sexual abuse in south africa

Today, millions of African women and girls are victims of violence and are subjected to sexual abuse in such a way that both private and public places are not safe . Sexual violence against women is an issue that has always been part of South Africa’s social structure, but it continues to be neglected by the government. Regardless of class or color, all women in South Africa live with the fear of facing sexual violence at some point in their lives. Although South Africa is one of the most developed countries in Africa economically, unfortunately it ranks, as one of the highest countries struggling with sexual violence against women. As an African country, South Africa still follows its traditions and cultural values despite the growing urban areas and adoption of western culture; thus cultural gender roles play an important role on the issue of sexual violence. Violence is an issue that is deeply embedded in South Africa and it is derived from the legacy of apartheid; therefore there is a need to understand perpetrators of violence or sexual abuse in South Africa from the lenses of apartheid. Rabenoro argued that one of the consequences of decades of apartheid is that for many people, physical violence has become the first line of strategy for resolving conflict and gaining control . The brutality of the Apartheid era left South African societies severely scared from economic, social and political inequalities. Although the South African government has been working towards achieving equality for all South African citizens, social issues such as violence against women have not been fully represented.

This paper will examine why the South African legal system has failed to address the issue of sexual abuse against women? My goal f...

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...violence imposed on them. Perpetrators of corrective rapes are most likely to never get arrested because culturally, homosexuality is not accepted in predominantly black South African societies; therefore sexually abusing lesbian women has been normalized as the right thing to do among African men. Okafor argued that homosexual resistance from traditional African societies is because black South Africans are trying to regain their nationality back as well as preserving their culture, which was lost during apartheid. In townships and rural areas, homosexuality is not as accepted as it is in cities such as Johannesburg, Cape-town, Durban and Pretoria. Although South Africa has laws in the constitution on homosexuality and equality of all people regardless of sexual preference, unfortunately these laws are not being enforced and people simply choose to ignore the law.