Rape Culture Prevalent in U.S. Court Cases and Impact on Our Society

 America undoubtedly has an unadmitted rape culture problem.  In the past years there have been numerous cases thrown away, or retried because of some archaic law still being used, or what the girl was wearing.  Despite age, young and old victims get blamed for their own rape.  It is rarely the person who entraps them, abuses them, violates them while conscious or unconscious; it is the person who is victimized that takes the blame. 

  Continually the act of rape as a legitimate case is demeaned because of the clothing the victim wore, how they supposedly acted, or for being unconscious.  This way of looking at blame in rape cases affects how one will report a case, and who will commit the crime.  If it is decided by society that someone may get away with holding down, beating, violating, and distributing pornographic evidence of the act, and that the victim shall be ridiculed, harassed, and ostracized for it, then where is the reason for the assailant to restrain?  If society holds it up to their morality to stop them, then it can not be trusted to raise children in a society that accepts this and teaches them treatment of others is not important if they are of another sex, or they choose to dress the way they would like that does not correlate with their opinion of modesty.

  A popular punishment in the instance of rape court cases is community service, or minimal jail time, usually about 30 days, for a rapist who beats, and violates their victim/s, while the victim is forbidden from speaking to anyone about the crime.  In the last few years this has incited many angry protests at judges for essentially giving a gag-order to someone who has already been forcibly over powered to begin with.  The idea of making a victim refrain from letting anyone know about their assault is an insult to anyone who has ever been taken advantage of, or who wishes to protect their family.

  This is seen in how our culture views sexuality at all times, if something starts off just a bit sexist, but generally harmless, rather than outright sexually aggressive, and something “just happens”, it is often just ignored.  If it is not a rape in some dark back alley, by a masked man wielding a weapon, the situation suddenly becomes a question of the victim’s outward appearance, which should not be a factor in any case once non-consent is stated.  The idea that victims live by is that they should be forced to just accept what happened to them, despite the trauma because it is so commonplace.  Why should this be acceptable, to demean, restrict, and label victims?  In the U.S. cases of social acceptance of all genders, and lifestyles should be upheld as long as they are following the constitution and laws, but for some reason this is being ignored, and retried again, and again in our courts with laws that must change.