1) Rape culture is a sociological concept for a setting in which rape is pervasive and normalized due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality. Behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming, slut-shaming, sexual objectification, trivializing rape, denial of widespread rape, refusing to acknowledge the harm caused by some forms of sexual violence, or some combination of these. The notion of rape culture has been used to describe and explain behavior within social groups. Entire societies have been alleged to be rape cultures.
2) A culture, environment or society where rape is common, and in which social attitudes or practices work to trivialize sexual violence, make rape seem normal, or shift responsibility from rapists to rape victims.
3) Rape Culture is an environment in which rape is prevalent and in which sexual violence is normalized and excused in the media and popular culture. Rape culture is perpetuated through the use of misogynistic language, the objectification of women’s bodies, and the glamorization of sexual violence, thereby creating a society that disregards women’s rights and safety.
Rape is pervasive! Just how expansive is surprising to most, but unfortunately not to people who have been assaulted or have worked with survivors. “One in 5 women and one in 71 men will be raped at some point in their lives” according to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center. Most rapes are not reported so we can easily assume that the number is much higher unfortunately. A woman is raped every 2 minutes”, RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network). According to Wikipedia rape is a type of sexual assault, therefore this shows that the occurrence of sexual assaults are more rampant than rape. The Bureau of Justice Statistics defines rape as: “Forced sexual intercourse including both psychological coercion as well as by physical force. Forced sexual intercourse means penetration by the offender (s). Includes attempted rapes, male as well as female victims, and both heterosexual and same sex rape [& bisexual- my brackets]”. Sexual assault is defined as “a wide range of victimizations, separate from rape or attempted rape. These crimes include attacks or attempted attacks generally involving unwanted sexual contact between victim and offender. Sexual assaults may or may not involve force and include such things as grabbing or fondling.” It also includes things such as the perpetrator showing their genitalia.
Rape, and sexually questionable behavior has been and continues to be supported in our culture through different forms of media.
For instance, I don’t know how many old movies I have seen in which a man forces a kiss, the woman slaps him, but then he does it again. Or he kisses her, and you can see that she is struggling to get away, but her part is written to eventually realize she wants this forced interaction and she eventually kisses him back and it’s supposed to be romantic.
(Picture from The Sydney Morning Herald)
A more recent example would be the song, which has a good beat, but is offensive, is “Blurred Lines” by Robin Thicke and Pharrell. A couple lyrics are, “I know you want it. I hate these blurred lines.” This is referring to consent as if there are blurred lines. Yes, means yes, and no means no. If you are not getting a “yes”, it’s a “NO!” For a feminist parody of this song check out the song check out the lyrics to the song “Defined Lines” by Law Revue.
Less rapey (I have made up this term (or perhaps others have too) because so many things that happen to women are have elements of rape but aren’t rape. “Rapey” or perhaps “rapie” things are not as traumatizing, but thus supporting Rape Culture) but sexist songs that only refer to woman by their body parts and what they need to do with them support Rape Culture. As well as your average movie that has three to four main characters, and perhaps one of them is a woman, who is most likely the sexual interest of one of the other characters, i.e. object, and not subject. It is not only offensive that women are not written as broadly as men and are often low-in-personality sexual objects, but what also bothers me that it is called a “regular” movie. But if there was a movie in which there were 3-4 female characters and one male character, that would be called a “chic flic,” which is dubbed a lesser movie.
There are so many behaviors associated with rape culture and supporting it that I couldn’t begin to cover all of them. Until you are woke (If I may use a term I understand originated in the Black Lives Matters movement(link)), you aren’t going to recognize some of the things listed, or start to notice other pervasive elements.
Slut shaming: The action or fact of stigmatizing a woman for engaging in behavior judged to be promiscuous or sexually provocative. Also judging women for not wearing much clothing, suggesting she was “asking for it,” which is mentioned quite often. Society tells women to be sexually appealing and then they are blamed for it. It doesn’t matter if someone is miscategorized as a “slut”, or is one, whatever that really means, since men who sleep around are not put to the same standards and called sluts in a derogatory manner. Even so, being a slut is not a crime and can be an independent way of owning your own sexuality. Often a woman’s sexual past is used to judge whether a woman was guilty of her own rape. Yes, I said whether she was guilty of her own rape, which of course sounds ridiculous, but happens, and is a great example of victim blaming.
Sexual objectification: Sexual objectification is the act of treating a person as a mere object of sexual desire. Objectification more broadly means treating a person as a commodity or an object without regard to their personality or dignity. Objectification is most commonly examined at the level of a society but can also refer to the behavior of individuals and is a type of dehumanization. I mentioned above just a couple of ways women are objectified in this culture.
Trivializing rape (in various ways): One thing is saying and supporting rape jokes and creating memes that mock rape. Letting men and boys get away with sexual harassment and assault by using excuses such as “Boys will be boys”. Men using the most offensive speech about women, sometimes in the locker room, and sometimes outside of it, often refer to it simply as “locker room talk”, even if only said just to men, it perpetuates the system in which boys and men learn how to speak and act in an offensive manner towards women. “Locker Room Talk” was the excuse used by Donald Trump in his now infamous quote, “I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. (Billy Bush, who is doing an interview with Trump: “whatever you want”). Trump: “Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything”. The fact that a large portion of this country, but not enough to win the popular vote, voted for this man, who with his many accusations of assault and constant misogynistic language about women is appalling to me. That vote and continued support itself supports rape culture. This trivializes rape, assault, and sexual harassment by not condemning people who act like this (and don’t get me going about the terrible things he has said about so many other groups and entire continents).
Denial of widespread rape: Most people don’t know about the high rates of rape and sexual assault as I have mentioned above. Even though the number of rapes are staggering, the majority of rapes are not reported for various reasons such as the victim just wants to move on, they don’t think they will be believed because they were drinking, or because the clout of the male they would be accusing, they are afraid this could get them hurt more, they had already reported a rape and the police blamed and revictimized them and they don’t want go through that again, as well as various other reasons. 3 out of 4 women are raped by men they know. In the movies its usually a crazy deranged stranger who grabs you at night. Also knowing the offender, whether they are a family, friend, or acquaintance sometimes creates issues that women think complicate things too much to tell. Not having the correct stats on widespread rape and sexual assault is one reason it can be denied. It can be denied for some of the other reasons mentioned such as not believing women and blaming them. Also, I think inflating false rape reports when those false claims are only 0.005%-5% looking at various sources. But I have seen more often about 2-3%. It’s easy to deny and dismiss the prevalence of rape when society gives the message that a lot of those people claiming “rape” are lying anyways. But of course, there are various other reasons.
Refusing to acknowledge the harm caused by some forms of sexual violence: There are a plethora of effects caused directly from rape and sexual assault which can be psychological, emotional and physical that effect the victim in various ways. Some of those are sexual transmitted diseases, including HIV, becoming pregnant by a rapist (and in some states and regions having a hard time finding a doctor to take care of that because of the anti-woman/ anti-choice moment and the survivor is revictimized by having to carry around a rapist’s baby) depression, anxiety, flashbacks, self-harm, eating disorders, addictions, sleep disorders, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, disassociation, and suicide. Some suicides happen because the victim feels like her soul or part of her was already killed. These are some of the things that happen in aftermath of rape. Many of these things will continue to disturb survivors throughout their lifetimes, even with counseling and psychological/psychiatric intervention.
Even though I was raped many years ago, being a Women’s Studies minor in college, just short of the major, and continuing to learn more about rape I have only recently learned about the concept of “Rape Culture” in the last year or so, so I have done a lot of research on it. I knew all this stuff. I finally had a name for it, how my life has been lived as a victim/survivor, and just a woman, and had clearer more detailed ways to talk and write about this thing that affects both men and women, but encompasses the world girls and women live in. Now that I have more language to talk about this wait for other posts I have written and will write on the subject. Some personal, and some not, but most, a mixture.
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