Women should not be forced to put up with any unwanted sexual advances from men. This is a major problem throughout the world yet it seems to fly under the radar. We need to make sure all women know it is okay to speak up about this and not feel ashamed for something that is not their fault. However, articles that reject these ideas such as "Women Can Dump Jerks Without Help of Lawyers", by Judy Jarvis make it difficult for women to feel comfortable enough to voice their problems. In her writing, Judy Garvis expresses her distaste of the concept of women who "play the victim". However, I actually do feel that women should no longer stay quiet on this topic and once and for all destroy this idea that women must suck it up and live in an environment …show more content…
This was a man who at the time was in the position of being elected associate justice of the Supreme Court. Anita Hill, who had worked for him as his personal assistant testified about these comments made by Clarence Thomas, "pornographic materials depicting individuals with large penises or large breasts involved in various sex acts. On several occasions Thomas told me graphically of his own sexual prowess (Smolowe)". This. Is. Not. Harmless. Garvis clearly did not take Hill 's words seriously and gave her own two cents about it, "Maybe he talked dirty to Anita Hill. Maybe He didn’t. Something obviously went on between the two of them that was sexually charged". What we are doing now is brushing off this man 's actions because a woman 's opinion is not valued enough because the attention was unwanted so there was no so called "sexual …show more content…
"...the most chilling aspect of this sexual harassment movement is the indoctrination of our young into the culture of victim hood" (Garvis). Call it whatever you want but what we are teaching our young ones is to stand up for themselves. There is no indoctrination going on. Is it so horrible for our kids to learn that if someone is acting inappropriately towards you, then you should say something about it? She even goes on to compare the actions of young kids whose minds are not fully developed to the behavior of middle aged men. "Do we really want an aggressive girl who bothers the hell out of a teenage crush...to be a criminal? Because that is the direction we 're headed" (Garvis). Very bad analogy to try to compare the actions of a teenager to the behavior of an adult who holds a very respectable career and should already know what is acceptable and what is
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Show MoreThe trial of 19 year old Owen Laurie has brought into light the alarming rate in which Sexual assault is rising. The issue that rages on in Colleges is said to be making its way to high schools and primary school. In a study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Division of Violence Prevention, 19% of Undergraduate women experienced
In today’s society, there is evidence that gender roles hold high standards in forming an identity, whether that gender is male or female. These standards put pressure on either gender to uphold them and commit to specific behaviors/actions that validate their very being. For men, this includes being considered masculine, or portraying the sense that they are authoritative over others, in which this includes displaying attitudes that contribute to female subordination. According to Pascoe (2016) in his article “Good Guys Don’t Rape” men are given the opportunity to challenge rape yet reinforce rape attitudes at the same time that are contained within rape culture and masculinity considered “norms.” Pascoe, illustrates that rape can be seen
Most importantly, the allegations of sexual harassment bring into question the consensual nature of his advances. As Rubin explains "A democratic morality should judge sexual acts by the way partners treat one another, the level of mutual consideration, the presence or absence of coercion, and the quantity and quality of the pleasures which they provide.
Since I have worked in a bar as a cashier and as security, I have been sexually harassed by men countless times. They grab me and tell me that they want me. I have had multiple different men tell me that I should make babies with them because they are taller than me and it would be a good investment for the NBA. Even though I tower over most women at 6 foot 3, I still have to worry about sexual harassment and sexual assault. Women are constantly told that we need to be on guard, stay away from dark alleys, keep our drinks in our hands at all times, and carry pepper spray to protect ourselves. When women report sexual assault, they are callously interviewed by police who ask what they were wearing or if they had too much to drink. We are being taught to not be raped instead of teaching men not to
Even today, we acknowledge the many advances women have made in academics, employment and athletics, we still need to recognize some dismaying facts in our efforts to achieve equity. While sex discrimination is no longer routinely accepted in education and has been prohibited since Title IX became law, the incidences of sexual harassment and assault that are continually reported show that freedom from threats to learning still has not been achieved. In response, the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Education has released its final policy guidance on sexual harassment to help educators recognize sexual harassment and formulate age-appropriate responses to prevent or resolve incidences of this form of sex discrimination.
90 percent of the victims of sexual assault are women and 10 percent are men, and nearly 99 percent of offenders in single-victim assaults are men (Bureau of Justice Statistics 2010). According to https://www.justice.gov/ovw/sexual-assault, Sexual assault is any type of sexual contact or behavior that occurs without the explicit consent of the recipient. Falling under the definition of sexual assault are sexual activities as forced sexual intercourse, forcible sodomy, child molestation, incest, fondling, and attempted rape. () Sexual Assault can happen to anyone, not just women it can happen to men and kids as well. Sexual Assault these days are a big trouble and it is not being addressed in good order, and it is
Given the frequent occurrence of sexual coercion, it is likely that many students accept this behavior as expected and within the boundaries of social norms (Johnson, 1980). One of the few studies to examine perceptions of sexual coercion used written vignettes to examine the impact of initiator gender and type of coercive act on interpretations of the actors and behaviors (Oswald & Russell, 2006). In that study, college students did not rate the target of the sexual coercion as experiencing high levels of victimization, no matter the aggressiveness of the coercive strategy used, nor did they view the influence strategies or the person using them as particularly aggressive. Although the study provides useful information on the perception of sexually coercive...
In the past century, America has made great leaps in terms of equality. With the efforts made by the civil rights and suffrage movements, all people gained the right to vote. We are even moving forward with marriage equality, and currently fifteen states recognize same-sex marriage. But regardless of all of our progressive institutional movements forward, we continue to socially oppress women. Men’s violence against women has grown to be an internationally recognized epidemic, and will continue to grow unless measures be made to stop it. Domestic violence continues to be prevalent in the lives of many families, and is the primary cause of homelessness in half of cases for women in children. Many women have been forced to alter their behaviors out of fear of being sexually or physically assaulted. One out of every three women is sexually or physically abused in their lifetimes. The first thing that comes to mind is, there are a lot of people abusing women out there. Many people with opposing ideas may claim that men can be victims of violence perpetrated by women, but in instances not used for self-defense, it is rarely part of a systematic pattern of power and control through force or threat of force. In fact, 99% of rape is perpetrated by men, but when confronting men about the issue of violence against women, it is often combated with denial. Jackson Katz writes in his book, The Macho Paradox, “We take comfort in the idea of the aforementioned child-rapist murderer as a horrible aberration. A monster. We’re nothing like him.”(Katz 30). The sad truth is that most women who are raped are raped by men they know, or even men they love. Many men have a hard time believing that saying that most violence is perpetuated by men does not...
Starting off in the new year, the Time’s Up Movement began with a letter of solidarity to be sent to hundreds of women to encourage addressing and resisting sexual assault as well as the supporting the stories of victims. On January 8th, Keith Kocinski of the “Channel One: Daily News Show” reported on the Golden Globes event that helped debut the equality and empowerment campaign. Its advocates form an alliance to empower women and stand up against the unethical treatment and lack of accountability towards harassers in a broad range of workplaces. Unfortunately, obscene remarks and unwanted sexual advances are far more common than one might realize. According to one study published by Cosmopolitan in partnership with SurveyMonkey, 1 out of
It was once acceptable for men to have full control over women, declaring when they will marry and when they will have children. However, over the past centuries, women have established a place in society, proving themselves much more than someone's property. This is why the word “rape” today is not taken lightly. According to findlaw.com, “Rape generally refers to non-consensual sexual intercourse that is committed by physical force, threat of injury, or other duress.” When one does not give consent to sex, it is considered a felony, possibly putting the rapist in jail. Contrary to sexual assault, “Sex is reified as penile-vaginal intercourse while an extremely diverse group of pleasurable and sexually stimulating activities are dismissively relegated to the category of foreplay...” (Reinholtz, Muehlenhard, Phelps, & Satterfield, 1995.) Although consented sexual intercourse is much more out in the open and accepted in society, the problem of rape is still very relevant behind the scenes.
Marital rape is a term that is seldom used in legal system and even less often in our society in general. In fact, I would guess that most people did not even realize such an act was real or that this crime truly existed, let alone understand to severity of this act. Unfortunately, I have quickly learned that this violent crime is commonly committed, but infrequently reported and is a large issue that negatively affects and hurts women today.
“She asked for it.” Attitudes, beliefs, and incorrect ideas about rape have been with us for centuries. There are constantly meaningless excuses, such as "women ask for it," and "women secretly enjoy rape". Women are indeed not objects of pleasure, but it seems as though people cannot get the message. Feminism is needed to get this point across; it is needed as a representation that women are people. Rape is a violent act of power; it is not a sexual act. Rape is dehumanizing for the victim, but yet the victim is always a fault. We live in a society where victims are being blamed for “what they were wearing” or “she led him on”. Justice is not being served in any shape, way, or form. Rape culture cannot be simply defined because of the factors that can influence the situation. However, it could be best defined by Emilie Buchwald, author of Transforming a Rape Culture, “a complex set of beliefs that encourage male sexual aggression and supports violenc...
Throughout her questioning she remained composed and consistent, providing the panel with eloquent answers to their questions. Hill chose to come forward, years after her harassment, because she knew it was the right thing to do. She provided the public with a depiction of a composed and educated black woman standing up against sexual violence, a depiction that was new to much of the American public. Diallo however, became a scapegoat in the media, with rumors of her sexual promiscuity, bad morals, untrustworthiness etc. being circulated. She was portrayed as a sexually and morally deviant black woman, which is a very common stereotype
Victims often find that they have to deal with a lot of harassment even after being shamed. For example, some men will come onto girls who have a reputation of being ‘sluts’ because they think the girls are going to be ‘easy’ and ‘into it”; thus, slut shaming can ruin how people, especially men, perceive and treat a woman. Slut shaming can also increase rape culture by discrediting a women’s allegation of rape due to her sexual history. In so many cases where rape is reported, officers and lawyers attack the victims by questioning how they were dressed prior to being rape, how they acted, were they being ‘promiscuous’, or were they flirting with their rapist; if any of the above questions were answered “yes” they would claim the victim was “asking for it”. In the Steubenville rape case, a 16 year old girl was recorded being raped by two football players at a party. The footage was later sent to other classmates and quickly spread throughout the whole school; as a result of the “stigma surrounding sexual assault, she [the victim] was labeled as a slut and viciously tormented by her classmates,” (Nelson, 3). In cases like these, girls are slut-shamed for being victims of sexual
Take Miss Nevada Nia Sanchez for example, upon winning Miss USA she was asked about sexual assault on college campuses. She replied with suggesting that women should get training to learn how to defend themselves. This sparked a nationwide outrage shortly afterward. Half the people posting on social media sided with Sanchez while the other half completely targeted her and saw her as “wrong”. Half of Twitter commented that instead of women having the responsibility of protecting themselves from rape, men should just “not rape”. Meanwhile, the other half of Twitter responded saying that it isn’t wrong to be able to defend yourself. Yes, it shouldn’t be a woman’s responsibility to be able to fully defend herself in order to not get raped, but self-defense also comes a long way in keeping themselves safe. Conservative talk radio host Dana Loesch tweeted “So wait -- now its “unfeminist” to defend yourself if attacked? Jesus take the wheel. #MissUSA”(twitchy.com) in response to Sanchez’s answer. Is it really wrong to suggest that women learn how to defend themselves just in case they were attacked? No, and its not “unfeminist” to suggest it either. Rape survivor Zerlina Maxwell tells Fox News, “I don’t think we should be telling women anything. I think we should be telling men to not rape women and start the conversation there”(bostonglobe.com).