It has been almost a month since Trump’s “locker room talk” scandal. Had the comments remained in the “cosy male-only space” for which they were intended, the final run-up to the election would certainly have gone more smoothly for him. And yet, he does not regret them. In fact, quite the opposite. Following the leak of the 2005 Access Hollywood tape, Trump attempted to normalise his behaviour and comments under the pretension that “boys will be boys”. Granted, Trump is largely an American problem, and hopefully will never become a truly global problem. However, his comments have revived one of 2016’s most contentious social issues: rape culture.
Sexual harassment and sexual assault are a daily reality for countless women worldwide, many of which seek the help of a sexual harassment attorney for compensation and to make sure that people think twice about their behaviour. So, it comes as no surprise that comments making light of this were met with such outrage. However, what matters more than who made the comments is the fact that many people still think that it is socially acceptable to refer to women in these derogatory terms. It’s frightening to think that even in 2016, it is normal to objectify women and to do so shamelessly. There are so many women and men who have suffered immensely as a consequence of sexual assault. Hopefully, an injury attorney Pittsburgh can help victims seek the justice they deserve.
It’s frightening to think that even in 2016, it is normal to objectify women and to do so shamelessly
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Excusing these comments as “just talk” demonstrates an attempt to separate talk from action. But, we have to ask ourselves, what is the difference between joking about sexual assault versus perpetrating a sexual assault? Can you, on the one hand, condone remarks like, “grab ‘em by the pussy”, while at the same time preach that rape is wrong? It seems hypocritical, and yet that seems to be the reality. The lines between right and wrong become blurred when you accept one and not the other, and soon you have a society in which Brock Turner, convicted Stanford rapist, exclaims, “but she liked it!”.
By allowing this dialogue to continue, we are downplaying the experience of assaulted and abused women: we are telling them that while we are very sorry for what happened to them, it’s still OK for the rest of us to have a joke at their expense. This is hardly an encouraging message.
The Union of Students in Ireland’s (USI) “Say Something” Report in 2013 examined Irish students’ experiences of sexual assault, unwanted sexual contact and sexual harassment. The report found that 30 per cent of female students had been previously sexually harassed and a further 1 in 3 women had experienced unwanted physical contact. One respondent said, “general groping … in clubs and bars has become acceptable and is to be expected it seems”. It cannot be denied that being groped in a nightclub has been a reality for the vast majority of women at some point. Instead of going out confident that your personal boundaries will be respected, you have the underlying fear that some guy on the dance floor might inappropriately touch you. Again, the fact that this behaviour has come “to be expected” and normalised only legitimises its occurrence.
However, most worrying of all is the finding that nine per cent of female students experience comments with a sexual undertone while in a learning environment. The idea that sexual jokes and comments about women are acceptable in university environments is a great cause for concern. Surely these academic spaces are for interrogating the issues with “harmless banter” rather than perpetuating them?
The USI report also outlined that many female students feel there to be a lack of shared understanding regarding acceptable language around sex and sexuality. This leads to the question of whether or not the people who engage in sexually aggressive dialogue actually understand the gravity of their remarks or understand that, for many women, it is not considered harmless banter. What if they don’t realise the impact of their words? The potential lack of understanding of the conversation surrounding sexual harassment and sexual assault is not just unique to men.
In fact, according to the USI report, only three per cent of women who had unwanted sexual experiences reported it to the authorities. Most often, their reason for not reporting was that they didn’t think it was serious enough to warrant reporting or sometimes that they didn’t think what had happened to them was a crime. These responses again outline the normalisation of sexual harassment and assault in our society, which only strengthens the rape culture that is rife at present.
Lad culture is a construct that serves only as an excuse for saying something unacceptable but rendering it the norm
But, is it good enough to blame “lad culture” for this problem? It is unfair to deem all men guilty for the actions of other men. However, it is hard to avoid this stereotypical view as many men buy into the excuse of “boys will be boys”. Lad culture is a construct that serves only as an excuse for saying something unacceptable but rendering it the norm. Not every man uses the derogatory language that debases women’s experiences of sexual harassment and assault, but those that do are sustaining society’s rape culture.
The men that engage in this dialogue are not only guilty of objectifying and belittling women, they are also guilty of encapsulating all men via the umbrella term of “lad banter” or, as Mr Trump would say, “locker-room talk”. They are making it normal. It is the responsibility of men everywhere to stand up and say that this behaviour is not normal and not readily engaged with by all men. In order to eradicate this problem, men must hold other men accountable.
Tom Meagher of White Ribbon Ireland, whose wife, Jill, was raped and murdered, talks about striking a delicate balance between seeing men as the face of rapists and avoiding using “lad culture” as a scapegoat. Meagher urges men to be proactive in changing this conception of themselves, taking responsibility of the situation, however long it may take. You can’t change rape culture overnight, but you can start to change the dialogue surrounding it.
