Military Mysteries
By: Kaitlyn Hardy
Tags: Rape, Sexual Assault, Not Invisible, Military, Law

The hidden stories of how the law and rape cross roads within the military

There are many secrets within a lot of public platforms;two of which I will focus on in this article: the military and the law. These two platforms are held on a high pedestal in society.

[“Despite feminist recognition in recent decades that “the central condition of many women’s lives [is] that they are ruled by male violence” (Cohen 1994, 350), the law has been unresponsive and ineffective in several respects. This bias is evident in the striking consistency with which the law regulates and responds to the use of violence by men and women in military and civilian society. Whereas the law generally recognizes the military as a social institution vested with legitimate authority to engage in the use of violence, it excludes women from most roles involving violence while at the same time ignoring much of the violence unleashed by military men and women.”] (Lucinda Joy Peach) Is Violence Male? The Law, Gender, and Violence

Lucinda’s quote shows the gender specificity that society proclaims to men and women, whether it be about the law or the military. Discussing these gender biases has been completely taboo to the American eye, so writing about it will show people how relevant gender bias really is within military and civilian society.

In reference to males, since they have a stronger persona men are always assumed to be the predators, never victims of violence. Especially if the sexual act is between a man and a woman. The law in particular favors males and males only. “The law has never been able to address battering effectively because of its own peculiar structure. Written by men for men, the law is designed to protect men from the power of the state and to adjudicate conflicts between men, to preserve order in a society of men.”(Jones 1994, 24) Since power sometimes induces violence in a man it is used as a bonus. It gives men the one up on a woman for the man mentally and physically.“The law understands violence as a form of male power and thus genders violence male.” (Lucinda Joy Peach) Even though it is violence, it is looked at as powerful. With women it would be looked at in a different lense.

In the opposite lense, women on the other hand are always formed as victims.“In both military and civilian contexts,then, when the law recognizes women at all in relation to violence, it is primarily as victims.”(Lucinda Joy Peach) With this false perception women are now only equivalent to victims and not perpetrators, which is a closed minded view. Women in this light of predators or perpetrators are “not real” in a sense.“Women who do or would act as agents of violence are ignored as nonexistent, excluded as illegitimate, or punished as transgressive.” (Lucinda Joy Peach) It then again does not make sense; if it is taboo for women to be aggressors, how are they given a harsher and more reprimandable punishment rather than men for doing the exact same thing. By gendering violence between men or women, it makes the problem even more harder to deconstruct. Lucinda’s “alternate approach to understanding the law and violence, I will argue, offers a better basis for developing strategies designed to empower women by deconstructing the law’s gender-bias treatment of violence.”(Lucinda Joy Peach)

Lucinda Joy Peach then touches upon the military sexual assaults that have happened within the years. While also hitting points about how women are not allowed to use certain items in combat, and not allowed to do really what they want to do. This is disregarding whether they are in a high position of control or not. This ties completely into the movie The Invisible War by Kirby Dick which exemplifies the high rates of sexual assaults that have happened and are happening in our military, army, navy, and air force.

In the movie The Invisible War over 20 people men and women spoke forward about their sexual assault cases whether they were looked at or not including people like Kori Cioca, who wasaped (within that rape her jaw was dislocated); Trina McDonald, who was drugged and raped; The extreme case of Valine Demos, who became pregnant after being raped; many other people were victimized.Women wise “over 20% of female veterans have been sexually assaulted while serving.” Women were always told to “suck it up” and to “stop crying over spilled milk” in order to calm them down and stop overreacting. This has the effect of making women sound crazy along with making it seem like they are making all of the rape accusations up. While the case goes through the police department and so forth the men are told to take on the case because the women sympathize too much, which is completely sexist. But in opposing thoughts, most women never share their stories because they can lose their rank, rating, and school. These rapes are usually planned due to the fact that, “15% of incoming recruits attempted or committed rape before entering the military.” And most of the women are ordered to drink by the captain when they go out. (This movie brought many hidden scandals on the surface and brought light to what nobody knew. In the title “The Invisible War” it is now visible and everyone is taking it very seriously.

Invisible has always been a term used in the military but now it has been brought to the surface. “For military women, before #MeToo there was #NotInvisible, our attempt to draw attention to the epidemic of sexual assault in the military which continues to be largely ignored by the American public.”(Antonieta Rico) Ever since the #Metoo movement women have been stepping up sharing their stories and being proud of their choices.“Women in the military have been speaking out about sexual harassment and assault for decades, from Tailhook in the early 1990s to Marines United earlier this year.”(Antonieta Rico)With the rise in movements like the #MeToo movement, hopefully the war that women in the military are fighting, will no longer be invisible.