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Theme Of Rape In The Bluest Eye

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Rape is inaccurately associated with sex when it essentially is about power. Feminist theorists assert that rape is only one symptom of the larger problem of a male dominated society (Cahill, 2001). Rape is an obnoxious fact of life due to its common occurrence and is commonly misinterpreted as a sexual act rather than a violent one. The act of rape does not occur because the rapist can’t “get sex elsewhere, but because they feel entitled to rape women in order to satisfy their needs. In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, sex is about power, violence and oppression. Sexual occurrences in the book are particularly forceful and humiliating, leaving a lasting effect of devastation on the novel’s characters sense of self. These effects can be observed from Freida thinking she is ruined after Mr. Henry assaults her to Pecola becoming insane after her own father rapes her through the novel. Rape can be associated with one’s need to …show more content…

Their anger and shame along with their past sexual failures lead them to doing horrendous acts. For instance Cholly’s first sexual intercourse with Darlene, which he is forced to continue having sex with her under the order of men with guns, leaves him humiliated and enraged which later turns into hatred towards the opposite sex. Cholly’s hatred and shame later results in raping and impregnating his own daughter Pecola. According to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services survey in 2012 for %80 of juvenile victims, the perpetrator was a parent. Every child thinks their father is invincible, so what happens when this invincible god-like figure of a child sexually assaults them one day to feel empowered? Most of them never recover from the horrible incident just like Pecola being driven insane after her father Cholly rapes him for the second time. Cholly’s trauma causes him to destroy Pecola mentally and transfers his curse to her as a result of his

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Rape myths are at the center of the problem of how rape and sexual assault cases are looked at, and treated as in society. Rape myths vary, some excuse the rape, others try to minimize the severity of the situation, while others doubt the act even happened in the first place (Levit and Verchick, 196). Some examples of rape myths include: a victim was “asking for it,” a victim’s previous sexual history, regretful sex is not rape, a woman’s “no” means “yes,” and women lie about rape all the time. Rape myths are targeted towards women, not the rapist. Despite, rape myths being proved false by empirical evidence, they are still prevalent in society.

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In recent decades, feminists have been fought to stop men’s sexual violence and exploitation not only against girls and women, but also against boys as women shared their experience of rape and other forms of abuse. Hence, by using the feminism lens this essay evaluates how sexual abuse by masculine men affect and traumatize both genders and how the victims did not want to speak up. Throughout

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Sharon Block’s essay, “Rape and Sexual Power in Early America”, discusses a woman being raped. While multiple people were aware of the situation, none of them took action. “Although several men were aware…they chose not to intervene or to allow other young women to do so” (Reis p.

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In Danielle McGuire’s book, At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance, the author argues that sexual violence was a way for whites to intimidate and control African Americans during the movement. McGuire points out that because of the sexual violence African American women went through, it allowed them to fight back against the oppression and shape the Civil Rights Movement. The author introduces the readers to the violence that African American women were facing, “The stories of black women who fought for bodily integrity and personal dignity hold profound truths about the sexualized violence that marked racial politics and African American lives during the modern civil rights movement.” (pg xx). This quote gives readers a broader understanding of African American women's challenges.

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Davis notes that racism always consisted of the underlying assumption that White men, particularly those of the bourgeois class, had an indisputable right of access to Black women’s bodies. Treating Black women as sexual objects and portraying them as hypersexualized creatures created the image of the mythical Black whore. Rape became the specific act of sexual violence forced upon Black women, with the myth of the Black whore as its ideological justification. Davis states that the controlling image of Black men as rapists has always “strengthened its inseparable companion: the image of the Black woman as chronically promiscuous and with good reason; for once the notion is accepted that Black men harbour uncontrollable, animal-like sexual urges, the entire race is invested with bestiality.” A race of “animals” can be treated accordingly, [1983: 191] “for the mythical rapist implies the mythical whore – and a race of rapists and whores deserves punishment and nothing more.”

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Celie and Pecola are both victims of their father’s sexual abuse as young girls. These recurring events of their childhoods are catalysts that push them into emotional solitude. Pecola’s relationship with her dad is already somewhat unusual; there is no real connection between father and daughter due to Cholly’s selfish tendencies and complete lack of parenting skills. In a drunken stupor one Saturday afternoon, Cholly comes home to find Pecola washing dishes and then proceeds to “tenderly” rape his own daughter. This disgusting act of “love” in the eyes of Cholly is his personal attempt to fix Pecola’s “young, helpless, hopeless presence” (Morrison 161).

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The second half of The Bluest Eye, “Spring” and “Summer,” are the heaviest, most intense sections of them all. Toni Morrison hard-hitting describes the terrible events that unravel during this time. The disgustingly real descriptions show us the true horror of abuse, rape, and violence and the aftermath of all of it. After reading this book, the song “Purple Summer,” by Duncan Sheik instantly came to mind.

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Andrew Solomon’s chapter on rape from his book, Far from the Tree: Parents, Children, and the Search for Identity, examined women who are raped and decide raise the children who were the product of this heinous violation. Solomon examines how rape has been perceived by different cultures over time and interviews various women who have first hand experience with rape in order to show the reader show the aftermath of this terrible crime committed against them. Initially, this student imagined rapists as outlaws who crawl out from the shadows to prey upon their victims, however, “80 percent of rapes are committed by someone the victim knows” (Solomon, 2012, p. 481). According to Solomon (2012), “more than half of rape victims in the United States

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Recent headlines have highlighted the fact that rape culture is prevalent in our society, most noticeably on college campuses. To understand why this is a social issue we first have to understand what rape culture entails. Rape culture is a set of assumptions that reinforces male sexual aggression and disregards violence against females (Hildebrand & Najdowski, 2015, p. 1062). Simplified, it is an environment where sexual violence is normalized and most of the time excused. One out of five females in the United States are sexually assaulted by a male at some point in their lifetime (Hildebrand & Najdowski, 2015, p. 1059) and college aged females are four times more likely to be a victim of rape than any other age group (Burnett et al.,

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Furthermore, Griffin commonly sites credible studies and explores historical moments to provide context and support for her claims. One article in particular written by Griffin (1971) demonstrates her masterful use of ethos, “Rape: The All-American Crime.” This article was the first of its kind as it discusses rape from a feminist perspective and challenges common beliefs about rape. Up until this point rape and sexual violence was rarely discussed and when it was it was by a man. Griffin begins the article by explaining her credentials, describing her personal experiences with rape culture in America, and illustrating the urgency with which women and victims need to be heard.

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• Psychodynamic Theories The Psychodynamic theory explains child abuse as a “parental dysfunction.” Followers of this theory such as B.F. Steele (1987) stated that ‘the abusive parents submit their children to traumatic experiences similar to those they had endured during childhood.” Therefore, child abuse is explained as a cycle due to the parent having experienced such behaviours from their parents as a child, hence now displays similar behaviours to their child as a parent. • The Sociological Theories There has been much agreement with Steele’s approach, however, it has been criticized to the extent that abuse against children is not necessarily only due to the parents’ experiences as a child but the abuse of children can also be as a

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Feminist theory, argues that the basic cause of sexual assault revolves around the nature of gender inequality; that is, gender inequality for all genders, not just males and females. In the focus of feminist theory we analyze patriarchal norms, gender discrimination as well as sexual objectification. The focus of gender as the key cause, is however, flawed. While this theory does explain a large proportion of sexual assaults and cover both distal and proximal variables, it doesn’t fully help explain the largely under researched topics of same-sex assaults and the factor of vulnerability and power. Structural functionalist theory is also a peculiar choice.

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Meanwhile, men are encouraged to express their sexuality and therefore serve as the actors in society. Furthermore, rape culture is reinforced through the media’s images of sexual objectification. As seen on a Duncan Quin

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Toni Morrison, the first black women Nobel Prize winner, in her first novel, The Bluest Eye depicts the tragic condition of the blacks in racist America. It examines how the ideologies perpetuated by the dominant groups and adopted by the marginal groups influence the identity of the black women. Through the depictions of white beauty icons, Morrison’s black characters lose themselves to self-hatred. They try to obliterate their heritage, and eventually like Pecola Breedlove, the child protagonist, who yearns for blue eyes, has no recourse except madness. This assignment focusses on double consciousness and its devastating effects on Pecola.

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