90% of Provo rapes not reported to police

[_Scottie]

This is not an LDS only phenomenon.

Right, it is also an Islamic one. Victims being demonized? This isn't normally how rape victims are treated.

Are they being demonized by religious leaders, or are they internalizing licked cupcake and pine box lessons and demonizing themselves? Or does it matter?

Many women assign some portion of blame to themselves.

Not to the extent that they refuse to report the incident. Certainly there has not be something about Mormon culture that would preclude someone from making it known.

This is obvious. A raped person is no longer a virgin, and most returned missionaries are looking for virgin women.

Perhaps. But, again, I ask the question where did they get the 400 number from? Maybe only 50 girls were raped and 42 reported it?

Also, what constitutes a rape? Is there a difference between an abduction/violent rape vs the girl that is kind of drunk at the party, and doesn't really want to, but doesn't put up too much of a fight and doesn't specifically say no, but feels violated the next day kind of rape?

[_Imwashingmypirate]

This is not an LDS only phenomenon.

Right, it is also an Islamic one. Victims being demonized? This isn't normally how rape victims are treated.
Erm, it is a worldly view. Not just major controlling religions but most if not all rape victims feel worthless. All rape victims feel disgusting. They feel this way because their womanhood has been taken away. What is rightfully theirs is stolen. No woman deserves this. The part that makes women scared is that they fear they are going to be killed. The have little control. When the entirety of your control is taken away completely and someone is abusing your body and soul and mind and heart you feel worthless and that you can do little. Woman often don't report it because they find it incredibly difficult to even admit it to themselves. They don't have the words and cannot express it because it is not really expressable. It is incredibly difficult and takes a lot of bravery. They feel they will be misjudged and that people will acuse them of being dirty because they feel dirty. And they fear that others will see their dirtyness. It has nothing to do with religion or belief. rape overcomes any belief because sexual tendancies have the biggest effect on human civilisation. it is the closest people can get to each other and someone breaking that barrier is like someone getting in. I often put up a barrier because I don't trust people much and this barrier is not me at all and if I let someone in and they hurt me, I feel bad because I let them in. This is pretty much why women feel it is their fault, because soemone has got so close. I am not explaining very well here, I apologise.

Many women assign some portion of blame to themselves.

Not to the extent that they refuse to report the incident. Certainly there has not be something about Mormon culture that would preclude someone from making it known.
ERm YES THEY DO. Men just don't understand, do they. It is incredibly difficult and probably more difficult for men. Give people some slack. Making it known is incredibly hard especially to the person. They will desire to forget it all. It is something that takes a great deal of trust to let it be known.
This is obvious. A raped person is no longer a virgin, and most returned missionaries are looking for virgin women.

I do not think that is the case. Women lose all self worth and confidence. They feel in themselves that no one will want them. This does not just apply to religious women but ALL women.

[_Imwashingmypirate]

I disagree. Woman that are raped are no longer virgins. That is how it is.

[_dartagnan]

I disagree: your virginity is something you give - it's not something that can be taken from you

Well that is a nice way of looking at it, but that isn't reality, nor is it how most men see it.

An assault is an assault whether it is vaginally or anally - you can't say someone who was raped vaginally is not a virgin where some who raped anally is - it's an assault- just like being hit repeatedly with a baseball bat. Those men who say that you can have your virtue taken from you need to be hit with a bat.

Whatever. Nothing changes the fact that Mormon men who grow up in the Mormon fantasy of having sex with his wife, who in turn, has never had sex, will be inclined to remove a rape victim as a possible candidate. I know it sounds shallow, but you're talking to someone who grew up in singles wards.

Erm, it is a worldly view. Not just major controlling religions but most if not all rape victims feel worthless.

Um, yes, I understand that. My sister used to work on a rape hotline. I understand the feelings of shame and filthiness are universal. What I am referring to is the article's comment about feeling demonized. Only in Islamic culture are rape victims demonized. They are blamed for being too provocative or allowing themselves to be alone with another man. Obviously this is not an exact similarity in Mormon culture, but I found it interesting that it said women felt demonized as well. Demonization isn't something you do to yourself. Demonization is a description in how people from the outside view you. It can have more to do with speculation as to whether a person was really raped. Rape is an extremely difficult thing to prove. I suspect the rapes taking place in Utah begin with the usual Mormon dry humping and the guy and/or gal get carried away. Rapes are generally understood as a crime of violence. But in Utah I don't think this is normally the case.

When someone is walking down an alley and is jumped by some stranger who beats the snot out of her, and then rapes her, that is appropriately described as an act of violence. The two Mormon girls I know, who claim to have been raped, both described their rapes as something far less violent, and by boys they had been dating. It was a case where two stupid kids thought they could keep walking on the edge of the volcano and never fall in.

[_Imwashingmypirate]

Woman that find it so very easy to admit they have been raped are unlikely to have actually been raped. All rape vicims are or feel demonised. Women often feel they are to blame because they were in the wrong place or they might have come across as attractive or whatever and that is why most rape victims will go on to make themselves look unattractive. They also clean themselves vigourously. And very often they turn out to be dirty in sexual terms. I believe were were not refering to silly gone to far type rapes but in fact serious literal rape. It is the worst and most terrifying thing that could ever happen to women and my heart goes out to all those that have been raped.

[_JAK]

I disagree. Woman that are raped are no longer virgins. That is how it is.

It’s all a matter of definition, Pirate.

JAK

[_Scottie]

I don't know, Dart...

I don't know any rape victims, but I have a REALLY hard time believing that any of the bishops that I have known would demonize the women.

If anything, they have heard too many licked cupcakes/I would rather see them in a pine box than lose their virtue type lessons. They demonize themselves. I doubt the members are demonizing them.

[Anonymous]

I don't know, Dart...

I don't know any rape victims, but I have a REALLY hard time believing that any of the bishops that I have known would demonize the women.

If anything, they have heard too many licked cupcakes/I would rather see them in a pine box than lose their virtue type lessons. They demonize themselves. I doubt the members are demonizing them.

Who is giving those lessons, Scottie? Who???? Who has decided on those lesson plans? Who??? LEADERS and OTHER MEMBERS. The victims have not given these lessons to themselves, nor invented them in the first place. To say they "demonize themselves" is grossly ignorant, let alone being a grammatical impossiblity.

by the way, you may very well know some rape victims. That you don't know you know them should speak volumes to you about the actual situation.

[_dartagnan]

who said anythingabout bishops?

"Demonize" isn't something people do to themselves. It is what people do to others.

[_beastie]

What is so disturbing about this to me is that back when I was at BYU in 1976-78, this same thinking was evident and pervasive among the coeds (ie, that it would be better to die than "let" yourself be raped). I know this was a pervasive and problematic viewpoint because the police (or maybe it was BYU security, I can't remember) went out of their way to try and dispel this bit of nonsense.

So nothing has changed in thirty years. That is tragic.