In the wake of the Stanford rape trial, I've seen a lot of posts and stories about what Brock Turner did. There is no doubt that he raped an unconscious woman and there is no doubt that his punishment is very unfair. There is no excuse for what Brock did and there is no excuse for the sentence from the judge. That's not what I care about though. Sure this is a terrible thing, he's not going to spend much time paying for what he did and the judge may not be punished.
I care about her. The woman. She's only a few months older than I and she's experienced what I, along with many others, have before. I know what it's like to have that power taken away from you. There's not a word that can describe how you feel after an experience like that. Disgusting just doesn't do it. There's only one word for what you just went through - rape. That's what it is, and that's what we should call it. It isn't forced sex, it isn't non consensual sex. It's called rape.
In popular culture, rape is often seen as a taboo topic. This leads to the assumption that the mere mention of the word requires censorship. Due to the trial and subsequent sentencing of Brock Turner, rape and the culture that surrounds it have been explored many times via social media. As a large influx of these explorations are available there are a few things that are clear but one stands out: the word rape makes people uncomfortable. But why? What makes this word so much more inappropriate than every other word in the English language? I've come to a conclusion, it's the culture behind the word.
Rape has, historically, been used as a tool to control women and because of its ties to the concepts of virginity and purity, been a source of shame for women and their families. However, in modern society, we now know that anyone and everyone can be raped. People of all different genders, races and economic classes can be attacked in such a manor.
So why is it that we shame those who are forced into something that they absolutely wouldn't chose themselves, part of that shame being the use of words other than what it really was? Denying the use of the only accurate word to survivors is denying them their right to identify and control this experience and what it does to their life.
I never want to see someone type "r*pe" again. I never want to hear the term "forced sex" again, because that's not calling it what it really is, and that doesn't help the survivors heal any faster. Rape isn't the bad word; avoiding it is what's bad.
