In a culture of sexual violence against women, it’s sometimes difficult to remember the change we want to see in the world, and in our leaders.
Todd Akin’s recent comments give us an important opportunity to consider what a true leader for our communities should be saying about sexual assault.
Leadership means sometimes saying things that challenge the social norm. And let’s be clear—in a country where one in three women experience sexual assault, accepting rape as a tragic yet inevitable part of life for women is the norm.
In an unhealthy society, it’s sometimes difficult to remember what health looks like.
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True leaders would denounce rape unequivocally and state clearly that the blame always lies with the rapist and never the victim. True leaders would acknowledge that there are few consequences for rapists today. They would acknowledge that when 1 in 3 women experience sexual assault, as a society we are doing something to create rapists. They would understand this requires committing to deep cultural changes and invest time and energy into making this happen in our schools and in our media.
True leaders would also acknowledge the power and bravery that women and girls do possess—not in their vaginas’ magical abilities to avoid unwanted conception, but in their abilities to learn to speak out about what’s happened to them, advocate for themselves
and others, and defend themselves in a culture that is otherwise not supporting them and keeping them safe.
Creating change with sexual assault requires a full systems approach. Preventing a sexual assault for one woman is not enough. Even sending one man to prison is not enough. If we truly want our sisters, our mothers, our daughters, our wives and our friends to be safe, we need to create change on a much larger level. Our nation’s dialogue about rape deserves more attention than a footnote in a conversation about contraception. It’s up to our leaders to initiate and support these changes.
In an unhealthy society, it’s sometimes difficult to remember what health looks like. Let’s take this opportunity to re-focus on what we want to see in our leaders and our society, not just what we don’t want.
Read more:
In Rape Culture, All Men Are Guilty Until Proven Innocent
While statistics vary, the stats that we use are that 1 in 3 women experience sexual assault, while 1 in 6 experience rape in their lifetime. You are right to distinguish sexual assault from rape. I do as well, and I tend to discuss sexual assault more than rape in order to address the issue more fully. However, I did use the words “rapist” in the same sentence, and I can see how that could appear to confuse things. It would have been more accurate to say “sexual assailants.” I wrote this article about women because it was in response… Read more »
OH BOY! OH BOY! OH BOY! Where Do You Start! Whilst I have absolutely no objection to questioning the words and language of leaders – and holding such people with media access and public opinion shifting power to account (with a cattle prod if necessary), I do have to wonder at the sudden change of statistics that have made an advent in this OPed! They would acknowledge that when 1 in 3 women experience sexual assault, as a society we are doing something to create rapists. There have been long hard and contentious debates and comments concerning the long standing… Read more »