Abstract
This chapter begins by drawing upon Judith Butler’s work in order to analyze how gender frames women’s lives as not fully livable and, in doing so, differentially exposes women to sexual violence. It proceeds by presenting the ambivalent moral and emotional responses with which sexual violence against women is met within contemporary Western societies such as the United States as an effect of such framing. The chapter concludes by considering how the author’s own analysis is framed and to what effect, and reflects upon possibilities for countering the gendered framing that promotes ignoring, minimizing, and excusing sexual violence against women.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
Juliet Eilperin, ‘Seeking to end rape on campus, White House launches “It’s OnUs,”’http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2014/09/19/seeking-to-end-rape-on-campus-wh-launches-its-on-us/.
- 3.
See Bogdanich, “Reporting Rape and Wishing She Hadn’t,” as well as his follow-up article, “Support for a College Student Grows After a Rape Complaint is Dismissed,” http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/22/nyregion/support-for-a-student-grows-as-college-examines-its-sexual-assault-policies.html.
- 4.
Juliet Macur and Nate Schweber, “Rape Case Unfolds on Web and Splits City,” http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/sports/high-school-football-rape-case-unfolds-online-and-divides-steubenville-ohio.html.
- 5.
Erik Wemple, “CNN is getting hammered for Steubenville coverage,” https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2013/03/18/cnn-is-getting-hammered-for-steubenville-coverage/.
- 6.
Kelly Oliver, “There’s No Such Thing as Nonconsensual Sex: It’s Violence,” http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/opinion/there-is-no-such-thing-as-nonconsensual-sex-its-violence.html?emc=eta1.
- 7.
Judith Butler , Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence (New York: Verso, 2004), 20; original emphasis.
- 8.
Judith Butler , Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? (New York: Verso, 2010), 14.
- 9.
Butler , Frames of War, 14.
- 10.
Ibid, 61.
- 11.
Ibid.
- 12.
Ibid, 34.
- 13.
Ibid.
- 14.
Ibid, 61.
- 15.
Frames of War, 25; my emphasis.
- 16.
Butler describes recognizability as “categories, conventions, and norms that prepare or establish a subject for recognition” and therefore “preceded and make possible the act of recognition itself.” See Frames of War, 5.
- 17.
Frames of War, 6–7.
- 18.
Ibid, 1.
- 19.
Ibid, 6.
- 20.
Ibid, 24.
- 21.
Ann J. Cahill , Rethinking Rape (Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2001), 104.
- 22.
Cahill, Rethinking Rape, 132.
- 23.
Ibid.
- 24.
Debra B. Bergoffen, Contesting the Politics of Genocidal Rape: Affirming the Dignity of the Vulnerable Body (New York: Routledge, 2012).
- 25.
Bergoffen, Contesting the Politics of Genocidal Rape, especially Chap. 2, “Slavery, Torture, Rape: Assaulting the Dignity of the Vulnerable Body.”
- 26.
Rethinking Rape, 132.
- 27.
Erinn C. Gilson, The Ethics of Vulnerability: A Feminist Analysis of Social Life and Practice (New York, Routledge, 2014), 2.
- 28.
Gilson, The Ethics of Vulnerability, 151.
- 29.
Ibid, 150.
- 30.
Ibid.
- 31.
Ibid, 152.
- 32.
Ibid, 153.
- 33.
Frames of War, 25.
- 34.
Ibid, 14.
- 35.
Ibid, 154.
- 36.
Ibid.
- 37.
Lise Gotell , “Third Wave Antirape Activism on Neoliberal Terrain: The Garneau Sisterhood,” Ellizabeth Sheehy, ed., Sexual Assault Law, Practice & Activism in a Post-Jane Doe Era (Ottawa, University of Ottawa, 2011), 9.
- 38.
Gotell , “Third Wave Antirape Activism on Neoliberal Terrain,” 9.
- 39.
Ibid, 15.
- 40.
Gotell analyzes the situation within Canada specifically, but the neoliberal, anti-feminist framing of sexual violence, as I show, is apparent within a US context as well.
- 41.
“Third Wave Antirape Activism on Neoliberal Terrain,” 16.
- 42.
Grubb and Turner cite research that distinguishes between “hostile sexism” and “benevolent sexism.” Hostile sexism refers to “the attitude that women should be punished for defying traditional sexual roles” by, for example, “wearing provocative clothes” or “drink[ing] excessively.” Benevolent sexism refers to the attitude that “women who are traditionally feminine should be rewarded.” See Amy Grubb and Emily Turner , “Attribution of blame in rape cases: A review of the impact of rape myth acceptance, gender role conformity and substance use on victim blaming,” Aggression and Violent Behavior 17 (2012), 443–452.
- 43.
Findings by Littleton et al. support the idea that “given the strong stigma against heavy drinking among women,” intoxicated victims are viewed as more blameworthy than victims who had not consumed alcohol. Their work also shows that internalized victim blaming appears to be more acute in impaired (i.e., intoxicated) and especially in incapacitated (i.e., unconscious) victims. In addition to engaging in the highest levels of self-blame, incapacitated victims are particularly susceptible to feelings of stigmatization that are unrelated to the external blame they actually experience . In other words, consistent with humiliation , it is the “victim’s own perception of [their] experience ” that generates “self-blame and … feelings of stigma.” See Littleton et al., “Impaired and Incapacitated Rape Victims: Assault Characteristics and Post-Assault Experiences,” Violence and Victims 24(4), 439–457.
- 44.
Grubb and Turner , “Attribution of blame in rape cases,” 448.
- 45.
See Macur and Nate Schweber, “Rape Case Unfolds on Web and Splits City.”
- 46.
Richard A. Oppel, Jr., “Online Comments in Ohio Rape Case Lead to Charges Against Two,” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/20/us/web-comments-in-ohio-rape-case-lead-to-charges-against-two.html.
- 47.
In the United States, 90 percent of reported cases of sexual violence are committed against women. Cahill describes a conversation she had with a male relative who questioned her focus on sexual violence against women given that men are also victimized. I was similarly confronted by a male panelist at an academic conference when presenting my own work on violence against women. See http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=317 and Cahill , Rethinking Rape, Chapter Four, “Rape as Embodied Experience.”
- 48.
In the United States, it is estimated, based on reported cases, that between 20 and 25 percent of women will experience sexual violence at some point during their lives. See http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=317.
- 49.
Support for the inevitability of sexual violence against women is reflected in the attitude of hostile sexism that women who violate norms deserve to be punished. See Grubb and Turner , “Attribution of blame in rape cases.”
- 50.
Frames of War, 41.
- 51.
Ibid, 159.
- 52.
Media coverage of the case notes that Holtzclaw raped and sexually assaulted “at least” 13 women; the 13 mentioned are those who came forward with allegations. See Matt Ford, “A Guilty Verdict for Daniel Holtzclaw,” http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/daniel-holtzclaw-trial-guilty/420009/.
- 53.
Treva Lindsey, “The Rape Trial Everyone in America Should Be Watching,” http://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a49050/daniel-holtzclaw-trial-oklahoma/.
- 54.
The relative lack of coverage is noted by Ford, “A Guilty Verdict for Daniel Holtzclaw.” The Huffington Post provided comprehensive coverage of the case: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/daniel-holtzclaw/.
- 55.
Holtzclaw was sentenced to 263 years in prison. See Ford, “A Guilty Verdict for Daniel Holtzclaw” and Sarah Larimer,“ Disgraced ex-cop Daniel Holtzclaw sentenced to 263 years for on-duty rapes, sexual assaults,” https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/01/21/disgraced-ex-officer-daniel-holtzclaw-to-be-sentenced-after-sex-crimes-conviction/.
- 56.
Frames of War, 53.
- 57.
Ibid, 6.
- 58.
Ibid, 5.
- 59.
Ibid, 9.
- 60.
Ibid, 156.
- 61.
Ibid, 24.
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Taylor, D. (2018). Are Women’s Lives (Fully) Grievable? Gendered Framing and Sexual Violence. In: Fischer, C., Dolezal, L. (eds) New Feminist Perspectives on Embodiment. Breaking Feminist Waves. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72353-2_8
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