Reflection, 4/30

Katie Covey

Eng. 460

Reflection Paper

4/30/2015

Reflection of Rape Culture

Wow, I can’t believe that I am writing my last reflection of my college career. It is so crazy that this semester went by so quickly and honestly, my entire college career flew by. I am about to dive straight into the real world and I can’t believe how much my views on various topics have changed over the last four months. In this class in particular, I was blind sided at the beginning. I had no idea that this class was going to be about rape. At the beginning of the semester I did feel a little uncomfortable about the idea of dedicating an entire semesters worth of material to rape and the subject of forceful assault. However, I was also excited because I really enjoy talking about a topic that is considered to be taboo or swept under the rug because it challenges societal views. 

Rape is such a challenging, yet sensitive issue. I find it interesting to talk about for a number of different reasons, yet I also can find it to be a reoccurring cycle because it all seems to connect after analyzing it all semester. At the beginning of the semester, I didn’t know much about rape. Obviously I knew what it was and what it entailed, but I didn’t know the details, contributing factors and how rape and sexual assault is actually different. At the beginning I viewed rape as something that happens to girls when they are being stupid and walking home at night alone, when a predator pops out the bushes that line B Street and rapes her. Also, I was aware of the date rape drug and that people can slip it into your drink while you are out partying. My parents would always chime to me, never leave your drink sitting at a party and come back to it, always keep your drink in hand. With this knowledge, I was generally safe when I was out and about during my younger college days. However, after taking this class, I began to realize how stupid some of the decisions I made back in the day and how fortunate I was that nothing happened to me. Overall, my perspective and lifestyle decision making began to change. After talking more in class about sexual assault and feeling my stomach cringe a few times after class, my knowledge base increased massively by the end of the semester. By learning just the simplest of facts about perpetrators and victims, I was able to understand what is usually found in a typical crime scene on a college campus. 

Applying rhetoric to college campus rape and rape in general was also very helpful in increasing my knowledge about rape. After the first essay that we turned in, I was able to identify many commonplaces within news articles about rape and what had happened. I discovered the difference between stranger rape and acquaintance rape and how unlikely stranger rape occurs. Within this class, I was able to use rhetoric and apply it to rape through different rhetoric terms. I also learned that rape has Kairos and there is an opportune moment for it to happen. There were many factors that have been studied in which I did not consider. I also discovered that in many news articles and popular media articles, that many journalists are biased when viewing either the victim or the perpetrator. Even today, some people still view the victims as the one’s who were asking for it. Overall, my knowledge of rape and myself as a learner has been given an insight that I never would have considered at first. I never would have believed the information that I learned in this class. Ideally, I feel very fortunate that I was able to take part in this class. It taught me the truth about rape, not the societal myths that we are taught all of our lives.   

Over the semester, I have also found my attitudes about rape have changed immensely. I find myself being more cautious and listening to my gut about people that I come across. I have also found that my views on being safe and choosing to associate yourself with the right people is a very large part in situations of rape. However, I don’t believe women should be overly cautious and not have fun and not enjoy themselves in college due to the dangers of sexual assault. It is all about choosing to make the right decisions and looking for the signs that could lead yourself into a situation of sexual assault. Understanding situations that create sexual assault is very important and I believe the lack of education that our young generations are experiencing will not be enough in the future. They have no idea what to look for and what to comprehend, and this is crucial in stopping rape and sexual assault. I also believe that the discourse and the language that we use in our society is huge. I have found myself cringing at the use of the word rape in an inappropriate context, like, “I raped that exam.” Using language such as this is horrifying in knowing that these people may be the leaders of our future America. I find myself choosing more carefully about what to read and watch because I pick up on inappropriate content. For example, I was reading the second book in the 50 Shades of Grey trilogy and after we talked about it in class, I found myself disgusted and I couldn’t finish reading it. I was appalled by the idea of this hyper masculine sense of man and I lost interest. Other interesting details I learned about myself this summer is my mix of traditional and modern values. I found myself agreeing and disagreeing with many things we discussed in class, such as views of gender roles in the corporate world. I believe that sometimes men are better at certain jobs than women are and there are some jobs that women are better at than men. I am not a feminist and I still believe in some traditional values, however I did find myself feeling challenged with some of these notions. I tend to still believe in some sense the idea of hunter and gatherer, and that a man should earn a woman, however, I believe that a woman should equally contribute if she is in a relationship. 

During the duration of this class, I also found myself very interested in the concept of hyper masculinity and sexual assault in the military. Before this class, I did not know much about hyper masculinity. I honestly didn’t even really know what it was. However, after dedicating my second essay to hyper masculinity and focusing on different facets of hyper masculinity within our culture, I found that it can be a very troubling topic. It plays a major role in sexual assault and rape, so I was able to gather more knowledge about this and start looking out for different hyper masculine traits within my every day life. I also found that the struggle the military is experiecing. It is so sad and unfortunate that the men and women who are dedicating their lives to save ours, are the one’s who are very at risk for rape and sexual assault. For what America preaches, it is a shame that it is so hypocritical. Honestly, overall, this class helped me view things differently within in my every day life. I began to understand more about my role as a woman in this world and begin to comprehend things that I may come across in my life at one point or another, if I haven’t already. 

In the end, I found this class very rewarding in understanding my life more clearly. By taking this class and being exposed to such a taboo topic, I was able to understand and dissect my views and ideologies more about how I feel about a number of societal issues that still take place today. I am entering the real world here in a few short weeks and feeling confident about where I am in life and understanding my views about gender roles, hyper masculinity, sexual assault and much, much more allows me to feel confident about where I stand when these issues come up in my life. Thank you for teaching a great two semesters of rhetoric. I will be able to use this knowledge in many different areas in my life in the future. 

Project #3

Below you can find the link to my website.

http://kaitlynncovey.wix.com/rapeculture

Response to Class Discussion - 4/7

During class, when we began talking about the article, I found it repulsive and just wrong that some cultures see women as "rapeable." The discourse and language that people use to discuss and talk about rape (which is actually what I am discussing in my third essay) is rather displeasing to the ear. How do you define someone as "rapeable?" I guess that goes back to the idea that many people have such as:

The way she was dressed
The way that she behaved at whatever social event
She "asked" for it
She drank too much, so it doesn't matter.

All of these examples are an unfortunate and inexcusable reasons for why a woman was raped. It is not at all an acceptable type of behavior, yet it still continues to happen. Why? Why is sex considered a taboo topic? Sex is the reason behind why the human population still lives and breathes on this earth today. So why is rape unspeakable? This is sort of irrelevant, but whenever the word rape is said, the line from Harry Potter of, "He who must not be named" pops up in my head and that how I feel rape is viewed as in society.

The cultural view on women as the weaker gender is interesting to me. I absolutely stand behind the ideal that women are just as capable as men and can run a business or do whatever the want. However, traditional values such as hunter and gatherers is not always a bad thing. Isn't the idea behind being able to provide for a family make a man, a man? What happens if you take that away from them? Does that create hostility towards women? And isn't hostility towards women a trait behind perpetrators of rape? If men can't provide for women because women insist of doing that themselves, what will the man do in the relationship? Will this discourage him of feeling like he can't provide, which connects to a number of different things, such as intimacy and personal feeling within a relationship? Then, won't that lead to the idea behind hyper masculinity where he begins to overcompensate and it may bleed into the wrong category and he will begin to rape? Rapists desire the idea of control, so will this idea of the women being able to do it all feed that need for control?

I am definitely not saying that women need to be the princess and rely on the man to provide and gather for her, however, I believe that there is a balance in every relationship, and really, honestly, in just socializing with the opposite gender.

Response to Class Discussion, 3/31

Today in class, I found the discussion to take a different perspective than it usually takes, which was examining how culture has affected how certain social interactions send underlying messages. For example, Professor Condon’s example of “Hey, can I buy you a drink” at the bar is a great example of how the underlying tone of sexual content thrives. Unfortunately, our culture norms have interpreted that as a pick up line and it is assumed that the guy wants to go home with that girl. Unfortunately, sometimes that may not be the case and the guy may just be interested in who you are. However, another solid point was that men feel as though the women need to get loosened up a bit and everyone needs the bit of liquid confidence, so buying a drink is just an easy way to break the ice. (I feel as though I am interpreting pick up lines) In a cultural such as this, when women feel uneasy or are approached, many put up a defensive wall very quickly, not sure of the guy and who he truly is. Which is why I feel like we hear less rape stories about women and bars than we do frat houses and house parties. The bar is really just an area of controlled meeting and interaction for adults.

Which leads me to an interesting concept to think about: what would it be like if our culture practiced as though house parties and frat houses were a meeting place for older adults, while bars were open to young adults? In a sense, bars are a controlled environment where if an individual appears too drunk, the bartenders will cut you off and the bouncers X you out. At a frat house or a house party, there is no sense of control anywhere. The people responsible for kicking out the obnoxiously too drunk people are drunk themselves, so they really don’t have a good sense of control either. If our culture was like this, would rape still occur? Well, yes unfortunately I think so.

Viewing the culture of rape has lead me to believe that it has so many different lenses, I find it hard to grasp it all at once, which may be another factor as to why this appears as such a taboo topic in the United States. Will rape ever be a crime that no longer exists in this culture? With the amount of social media, lack of communication and honestly lack of understanding of this crime, it is hard to say where this will lead to in later years.

One question I would like to look into more as to why men think that they need alcohol to help ease them into conversation with women? As lame as rejection feels, that cannot be the sole reason to feel like they must feed alcohol into women to break the ice?

Response to Class Discussion, 3/26

Well to start class off, I really enjoyed the cake so that was great. They can visit any time they would like!

But translating and interpreting the handout that was My Last Duchess by Ferrara was an interesting piece. Without going through it as a class, I would have set that down as soon I began reading. Old English language such as that is not my forte. But, translating it and reading from different perspectives help understand it. But the guy in the story is definitely creepy. And like Professor Condon said, the guy is hiding.

In the culture of rape, I guess I never did think about the assumptions that are usually assumed in most rape cases. The assumption that the girl went home with the guy because she was drunk, then it must be okay. The assumptions and unstated comments that are in the air that are created from our culture is what is going to interfere with the culture of rape. Other assumptions that go along with it is consent and sex. Also, how the girl presents herself. If she is flirtatious, dresses provocatively then "she was asking for it." Our country practices and preaches about individualism and how no one should be judged for what they wear or how they act, yet we are the most hypocritical and stereotypical country out there. If someone isn't conforming or acting the same as every body else, they are judged and it is very wrong.

Other hidden facets that are apart of rape culture is the way assumptions of success. It is assumed that white men have solid jobs, the women are at home in the kitchen and people of color are neither. In the world of business, it is sad to see how people judge and assume instantaneously. The common cliche quote of, "Don't judge a book by its cover"is pathetically inaccurate yet we preach it like it is a moral code. Yet, our moral goods aren't practiced either. And rape should fall under Do Not Harm, and do not do to others what you would not like them to do to you yet this happens multiple times on a day to day basis. The unfortunate matter is hiding behind the assumptions and unstated comments are killing the success of a rape free society. 

Essay #2 - March 24, 2015

Katie Covey
English 460
Essay #2
March 24, 2015

Hyper Masculinity in Our Culture
   
Hyper masculinity is an issue that is not only becoming immune in our society, but it is helping play into acts of sexual violence and assault. It is seen in every day contemporary society, yet it has become yet another facet of an exempt topic. Hyper masculinity is seen in a variety of cultural ways through entertainment, such as movies, sports, and books to even more of a day to day professional basis, such as the army or even heads of corporations in the business world. Unfortunately, hyper masculinity is also seen through a monetary value. In the business world alike, it is seen far too much that women take a pay cut far more often than men do. With just these examples, the idea of hyper masculinity may be one of the main causes behind aggression and hostility toward women alike, leading to these types of personalities being the perpetrators behind rape.
    According to Dr. Sarah Edwards, lead researcher behind the study titled Denying Rape by Endorsing Forceful Intercourse: Exploring Differences Among Responders says that men who have hostile feelings towards women along with negative interactions, tend to be the men who project the personalities that many rapists have. However, men who said they wouldn’t directly state that they would rape during this research fall under the hyper masculine classification. This specific group of men that fell under the classification that they would not rape a woman, said they would force a women into having sexual intercourse. Edwards stated, “In general, they objectify women and feel expected to be ‘sexually dominant’ and display some traits of hyper masculinity.” (Frost) Edwards found that working with hyper masculinity and the males that fall under this category, tend to display very different personalities than that of rapists. “If you’re working with hyper masculinized groups, you think of the usual suspects. Male sports -- it’s very competitive, there’s a big focus on body image and the idea that bodies are power and you’re taught to value physical conquest over others.” (Frost) With these extrinsic proofs and Edwards testimony about the hyper masculine category, behaviors of forceful aggression can lead to rape. And we see still see many cases of rape and athletes all around the nation. Many well known college campus rape stories that hit newsstands do involve athletes, such as Florida State University’s Jameis Winston or the Vanderbilt case, that involved multiple football players who were found guilty of numerous different counts of sexual violence. Hyper masculinity does heavily play into the Vanderbilt case. In this specific case, the victim was gang raped by multiple football players in a dorm room. Competition is a key here, displaying that these hyper masculine males felt the need to compete with one another. Rhoda Jordan, writer for the Huffington Post, perfectly defined hyper masculinity in a recent blog posting. “Simple: It's the delusion that masculinity is king. That aggression, toughness and competition trump compassion, expression and collaboration.” (Jordan) This perfectly describes the hyper masculinity that can be found in our contemporary society today.
    Sports do conduct a tenacious view of hyper masculinity, however the army also subsists a very heavy hold on hyper masculinity. Michael T. Crawford, a solider in the U.S. Army, as well as Communications Assistant for the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape cannot believe the rates of sexual assault that is taking place. Crawford states, “Rates of sexual assault in the military are staggering. Our service men and women deserve better than this. A culture of hyper masculinity -- strength and stoicism -- breeds the sense of power and entitlement that drives sexual assault.” (Crawford) A man, a solider and a citizen who is speaking out against rape is able to identify the problems of sexual assault within the military and he is also capable of establishing the belief that it is wrong. Hyper masculinity is not only a driving force behind sexual assault, it is a cultural norm that we are too comfortable with. This cultural norm isn’t just included in the way we think and act, it is practice through our discourse and rhetoric. Hyper masculinity is produced through our cultural needs for entertainment. Hollywood takes hyper masculinity and uses it to provide a story line in movies, advertising and even books. When Crawford began to examine and analyze the field of anti-sexual violence, Crawford said that, “Anti sexual violence brings forth a lot of introspection. For me, that has meant coming to terms with learning that my world views were largely manufactured by Hollywood and advertising. ... Everyone is exposed to the same messages, and those messages are rooted in hyper masculinity.” (Crawford)
    In Hollywood for example, hyper masculinity is seen a variety of different genres of film and TV shows. Hyper masculinity can often be found in movies that contain law enforcement or war. Just to name a few that easily came to mind, Starsky & Hutch, Fight Club, The Terminator, or even the classics, like James Bond. With these movies, come the existence of gender roles and the objectification of women. As movies are just one facet of Hollywood, music, often seen in Hip-Hop or Country, women are also objectified to look pretty and do what the man wants. The unfortunate case in our society has now used to this discourse and we are now paying for it in the result of sexual assault. Our use of language as well as our practiced norms are setting up our society and younger generations for failure against rape. And unfortunately, it is not just happening in the United States, it is universal phenomenon.
    Crawford agrees with such a statement.
    “Hyper masculinity is not just unique to the Army, or any branch of service. That’s     national. Hell, that’s global. And sadly, to a degree, it’s necessary for a select group of     men and women who ultimately have to pull the trigger, so others don’t have to. But     instead of being treated as the conditionally necessary evil it is, the world celebrates this     kind of "macho" behavior. That kind of behavior is rewarded, and the people who have     been force-fed these messages their entire lives wind up in the military.” (Crawford)
The frightening truth behind masculinity is just that. It is a celebrated type of behavior we see in our daily lives. This is practiced in almost all stages of life; from the time we are children and playing with the neighbors to the time we are old sitting in our chair, while my husband and I are drinking tea, that I made for him... The unfortunate matter of the fact detail is, hyper masculinity is an underlying bearing that we will always see in some place in our lives. Hyper masculinity can and does begin at a young age. With a number of diverse reasons that can contribute to the development of hyper masculinity, young men will begin to evolve these habits into unspeakable and terrifying actions, such as rape. Many do contribute hyper masculinity to the patriarchal system that the U.S. has carved out for young boys growing up. Gender roles can be based on this type of system, where male entitlement becomes active in a young man’s life. Other things that contribute to an adolescent's young life is how the control of the family is portrayed and the urgency to compete with others. With so many different factors to consider, hyper masculinity can be seen through a variety of family habits. Patriarchal routine can lead to family violence and be an origin for hyper masculinity. According to Ian Gault, a presenter at the No To Violence Conference, presented his findings and proofs about the Macho Man and how hyper masculinity and adolescent behavior can lead to it. When young males are born into families that have a patriarchal system, they tend to produce hyper masculine behavior.
    “Encouragement of violence and sex can lead hyper masculine fathers to be complicit in     their sons' sexual violence, for example, by excusing the behavior and minimizing it to     police. [Ian says,] "The message is 'You can have your fun and get away with it too'.     That's incredibly important, because in patriarchal families, the father is seen as the most     important person." (Gault)
With this testimony from Gault, the extrinsic proof is displaying that these types of families are creating and producing young men that may possibly be perpetrators in the future. This type of control and desire for power create men who also rule over the business world and bring hyper masculinity into this area of culture too.
    In today’s world, it is more common to see a woman in a commanding position, if not top position in the business world. However, women still struggle receiving the same pay grade that men do on an average income. Based on empirical data from Institute for Women’s Policy Research, women still earn quite a bit less than men do.
    “In 2013, female full-time workers made only 78 cents for every dollar earned by men, a     gender wage gap of 22 percent. Women, on average, earn less than men in virtually every     single occupation for which there is sufficient earnings data for both men and women to     calculate an earnings ratio.” (About Pay Equity & Discrimination)
Although hyper masculinity cannot be proven to be directly tied with thus data, it is can still be assumed that it plays a role. In a contemporary society, such as this one, it is hard when women begin to compete with men for higher ranking position. For so long, a traditional value was held that women would be there to support the man, that it was unseen that women could also carry out the same responsibilities that men did. Gender roles were set and for many (especially men) that was okay. However, when this began to change and women started taking over, competition emerged, which also brought aggression.  The desire and need for power and control also emerged, which are underlying attributes for hyper masculinity. When all of these things begin to merge, acts of sexual violence can begin to form. In 2006, the National Sexual Violence Resource Center gathered information from the Equal Employment Opportunity Council and received 12,025 charges of sexual assault (15.4% filed by males). (What is Workplace Sexual Violence?) And unfortunately, there are many different types of sexual violences that can occur. The NSVCR stated that jokes about rape or women as sex objects was the most frequently used behavior, with language, images, pay inequity, verbal abuse following, then at the top being physical abuse, rape and sexual assault.
    With all of this data, it is easy to testify that the culture of rape, sexual violence, hyper masculinity and gender roles are becoming much more of an immune behavior. Among the cultural norms that are produced on a daily basis plus the origins of patriarchal habits and family violence, hyper masculinity is becoming much more common and celebrated in our daily lives. With the perpetual existence of hyper masculinity, hostility and aggression will continue to thrive in our society and from that will branch more occurrences of sexual assault and violence in the work place, on college campuses and in our daily lives. With the hermetic cultural that persists to carry these norms, society will not see change unless we can begin to penetrate the walls of hyper masculinity.



References:
"About Pay Equity & Discrimination." Institute for Women's Policy Research. Institute for Women's Policy Research, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. <http://www.iwpr.org/initiatives/pay-equity-and-discrimination>.

Crawford, Michael. "A Culture of Hypermasculinity Is Driving Sexual Assault in the Military." Huffington Post 4 Apr. 2014. Huffington Post. Web. 4 Mar. 2015. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-t-crawford/a-culture-of-hypermasculi_b_5147191.html>.

Frost, Aja. "Study Examines Rape, Hypermasculinity and Hostility in College Men." USA Today - College 21 Jan. 2015. USA Today. Web. 5 Mar. 2015. <http://college.usatoday.com/2015/01/21/study-examines-rape-hypermasculinity-and-hostility-in-college-men/>.

Gault, Ian. "Macho Man: Hyper - Masculinity and Adolescent Dating Violence." Www.ntvconference.org. No to Violence, 16 Nov. 2012. Web. <http://ntv.org.au/conference/wp-content/uploads/2012-ntv-conference-workshop-3d-macho-man-doc.pdf>.

Jordan, Rhoda. "The Problem With Masculinity." HuffingtonPost.com. Huffington Post, 7 July 2014. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.

"What Is Workplace Sexual Violence?" Http://www.nsvrc.org. Http://www.nsvrc.org. Web. <http://www.nsvrc.org/sites/default/files/file/SAAM/SAAM_WPSV-Factsheet.pdf>.

Response to Class Discussion, 3/10

During today's class discussion, we were able to cover how pathos is portrayed in the rape culture. Pathos is the emotional side of the audience or what the writer is trying to portray throughout the story. One concept that is related to the culture of rape that we discussed was collective compassion and what that truly is. In my opinion, collective compassion is compassion that the entire community can agree on. If we as a culture want to reach collective compassion, there are many things we need to begin to change to achieve that.

One thing that would need to change over time is being proactive versus reactive. When connecting this specific particular to media, media is always going to be reactive to the situation. And by doing so, we in our communities are not getting anywhere further in progressing to making communities safer and decreasing the rate of rape. The difference between being proactive and reactive will, I think, begin to see the differences in collective compassion and rape. Being proactive would be the beginning of changing the cultural norms in our society. Changing the commonplaces that we tend to look at as a normal "college" thing and understand that what we are doing is not being proactive. To be proactive, we should begin to analyze the where these cultural norms are not so normal. Binge drinking and drinking until you are blacked out, is something that should be worry some to the world. We as a culture focus too much on reactive side of rape and not changing the factors that help cause it. We focus on what the victim could have done wrong, we focus on how much everyone involved drank and the location that the crime took place in. However, what about what can we do to create positive proactive traits to help the victims or the people who find themselves in these situations. We need to begin to acknowledge that the taboo of rape is not a bad thing. It sits at the same place that sex does, where it is not a public topic to discuss, but hey guess what? Everyone is doing it. Everyone has sex. How would we keep producing and populating this world without it? By acknowledging rape, we are taking one step closer to reassuring victims of direct and indirect cases of rape that they will be okay and it is okay. By doing so, we can help them take a stand to how they got themselves in that position. Another important proactive detail that we should look at it, is what can we offer to victims to help them share their what they want. By properly educating people in this world, we can begin to help prevent rape around our communities.

If we can begin to be proactive and not reactive, we could see a change in rape numbers in our society. Unfortunately, we as a society must be picky how we to choose to demonstrate and voice our opinions without it coming across as an extreme. Too many times in our society, people cry wolf and then no one takes their opinion, voice and incidents seriously. How can we find the middle ground to properly educating the men and women of this generation without them viewing it as a joke?