The Huffington Post reported on Illinois’ new rape kit law, which would require investigating law enforcement agencies to submit all evidence of sexual assault to the crime lab within 10 days of receiving it from a hospital. However, the New York Times points out a loophole in the law language (“if sufficient staffing and resources are available”) and The Curvature remarks, “In cases where a victim knows hir rapist and the accused claims that all sexual contact was consensual — a majority of cases — the rape kit doesn’t do a whole lot…But I say that anyone who subjects themselves to what is usually the indignity and invasion of a rape kit examination damn well deserves to have hir law enforcement agency take that effort and sacrifice seriously.”
I say Illinois’ new law is an incredible step in the right direction (good going, home state!), certainly lightyears ahead of Gov. Jindal’s manadatory ultrasound law for abortion with no rape exemption, as RH Reality Check reported, or Sharron Angle’s advice to a pregnant victim of incest to turn lemons into lemonade, as Change.org pointed out.
There was unfortunately too much news this week regarding violence against women, with Mel Gibson hogging the spotlight as the most visible victim-blamer. The LAPD has luckily arrested a man known as the “Grim Sleeper” who has been accused of sexually assaulting and killing 11 victims (ps, what’s with all the cutesy names for perpetrators of violent acts? Rape and murder is not “sleeping” just as the DC man who broke into women’s homes and touched himself was not a “hugger” or whatever they called him – it belittles the gravity of the assault).
Children, as always, made devastating headlines. First, a New Jersey man was arrested for raping (and thus killing) a 7-month old girl. In New York, a man robbed a 3-year old girl and was attempting sexual assault when neighbors discovered him. And in Ohio, a 31-year old woman posed as a teenage boy to assault a 16-year old girl. But what’s more, as Gawker pointed out, the media was trying to pinpoint the story as a real-life Boys Don’t Cry, which is taking a story about transsexual tragedy and likening it to child abuse. Good call on pointing out that fail. Another media fail, as NOW aptly pointed out, was a graphic depiction of sexual violence on True Blood.
Gender Across Borders has a brave post from a rape survivor about coping and opening up to new lovers: “In the past I tried to talk to old boyfriends about it, but they didn’t want to hear it, or didn’t want to believe it. They denied my story when I needed their support. I couldn’t believe my ears when my exes did what society so often does in cases of sexual assault—they blamed me, the victim.”
In other parts of the world, Vietnam is being rocked by the idea of a “virginity spot” that is freeing rapists left and right, and the UN released a toolkit of how to deter sexual violence in war.
What are some positive things that people are doing to combat sexual assault that you’ve seen this past week?
Amanda is the author of the blog, The Undomestic Goddess.
Wait. I don’t watch True Blood, so it’s entirely possible that I’m missing something! But from the NOW description, it sounds like Lorena is actually the one raping Bill, since he physically has no choice but to comply with her wishes. While the resulting image sounds like it looks visually like a man raping a woman, it seems that the woman is actually raping the man, and he is actually defending himself against her. And if I’ve got that right, NOW’s analysis strikes me as largely pretty fucked up.
That doesn’t mean that the characterization of Lorena isn’t misogynistic — it sounds like it is. Nor does it mean that the writers/director/producer wasn’t going for a scene that looked like sexual violence against a woman for titillation value — a problem in its own worthy of upset. But it this case, it would seem that a man has every right to hate a woman with power over him — she’s using it to rape him.
Right?
@Cara, that’s an interesting question…I DO watch True Blood, and more than anything I was just confused by the scene. Reading the NOW piece was actually the first time I considered the “he has to do it because she’s his maker and he is forced to obey” angle, partially because I forget what the vampire “rules” are on this show, and also because I’m pretty sure there have been other times when he has actively disobeyed her. It definitely read to me as disturbing, violent sex (people use the phrase “hate-fuck” which makes me feel so ill, I can’t really dignify it’s use) in which his rage isn’t related to his feeling coerced or controlled. But if the NOW summary is really a correct description of the dynamic, then I would be inclined to agree with you.
That Angle quote is truly horrible. “I think that two wrongs don’t make a right. And I have been in the situation of counseling young girls, not 13 but 15, who have had very at risk, difficult pregnancies. And my counsel was to look for some alternatives, which they did. And they found that they had made what was really a lemon situation into lemonade”
A LEMON SITUATION??!!? This is like something that would show up in a satire about anti-choice rhetoric.
Thanks Sarah, that helps! It seems that there’s something really not cool going on in the NOW analysis regardless, but that who was being victimized in the scene and what to take from it was made a lot less clear by those making the show.
Sorry, I just stumbled across this blog, and as a true crime buff (and feminist), I wanted to correct one misconception. The “Grim Sleeper” isn’t known as such because of the reason you think. The police certainly aren’t referring to rape and murder as “sleeping.” He got his nickname because he went through a long period of crime, then apparently took a 14-year hiatus, followed by a sudden return to killing. Serial killers usually get their police or media nicknames based on the most noteworthy aspect of the crime, and in his case, it was the unexpected dormancy. Most killers continue without stopping until caught. And the cutesy titles are used because they’re easy for identification between the different creeps operating at any one time in the absence of a name. I have no excuse for the label “Hugger,” though – that was obnoxious.
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