Thoughts Before You Begin Reading
It is our hope that in learning about rape culture, you become aware of how you or your friends might be participating in it. Also, we hope you will become more aware of how it may influence your thoughts or decisions subconciously. Being aware is the first step towards action.
You may see the word rape over and over again. Do not be alarmed. Its true, the word is taboo to bring up. However, not talking about it only makes it harder to prevent.
A Rape Culture — what does that mean?
Rape Culture is best defined as a culture in which rape is everday, commonplace and allowed through basic attitudes & beliefs about gender, sexuality, and violence. Many feminists, scholars, and activists argue that the United States is the archetypal Rape Culture. America’s traditional gender roles which polarize the sexes, offer allowances and restrictions for female and male sexuality. These rigid ideologies serve to label men sexual subjects (read: predators) and women as sexual objects (read: prey). In a system such as this, it is no wonder rape is as prevalent as it is.
What Rape Culture Implies & Does Not Imply
Because a woman is able to avoid being raped during her lifetime does not mean she is not affected by fear of the possibility. You would be hard pressed to find a woman who does not fear being raped and who organizes her life accordingly.
Secondly, using the term “rape culture” does not imply that every man is a potential rapist. But every woman is a potential rape victim whether or not she experiences an actual rape in her lifetime, even if only a small percentage of men are perpetrators, because most perpetrators repeat the act again and again. The rehabilitation rate for sexual predators is something like 10-20% max.
Thirdly, the actual commission of rape is only part of the term “rape culture.” The myths about rape — about men’s motivations, about women’s, about victims deserving what they get, and so forth, remain highly prevalent. Just because it is possible for us individually to reject those myths does not mean we are not subject to them in their institutionalized form. They certainly remain prevalent in law enforcement and the judicial system despite all the efforts that have been made to eliminate those misconceptions.
Fourth, yes, “rape culture” is a part of the overall “culture of violence” — more particularly the culture of violence against women. Saying so does not deplete the usefulness of the term for the specific purpose of defining the problem and the solutions. It is particularly helpful against definitions that we see rape as an individual problem with individual solutions, ignoring the reality of the social, political, economic, and cultural systems that reinforce the myths about rape.