We asked girls if rape culture still exists

“Did you try closing your legs?” “How many drinks did you have?” “What were you wearing?”

Rape culture is a world in which victims of rape are asked questions like these. Rape culture is a world in which girls are told to “cover up” because their clothes look like they’re “asking for it.” Rape culture is a world in which white male athletes receive only six months in prison for committing an offense that forever changes a person’s life.

It exists. And it needs to change.

I asked girls for their thoughts on rape culture: How do you know it exists? What evidence of it do you see on campus?

Asia, 19, Temple University

People who deny [rape culture exists] are either not victimized by it or they’ve been blinded. Rape culture manifests itself in subtle ways. Sometimes it is as subtle as women getting free drinks at bars. People paint this as “female privilege” without looking at the implications – women get more free drinks so that they get drunker and are less able to think clearly and resist. Rape culture definitely exists at Temple. I’m quick to point at frats as cesspools of it, but it exists all over. Like, you give a woman a bunch of free drinks hoping she gets drunk enough to go home with you. Then when she realizes what’s happened, you criticize how many drinks she had and blame her, when it was your intention to rape from the start.

Jasmine, 20, Penn State University

Rape culture is so embedded into our lives, especially in college, that if you don’t know about it sometimes it’s hard to tell it exists. One in five women and about one in twelve men will be sexually assaulted – that’s rape culture. A judge asking a victim “did you try closing your legs” is rape culture. A man raping a woman but only getting six months of jail and having his swimming times posted in an article reporting on the case is rape culture – that’s why I know it exists.

I see it all the time in Penn State. I’ve gotten numerous alerts about sexual assault, even though it’s the summer. I’ve sat in a room with 100 girls and 15 of them have confessed they were sexually assaulted. I’m lucky nothing has happened to me, but there’s always a chance that it could, and that shit scares me to death.

Erica, 21, University of Pittsburgh

I can’t tell you how many times people have told me I’m “asking for it” when I wear anything seductive at all. I’ve had boyfriends ask me not to wear certain clothes because I’m “going to attract bad guys” and I’m like, why are you blaming me for what I wear? You’re just enforcing the problem. By telling me not to wear clothes that I look damn good in, you’re not only trying to control my sexuality which is MINE, but you’re being a part of rape culture. You’re a self fulfilling prophecy.

“Boys will be boys” is not an excuse, and I see that too much in society. I cannot date men who try to control me in that way. You should be supporting me, not getting upset with me for loving myself. I should not have to be afraid to wear my favorite dress out and I should not have to worry about you getting upset with me either.

Anna, 19, Penn State University

Today, one out of three girls are raped and one out of five guys are raped. These are statistics that every college student is told during orientation. Nothing that I took too seriously because they are just numbers. But the truth behind the numbers is too real on college campuses. I know one too many girls who were been sexually assaulted… I have heard one too many stories, and I have only just finished my freshman year.

The first time I learned that someone I knew was assaulted was the last weekend of the school year. Only finals left and then we would be free. I had a great weekend filled with laughter, bonfires, and good-ole fun. I didn’t hear from my friend all weekend, but I didn’t think anything of it because that happens with her. I knew she was alive and that she went out because of Snapchat. She texted me Sunday afternoon. I assumed it was to catch up on our weekend antics, but she said: “I just got back from the hospital to have a rape kit done.” I had to stop walking. How could this happen? This weekend was great! We were going home! Where were her friends? How could they leave her like that? How could someone do that?

Marisa, 19, Temple University

Refuters of rape culture seem to be convoluted by the lack of a clear-cut definition. Rape culture can be defined beyond “the normalization of rape”. Rape culture is the way ladies are told their shorts are too short or their top is cut too low. It’s the way women are encouraged to take self defense classes to protect themselves from aggressive men. It’s the way society invalidates women attackers. It’s how men are labelled as weak if they are not dominant. It’s how victims are blamed for his or her own rape. It’s how rape prevention is taught in school. These examples just merely scrape the surface of rape culture. Unfortunately, our society is saturated in the endless behaviors of rape culture.

Helen, 19, Penn State University

I often see men act like they’re entitled to women’s bodies, whether it’s cat calling or any sort of harassment, but I almost never see them getting any consequences for it.  In fact, I see encouragement from their friends!  It just seems like this kind of behavior has become the norm and even though it’s not ok, a lot of people don’t really care and do it anyway. At parties, there are always boys who won’t take no for an answer when a girl doesn’t want to dance with them.

Probably the most depressing encounter I had was at orientation, though. I was sitting with a group of people I’d just met after we’d had the sexual assault talk with our orientation leader. Everyone was talking about it, and a boy chimed it about how it’s unfair that you can’t hook up with someone if they’re drunk. This led to a conversation about how hard it is for the boys and how they have to be so careful. One girl said “I feel bad for the boys!” I was like, really? It’s not that hard not to rape someone.

Gigi, 20, University of Maryland

I think rape culture exists. Women are portrayed and objectified in the media. They’re seen as weak, sexual objects, and that conditions men to treat all women in real life that way. I think those men are weak themselves, though. And I know that on my campus I’ve seen a lot of guys get mad when they get rejected at bars and stuff when they ask girls to go home with them. Also there’s a lot of catcalling. Fraternities list their body counts and the guys are praised over who has the highest. They use girls for their ego.

Colleen, 19, Lesley University

I really want to say that rape culture doesn’t exist because I know so many sweet and respectful guys. But no matter how many sweet and respectable guys there are in the world, rape culture still exists because there are people who don’t want to punish the rapist, as with Brock Turner. We all have our reasons for not getting involved – we’re scared, we’re in denial, we just don’t know what to believe – and honestly, until it happens to someone we’re close to, most of us don’t know the gravity of the situation… It’s these moments of not turning in our brothers, cousins, uncles or boyfriends, of letting rapists go unpunished and rape culture unchallenged; it’s these moments that prevent people from having the courage to fight rape culture and save girls and boys from being raped in the future.

Natalie, 21, College of Creative Studies, Detroit

I do not think rape culture exists, I know it does. From comments I hear thrown casually around to behavior in the workplace, I have heard it from friends and experienced it myself. Watching the Olympics, I’ve heard “Why are the women dressed in bikinis? Why not one pieces? Why are they dressed in sexy outfits for sports?” The comment wasn’t meant to mean anything harmful, but the fact that the women playing volleyball in bikinis were viewed as “sexy” and not just dressed practically for their sport was to me an issue. Attraction is normal, but looking at another being as “That person is sexy, I want that, I might take that” is learned through culture, and the fact that the human body is still viewed as taboo and women as objects.

[Rape culture] makes me suspicious of strange men, even when getting in an Uber. It dulls your real sense of alarm, constantly having to be on alert, the fact that people think it is “okay” to objectify other people and use them, the fact that so many (women, especially) think this behavior is alright or that they won’t be accepted if they don’t give in or live in fear of telling about this for being judged…. Well, it makes having to limit your wardrobe choices because how of someone might see you in short-shorts the least, and most, of your worries.

April, 19, New York University

It’s hard to refute the existence of rape culture in America. Society blames sexual assault survivors while exonerating the perpetrators, as seen in Brock Turner’s meager six-month sentence and CNN’s coverage of the Steubenville rapists. Fortunately, I haven’t personally encountered blatant examples of rape culture at NYU. Although as a straight, cisgender woman, it’s vital for me to acknowledge how these issues particularly affect the LGBTQ community. Transgender people and bisexual women, especially, are more likely to be raped, harassed, and experience violence. I’m glad that we as a society are starting to discuss these issues more openly and proposing ideas to resolve rape culture.

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Rape culture exists. And it shouldn’t. That’s why we as a nation, as a world, need to acknowledge it. It affects men and women, straights and gays, cis and trans; everyone. Only by acknowledging its existence will we begin to change its reality. Victims should not be blamed. Girls should feel safe wearing what they want to wear. People should be taught not to rape.