The National Crime and Victimization Survey asked a sample of 40k different households throughout America and found that 38% of the victims of rape and sexual violence were against men. Due to the past idea that men not victims and that they were almost always perpetrators, the leader of this investigation decided to check if this was an error somewhere as the results were greatly different that the previous 5-14 percent of victims.
They couldn't really find anything that could explain why this increase happened, but it would be probable that the publicity surrounding the scandal at Penn State's head football coach sparking attention in victim's lives.
It later goes on to explain that since men usually have penises that are "made to penetrate," they will be the perpetrator. The article explains that they found about 46% of male victims to have been attacked by female aggressors.
More details can be found at:
http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2014/04/male_rape_in_america_a_new_study_reveals_that_men_are_sexually_assaulted.html
-Elijah Zagorski
It's crazy to think that so many people have kept their sexual abuse a secret until the incidents at Penn State came out. The amount of men reporting that they had been sexually assaulted surprises me, and makes me wonder just how many more people, men and women alike, are still keeping their secrets.
ReplyDeleteAnthony
It's nice that people are starting to realize that as much as a man can be a perpetrator of sexual violence, so can a woman. Males can be as much of a victim as a female. I feel like we have been so conditioned to think that the man will always be the perpetrator. It all goes back to gender role ideas that men are supposed to be aggressive and dominant while women are weak and submissive. If more people realized that the gender roles that we assign to people aren't always the way the world works, then maybe men wouldn't be so afraid to report that they had been sexually assaulted.
ReplyDelete-Ali Marnon
Recently, Shia LaBoeuf came out saying that we was raped by a women during a performance art piece. It's heartbreaking to see that there are so many people who have said he "should have enjoyed it" or "is being a pussy." Victim blaming is already a huge problem with rape culture, and the invalidating of men's emotions is also a prevalent issue on its own. Seeing these two collide is just further proof of things we need to change in our society.
ReplyDelete~Alex Duncan
It's well known that males are less likely to go get medical help than females, so I think it wouldn't be too far of a jump to say that males are less likely to say they were raped. Also, our society does have this weird notion that a guy can't get raped since he's the one with the "raping material". I wish more people would seriously think of rape as extreme psychological damage that's resulting from something physical, and purely preventable and totally malicious. Thank you for bring this up- Rape is by no means so simply defined as being penetrated. People can be so silly.
ReplyDeleteWhat this really is, is a lack of education. Come on U.S!
--Josephine Hicks
I agree with what Josie had to say. I think that men are already less likely to be raped because of their physical stature, but even more less likely to report rape because they feel a need to uphold their masculinity. Rape is such a sad thing to hear about, regardless of who raped who. I think our class discussion about how beginning education young on to protect oneself from rape and assertively say "no" is applicable for both males and females. Thanks for sharing this!
ReplyDelete-Bridget Thomas