sic] what a sexual assault is, because the line easily becomes fuzzy. Therefore, the problem step was not completely clear. If you can't clearly identify the problem, you can't ask people to take an action."

Hmm. Hmm . "Kein Problem ?" Let's look at some of the statistics I used, shall we?

"One in six women and one in thirty-three men will be sexually assualted in their lifetimes. College women are four times more likely to be sexually assaulted. According to campus police, there were four incidents of forcible sex offenses on campus during 2006. Sixty percent of sexual assaults are not reported to the police."

How is the problem not clear? Sexual assault itself is a problem. I don't give a shit if you define it as an unrequested ass slap or a full-on violent rape. They are both problems, one is more serious than the other, but they both represent facets of the gross lack of respect for women's bodies in our society. All forms of sexual assault are problems that need to be taken care of to ensure equality between men and women in our society. I've been harrassed on the street and I've been raped, and no one should have to go through either experience. The fact that a funny story one of my friends told me the other day (in which his friend went to New York City, got on the wrong train, ended up in a bad neighbourhood at 3 am, asked a guy for directions, was told to give the guy $10 if he wanted directions, laughed it off, walked away to find a group of "unfriendly looking guys" waiting for him, and turned around to find $10 direction guy waiting again) was hilarious for him but sent chills up my spine? That's not okay. That there are neighbourhoods that I know far better than my boyfriend does that I would not feel comfortable walking through at night without him or another trusted male there with me is not okay. That this freaked me out so bad is not okay. That a dude has come up to me and a female friend telling me his name is "Ben Dover," and asked where our boyfriends are, with three huge friends behind him, is not okay. That my high school boyfriend thought it was okay to have sex with me when I had already told him no is not okay. Got it?

No, I don't think you do. RAINN 's definition is,

"Sexual assault is a broader category that the Justice Department uses to classify rape, attempted rape, and other violent felonies that fall short of rape. Rape is defined as forced vaginal, oral, or anal penetration."

(I referenced RAINN multiple times in the speech. So he has an easy source to look stuff up.)

But really? What his comments read to me as is, "you haven't given me all the answers in five minutes. Therefore, I will keep on being a rapist or potential rapist and I will not question my actions or think about this further, because I have not been spoon-fed absolutely everything, simply told some important facts and that it is wrong."

Then again, maybe it was just my repeated references to sexual assault as a cultural problem which could be changed rather than a "natural" one that luckily for him can't be changed. He doesn't want to lose his easy excuse, don'tcha know.

Fucking bastard.

I have recently become obsessed with Battlestar Galactica and have watched everything through Season 3 on DVD (I am impatiently awaiting the release of Season 4.0). The show brings up so many issues including race, gender, sexuality, class, and politics.

One episode that I found especially intriguing was "The Farm" in Season 2. Lt. Kara Thrace "Starbuck" is held hostage in a medical facility where her cylon-docotr, suggests that being pregnant would be a better use for her than continuing as a fighter pilot. She is repeatedly drugged and it is implied that the doctor may have harvested her eggs or removed one of here ovaries. Starbuck being the strong woman that she is murders her doctor. In her escape, she finds many women hooked up to machines to impregnate them. She destroys the machines stopping their rape

At this point, I want to celebrate, jump up and down, hoot and holler. But Starbuck's doctor, the head honcho in this "hospital," is a black man. Here BSG is holding hands with the likes of Birth of a Nation and lynch mobs. BSG is taking part in the American stock story that black men rape white women. This relationship has been used to justify not only casrtration of black men, but also the paternalistic "caring" for white women. Black women are all but erased.

Now this is not the only portrayal of rape on the show. Two cylon detainnees, Gina Six and Athena, were both vitims of rape. Gina Six's story (in episodes "Pegasus" "Resurrection Ship") is an incredibly sad portrayal of how some victims cannot cope with the aftermath; although it is worth noting that Gina Six is dealing with alot more than just sexual assault. Ultimately, she murders Admiral Cain, the woman who is ultimately responsible for her rape and torture, as she is the commanding officer. And it is later reealed Admiral Cain and Gina Six were lovers (Razor), which is another bag of worms, as they are only lesbian or homosexual couple depicted o nthe show thus far (unless something happens in 4.0). Ultimately, she takes her life with an atomic explosion, really driving home how scarring violence can be.

(Warning this could trigger victims of Sexual Assault)

Sometimes I wish I wasn't a survivor. Actually I do wish I wasn't a damn survivor. I wish that I was never molested and raped as a kid. But it happen. And up until recently, I had blacked out my whole childhood. Deciding to completely forget my past. I mean what you can't remember wont hurt you right?

And that worked, for a bit at least. Now here I am having one of the toughest week's I've ever had as a survivor of sexual abuse. All I can think of is what happened to me. All the things I blacked out, well they are vivid in my mind now.

And what makes it worse, is that the person who did all this fucked up shit to me was my own father. My own fucking father molested me.

I use to always deny he did anything, I didn't want my mom to feel even worse about keeping us in that situation until I was old enough so that we could fight for termination of his parental rights and I could tell a judge I really didn't want him as my father. I never wanted my mom to feel like it was her fault. Cause it wasn't her fault. She was abused. He would verbally abuse her and sometimes physically abuse her. She couldn't leave that situation for fear of him killing us. And he tried. The one thing I was always able to remember before my flashbacks started was how when I was around three years old, he put a gun to my head. I remember it. And it's crazy. Cause I was a baby. But I remember my mom begging him to stop; I remember her face, and her tears going down her face as she tried to figure out how to calm him down. So the last thing I wanted to do was tell her that her now ex husband, my father, molested me. I can't even believe im writing this.

I wrote the following as a hypothetical rant to a male friend who I adore in every way except for the fact that he constantly jokes about rape. I object every time, but the response is the one you're ALL familiar with: exasperated, implying that I'm just too sensitive and need to lighten up.
This was not written for Feministing, but not knowing what to do with this once I'd written it, I decided others might like to read it, because it is simply stream-of-consciousness and not structured. I thought about putting an introduction, after the fact, to make it more like a letter or something, and more linear for Feministing readers, but that's not how it was written and it felt more honest to leave it as it is.
---
I wonder if you joked about slavery and lynchings all the time you were in africa? Or if you're around orthodox jews, do you casually joke about the holocaust and feel exasperated at their lack of humour when they fail to see the funny side? Probably not. Those things are considered 'history', but you'd never joke about them. Rape is happening now, to our friends and family. There are probably many girls you know (and even some boys) who've never told anyone. On a larger scale, literally thousands of girls a year are trafficked in and out of this country and many others to be sold into sex slavery.

I'm sure my suggesting that rape jokes are misogynistic seems as if I'm trying to portray women as constant victims, threatened even by simple words. But I refuse to pretend that I'm the one with the problem, instead of this casual approach to rape being the problem, which is the reality. If my comparisons above aren't good enough, and you're still convinced there's something different about this case, try to see it from the perspective of a woman. There is no escaping the endless harrassment from men, in daylight, at nighttime. The response that comes back is 'Don't go out if you don't want to be harrassed.' If you're a woman, society views you as an overgrown child who doesn't have the right to go to the places men can go to, or do the things men can do. And if you do, you're blamed for what happens. When a woman is raped, people go out of their way to blame her. Here's just a few examples. A 17 year-old girl went to court over her rape, where it was suggested that she was responsible for the attack for wearing underwear with the words 'little devil' on it*. A friend of ours was assaulted when she was 14. Authorities told her she was responsible for wearing make-up and having highlights in her hair. An 18 year-old woman was attacked a few years ago, and the judge stated she was probably grateful for the attention. The headline printed was 'Rape girl grateful for sex'. This list goes on and on, these are not isolated incidents. Even paedophillia, if the victim happens to be female, brings on a similar response. Girls as young as five have been accused, in british 21st century courts, of leading their attackers on.

If this were not the case - if women who were raped were not accused of being responsible - I wouldn't worry so much. The fact that women are blamed for their rapes - and that people think rape is funny, too - hurts almost more than the fact that women are raped in the first place. I do not fear rape nearly as much as I fear a society that not only renders rape victims powerless, but pours scorn on them and makes them feel like worthless pieces of shit who deserved what they got and whose situation is something to banter about over a pint. Sexual violence, to a woman, is not something that just happens 'out there' to other people. It is always close to home.
---

This weekend I went to see Quantum of Solace, and thanks to my severely reduced expectations, rather enjoyed losing myself in the car, boat and plane chases.  One scene, however, snapped me from my suspended reality back to the misogynist world that Bond operates in.

Trigger Warning

Hi Feministing Community!  I am struggling with finding some resources on acquaintance sexual assault and thought that maybe someone here would have some suggestions.  I have found some decent academic articles, but am having a very tough time finding good books, specifically books geared towards survivors and not counselors. I have found some great resources for adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse, but nothing specifically geared towards acquaintance sexual assault survivors.  I have sifted through a bunch of books that are chock full o' blame and have ridiculous and harming 'safety' and 'prevention' tips and feel like I've hit a wall in finding any really stellar books.  Does anyone have any suggestion on books geared towards survivors that deal with acquaintance sexual assault, drug-facilitated sexual assault or stalking?

I'm having abit of an argument with a freind, she pointed out this   site to me, I said I thougth it was bullshit and she thinks it offers sensible advice.

While I don't dispute  common sense I am SICK of the respobility being hauled upon women and women who didn't do what they 'should' have done being blamed for being raped, sites like this do not offer anything postitve in my opinion espcially when they have such delsightful statements such as this

'Don't Put Yourself in a Situation Where You Could Be Raped
At first glance, this is the biggest "NO DUH!" statement we could make. And yet, it is something that the nearly 100,000 US women -- who are raped every year -- didn't manage! '

cross-posted at UneFemmePlusCourageuse .

This has nothing to do with elections, nevertheless...

Oh, Speech class. How you constantly infuriate me.

This, by the way, will have nothing to do with the Idiot Boys . It does, however, have to do with the guy I have previously referred to as 'Seemingly Singular Nice Boy,' (SSNB) who since that day I have realized ain't nice. (Was it the fact that he used something I said as his own argument and then, when he misstated it, threw it back as mine, leaving me to defend a mere shell of my actual position? Maybe. It's also the horrible vibes that seem to suggest both, "I think I am better than all of you and you do not recognize my brilliance because you are idiots" and "I am a creep.")

Anyway, a girl in my class gave a speech about rape and sexual assault and sexual harassment/street harassment, and how that all ties into the patriarchy. Awesome. It was a really excellent speech, period, even when I am trying to be unbiased and pretend that she didn't completely represent my belief system in a very good way. She mentioned Andrea Dworkin very briefly, my teacher mentioned (aka misstated) what Dworkin said about sex and rape without talking about Dworkin's motivations and reasonings behind her statement, and basically made Dworkin out to be a total nut whose work is without merit because of it. (Anyone discussing Dworkin and John Stoltenberg's relationship needs to know the history behind "political lesbianism" as well as the theory of a continuum of sexuality, or they will not get it.)

I have some bad news. A good friend of mine recently worked up the courage to go to the police about the man who abused her throughout high school. However, after suffering ridicule, skepticism, dishonesty, and distain at the hands of the police service, she has decided not to pursue this case any further.

I'm extremely frustrated that this sicko will NOT be going to prison, and instead he will continue to be free to continue preying on teenage girls. I certainly don't blame her for backing out - from what she's told me, it seems that the police all but blamed her for the repeated attacks ("Why didn't you say no?" "I did!" "Well why didn't you make him stop?" "Because I was scared" "Why did you continue to see him?" "I had to go to school" etc) and they essentially told her that her case was completely pointless.

At least they didn't pull the "you oughta be ashamed of yourself, you could ruin this poor guy's life!" BS they did when I reported the man who raped me when I was 15. (I also didn't end up pursuing that one in court after the way I was treated by the police.)

What the FUCK is wrong with our system that we seem to think it's okay to treat rape victims this way?!?! My friend and I are not minors anymore, but our assaults happened when we were CHILDREN in the eyes of the law. Why is our justice system refusing to protect children from rapists? Why is it okay to attack the character of a scared 18 year old girl reporting the 35 year old man who attacked her at a concert 3 years ago, but it isn't okay for her to attack his character? (i.e. suggest that he might have actually, y'know, raped her .)

I am just so sick and sad about all of this. Is there anything that can be done? I don't want to go through that humiliation and pain again (and I know my friend probably never will either) but it terrifies me to know that the man who raped me and the man who molested and brainwashed my friend are both still out there, with access to other young girls just like us.

*More on my friend's story. He was in a position of power, and she was 14-17 during the time of the ongoing molestations. He forced her to cut out other activities and devote all of her attention to him and his group. He refused to let her see some of her friends, and he forced her to miss school to go on private camping trips under the pretense of a "school activity." Through this segregation, he managed to brainwash her into thinking that what he was doing was okay, that her eating disorder was a GOOD thing, and that her parents and friends were just being controlling. When she graduated, she managed to get away from him, but he found her a few months ago and chased her in his car - that was the turning point when she decided to report his actions.

I am always amazed how whenever there is a rape case, it's treated as a given that women lie about sex.  Perhaps I'm imagining things, but it seems to me that in almost every rape case the defense will somehow bring up that the woman willingly had sex with the man and then lied to A.) extort money or something else from him or B.) protect her image of purity and/or chastity.  Couldn't it just be that she's telling the truth and that the guy is just guilty?

It's always good to see defense attorneys keeping it classy, like with this quote:

"Levine said the women who testified against Alexander "invited what happened" and then made up stories so they could sue Alexander after his criminal case."

Recently, Feministing posted about Scotland's fantastic current 'this is not an invitation to rape me' campaign. If you go to their website there are categories of what constitutes rape and what doesn't, one dealing with marriage. There is a place to leave comments, and one man is apparently so offended that this campaign would have the nerve to talk about spousal rape that he's leaving the country. Here's his comment:

"To associate pictures of a Wedding with rape is just the confirmation I needed for taking my beautiful wife and children away from this country. I know you already hate me but as a husband and father of five children I will say this..... My children will not see one of your billboards, TV ads, or Newspaper articles. But I am totally confident my four sons will be in every way respectful of any woman they ever encounter. And I hope for them the same love a man can feel for a woman, the happiness of being with her, and joy of holding each newborn child. As for my daughter, I want her to love, be loved, and have her fairytale wedding. I wish for all of my children the happiness my wife and I have, which is captured in every picture of our wedding day. This campaign seems designed to destroy that image for all of my children."

*SCREAMS*

This story has been in the media quite a lot over the past few months or so, but the case still hasn't been resolved. Frankly, the scare quotes in the headline of that otherwise decent article are a stark reminder of how the case has been ignored by the police . Some have even called for the arrest of Sister Meena Barwa.

This is, I think, pertinent for a few reasons, one of which is the fact that (as some commenters at the Indian Express thread said) the reason that the case is attracting both so much and so little attention is because the victim is a nun.

On the one hand, it seems to be again valorising the supposed purity of a woman and making it all the more heinous because of her vow of chastity, similar to how the media over-reports the sexual assault of virgins.

On the other, there's a likely chance the mob chose to attack a nun because she was a nun, because of those vows, to further drive home their message. There would also be religious motivations in the questioning of the validity of the attack and in the cover-up - because the conflict in Orissa is an "embarrassment" to the regional government.

To be honest, I really do find the fact that she was a nun a reason why this attack was so brutal (not that sexual violence against those not of religious orders is any better). As a nun, she made a public statement about her sexuality. And she was attacked as a political statement, because of her appearance (and what that appearance stands for), which is dehumanising.

Sadly, news media coverage of this has been rather shoddy, and I hope for the swift resolution of the case, as well as wish that in all conflicts women's bodies would cease to be the vehicles of statements in the form of victims. Because this has been a recent fixture in the papers I read, but Sister Meera is not the first, nor the last, and there are probably more unreported stories out there.

Here in Scotland, a new pro-woman, anti-rape ad campaign has begun, challenging the perceived notions that certain women are 'asking for it', it demonstrates a never-blame-the-victim ethos and a firm belief that rape is never acceptable under any circumstances.

Hooray for Rape Crisis Scotland and their fantastic, myth-busting campaign!

thisisnotaninvitationtorapeme.co.uk

Wow. I find it amazing the things judges will accept to justify sexual assault of minors. First, Canada brought the world the sexsomnia defence and now we are inaugurating yet another 'get out of jail free' rape defence. With so many valid reasons for raping someone being found in this country, I'm not certain if next week we won't find out that mild depression or anxiety is a justifiable defence for sexual assault. Here's the story from Alberta:

Having sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl he believed was older was not a criminal act by a Calgary man, a judge ruled yesterday.

Provincial court Judge Bruce Millar said Matthew Allan Armstrong's testimony he accepted the girl's claim she was 16 was convincing, especially since he suffers a condition which makes him more gullible.

Millar noted Armstrong has myotonic muscular dystrophy, a disease which makes it difficult for those afflicted to make complicated decisions.

"The sufferer deals in absolutes," he said, pointing to expert evidence called by defence lawyer Balfour Der.

"People with myotonic dystrophy tend to believe what they are told is fact."

Well, I'll be. That sounds terrible! Except, that if you read the whole article you find out that the girl claimed the sex wasn't consentual and that this wasn't the man's first time picking up underage girls on the internet.

He also said testimony from the girl, in which she said she was forced to have sex with Armstrong and he was aware she was only in junior high school, was tainted by poor police work.

[...]

The verdict was decried by the girl's mother, who said the incident two years ago has had a lasting effect on her daughter.

"She's not the same girl, she's not confident, she doesn't hang around with her friends anymore," said the woman, who warned parents to always keep an eye on their children's Internet use.

Armstrong still faces other allegations he tried to lure young girls over the Internet and remains in custody on those charges.

For more information on the condition check out the wikipedia page...

I recently watched the documentary Girl 27.

It's about Patricia Douglas, who in 1937, who was hired to work along with many other women and girls to work at a party MGM threw for its salesmen (they thought they were going to a film set). Patricia was raped at this event, and MGM systematically proceeded to cover up the crime. Patricia sued MGM in federal court. Although her case was dismissed, I am amazed at the courage it took for her to publicly take on a giant like MGM.

Ok, so I have a separate Livejournal, where I talk about all the stuff that has real potential to start flame wars that I don't want to deal with in my regular journal.

http://polimicks.livejournal.com/

So far the two most contentious subjects have been Health At Every Size (what, you're just giving up?) and a series of posts I've been doing on rape.

I love my male friends, but most of them just don't seem to get it. At all. From the sarcastic comments that I'm "taking a really brave stand saying rape is wrong" to "the cops don't really treat rape victims like that" to "women accuse men falsely all the time." And I've even got some female friends who chime in regularly on the "but women falsely accuse men of rape" bandwagon.

Dan Savage is a hugely popular sex columnist. Many times, his advice and views are a refreshing change from the usual. At other times, like in this column, he makes me squirm.

Essentially, he's telling women to close their eyes and think of England. Like we haven't heard this from the patriarchy a thousand times.

Here's the quote:

"But you also commit to making sure your boyfriend is well and thoroughly milked - with your cheerful assistance - at least three additional times a week. You commit to being his full-blown sex partner once a week and his life-size, ambulatory masturbatory aide at least three times a week." How would that work? Well, let's say you're not up for sex on Wednesday because you had sex last Sunday. But he's horny. So you plop your twat down on his face and let him eat you out while he beats off. It'll take 10 minutes. Then let's say he's horny again on Friday, but you're just not feeling it. So you treat him to a hand job while you rub your tits in his face. Another 10 minutes..."

If this is GGG ("good, giving and game"), I am getting turned off sex permanently. I no longer want a boyfriend, especially a boyfriend who reads this crap and then expects women to follow it.

Thoughts?

Recently there have been a lot of billboards leased by the Meth Project here in Wyoming.  While I'm generally in favor of this kind of advertising, I'm pretty shocked by the latest one they added.  I understand that the point of this is to evoke shock and disgust, but equating rape with romance is extremely irresponsible, no matter how worthwhile your agenda is.

So, I guess I'll be writing a letter to the local newspaper again...