What Is Rape Culture? *Content Warning*
Rape culture is an environment in which rape and sexual violence are ignored, condoned, trivialized and normalized. Rape culture is pervasive, systematic, and affects us all negatively.
Shannon Ridgway from Everyday Feminism wrote "25 Everyday Examples of Rape Culture"
"A Rape Culture Is...
1. A university in Canada that allows the following student orientation chant “Y is for your sister. O is for oh-so-tight. U is for underage. N is for no consent. G is for grab that ass.”
2. Pop music that tells women “you know you want it” because of these “blurred lines” (of consent).
3. A judge who sentenced only 30 days in jail to a 50-year-old man who raped a 14-year-old girl (who later committed suicide), and defended that the girl was “older than her chronological age.”
4. Mothers who blame girls for posting sexy selfies and leading their sons into sin, instead of talking with their sons about their responsibility for their own sexual expression.
5. Photo memes like this: (Removed, triggering content)
6. Supporting athletes who are charged with rape and calling their victims career-destroyers.
7. Companies that create decals of a woman bound and gagged in order to “promote their business.”
8. People who believe that girls “allow themselves to be raped.”
9. Journalists who substitute the word “sex” for “rape” – as if they’re the same thing.
10. Politicians distinguishing "legitimate rape" and stating that rape is "Something God intended to happen" among other horrendous claims.
11. Calling college students who have the courage to report their rapes liars.
12. The ubiquity of street harassment – and how victims are told that they’re “overreacting” when they call it out.
13. Victims not being taken seriously when they report rapes to their university campuses.
14. Rape jokes- and people who defend them
15. Sexual assault prevention education programs that focus on women being told to take measures to prevent rape instead of men being told not to rape.
16. The victimization of hospital patients, especially people with mental health issues and the elderly, by the very people who are there to protect them.
17. Reddit threads with titles like “You just have to make sure she’s dead” when linking to the story of a 13 year old girl in Pakistan being raped and buried alive.
18. Reddit threads dedicated to men causing women pain during sex (I’m not going to give the thread credence by linking to it).
19. Twitter hashtags that support accused rapists and blame victims.
20. Publicly defending celebrities accused of rape just because they’re celebrities and ignoring or denouncing what the victim has to say.
21. Assuming that false reporting for sexual assault cases are the norm, when in reality, they're only 2-8% which is on par with grand theft auto.
22. Only 3% of rapists ever serving a day in jail.
23. Women feeling less safe walking in the streets at night than men do.
24. 1 in 5 women and 1 in 71 men having reported experiencing rape.
25. The fact that we have to condition ourselves not to use violent language in our everyday conversations.
(Editor’s Note: While this list demonstrates the pervasiveness of rape by cis men against cis women, Everyday Feminism would like to note that sexual violence and rape culture affect trans and gender non-conforming people (as well as cis men) at an alarming rate. Rape culture is everyone’s issue, regardless of gender.)"
Source: Everyday Feminism (March 10, 2014)
Shannon Ridgway from Everyday Feminism wrote "25 Everyday Examples of Rape Culture"
"A Rape Culture Is...
1. A university in Canada that allows the following student orientation chant “Y is for your sister. O is for oh-so-tight. U is for underage. N is for no consent. G is for grab that ass.”
2. Pop music that tells women “you know you want it” because of these “blurred lines” (of consent).
3. A judge who sentenced only 30 days in jail to a 50-year-old man who raped a 14-year-old girl (who later committed suicide), and defended that the girl was “older than her chronological age.”
4. Mothers who blame girls for posting sexy selfies and leading their sons into sin, instead of talking with their sons about their responsibility for their own sexual expression.
5. Photo memes like this: (Removed, triggering content)
6. Supporting athletes who are charged with rape and calling their victims career-destroyers.
7. Companies that create decals of a woman bound and gagged in order to “promote their business.”
8. People who believe that girls “allow themselves to be raped.”
9. Journalists who substitute the word “sex” for “rape” – as if they’re the same thing.
10. Politicians distinguishing "legitimate rape" and stating that rape is "Something God intended to happen" among other horrendous claims.
11. Calling college students who have the courage to report their rapes liars.
12. The ubiquity of street harassment – and how victims are told that they’re “overreacting” when they call it out.
13. Victims not being taken seriously when they report rapes to their university campuses.
14. Rape jokes- and people who defend them
15. Sexual assault prevention education programs that focus on women being told to take measures to prevent rape instead of men being told not to rape.
16. The victimization of hospital patients, especially people with mental health issues and the elderly, by the very people who are there to protect them.
17. Reddit threads with titles like “You just have to make sure she’s dead” when linking to the story of a 13 year old girl in Pakistan being raped and buried alive.
18. Reddit threads dedicated to men causing women pain during sex (I’m not going to give the thread credence by linking to it).
19. Twitter hashtags that support accused rapists and blame victims.
20. Publicly defending celebrities accused of rape just because they’re celebrities and ignoring or denouncing what the victim has to say.
21. Assuming that false reporting for sexual assault cases are the norm, when in reality, they're only 2-8% which is on par with grand theft auto.
22. Only 3% of rapists ever serving a day in jail.
23. Women feeling less safe walking in the streets at night than men do.
24. 1 in 5 women and 1 in 71 men having reported experiencing rape.
25. The fact that we have to condition ourselves not to use violent language in our everyday conversations.
(Editor’s Note: While this list demonstrates the pervasiveness of rape by cis men against cis women, Everyday Feminism would like to note that sexual violence and rape culture affect trans and gender non-conforming people (as well as cis men) at an alarming rate. Rape culture is everyone’s issue, regardless of gender.)"
Source: Everyday Feminism (March 10, 2014)