January 21st, 2012
Rape is rape
American feminists have won a historically significant battle against rape.
The New Year was kick-started by a historic event when the Obama-administration on January 6th decided to change FBIs definition of rape. The definition, which has been unchanged since 1929, has caused a tremendous under reporting of rape. The reason is that rape until then was narrowly defined as “the carnal knowledge of [raping] a female forcibly and against her will”. In practice, a definition like that outnumbers rape committed against men, forced oral or anal intercourse and sex obtained with lack of consent and a considerable amount of use of violence and force.
In social media, people expressed happiness when it became clear that the eight months long campaign “Rape is Rape” led by Ms. Majority Foundation and Ms. Magazine, finally gave results. American feminists have fought a long and tiresome battle on behalf of rape victims many consider second-class. Among those is one of Ms. Magazine’s female readers – we can call her «Lucy» - who was raped anally by a friend with whom she had previously had a sexual relationship. She got badly injured during the assault and sought medical care. However, when the case went public, no help was to be obtained neither from the university where she studied, nor the legal system. An Assistant District Attorney (DA) told her not to press charges. The DA also claimed that cases like that would not be considered “rape” because it was anal, and that they would be lucky if they even succeeded in charging him with a misdemeanor.
According to Human Rights Watch (2001), more than 140.000 inmates in American prisons have been raped, many of them are men. Rape is used to discipline and demarcates a person’s position within the hierarchy. For some entering into sexual relations with other inmates and prison guards, becomes a strategy of sheer survival. In the U.S, there is close to impunity for crimes like this. They do not figure in the statistics – hence they too become invisible in the public conscience.
Today many states have a penal code where coerced anal and oral sex is considered to be rape, but «Lucy’s» case is evident of the signaling power behind FBIs definition. Inasmuch as definitions carries with them norms and values, they too draw the boundaries between worthy and unworthy victims.
It is a pleasure to see that President Obama and FBI Director Robert Mueller have taken these steps and showed that it is indeed possible to change outdated convictions about sexuality and violence. However, the U.S is still among the few UN member states that have failed to ratify The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and its optional protocol. There is a long way to go before American men and women who are exposed to gender based violence will get justice.
Published in the column «Radical Voices» in the Norwegian newspaper Dagsavisen on January 20th 2012.