INTRO

–    An underage girl in Steubenville was raped last year by two teenagers, Ma’lik Richmond and Trent Mays. In March, Richmond was sentenced to one year in juvenile detention for rape, while Mays was sentenced to two years for rape and the release of pornographic pictures of the victim. This case has brought about national attention to the issue of rape and rape culture. Rape culture is the idea that rape, violence, and sexual assault are endemic in today’s society, and that such things are perpetuated by popular culture. The following is a discussion of four aspects of rape culture.

CONSENT

–       Anything that isn’t explicitly “yes” is no. There’s no hidden meaning, no ulterior motives, no exceptions. And it’s alarming how many people don’t understand something as easy as that. It’s something that should just be inherent, like the fact that the sky is blue or that grass is green. If someone says “no” to sex, their statement should be taken at face value. Each person has their own set of boundaries, their own limits. And nobody has the right to infringe upon those boundaries. No one. If somebody is mentally compromised, like being under the influence of drugs, that’s considered dubious consent, which could be considered rape, depending on the situation. The “Don’t Be That Guy” campaign looks to end rape via dubious consent and rape in general, with marketing aimed at men ages 18 to 25. They have posters emblazoned with slogans like “Just because she’s not saying no doesn’t mean she’s saying yes.” The bottom line is that no means no, and it’s time to treat it that way.

SYMPATHY FOR RAPIST

–       You’d think that when a crime is committed, the victim is the one who should feel sympathy. Maybe you’d think “Hey, this person is suffering and their life could be changed forever because of an unfortunate event.” But the thing about rape is that many victims don’t receive the justice or the help or the sympathy they deserve. According to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, only about 3 percent of rapists ever go to jail, that’s after factoring in the approximately 54 percent of unreported rapes. In the case in Steubenville, so much of the news coverage was about how the boys had such promising lives, and how their promising lives were ruined. The most famous slanted coverage came from reporter Poppy Harlow at CNN, when she said “these two young men who had such promising futures – star football players, very good students – literally watched as they believed their life fell apart.” She has since received much criticism, from people and reporters across the country. The news of Steubenville was spun in a way, not only at CNN, that made it seem as if the victim had screwed Richmond and Mays over by being raped by them. She didn’t. Those boys deserved way more of a sentence than they got for the crimes they committed. Each received the minimum sentence that they could. What really bothers me, though, is that even after they had raped a girl, spread incriminating pictures on the Internet, and made fun of the incident afterwards, people still had the audacity to pity them and their forsaken futures. I don’t pity them. I can’t find it in myself to pity people who made a conscious decision to assault another person, in this case, or in any case. Pity should be saved for real victims. It should be saved for the people who suffer at the hands of others, and for the people who will forever be scarred by the bad decisions of the people around them.

VICTIM BLAMING

–       Since the Steubenville case went nationwide, the girl who was accosted has received death threats. People are literally threatening to kill her because she was the victim of rape. The lawyers defending the perpetrators blame her for their actions that night in August. In this case, and many others, people blame the victim by making excuses for the person who committed the crime. So often, people will say things like “she shouldn’t have worn such revealing clothing,” or “she should have known not to drink that much,” and far too often people will flat-out say, “It’s her fault.” But does wearing revealing clothing really equate to permission for rape? In our society there exists a strange paradox: we tell people to “love your body” and to have self-esteem, but then we claim, when they do love themselves enough to show off their bodies, that they have no self-respect. We do this because we believe the only reason a girl wears short shorts is to impress someone of the opposite sex. It couldn’t possibly be because they like themselves. In fact, we claim it is because the opposite is true: you must hate yourself; otherwise, why would you want attention? Except what fuels these assumptions is that society has determined a woman is not of value unless she is pretty enough that a man desires her, thus all a woman’s clothing choices must revolve around getting a man’s attention. The thing is, if a girl chooses to wear revealing clothing or drink, that’s her decision. It’s not a suggestion or a come-on; it’s a personal choice and one that should be respected, or at least not taken advantage of. Bottom-line: nobody asks to be raped. No one buys a skirt thinking: wow, I hope this gets me sexually assaulted. Nobody goes out looking for a good time and expects to be physically and emotionally abused. Much like it seems “no means no” is an easy concept to understand, “it’s never the victim’s fault” should be an easy one to grasp too.

SEXUALIZED CULTURE

–     Super hot girl in bikini plus a burger equals what? Just your average Carl’s Jr. commercial. Why do we need sex to sell a burger? I don’t know. But it doesn’t end with fast food. The mainstream media is chock-full of oversexualization. This insane predominance of sex isn’t necessarily the problem. It’s in the implications of these representations where trouble arises. These “sexy” depictions dominate our culture and warp our values in such a ways that the only way a woman can make herself “valuable” is by being desired by men. This kind of mentality is disgustingly present in message boards, and social media across the Internet, where people anonymously claim those considered “unattractive … should be grateful that anyone even wanted to rape them.” As nauseating as it is, we see that the problem is that constantly sexualizing women sends a message to men that they are entitled to sex. Women are painted as a goal to be conquered but they really aren’t, and shouldn’t be treated as such.