Dahr Jamail: Rape Rampant in US Military

[unhappycamper]

Earlier this year a house subcommittee held a hearing focused on sexual assault and violence against women in the military and at the academies.


Rape Rampant in US Military
by Dahr Jamail
Published on Tuesday, December 21, 2010 by Al-Jazeera-English

Sexual assault within the ranks of the military is not a new problem. It is a systemic problem that has necessitated that the military conduct its own annual reporting on the crisis.

A 2003 Air Force Academy sexual assault scandal prompted the department of defense to include a provision in the 2004 National Defense Authorization Act that required investigations and reports of sexual harassment and assaults within US military academies to be filed. The personal toll is, nevertheless, devastating.

Military sexual trauma (MST) survivor Susan Avila-Smith is director of the veteran's advocacy group Women Organizing Women. She has been serving female and scores of male clients in various stages of recovery from MST for 15 years and knows of its devastating effects up close.

"People cannot conceive how badly wounded these people are," she told Al Jazeera, "Of the 3,000 I've worked with, only one is employed. Combat trauma is bad enough, but with MST it's not the enemy, it's our guys who are doing it. You're fighting your friends, your peers, people you've been told have your back. That betrayal, then the betrayal from the command is, they say, worse than the sexual assault itself."

On December 13, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other groups filed a federal lawsuit seeking Pentagon records in order to get the real facts about the incidence of sexual assault in the ranks.

[CBGLuthier]

1. Sounds like the military has a problem with its "heterosexuals."

I guess "heterosexual men" just can not be trusted to control themselves. Can you imagine what they are thinking while you shower? Dirty heteros with their dirty hetero ways.

[Brickbat]

2. Gay rape, right? Nasty, uncontrollable, man-on-man penetration, right? Or is it brutish lesbians

corrupting sweet tender virgin privates? Whatever it is, it's gay, right?

[cottonseed]

22. The rape of young women is funny to you?

I see what you're trying to do here, but there are real human victims here.

[Brickbat]

26. Believe me, nobody knows that more than I do.

I didn't say rape is funny. I know you're being rhetorical, but come on.

[qazplm]

3. I do not believe

the rate of rape and sexual assault in the military is any different than among a similiarly aged cohort in the civilian sector. I also don't see the civilian sector doing the investigations and reporting of sexual assault and sexual assault practices like the military has done, nor have they gone out and gotten special prosecutors (called special victim prosecutors) just for sexual assault cases like the military has done. The military has also changed completely the statute covering rape to make it easier to get convictions by removing the element of lack of consent from having to be proven by the government.

If rape is rampant in the military, then it is rampant in society as well, and only the former is taken pains to address it.

[SwampG8r]

4. well said thank you

[w8liftinglady]

5. I can only repeat what homeless female vets have told me.

They would sleep in shifts to protect each other.They were afraid to complain due to what they had seen happen to their peers who had.Most internalized their trauma through drug abuse and suicide attempts.Of the eight I've gotten treatment for,7 were raped,and one's best friend was.
This is what happens when multiple deployments start taking their toll,especially in an area where "off base activities" simply don't exist.
My partner,a Gulf War and Vietnam vet said he couldn't believe this rape thing either.I asked him how many women were deployed for 15 months with the male troops "in country" during VietNam and Gulf War One.According to him,most were officers-usually in medical areas.he also told me that women were in separate quarters,guarded by MPs,not in the same barracks.This may or may not be correct(however,he was an MP).
Some info
www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/03/07/women_in_military
http://www.truth-out.org/article/military-hides-cause-women-soldiers-deaths
www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/oct/25/usa.gender
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103844570
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=0&q=related:q8Slt7eZvtMJ:scholar.google.com/&hl=en&as_sdt=10000000000000

There is a definite trend toward forced sex in younger women as a whole,both as adults and as children.It is an expected thing in younger women both in and out of a relationship.I'm glad the military and the VA has at least acknowledged.It has,unfortunately,involved the same ignorance that PTSD has.

[qazplm]

13. I can only respond

with what the many current and recent military women I have served with have said, they almost to a woman do not believe the stats are correct nor do they live in any more fear of rape then your average woman (which is not to say the average woman doesn't have legit concerns and work doesn't need to be done).

The vast majority of all men and women who live in barracks today live in one person rooms. A large chunk in Iraq live in two person trailers with locked doors. I can't speak about the conditions in Afghanistan since I haven't been there. So while I can't say those women you speak of are not telling the truth, I also cannot say that truth is widespread.

[w8liftinglady]

14. It just makes me wonder why it has been broadcasted so much over the last 10 years.

What the motive is....you'd think there would be a desire to have more women enlist,so that multiple deployments aren't necessary.This type of publicity does not entice women to join...

[COLGATE4]

23. My daughter is a Navy doctor who recently came back from a tour

of duty in the gulf, stationed at a Navy/Marine base. She tells me that the far and away medical problem for all female personnel, both enlisted and officers was urinary tract infections brought on by "holding it" overnight so as to not have to go to the head and chance being raped.

[w8liftinglady]

28. which is exactly what affected (a female soldier) I know

She still hasn't to the point where she can talk yet.

[PassingFair]

24. The one woman I know who was deployed to Iraq told me that she ...

knew of several women who had been raped. Some
of them filed reports, but most of them didn't
want the hassle of being seen as trouble makers
and didn't report it.

She was not raped herself, but she never went
anywhere alone. Not even to the shower or to
the bathroom.

She was in the army.

[SaveAmerica]

27. They pound into female SMs heads to stay in pairs, that they will be wanted

That they have to stay on guard during their deployment. This is what my husband told me they say to females during in-processing. It's repeated over and over. My question is, why aren't they slamming the men with commands to leave the females alone? It's a mess over there, period. They are fast-forward and knee deep in it and the momentum is hard to turn around.

[pinboy3niner]

15. DVA recognizes the problem even if you don't

http://www.ptsd.va.gov/professional/pages/military-sexual-trauma.asp

[EFerrari]

20. I'm not a great believer in anything but I have found Jamail to be a good reporter. n/t

[Vattel]

29. do you have evidence for this? Or is it an article of faith?

[kickysnana]

30. As a 1970's WAC I can say rape was and is institutionalized.

If you report it you are in trouble. The people who ran the mental health clinc ran a prostitution ring out of the clinic acting as pimps. You got sent there if you got ill with anything during basic training or were seen crying. It was no better 15 years later when my younger sister's best friend joined or 10 years after that when my daughter-in-law joined. In the US you have a chance to get away not so in combat areas or basic training.

If you talk about it most people will say you must be exaggerating so you generally don't talk about.

[Gravel Democrat]

6. ^^

[L0oniX]

7. ...and we need Al-Jazeera to publish this. Thanks American news assholes.

[Karmadillo]

8. Support the troops! Ignore the facts!

http://articles.cnn.com/2008-07-31/us/military.sexabuse_1_sexual-assault-sexual-abuse-military-service?_s=PM:US

Sexual assault in military 'jaw-dropping,' lawmaker says

Ingrid Torres said she was attacked on a U.S. base in Korea: "I was raped while I slept."A congresswoman said Thursday that her "jaw dropped" when military doctors told her that four in 10 women at a veterans hospital reported being sexually assaulted while in the military.

A government report indicates that the numbers could be even higher.

Rep. Jane Harman, D-California, spoke before a House panel investigating the way the military handles reports of sexual assault.

She said she recently visited a Veterans Affairs hospital in the Los Angeles area, where women told her horror stories of being raped in the military.

more...

[w8liftinglady]

9. Thank you for posting.

[Karmadillo]

10. It's always interesting to see which threads get attention and which ones don't.

nt

[PufPuf23]

11. k&r nt

[leftstreet]

12. K&R

[MsLeopard]

16. K&R

:kick:

[earth mom]

17. Not surprised. K & R. nt

[pinboy3niner]

18. K&R

[Odin2005]

19. K&R

[Mnemosyne]

21. KnR... n/t

[justiceischeap]

25. Makes me wonder if when LGBTs are allowed to serve openly if some of this will stop

How many of the women reporting these rapes were raped because they are lesbian and couldn't be out about it. So therefore had to pretend to be hetero. I'm not suggesting rapists won't rape lesbians but if more women felt safe reporting these assaults, maybe they'd stop (or drop).