Rape, Campbell

Campbell's study about rape and how certain systems respond to rape confirmed to me that we have adequate systems in place to handle this dilemma. The systems addressed were medical, legal and mental health systems. It seems that in the past, theses entities have not always worked methodically together, and they still might not if it were not for rape advocates and rape recovery centers that have specifically trained individuals to coordinate all 3 systems for the victim.

The article discussed the satisfaction of the victims with regard to how each of the 3 systems helped them or provided services. For the most part, greater than 70% of the victims were satisfied. In any situation, there will be some people that are not satisfied with results or systems, but I thought that an overwhelmingly high percentage of victims was satisfied.

Rape is a terrible crime and experience for the victim. It appears that while our society cannot control or prevent rape, at least it has systems in place to take care of the victims at present.

Rape prevention and punishment is an entirely different social issue. It has to do with the perpetrators and the aggressors and not necessarily the treatment of the victims after the rape.

There are many reasons why rape continues in today's society. I for one, believe that we are keeping men empowered over women by our society allowing rape to occur and to keep women in their place. This continues to be re-affirmed and rewarded by how our media display women as victims and sex slaves, and also how the legal system does not adequately punish perpetrators for raping women.

Because we choose not to address the larger issues, we must deal with the rape victims through the systems we have in place. This is exactly what society is doing, hence the Campbell article and study.