Earlier this week, the results of a survey on rape and blame were announced, which Hannah Mudge covered for BitchBuzz News. It was quite simply astounding to discover that:
"The majority of women surveyed believed that some rape victims should take responsibility for what happened to them."
The idea that victims (usually women) are to blame in rape cases is not only offensive to women; it is also offensive to men too. It implies that men can't help themselves and are all just aggressive Neanderthals who can and will attack others because it's part of their nature. Individual circumstances should obviously be very carefully considered every time an accusation goes to court, and sometimes the victim may well be considered to have put themselves at increased risk of attack, but the idea that victims "should take responsibility for what happened to them" equates in a lot of people's minds to "the victim is to blame".
How is this going to help juries remain impartial? How is this going to help friends and relatives of victims to provide support when it's most needed?
In my opinion, part of the problem is that most people think that rape is about sex, when it's actually far more about power, and quite often, violence. When searching for other people who have written about this online, I came across and old blog post from Abstract Nonsense who shares my view that rape is not a sexual act but a nasty and violent crime.
"Another view is that rape is a violent crime – in particular, the second worst, so that it shares some characteristics with murder and some with assault and robbery. In this view, it’s as enjoyable as being beaten up; it’s certainly more traumatic [...] More importantly, the best way to reduce the rape rate is to reduce the overall rate of violent crime."
Quite simply, rape is about power. In the case of an attack by someone you know – sometimes called date rape – it is often a case that the woman has the power over whether or not the couple have sex, and so a rejected man may want to take that power back. Frustrating though it must be for them, thankfully most men in that situation don't continue when told not to. In the case of an attack by a stranger, it's about exerting power over another person in the same way that any assault is.
It's not just young attractive girls wearing short skirts and high heels who get raped, so I'm unsure as to why this idea of anyone 'asking for it' has hung around. Sadly, the high-profile reporting of a very small number of stories where women have mentioned or acted upon their rape fantasies don't help stop the myth that "women enjoy it" either.
Sadly, this is not a new phenomenon. An article entitled Rape myths past and present from the New Statesman refers to a case in 1880 that was dropped, presumably because the court believed a number of these myths. In these more enlightened times, you’d think it would be easy to understand that women don’t frequently lie about rape, and no does in fact mean no.
It is also shocking that a woman’s sexual history can be dragged up in court to prove that her attacker was provoked. Would they do the same if the male victim of a violent attack took part in boxing, or if someone who’d been mugged had a habit of loaning money to friends? No, because it’s irrelevant. The sooner people realise that rape is not about sex, the better.
For the record, just because I write articles on sex and have a colourful sexual history which includes a fondness for submission, this does not mean I want to be raped. Even when those involved may be playing out a scene that indicates otherwise, sex is consensual. Rape isn’t, and that makes a world of difference.
Image via Tiago Rïbeiro's Flickr