Society portrays certain narratives within our lives that further establishes an ideal that we already have inscripted in our “bubbles”, or our “American ideology”. Society contributes to many ideals we have been taught to live by growing up; whether those ideals have been explained by our parents, teachers, or peers, society contributes to making those ideal part of our American culture. One example of society contributing to our American “bubbles” is society’s contribution to the rape culture seen on college campuses throughout the country. The many ideals society instills in our culture, such as the worship of athletes and the different teaching of genders, contributes to the rape culture seen on college campuses across the country by providing the “bubble” of victim blame that is the common outcome of rape cases.
Society contributes to the rape culture present on many college campuses by instilling the idea that college athletes are nothing short of gods to be worshiped. Society sets a sense of entitlement upon these young athletes, starting from a young age. “Signing Day” is a big deal for most high school athletes going on to play college level athletics; if they are an especially big-time athlete, there will be press and crowds present at the signing day. This sense of entitlement only increases at the college level when a young freshman walks out on to the field with thousands of people screaming their name. It provides the student-athlete with an attitude of invincibility. This new-found attitude is carried with the athlete around campus and off campus, which could lead them to believing that they have more importance than the students around them, believing they can do whatever pleases them without repercussions, which in the case of rape, is usually the outcome.
In the case of Jameis Winston and Erica Kinsman, as shown in the documentary The Hunting Ground, Winston (a starting freshman quarterback) rapes Kinsman in his dorm room. Right afterwards, Kinsman goes to the emergency room and gets tested for the rape. After months of trying to get a DNA sample from Winston, he complies and the DNA found from Kinsman matches Winston’s DNA. Two years after the rape occurred, Florida State holds a conduct hearing and Winston is found not guilty of “violating the student code of conduct”. Since Winston was a high profile player, the case was followed by ESPN. The commentators on ESPN who were discussing the case were appalled by it, because they felt that it was unfair to Winston to hold him accountable for the rape when the Florida State team was in the middle of the playoffs to go to the championship. In this case, the media and the school created the bubble that the fault was Kinsman’s, not her rapists. The school continued to allow Winston to play in games even after he had been proven to have raped Erica Kinsman. Society’s worship of college athletes helps establish the bubble that the worship of college athletes is deserving and helps give athletes the idea that their actions have no repercussions. Of course, this is not the mindset of all athletes, or even a majority of them; but it happens frequently enough where we, as a society, need to change the way we hold young athletes to be "god-like" figures in our culture.
The way society teaches young boys and girls has a direct impact on rape culture on college campuses. For example, self-worth is taught to both boys and girls differently. Young boys are taught to be proud of their bodies, while girls are taught that there is always something they can change, establishing the idea that men are more superior. I see this now when I am walking around campus, almost always I am expected to move out of the way of a man on the sidewalk, or else we will run into each other, because I was taught to adapt to the way a man is walking, whereas the man was taught that he is superior to me. Young girls are taught to be wary of men striking up a conversation with them because if something goes wrong, the women is at fault because she gave “mixed signals”. If a girl is at a party, she must always be aware of her surroundings instead of focusing on having fun, because a man might try to take advantage of her. Society focuses on telling girls how not to act in public, rather than teaching young men to be respectable members of society, which puts the “bubble” around the victim blame culture of rape culture.
Society portrays certain narratives within our lives that further establishes an ideal that we already have inscripted in our “bubbles”, or our “American ideology”. Society contributes to the “bubble” of victim blame that surrounds the rape culture on college campuses. By placing the blame on the victims rather than the criminal, society contributes to the already popular victim blame placed on victims of rape.
