Monday, February 23, 2009

What situation could lead to rape or sexual violence on a college campus?

What I think:

The first one should be blatantly obvious. Every stereotypical response will immediately point to excessive drinking or drugs, especially if certain sororities or fraternities are involved. While there is definitely true that some of those situations could lead to rape or sexual violence, there are other situations that can lead to that as well.

Any imbalance of power can lead to rape or sexual violence. A peer mentor, an R.A., an upperclassman, or even a professor or faculty member. Any time there is an imbalance of power, something could happen, though thankfully most of the time, this isn't the case.

Peer pressure can also lead to rape or sexual violence. People can be pushed to do things that they otherwise wouldn't. This also goes back to the pressures put on by Greek life.

So to sum it up, my list of possible situations is:
Drinking
Drug use
Fraternities/Sororities
Imbalance of Power
Peer Pressure

What the sources say:

College campus rape

Some studies indicate a particular problem with rape on college campuses. According to a 1992 study, one out of twelve college aged men and women committed rape.

The Department of Justice study also found that in "about half of the incidents categorized as completed rapes, the women or men did not consider the incident to be a rape." According to the Journal of Counseling and Development, women aged 16–24 are at the highest risk of sexual assault. One study has concluded that as many as one in four college aged females and one in ten college aged males has been a victim of either rape or attempted rape.


College Campuses and Rape

"1 in 4 women in college today has been the victim of rape, and nearly 90% of them
knew their rapist."

I Never Called It Rape, Robin Warshaw

  • 60% of male college students “indicated some likelihood of raping or using force in certain circumstances.”
  • Men in fraternities appear to engage in more non-physical coercion and use of drugs and alcohol as a sexual strategy than do independents.
  • Every 21 hours there is another rape on an American college campus.
  • 90% of all campus rapes occur under the influence of alcohol.
  • Men are more likely than women to assume that a woman who drinks alcohol on a date is a willing sex partner. 40% of men who think this way also believe it is acceptable to force sex on an intoxicated woman.
  • Alcohol use at the time of the attack was found to be one of the four strongest predictors of a college woman being raped.
  • 43% of college men admit using coercive behavior to have sex, including ignoring a woman’s protest; using physical aggression; and forcing intercourse; 15% acknowledged they had committed acquaintance rape; 11% acknowledged using physical restraint to force a woman to have sex.
  • College rape victims receive external physical injuries in over 47% of all rapes.
  • Of the college woman who are raped, only 25% describe it as rape.
  • Of the college women who are raped, only 10% report the rape.
  • College women are most vulnerable to rape during the first few weeks of the freshman and sophomore years.
  • One in twelve college-age men admit having fulfilled the prevailing definition of rape or attempted rape, yet virtually none of these men identify themselves as rapists.
  • 34% of completed rapes and 45% of attempted rapes take place on campus. Almost 60% of the completed campus rapes that take place on campus occur in the victim's residence, 31% occur in another residence, and 10% occur in a fraternity.
  • 3/4 of off-campus rapes and 7/8 of on-campus rapes involved perpetrators who were known to the victims.
  • 78% of the men identified (as rapists) were an acquaintance, friend or boyfriend of the victims.
  • Most rapes occur on the weekend.
Other resources:
Acquaintance Rape on College and University Campuses
The Sexual Victimization of College Women
Sexual Assault on Campus: What Colleges and Universities are Doing about it

1 comment:

  1. A good aspect to highlight is the fact that most often college women do not think of the situation they may have been involved in as rape. So maybe there needs to be more of a discussion on college campuses of what rape is and how to prevent it and how to talk about it. Because there have been plenty of drunk sexual encounters that no one probably thought could be considered rape or sexual assault, but they probably were.

    -Sarah Hund-Brown
    Community Educator
    Rape Crisis Intervention Service of Carroll County

    ReplyDelete