New research for the End Violence Against Women Coalition, carried out by YouGov, has shown devastating attitudes towards sexual consent and rape in the UK. Their report begins: “There is a crisis in the way the justice system deals with rape and sexual violence. Despite increasing numbers of women reporting rape to the police, the rates of people charged with and convicted of rape are falling. There have been recent investigations revealing worrying findings about juries’ reluctance to convict some defendants of rape”.
It is undeniable that many victims of sexual violence are so wary of the police and the criminal justice system that they refuse to go anywhere near it to report their victimisations. The police and courts have such a terrible reputation, and few people with inner knowledge of the system can blame women for not coming forward. But for those who do, terrible attitudes about rape and abuse are getting in the way of justice.
So, the End Violence Against Women Coalition (EVAW) asked almost 4,000 people a series of questions about their attitudes to rape and consent, and the findings were terrifying:
- 33% of people in Britain think it isn’t usually rape if a woman is pressured into having sex but there is no physical violence
- 33% think if a woman has flirted on a date it generally wouldn’t be rape, even if she hasn’t consented to sex (21% of women believe this)
- 24% of people don’t think that, in most cases, sex without consent in long-term relationships is rape (despite laws against rape in marriage being in place since 1991)
- 11% of people believe the more sexual partners a woman has, the less harm they experience from rape
- 40% of people think ‘stealthing’ it is never or usually not rape
- Around one in 10 are unsure or think it’s usually not rape to have sex with a woman who is asleep or too drunk to consent
- Over 65s have most troubling attitudes to rape, while younger people have opinions that are more closely aligned to the law.
Attitudes start young
Although the survey revealed that younger adults tend to have a more progressive attitude towards consent and rape, the overall statistics are still very worrying. And while I hear anecdotes about children as young as three or four being taught the concept of consent and being instructed on how to implement enthusiastic consent in their play and interactions, it seems clear that sex education at older ages is missing out information on consent and rape.
For 33% of men to believe that a woman flirting on a date is the same thing as her consenting to sex is nauseating, and for the same proportion of people to believe that being pressured into sex without violence being present does not equal rape is very frightening indeed. This leaves women who go on dates with men, in particular, highly vulnerable not only to assault (because the men they are dating have these beliefs) but also at risk of not being believed or not being taken seriously if they come forward. Because the people they come forward to may also share these beliefs.
Sex education needs to be radically updated to adequately address issues of consent so that this starts to change in the younger generations, who can then at least try to educate their elders. But that 33% includes teachers, so what they teach their kids could be affected by their own inappropriate beliefs.
The 33% also includes doctors. It includes nurses. It includes police officers. It includes barristers and lawyers. It includes your gas man and your bus driver and your friends and your parents. It includes your partner. Does it include you?
Juries are made up of that 33%
The thing about reporting your rape to the police is that you might end up at trial. And even if the police officers you work with are not part of the 33%, and even if the Crown’s barrister isn’t, and even if the judge isn’t, about 33% of that jury of twelve of your peers will be. 40% of them believe that a man secretly removing a condom without your permission and just carrying on is absolutely fine. One in ten of them thinks that if you’ve had numerous sexual partners then what you went through isn’t so bad at all. A quarter of them think it can’t be rape if you’re married to your attacker.
And these are the people who find your perpetrator guilty or not guilty. With attitudes like that so prevalent in society, is it any wonder that so few people accused are ending up in jail?
We need to look at our own behaviours
As well as looking around, wondering which of your family or friendship group might believe that having sex with a woman who is asleep is fine, we have to look at our own beliefs and attitudes and really examine what we believe and whether it is fully and completely respectful of those around us. Lena Bloody Dunham made up lies to discredit a woman who accused her friend of rape and, while we might not all go so far, would we find ourselves feeling negatively towards someone who accused our best bloke mate of going too far, too fast? Would we find ourselves excusing his behaviour if a woman said he had pushed her further than she had wanted to go?
We can’t look out at society with outrage without looking inside to make sure that we have not absorbed the lies that society so desperately wants us to believe. The patriarchy relies on us taking some of it in and, even if we think we have the right attitude towards victims of rape, we must never get complacent about the way we think and act.
Photo: Garry Knight