Can we end rape as tool of war?
Gloria Steinem and Lauren Wolfe:
Sexualized violence may be the only form of violence in which the victim is blamed or is even said to have invited it. In war, rape shames women, men, children, entire societies. The stigma imposed on all who are touched by this violence makes this weapon incredibly effective as a means of destroying the enemy.But it is crucial to remember that it wasn't always like this, nor does it have to be. Sexualized violence isn't a "natural" part of conflict. For the first 90% or more of human history, females and males had roles that were balanced and porous. Our societal positions weren't based on the domination of females by males. Humans and nature, women and men, were linked rather than ranked. The circle, not the hierarchy, was the organizing principle of our thinking.
By analyzing how sexualized violence was used to ethnically cleanse, as it was in Bosnia; to force pregnancies that would literally change the face of the next generation; or, as in Egypt, to stop dissent, we can look to future wars and possibly prevent a reoccurrence.
[...]
Naming sexualized violence as a weapon of war makes it visible -- and once visible, prosecutable. What happened to men in the past was political, but what happened to women was cultural. The political was public and could be changed; the other was private -- even sacred -- and could not or even should not be changed.
Making clear that sexualized violence is political and public breaks down that wall. It acknowledges that sexualized violence does not need to happen. When masculinity is no longer defined by the possession and domination of women, when femininity is no longer about the absence of sexual experience or being owned, then we will have begun.
But first, we have to stop saying sexualized violence is inevitable, or allowing its victims to be blamed. We have to imagine change before we can create it.
Yes, by all means lets stamp out this appalling practice and return modern war-making to the wholesome family-friendly pursuit its meant to be.
I agree Merowe -- the opening post is revolting in its immorality and dispiriting in its ignorance. It even repeats the lie that rape was used as a weapon of war in Libya, a lie broadly recognized to be a total fabrication.
It is moronic from the first sentence onwards:
Actually, in most wars the victims of the violence are blamed for the violence. Palestinians are said to be rejecting peace, Iraqis were said to be supporting insurgents, Russians were said to be "occupying South Ossetia", Serbs were said to be running concentration camps, Pakistanis are said to be supporting Al-Qaeda, et cetera.
It is in no way surprising that Gloria Steinem, whose career was propelled by ties to the CIA, wants to promote the rubbish of sanitized imperialism. She is no doubt in favor of surgical strikes, humantarian carpet bombing, and economic sanctions. How the hell does somebody write a piece saying "If you're going to kill 100,000 people, make sure not to rape anybody"... it boggles the mind. It's totally disjointed from human nature. Obviously people who walk around acting like Gods and killing people are going to take what they want when they want, if you don't like the attitude, try opposing the war in the first place.
Every time I come back to babble, even briefly, I see articles like this one promoting imperialism. It really makes me sad.
ETA: I just double checked the examples in the article. The only examples cited are those of Nazis, Serbs, black, and brown people using rape as a weapon of war. No surprise there. They don't have the courage to mention Palestine, Vietnam, et cetera.
Why would they neglect to mention the behavior of western troops in Korea and Vietnam? hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm? Could it be that the purpose of this piece is just to prpomote racism against "the other", by exploting chivalrous tendency that is the desire to protect women who are idealized in the piece as weak, powerless and desperate for western help?
Hi Gents. You're in the feminsm forum. Thanks.
You post an article promoting imperialism and then you hide behind the label of the forum.
You should post some articles about how girls in Afghanistan are now going to school.
Hi Apples, don't post in this thread again. Thanks.
You are nothing more than an apologist for imperialism.
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For those who want alternatives from the Catchfire-view, it is not just Brown men who rape during war.
http://www.bridgew.edu/soas/jiws/nov00/duty.htm
Duty, Honor, Rape: Sexual Assault Against Women During War
by Kevin Gerard Neill, MPH
The link discusses Vietnam, among other conflicts.
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500_Apples, you repeatedly flounce from this site, only to return a few weeks later to abuse it. You won't be getting another chance. I don't know what happened to you, but I'll miss the old Apples.
The simple answer is no we can not end rape as tool of war.
Abuses against civilians will always happen no matter what control measures are set in place by government and military organizations.
Humans will always be cruel to each other, as Apples mentions it does not matter or skin colour or religion of the individuals committing the crime.
I was really hoping for a bit deeper thinking than has happened in this thread. There is a clear dearth of feminist analysis on babble these days.
Ending Rape in War
Steinem again:
Never mind.
Double post, my mistake.
Steinem, unapologetic transmisogynist, erasing male victims of rape in a war zone... yep, that's some good feminism... no, sorry, wait, tenure masquerading as feminism.
This board seems oftentimes really hostile not to anti-feminists but those feminists who don't endorse the unidirectionalism of the second-wave, to the point that for sex worker's advocates, pretty feminist folk, this board does not feel like a safe space. Anyway, yes, all wars are crimes, all rapes are war crimes, but each activity within a war seems to take a highly gendered toll... it's interesting to note how those people who explicitly oppose explicit and implicit differentiation based on gender, seem to implicitly have different levels of difficulty with it based on the gender, legal, assigned, lived, or otherwise, of the victim.
Can we end rape as a tool of war? Yes, but to do so we must develop a consensus doctrine for the use of force that makes it illegitimate to target civilians. If you think there's no connection with predator drones attacking rescuers and civilians after an attack on a suspected combattant, as Greenwald has been reporting, and rape of civilians as a method of instilling terror, you are sadly mistaken.
As with a lot of things, I suspect it is probably a question of not "can" but "how"? I don't have the answer to that, but I hope it's out there somewhere.
On "how", this seemed useful:
There's been a lot of useful work getting the basis for "rape as a war crime" down in international law. But leaving it to the international lawyers doesn't seem like the way forward. There's much to be said for a turn to "women-led civil society effort." Maybe that will help dispel the aura of inevitability -- "Of course rape happens during war! Boys will be boys," etc. Maybe it will help increase the chance for lasting peace solutions. Probably leadership in this effort should pass from the international lawyers to groups like, perhaps, Héritiers de la Justice and other locally-led initiatives.
If it doesn't, then yeah, there's a danger that (in Cynthia Enloe's words) "exposing militarized rapes does not automatically serve the cause of demilitarizing women's lives.... A woman outside the military who ahs been raped by someone else's soldiers can be remilitarized if her ordeal is made visible chiefly for the purpose of mobilizing her male compatriots to take up arms to avenge her -- and their -- allegedly lost honour." (Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women's Lives) I think that can be extended to the anti-imperialist point that what "they" do to "their women" justifies invasions to impose a more American way of life.
Anyway, hoping to learn from listening to the thread...