Context: As many of you know on December 16th a medical student in New Delhi was gang-raped by several men. The men crushed her body and penetrated her with rusting metal bar that removed some of her intestines which eventually led to her death. This attack in India has given people a wake up call about violence towards women, specifically rape. Women have been victims of rape for a number of years due to the fact that men feel it is a way to prove their masculinity and degrade women. This recent incident has led people to consider rape against women a serious problem and discuss ways to change it. The author of the article, Lauren Wolfe, believes that in order to fix this problem people should not be focusing solely on the victims but on the people committing the crimes. Many women do not report what has happened to them because they know that the men responsible will have no penalty. If this form of violence towards women is to be seen as a serious crime than the people who commit it must spend time in jail. People, especially in India, have been protesting violence against women and have been calling justice for women.
http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/01/opinion/wolfe-end-rape-in-2013/index.html?hpt=ju_mid
Response: This post relates very much to Meena's post about the recent victim in New Delhi and what that incident has started. Violence against women has been a problem all over the world for decades and I think that it's an important issue that needs to be dealt with. In the article I read the author discusses why men feel the need to act violently towards women and why rape is the way they do it. Men feel the need to dominate and show their peers how masculine and manly they are. By penetrating women with objects men are able to show others the power they have over "their" women and they think that in order to own a woman's body you need to be in control of the reproduction system. How is someone suppose to control a man's need to be more powerful? It doesn't seem like that's something a person can really do. Men want to have more power than women and they do that by raping them, degrading them, limiting their rights, etc. but what I don't understand is why do they have to be more powerful? Not only have been acted out against women in violent ways but for centuries women have been considered second class citizens to men. In the United States women did not have the right to vote until 1920 and many women in countries today still do not have the right to even speak up for themselves. No women should have to go through the experience of getting rape and I think that the fact that this problem is being dealt with now is great but people should have realized it earlier. Violence towards women is a problem under the overall issue of women being inferior to men and how women have yet to accomplish equality to men. Do you think that there is a connection between women's rights and this specific violence towards women? How would you go about trying to fix this problem? Do you think that rape is something you can really stop? Why do men feel the need to have more power? What if men were in the current position of women, do you think it would be the same?
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This article and story is incredibly devestating, and equally disturbing. Before starting my response, I would just li8ke to point out that women are not the only victims of rape, and that males are also preyed upon and have terrible trauma from this act of violence. No matter the gender or sexual orientation of one, this hideous act is disgusting and much too prevalent in society all around the world. Rape is not only the physical abuse and forced sex upon someone, but the rapist steals much more from their victim. They rip away the victim's sense of safety, their dignity, their relationships for the rest of their life, as well as their overall approach to a very human concept- sex, which is intended to be a positive experience versus a brutally traumatic one. I am still in shock of this story, although I know it is not the first attack, and certainly will not be the last. The government cracking down on rape just now shows ignorance of the trauma one must face after this act. Support is necessary for the victims of rape, but I agree that more notice should be taken to the criminal who committed the rape. In many cases rape can be a very hard thing to prove because of prejudice, lack of evidence, and if no bodily evidence is given, the case becomes a matter of hear-say. A rapist is worse than a murderer because that person takes the life away from their victim, yet leaves them to suffer in their walking death. I believe that there should be a death penalty for all rape and sexual abuse against children cases, because if one thinks that they have the right to do whatever they want to someone else's body, they should no longer have the right to live.
ReplyDeletePlease see my comments under Meena's post. Again, very thoughtful and thank you for taking on such a tough tough issue in your response.
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