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.
In general, sexual assault is involuntary sexual contact that occurs through the actor's use of force, coercion or the victim's incapacitation. The law will consider the victim incapacitated if he or she did not have the mental ability to understand the nature of the sexual acts, or if the victim was physically incapable of indicating their unwillingness to participate in the sexual conduct. Common examples of these charges may arise
Defense attorneys in cases of sexual assault often “attack the victim’s credibility - the time-honored rape defense that so often results in an acquittal” (Krakauer 136). Diminishing the victim’s credibly and highlighting the standing of the accused are both methods that defense attorneys, like Donaldson’s lawyer, use to win cases of sexual
Sexual violence means, “any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, unwanted sexual comments or advances, or acts to traffic women sexuality,
“Every two and a half minutes, someone is sexually assaulted in the United Sates” (Hansen, 2011). With the crime of sexual assault, the victim’s body becomes part of a crime scene. When the victim reports the assault to the police, the person is taken to a hospital or crisis center. “At the hospital most of these victims consent to the collection of physical evidence from their bodies, or a ‘rape kit’ (Nat.
When questioned about rape, especially most women, they might think or even picture a stranger coming out of a dark place to assault someone. But in reality there’s more to it. According to the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, “About half of all people who are raped know the person who attacked them. This is known as date rape — forced sex that can happen not only on a date, but also somewhere like a party with someone the victim may know, like, or even be interested in.” Furthermore, social critic and feminist, Camille Paglia, has been discussing this persisting issue about date rape with a personal stance that many women may disagree with.
According to Solomon (2012), dating as far back as the times of Hammurabi’s Code, rape victims were compared to adulterers and were perceived as “damaged goods” because it spoiled a women’s marriageability potential (Solomon, 2012). During the colonial period in America, a woman could not report that she was raped to a local civil officer, instead she needed her husband, father, or employer to make the claim. In other words, women were seen as second class citizens who were denied the right to advocate for themselves without the support of a man. Also, it was believed that women “were prone to brining such charges [of rape] to disguise illicit consensual sex” (Solomon, 2012, p.
In 1826, the first mention of prison rape in the history of the republic, Rev. Louis Dwight wrote that “Boys are Prostituted to the Lust of old Convicts” throughout the institutions he surveyed from Massachusetts to Georgia. Dwight, the founder of the Prison Discipline Society of Boston, a prison reform group, wrote that “Nature and humanity cry aloud for redemption from this dreadful degradation.” It was not until the 21st century that the nation saw its first anti-prison-rape legislation. Last year, congress passed the Prison Rape Reduction Act, which allocates $60 million to support rape-prevention programs run by federal, state, and local corrections staff and to aid investigations and punishment of perpetrators. The bill, which enjoyed
The Prison Rape elimination Act is a federal law focused on sexual assault and victimization in prisons, jails, juvenile facilities and detention centers. The Prison Rape Elimination Act was passed in 2003 and the final standards were made effective I 2012. 13% of the 21 million inmates have been sexually assaulted. The sexual assaults have caused several other problems for inmates including victim traumatization, the spread of disease, and increased recidivism.
The first settlement of colonies in Australia received the English common law, which was in turn adopted as Australian common law. The adopted laws included the 18th century proposition that ‘marital rape immunity’ prevented a man from being convicted of the rape of his wife, because she was presumed to have given general consent to sexual intercourse with him upon marriage. This suggestion of ‘marital rape immunity’ may be traced to ‘Sir Matthew Hale's The History of the Pleas of the Crown’. In the early common law, the offence of rape did not extend to the matrimonial relationship: Thus, a husband could never be charged or convicted of raping his wife.
The legal definition of rape is the unlawful sexual activity carried out forcibly or under threat of injury against the will usually of a female or with a person incapable of valid consent. The current repercussions of rape cases are not severe enough to show the public that rape cases should be taken seriously. The frequent number of rape allegations on domestic violence, statutory rape, and rape culture in general prove this to be true. Rape is a serious matter, and should be taken seriously.
In the real life, it becomes rape. Julia T. Wood and Natalie Fixmer-Oraiz show in their book, Gendered Lives: Communication, Gender, & Culture, that: ? Sexual assault is any sexual activity that occurs without the informed consent of at least one of the people involved. One type of sexual assault is rape, which is one or more acts of nonconsensual oral, anal, or vaginal penetration by a body part or object. In the United States alone, 12.3% of women over the age of 18 report having been raped.?
Sexual assault laws have been amended and created over time to ensure the criminal justice system remains sensitive to the tribulations involved in rape trials for the victim. However, the connotative capacity of language used in evidentiary testimonies in rape trials can defeat the purpose of these reforms as ‘language is not merely a means of putting forth evidence in a case, but it in fact transforms the nature of evidence itself, thus influencing the outcome of the case’ (Maheshwari 2014:1). As theorised by Bourdieu (1982) symbolic power as ‘the power to create reality through language’ (Matoesian 1995:38) is successfully employed in rape trials to instil patriarchal and legal domination over the victim. The use of language in courtroom
Nearly one in five women surveyed that they had been raped or had experienced a rape attempt once in their lives. If you are unsure what rape means I will provide you with a simple definition, Rape is unlawful sexual intercourse or any other sexual penetration by another person without your consent. While according
