If you kept up with the news last week, you may have heard the infamous "why couldn't you just keep your knees together?" comment made to a rape victim by Judge Robin Camp in court.
CNN released a video in which discusses Judge Robin Camp's disrespectful comments made in court two years ago. If you missed it, a reporter reads verbatim some of his comments, which include: inquiring to the rape victim why she couldn't skew her pelvis to avoid penetration, advice to the perpetrator on staying careful around women to protect himself, and facts to the rest of us on the human desire of sex, along with justification for any physical pain it may entail.
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Judge Robin Camp is a Judge in Canada, where the case took place. He is from South Africa, and his personal defense on these comments involves his apparent lack of Canadian criminal law knowledge. While it can be agreed that there's no excuse for making dehumanizing statements, especially to a victim of crime, there is some meat for the rest of the world to chew on when considering the cultural implications of rape.
There is a great hesitation for anyone to speak on rape, specifically in any way that doesn't involve extreme empathy for victims and disgust for perpetrators. It is difficult to put the emotional tags behind rape aside to examine it for what it is. As a psychology major, I was forced to do this for a class. Speaking from an evolutionary standpoint, rape has the positive of causing pregnancies, which lead to the forward-movement of a species. Rape is seen across the animal kingdom - in ducks, geese, dolphins, orangutans, and, unfortunately, human beings.
I'm going to speak for every human being when I say that rape is disgusting. It is a complete misuse of power, and, arguably, the worst thing you can do to another person. While I come from a background with extreme emotional tags attached to this R-word, to others, it may just be yet another terrible act - such as war, or famine.
South Africa, where Judge Robin Camp is from, is said to have the highest rate of rape and the highest prevalence of HIV/Aids in the world. It is likely that the act itself has become desensitized due to its prevalence and discussion of prevalence. Rape is a global issue that goes under-reported consistently, for various reasons. While many rape cases go unreported in the United States due to public shaming, many rape cases in South Africa go unreported because women feel as if nothing can or will be done. Not only are rape victims powerless in the moment, but now they feel powerless after the moment.
Desensitization of terrible things allows the human mind to justify evil. For example, violence in video games along with statistics on war and mass killings have desensitized us to violence and murder. Words like famine or genocide have lost their emotional tags because of their prevalence, and because of our discussion of such prevalence. Rape happens all the time, but we don't talk about it as much. Why is that?
While law has its definition of rape, it is fluid, and most of us can't verbalize exactly what it is. This differs from war, poverty, murder - we know what those things are defined by, and therefore we can use them in language. Not only does our lack of discussion allow for the r-word's emotional tag to stick, but our varying interpretations of what the word actually means do, as well. While it's uncomfortable, it needs to be discussed more.
Whenever I hear speeches made by public figures on rape, it is typically a drawn out version of "it's wrong." Rape is wrong, and I do appreciate the clarification, because some people out there might actually think it's not. But moreover, what is rape? Who are the victims? Who are the perpetrators? Why is it happening? What can we do?
One could argue that the second this r-word loses its emotional tag is the second that rape becomes just another violent crime with victims that become mere statistics. But, if losing that emotional tag and desensitizing it is what it takes in order for rape to be defined in not only a court of law but in everyday life, then maybe we all need to start talking about the r-word.
