Posts Tagged: rape
The Sacred and the Profane
There is a total silence in the West on India’s culture of dissenting women in the face of severe patriarchy and authoritarianism. It doesn’t quite fit, does it, into the dichotomy carved out for Indian women by Americans and the British…
...more“A Tragedy of Choice”
...moreBut for those of us who didn’t have a choice, those of us who survived the choices of men who violated our bodies, those of us who defend ourselves everyday, those of us who are still trying to figure out what does and doesn’t make us a real victim, tears aren’t enough to make us wish you didn’t have to pay.
We Still Have A Long Way to Go
A grim reminder of one of the reasons we still need things like International Women’s Day: the suggestion that men should take responsibility for not raping women is apparently outrageous.
At Salon, Mary Elizabeth Williams tells the story of Zerlina Maxwell, who appeared on Sean Hannity’s show to say, “If you train men not to grow up to become rapists, you prevent rape.” The sadly predictable result: “I can’t even go on my Facebook page,” says Maxwell.
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Holy Orange
Years later, Bombay is still fresh in my mind and in my bones. As a visitor, I was naïve and lost. When I hear bells, I still see statues of Ganesh in a cool, stone temple and smell sandalwood incense.
...moreKissa Yoni Ka: What The Vagina Monologues Mean In Hindi
As reports of the utterly horrifying rape and death of a woman in Delhi have made clear, India, like most countries, can be a dangerous place for women.
In a guest post for Racialicious, Hannah Green uses an Indian performance of The Vagina Monologues as a jumping-off point for ruminations on sexual assault and women’s rights, in both India and the US.
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Tramp
On what would turn out to be the eve of the death of the recent gang rape victim in Delhi, my family and I gathered together to watch a Hindi film that my parents had ordered on Netflix. The 1951 movie, Awaara, which translates to “tramp” in English
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In the Wound Lies the Gift
At 13, I never hear anyone use the words “slut, whore, bitch,” until they are said to me, about me. Brain damage, in one area of my skull. Straight A’s in the other.
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Eleven
We don’t know how to talk about children anymore. We get so wrapped up in these shallow narratives about children being preternaturally advanced, about little girls wearing make up and dressing provocatively and seducing the camera, about little girls maturing faster, developing sooner. We forget.
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What I Learned In Homemaking
I sped up, my head down, my attention pressed toward the sidewalk. The boys stayed turned from me, hushed, and I thought for a moment that they had tired of me, that I could finally get by.
...moreStories We Tell
Molly Boyle writes about how murder ballads helped in her efforts to find the “sublimity of survival” after an attempted rape.
“The stories we tell ourselves happen often to be about dying, in the most romantic, sometimes pat, often campy and necessarily truncated ways.
...moreSexual Assault and the Military: An Interview with Staff Sergeant Lisa Rose
Reports of sexual abuse in the military are now higher than that of the civilian population. An annual report released in 2009 by the Department of Defense showed an 11 percent increase in sexual assault cases among service members over the past year.
The City of Joy
“This is not rape as people in the West understand it. This is a weapon of war, a deliberate strategy designed to destroy our communities by leaving our women disabled and ostracised from their families and neighbours.”– Dr. Denis Mukwege, a Congolese doctor who treats rape victims and is helping to build a place called “The City of Joy,” a town especially built for women to “heal, rebuild and learn new skills to take out into the world again.”
You should really, really read this article.
...moreNormal People Don’t Live Like This
“She wonders if sex is like math, like if you make a man want to eat your hair or go too far, does it follow that you balance the equation by letting him.”
...moreThe Rumpus Interview with Donald Ray Pollock
“I tried to put a lot of humor in Knockemstiff because the things that happen in my stories—if there wasn’t any humor, by the time you finished reading the book you’d probably want to kill yourself.”
The Beautiful Nightmares of Roberto Bolaño’s 2666
Prior to launching The Rumpus, during our test phase, we ran this incredible, thorough, and thoughtful review of Roberto Bolano’s 2666 by Michael Berger. Today seemed like a good day to bring it back. – SE