Rape: The Opening of a Taboo
missing works cited
“I had been working a while, maybe an hour or so, when I became aware of the sound of breathing behind me. A man was standing there, watching me type on the laptop. He had been there for quite some time,” wrote a Massachusetts Institute of Technology student in the university’s newspaper, the Tech.
Concern about the victimization of female college students has grown in this country since 1990, according to the Sexual Victimization of College Women report by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). The rising awareness of sexual victimization has displaced the ideal of college campuses as ivory towers for the new fear that campuses have become “hot spots for criminal activity,” the report said.
Awareness about this topic began to grow with the passing of the Student Right-to-Know and Campus Security Act of 1990. This act forced any college that was participating in a federal student aid programs to publish and distribute to its students and employees an annual report containing security policies and campus crime statistics for the university, the NIJ and BJS report said.
The Campus Sexual Assault Victims’ Bill of Rights was added to the act in 1992. The federal law requires that the victim has the right to change their academic schedule and their residence hall, according to James Ferrier, Associate Director of Public Safety at Northeastern University.
" Now often times the woman says ‘Wait a minute, he’s the one who did it. He’s the one who should move or he’s the one who should have his schedule changed. Why should my life be changed? Why should I move out from out of my circle of friends and move somewhere else?’ The answer there is clear, it’s a due process issue. At that point, the perpetrator hasn’t been found responsible of anything, he’s innocent until proven guilty. Just on an accusation, it would violate that person’s rights of due process,” Ferrier said.
Campus Statistics
Many studies have been done since the act was passed in 1990 to collect the statistics of sexual assault on college campuses.
“The statistics that are used are 35 out of 1,000 college-age women will raped each academic year. On a campus with 10,000 students, that’s 350 a year,” said Sarah Dawgert, Public Education and Volunteer Coordinator at the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center (BARCC).
“One out of six or one out of ten is a victim of sexual assault during her college career.
In "Fraternities and Collegiate Rape Culture" Ayres Boswell and Joan Z. Spade analyze the social perspective of the gendered relations in male fraternities that add to the high rate of violence against women on many college campuses. They list a host of factors that distinguish higher-risk from lower-risk atmospheres discussing the rates of rape in colleges and state how "1 out of 4 college women say they were raped or experienced an attempted rape" (217). Additionally, "1 out of 12 college men say they forced a woman to have sexual intercourse against her will" (Boswell, Spade 217). In other words Boswell and Spade indicated that the rates were high when it came down to women getting raped in colleges by men who also attended those colleges. In addition, Boswell and Spade specify in how most people are aware of rape but know very little about rape culture (Boswell, Spade 217).
With one in five college students experiencing sexual assault during their college career who wouldn’t be afraid? This remains especially true for young women between the ages of 18-24 (“The Realities of Sexual Assault”). While a woman’s freshman and sophomore year of college are when she is at a most risk for assault, it can happen at any time. According to Robin Gray in the article on sexual assault statistics, “between 20% and 25% of women will experience a completed and/or attempted rape during their college career,” (Gray). At Northwest Missouri State University for the 2016-2017 academic year there are 5,618 undergraduate students enrolled. With the ratio of male to female students being 44% to 56%, there are about 3,147 female students. In terms of the statistics estimated by Gray, 630-787 of the female student population at Northwest Missouri State will experience rape during their college career (“Northwest Missouri State University”). This is a disturbingly large figure. Women are not the only ones susceptible to these acts, but men are too. It is said about “10%” of all sexual assault cases involve male victims (“The Realities of Sexual Assault”). While this number is slightly lower for men it is often believed that male victims of sexual assault do not often report their crime due to the social stigma surrounding their assault. Men may feel
The main point disregarded by Frazier, is religion’s ability to adapt. Frazier’s beliefs of black assimilation collided with Melville Herskovits idea that you can link black people to Africa in context of the rich cultural land and tradition, as stated in “The Myth of Negro Past”. Two key points of Frazier’s argument that lead to a “death” of African religion were: difficulty of the transatlantic passage, youth’s inability to retain culture. These points were undermined by Wilmore’s explanation of Vodun, and the adaptability of religion. In these points Frazier believes that all slaves were essentially a blank slate that had no retention, or recollecti...
Look at the media and movies about college life. Most stem around getting drunk and having sex. This norm or perception about women going to college to be raped needs to be eliminated. Obviously there need to be programs, punishments, and awareness training to help eliminate the sexual assault on college campuses. However, campuses also need to get the college community involved to make sexual assault less of a norm and more of what it is; unacceptable!
"Statistics about Sexual Assault and College Campuses." Statistics about Sexual Assault. Sarah Lawrence College, n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2013. .
The majority of sexual assaults are committed against women between the ages of 15 and 25, making college-aged women the group with the highest vulnerability to being assaulted. In fact, according to Kelly Walker from campusspeak.com, and a sexual assault survivor, one in four women will be raped during their college experience. Furthermore, during one’s freshman year, they are at the highest risk time for assault, according to the Northeastern University Police Department.
Ryan, Jeffrey R., and Jan F. Glarum. Biosecurity & Bioterrorism: Containing and Preventing Biological Threats. Oxford: Elsevier Inc., 2008.
A major issue and focus of our research deals with the diseases feral hogs transmit. Feral hogs are plagued with a host of diseases that can affect wildlife, livestock, commercial swine operations, and humans. Two notable diseases we will test for in the northeast region of Louisiana include Brucellosis caused by the facultative anaerobic bacteria Brucella
When it comes to sexual assault on college campuses there is also the question of what can colleges do to decrease the amount of sexual assaults. Bradford Richardson and Jon A Shields wondered the same thing, so they conducted an ...
Rothman, E., & Silverman, J. (2007). The effect of a college sexual assault prevention program on first-year students’ victimization rates. Journal of American College Health, 55(5), 283–290.
About one in four women are victims of sexual assault in college, but there are ways to prevent this problem. The consequences of sexual assault are harmful and long-lasting and affect not only the victims but also their families and communities. Solutions to this problem _______. But, as Richard Edwards, chancellor of Rutgers-New Brunswick college said, “Regardless of the number, it’s a major problem, affecting our students and people all across the country and it has to be taken seriously” (5). If people work together, the steps can be taken to stop sexual assault in colleges.
Bonnie, S. F., Francis, T. C., & Michael, G. T. (2000) The sexual victimization of college women. U.S. Department of Justice.
"Sexual Assault and College Campuses - Statistics." Statistics about Sexual Assault. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Apr. 2014. .
One in every six women and one in every thirty-three men has been reported being raped. Usually women are raped under the age of eighteen and men under the age of twelve. Women are more likely to report rape than men. Out of high school youth nationwide, nine percent reported they have been raped. Among college students nationwide, between twenty and twenty-five percent of women reported completed of attempted rape. Among adults nationwide, more than 300,000 women and over 90,000
APHIS is additionally launching focused on PRV inspecting of serology specimens submitted to partaking National Animal Health Laboratory Network (NAHLN) indicative labs for other creature wellbeing purposes. This reconnaissance stream uses existing specimens for expense proficient checking of the national swine populace. Testing will be directed and reported through existing NAHLN connections, making more prominent efficiencies in this developing APHIS association with the country's creature wellbeing symptomatic framework.