I'm in the process of planning a novel that revolves around rape, sex, purity and God. I don't know what the protocol is with raising such sensitive subjects - if even reading this is affecting you, or if anyone who's been through this is reading and it's not helping you, just stop reading, it's okay. Here's a brief outline of the story: - My heroine is a Christian brought up in the protestant evangelical "purity/modesty" culture. - She is raped by a man she knows, and then her boyfriend blames her. Eventually the police gets involved and the rapist is caught, put on trial, and found to be not guilty. - Later my heroine marries a man who loves her dearly. My heroine goes ahead with having sex with her boyfriend, who later becomes her husband, but throughout this point I will insert flashback of the rape scene. How she regards sex here is of course very important. - Eventually she gets pregnant and then miscarries. She begins to refuse sex all over again. - Eventually she recovers and finds healing, and I will finish the book with her actually initiating sex with her husband, and trying to have a baby once more. As you can see, the experience of rape, and how she deals with it, and how the people around her deal with it, their reaction towards her - they're of paramount importance. In this novel, I want to reveal the horror involved, the sheer extent to which victims are never avenged and how society even blames the victims, and a critique on the purity culture of the church. I absolutely need to present this realistically, and I do not want to make light of anyone who's experienced such trauma. So if anyone has any information on the psychological trauma and/or legal proceedings of arresting and trying a suspect, or even experience of this subject, please reply either here or via PM. Please, if you are a victim of rape, indicate if you're happy for me to contact you with any further questions. I would especially appreciate victims of rape to reply, to be honest, but I absolutely understand that that might not be possible or appropriate.
wow - there's a storyline for a book.... I'd imagine a really good place to start would be your local women's refuge / rape crisis centre. Talk to a counselor, maybe she can ask around to see if anyone will talk to you one on one.
Wow, that would be a good idea. The only problem with that is I live in the Czech Republic and I don't actually speak Czech... However, in my church there's an anti-human-trafficking ministry and one of the participants is a friend. She goes into brothels, some of them include willing and legal girls. Other brothels are suspicious, with the girls likely to be trafficked. Maybe I'll ask her if there's any girls she knows who might... say something. Yeah, I have no idea what I'm getting myself into.
Rape is a taboo and there are huge misconceptions about it. The only people who know what aftermath is like are survivors or people close to them. And it's vasty different from what most people imagine it to be like. In fact, what most people imagine about rape is usually wrong, discriminatory or even demeaning. The main reason is that people try to find a way to convince themselves why something like that can't happen to them or the people they love. Society has the habit of blaming the victim, it is the number one issue rape survivors face, and prejudice towards them is often as hurtful as the rape itself. In fundamentalist islamic countries, this blame takes the most morbid form - a women who is raped can go to jail for "dishonouring her family" and the rape is usually resolved legally by courts ordering a victim to marry her rapist. I think rape is one of those topics that can't be imagined or researched and real survivors will be reading it so you probably want to speak to a few of them to make sure you understand their plight. ps. Prostitutes are so called "high risk victims" and actually a minority. Most rape victims are ordinary women, rarely men but it happens a lot more than people think. Most of the time (about 80% of the cases), rapist is known to the victim, out of that, something like 30% are family or friends, the rest are acquaintances. Only about 15% of the rapists are complete strangers.
think I mentioned that Jazzabel about speaking with actual victims. Not sure where you're going with society blaming the victim... Getting back to your story McKK, it really depends what you want your reader to feel... total disgust, do you want to creep them out? Was it a violent back street rape or a more subtle blackmail type of rape - and yes I know before anyone jumps on my back - rape is rape. Girl with the dragon tattoo springs to mind where the girl didn't get her allowance if she didn't "play the game". The description in the book was a lot more graphic and chilling than the movie. It just depends what road you want to take your reader up but it's something only a victim can explain to you. You won't find it on wiki....
@erebh: I was going in the direction of giving the OP authentic information about her question. I didn't even read your reply so I am sorry if I offended you, but nothing I said was actually in response to anything you said. Society blaming the victim is at the core of rape aftermath. For survivors, it is often more difficult to live with than the memories of rape, because rape happened and then it ended, but in the society, they are branded for life, required to keep their secrets and never publicly speak about them, and when they do, they get equal amount of hate and spite as they get understanding. Most of all, they are considered "damaged" in the same way that traumatised soldiers are marginalised and ostracised. Many a book, PhD thesis and article has been written about this and they are freely available, if you look for them. In practical terms rape survivors are almost always disbelieved, questioned about how they contributed to it, in courts they are ripped to shreds and their "reputation" and "clothing" and "how many times they said no" and "did you say No or Stop, because No might not be clear enough" etc. This is why less than 10% of rapes are reported, out of those, less than 3% reach court and out of those maybe 10-15% lead to a conviction, which is usually pathetic (months or at most a couple of years, if "he didn't hurt the victim badly enough" ie. didn't visibly disfigure her for life).
Yeah, I'm aware that the victim often gets blamed, and that majority of cases the victim actually knows or even trusted the rapist. It is precisely why in my novel, I'm gonna make the rapist someone my heroine knows. And it is also why her boyfriend will blame her for this, and also why the rapist will go free and found not guilty. I want the reader to be appalled by the way society treats women and rape victims, I want the reader to realise it is NEVER the victim's fault. It is much more about trying to portray this as accurately as possible, whilst detailing the victim's road to recovery within the framework of the church (because I believe the church teaches things that can bring healing, but unfortunately it also teaches things that bring damage, even if unintentionally - it boils down to, for me, where God is in the midst of this abuse) It's not so much about rape as it is about the victim and God. If anyone knows of any good court cases on rape that I can read online, that would be good too. Thanks Jazzabel - 'cause what you said with the questioning process in court is very useful as I hope to write such a scene, where my heroine is ripped to shreds and she realises that even the jury blames her. Indeed, I think only people who've been through such trauma can speak properly into this - I'm kinda hoping some might come forward, because I've seen it happen before in other forums. So, we shall have to wait and see and for now, I will do whatever research I can. Still reading more online stories on people who've been through abuse, and next stop I'm gonna check out forums for rape victims. It is indeed taboo - and it shouldn't be, it cannot be, and people need to realise how horrifying it is for the victim. Truth is I don't feel qualified to write this book because I've never been through anything like this, but I know I feel passionately about it. I'm gonna give it a shot. Maybe I'll write it and then shelf it for many years, until I am wiser and more mature, rewrite the thing and only then submit it, who knows. Oh and re prostitutes - they're a difficult case. I became very interested in modern slavery last year and it's fed into my passion for women and women's freedom/rights. Amongst the trafficked girls, rape is the only way to define their experience - except that someone is making cash out of it, and that for these girls there's no way out. They must wait in a locked room, be beaten daily and then be raped for up to 30 times a day and that is their life. Why I say prostitutes become a difficult case is because the average customer probably did not know the girl was trafficked at all - the customer thinks the girl's there of her own free will and because she's oppressed and frightened, she will even say so. To the average customer, these girls are simply "prostitutes" - they're not. They're slaves. But it is hard to identify them. It is systematic rape, it is the worst possible way of exploitation, and it is disgusting that people would do this, and that others know about it but do nothing about it. I read a story once - a non-fiction book called "Not For Sale" that details human-trafficking, with sex trafficking being one of the topics, and a policeman stood by and watched a woman get kidnapped. The policeman's excuse? "It's his property". I think this was in India. There's also been numerous stories of trafficked girls who escaped, runs to the police for help, and guess what? The policeman personally drives the girl BACK TO THEIR KIDNAPPERS. I have no words for this atrocity.
If you don't find someone to talk to one on one there are a ton of forums for rape / sexual abuse victims such as http://www.after-silence.org/forum/
What I find the most disgusting about rape is how hard it can be to get a conviction. Rape can be incredibly hard to prove, especially if the rapist is known to the victim and there were alcohol involved, as essentially there is word against word. On one hand, the rapist might claim the sex was consentual, while the victim would claim that she was raped. And there have been plenty of stories where the victim have lied about this, either because she cheated on a boyfriend, or for other reasons, which just makes it that much worse for all the real rape cases where the victim actually was raped. Additionally, there is as many ways to respond to being raped as there are rapes. A girl at my workplace was raped when she was a child. I do not know the full story, but when I talk to her on a daily basis, there is no way to tell that anything ever happened to her. She just behaves just everyone else does at her age, while other people might go into year long depressions. I suggest you do as already suggested here, and try to seek out anyone who might be willing to share their experiences, assuming you are serious about your story. Contact a help center for women, or at least read stories you can find online. Many people share their experiences through blogs or forums as a way to heal.
agree with TH - I think the biggest obstacle for rape victims are girls that claim rape when they never were. Whether they do it for spite, or money, blackmail, to cover up an affair whatever - i honestly think they are as bad if not worse than a rapist and they do all women such a terrible mis-service.
Thank you erebh for the link, I will certainly check it out Tim Harris - totally agree that it's disgusting how hard it is to convict rapists. I once watched a film, I think it's called Lincoln Lawyer - it's not on rape but it is on physical assault and the victim was a prostitute, as far as I remember. SPOILER ALAERT - because of the woman's status and that she flirted with the man, the man was found not guilty. But we know, and the lawyer knows, that the man was in fact, guilty. --SPOILER ENDS. I thought it was a good illustration of how women are generally discriminated against. Now while I agree that the women who simply cry rape do the true victims a great disservice, I'd like to steer away from the false rape charges. This is a thread about rape victims, and I am all too aware how even the most well-meaning people end up, once again, focusing on women and blaming women - the fault always seem to land on the women. I understand nobody is saying the true rape victims are at fault, but let us focus on true victims, and real perpetrators. Above all the blame lies in the rapists (majority men), it lies in these rapists' lust and selfishness and pride, it lies in the flawed justice system that is forever discriminating against women and not holding rapists accountable, it lies in society's perception of women - and that bottom line is that, as much equality as we have managed attain, we have a long way to go yet because 9 times out of 10, we STILL see a society that blames women for the tragedy that happened. It lies in this deep-seeded idea that women are untrustworthy, that women are objects, that it is the women's responsibility not to "entice" men and men are not held responsible at all. I think Steig Larsson was onto something when he named his novel "Men, who Hate Women", which was the original Swedish title for the book Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. So, let's focus on the real problem, and the real people to blame - and as much damage as crying rape does indeed do to the real cases of rape, I would like the blame to lie on where it really should be: on the underlying mistrust and disrespect and hatred against women that is obvious in society as a whole. This attitude in turn leads us to always be questioning the woman first, rather than the man - and that needs to stop. Rape charges are often dropped or rapists found not guilty NOT because of people crying rape, but because there's something wrong with our justice system and something wrong with the way we, as a society, perceive women and women's bodies.
I'm sure you have lots of stats to say that society blames the women - I've never come across this - ever! I've never seen a case on the news and people say "Ah she asked for it, it's her fault going to the pub dressed like that" Yes, the justice system has a lot to answer but really, unless it's down a dark alley, it is very hard to prove or disprove. "I didn't say yes" "Well you didn't say no" is no longer an excuse but more often than not it comes down to his word against hers. Or who has the better lawyer, for it's the defendent's lawyer's job to shred the witness/victim - he has to make a liar out of her, drag up her sexual past, her misdemeanours or discretions. It is not up to the prosecuters however to discredit the accused - hence innocent till proven guilty. Yes it's hard on the woman and it's unfortunate these rapists aren't put on an island of bears somewhere. Just watching the news last night and a fraudster who conned a bank out of 2 million got 14 years prison while a convicted 3rd time rapist got 8 years... WTF? In Ireland for example marital Rape is a very grey area still in 2012 and only goes one way, for instance there is no crime if she rapes him. I'm not sure any man has been convicted of raping his wife in Ireland and there has only been 2 cases in the UK according to http://www.academia.edu/1718081/For_Better_For_Worse_Marital_Rape_Law_in_Ireland which is a trusted site. America is not far behind on marital rape either. I can't understand a lot of stats either especially when they say that only x% of rapes get reported. In order to know that, they'd have to know how many rapes occurred and how many were reported and then quickly calculate a percentage. If they knew of every case of rape, then they must have all been reported so stats are very dodgey at best. Good luck with your book, you're a brave man taking on such a challenge. Do you ever think it will be published mainstream as a novel or do you think it will be a resource for such victims?
erebh - I could try and find you the link where I read dozens of comments, from both men and women, excusing the rapist with a multitude of excuses, including "The man's not made of stone, he has his urges!" But you're right, you will not usually find this level of frankly in face-to-face communication or broadcasted on TV - society is ugly, but we are not stupid. That is why the blame on the victim is never so direct as to say "It's your fault." They blame you indirectly by asking, "Are you sure you weren't leading him on? Are you sure he didn't get the wrong message? What were you wearing to make him do that?" I would like to see it as a mainstream novel, if possible - it is focused on my religion, Christianity, and the identity of my God, Jesus Christ, in the midst of this atrocity, but the notion of blaming the victim and the trauma a victim goes through is universal. But in the end, I don't really mind - I just want to raise awareness. If it helps heal anyone, or helps someone understand rape better and stop blaming the victims, then I am glad and blessed.
@Mckk: well said, and I too would like too see it as in the mainstream, it would be an interesting subject to the publisher but writing it would be a challenge. @erbh: There are many other places rape victims go for help and support, apart from the police. Police have for a long time refused to even file rape reports, and when they do file it, there's a 2 year backlog on rape kits. Many victims never get their evidence, the system is biased against prosecuting rapists which is why it is such a prevalent crime. Just look at paedophiles, and how infrequently they get adequately punished or caught in a timely manner. Many rapists threaten to murder family members, to rape again, they can also wash the victim inside and out, clip her hair, nails, shave her, rapists commonly drug their victims so that by the time they realise what happened, the evidence is no longer available. There are so many situations in which the victim can not get the physical evidence and despite the fact that it is easy to authenticate a rape victim's testimony, it almost never leads to a conviction. Which hopefully answers your questions about those stats. ps. Blaming a victim is as much a part of Western as any other culture. We only do it insidiously and through institutions or anonymously, whereas in more primitive societies, the extreme abuse just continues. You disbelieving this scientific, well-known fact is just one way of denying and diminishing.
I have no doubt you have dozens of examples of people blaming the victim. But that's it - dozens and there are nearly a billion people on the planet. In previous posts society as a whole was blamed. I question the society part. Of course I am thinking Western society and more to the point 1st world western society. I am sure places like Afghanistan and the parts of Africa will always blame the victim, or should I say the woman. I watched a programme last week about acid attacks on women in Pakistan. Many of them had been raped and this was a way of shutting them up. One girl on the news recently got 12 years in prison for having carnal knowledge of her rapist. She didn't report the rape until she found out she was pregnat and being unmarried, it was a huge taboo / crime. The rapist was sent home after the trial. After 6 years in prison the woman was freed on condition she married the rapist and they brought the child up together as a family, hence the sex outside of marriage charge was annulled. Good luck with your book.
I've just been dealing with a similar issue in my own novel (incest) and came across this really informative website. It deals with post-traumatic stress, which of course every rape victim will experience, and there are many in-depth interviews, etc, linked to the site. You might want to have a look at it: http://www.helpguide.org/mental/post_traumatic_stress_disorder_symptoms_treatment.htm
Forget about Pakistan and Afghanistan, blaming the victim is the RULE in all Western societies too. It's just more indirect. Shockingly, it's just as bad in otherwise more enlightened Scandinavian countries as well. You simply aren't aware of it because it is a taboo that nobody talks about outside of counseling sessions and thematic pieces. The blame culture is so strong that it is viewed as "not blaming" and every time someone points out that it is the blaming culture, many voices just like yours get raised to oppose and dispute. I'll give you an example, I could be a rape survivor. Or my sister. Or I could have had many patients who are rape survivors. Or I might be a professional in one of the fields and know, beyond any doubt, the actual realities of rape aftermath. And you still wouldn't believe me. This is how strong the blame cuture is - you are convinced that your position is true, even if that means disrespecting an opinion other than those that claim there is no blame. The only loser in all this is the rape survivor, who goes through life silent and suffering, and as soon as they start to speak, there's blame and dismissal. Perhaps you should open your mind to this reality, unpleasent as it may be. Because while you have every right to refuse to know more about it, you shouldn't argue that there is no problem, because you obviously don't know.
Bravo, Jazzabel - you said it better than I ever could. Exactly why I want to write this book! (now if only I could get my tone of voice for the novel right...) @Jannert - thanks for the link!
I think if the plots are developped with the right voice it could be a book that can bring about healing.
I think that this novel idea would go far. People don't realize the seriousness of rape and how it effects people. Rape is something that someone can live with the rest of their life, whether it be a baby or the scarring memory. This is a very smart, sophisticated idea that I think you've thought out.
Re society blaming the victim: When someone is robbed, you don't hear people asking, "Are you SURE that he knew that you didn't want to give him your wallet? What were you doing in that neighborhood anyway, and wearing an expensive suit? Isn't that essentially consenting to handing over your watch and valuables? Wait, you didn't lock your front door? Well, then, you really can't call it a burglary, right? You essentially consented for them to take your TV." But questions similar to these are asked in cases of rape. Now, one could argue that that's different, that people do have sex with each other, after all. Yes, but people do give each other gifts, too, and they even give away their used possessions. But somehow we manage to maintain a clear bright line between gifts and criminal theft, while that line between normal interaction and crime is obscured for rape. That obscuration is, IMO, one of the ways that our society blames the victim.
Unfortunately, you do hear people saying these things after a robbery. Read the fine print on your home insurance policy, if you don't believe me. And people who leave sat navs and other valuables locked inside their cars? Yup. Shouldn't a done that. It's an 'invitation' to break-ins. There is a tendency to blame the victim in these circumstances, because outsiders see what happened as a lack of common sense on the victim's part. While common sense can make these crimes slightly less likely to happen, it NEVER excuses the criminal. NEVER EVER. That's like saying: If I pass a house and the front door is open, it's okay for me to walk in and take something. Most of us wouldn't dream of doing this, would we? Same with rape. Saying: 'Wow, she's so drunk she'll never remember this in the morning' does NOT excuse rape. Most of us, when coming upon a drunk and incapable person would never think this way. However, rapists do. And if the 'opportunity' isn't there, they will often go out and create one. It's such a mistake to focus on a victim's lack of 'common sense.' This just encourages criminal behaviour and makes it easier for the criminal to justify it.
There's no uniform way to deal with it. Some shrug it off and decide to forget about it, especially if they blame themselves (e.g. "I was drunk"). I recently read a rape account by one Finnish woman: she had been confused whether the rape had even happened because she had made out with the guy, then they had gone to sleep, but a little later the guy had come to her bed and had his way with her drowsy body, then fallen asleep next to her. She didn't get terribly traumatized, but apparently still felt defiled. The man was not convicted or anything, because of the lack of proof. The woman hadn't realized that she had actually been used until later. If it's more violent and includes battery, the victim probably feels different than the woman I described above, and would have a harder time e.g. establishing healthy relationships later in life. So when you think how to portray the trauma, you'd also want to take into account the level of violence -- and how "used to" violence the victim is (yes, this matters. Those who've led a safe, sheltered life can get fazed and frozen more easily by a sudden burst of violence). Getting betrayed by someone you knew and trusted is another burden that someone raped by a stranger won't carry. Also, a woman with more sexual experience can feel differently about the after effects than a pious woman who was planning to wait until marriage. I would imagine she feels ashamed. Worthless. Like a commodity. Flashes of the event appear before her eyes even years after the fact, and they make her cringe, even squeeze shut her eyes, and she has to seek distractions to keep her head together. She'd take anti-deps and sleeping pills and get addicted. If she forgets the pill, she could get panic attacks at the most inopportune moments. Then there's fear, fear of betrayal and violence by someone she's supposed to love, be it husband, boyfriend, etc. Conflicting emotions about wanting a baby, because the baby will be born of a physical union that's defiled in her mind. She could get really bad post-natal depression. By the way, check this short blog post about the current market in women's fiction. This is slightly OT, but what is this claim based on? Not that I outright dispute it because there are idiots everywhere, but I'd like to see some examples for research purposes.
Rape is a very sensitive topic, especially for those who have actually experienced it. I know of two people who have actually gone through it, though never went through the legal proceedings to get a conviction. Note: what I'm about to say is coming from my opinion only and from what I've researched online. I am in no way saying all victims feel this way, nor am I trying to put a label on their situation. This is just from my experience and further study on the subject. The second is probably the most common. A friend of mine had a boyfriend. Within the first week of their relationship, they had sex. No big deal. But the second time they went to have sex, he wanted to try a different position. The position hurt her, so she tried to stop him. But enjoying himself, he didn't want to stop or change positions. So he grabbed her wrists and pinned her down. No matter how many times she told him to stop or how loudly she cried, he didn't stop. She never reported it. She told very few people. Because, in her boyfriends mind, she agreed to have sex, so it wasn't rape, even though she tried to stop it after. And in her mind, she felt responsible because she didn't try harder. She didn't feel like a victim. She felt like the cause. And after that, it was very hard for her to get close to anyone. Sex became repulsive, intimacy was nauseating, and relationships seemed impossible. And she often had nightmares about it. Not the rape itself, but about being close with anyone at all. If she kissed someone in her dreams, she would wake up feeling so violated, it ruined her whole day. Just this feeling of... wrong and gross just hung over her like a second skin that she couldn't shed. That feeling of violation is something that never goes away, it still pops up after a dream or memory, no matter how much time has passed. The second case seems less likely. Again, a friend was raped by her boyfriend of several years. She was more reluctant to give the details. But I know it was very traumatizing for her. But instead of pulling back like in the first case, she reached out. She began searching for someone, anyone, to fill that hole that the rape had left in her. She needed to feel loved again, secure, so she started dating left and right, sleeping Keith complete strangers, just to get rid of that negativity that the rape had brought to her. And eventually, she somehow forgave the man who raped her. He didn't mean to, she thought. I just misunderstood. If I wouldn't have been so stupid about it, it would have never happened. But she was wrong. Because they got back together. They were together for a few months before he lashed out again. He beat her. Luckily though, someone intervened before it became too serious. She pressed charges, filed a restraining order. And she had been making a phone call when he started beating her, so the entire encounter was recorded on her friends voicemail. Yet she was still blamed by some people, claiming that she hit him first, she egged him on. I don't think he was ever found guilty. And she still has people who claim it was her fault. But she's finally over him, I hope. She's in a new, healthy relationship and is starting her life over. So as you can see, two very different endings. One struggled to find intimacy while the other craved it. So you can really go either way. Just know that, often times, the victim doesn't WANT to report it. So try to reflect that in your writing. They do it to prevent others from getting hurt, but more often than not, they don't "care" about what they went through. "Care" meaning they don't feel it's important because they feel it was their fault that the rape happened in the first place. Good luck.
