America Victim Blames So Easy

"Some girls rape easy."Wisconsin  Rep. Roger Rivard said this. When trying to clarify his statement, he said,

"[My father] also told me one thing, 'If you do (have premarital sex), just remember, consensual sex can turn into rape in an awful hurry,' " Rivard said. "Because all of a sudden a young lady gets pregnant and the parents are madder than a wet hen and she's not going to say, 'Oh yeah I was part of the program.' All that she has to say or the parents have to say is it was rape because she's underage. And he just said, 'Remember, Roger, if you go down that road, some girls,' he said, 'they rape so easy.'"

I'm so sick of this conversation about women changing their minds about sex the next day, or down the road. Sex is consensual in the moment, then the woman changes her mind and calls it rape the next day, because she feels guilty, because she feels ashamed. I'm sure this has happened, but let's stop talking about it like this makes up the majority of rape accusations. There are several problems with this narrative.

1. This implies that women should, and do, feel guilty about sex. Of course women feel guilty about sex, especially young women, when their culture is constantly telling them to be sexy but don't have sex, to be desirable but not to feel desire. Women are more connected with the image they are putting out, with how they look, than how they feel. Peggy Orenstein, in her book Schoolgirls, spoke to one young girl who told her about a "hooking up" situation with a boy. When asked how it felt, the girl responded, "I felt like I looked good."

2. This narrative leaves every victim wide open to accusations of lying about a rape. This allows policemen, parents, bystanders to ask "Are you sure you didn't want it?" It allows people to call into question what the woman was wearing, if she was drunk, how she was behaving, if she agreed to some sexual encounter and then changed her mind. It calls into question every woman who is brave enough to report a rape.

3. This narrative also leaves out men in several ways. First, it doesn't allow for the possibility that a woman did feel ashamed, because she was coerced by another person. But this narrative paints the guy (or the woman if it's a man, but I'll get to that in a minute) as a victim. HE just had sex and then suddenly she's going back on everything that happened, she is lying, she is embarrassed and trying to cover her own ass. He is just an innocent bystander. Also, this narrative doesn't allow for a male victim, either as a victim of rape, or as someone who feels confused or ashamed about sex after the fact. Men have feelings too, people. I know men who have had sexual encounters that they regretted, or were confused about. I know a man who lost his virginity to a confident, aggressive older girl, a girl who didn't know he was a virgin and didn't ask if he wanted to have sex. And afterward, he was suddenly sad that he had lost his virginity in this quick way. Some people, especially if the genders in this scenario were reversed, would absolutely call this rape. He doesn't call it rape (and he doesn't have to). But my point is that he has never really been able to work through any regretful or confused feelings about his first sexual encounter because in our culture, he should be nothing but excited about having sex. And a girl initiated it? Awesome! He's a stud. End of story. It's just not fair.

4. In the same way that this narrative doesn't allow men to feel bad about sex, it doesn't allow women to feel good about it. It says that women should feel bad about sex. It says that if their parents find out they had sex, of course they are going to lie about it, because they should be ashamed and secretive about it. It doesn't allow for women to enjoy sex or for young women to admit that they are responsible and safe about sex.

We need to talk about sex, openly and honestly. We need to acknowledge that women feel desire the same as men, and that men feel confusion about sex the same as women. We need conversations that acknowledge sex as something good and pleasurable (and to be done safely and responsibly), instead of as something bad and shameful.

Legitimate Rape vs... What?

I woke up yesterday to an e-mail informing me that Congressman Todd Akin (a Congressman I had not heard of until today) was on TV this weekend talking about abortion. When asked about exceptions for rape and incest, he said:

"It seems to me, first of all, from what I understand from doctors, [pregnancy from rape is] really rare. If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down."

Thanks, Todd Akin! I was really afraid that rape could sometimes result in pregnancy, but now I realize that if I am legitimately raped, my body will wave a magic wand and make that unwanted fertilized egg poof! disappear.

Phrases like "legitimate rape" are so dangerous because they imply that there is another kind of rape: the illegitimate kind. I'm not sure what Akin thinks would classify as illegitimate rape, but I have a few guesses: a rape that occurred when a woman said yes to "hooking up" but then changed her mind; a rape that occurred when a woman drank too much and wasn't capable of making decisions; a rape that occurred when a woman went out to a bar in a tight or revealing outfit; a rape that was committed by someone the woman used to have sex with. Guess what Todd Akin? These situations are all rape. A sexual activity forced on someone who doesn't want it, whether through violence, coercion, drugs, etc., is rape. This is why we worked so hard to get the FBI to change their definition of rape, to get rid of the phrase "forcible rape." It just doesn't make sense (a sentiment echoed by President Obama).

Phrases like "legitimate rape" are dangerous because not only do they imply other kinds of rape, but they put doubt and blame on the victim's shoulders. It's just another way of bringing up questions like "Were you asking for it?" "What were you wearing?" "But you went to his apartment, right?" And now with Todd Akin saying that he understands this all from doctors (I'd like to know which doctors!), he could really have believing that their pregnant daughter can't have been raped, because otherwise her body would have performed the magical expulsion of the rape-egg. He's completely ignoring science and biology, and he's doing it in a dangerous way that could have real, terrible consequences for women.

Survivors of rape have so much shit to deal with; let's not add Todd Akin's idiotic understanding of the female body or the shame and blame he would impose on it.

Dan Savage, Rape, and the Gray Area

I was listening to Dan Savage's (sex and relationship advice columnist and star/host of the new MTV show Savage U) most recent podcast and a caller wanted to know if he (the caller) had been raped. His story was of a girl with whom he had a sexual history taking advantage of him and having sex with him when he was blackout drunk and she was sober. And, it should be noted, he had made it clear to her prior to this incident that their sexual relationship was over and that he was no longer interested in seeing her. So in his answer, Dan discusses the gray area that he believes exists and doesn't get talked about in the realm of sexual violation.

Dan's opinion is that people have experiences, negative experiences, that leave them feeling violated but that aren't necessarily rape. And I think, though I've never spoken to him, that he is defining rape in this context as a "you could and should report to the police and pursue an arrest/conviction for the perpetrator" situation. So he's saying that there are situations that lead to feelings of violation, feelings of being taken advantage of, that don't necessarily mean the other person involved is a criminal because of what happened. 

He also said that he doesn't understand what good it does (in some cases, not all) for people to label a situation like this as rape. For example, he told the guy who called that he could label it rape, he was well within the general definition to do so, but he didn't understand what good that would do. For one thing, as a male victim, reporting to the police would most likely not be taking seriously. 

My first reaction to this is, "No, Dan, we just got the FBI to expand the definition of rape; don't try to lessen it for us!" But, at the same time, I understand what he means about experiences that may leave you feeling violated but not leave you feeling like the victim of a crime.

However, I wonder, is this because the gray area exists, or because our society has convinced us to see certain types of sexual experiences as okay, or even just unpleasant, but not to see them as rape. Is it just another symptom of rape culture that we discuss this gray area? Or is it just a more nuanced way of looking at sexual experience (as opposed to consensual, good sex vs. non-consensual rape)?

I know a woman who once got extremely drunk at a friend's house. A guy was there with whom she had had a friends-with-benefits relationship. Drunk, feeling sick, and not interested in anything but sleep, she excused herself from the party and headed into one of the spare bedrooms to pass out. (I think she also went to the bathroom to throw up first.) The last thing she remembers is this guy, with whom she had hooked up previously but with whom she had no interest in hooking up that night, crawling into the bed with her and starting to make out with her. I don't remember what he said to her, but I know her responses were along the lines of, "What? I got sick" and other drunk, sleepy, confused responses. She woke up with her underwear on, so she's pretty sure intercouse didn't happen (she doesn't think she would have put underwear back on after if it had, since she was so incapacitated). But she doesn't remember what did happen. She doesn't know how much happened. She doesn't know if anything happened. And because she never talked to him about it later, she'll never know.

Now, I'm using this example for a reason. I know this woman did not consider herself to have been raped. I also know this woman felt uncomfortable about what had happened. She felt violated. She felt disgusted with this guy, whom she had known so well and for so long, for taking advantage of her drunken state. She felt scared and bothered by the fact that she had some kind of sexual experience with no real consent and no memory of it. At the time, I told her that she had been raped, period the end. But can you really say that when you don't know what happened at all? She'd been taken advantage of, that's for sure, but that's all we really know. (I did advise her to talk to the guy, not in an accusatory way, but just to ask what happened, but I don't think she ever did; honestly, I think she wanted to move and never deal with it again. And if that's what she wanted to do, then who am I to tell her to do differently?) So how can we go about defining this experience?

Recently, the rape definition was expanded by the FBI (thanks to a long campaign by the Feminist Majority Foundation and Ms. Magazine). It now allows for male and child victims, and it defines rape as the forced penetration of any person without their consent (so rape with an object counts; forced oral sex counts). This definition is a huge victory. But it doesn't necessarily solve all rape-definition problems. 

Feminists always talk about consent, and that the lack of "no" doesn't mean "yes." And I agree with that. If you're hooking up with someone, and you move your hand somewhere, and they don't push it away, but they also don't seem to like it, you might want to check in before continuing. And asking if someone likes something, or how they want you to do it, can still be sexy; it doesn't have to be awkwardly asking for permission. And yet, I can understand how a person can find themselves in a situation where, after the fact, they find out that their partner didn't want something done and didn't voice it, and they truly didn't know that what they did wasn't okay with their partner.

Let's be honest. It can be hard to say no, especially, but not only, in a relationship with someone (be it a committed relationship, friends-with-benefits relationship or any other situation in which you find yourself having sex with someone you know well and are generally comfortable with). You're used to each other, you're past the point of nervously initiating sex, you're used to trying new things, and suddenly someone wants sex when you don't feel like it, or wants to try something that you're not interested in or ready for. It can be hard to say no. You don't want to disappoint them. And I do wonder, in this kind of situation, in the kind of situation like the example above, does the other partner's unawareness of your discomfort when you don't say anything automatically move them into the rape area? 

I'm really struggling with this concept. The first thing that comes to mind when someone says "rape" is a man (sorry, it is still statistically true, as well as the common image our society gives us) trying to touch/have sex with a woman, her clearly saying no, and him continuing anyway, forcefully if necessary. But I know that rape doesn't only occur in this way. I know the power dynamics between the two can affect how one may react (like an employee not feeling able to say no to a boss). The use of a weapon and threats can keep someone from saying no. 

Can we say that how the person feels about the situation is enough to define at as rape or not? Meaning, if the woman in the situation above said "I feel violated, but I don't feel raped," is that enough to conclude that she then wasn't raped? I'm not sure if that works either, because so many women describe situations of forced sex that they would not themselves define as rape, but many others would. 

So what do you think of the gray area? Does it exist? Do we need to separate the idea of rape from the idea of reporting to the police (meaning, is it better to define it as rape even if the survivor has no intention of pursuing any kind of arrest, as opposed to saying, "I would never try to have this person arrested for this, therefore it wasn't rape")? And is it important to get someone to define their experience as rape when they don't see it that way? Or is this gray area just another symptom of a culture that normalizes rape?

Chris Brown's Return: Rape Culture at its Finest (Worst)

OK guys. Get ready for rape culture in action (and domestic violence culture in action; if that's not a term, it should be). Rape culture is a "term used to describe a culture in which rape and sexual violence are common and in which prevalent attitudes, norms, practices, and media normalize, excuse, tolerate, or even condone sexual violence. Examples of behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming,sexual objectification, and trivializing rape." (Yes, that's from Wikipedia)


Last night, Chris Brown made his return performance to the Grammys. What does Chris Brown at the Grammys have to do with rape culture? Well, about three years ago, he beat up his girlfriend, pop star Rihanna. He beat her up so violently that she had to go to the hospital. 


After this story was leaked to the press, there was a huge media storm about it. And a large portion of that storm was discussing how Rihanna caused this to happen. A large portion of that storm was making excuses for Chris Brown, the abuser. And ever since this happened, people have been complaining that people need to pipe down and stop reminding everyone what Chris Brown did. "Let him move on!" "Get over it already!" Even someone in my own college newspaper wrote last year about how reporters should stop bringing up his past (I wrote a response to this which was never published in the paper, and so I published it here and started this blog). 


What about Rihanna? Was anyone helping her move on? Even when someone spoke up in the press about Rihanna needing support, the backlash was so great that he had to apologize for possibly offending Chris Brown. 


Now, three years later, Chris Brown has been welcomed back as a performer at the Grammys. And everyone is talking about how great it is to have him back. And those same people are completely ignoring his abusive past, and staying eerily silent on the reason he was gone in the first place. Now, I'm not saying that no one deserves a second chance. But Chris Brown has not actually been punished. He was put on probation and given community service hours. He was not in attendance at the Grammys for two years. That's nothing. What are we telling women when the men who abuse them get nothing but a slap on the wrist?


And the most twisted part? All the tweets and status updates from women saying basically the same thing, "Chris Brown's so hot I would let him beat me up any day."

This. Is. Rape. Culture. In. Action. 

When we have normalized domestic violence so much that women can casually joke about it being an easy price to pay for the man you want, we have a big problem.


Folks, we have a big problem.