You're in the army now (rape culture)

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Everyone knows that "accidents" happen. Every flock has its black sheep. Normally, the black sheep are singled out and either served a solid, forceful whitening or removed. There is no reason to assume that violence and abuse will not happen in an army. However, the situation here is different: no one up the ladder wants to do anything. What's more, we aren't talking about good old beating for insubordination but about regular sexual assaults.

Not everyone is supportive of the idea of women in the army. I for, one, don't like it the way it happens sometimes - i.e. lowering the standards for height or weight or physical strength for all recruits or for female recruits (which is even worse in assignments where height and weight is not about proportional build but actually has a meaning of its own), let alone the trouble with separate quarters (doesn't make much difference for officers, but is a pain in the side when it comes to grunts). However, people up there in the military apparently think that since women wanted to serve in the army, they are getting what they "deserve". Officers and generals adopt the "that will teach them feminists" stance and conveniently look in the other direction. This goes so far that female soldiers are scolded, attacked... almost punished by their superiors for reporting sex assaults.

Soldiers who are supposed to be the valiant, noble defenders of the nation's honour use date rape drugs like the lowest of the low college losers who can't get a girl other than pinning her down. Well, some couldn't even pin a girl down, so they use drugs. Et voila, soldiers follow the same route.

They should be dishonourably discharged with no chance whatsoever to work in any kind of public service. They squarely deserve one of those good old-fashioned ceremonies with a slap across the kisser and tearing down the epaulettes in public, so other hero wannabies would think twice before following their steps.

But what do they superiors think? Apparently, they think that their good lads deserve some "fun". When they openly say that shooting people is fun, what a surprise that they don't see anything wrong about their underlings raping women. They have done the same in captured cities for ages, why not in their own ranks now?

Some of the superiors actually abuse themselves the women who try to report assaults.

Here's an excerpt from the story of one soldier:

The rest is here.

Apparently, reporting cases of sexual assault is a threat to good order, morale and discipline.

So what should a woman in the army do? Grin and bear it? Take care of her male colleagues good morale and give charitably? Someone more than just the grunts deserves a slap across the kisser here.

So much as the Department of Justice lawyer didn't really surprise us, here's what the Supreme Court did:

I would think that the duties of the judiciary include uncovering the wrongdoing and punishing it instead of covering the tracks and protecting the abusers, but, apparently, I was mistaken. Well, this gives us a couple more people who deserve a slap across the kisser. Up the constitutional ladder we go.

It looks like we have a problem to deal with. What is the most convenient way to deal with a problem? Of course, pretending there is no problem. Voila, it doesn't exist.

Yeah, look on our figures! They show nothing like that. Indeed... That's the problem. Thanks to such a policy, look what the supposed lefties and feminists have to say:

Feminists and lefties are always talking like that, so there's nothing new here. But, what actually is new, perhaps the lefties are right?

Abuse in the military, however, isn't limited to fellow soldiers. There are also, traditionally, the civilians in the conquered lands.

No less traditionally, evidence is supressed. Telling the world what the heroes of the neighbourhood are doing is a threat to national security, good order and morale.

But we'll look into captives and civilians later and let's get back to the military for now. Apparently, a certain smart colonel, who is probably earning his stars now, has come up with a wonderful way of getting rid of rape claims:

Well, I suppose someone should sodomise our dear colonel and give him the test to fill in. If the ratio of supposedly false claims is 60% vs the national 8%, wonder where his one would fall.

What the colonel had more to say:

Of course, there will always be sociopaths and attention seekers. But, thanks to such talk and such questionnaires, they will automatically be given credit by the press on whatever they say, along with the real victims.

Who the heck cares if a woman files a rape report for attention or any other reason, if the crime has really happen? What do her reasons change?

Also, such talk and such peculiar ways of addressing the problem give feminists and lefties a new weapon in the endless struggle with the establishment. In the end, it will rebound and finally someone will demand that the accused should be convicted on accusation alone, thanks to exactly this kind of policies of protecting the offenders at any cost, including truth and justice. The truth is just another casualty.

Yeah, no matter what you do, we will protect you. Everything for the country. Look what the woman says to sum up her story:

While I hardly agree with "a rape nation", I can't help thinking that the establishment's view isn't miles away from what she described. And, because what is done is done by military and civil officials, it is indeed done "in our name".

Different things should be done in the nation's name by the military.

But now let's get back to civilians and other captives, as I promised.

The rest is here.

Look what the general had to say after it become clear she wasn't about to get away with things:

Apparently, rape is a perfectly accetable new technique to get more information from detainees.

Of course, as always, no one cared until it leaked out and the press got the air. As always, the evidence was conveniently destroyed. Everythingt to protect our valiant troops!

Now another general, this time Taguba:

Yes, disciplinary action strongly recommended. Perhaps even a one step demotion? Or maybe even a transfer? To another POW camp, of course.

Who cares if rape was included in the instructions or was an excess if the instructions already included sexual abuse?

Since when is sexual abuse an acceptable way of treating people?

WARNING: The article contains a link the original article, which includes photographs. The photographs have been censored, but they are still disturbing.

I would think that protecting a nation's honour is done by acting honourably and rooting out all abuse. However, it seems that it's actually all about silencing the victims and destroying the evidence.

Look what the rest of the world has to say. The Chinese are already bringing up Vietnam:

Does it ring a bell? Sure. It does sound like a classic piece of commie propaganda. But here's the catch: what if the commie propaganda actually isn't all lies? The developments in Iraq have shed some light on the subject. They have also shown that, hadn't it been for chaos and disorganisation, nothing would see daylight. We would be fed with the heroes of the neighbourhood until we threw up. Just a couple of women would cry and shout, but who would listen to them?

 

I was actually thinking of this from my experiences in the US (I lived there for a few years) and I think this probably starts off in Highschool and College and gets taken to the workplace. Due to the popularity of hazing and the competition 'to be popular/cool'. While this can seem funny at first (well I personally don't like the idea of hazing), the joke gets taken too far. Below is this taken to probably one of its extremes, but is sadly not an isolated case.

http://www.wpxi.com/news/4374533/detail.html

The worst thing is that the heads of department thought it was more humiliating for the school image than the victim herself. I don't think detention or even expelling these people will 'make things right'

 

This is the way it is, put on a uniform on people and tell them they are special and anyone pointing out misdeeds will be the one punished. Getting bullied by your "comrades"? Tough luck, they are just teasing, dont be such a wuss. Getting your genitals shaved while being tied down? Just a little friendly hazing. Being shoved into a corner and brutally raped? Well, wasnt that why you joined the military to meet lots of men, you slut.

 

Rape and sexual abuse/harassment are very serious offences in the military. People ARE court-marshalled, people ARE sent to prison (and not the whimpy prisons like San Quentin -- we're talking Leavenworth here, military prisons are brutal). As Chev has pointed out, you can find cases of abuse and even cases of institutionalized abuse.

This is an interesting statistic -- there are nearly one MILLION soldiers in the Army, with at least another 100,000 civilians working on Army bases and there are 753 reported sexual assaults and 445 reported rapes. That's ~45 rapes per 100,000 (the way crime is reported in the US). Let's look at Chicago: in 2001 there were 1,963 rapes which is 67.8 per 100,000.

I personally think sexual assault/harassment awareness is much better in the military than in Chicago (i.e., more cases are reported than in the civilian communities). So by these number, the military is doing better than the big cities (which is where the majority of the personnel come from).

The military takes the people it can, and tries to be selective about it. But most young men and women joining the military come from communities with lower incomes and higher crime rates. Some of these individuals were criminals before they entered the service and are still criminals.

I do believe the military still has a lot of improvements it can make in this area, but to categorically condemn the men in the service of their country is blatently unfair.

 

@Cesard:

I'm inclined to think that those who were called in to watch and did watch were even worse than the direct offenders. We all know the mindset of the sociopathic freak who abuses other people. But what kind of a freak does it take to enjoy such scenes live while pretending that you live a normal life, are a normal Christian, Jew, Muslim... whatever, brother, son, boyfriend... It's such freaks who scare me, not the direct offenders. It's not like your average male is spotless - just how many guys enjoy rape scenes in movies or in games? Some of those enjoy porn movies claiming to feature a real life rape. It's already depressing. But to watch something like that live? What sort of a freak does it take?

And those teachers suspended? First, the teachers acted with regard to offending students the same way officers acted with regard to offending soldiers. But then someone acted with regard to them the same way as generals with regard to officers, so to say.

The place of the students is in prison. They would use ten years. Those who watched should already face charges of their own - don't know about the US, but in Poland this would be possible. Teachers should go to jail and not just be suspended. First, they attempted to obstruct justice. Second, they ignored the threat to other students' safety. Basically, they intended to take no security measures. They intended to hope that the incident wouldn't happen again. If it were to happen again, they would ignore it all the same. There's no place for such people in public service and the teacher's vocation is public service.

 

I know some really excelent military people -- My uncle was a Marine in the US, my father served in WWII. But I've also met some absolute slime in the military. Overall, and sad to say, I believe the slime outnumber the decent people. As Joacqin said, the macho image is so prevalent that breaking through it is tough. Soldiers need to be respected when they defend our freedoms and laws, but they most certainly should not be above the law. In all seriousness, I wish that those guilty of obvious, violent rape could be castrated as punishment, but we're too civilized for that -- we just turn a blind eye.

 

I come from a long line of fighters myself, so to say. Everyone down the tree was a soldier of some sort back to times immemorial. I've been mistaken for a military officer by real soldiers without wearing anything special or pretending anything. But still, the news plays on my nerve. Apart from the huge immorality of it, it's so unprofessional. Come on, what sort of a soldier would do that? A savage fighter maybe, yeah, but a real soldier? No way. Those idiots disgrace the uniforms they wear and so do the officers and generals who support them. Not like officers don't happen to do such things as well, as it was suggested in the article (the military medic is another officer), anyway.

There is no place in the army, or even in the society, for rapists or even lesser abusers. Anything more than unwanted advances which cease when the woman so demands is something that puts a man outside a certain bracket.

Does anyone know about a single repented rapist or sex offender? I don't. I know of all sorts of repented criminals, but not sex offenders.

 

One of my friends is doing a "devil's advocate" essay, as she terms it. She's studying cases of harassment of convicted sex offenders - pursuant to some law or other, they are obligated to go around to each neighbor around them and tell them that they were convicted of sex crime. Sometimes, they are brutally attacked after the police escort leaves. Sorry for the off-topic, I just thought that that was an interesting tidbit.

 

I think the lack of repentance may have something to do with the near hysteria experienced when someone is acused of crimes involving women (sex) and\or children (peado-). British case in point would be Maxine Carr.

Although obviously I have no wish to take anything away form those who have suffreded because of sex or child attackers. The media frenzy that takes place is certainly no help.