Rape Culture

An opinion piece was recently published in Time calling for an end to the rape culture hysteria.  There has, of course, been some backlash from the feminist blogosphere.  Essentially, what the opinion piece says is that rapists should be held accountable for raping people.  Yes.  Absolutely.  We agree wholeheartedly...however.  If these rapists are not being held accountable by their schools, or law enforcement, or the criminal justice system at large, can we really attribute that to each of those individual people being incompetent?  What does it mean when every person a victim speaks to asks them weighted questions about their behavior prior to the assault?  What does it say about the messages young men receive when we have to have PSA's about victims needing to be awake to consent?  Doesn't this assume that these young men have received a contradictory message at some point?  That it's okay to take what you want from a person?  These are the reasons people are still yelling about rape culture--because it isn't one or two incompetent people in EVERY community in the United States, it is a pervasive attitude and that's why "rape culture" was coined, and that's why we have to keep yelling, and keep advocating, and being angry and keep telling people that it's not their fault.

 

Infographic from http://act.weareultraviolet.org/act/rape_culture_infograph