The day after Professor Seidman’s appearance in my Crim Law class, I’m still shaken. I wasn’t surprised by much of what she said, because I knew most of it. Key points: most men are NOT rapists. Most men CANNOT be pushed to rape. Rapists are recidivists, committing an average of seven (7) rapes in their rape careers. See Kilpatrick, Dean G., Rape and Sexual Assault, http://www.musc.edu/vawprevention/research/sa.shtml . Research indicates that one out of every six women has been raped in her lifetime. Id. Numbers vary by population; more than half of all rapes are committed against women 25 and younger. Id. 25% of rapes happen on college campuses. See RAINN’s statistic page at http://www.rainn.org/statistics . The number of false rape accusations mirrors that of just about every other crime. See “Project Safe,” from Vanderbilt University. But see the Fox News article “False Rape Accusations May Be More Common Than Thought” and recognize that bias can come from both sides. How many people do you know who have lied about a burglary (breaking and entering the dwelling of another at night with the intent to commit a felony therein)?
Professor Seidman had an interesting thought about attitudes toward rape. We find rape shameful, she said, because it involves sex (though, she added, “I would argue that rape has nothing to do with sex”). We’re ashamed of the way we think about rape. I take this to mean two things. First, we’re ashamed that we, in the 21st century, are embarrassed to talk about sex. Second, we’ve all taken in pieces of rape mythology and we’re ashamed to admit it. Maybe she shouldn’t have had that last drink. Maybe her dress was too tight. What was she doing going up to his hotel room? Why did she lead him on and then expect him to stop? What was she doing walking alone at night? Why was she acting sophisticated beyond her years?
Like all myths and legends, modern mythology springs from a sense of life’s wonder, excitement, mystery, and terror. Modern legends offer images of the best and worst aspects of the human condition. They suggest that good behavior will be rewarded and evil, greedy, or foolish behavior punished. Some modern legends reflect people’s fear of rapid social change or of science and technology; others appeal to their desire to find meaningful patterns beneath the confusing chaos of ordinary life.
I am surprised by the responses that came from some of my peers. In class, we discussed an alleged rape by Boston attorney Gary Zerola, as described in The Boston Globe. This is law school. 90 very bright individuals sat in that lecture hall. Some of them were appalled at the way Zerola’s attorney, parroted by the journalist, blamed the (alleged) victim for the rape. Others suggested that it’s the defense attorney’s job to discredit the witness and any journalist would simply report the facts to his newspaper’s audience. See The Boston Globe’s article, “Woman describes alleged assault by lawyer,” John Ellement, 2008. [The accused rapist, Gary Zerola, graduated from my law school, Suffolk University.] Ellement quotes the alleged rapist’s attorney, Janice Bassil, in writing about the alleged victim ”She liked to party,” Bassil said. “She liked to drink. She liked to do drugs. She acted sophisticated beyond her years.”
Then: “Ex-Prosecutor Acquitted of Rape Charge,” John Ellement, 2008. Now I should take back all that stuff I wrote about the “alleged victim” and “accused rapist.”
We have rules about what women should do to prevent rape. Women should not walk alone at night; women shouldn’t drink too much; women shouldn’t lead men on; women should not wear tight clothes or low-cut blouses or sexy underwear. See Myths Encyclopedia, http://www.mythencyclopedia.com/Mi-Ni/Modern-Mythology.html .
Feminism n. Belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. I’ve not heard much about how men are taking risks when they wear tight jeans. How many drinks is too many for a man? Can a man flirt with a woman and still expect to walk free at the end of the night? Should that man walk alone if he does walk free at the end of the night? (I’m focusing here on heterosexual rape, though I know male rape survivors.)
Hey, you victim-blamers: I’m not buying what you’re selling. Get out of my way.
I always cringe when I hear people talking about things that women should be doing to prevent being raped. Its the wrong approach. The key here is finding the sometimes difficult balance between preventing a crime from occurring and living freely. In other aspects, we find this balance fairly easily. I don’t have thick bars on my windows to prevent burglaries but I do have a strong door with a solid lock. I keep my car doors locked when I park it in my neighborhood and I don’t keep anything worth grabbing in plain view, but I don’t stand guard with a shotgun all night.
But none of this, and I mean NONE of this, takes any of the blame away from the person who might try to commit the crime that I may not be trying hard enough to prevent. No one ever claims that a victim of a break-in deserved to be robbed because they didn’t have bars on their windows.
We need to start looking at heavy drinking or tight clothing as something that women can consider in that tough balance being living safely and living freely, but not something that shifts even a small amount of blame from the rapist to the victim.
BEAUTIFUL comment, Dan.
i was really astonished at the types of comments people in our class made. it seems like people couldn’t grasp the concept of why she was showing us the article. or if their argument was that they didn’t buy it as an example of societal views, they didn’t have much substance in their retorts that the author of the article was just parroting the defense attorney. meh. good blog post laura. kuddos!
happy thanksgiving!
I cannot, CAN NOT, imagine having a conversation about something as emotionally charged as gender-based victimization. I agree, obviously, with your professor who asserted that rape is not about sex, and the loathsome, cretinous attitudes you allude to here just make me want to punch people. I’ve had conversations about this and similarly charged issues in varied circumstances, and it’s hard enough to talk about these things with women, with mature, thoughtful adults who understand how much power language can have. I can’t imagine having the conversation in a room as large as your law classes are, with that many people, of that average age and that average gender. I applaud you for even trying to do it.
[...] Laura discusses victim blaming through the eyes of law students, and brings up a particular point: Professor Seidman had an interesting thought about attitudes toward rape. We find rape shameful, she said, because it involves sex (though, she added, “I would argue that rape has nothing to do with sex”). We’re ashamed of the way we think about rape. I take this to mean two things. First, we’re ashamed that we, in the 21st century, are embarrassed to talk about sex. Second, we’ve all taken in pieces of rape mythology and we’re ashamed to admit it. Maybe she shouldn’t have had that last drink. Maybe her dress was too tight. What was she doing going up to his hotel room? Why did she lead him on and then expect him to stop? What was she doing walking alone at night? Why was she acting sophisticated beyond her years? [...]
[...] As I noted previously, sexual assault has very little to do with sex. Sexual assault is about power and domination and control. The victim’s sex (and, I’d argue, gender) have a lot to do with the way that individual responds to a sudden onset of power, domination, and control. See “What Juries Don’t Know,” by Jennifer J. Freyd. Freyd notes that a passive or freeze response is not uncommon among sexual assault victims and is a reaction to such things as powerlessness and fear: [I]f your front door is unlocked and someone you know walks into your house and takes your laptop computer while you cower in the corner, this is a crime unless you have explicitly given affirmative permission. There is no argument to be made that you have implicitly consented to engage in giving away your possession by your open door, the prior display of your product, or your silence during the theft. [...]