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Recommended: Violence on women
The year was 2007 and the, at the time, fourteen year old Cherice Moralez was under more pressure than the typical teenage girl. Behind closed doors, one of Moralez’s teachers, forty-eight year old Stacey Rambold, was repetitively raping her. Before her confession, Cherice was battling her reluctance to tell authorities about what was happening, fearful of the judgment she might endure from her peers. It took until October 31 of 2008 for Rambold to be arrested. Though many would think Cherice’s troubles would be over and potential victims would be saved, this case proved to be more than controversial. After pleading guilty to only one of three charges of sexual intercourse without consent, Rambold was given the opportunity to have all charges dropped if he attended sex offender treatment. Not only this but Cherice was being shunned by other students at her school. Even though the rape was not “forcible, beat-up rape,” as Judge Baugh phrased it as he defended his undersized ruling on the case, having sex with a child who cannot consent is considered rape (Insert Daily Mail Citation). Under all of these circumstances, why does the government let this happen? Why do some rapists receive minimal punishment as their victims attempt to piece their lives back together while being outcasted from society? Today, rape and sexual assaults are becoming an even bigger issue than ever before. With a 25% increase of reported assaults as of 2008 (Insert HWR Citation), it is estimated that one in four women will be raped at one point in her lifetime (Insert TheHathorLegacy Citation). What is to blame for this alarming epidemic? The United States over its many years seemed to have developed a society based around the rationalization of conventio...
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... are looking this phenomenon and actually interpreting it as a morally problematic issue (Insert Plato Citation). This is because civilization has become so accustomed to it. Modern society will almost never notice this objectification because it is bombarded around them in the media. Sexual objectification now deemed normal because it is used so often in commercials and advertising, magazines, television shows, movies, and video games. It is not uncommon for commercials to use women or close ups of women’s bodies to sell alcohol, cars, food, and everything in between. Sometimes it is difficult to even decipher what they are pitching to the viewers. Through advertising and articles, magazines are being littered with ways for women to look sexier and attract more men, further boxing women into a single category of objects of men’s desires.
Rape is a hidden epidemic that affects many lives world wide. It is a problem that is so terrifying and uncomfortable that people do not talk about it. John Krakauer, author of Missoula, focuses on this issue of rape in the college town of Missoula, Montana. His focus is specifically on the case of Allison Huguet and Beau Donaldson. As the progression of Allison 's case continues we learn of more and more rape cases that happened to women on this same campus. A majority of women do not report these cases, we later learn as Krakauer continues through Allison 's case, because reporting and pursuing the case would be giving their life away. [4] Of course Allison decides to go through the trails of Beau Donaldson, however it is obvious that it is extremely difficult to convict someone with little evidence. As hard of a read as Missoula
In what is sure to be a very solemn matter for all American students and their families across the country , in January 2013 , President Obama, the office of the Vice President and the White House Council on Women and Girls converged and issued a renewed call to action against rape and sexual assault report which analyzes the most recent reliable data about this issue and identifies who are the most in peril victims of this malefaction, investigates the costs of this violence both for victims and communities , and describes the replication very often inadequate of the US malefactor equity system.
Susan Griffin’s Rape: The All-American Crime touches on many issues within American society. She begins by recounting how she was taught to be afraid of strange men from such a young age that she had not yet learned what it was she was so afraid of, and then goes into her experience with harassment, an experience shared by every woman at some point in her life. Griffin recounts the belief that all rapists are insane and the proof that they are just normal men and dispels the myth that rape is normal activity that is prohibited by society. However, she goes on to clarify that our culture views rape: “as an illegal, but still understandable, form of behavior” (Griffin 514). It seems that the wrongness of rape is determined by the situation in
Szymanski, Dawn M., Lauren B. Moffitt, and Erika R. Carr. “Sexual Objectification of Women: Advances to Theory and Research.” APA, 2011. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Sexual assault is defined as any type of sexual contact or behavior that occurs without the explicit consent of the recipient. Falling under the definition of sexual assault are sexual activities as forced sexual intercourse, forcible sodomy, child molestation, incest, fondling, and In the United States 80% of sexual assault victims are under the age of 30. Of that 80%, 44% are under the age of 18 (RAINN, 2016). That leaves 36% of victims between the ages of 18 and 30. These percentages become even more alarming when that 80% is of about 293,000 victims of secual assualt each year (RAINN, 2016). It is estimated that 1 in every 6 women in the US has been or will be victims of sexual assault in their lifetime. The risks of sexual assault increase on college campuses. Women ages 18-24 who are enrolled in college are 3 times more likely than women in general to suffer from sexual violence (RAINN, 2016). One would think that with all these women being sexually assaulted, one would hear more about it, or perhaps the police stations would constantly be busy. This is not the case. Sexual assault is one of the most unreported crimes, with 68% still being left unreported (RAINN, 2016). This could be because of every 100 rapists, only 2 will spend a day in jail. Of the 32 out of 100 that would be reported, only 7 are referred to an arrest (RAINN, 2016). Why would men or women want to report sexual assault when the system that is supposed to protect them fails so often, and why does this system continue to fail?
In today’s society, juveniles that commit a sexual assault have become the subject of society. It’s become a problem in the United States due to the rise of sexual offenses committed by juveniles. The general public attitude towards sex offenders appears to be highly negative (Valliant, Furac, & Antonowicz, 1994). The public reactions in the past years have shaped policy on legal approaches to managing sexual offenses. The policies have included severe sentencing laws, sex offender registry, and civil commitment as a sexually violent predator (Quinn, Forsyth, & Mullen-Quinn, 2004). This is despite recidivism data suggesting that a relatively small group of juvenile offenders commit repeat sexual assaults after a response to their sexual offending (Righthand &Welch, 2004).
Sexualization of women is taught to the public from an early age through the media. This is not a new phenomena, however. As Roberts and Zurbriggen (2012) address, the problem exponentially compounds over time, as evolving mass communication technology creates more opportunities for the press to teach sexualization. New technology is not entirely negative though, as it allows the public to more easily engage in discussions regarding the expression of
“Sex sells” is an aphorism closely adhered to by both the film and print advertising industries. For over a century, magazines, newspapers, film, and other advertising mediums have utilized women and sexuality to persuasively market their products to consumers (Reichert, 2003). By representing an assortment of consumer products surrounded by women who exemplify a “desired” body type, marketing specialists quickly discovered the direct correlation between sexuality and consumer buying. So why is using beauty and sexuality as a marketing gimmick so harmful? With women being the primary audience of both general interest and consumer product magazines there is constant exposure to the idealistic body image that advertisers and mass media believe women should adhere to.
What do you think and feel when you hear the word rape? Do you feel uncomfortable? Maybe even angry? Your certain feelings and emotions towards this word is a result of rape culture. Rape culture, essentially, is how a society as a whole sees and reacts towards rape or instances of rape. In 2013 rape was defined by the FBI as, “Penetration… of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” (Division’s Crime Statistics Management Unit 1). The definition was finally changed after the old definition deemed inappropriate by today’s standards, which beforehand, stated that physical force needed to be used for rape to be considered rape. This is good news for men and women who have been fighting for the definition to be changed, but unfortunately this does not mean that state laws are being changed the same way. Even though the FBI may acknowledge the older inappropriate definition, most states do not. Sexual assault is a commonly unreported crime, where only an average of 36% of sexual abuse is actually reported to the authorities (Planty 7). Some forms of rape can include physical harm, threats, and even death of the victim, and most victims do not want to tell others for fear of criticism, self-blame, or even the fear that their attackers will carry out on their threats. In many cases, victims do have a reason to be afraid. When someone is brave enough to come forward and say they were sexually assaulted, they are putting themselves in the position of being in not only a long legal process, but also having their motives questioned and misunderstood, which is the last thing they want after their experience. The legal system in the United States...
A common trend in the entertainment industry today is the objectification of women in society. Sexualizing women are seen in media such as; movies, advertisement, television show and music video, where their main focus is providing the audience with an image of women as sexual objects rather than a human. This is detrimental to society since the media is producing social stereotypes for both genders, which can further result in corrupted social habits. Objectification in media are more focused on females than male, these false images of women leave individuals with the wrong idea of the opposite sex. As media continuously use sexual contents regarding women, the audience starts underestimating women. Specifically movies, it allows media to shape the culture’s idea of romance, sex and what seems
It is shocking to see the digression in humanity’s morals and values over the past decade. As cliché as it sounds, the media is the center of it all. The way women are being represented, from our television sets, the radio, pornography and even art has pushed beauty to the top of the list of controversial and widely debated topics around the globe. “Whenever we walk down the street, watch TV, open a magazine or enter an art gallery, we are faced with images of femininity,” (Watson and Martin).
When girls are told that they need to work towards certain standards and ideals entirely created by society, then they can only see themselves as an object following orders. This type of patriarchal and sexist objectification "keeps [women] in [there] place" and limits women's potential as productive beings (Young 271). There is a massive double-bind in our society which tells women to be quiet and to restrict the space they take up, but in the same token also requires them to be sexy and flirtatious. The ideas women have about their bodies always come back to societal expectations and how others view them because there is always the "possibility that one will be gazed upon as a mere body, as shape and flesh that presents itself" (Young 270). It is hard to break the cycle of seeing oneself as an object in world where that is what is explicitly
With the survey and all the readings, I found during the research process, I came to a few conclusions. First, the fact that women are still being sexualized in pop culture nowadays come from the fact that it became part of our society that the body of a woman should look a specific way to be attractive and be advertised. This led me to the impression that all women should look like the one you see in advertisement and movies, but it is not the case and every woman should feel good about themselves no matter how they look. It is the society that shapes us to think like this since we are born. It became normalized and that is why something has to be
An eight-teen year old girl who renames anonymous had went on a date with a young man and upon this date after dark when he invited to his house he took their foreplay as a invitation to have sex, and that right there is rape with no questions ask. Only because it’s done without out her consent. Some may argue that no other crime is handle more poorly by the criminal justice system than rape. The vast majority of rape victims, in fact, never do report to police. And of those cases that are reported, the prosecution rate is lower than for any other serious crime.
Hatton and Trautner (2011) found out that no matter in the past or at present, the sexualization of women is continuous. This conclusion is based on their research to the covers of Rolling Stone from 1960s to 2000s, nearly forty years. They summarize their results on a line graph (Fig 1), it directly reflects the percentage of sexualized images of women has a sharply increase, from 45 percent to 82 percent, on the contrary, the percentage of nonsexualized images of women falls from 55 percent to 17 percent. Rolling Stone rather than a men’s magazine, like Playboy, even though it is a magazine about American popular culture, the objectification of women is full of the covers of this magazine. Thus, it can be seen, the objectification of women is a historical problem.