Hey, Can A Woman "Ask To Get Raped"?

My pro men victim bonafides are solid.

Sexual Trauma Among Men in the Military

It is hard to estimate the number of military servicemen who have suffered from sexual trauma during active duty. Reliable statistics simply don’t exist. VA records show that one in every 100 male veterans treated by the VA reported being sexually traumatized by fellow servicemen during their military careers. Given that 18 million of the 24.5 million veterans don’t use the VA health system and that the majority of sexual assaults go unreported, the numbers are undoubtedly much higher.

The Stigma of Military Sexual Trauma

Military sexual trauma, defined as any unwanted sexual activity, including harassment, sodomy, rape, verbal remarks, grabbing and pressure for sexual favors, affects thousands of men each year. Victims are most often young, low-ranking enlistees who fall prey to peers’ and superiors’ desire to demean or humiliate others. The acts are rarely homosexual in nature but rather an effort to feel powerful or dominant over others.

"Sexual assaults on military men is much more prevalent than people imagine," said VA psychologist David Sutton, a former Air Force pilot and Vietnam vet who counsels male sexual assault victims. "In basic training, it’s easy to exert one’s power over a young recruit. And even if they do report it, there is an attempt to disregard it or an attempt to cover it up."

Shame and stigma run deep in all forms of sexual abuse, but are particularly problematic for men in the military. Because sexual assault is often misperceived as a “women’s issue,” men may be afraid to appear “weak” in the eyes of their comrades. Rather than jeopardize the career they’ve worked so hard to build or make themselves a target for retaliation, most men stay quiet. Concern over being labeled homosexual or “less of a man” makes it even more difficult to come forward.

A 2010 Pentagon survey indicated that almost half of active-duty soldiers who had been sexually assaulted kept silent because they didn’t want anyone to know; one-third said they didn’t think anything would be done; and nearly 30 percent said they feared retaliation.

Trauma Destroys Lives

Trauma lies at the heart of many of the most insidious and life-threatening mental health disorders. Substance abuse, eating disorders, sex addiction, depression and anxiety all frequently develop as a result of trauma.

Military sexual trauma destroys people’s sense of self. Victims lose their ability to trust in their relationships, focus on the job, and feel love and happiness. Many suffer from depression, anxiety, panic attacks, sleep problems, chronic pain, and other emotional and physical conditions. Although they may leave the military alive, many wish they weren’t. Post-traumatic stress disorder and suicide rates are high among survivors of military sexual abuse.

The trauma men experience ends up being relived over and over. First, men are being attacked by the people they are supposed to trust with their lives. In many cases, the perpetrator is a supervisor or higher ranking authority figure with whom the individual has to live, work and answer to on a daily basis.

When reaching out for help, men are told they must’ve provoked the attack, and to keep quiet or else. Rather than punishing the assailant, it is often the victim who is moved to another unit, demoted or ostracized. Frequently, those who report a violation are classified as homosexual and kicked out of the military. Forced to give up their military careers or go AWOL, many experience ongoing humiliation and suffering back at home.

The trauma continues when men seek treatment at VA hospitals. In an institution that reportedly has long waiting lists and is run by the same institution that allowed the violation to occur, few military sexual trauma victims feel safe receiving the treatment they need.

Government Efforts Insufficient

The government has tried to prove that it takes military sexual trauma seriously, defining the condition in broad terms and establishing a specially trained unit to handle incident reports. As a result of a 1999 federal law, veterans are routinely asked in a Department of Veterans Affairs survey whether they were sexually harassed or assaulted during their military careers.

Many say these steps aren’t sufficient, and that civilian laws offer more protection than military procedures for prosecuting these crimes. According to Pentagon figures, only 15 percent of reported cases were prosecuted last year.

Servicemen who have sustained emotional rather than physical injuries face a series of obstacles in getting benefits. While veterans who file claims for combat-related PTSD do not need to have reported the incident when it happened or have proof that it occurred, those subjected to sexual trauma have the burden to prove that the sexual assault occurred.

Legislation has been introduced to combat this double standard, but the process takes time and the outcome is uncertain. Meanwhile, thousands of servicemen continue to be assaulted, often by assailants who have offended before and have never been brought to justice.

Recently, a group of 16 men and women who were sexually assaulted during active service filed a class-action lawsuit against Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his predecessor, Donald Rumsfeld. They are accusing the military of running institutions in which “perpetrators were promoted …and Plaintiffs and other victims were openly subjected to retaliation.”

Help for Male Survivors of Military Sexual Trauma

People don’t want to acknowledge military sexual trauma because it may tarnish the reputation of the U.S. military. But not talking about it only exacerbates the shame and stigma, driving men further into hiding.

Any time there is a lack of awareness, there is often a lack of resources. Few male survivors of military sexual trauma know where to turn for help with trauma recovery. Just as many clinicians are unsure of which programs and community resources are available to their patients. There is only one VA inpatient facility in Florida dedicated to treating sexual trauma, and its wait list continues to grow.

Veterans who have experienced sexual trauma are calling for greater assistance both within and outside the military. In addition to proposed improvements to the VA treatment system, social networking sites, crisis centers, and treatment programs for trauma and related issues are all playing an important role in helping survivors of military sexual trauma.

The men and women who serve our country do so in pursuit of justice, yet the treatment they receive insults the commitment they’ve shown to protect a country that doesn’t protect them in return. With greater awareness, more equitable laws and improved access to trauma treatment, fewer servicemen will lose their families, careers and mental health at the hands of other Americans.
http://www.recoveryranch.com/articles/trauma-and-ptsd-articles/sexual-trauma-among-men-in-the-military/

I prefer to argue that we should change our approach to sexual regulation, because what we are doing degrades men, creates unneeded suffering, does not work very well, and costs a lot more money than it should.

The premise of the segment is that the Obama White House is exaggerating the incidence of rape on campus. Host Stu Burguiere kicked it off by attacking the 2007 Campus Sexual Assault Report and the 2010 National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS), saving most of his ire for the latter. He mostly argued semantics, saying that researchers should only count something as "rape" or "sexual assault" if the victim explicitly calls it that. (The current methodology asks people about their experiences directly, and classifies any incidents that meet the legal definition for sexual assault as such). As far as I can tell, the only reason to eschew the more exacting legal definition and revert to hazier methods of victim self-identification is to artificially suppress the number of reported assaults, since many victims still think it's only rape if a stranger in the bushes does it.

Clearly the women in the survey did feel violated,

and may have been sexually assaulted or even raped,

To maximize the comic effect of the violent, humiliating abuse of women, Burguiere brought two men on camera, one dressed oh-so-hilariously as a woman, to act out "questions the study actually used to determine if a woman was raped," according to Burguiere. The male character told the female character that he was an Abercrombie model. She responded by giggling and twirling her hair, in case you forgot that women are ridiculous. Burguiere then jumped in with a big red sign reading "RAPE!" "Whoa whoa whoa, stop!" he yelled. "That's rape. Pressuring someone to have sex with you by telling them lies is the same as rape," he said sarcastically.

Gosh, that would be alarming if the NISVS did that, wouldn't it?

In fact a survey of the surveys found that the majority of women was both surprise and in disagreement when the authors of the surveys listed them as so call sexual assault victims

Hell if memory service me correctly

No it's not. You've got this weird belief that people with an agenda have been pressurising women into claiming consensual action was rape. That's hogwash. It's a survey into sexual violence, they're only going to class something as sexual violence if they did feel violated.

nly going to class something as sexual violence if they did feel violated.

http://exposingfeminism.wordpress.com/the-ten-most-common-feminist-myths/

1. Myth: One in four women in college has been the victim of rape or attempted rape.

Fact: This mother of all factoids is based on a fallacious feminist study commissioned by Ms. magazine. The researcher, Mary Koss, hand-picked by hard-line feminist Gloria Steinem, acknowledges that 73 percent of the young women she counted as rape victims were not aware they had been raped. Forty-three percent of them were dating their “attacker” again.

Rape is a uniquely horrible crime. That is why we need sober and responsible research. Women will not be helped by hyperbole and hysteria. Truth is no enemy of compassion, and falsehood is no friend.

(Nara Schoenberg and Sam Roe, “The Making of an Epidemic,” Toledo Blade, October 10, 1993; and Neil Gilbert, “Examining the Facts: Advocacy Research Overstates the Incidence of Data and Acquaintance Rape,” Current Controversies in Family Violence eds. Richard Gelles and Donileen Loseke, Newbury Park, CA.: Sage Publications, 1993, pp.120-132; and Campus Crime and Security, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Education, 1997. *According to this study, campus police reported 1,310 forcible sex offenses on U.S. campuses in one year. That works out to an average of fewer than one rape per campus.)

This mother of all factoids is based on a fallacious feminist study commissioned by Ms. magazine.

One study, hardly an epidemic.

Q. College Incest: I recently started school at a large university for the summer term after transferring from a small private college. I have a disability that makes it difficult for me to live with others and make friends, so I was delighted to have a liberal-minded roommate who is not only incredibly considerate and fun to live with, but who has helped me make other friends. I know that her mother died a few years ago, and she and her father have had difficulty coping. Yesterday, I returned early when my class was canceled and was shocked to find her and her father having sex in our room! They were startled and he quickly explained that he is not her biological father. She told me later that the relationship with her adoptive father began after her mother’s death when she was 18, that it is fulfilling and she plans to continue it, though she promised I would not have to witness it again. I am concerned that this is unethical or illegal, and that he is taking advantage of her. I don’t want to lose my friendship or living situation, and I’m not sure what the school could do to help. Should I insist she seek counseling?

A: OK, this guy wins today’s sick dad contest. You’re right that this is breathtakingly unethical. I don’t have time to investigate during the chat what incest laws say about sex with a legal adult child, and the laws do vary by state, but whether the father is a prospect for the criminal justice system, he is an egregious violator of the soul of his daughter. It doesn’t matter that he is not her biological father. He has taken profound advantage of his motherless child or she has taken advantage of him, and that she says the relationship is fulfilling shows that she’s not really in a psychological state to assess what’s happening because she must be a victim because she claims to want something that the minders have said that she is not allowed to want. The fact that he would visit her on campus to have sex shows how far outside the boundaries of sanity these two have gotten or that they really need/want each other , or actually, how far he’s dragged her again, because she is the one called victim, so she cant have had anything to do with this outcome. You cannot insist she get counseling. But you can go to the counselor yourself and ask what to do. I also suggest you call the hotline of the Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network, explain what you’ve seen, and ask what you should do next. Your roommate has been a good friend to you, and now you have to be one to her. This means being kind and understanding this is a redefining of words on an scale that our Firefly would be pressed to equal....and she is very good at this , and turning to knowledgeable adults to see what should happen next.

She is a victim, that means that her will and desires are to be ignored in favor of what the state wants.