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.