Rape Injustice Against Women

Rape is known as one of heinous crimes a person can commit to someone else. Even though US’s justice system recognizes that rape is a serious threat to women’s physical and mental safety as well as their autonomy, our justice system gravely fails to convict and persecute the perpetrators, making women vulnerable to these sexual crimes. Hence, many women, especially those who are victims of rape, live in fear, which seriously curtails their freedom of movement and confidence in everyday life (Chamallas, 2013). Not only our justice system fails to protect women from rape, but also our society’s skeptical attitude towards rape severely affects rape victims to come forward or report their terrible experiences. The general public views rape as a myth rather than as a fact, and believes that women cry rape just to get public attention, sympathy, and compensation from the perpetrators. Even if the rape did happen, most people still blame women for being irresponsible. Due to the lack of our justice system in convicting rapists and our society’s misconception of rape, the conviction rate of rape is very low even though it is a common crime in our country.

By discussing the problems demonstrated in the book, Missoula by Jon Krakauer, I argue the incapability and disinclination of our justice system in protecting women from rape and the skeptical attitude our society has on rape not only jeopardize women’s security and autonomy, but also legitimize the expropriation of women’s bodies for men’s own satisfaction.
Missoula was a hard reading not because it was difficult to understand, but because the frustration I felt throughout the reading. One of the main problems depicted in Missoula that perpetuates men to commit rape or other sexual crimes against women is the normativity of hegemonic masculinity in our society. As Chamallas puts it, hegemonic masculinity is an ideal form of power dynamic that most men strive for in order to exert power and control over others. As hegemonic masculinity is something that can be possessed or be achieved, men constantly have to prove that they possess this normative masculinity, causing them to be engaged in aggressive or even destructive masculinity contests (Chamallas, 2013). Rape became one side effect of this norm as, Katherine Baker points out, men tend to rape for sex or to show masculinity or dominance (Chamallas, 2013). All these reasons for rape are ultimately concerned with men wanting to satisfy their own desires by appropriating women’s bodies. Hegemonic masculinity is clearly depicted in both Calvin Smith and Jordan Johnson cases as both boys used physical violence to force the girls to engage in sex even though both victims showed signs of non-consent. Both Smith and Johnson’s behaviors prove Chamallas’s point on how heterosexual males are entitled to commit violence against women to prove their masculinity and power. Especially, Smith taking Kelly’s jeans as a proof to show his friends that he had sex delineates how most men see women as tools to help them achieve and boast their masculinity. Though, men fail to realize that their violent behaviors constitute as severe crimes because our society see it as a norm for them to prove their masculinity by exerting control and power over women. Yet, our legal system also fails to recognize these behaviors as crimes and allows men to continuously subjugate and dominate women to achieve their own satisfaction.
Another crucial problem depicted in Missoula is the perpetuating male dominance and male bias in our legal courts and system. Catherine MacKinnon strongly argued how our legal system failed to protect women’s bodily integrity by maintaining male dominance while disregarding women’s interests (Chamallas, 2013). Before sexual harassment or sexual assaults became a legal crime in our society, our legal system never regarded any sex-related assaults as harms. Yet, it took a long time for our legal system to recognize them as harm because historically, women were considered as property to men and the penalties for rape often involved compensation paid to their husbands or fathers. Moreover, it was difficult to enforce sexual crimes in our criminal justice system because no men had ever experienced them before and it was mostly women who were victims of these crimes. Even though our legal system finally recognized sexual assaults and harassment as crimes, the conviction rates of these crimes remain low as our male-dominated legal system diminishes them as sexual misconduct or inappropriate behaviors rather than upholding them as severe crimes that could harm women’s mental and physical health.
Hence, the majority of men who are accused of rape enjoy the flexibility of the law and become free from conviction, which demonstrate implicit male bias as the law fails to protect women’s bodily sovereignty. This was mostly the case in Missoula, as the Missoula detectives showed more sympathy and understanding towards the boys who were accused of rape while showing indifference and suspicion towards the girls who were raped. In Kerry Barrett’s case, for instance, the female detective who was in charge of the case instead comforted Adams, whom Barrett accused of attempted rape, and accused Barrett of lying. The Johnson case also depicted the male dominance in the legal system as the jury found him not guilty of raping Cecilia Washburn even though there was clear evidence of rape. Not only in these two cases, but also in most rape cases, our male-centered legal system provides more leeway to men who are accused of rape and they always get the benefit of the doubt because police, prosecutors, judges and juries have biased views on rape. They have either skeptical view on the allegation or look to blame the victims by finding faults to diminish their credibility, a traditional view of rape that our society has. This approach further subjugates women’s autonomy, integrity, and sovereignty as the male norm in our law provides more protection towards men when it comes to sexual crimes.
The unclear boundary between consensual and nonconsensual sex is another problem depicted in Missoula. In Missoula, it seemed hard to prosecute rape when the victim was highly intoxicated as shown by the Kelsey Belnap’s case. The police and prosecutor did not push this case forward because Belnap was not physically incapacitated, but was semicomatose during the intercourse in which she could have given non-consent. But with her high blood alcohol level (0.219), Belnap was physically incapacitated to give non-consent, but somehow both police and prosecutor neglected this fact and declared it as consensual sex. This case just demonstrates how our legal system fails to understand what constitutes as nonconsensual sex. As Chamallas puts it, “sex is not mutual if one person is disabled from consenting, simply gives up, or decides that resistance is futile or not worth the cost” (Chamallas, 2013). Some rape victims are unable to show non-consent because they experience sudden paralysis or physical threats such as their heads pinned down on bed. Sex is only consensual when both people mutually agree to have intercourse, but if one person is unable to give consent for whatever reason, that sex can never be mutual.
Not only that, the boundary of consent has expanded as police, prosecutors and general public include drinking, wearing provocative clothes, or being sexually experienced as part of consent, which Chamallas called as “casual attribution.” In Belnap’s cases as well as other rape cases, when women are highly intoxicated, the police, prosecutors, jurors, and general public not only question the victims’ credibility, but also blame them for provoking rape rather than investigate the alleged perpetrators (Chamallas, 2013). As both our legal system and general society shift the focus away from men who committed the crimes, women become solely responsible for causing their own harms. Yet, this approach of placing casual responsibility on women for not controlling men from committing the danger justifies rape. This not only re-victimize women, but also degrades women’ sexual agency as our legal system assumes that women are incapable of giving proper consent to have sex. The autonomy feminists, such as sex-positive and partial agency feminists, strongly argue that women and any victims of oppression are “agents of their own destiny” who are capable of making their own decisions (Chamallas, 2013). Women are competent to protect their sexual autonomy and to resist male dominance, but our male-centered law subjugates women’s agency and even blames them for their harm instead of protecting them.
Furthermore, Missoula portrays the how our male-centered legal system and cultural bias towards rape ultimately re-victimize rape women. One reason that explains victim blaming is that many accused rapists that police and jurists encounter look normal and good men who do not resemble as a rapist. Both Chamallas and Krauker though, argue that it is these normal men who mostly commit these crimes, but our society tends to sympathize with these men and blames women for falsely accusing them. Victim blaming is also natural due to the casual attribution approach, which blames women by promoting men’s innocence (Chamallas, 2013). The detectives asking girls if they have boyfriends in Missoula just delineates how our legal system and general society try to focus more on finding faults on raped women than on accused men. They also view drinking and being sexually active as proofs of women’s consent to legitimize forced sex. Even those women who bravely come forward to accuse their perpetrators by going through trials get public shame as people condemn them for lying or for being unable to protect their injuries. This creates a double bind for women because even though they did the right thing to confront sexual crimes against women, the general society just sees it as if they want public attention and sympathy for their injuries. What needed the most for these women are comfort and reassurances that what happened to them was not their fault. However, the society’s skeptical attitude toward rape and rape victims come from our deeply embedded traditional male-centered view that women should not only be a property of men but also be remained sexually pure. Our society still values this sexual purity of women as it emphasizes personal responsibility and self-discipline among women to prevent their own rape (Chamallas, 2013). This male bias reinforces men’s innocence of all sexual crimes while severely suppressing women’s autonomy as it restrains their sexual desires and curtails freedom of movement and self-competence in their everyday life.
Missoula has clearly portrayed the problems of our legal system and cultural views of rape, but it did not portray the racialized rape prototype and risky victims who get no protection. One intersectional feminist, Angela Harris, noted that the racialized rape prototype brings less protection for minority rape victims (Chamallas, 2013). In most cases, colored women do not report their rapes not only because of their mistrust of the legal system, but also because they are reluctant to accuse their own race. This racialized rape prototype hurts white female victims as well because they are also reluctant to accuse their perpetrators if they are colored men since the jurists and public might accuse them as racists. Risky victims are those women who are incapable of giving consent (such as aboriginal women), but recently, feminists also added men in this category because men also experience rape, but get less protection and attention because the public sees it as rare or even unreal. Rape is a severe crime that women should never experience, but our male-biased legal system and cultural attitudes have not only repressed women’s autonomy but also justified appropriation of women’s body for men’s own desire.