Content warning: violence against Indigenous people, sexual assault, sexual assault of minors, anti-Blackness
Sexual violence is ingrained in the foundation of the United States, and so is its intersection with race. When Christopher Columbus colonized what is now the United States in 1492, sexual violence was a key locus of control used to assert power over Indigenous women. Columbus and his associates not only perpetrated acts of sexual violence upon Indigenous femmes and gender diverse people but also sold them to others for the purpose of rape in what constituted a system of sex trafficking. Many survivors of this violence were nine to ten years old.
Sexual violence and rape culture have also been woven into the United States legal system since its inception. The American colonies defined rape in common law as “carnal knowledge of a woman 10 years or older, forcibly and against her will.” This conception of rape excluded male survivors and normalized acts that would now be considered statutory rape. It also did not provide legal protections to women of color, as many states excluded both free and enslaved Black women from their rape laws. Black women were also victimized by a 1662 law stating that any children resulting from intercourse between an enslaved woman and a white man were not legally free. This law created an economic incentive for white slaveowners to rape enslaved women, effectively legalizing sexual violence against Black women.
Sources:
- Ali, Russlynn. “Dear Colleague Letter .” U.S. Department of Education, Last modified January 5, 2021. https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-201104_pg1…;
- “Campus SaVE Act.” RAINN. RAINN. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://www.rainn.org/articles/campus-save-act.
- “Clery Act.” RAINN. RAINN. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://www.rainn.org/articles/cleryact#:~:text=In%201986%2C%20freshman….
- “'Dear Colleague' Letter on Campus Sexual Misconduct.” United States Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, United States Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, 22 Sept. 2017, https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-title-ix-2…;
- Obama Signs Renewal of Violence Against Women Act. n.d. USA Today. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/03/07/obama-signs-vio…;
- “The Jeanne Clery Act.” Clery Center. Clery Center. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://www.clerycenter.org/the-clery-act.
Content warning: sexual assault, anti-Blackness, medical racism, sexual assault of minors
A large part of United States rape culture is based in the disregard or omittance of Black femmes. Much of this erasure lies in a demonstrated lack of attention to consent and Black femmes’ ability to give it. J. Marion Sims, a doctor during the early 1800s that has since been widely discredited, is often cited as being one of the most severe case studies in this intersection. While he had very little knowledge of gynecology, he leased three enslaved women who experienced complications after childbirth and experimented on them without anesthesia or any clothing for five years. Anarcha, Betsy, and Lucy, the subjects of these experiments, were not able to consent as they were bound by the economic agreement made between the slave owners and Sims. They were also forced to do more uncompensated labor as Sims’ assistants in later experiments on each other and other enslaved women. When the results of the experiments were published, Sims was pictured alongside white nurses operating on white patients.
Further, the law also communicated that it was not necessary for Black women to give consent in a sexual encounter. Black women were not able to file rape charges against white men until 1861. Even with this legal protection, sexual violence against Black women continued to be used as a political tool. Many historians consider the American Civil War to be an anomaly in that it did not see widespread sexual violence. However, this conclusion is untrue and erases the experiences of many enslaved women, who were raped by Union soldiers as a show of power against the Confederacy. White women also experienced sexual violence during the Civil War, but their cases were more likely to find their way to court. Once in court, female survivors experienced even more barriers, such as testifying to all-male juries. Survivors were also required to document their age to proceed with a claim.
For enslaved or formerly enslaved women who often did not know their birthdays, this regulation was one of many that prevented Black women from accessing the criminal justice system in instances of abuse. Even when they were able to jump over these hurdles, Black women very rarely received favorable judgments against their abusers. In June of 1855, a slave named Celia killed slaveowner Robert Newsom in self-defense of an attempted rape after years of abuse beginning when she was 14 years old. Celia was incarcerated for the duration of the trial and delivered a stillborn child while in prison. Despite her lawyer arguing at trial that state self-defense laws made no distinction based on race, trial judge William Hall advised the all-white jury that they could not take self-defense arguments into account. These instructions all but demanded a guilty verdict and resulted in Celia’s execution in December of 1855.
Sources:
- Finan, Eileen. Tamika More for People Magazine. n.d. People. https://people.com/health/artist-michelle-browder-is-reclaiming-history…;
- Jensen, Annika. “Finally Speaking up: Sexual Assault in the Civil War Era.” The Gettysburg Compiler, July 14, 2017. https://gettysburgcompiler.org/2015/10/05/finally-speaking-up-sexual-as…;
- Jones, Briona, and Steven J Niven. “Celia (Missouri).” Enslaved Peoples of Historical Slave Trade, January 1, 1970. https://enslaved.org/fullStory/16-23-106167/.
- “Life Story: Anarcha, Betsy, and Lucy.” Women & the American Story. New-York Historical Society. https://wams.nyhistory.org/a-nation-divided/antebellum/anarcha-betsy-lu…;
- “Rethinking the Legacy of Marion Sims.” Equal Justice Initiative. Equal Justice Initiative, January 9, 2023. https://eji.org/news/rethinking-the-legacy-of-marion-sims/.
- “The ‘Father of Modern Gynecology’ Performed Shocking Experiments on Enslaved Women.” History.com. https://www.history.com/news/the-father-of-modern-gynecology-performed-….
Content warning: sexual assault, anti-Blackness, racialized murder and violence
Sexual violence against and scapegoated upon Black men is also an important foundation of rape culture in the United States. Its underpinnings lie in slavery, which used sexual violence and other power-based violence as tools to maintain a racial hierarchy based in white supremacy. Many scholars have studied the portrayal of the Black male body during this time period and find it to have contributed to a hypersexualization of Black masculinity. Slaves were often not fully clothed and were depicted as such in pop cultural images. This portrayal and the systemic objectification of enslaved people contributed to a culture that fixated on Black bodies and enabled sexual violence against them. For Black men, this translated to sexual violence perpetrated against them in many forms, including forced coupling and sexual assault of female slaves for the purpose of creating more slaves, sexual assault as punishment, and sexual violence perpetrated by white women on plantations.
During Reconstruction, which began in 1865 at the end of the Civil War, white people were watching as the oppressive social order they built crumbled after emancipation. They then began to seek ways to reassert that power over Black people. This resulted in widespread sexual violence and violence in general perpetrated by white mobs and individuals against Black people between 1865 and 1877. A key idea this rash of violence relied on was framing Black men as commonly desiring to rape white women. This resulted in a shift from Black men being seen as weak and easily subjugated through slavery to hypermasculine and sexually threatening during Reconstruction. This dangerous rhetoric resulted in mass lynchings of Black men accused of sexually assaulting white women. Little to no evidence was presented to support these claims, and many of the women making them recanted after these Black men were murdered. While it is a common rape myth that survivors frequently lie about their experiences, this specific phenomenon is an example of intentional racialized violence. The Equal Justice Initiative has documented 34 mass lynchings that occurred during Reconstruction, each killing between 6 and 200 Black people. This number does not account for the countless individual lynchings that went undocumented. Accusations of rape accounted for one in every four of these lynchings.
These racist ideas about Black men were not unique to the Reconstruction Era. Their legacies continued to motivate violence against Black men post-Reconstruction and still do to this day. One of the most notable examples of this effect was the 1908 Springfield riot. Mabel Hallam, a white woman, claimed that George Richardson, a Black man, had raped her. Richardson was quickly taken into custody along with Joe James, another Black man who was being held on murder charges. A 5,000-person white mob gathered outside the jail and demanded the release of the two men so that they could inflict their own violence upon them. The two men were secretly moved to another jail, and the mob, upon learning this, erupted. They went to Black neighborhoods and destroyed Black homes and businesses until the violence eventually culminated into the lynching of Scott Burton and Will Donegan, two prominent leaders in the Black community. Hallam recanted her rape allegation two weeks after the riot.
Sources:
- “Chapter 3: Documenting Reconstruction Violence.” Equal Justice Initiative Reports, June 15, 2020. https://eji.org/report/reconstruction-in-america/documenting-reconstruc…;
- Foster, Thomas A. “The Sexual Abuse of Black Men Under American Slavery.” Journal of the History of Sexuality. University of Texas Press, August 31, 2011. https://muse.jhu.edu/article/448992.
- George Richardson. n.d. The State-Journal Register. https://www.sj-r.com/story/news/2008/05/31/the-accused-george-richardso….
- “History of the Springfield 1908 Race Riot.” Visit Springfield Illinois, January 31, 2023. https://visitspringfieldillinois.com/BlogDetails/History_of_the_Springf….
- Merritt, Carole. Something So Horrible: The Springfield Race Riot of 1908. Springfield, IL: Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation, 2008.
- Quin, Kevin C. “Sexual Violence Against Enslaved Men.” AAIHS, October 28, 2019. https://www.aaihs.org/sexual-violence-against-enslaved-men/.
- Senechal, Roberta. “The Springfield Race Riot of 1908.” IPO. Illinois State Library. Accessed March 30, 2023. https://www.lib.niu.edu/1996/iht329622.html.
- Sherman, Pete. “The Accused: George Richardson.” The State Journal-Register. www.sj-r.com, May 31, 2008. https://www.sj-r.com/story/news/2008/05/31/the-accused-george-richardso….
Content warning: sexual assault, anti-Asian racism, anti-Blackness, racialized murder and violence
Racialized sexual violence perpetrated by U.S. citizens was not confined to American soil. During World War II, systematic sexual violence was perpetrated against women by many different armies. The Japanese military employed a system of sexual slavery that exploited over 200,000 women and girls as “comfort women” for Japanese soldiers. While the United States military did not have such a formalized system, historians are continuing to unravel the atrocities it committed in Japan during military occupation. There are many documented instances of American soldiers taking Japanese girls from their homes at gunpoint in military vehicles. Many soldiers also used their positions of authority to perform “inspections” of Japanese homes only to return later that night to rape any women they found in that home. The American occupying forces mandated censorship of many of these incidents in Japanese news outlets, making these cases incredibly difficult to prosecute at the time and just as difficult for historians to study today.
Back on the homefront, Black women also continued to experience racialized sexual violence during this time period. One of the most prominent cases was that of Recy Taylor, a 24-year-old Black mother. On her walk home from church on September 3, 1944, seven white men held her and a friend at gunpoint and abducted Taylor. They then took her to a remote area of the woods where six of the men raped her and left her on the side of the highway. The racial violence of the Jim Crow era prevented many Black women from sharing stories of similar violence. Taylor was one of few that identified her rapists to the police and testified against them. One of the men confessed afterwards and identified the other six men, who claimed that because they had “paid” Taylor, the incident could not be considered rape. None of the men were taken into custody, and the Taylor family home was burned down the day after the confession.
In response to this injustice, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) sent activist Rosa Parks to investigate and support the Taylors. Despite being memorialized in history for her role in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Parks was the NAACP’s chief rape investigator during this time period and had a large role in the rape crisis movement, another example of the omittance of Black women’s role in organizing around sexual violence. Taylor and Parks’s efforts to galvanize support resulted in a hearing on October 3, 1944. The all-white, all-male jury dismissed the case after five minutes of deliberation. Parks continued to organize alongside other activists by forming the Committee for Equal Justice for Mrs. Recy Taylor. A second trial began on February 14, 1945, resulting in three more of the men confessing to the rape. However, none were prosecuted for the crime.
Racialized narratives of sexual violence also continued to direct violence towards Black men and boys in the Jim Crow era. One of the most prominent examples of this phenomenon is the murder of Emmett Till in 1955. Till was visiting family in Mississippi when he entered a convenience store, bought some candy, and interacted with Carolyn Bryant, a white woman, on his way out. Bryant alleged that the 14-year-old boy made sexual advances and wolf-whistled at her. A few days later, Roy Bryant, the white woman’s husband, and J.W. Milam, her brother-in-law, kidnapped Till from his relatives’ home, beat him in Milam’s toolhouse, shot him, and threw his body in the Tallahatchie River. A cotton-gin fan was attached to his neck with barbed wire to weigh him down. When his body was recovered three days later, it was so mutilated that his relatives could only identify him by a ring left on his finger. Till’s mother insisted on an open-casket funeral so that the world was forced to confront the heart wrenching and inhuman effects of racism in the Jim Crow South. 50,000 people were in attendance at the funeral, and Jet magazine published photos of Till’s body that attracted national attention.
Bryant and Milam, meanwhile, were acquitted by another all-male, all-white jury. They went on to sell a detailed account of the murder to Look magazine, which published the article in 1956. Carolyn Bryant also recanted her testimony, stating that Till did not make any sort of advance towards her. The horror of this case is often cited as a key factor in the advent of the civil rights movement. Three months after the discovery of Till’s body, the Montgomery Bus Boycott began.
Sources:
- Alexander, Kerri Lee. “Recy Taylor.” National Women’s History Museum. 2020. www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/recy-taylor.
- “Emmett Till Is Murdered.” History. A&E Television Networks, August 24, 2022. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-death-of-emmett-till.&n…;
- “Emmett Till Murderers Make Magazine Confession.” History. A&E Television Networks, January 26, 2022. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/emmett-till-murderers-make-…;
- McCarthy, Julie, and Photos by Cheryl Diaz Meyer. “Photos: Why These World War II Sex Slaves Are Still Demanding Justice.” NPR. NPR, December 4, 2020. https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/12/04/940819094/photos-t….
- Recy Taylor. n.d. National Museum of African American History & Culture. https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/recy-taylor-rosa-parks-and-strugg…;
- “Recy Taylor, Rosa Parks, and the Struggle for Racial Justice.” National Museum of African American History and Culture, August 10, 2020. https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/recy-taylor-rosa-parks-and-strugg…;
- “Synopsis.” The Rape of Recy Taylor. Augusta Films LLC. Accessed March 30, 2023. https://www.therapeofrecytaylor.com/the-film/.
- Tanaka, Toshiyuki. “Chapter 5.” Essay. In Japan's Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery and Prostitution during World War II and the US Occupation. London: Routledge, 2007.
- “The Murder of Emmett Till.” Library of Congress. Accessed March 30, 2023. https://www.loc.gov/collections/civil-rights-history-project/articles-a…;
- “The Murder of Emmett Till.” PBS. Public Broadcasting Service, August 23, 2022. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/till/.
Content warning: sexual assault, anti-Blackness, transphobia
The 70’s saw the beginnings of streamlined professionalization in the rape crisis movement. While this era produced many victories for the cause, it also was driven by the whitewashing of a movement that began with the work of BIPOC and queer people. Much of what we recognize as the rape crisis movement today started with the testimonies of Frances Thompson and Lucy Smith, following the Memphis Riots of 1866. These Black women were raped by a white mob fueled by the racist tensions underlying Reconstruction and post-emancipation America. In coverage of their testimonies, news outlets attempted to discredit Thompson specifically because she was assigned male at birth but presented herself in a very traditionally femme way. Articles about the testimonies included the results of examinations by doctors of Thompson’s genitalia. In discussing the beginnings of more mainstream activism in the 70’s, it is critical to remember these women and so many others, who were breaking the silence around sexual violence even before infrastructural support for such resistance existed.
One of the most notable accomplishments for the movement of the 1970’s was the opening of the first rape crisis center in San Francisco. This center is named Bay Area Women Against Rape (BAWAR) and was co-founded by Oleta Abrams in 1971. Her 15-year-old foster daughter experienced sexual violence in a stairwell at Berkeley High School and was not adequately supported by police officers and doctors after reporting. This lit a fire in Abrams to create a resource that would have benefited her daughter in her experience as a survivor.
One year later, in 1972, Title IX was enacted into law. This piece of legislation sponsored by Senator Birch Bayh is associated most strongly with its application to sports, but it has a tremendous role in providing protections to survivors of sexual violence as well. Case law concerning Title IX has evolved to create a legal duty for schools receiving federal funding to protect students from gender-based violence, making it an important piece of the puzzle in addressing sexual violence on college campuses.
Sources:
- “A Case of Sexual Violence during Reconstruction, 1866.” The American Yawp Reader. Accessed March 30, 2023. https://www.americanyawp.com/reader/reconstruction/a-case-of-sexual-vio…;
- Greensite, Gillian. “History of the Rape Crisis Movement.” Washington Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs. WCSAP. Accessed March 30, 2023. https://www.wcsap.org/sites/default/files/uploads/resources_publication…;
- “Harvard University, Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, 96-M117-C1-1-7.” Hollis. Harvard Library, August 4, 1976. https://hollis.harvard.edu/primo-explore/viewcomponent/L/HVD_VIA8000893…;
- History.com Editors. “Title IX Enacted.” HISTORY. A&E Television Networks, November 16, 2009. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/title-ix-enacted.
- May, Meredith. “Oleta Abrams -- Co-Founder of Rape Crisis Center.” SFGATE. San Francisco Chronicle, January 16, 2005. https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Oleta-Abrams-co-founder-of-rape-…;
- “Title IX and Sexual Violence in Schools.” American Civil Liberties Union, September 29, 2010. https://www.aclu.org/title-ix-and-sexual-violence-schools#:~:text=Under…;
- Women's Walk Against Rape. 1976. Schlesinger Library. https://hollis.harvard.edu/primo-explore/viewcomponent/L/HVD_VIA8000893….
Content warning: sexual assault, anti-Blackness, racialized murder and violence
1975 was a hallmark year for sexual violence prevention and response. It marked key changes in societal understandings of sexual violence resulting from the increased visibility of activism seen in the early 1970’s. These results were first seen in the publication of Against Our Will, Susan Brownmiller’s book discussing the political and cultural phenomena underlying sexual assault. Brownmiller’s work was critical to a public construction of sexual violence as power-based violence because it framed sexual violence as an attempt by men to exercise control over women. This observation, however, raises several concerns about the intersectionality of Against Our Will. Alongside being a very obviously gendered take on sexual violence, many feminists of color such as Angela Davis and bell hooks spoke out against its racist rhetoric. Much of this criticism stems from Brownmiller’s discussion of Emmett Till and her description of his alleged whistle as a “deliberate insult just short of physical assault.” For this reason, critics said that the book relied on the false image of the Black male rapist to make its points. The book also failed to include the perspectives of many women of color and focused almost exclusively upon sexual violence perpetrated by men against white women. Despite the progress it represented for visibility of sexual violence at the time, Against Our Will is one of many examples from this era of white progressives failing to make space for people of intersectional identities in their activism and deliberately harming those with multiple marginalized identities.
The increased visibility of survivors in the 1970’s was also reflected in the legal system. Also passed in 1975, the country’s first federal “rape shield” laws prohibited a survivor’s past sexual history and reputation from being presented as evidence to the court. This practice was fairly common before this legislation was passed and prevented many survivors from reporting for fear of a loss of privacy. This change was a key step in crafting more survivor-centric systems within the law.
All of these events culminated into one of this time period’s most notorious cases involving sexual violence: the trial of Joan Little. On August 27, 1974, corrections officer Clarence Alligood was found dead in Little’s cell. Little told corrections staff she had acted in self-defense after Alligood entered brandishing an ice pick and attempting to sexually assault her. She was still charged with first degree murder. This trial drew national attention on the heels of the Civil Rights movement as Little, a Black woman previously convicted only for a petty offense, would face the death penalty if found guilty for the murder of a white corrections officer. Chapters of the Joan Little Legal Defense Committee were founded across the country, including a Detroit chapter led by Rosa Parks. At the end of the trial, the jury found Little not guilty. Much of this verdict can be attributed to not only Little’s testimony but that of Ida Mae Roberson and Phyllis Ann Moore, two other Black survivors of Alligood’s violence. The “Free Joan Little Movement” and its result exemplifies the intersectionality of oppression based in race, gender, and carceral status and the power of those organizing against it who do not often receive recognition within the rape crisis movement.
Sources:
- Activists Gather to Protest for Justice for Joanne Little. n.d. Prison Culture. http://www.usprisonculture.com/blog/2011/01/04/free-joan-little-reflect…;“Aug. 15, 1975: Joan Little Acquitted.” Zinn Education Project.
- Rethinking Schools and Teaching for Change. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/joan-little-acquitted/.
- Bishop, Kyla. “A Reflection on the History of Sexual Assault Laws in the United States.” UA Little Rock. University of Arkansas at Little Rock, April 15, 2018. https://ualr.edu/socialchange/2018/04/15/reflection-history-sexual-assa…;
- Cohen, Sascha. “How a Book Changed the Way We Talk About Rape.” Time. Time, October 7, 2015. https://time.com/4062637/against-our-will-40/.
- Cooke, Rachel. “US Feminist Susan Brownmiller on Why Her Groundbreaking Book on Rape Is Still Relevant.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, February 18, 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/18/susan-brownmiller-against….
- Farmer, Ashley. “Free Joan Little: Anti-Rape Activism, Black Power, and the Black Freedom Movement.” Black Perspectives. African American Intellectual History Society, February 4, 2016. https://www.aaihs.org/free-joan-little/.
Content warning: sexual assault, violence against Indigenous people, genocide, racialized murder and violence
Amidst many of these historic victories, violence against Indigenous femmes and its promotion in mainstream society remained constant. In November 1982, American Multiple Industries published the video game Custer’s Revenge. Players took on the persona of a United States commander that earned points for each successful rape of a physically restrained, Indigenous woman. While Custer’s Revenge sparked mass protests that succeeded in removing it from circulation, it did not leave shelves before approximately 80,000 copies of the game were sold. A remake of the game was published online in 2014.
In the same year, the United States funded sexual violence and violence in general against Indigenous people in Guatemala. Commonly referred to as the Maya genocide, the Guatamalan government systematically raped, tortured, and murdered Maya people during the Guatamalan Civil War, which lasted from 1960 to 1996. 900,000 Maya people were displaced, and 166,000 were killed. During the Río Negro massacres, the specific event known and funded by the United States in 1982, Guatemalan soldiers forced Maya women to dance for their entertainment before taking them apart from the group to rape them. They then forced the captured Maya group to walk up a nearby mountain while beating the women and children. Once they reached the top, the group was brutally massacred.
Both of these events are not in the distant past and represent continued intersectional struggles for Indigenous women and people in preventing and responding to sexual violence. The legacy of colonialism in the United States is one of these oppressive structures.
Sources:
- Carasik, Lauren, and Grahame Russell. “Justice Delayed 30 Years in Guatemala.” Al Jazeera. Al Jazeera Media Network, January 4, 2012. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2012/1/4/justice-delayed-30-years-in…;
- Cipolla, Ariel. “The 5 Worst Videogames in History.” LatinAmerican Post. Global Mass Media, March 15, 2020. https://latinamericanpost.com/32358-the-5-worst-videogames-in-history.&…;
- Foster, Lynn V., and Peter Mathews. Handbook to Life in the Ancient Maya World. New York, NY: Facts On File, Inc., 2002.
- Protestors against Custer's Revenge. n.d. UCONN Library. https://blogs.lib.uconn.edu/archives/2015/04/01/man-woman-machine-gende…;
- “Río Negro Massacres v. Guatemala.” Loyola Law School. Loyola Marymount University. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://iachr.lls.edu/cases/r%C3%ADo-negro-massacres-v-guatemala.
- Smith, Andrea. “Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide.” Journal of Religion & Abuse 1, no. 2 (1999): 31–52. https://doi.org/10.1300/j154v01n02_04.
- Wheeler, Kim. “Indigenous Video Game Designer Takes Stand against Custer's Revenge.” CBC. CBC/Radio Canada, November 26, 2014. https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/indigenous-video-game-designer-takes….
Content warning: anti-Blackness, medical racism, sexual harassment, racialized murder and violence
Despite the increasing progressiveness of the movements against sexual violence and for reproductive freedom, victories for some often meant harm for women of color. A prime example is the advent of Norplant, an extremely effective form of birth control inserted into the arm to release progestin over a period of five years. The Food and Drug Administration approved Norplant in 1990, and its use soon took a coercive turn. Popular news outlets began to publish pieces suggesting that this new form of birth control could be used to reduce the number of Black children. A prime example is The Philadelphia Inquirer article entitled “Poverty and Norplant: Can Contraception Reduce the Underclass?” among others. Because of Norplant’s unique qualities of longevity and not being able to be removed without the aid of a medical professional, it came to be viewed as a powerful eugenic tool against communities of color and low income communities.
This rhetoric was not confined to public discourse and translated strongly to the courts. Legislators in more than a dozen states authored legislation that advocated for forced implementation of Norplant for impoverished communities. Judges began to offer low income and Black women convicted of crimes the option of a reduced prison sentence if they agreed to a Norplant insertion. Sometimes, the implementation of Norplant was even included in the original sentencing as was the case for Darlene Johnson, a 27 year old mother brought in on a child abuse charge. Given the state of mass incarceration in the United States, the impact of these trends fell disproportionately upon low income people of color.
During this same time period, one of the most visible hearings concerning sexual harassment in the United States was taking center stage. In 1991, Anita Hill, an attorney and previous advisor to Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, testified that Thomas had sexually harassed her during his time as chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Hill testified before a committee of 14 white men. Records from the committee’s discussion include comments such as that of former Senator Arlen Specter, who stated that discussing “large breasts” in the workplace was commonplace and, therefore, not offensive. In his response, Thomas dubbed the hearing a “high-tech lynching” that told other Black Americans with conservative viewpoints they would be “lynched, destroyed, [and] caricatured by a committee of the U.S. Senate, rather than hung from a tree.” Thomas was confirmed by a vote of 52 to 48. This hearing exemplified the many different layers of oppression that Black women face in general and when reporting perpetrators of color, specifically Black men.
Sources:
- Anita Hill. n.d. Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Anita-Hill.
- Booth, William. “Judge Orders Birth Control Implant in Defendant.” The Washington Post. The Washington Post, January 5, 1991. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1991/01/05/judge-orders…;
- Gross, Terry. “Anita Hill Started A Conversation About Sexual Harassment. She's Not Done Yet.” NPR. NPR, September 28, 2021. https://www.npr.org/2021/09/28/1040911313/anita-hill-belonging-sexual-h….
- “'High-Tech Lynching': Thomas Denies Anita Hill Harassment Allegations.” The Washington Post, The Washington Post, 18 Sept. 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/high-tech-lynching-thomas….
- Mills Rodrigo, Chris. “Timeline: A History of the Joe Biden-Anita Hill Controversy.” The Hill. Nexstar Media Inc., May 4, 2019. https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/441408-timeline-a-history-of-the-…;
- “Norplant: A New Contraceptive with the Potential for Abuse.” ACLU. American Civil Liberties Union. Accessed March 16, 2023. https://www.aclu.org/other/norplant-new-contraceptive-potential-abuse#:…;
- “Poverty and Norplant.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 12, 1990.
Content warning: sexual assault, intimate partner violence
One of the structural issues fostering sexual violence, particularly in early legislative history, is the lack of resources that aid in giving it a name. Federal and state laws codified in the early 1990’s chipped away at this issue. In 1993, marital rape was outlawed in all 50 states. Prior to this development, many rape statutes only considered forced intercourse to be rape when the perpetrator was male and the survivor was someone he did not have a prior sexual relationship with. The marital rape exception was, therefore, rooted in the idea that consent is a contractual relationship a woman enters when she marries a man.
While this thinking may seem outdated in the context of modern social movements, many states still have loopholes in their legislation that allow for marital rape cases to go unprosecuted when survivors bring them forward. Such was the case of Jenny Teeson, a survivor of marital rape, in 2019. When she reported her case to law enforcement, Teeson discovered that Minnesota law still contained a provision shielding perpetrators from prosecution if the survivor was their spouse or in a voluntary sexual relationship with the perpetrator. The provision was repealed that year due largely to Teeson’s efforts in lobbying state lawmakers. Despite this win in Minnesota, approximately a dozen states still provide legal protections to perpetrators in situations of marital rape. In South Carolina, married survivors have to prove a threat of physical violence within 30 days of an act of sexual violence before pursuing a case. In Ohio, intentionally impairing a spouse’s mental state to perpetrate an act of sexual violence or perpetrating when a spouse is unconscious is completely legal.
In 1994, these victories at the state level were complemented by overarching federal legislation. Joe Biden, who was a senator of Delaware at the time, wrote the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). VAWA was the first law to define sexual violence as a federal crime. It also created several federal resources for combating sexual violence, such as frameworks for prevention programs. VAWA is up for renewal every five years, and, while originally authored as a provision to serve women, it has evolved with each iteration to serve a more diverse community of survivors. The 2022 renewal created an LGBTQ+ program and strengthened pertinent non-discrimination laws so that VAWA can be applied to people of all genders. It also restored tribal jurisdiction for Native American tribes to prosecute non-Native perpetrators.
Sources:
- Bierschbach, Briana. “This Woman Fought To End Minnesota's 'Marital Rape' Exception, And Won.” NPR. NPR, May 4, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/05/04/719635969/this-woman-fought-to-end-minne…;
- Jenny Teeson, Center, in White, Looks on as Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz Signs a Bill Repealing a Law That Prevented Prosecutors from Filing Sexual Assault Charges against People Accused of Raping Their Spouse. n.d. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/03/us/minnesota-marital-rape-repeal/index.h…;
- Trau, Morgan. “Bill to Criminalize Spousal Rape in Ohio Has No Opponents, so Why Can't It Pass?” News 5 Cleveland WEWS. Scripps Media, Inc, April 19, 2022. https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/politics/ohio-politics/bill-to-crim…;
- “Violence Against Women Act.” National Network to End Domestic Violence. National Network to End Domestic Violence. Accessed March 23, 2023. https://nnedv.org/content/violence-against-women-act/.
Content warning: sexual assault, homophobia, transphobia
A wave of organized activism in sexual violence prevention and response occurred in the early 2000’s. The first official Sexual Assault Awareness Month (SAAM) was held in April 2001, but it was preceded by decades of public demonstrations in the month of April led predominately by women of color. The National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC) brought these coalitions together through polling about top issues and what symbols should represent the movement. This collective decision making resulted in the advent of the teal ribbon as a symbol for sexual assault awareness. The earliest SAAMs were focused on raising awareness for the issue. The month eventually evolved first to focus on prevention and now to focus on a different theme each year. The theme of SAAM 2023 is “Drawing Connections: Prevention Demands Equity.”
Early 2000s efforts also resulted in the passing of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). The 2001 Human Rights Watch report entitled “No Escape: Male Prisoner Rape” was instrumental in garnering national attention of the issue. Because of this traction, the original version of PREA focused only on sexual violence perpetrated by male inmates upon other male inmates. Most of the survivors participating in the bill’s first congressional hearing were men, marking a significant turning point in the visibility of male survivorship. PREA was also groundbreaking in that it addressed the increased sexual violence perpetrated against trans and non-binary inmates as a result of being incarcerated in facilities not affirming to their gender identities. It provided greater autonomy to these individuals in determining where they would be housed and if they wanted to perform potentially vulnerable activities, such as showering, separately from other inmates. While this increased access for male and queer survivors was positive, the original PREA was criticized for not addressing staff-initiated sexual violence, which affects inmates of all gender identities but was statistically shown to affect more female inmates. This alteration was made, and PREA passed in 2003.
All of these organized efforts and the history that preceded them culminated into the inception of the Me Too movement. It was founded in 2006 by Tarana Burke, who was inspired by her work with predominantly BIPOC youth and their experiences with sexual violence alongside her own. Burke worked to build a community of advocates armed with the resources to fight sexual violence on a grassroots level until October 2017 when the movement gained new popularity. Actress Ashley Judd told her story of Harvey Weinstein’s sexual misconduct against her, and Alyssa Milano invited others to share their stories on social media with the hashtag #MeToo. Burke was not widely known as the founder of Me Too at this time due to this visibility sparked by wealthy, white women, but Milano and Burke eventually joined forces to properly credit the movement to Burke.
The early 2000s saw a slew of new stories and voices in the fight against sexual violence and an ongoing public dialogue about how power dynamics factor into sexual violence perpetration. The Me Too movement and the other activism occurring during this time period represent an important shift in mainstream prevention and response to favor a construction of sexual violence as power-based violence.
Sources:
- Alexander, Kerri Lee. “Tarana Burke.” National Women’s History Museum. 2020. www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/tarana-burke.
- Burke, Tarana. “History & Inception.” me too. Movement. me too. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://metoomvmt.org/get-to-know-us/history-inception/.
- Chicago Tribune Dataviz team. “#MeToo: A Timeline of Events.” Chicago Tribune, February 4, 2021. https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/ct-me-too-timeline-20171208-h…;
- Khomami, Nadia. “#MeToo: How a Hashtag Became a Rallying Cry against Sexual Harassment.” The Guardian. Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies, October 20, 2017. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/20/women-worldwide-use-hasht….
- “LGBT People and the Prison Rape Elimination Act.” National Center for Transgender Equality, National Center for Transgender Equality, July 2012, https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/PREA_July2….
- “Prison Rape Elimination Act.” American University Washington College of Law. Washington College of Law. Accessed March 23, 2023. https://www.wcl.american.edu/impact/initiatives-programs/endsilence/leg…;
- Tarana Burke at #MeToo Survivors' March. n.d. Los Angeles Sentinel. https://lasentinel.net/metoo-founder-tarana-burke-leads-survivors-march….
Content warning: sexual assault, murder and violence
Barack Obama’s presidency saw many changes in the federal treatment of sexual violence prevention and response. One of the first of these developments was the 2011 Dear Colleague Letter. It directed schools to employ the “preponderance of the evidence” standard, which dictates that a student is responsible for sexual violence if it is more likely than not that sexual violence occurred. This standard represented a lower threshold for findings of responsibility than previous rules set by some schools. The letter also discouraged the use of cross examination in Title IX hearings as it had the potential to violate Title IX protections for survivors. Further, the letter recommended that schools, while still affording the rights of the accused, do not unnecessarily delay conduct proceedings related to Title IX. Having these provisions in writing from the White House was incredibly significant in providing protections to survivors undergoing school-led conduct processes and designating sexual violence prevention and response as a national priority.
In 2013, President Obama signed another historic step in university prevention and response into law: the Campus SaVE Act. This piece of legislation amended the Clery Act, which requires universities to disclose crime statistics relevant to its communities and support survivors of violent crime with campus resources and preventative measures. The Clery Act was named after Jeanne Clery, a freshman who was sexually assaulted and murdered in her dorm room in 1986. Despite this law being enacted in response to an act of sexual violence, the Clery Act previously lacked detail in its provisions regarding sexual violence. It also only required that forcible and non-forcible sex offenses be reported. The Campus SaVE Act now additionally requires schools to report statistics on other forms of sexual violence such as sexual assault, intimate partner violence, and stalking. It also made the Clery Act more survivor-centric by providing survivors with the explicit right to accommodations like changes in their living situation and pursuing a restraining or no-contact order. The Campus SaVE Act additionally requires that schools implement and support prevention and education programs as well as clear response processes for cases of sexual violence. Both of these provisions, while altered through different presidencies, represent new resources for survivors and renewed prioritization of their rights on campus.
Sources:
- Alexander, Kerri Lee. “Tarana Burke.” National Women’s History Museum. 2020. www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/tarana-burke.
- Burke, Tarana. “History & Inception.” me too. Movement. me too. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://metoomvmt.org/get-to-know-us/history-inception/.
- Chicago Tribune Dataviz team. “#MeToo: A Timeline of Events.” Chicago Tribune, February 4, 2021. https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/ct-me-too-timeline-20171208-h…;
- Khomami, Nadia. “#MeToo: How a Hashtag Became a Rallying Cry against Sexual Harassment.” The Guardian. Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies, October 20, 2017. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/20/women-worldwide-use-hasht….
- “LGBT People and the Prison Rape Elimination Act.” National Center for Transgender Equality, National Center for Transgender Equality, July 2012, https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/PREA_July2….
- “Prison Rape Elimination Act.” American University Washington College of Law. Washington College of Law. Accessed March 23, 2023. https://www.wcl.american.edu/impact/initiatives-programs/endsilence/leg…;
- Tarana Burke at #MeToo Survivors' March. n.d. Los Angeles Sentinel. https://lasentinel.net/metoo-founder-tarana-burke-leads-survivors-march….
Emerging legislation and activism created a need for more publicly available data about sexual violence, especially at institutions of higher education. In the spring of 2017, Tulane responded to these concerns by conducting a climate survey on sexual violence and harassment on campus. The results of this survey stirred an emotional response in students, who learned that a disproportionate number of their peers were survivors of sexual violence. 41% of surveyed undergraduate women responded that they had experienced sexual violence since enrolling at Tulane. Queer women were found to be the most heavily victimized with 51% of the population having experienced sexual violence since enrolling. It is likely that students of color were underrepresented in the survey; while nationwide statistics tell us that this population experiences disproportionate rates of sexual violence, the Tulane climate survey did not yield this result. Campus activism around sexual violence exploded and, among other efforts, resulted in the first annual Tulane Sexual Violence Town Hall, which the Sexual Violence Prevention and Response (SVPR) collective continues to hold to this day.
The concerns of these students were not unfounded as much of their rage was also focused on events happening on campuses across the country. In 2016, Chanel Miller was attending a fraternity party with her sister at Stanford University. She was later found unconscious behind a dumpster being sexually assaulted by Brock Turner, a freshman at the university. Despite the maximum sentencing for the crime being 14 years in state prison, Turner was sentenced to six months in county jail. The judge attributed much of this sentence to Turner’s swimming career and his Olympic aspirations. In the end, Turner served three months of his sentence.
The case received national attention when Buzzfeed published Miller’s, then Emily Doe’s, victim impact statement. Her words were eventually expanded into a memoir she wrote about her experiences as a survivor entitled Know My Name. The book quickly became a New York Times bestseller, marking the first time many people were exposed to concepts of institutional betrayal and revictimization by the courts in such an accessible format.
In 2018, the country was shook once again by a highly publicized trial pertaining to sexual violence. When Brett Kavanaugh was nominated to the supreme court by Donald Trump, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford came forward with her story of victimization by Kavanaugh when the two were in high school. In later interviews, Dr. Blasey Ford also described an enduring rape culture in the network of preparatory schools in D.C. where the assault had occurred that created the environment in which this behavior was accepted. Despite the FBI receiving approximately 4,500 tips regarding the case, Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Supreme Court. He still serves as a justice today.
Earlier that same year, however, survivors came out in large numbers to secure an important victory in the prevention and response movement. Larry Nassar, a former doctor at USA Gymnastics, was convicted for abusing at least 260 women and girls in the course of his work. The first public allegations against him were lodged by Olympic gymnast McKayla Maroney in October 2017 during the aforementioned renewed energy around the Me Too movement. Other prominent athletes such as Aly Raisman, Simone Biles and many more told their stories publicly over the course of the trial, which cemented the case in a public dialogue about Nassar’s personal failures and the failures of the institution that employed him. At the end of the trial, 204 survivors and their advocates read victim impact statements to a national audience.
All of these testimonies represent more than political phenomena or a number on a page. They are the lived experiences of people, who still exist outside of these moments of pain.
Sources:
- Baker, Katie J.M. “Here's The Powerful Letter The Stanford Victim Read To Her Attacker.” BuzzFeed News. BuzzFeed, June 3, 2016. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/katiejmbaker/heres-the-powerful-le…;
- Chanel Miller. Penguin Random House. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://chanel-miller.com/.
- “Climate Assessment.” Tulane University. Tulane University. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://allin.tulane.edu/climate-assessment.
- Contrera, Jessica, Ian Shapira, Emma Brown, and Steve Hendrix. “Kavanaugh Accuser Christine Blasey Ford Moved 3,000 Miles to Reinvent Her Life. It Wasn’t Far Enough.” The Washington Post. The Washington Post, September 27, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/christine-blasey-ford-wanted-to-fl…;
- De Silva, Sanjali, Story Sullivan, and Sophia Mariani. “Students Push for Representation in Sexual Assault Prevention Efforts.” The Tulane Hullabaloo. The Hullabaloo, October 5, 2017. https://tulanehullabaloo.com/30542/news/petition-town-hall-address-sexu…;
- History.com Editors. “Larry Nassar, a Former Doctor for USA Gymnastics, Is Sentenced to Prison for Sexual Assault.” HISTORY. A&E Television Networks, August 28, 2019. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/larry-nassar-usa-gymnastics…;
- NPR Staff. “READ: Christine Blasey Ford's Opening Statement For Senate Hearing.” NPR. NPR, September 26, 2018. https://www.npr.org/2018/09/26/651941113/read-christine-blasey-fords-op…;
- Rahal, Sarah, and Kim Kozlowski. “204 impact statements, 9 days, 2 counties, a life sentence for Larry Nassar.” The Detroit News. www.detroitnews.com, February 8, 2018. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2018/02/08/204-im…;
- Sheehey, Maeve. “Christine Blasey Ford Lawyers Call Kavanaugh Investigation a ‘Sham’ after New Details Emerge.” Politico. Politico LLC, July 23, 2021. https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/23/christine-blasey-ford-brett-ka….
- Tulane University. “Tulane Climate Survery Executive Report & Action Plan.” Wave of Change. January 31, 2018. https://allin.tulane.edu/sites/default/files/WaveofChangeExecutiveRepor…
Despite increased visibility, survivors on college campuses experienced a significant setback in August 2020 with the release of then Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s alterations to Title IX. These regulations are regarded by many working in prevention and response as harmful to survivors for several reasons. The first of these is that the regulations narrow the definition of sexual violence and who can seek recourse from a university after experiencing it. Universities no longer have an obligation to respond to reported sexual misconduct that occurs outside of campus activities or buildings. It also has no obligation to report behavior that is not severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive.
The regulations also produce several procedural obstacles for survivors who do report. DeVos allows schools to depart from the Dear Colleague standard of “preponderance of the evidence” in favor of “clear and convincing evidence.” In practice, this means a higher threshold for perpetrators to be found responsible for sexual violence. The new regulations also require that a live hearing with cross examination, conducted by a representative of the perpetrator’s choice or the perpetrator themselves, be allowed in conduct proceedings involving sexual violence. All of these provisions are examples of revictimization of a survivor by institutions after an incident of sexual violence. In March 2021, the Biden administration issued an executive order demanding that these regulations be re-examined, but concrete policies are still being developed.
Much of this emerging discourse surrounding the due process rights of perpetrators came to a head on Tulane’s campus in November 2021. An anonymous Instagram account gained notoriety for publishing stories of survivorhood submitted by female students that often included the names of their perpetrators. The page received several criticisms for its structure, including its binary view of gendered survivorhood and its process for submissions, which resulted in its owner making the decision to shut down the account. Shortly after the account was removed, a list of alleged perpetrators entitled “Vigilante Justice” was released on the anonymous social media platform YikYak. In the midst of the aforementioned national discourse surrounding due process and sexual violence, Tulane students exploded into activism related to this specific instance. In November and December of 2021, protests were organized, listening sessions were held, and students showed up to confront how formal systems often fail to hold campus perpetrators accountable. This spike in activism is only comparable in its scope to student reactions following the 2017 Tulane Climate Survey.
Sources:
- “Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights Launches Comprehensive Review of Title IX Regulations to Fulfill President Biden’s Executive Order Guaranteeing an Educational Environment Free from Sex Discrimination.” U.S. Department of Education, April 6, 2021. https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/department-educations-office-civ…;
- Grayer, Annie, and Veronica Stracqualursi. “DeVos Finalizes Regulations That Give More Rights to Those Accused of Sexual Assault on College Campuses.” CNN. Cable News Network, May 6, 2020. https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/06/politics/education-secretary-betsy-devos…;
- Lazarus, Lily Mae. “@boysbeware.tulane shuts down after growing popularity.” The Tulane Hullabaloo. The Hullabaloo, November 17, 2021. https://tulanehullabaloo.com/58100/news/boysbeware-tulane-shuts-down-af…;
- Levitan, Hannah. “USG sexual assault meeting posed difficult questions for administrators.” The Tulane Hullabaloo. The Hullabaloo, December 8, 2021. https://tulanehullabaloo.com/58474/news/usg-sexual-assault-meeting-pose…;
- Pitre, Emile. Anita Hill, Left, and Christine Blasey Ford at the University of Washington Graduate School’s Public Lecture Series Nov. 6, 2019. n.d. Seattle Times. https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/anita-hill-and-christine-blasey-fo…;
- Students Hold Homemade Signs Calling for Increased Accountability. n.d. The Tulane Hullabaloo. https://tulanehullabaloo.com/58213/news/sexual-violence/.
- “The State of Title IX.” Know Your IX. Accessed March 28, 2023. https://knowyourix.org/college-resources/hands-off-ix/.
The question now is how will this work continue for you? While this query may seem daunting, it can be answered in ways both big and small. Every time you show up for a peer or speak up when a harmful comment is made in class, you are aligning yourself with sexual violence prevention and response. Reading this timeline is part of that allyship, too. Take what you’ve learned here and let it bring you to action against oppressive structures that still exist in our country and our world. However, perhaps even more importantly, also let the voices speaking through this timeline remind you that while the work still isn’t done, there are so many driven, multi-faceted, incredible human beings working alongside you. They are not alone, and neither are you. Here’s to giving activists and advocates their roses and a future where we have eliminated sexual violence.
