INST 205- Review Sheet - Section Nine: Violence Against Women
Learning Objectives
· To be aware of the prevalence of violence against women and of how social constructions of gender contribute to these crimes.
· To understand how social institutions, including politics, the military, and fraternities contribute to a culture of violence against women.
· To recognize the effects this violence has on women’s lives, including how this violence institutionalizes the control of women and of sexual/gender minorities.
· To be conscious of the ways in which hierarchies built on race and ethnicity, class, and sexuality intersect with gender inequality to produce and maintain violence against women.
· To understand how male privilege and mainstream male socialization contribute to violence against women.
Section Summary
Violence against women is pervasive in all cultures. Violence and the fear of violence are used to control women’s actions and bodies.
· Violence against women is produced at the intersections of race, class, and gender.
· Social institutions as well as individual men create and continue violence against women.
· Violence against women is a hate crime that is encouraged by sexist ideology.
· Violence also occurs against others less powerful including children and those who cross gender boundaries.
Reading 38: Robert A. Hummer and Patricia Yancey Martin, “Fraternities and Rape on Campus”
Rapes occur frequently in fraternities because the recruitment processes, structural characteristics, and treatment of women in fraternities produce a culture that accepts and promotes the sexual coercion of women.
· Most fraternities are deeply concerned with definitions of masculinity that are grounded in aggression, competition, and heterosexuality. Fraternities try to recruit men who exhibit these stereotypically male characteristics.
· Practices and structures in the fraternity such as the mistreatment of pledges, the focus on brotherhood, a concern about group loyalty, the use of alcohol, and the prevalence of violence and competition contribute to a rape culture.
· Women are treated as commodities by fraternities; they are used as bait (to attract recruits), as servers (filling men’s needs), and as sexual prey (conquest), and this can be found in the structural characteristics of fraternities (e.g., Little Sisters).
· These characteristics not only contribute to the prevalence of rape, but they also make it highly unlikely that fraternity men can be adequately prosecuted for their crimes.
· It is the fraternity as a group structure that contributes to the prevalence of rape in fraternities. Fraternities must change dramatically before this can be stopped.
Boxed Insert: Robert L. Allen and Paul Kivel, “Men Changing Men”
Allen and Kivel describe their activism to stop male violence against women. The Oakland Men’s Project explores how domestic abuse has its roots in the socialization of men.
· Boys and men are pushed to prove their masculinity by being violent or by demonstrating their power over women (or children).
· Heterosexual assumptions about how women should take care of men’s needs and men’s fear of homophobic taunting also contribute to domestic violence.
· The Oakland Men’s Project uses role playing, lists, and “stand up” exercises to explore the prevalence of attitudes and behaviors associated with domestic abuse and how these are related to the gender training men receive.
· There are many men who wish to change this situation. Men must understand how power and inequality are structured in order to stop male violence.
Reading 39: Gloria Steinem, “Supremacy Crimes”
Most mass and serial murderers are white males who believe they are heterosexual (though a few may practice homosexuality). These crimes are supremacy crimes; these men commit murder because they have internalized dominance and expect it.
· The media often fail to acknowledge the sex of the perpetrators of crimes like the mass shootings at Columbine High School or sadistic murders. Sometimes the media even refer to the perpetrators of these crimes as “our children” or in other familiar terms that would not be used if the race, class, or gender of the perpetrator(s) were different.
· The failure to recognize the social position of these perpetrators as white “heterosexual” men leads to ignorance of how these are crimes of dominance.
· The assumptions and the privilege of masculinity and whiteness must be challenged in order to stop these crimes.
Reading 40: Kimberlé Crenshaw, “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color”
Race, class, and gender operate together to place many women in danger of violence and to prevent them from receiving help. The political strategies of the antiracist and feminist movements have often silenced debate about the needs of women of color.
· Immigrant women are often forced to remain in abusive relationships to avoid being deported. Additionally, many of these women confront cultural and linguistic barriers to services for abused women.
· Although many women of color experience domestic violence, anti-racist movements have silenced women’s concerns in order to counter stereotypes of minorities and to maintain family honor. It is likely that racism contributes to domestic violence.
· The feminist movement has broadened the public’s understanding of who is abused to include women of all racial and economic backgrounds, but it has done so in a way that often ignores the specific needs of women of color and addresses only the needs of white women.
· When violence against women was viewed as a minority problem, it was ignored, but it receives attention now that it is seen as a gender issue that relates to white America.
· Domestic-violence support services have often disregarded the needs of women of color and are often inaccessible to non-English speakers.
Reading 41: Joane Nagel, “Sex and War: Fighting Men, Comfort Women, and the Military-Sexual Complex”
Nagel describes the ways in which ethnicity and sexuality shaped violence against women globally in the 20th century military-industrial complex. Militaries often use sexuality as a weapon against ethnically different populations and military communities often include women, and some men, of other ethnicities who provide sexual services to soldiers.
· Sex is often linked to the masculinity of soldiers. Around the world, and throughout history, military bases have encouraged prostitution. This can especially be seen in U.S. bases in Asia where entire sex industries have sprung up. These industries serve a variety of interests, including fostering cultural ideas of masculinity and militarism.
· Ethnosexual prejudices feed the abuse of women and the prostitution industry. Those who are assaulted and who provide prostitution are almost always ethnically different from the soldiers. In fact the women who are sexually abused or who provide sexual services have often been ranked in their desirability according to their ethnicity.
· Stereotypes of Asian women as exotic and submissive hide the brutal realities of these women’s lives. Many of these women have been forced into sex work through poverty and forced servitude.
· Sexual exploitation has been a common tactic in war during the 20th century. Rapes typically occur across ethnosexual boundaries and rape is used by both sides. The rape or sexual enslavement of women is used: to terrorize and humiliate the enemy, to reward the troops, and to aid in the creation of solidarity and mutual guilt among soldiers.
· The wars in post-Soviet era Eastern Europe, such as those during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia, brought new awareness to the hidden reality of rape in war.
o Ethnic cleansing in this region included the mass raping and sexual enslavement of mostly Muslim women by Serbians. Shame over these incidents aided the Serbian war effort and increased the victimization of these women.
o The UN and international women’s groups raised new questions about whether rape and sexual slavery are “crimes against humanity.”
· Men are also assaulted, and sometimes castrated, in war time, though this is less frequent than sexual assaults against women. War has other consequences for men such as being trapped in masculine roles in which they are forced to act out patriarchal scripts and ethnosexual violence. These scripts can have lasting effects through post-traumatic stress disorder. Displaying these symptoms can in turn often compromise a man’s masculinity.
· During peacetime, militaries and peacekeepers operate large-scale bases overseas; this presence has institutionalized female and male prostitution on an unparalleled scale. It is the scale of military operations, not of combat, that determines the amount and intensity of sexual action. These sexual encounters are often the only real interactions foreign soldiers have with the local population, and this magnifies stereotypes and prejudices each group has of the other.
· The U.S. military contributed to the international sex tourism industry. For example, Thailand’s sex industry profited greatly from military R&R, and with the help of the World Bank they capitalized on this ethnosexual commerce and expanded it for civilians.
Discussion Questions
Reading 38: Robert A. Hummer and Patricia Yancey Martin, “Fraternities and Rape on Campus”
1. How does the way fraternities focus on masculinity and heterosexuality contribute to a rape culture?
2. How do fraternity values such as loyalty and secrecy contribute to the prevalence of rape in fraternities? How do these values make it difficult to bring fraternity men to justice?
3. What aspects of fraternity recruitment are likely to contribute to a rape culture? What structural characteristics of fraternities contribute to this?
4. How are women treated by fraternities? [Discuss the idea of women as bait, servers, and prey.]
5. How is alcohol used by fraternity men?
Boxed Insert: Robert L. Allen and Paul Kivel, “Men Changing Men”
6. How do gender socialization and heterosexism contribute to domestic abuse?
7. What must be done to stop domestic violence?
Reading 39: Gloria Steinem, “Supremacy Crimes”
8. Discuss the characteristics of most mass murderers or serial killers. Why are these people most likely to be white and male?
9. How do norms and expectations of dominance contribute to these killings? How can this be stopped?
Reading 40: Kimberlé Crenshaw, “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color”
10. In what ways are most women of color who are abused excluded from services for abused women? Can you think of examples of how women of color are excluded from other women’s services?
11. Discuss the way in which many feminists discuss domestic violence as “not just a minority problem” and explain why Crenshaw sees this as problematic.
12. What changes are needed in order to address the issue of violence against women of color?
Reading 41: Joane Nagel, “Sex and War: Fighting Men, Comfort Women, and the Military-Sexual Complex”
13. How has sexuality been used as a tactic in many wars and conflicts? What are some of the examples of ethnosexual violence Nagel describes? Can you think of other examples of ethnosexual violence in war?
14. Why does Nagel use the term “ethnosexual” to describe the sexual assault and prostitution of war and militaries? How does ethnicity play an important role in who is assaulted and who provides prostitution?
15. What was the conflict that brought international attention to sexual violence as “crimes against humanity,” or what is often called “rape as a war crime”? Should acts of sexual violence be considered war crimes like mass killings? Why or why not?
Reasons for the Statistics: Use this exercise to demonstrate the extent of violence against women in the United States and to explore how these crimes have consequences for women’s lives. Distribute statistics on violence against women. Such information can be found in the various reports by the U.S. Department of Justice (http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/vawo/statistics.htm). Lead a discussion about why women are more likely than men to be victims of sexual crimes and acts of violence by their partners. Also discuss how these crimes affect women’s behavior as either victims or potential victims.
Discrepancies in Statistics on Violence against Women: Statistics on violence against women can be difficult to interpret. This exercise can be used to demonstrate why statistics on these crimes can vary. Have students break into groups. Ask each group to gather statistics from a different source on the number of rapes or cases of domestic abuse on campus. Sources might include official university statistics, police statistics, statistics from the women’s center or from the women’s studies department, a local rape-crisis center, or a rape-prevention group. The student groups should report their findings and then engage in a discussion about why there are discrepancies in these statistics (e.g., differences in definitions, different reasons for concealing or revealing these crimes, etc.).
Hate Crimes: Ask students to research the local legislation and police procedures relating to hate crimes. Do gendered crimes fall into the category of hate crimes? What about crimes against lesbians? What if a crime happens to a person because of his or her racial and gender status? Would it be a hate crime?
Web Links
Amnesty International: Stop Violence Against Women
Amnesty International is an international organization that monitors human rights abuses and fights against human rights abuses. In recent years violence against women has been understood as a human rights violation. Amnesty International provides information on the abuse of woman around the globe and the role of wars and militaries in this violence.
http://www.amnestyusa.org/stopviolence/index.do
Communities Against Violence Network
Another important resource on interpersonal violence, including violence against men, is the website of Communities Against Violence Network (CAVNET). Supported by a grant from the Ms. Foundation, CAVNET “has developed an international network of professionals addressing domestic violence, sexual assault, rape, incest, stalking, juvenile justice, human rights, same sex violence, and crime victims with disabilities…”
http://www.cavnet2.org/
Dowry Deaths in India
Violence against women is a cross-cultural phenomenon related to male control of women’s sexuality, the relationships between women and property, and economic inequalities between men and women. Visit this site to read about bride-burning and dowry death—violent examples of these interconnections.
http://www.indiatogether.org/wehost/nodowri/stats.htm
Female Infanticide