4/2/15

Today, we talked about the problem, response and calls to action in regards to rape and sexual abuse. One article that we happened to talk about was a NY time article. I named the four types of rapists. There are aggressive, hyper-masculine, stranger rape, and acquaintance (date) rape. There were many things in which this article explained, however it was very interesting to hear about how a victim can create an opportunity to escape. The article said that talking to the actual perpetrator can help. It can help talk them out of what they are planning to do in several different ways. For one, if you start talking to them than they will start to see you as a person rather than just an object. By "putting a human face" on the situation at hand, you are then much more real to the perpetrator.

We also discussed how our cultural norms can help us escape a situation before it even gets tot he point of being dangerous. We were taught these cultural norms as children. We talked about the "stranger dangers", in which our parents told us about at a young age. As kids, we had prepared small triggers in our brains that make us think, "oh no is this the situation my parents told me to avoid?". We then talked about how we learned key words for safety routines. This whole kind of ideal could be used to train young women to avoid such situations as well. However, it would be on different terms, but may have the same effect.

We brainstormed many ways in which this could pan out. We thought, what if you started teaching girls at a young age [such as ten to twelve years old] to become aware of certain realities of the world. For example, what if they were taught to prepare themselves for bad situations, or be more conscientious of their surroundings, in order to avoid such bad situations. Also, what if young boys were also taught this method, but in a different way. By letting boys know at a young age of what is okay and what is not, may be very appropriate. People do not admit to rape, but they admit to the behaviors. Therefore, if we were to teach young boys what these definite behaviors are, than there will less unknowns for these boys.

The most surprising thing about the NY times article for myself was, that the advice given here was the same for any situation when somebody is trying to take control. I also felt is was good to understand that talking to a perpetrator and keeping the conversation going could make all the difference in the world. It decreases the space between the aggressor. The more you talk, and create a "relationship", the more real [or even valuable] you may seem.