Rape as a Purely Modern Issue - Essay Example

Teacher 7 January 2008 War, Rape and the Evolution of Assault Law Introduction Susan Brownmiller believes that rape is a condition unique to mankind; furthermore she asserts that it is used everyday as a way for men to prove their dominance over women and that rape is performed freely and without reproach in times of war. Initially, Brownmiller does not place blame on the male sex for trying to initiate sex with women due to simple biological urges, nor does she attempt to relate to rape as a purely modern issue. She does, however, feel that in contemporary context, society is capable of instilling men with the knowledge of what rape is and how it is fundamentally wrong. Brownmiller feels that rape perseveres as a way for men to perpetuate their historic societal dominance over women on the whole. Assault laws have evolved over recent decades with respect to different classes of rape; harsher sentencing for wartime rapists has also been achieved where once it was nearly impossible to convict a man. Wartime continues to be the most difficult scenario for the control and subsequent punishment of rape. Brownmiller and her colleagues agree that because of the relaxed morality of a battlefield or a war-torn country, men feel free to not only take advantage of their baser instincts to fight and kill, but also to rape. The Biology of Rape Brownmiller explains rape as a purely human issue; she notes how zoologists will not address rape since it is believed to be nonexistent in the animal kingdom. To Brownmiller and many other researchers, “human beings are different” (1975, 1) in that their males are capable of rape and their females are capable of succumbing to violent sexual acts. In nature, the sexual act of animals is governed by the female’s fertility cycle: in essence, animals will not have sex unless the female is fertile and the male senses this. With humans, however, the female fertility cycle does not govern sexual acts nor does it have any effect on the sex drive of males; this is the fundamental difference between people and animals on which Brownmiller bases her distinctions of rape. Instead of being based on the fertility cycle, people copulate based on their individual urges. As Brownmiller says, “our call to sex occurs in our head” (ibid.). With animals, the male of the species will not attempt to copulate with a female unless she is clearly fertile; therefore the fertility cycle governs not only sexual urge but the act itself. Since humans do not behave based on this fundamental principle, women are always able to be viewed in a sexual way, men are always able to become aroused and there does not need to be consent in order for sex to occur. It is due to this difference between mankind and nature that Brownmiller believes “the human male can rape” (ibid.). While it is clear that such a distinction can be made between humans and their animal counterparts, it remains to be determined whether or not rape as we define it can occur in nature. Regardless of the existence of fertility cycles and sexual ‘seasons’, rape is often quite loosely defined as a violent sexual act that occurs without mutual consent. It is not difficult to determine whether or not human females have consented to sex simply because on the whole we understand human behaviour, and moreover, the woman can communicate to us whether or not the sex was consensual. The existence of a blatant sexual cycle in the animal kingdom may clearly define when a male becomes aroused, when females are capable of becoming aroused and when sex occurs, but there is absolutely no way to determine whether or not the sex was consensual or if such a thing even exists outside of human existence. The biology of rape is therefore difficult to define, even in Brownmiller’s often black and white terms. Human female do posses a fertility cycle, and although it is not used as a definitive sexual season, the fact is that like animals, human women are able to become aroused simultaneously as men; this does not mean that consent is automatically reached, however. It is often for lack of strict definition that rapes have gone unpunished or simply overlooked; in a historical setting it seems that rape laws are dependent on the culture of the time. In terms of warfare, rape has always been a factor however only in recent history have lawmakers and independent citizens attempted to reform the justice system to protect women and punish offenders. Historical Rape Laws Rape is an act that has always been somewhat difficult to define, although in the most general sense it labels the act of non-consensual sex. Historically, rape was acknowledged and sometimes punishable by law, however the context of the rape itself and the culture of the society in which it occurred had a lot to do with the specific laws surrounding the act. With reference to times of war, rape has evolved into something more than the individual act against one or several women and turned into a different method of bringing down the enemy. Although crimes such as these have been much more critically addressed in recent years, rape and war have always been two incidents that go hand in hand. When the Vikings were still a powerful force in Europe, they would use the twin elements of warfare and rape to perpetuate their own existence on tiny northern islands. They used what was called bride capture to simultaneously rape and kidnap women from a foreign country; the warriors would bring the women home to be wives, mothers and slaves (MSN Encarta). According to Norse law, this was a perfectly acceptable practise, and without bride capture, warfare and pillage, the Vikings could not have sustained themselves and reproduced to preserve the culture. Rape was not only deemed appropriate behaviour by the Vikings; the founder of Rome is still credited as populating his new city with captured women from an outlying society. Although rape may not have been an initial issue when the women were captured, it became one when they were forced to marry Romans and bear children. In Babylonian times, the Code of Hammurabi existed as the major law document that governed the lives of all Babylonians. Of rape, this document states that rape is a punishable offence; not only would the man be punished, however, but if the woman was married she would be simultaneously punished for committing adultery. If the public discovered that such a rape had occurred, both the man and the woman were killed (MSN Encarta). Even the Old Testament of the Bible discusses rape and the various ways of dealing with it: if a man raped a woman the punishments could be severe. If, however, a man raped an unmarried women and was willing to pay a fine to the woman’s father and then marry her, all was forgiven. Basically, history sees rape as a way of dominating and owning a woman and her fertility. Many ancient civilisations were created and perpetuated on the ability of men to obtain women and put them to use bearing children; others held the firm belief that rape was a punishable crime and the man should be punished. In many circumstances, however, any raped woman was seen as ruined and useless unless a match could be made between her and her rapist. If a married woman was raped she was generally of no further use to her husband and could easily be killed off so that he might find a replacement. War and Rape It is the belief of many many women that rape is “…the expression of rage, violence and dominance over a woman” (Seifert, in Mass Rape, 55). The Geneva Code of 1949 addressed the matter of wartime rape, and outright prohibited the use of rape by soldiers during war or civil conflict (MSN Encarta). Despite this international agreement, it is understood that there are many countries still in recent history who have not only allowed their soldiers to rape women during times of conflict or war but whose military leaders actually employ rape as a method of enacting psychological warfare. This kind of mass rape on one culture, ethnic group or country is not altogether uncommon even in contemporary times, since it is the belief of many military personnel that if their soldiers overtake the entire female population, the enemy will lose morale and simply become to disheartened to win the battle or the war. In 1996, Burmese soldiers fighting against insurgency in the Karen state reportedly raped four women in an effort to instil fear in their enemies. These soldiers were eventually brought into court based on the allegations of the women, however general international opinion is that an uncountable number of similar rapes occurred during the Burmese fighting and every other military conflict to date (Jubilee Campaign, 1998). Similarly, during the Bosnian War (1992-1995), Bosnian women were captured by Serbian forces and repeatedly raped; many of these women were killed afterwards (Gutman et al, 1994, I-35). The Bosnian War was a conflict between Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Former Yugoslavia and Croatia. Political allegiances changed frequently as different factions of each country or ethnic group saw fit; ultimately it was the Serbian forces whose actions were called into question on the international stage. It was during this three year conflict that Serbian forces used rape as a war tactic, first kidnapping Bosnian women, raping them and killing random individuals. The women were held in a prison camp setting together and had little recourse for retaliation; unarmed and not active in the military, the Bosnian women were unable to protect themselves and the Serbs took full advantage of this fact so that they might intimidate their enemies. Research into these rapes coincided with Brownmiller’s opinion that rape is fundamentally used as a way to dominate a woman and not to gain sexual pleasure; although on an individual basis this might have been the case for several of the Serbian soldiers, the overall effect of the rapes was meant to be the realisation by Bosnian soldiers that they were weak, unable to protect their homes and families, and ultimately unable to win the war (Ibid.). The after effects of the Bosnian War was the commencement of full-scale investigations not only into the rapes that were committed by Serbian forces, but into the function behind the rapes themselves in terms of warfare (Seifert, 1999, 35-43). Prior to these incidents, which shocked the international community, rape was seen as something of a natural consequence of war, since individual and national morality itself changes as soldiers find themselves compelled to kill, trap and even torture other people. Given the necessary change in a soldier’s mentality during war, it seemed no giant leap to consider that these men, under pressure, uncertain of right and wrong, were capable of performing acts of sexual violence against any number of women (Ibid.). Further investigation into wartime rapes has instead pointed at the use of rape as a psychological tool; troops who engage in the rape of their enemy are suspected moreover of fear mongering and of attempting to break the will of the enemy troops. Brownmiller’s ideas of male dominance do carry over to such circumstances in that war itself can be viewed as a large-scale display of male-oriented dominance. Enemy sides are overwhelmingly comprised of male soldiers; it is the role of these soldiers to carry out the objectives of their home country, faction leadership or religious doctrine. In carrying out orders to this end, each side is attempting to dominate the other and to convince enemy soldiers that they are weak, incapable of winning, and finally, that they are wrong in their convictions. Rape, therefore, is simply a continuation of this determination to undermine the other side. To a large degree, particularly since women are not generally combatants in war, they can easily be viewed as the property of their own soldiers (Gutman et al, 1994, 54-62). As such, it is a personal slight against those soldiers if the women are dominated; it is secondary to the primary goal and often much easier than proving dominance over the enemy soldiers themselves. As in the cases of the Burmese soldiers and the Serbian soldiers as recently as the last decade, it is clear that rape is still used as a functional part of warfare. War’s Dirty Secret describes three different types of wartime rape: individual, mass rape and military sexual slavery (Barstow, 2001, 11-12). Individual rape is described as the desire to assert dominance over one person; this can be instigated either by a soldier or by a civilian during conflict. This is essentially the same circumstance as a non-wartime rape, the difference being that it was fuelled by the questionable morality of wartime itself. Mass rape occurs when an entire army is acting under the leadership of its military in dominating women from the enemy group; anywhere from dozens to hundreds or thousands of women may be raped during such military endeavours and usually they will be killed afterwards. Although mass rape is more of a historical warfare tactic than a modern employment, it has still been a major part of recent history. Military sexual slavery is the most complicated of all the types of wartime rape, and it requires more blatant acknowledgement from military leaders before it can be enacted. Military sexual slavery involves the kidnapping of many women from foreign territories and the use of them for sexual gratification of the soldiers. This is not the same as mass rape because it is not primarily meant to exert dominance over enemy troops; instead its function is to provide fighting men with women while they are away from home and unable to benefit from normal social structures. Japanese forces in World War II employed such tactics with women captured from Korea and Taiwan (Ibid.). Evolving Sexual Violence Laws As time goes on, rape itself has become a bigger and bigger issue in terms of law; this means that individual countries, States and communities are all tackling the one major problem in rape identification and punishment: the definition (Campbell, 2004, 329-350). Researchers, lawyers and victims of rape all agree that this is the primary reason for continued violence against women and the failure of the international community to eradicate rape from daily life. In terms of warfare, however, the lack of strict definition is less of a problem than the labelling of women themselves (Koo, 2002, 525-536). In both circumstances, experts agree that the issues that need confronting in the battle against sexual violence are the definitive label of ‘rape’, the current assessment framework and the international male-centric societal viewpoint that tends to put women in a disenfranchised, vulnerable position. It was made clear to the international community after the atrocities committed during the Bosnian War and other marked combat rapes in recent history that not only do wartime rapes need to be addressed but that they must be researched in a new way to discover the function behind such actions. The first major triumph over wartime rape comes from the Geneva Code, which although it has had no permanent, widespread effect on rape by soldiers, did call attention to such crimes where historically little heed was given to them. One of the major problems that arises from bringing rape cases into courts of law is the lack of definition; this neither means that definitions have been to general nor that they have been too specific, but that both have seen rape cases fail in court. In many places around the world, it is not possible to convict a married man of rape if the woman in question is his wife; while this may be easier to prove had the couple been separated for some time or going through a divorce, it is nevertheless a nearly impossible task when no evidence of marital conflict can be found (Ehrlich, 2001, 121-158). Similar problems occur when the woman and man are a couple. There is still further conjecture on exactly what constitutes rape in terms of the physical contact: is it purely the act of intercourse itself, or can rape include fondling, or penetration with fingers or other objects? Another issue when bringing rape cases into court is the behaviour of the woman before and during the alleged rape. If she isn’t deemed to have put up enough of a fight, the case may be lost (Ibid.). Because of the individualistic nature of rape, it is impossible to determine the myriad of ways in which it might have occurred, something that sees the legal system fail many women. One cannot predict how any woman will act when confronted with a rapist; nor can anyone assume what behaviour should be expected or what sexual acts will be forced upon her. If the legal system is to be properly updated so that all forms of rape are punishable, it must either become more flexible in itself or professionals must agree upon the basic principles that can define a rape. Brownmiller’s Ideas of Male Dominance Susan Brownmiller is one of the leading researchers and writers on the topic of rape; she has gained international fame for her dedication to the subject and for her unique ideas on male dominance. Despite her reputation as a scholar on the subject, Brownmiller is a clear feminist who has taken many rape cases as a personal affront. In her book Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape, she suggests that human’s evolved differently than other animals in that they are more self-conscious; she attributes the desire to abstain from sex to this particular evolutionary process and suggests that in self-defence it may have been a woman who “picked up the first stone and hurled it” (1975, 2). Brownmiller believes that it is the natural state of man to not only want sex but to dominate women as he sees fit; she cites biology and male mentality as reasons that men are designed to rape and women are bound to be mistreated. The author suggests that once men discovered a few thousands years ago that women didn’t always want to have sex, they learned to set traps and plan ahead to capture and rape women. In having to carry out such plans and acts of sexual violence, Brownmiller believes that sex became the ultimate goal for men who ultimately discovered that they were stronger and able to dominate not only women for sex but women and other men for a leading role in society. It was through this initial sexual response, she argues, that men first began to equate sex with violence, and both with being dominant. Because of this early sexual history, it follows that sex is still being directly linked to violence and war between men; this accounts for the fact that every major military clash has consequences of sexual violence. Men were led, through their very early experiences with sex and with rejection by women (however unsuccessful) to conceive of their own penis as a weapon. As handmade axes, clubs and even fists could be used to dominate another male for whatever reason arose, so could the penis be used to dominate a woman for purposes of sex. The close relationship between these two violent acts meant that men evolved to think of them along the same lines; to exert force over another man was to prove male dominance; to exert force over a woman was the same thing. Sex was no longer the lone goal in a rape; men not only wanted sex from women, they wanted the feeling of dominance. Through rape, men discovered the ability to feel strong, in control and essentially better than women. Brownmiller asserts that although early rapes probably confused men, as the centuries wore on sexual violence became a simple and effective way for men to get sex and to boost their egos. In contemporary times, Brownmiller feels that her ideas of rudimentary human males still have a significant impact on rape, and in particular, rape during wartime. She feels that the two are now and always will be inextricably linked simply due to the early experiences of man with women who wanted to keep their sexual integrity. Conclusion Susan Brownmiller can easily be accused of being overly feminist in her views of rape: she is clearly disgusted, unforgiving and somewhat fearful of men in general and this carries over into her research of rape during war. Despite these ultra-feminist tendencies, Brownmiller has drawn some compelling lines between the stereotypical male dominant attitude and the high rate of rapes during times of military conflict. Early sexual history between men and women does seem to equate well with the idea that times of violence bring on baser instincts of man to sexually dominate a woman; however there also exists a great deal of research that suggests women are used as pawns in psychological warfare. Historically speaking, rape has not always been viewed as a crime and in many societies it was seen as a necessary part of life. The trend to condemn rape, found in several ancient societies, however, has carried on into recent history and in 1949 the most important step towards fair judgement for rape victims during war was achieved when the Geneva Code forbade soldiers to rape for any reason. Before further legal justice can be done, however, a definitive framework for the identification of a rape must be agreed upon; currently there are too many variables for the legal system to cope with. Although in terms of the numbers of rapes during war it does seem that men have given themselves permission to rape at these times, the law is working to catch up and put a stop to this behaviour. References Barstow, AL (ed.) 2001, War’s Dirty Secret: Rape, Prostitution and Other Crimes Against Women, Pilgrim Press. Brownmiller, S 1975, Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape, Simon and Schuster. Campbell, C 2004, ‘The Trauma of Justice: Sexual Violence, Crimes Against Humanity and the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia’, Social and Legal Studies, vol.13, no.9, pp.329-250). Ehrlich, S 2001, Representing Rape: Language and Sexual Consent, Routledge, London. Gutman, R, Enloe, C, Stiglmayer, A, Fabet, M 1994, Mass Rape: The War Against Women in Bosnia-Herzegovina, University of Nebraska Press, Nebraska. Koo, KL 2002, ‘Confronting a Disciplinary Blindness: Women, War and Rape in the International Politics of Security’, Australian Journal of Political Science, vol. 27, no.3, pp.525-536. MSN Encarta, Rape (law), viewed 7 January, 2008, . Seifert, R 1994, ‘War and Rape: A Preliminary Analysis’, Mass Rape: The War Against Women in Bosnia-Herzegovina, pp.55. Seifert, R 1999, ‘The Second Front: The Logic of Sexual Violence in Wars’, Women’s Studies International Forum, vol.19, no.1-2, pp.35-43. Read More