RAPE: ROUND THREE

The following is the third in a series of articles concerning rape contributed to WSW by Jeanne Van Atta.

Two of the most common and most self defeating attitudes women have concerning rape is the lack of confidence in their ability to defend themselves and the strong feeling of guilt. Both attitudes are products of society's earliest physical and mental influences on girl-children. The continual reminders to a young girl that he shouldn't be a "tom boy" generally result in her eventual removal from the realm of sports and strenuous physical activity. There are obvious exceptions to this, but they must be recognized as just that-exceptions.

Although many young girls are raised with the fear of potential attack very few are given any physical or psychological tools for self-defense. Though never instilled with fear as a child as many girls are, I was simply told to deliver a swift kick "between the legs" to any boy who bothered me. Years later when I found myself in the position to heed that advise, I was barefoot, so those long remembered words proyed useless. I resorted instead to my powers of persuasion and eventually it worked. My assailant recovered his knife, which I suddenly remembered I had knocked out of his hand, and left.

Although I have talked myself out of two such encounters-each under totally different circumstances. I don't think there are any magic words to use to ward off potential rapists. Never having

engaged in any form of physical combat before, I certainly felt unsure of attempting any quick punches, though both of my attackers were close to my size. Still I was more confident releying on my mind to save me-and I was lucky that it did. Many attackers are far beyond the-reach of reason.

Yet other women have escaped attack by use of their wits. Two women, approached by a threatening man threw their arms around tach other in an ambrace. Their assailant, thinking they were lesbians and not attracted to men, left in disgust. A woman in her mid-seventies caught by surprise by an assailant thought fast and said, "You don't want to have sex with a cancer-ridden old woman, do you?" Still another woman turned away an attacker by professing to have VD. It is important to try to take a quick evaluation of the mentality of the person you are dealing with if you are attacked. Some are highly dangerous and violent who might only be provoked by tricks.

A diagnostic treatment center for persons who are cor dered to be sexually dangerous was estab lished in Bridgewater, Mass. in 1959. In the last 15 years they have observed 950 patients, 50% of whom were convicted rapists. A statement released last year by a resident psychologist, Ralph Garofalo, divided sex offenders into four differ-

ent classifications determined by their motivations and attitudes. The first category is a man who is destructively aggressive. He usually has a long history of having difficulty in having heterosexual relationships His attack of a woman is motivated by the strong desire to humiliate and defile her. He chooses a woman as his victim in order to vent the anger which consumes him.

The second category devised by Garofalo is one in which sex is the motivation for the attack. This kind of man, they found, is generally socially isolated and passive. He will not be excessively violent in his attack, but he will use just enough force to evercome resistance. This type of attacker, Garofalo states, will generally give up under strong resistance from his victim.

The third type of sexual offender is sadistic. He is the kind of person who is sexually stimulated by the repeated resistance of his victim. Often he will misperceive that resistance as excitement on the part of the victim. This kind of person, Garofalo says, is usally cold and hostile in most rela. tionships with other people and has an extensive history of non-sexual "anti-social behavior.

The final category is a person who is neither sexually nor aggressively motivated. The person is an opportunist who has no qualms about break. ing the law. His use of violence runs the gamut from minimal to the opposite extreme. Garofalo concludes that even the least violent of these people is clearly dangerous. "At best these men have exploited women, used them as recepticals and objects without regard to the physical and psychological sequelae which may result from brutal and violent insults to their bodies and psyches," he says.

I have always felt that the liberation of a woman came not from the filling of vacancies left by men and thus being just as they are but rather through the discovery of our own self-worth as separate and different individuals. Along with this ealiza. tion comes a form of self-confidence which most women so shockingly lack. This assurance can enable a woman to go through many experiences including rape with a much lower degree of mental anguish. The ancient guilt for which the female sex has been made to pay penance is quite evident in most women's reactions to being raped. Drawing on old myths as archaic as Adam and Eve or the more modernized one that "nice girls don't get raped," women victims are left searching their souls for the quirk which may have caused the attack.,

There is a lot of damaging mythology surrounding the crime which stems from attitudes toward women in general. The fact that most people mis-

takenly believe that the primary motivation for rape is sexual is probably the source of most of the other fiction on the subject. The psychologist in Massachusettes is not the only person to contend that relatively few rapists are driven by their uncontrolable libido to commit a crime. Marion Kaszewski, Chief Administrative Assistant to Cuyahoga County Sheriff Ralph Kreiger, feels that hate is the prime motivation for rape. The rapist tries to reduce his victims to a helpless mass to defile them, he explains. They hate people, he says, not just women, and when they are put in jail, they rape each other. A regular visitor in county jail, Kaszewski says the number of rapes which take place there is appalling. But, the men who rape each other in jail are far more likely to pick a female victim when they are not incarcerated. Kaszewski relates that the FBI is currently conducting a study to discover the relationship of the occurrence of bombings and sex crimes to the phases of the moon.

Another one of the most destructive pieces of misunderstanding concerning rape is that women who are raped bring it on themselves in some way. A woman who goes out alone at night, wears alluring clothing or who talks to strangers is penal. ized with the accusation that she asked for it. This attitude prevails in all sectors of society and is not necessarily only at the perimeter of the circles of those who are guardians of the criminal justice system. Captain Violet E. Novak, head of the Women's Bureau of the Cleveland Police Department discussing ways in which a woman may protect herself from attack adds, "of course, if a woman sits in a bar and accepts a drink from a stranger, they might..." her voice trails off slightly. The rest is apparently understood; she is asking for trouble.

The moral here apparently is that in the pro-

cess of raising our own self-esteem we must learn to take charge of our own lives, and if that includes buying our own drinks, it is a small price to pay. Changing one's attitude toward being a woman includes being aware of the variety of ways in which our expected passiveness manifests itself.. The new danger, I suppose comes when the same kind of old attitudes follow a woman's attempt to remove herself from her own ingrained notions. So if a woman is raped by a man whom she asked to go out she will again be told that she asked for it. But no one else will obsolve us of our personal guilt if we are not first able to believe it ourselves.

What She Wantes/February, 1975