Definition Of Rape Research Articles

Distorted Reality: A Commentary on DiMarco et al. (2022) and the Question of Male Sexual Victimization

Our commentary responds to claims made by DiMarco and colleagues in an article published in this journal that the majority of victims of rape are men and that 80% of those who rape men are women. Although we strongly believe that studying male sexual victimization is a highly important research and policy endeavour, we have concerns with the approach taken by DiMarco and colleagues to discuss these incidents. Specifically, we critique their paper by addressing the definitions of rape used by the authors, questioning their interpretation of national victim surveys, evaluating their analysis of the underreporting of male rape, and highlighting the heteronormative framework they use to outline the landscape of male sexual victimization. With this commentary, we call for a holistic, nuanced, and balanced study of male sexual victimization that recognizes the reality of both female-on-male and male-on-male violence, the experiences of survivors, and multi-layered barriers that male victims often encounter.

“Yes means Yes”. Theoretical dilemmas and new definition of rape and sexual assault in Slovenian Criminal Law

The legislation of crimes against sexual integrity was initially aimed at safeguarding specific interests such as the honour of the father, the family, virginity, and the social security of women. Accordingly, the extent of rape victims was for a long time limited only to women (e.g. under Article 100 of the Criminal Code of the Socialist Republic of Slovenia from 1977, the execution of rape was only possible as immission penis in vaginam). In modern society, legislators seek to protect the self-determination of the individual, sexual and physical integrity, and sexual autonomy. This reversal demonstrates that modern criminal law revolves around the essential question of whether sexual intercourse is engaged in through free choice, that is, autonomously. Domestic legislators have been put under the pressure of media campaigns and controversial case law to modernise criminal law accordingly. In the spirit of the reforms, the Republic of Slovenia in 2021 adopted the amendments of Rape and Sexual Assault in the Criminal Code (KZ-1H) consistent with the affirmative consent model (“yes means yes”).

The Inconsistencies of Age-Related Incapacity Thresholds in International Law: Child Rape Victims at a Disadvantage

Abstract Over the past few decades, the definition of rape has been the focus of widespread attention in international law. However, the circumstance of age-related incapacity in its definition has been left unexplored. While no definition of an age of sexual consent is found in international criminal law, though suggestions have been made in international criminal jurisprudence, other international legal frameworks have included clear and well-defined thresholds in their definitions, i.e. recruitment, trafficking, sale, prostitution, and pornography. This article argues that the vagueness of an undefined threshold in the rape definition, and the existing inconsistencies when compared with the other frameworks, are at odds with the evolving trends in international law on the treatment of consent and child victims. This leaves child rape victims at a comparative disadvantage, especially adolescent girls, who pervasively experience the consequences and harms derived from this vagueness and inconsistency.

THE BRAZILIAN TRANSLATION FOR “RAPE” IN THE ARTICLE 7 “G” OF THE ROME STATUTE

This article analyzes the Brazilian translation of the crime “rape,” contained in article 7(g) of the Rome Statute, established in Brazilian law by the Executive Decree n. 4.388/2002 as “agressão sexual.” First, the contrast between these two expressions reveals a difference in their semantic field. Second, this study indicates the essential aspects of Brazilian criminal law when the Rome Statute was internalized. At that moment, the definition of rape in Brazil was applied only to male conduct against women and strictly described the possible behaviors that fit that definition. Given these differences, this article reflects on the behaviors described by the Brazilian translation. It also uses the Case Akayesu, which took place at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and the identification of rape and genocide, as a comparative and interpretative theoretical tool to highlight the limitations and challenges of Brazilian criminal law relating to gender and sexual crimes.

Unequal Power and Sexual Consent: The Case of Cassotte la Joye

Unequal Power and Sexual Consent:The Case of Cassotte la Joye Lucia Akard In 1386, something troubling, damaging, and potentially violative happened to Cassotte la Joye. She had a sexual relationship with a man named Jean Ayore and became pregnant by him, but he would neither marry her nor support their child. Cassotte went to the diocesan court in Paris to seek justice for what Jean had done to her and she had reason to believe that the court might help her as it had other women in her position.1 But Cassotte was socially marginalized in respect to Jean, and disadvantaged in terms of her gender and single status, and the court did not help her. She claimed that Jean had made her future promises of marriage followed by sexual relations, which had resulted in her defloration (defloratione) and left her with child.2 Cassotte's claims indicated that she and Jean should have been married, as promising to marry someone and then having sex created a binding marriage contract.3 Jean confessed to the sexual intercourse and the offspring, but would not confess that he had promised to marry Cassotte. Cassotte had no witnesses, so on the claim of future promises to marry she resorted to using the decisory oath, which meant that Jean was asked to swear on his soul that he had not promised [End Page 285] to marry her.4 He swore he had not, and the court decided the case in a rather unusual manner, absolving him of all of the claims despite the fact that he had admitted to the offspring. They also stated that Cassotte must not "impede" ("ne impediat") him any further.5 In no other marriage case in the register did the court use such language, and in the other cases that involve combinations of deflowering and future promises to marry it was the male party who was tasked with demonstrating that the woman was not a virgin before they had sex. The court did not ask Jean to prove that Cassotte was deflowered by someone else, nor did they order him to pay her any sum for the pregnancy and child.6 Cassotte appears to have had sex with Jean expecting that they would be married afterwards. Instead, the relationship left her as a single mother, with no monetary support from the father of her child. While Cassotte's case is not one that would typically be used in a study of rape in the Middle Ages, the field of medieval sexual violence needs to turn toward such cases because they stimulate questions about how we define sexual violations and rape in the past, and because they allow us to investigate the unequal power dynamics that underpin heterosexual relationships and undermine consent. Cassotte's case highlights how power could be leveraged in sexual relationships between unequal partners, and demonstrates the inability of consent to prevent harm in such relationships. Though scholars of medieval history have produced many studies of rape, rarely have they interrogated what types of sources should be included in a study of rape in the past, nor have they until very recently given much attention to sexual consent. This is partially due to the fact that the sources typically used to study rape do not offer many avenues for analyzing those sexual violations that fell outside the narrow legal definition of rape. The definition of rape from Philippe de Beaumanoir's thirteenth-century customary law collection Coutumes de Beauvaisis offers one such limited legal interpretation : "Rape is when one has by force the carnal company of a woman against the will of that woman and when she [End Page 286] does everything in her power to defend herself."7 Rape is thus defined as a gendered crime that only victimizes women, and as a crime that includes force against which the victim must actively resist. It also must be against the will of the victim/survivor.8 Though Beaumanoir's definition of rape was not necessarily widely used at the time, legal sources representing an array of jurisdictions in France reflect similar such definitions: letters of remission often denote rape by using the phrase "had...

Marital Rape- An Unaddressed Stigma of Indian Society

Marital rape ranks among the most horrifying crimes perpetrated in India. Marriage-related rape is a type of rape and shall not be considered a lesser offence. The majority of times, marital rapes target married women. It is one of the greatest threats to India’s system of gender justice. It is the ideal illustration of a social malady that has long affected India and is still wreaking havoc today. In India, the issue of marital rape has never been addressed. In Indian culture, it is rarely contested by anybody for a variety of reasons. The paper discuses about the definition of rape, definition of rape under IPC, causes, effects, constitutional provisions available against him and current status of marital rape for better understanding of readers.

Criminal protection of women’s rights in India: History and modernity

In the unique criminal law model of India, a hybrid combination of principles and institutions of the three legal systems, one of the most odious crimes involves encroaching on the honor, dignity, and sexual integrity of a woman. The authors aim to analyze the criminological principles of the scale and simultaneous latency of violent sexual crimes in India. Cultural and civilizational incentives for the prevalence of rape have been identified, including the historical practice of male polygamy, early child marriage, subordination of a woman in the family, her domestic retreat and “eternal widowhood”, as well as a “gender imbalance” and girls’ infanticide in traditional Hindu families. From the point of view of the systematics of crimes, Indian criminologists distinguish more than ten different categories of “feminine torts”, including sexual assault, are classified as a group of “crimes of passion” (Articles 354, 375–376, 509 of the Indian Penal Code 1860). From the point of view of elemental composition of rape, the objective test is dominant (peno-vaginal penetration) and consists of six alternative conditions of a constitutive element “women’s consent”. The recent innovations in the IPC 1860, which expanded the definition of rape and legalized the concept of “custodial rape” from the judicial practice (Tukaram v. State of Muharashtra 1978), as a special composition of sexual violence using official position. There is a significant expansion of the legislative definition of “violence against women” in the family and at office, as well as the toughening of punishments for violent acts against women, up to the expansion of the grounds for the use of the death penalty.

Countering MacKinnon on Rape and Consent

Feminists are divided on whether consent should be employed in legal definitions of rape. Catharine MacKinnon has criticized the usefulness of consent in enabling legal systems to recognize and prosecute instances of rape (MacKinnon 1989, 2005, 2016). In a recent article in this journal, Lisa H. Schwartzman defends the use of affirmative consent in rape law against MacKinnon’s critique (Schwartzman 2019). In contrast to MacKinnon, Schwartzman claims our understanding of rape must include both force and consent components. In this paper, I will argue in agreement with Schwartzman and against MacKinnon that the legal definition of rape should include an affirmative consent component. I will take Schwartzman’s discussion as my point of departure and consider whether she has responded adequately to MacKinnon’s criticisms of consent. I will argue that her responses are not fully adequate. In particular, she has not successfully rebutted the argument that an appeal to consent is unnecessary once we have accepted an expanded definition of coercion. I will then provide a more affirmative defense of affirmative consent in response to MacKinnon’s most challenging criticism.

A Collation of the Definitions of Rape under the Penal Codes of Bangladesh and India

A Collation of the Definitions of Rape under the Penal Codes of Bangladesh and India

Sex Must Be Voluntary: Sexual Communication and the New Definition of Rape in Sweden

AbstractMany countries are in the process of replacing outdated sex offense regulations with laws that accurately correspond to late modern ideas about gender equality, sexual self-determination, and consensual sex. One example is Sweden, where a law that defines rape based on a criterion of nonvoluntary participation entered into force in 2018. This article analyzes the representation of rape in the new law and legal discourse in Sweden, and shows that rape is represented as a matter of choice and communication in sexual situations. Further, the new rape law is coupled to an emerging problem within such disparate spheres as public health, social media campaigns, sexual education, and gender studies; namely, the problem of sexual communication and gray zones in sexual encounters. To understand this new representation of rape, further exploration is suggested both into the effects of sexual violence being framed as a matter of individual choice, consent, and communication in late modernity and into the role of criminal law in the era of thin normativity. The article concludes that the new rape law sends a clear message about what sex should be—namely, something voluntary—but does not accurately describe the crime and the conduct that deserves criminal censure.

The Rape Paradigm: Violent Stranger VS Warrior Victim

The purpose of this article is to show the narrow boundaries and incompleteness of the Georgian legislation regarding rape, which fails to cover all the actions from which the protection of an individual's negative sexual freedom is the responsibility of the state. The article aims to show the reader the advantages of the new approach in parallel with the critique of the old law regarding rape, which means expanding the scope of the definition of rape and hence criminalizing more actions. For this purpose, the importance of non-consent as the main element of the rape actus reus is discussed. The article also analyzes the importance of protecting the boundaries of rape so that the state does not unjustifiably restrict a person's positive sexual freedom while protecting negative sexual autonomy. The purpose of this article is neither to criticize nor support any of the consent-based rape models ("no means no" or "only yes means yes" models), but rather to highlight the importance of consent to sex crimes and to emphasize the basic guideline for consent

Coping strategies of a rape victim as reflected in Chanel Miller’s Know My Name memoir

Memoir is a literary work genre that belongs to the subgenre of autobiography. Most of the memoir showcases the writer’s particular moment of life, rather than the reels of their whole life. Chanel Miller, for example, showcases her experience during the aftermath of rape in her memoir, Know My Name. Various definition of rape has one thing in common, which rape is something that happens despite the lack of consensus and that creates stress after it happens. Stressful encounters require a coping strategy to conquer them. This study tries to analyze coping strategies on Know My Name memoir because it is due time for us to recognize how rape has influenced the victim’s life to provide better care both physical and psychological wise for rape victims and, even better, to formulate better law to protect the victim. Using descriptive study, the important features were found as Channel Miller’s emotional reactions to choose a way out of the problem.

Legal Mobilization to Protect Women against Rape in Islamist Sudan

The article explores the variety of normative and legal resources that Sudanese women inside and outside of Sudan’s Islamist regime, as well as their conservative religious opponents, have mobilized to campaign for legal reform to protect women against rape. Women’s rights activists and Islamist women within government institutions have largely mobilized in parallel, without much interaction and collaboration, to address the problems associated with the law’s definition of rape as adultery and fornication without consent. In 2015, Sudan’s National Assembly enacted an amendment to the 1991 Criminal Code with a new definition of rape, de-linking it from adultery and fornication; a process which completely excluded consultation with civil society. The reform has been poorly enforced and has come under harsh critique especially for not explicitly criminalizing marital rape.

IS A REDEFINITION OF RAPE REQUIRED IN POLISH CRIMINAL LAW?

The article concerns the crime of rape stipulated in art. 197 of the Criminal Code, or more precisely the definition of this phenomenon. The author analyzes the regulations penalizing this type of sexual abuse, in force both under Polish criminal law and under international law, in order to find the answer to the question whether the current provisions of the penal code comply with the convention standards and whether the definition of rape corresponds to the theory of sexual autonomy, according to which sex without voluntary, informed, and free of forced consent is rape.

‘An Alternate Conclusion of Misadventure’: Construction of the Female Body in Rape Trial

I aim to examine the discursive construction of the female body and the definitions of rape and consent in the language used in the Indian courtroom. In order to do so, I locate my analysis in two recent controversial judgements— Mahmood Farooqui v. State (Govt. of NCT of Delhi), 2017 and Vikas Garg and others v. State of Haryana, 2017—both of which reveal how judicial discourse produces female (and male) bodies as normalized sites of a distorted sexuality. Further analysis shows the limitations of legal grammar and semantics in envisaging the female body outside of categories existing in relation to men, and the failure of the judicial apparatus when such classifications crumble. To develop this analysis, I chiefly draw upon the writings of scholars of legal feminism and a scrutiny of reports of the Law Commission of India. The purpose of this article is therefore to arrive at an understanding of the subject of the law as not merely a theoretical, objective entity but as a product of a gendered, variable ideological context, thereby exposing the weaknesses of the linguistic construction of the female body and how it affects decisions of the courts.

Marital Rape in Denmark and Pakistan

This article investigates how rape laws and rape cases are culturally influenced, with a focus on marital rape. The first part of the article looks at cultural influences on rape laws and compares the historical development of these laws in Danish legislation, Pakistani legislation and more broadly in Muslim law. Danish comparative law often compares with legislation in neighboring countries, but comparing to a more different legal system is valuable too. We find that in both Denmark and Pakistan, socio-economic changes challenge existing definitions of rape and marital rape, leading to demands for legal reform, while the legal system tries to maintain as much continuity in the legal definitions as possible. In both jurisdictions, societal views on women and sex also influence how judges and jurors interpret the law, sometimes leading them to contradict the written law. The second part of the article analyzes two court cases involving marital rape in Danish-Pakistani couples. Cultural considerations influenced every part of these court cases, from the questioning of witnesses to the judges’ legal reasoning. Thus, having an understanding of the parties’ culture is important for judges and lawyers. The cases show that culture varies markedly between people from the same national background. Because culture is not uniform, parties are likely to disagree on which cultural rules they followed in their marriage. Judges must be aware that parties may rely on stereotypical cultural views to portray the other party negatively. The article concludes with recommendations, including the need to educate the population as legal concepts of rape change, as well as for judges to be aware of not only the legal culture and the culture of the parties, but also of how their own culture might influence their decisions. The article also reflects on recent legislative changes in Denmark and Pakistan and points out that the debate in Denmark has not considered how consent and threats can have different implications in minority cultures.

Yes, (Most) Men Know What Rape Is: A Mixed-Methods Investigation Into College Men's Definitions of Rape.

Sexual violence, including rape, is a pervasive problem on college campuses in the United States. Although men perpetrate the majority of sexual violence, men's attitudes, experiences, and perspectives are not typically included in research on rape and sexual violence. We addressed this empirical gap through our mixed-methods analysis of 365 college-aged men's definitions of the term "rape." Our analysis via consensual qualitative research revealed that men's definitions fit into nine primary domains: lack of consent, taken advantage of, sex, sexual activity, unwanted, gender/sex-specific, harm to victim, relationship, and emotional response, as well as a miscellaneous domain. Further, using chi-square tests of independence, we compared responses from men with and without histories of sexual violence perpetration. Findings showed that the definitions generated by men with a history of perpetration were less likely to include nonpenetrative sexual violence and were more likely to use gender/sex-specific language. We conclude that most young men have a generally accurate understanding of rape, though perpetrators' understandings may be somewhat narrower and more limited than those without a history of perpetration. We end with recommendations for refocusing sexual education curricula to better aid in the prevention of sexual violence perpetration. Specifically, given that (most) men know what rape is, educators should emphasize the cultural and situational factors that make rape more likely so all people can reduce the risk of sexual violence and take proactive precautions to prevent it.

A mathematical model for studying rape and its possible mode of control

Estimates of rape against women had been usually taken from two main sources till the early 1980s; The national crime victimization study and the Uniform Crime Report’s official statistics. Scholars argued, however, that the true incidence of rape was greatly underestimated by those data sources. For example, a uniform crime report focuses on recorded incidents, but several violations are not reported to the police. Two methodological causes have contributed to the underestimation of rape by national crime surveys. First, its definition of rape was considered too limited because it covered only carnal information and, thus, omitted many actions, such as offenses other than penile-vaginal penetration, from the scope of contemporary rape laws. Second, critics argued that the national crime survey was inappropriately structured for interviewees who had previously been assaulted to generate allegations of abuse. The crux of this critique was that there was no clear concern about rape in the national crime survey. How to establish evaluation methods that would show the real nature of rape was the crucial question. As a result of this, we are inspired to design a new mathematical model in this paper to study the dynamics of rape in our societies. Several characteristics of the established model, such as model formulation, boundedness, equilibrium solutions, basic reproduction number, global stability analysis are derived. The existence and characterization of the optimal control function are carried out. For sensitivity analysis as well as to show the significance of the control strategies, several simulation results are given. To get a deep insight into the dynamical behavior of the model, numerical simulations are performed and consequently we obtain the graphical results based on parameters taken as variables. The Euler technique is employed to do the job.

Sex uden samtykke ̶ udviklingen i islandsk ret

AbstractPenal Code chapters on sexual offences have been revised in all the Nordic countries in recent years. The concept of rape has been changed and is now much more extensive than before.
 In Iceland, the Penal Code´s (GPC) provisions on rape and other violations of people´s sexual freedom were revised and changed with Act no 61/2007. These amendments included a new, broad statutory definition of the concept of rape, which was supposed to cover incidents where the victim did not consent to having intercourse or other sexual interactions with the offender. The concept of consent was not mentioned in the provision, but instead the unlawful act was defined as rape if the perpetrator had intercourse or other sexual interactions with the victim by using violence, any kinds of threats, for example threats on the internet, or other kinds of unlawful coercion, under par. all 1 of Art. 194 GPC. According to par. 2 of Art. 194 GPC, rape also involves the abuse of the situation of a person, who does not have the same capacities as adults generally do to defend themselves against sexual attacks. This can be the abuse of a victim’s permanent condition, i.e. a mental illness or any other type of psychological disability, to have sex with the victim, or the abuse of a victim’s temporary condition which causes the victim to be unable to defend themselves against the offence, e.g. because the victim is drunk, sleeping, or unconscious because of the use of medicines or drugs.
 In 2018 the definition of rape under par. 1 of Art. 194 was revised again and consent is now included in the provision. It is considered consent if an individual expresses it of his or her own volition. It is not considered consent if violence, threats, or any other type of unlawful coercion is used. Note, however, that this new definition from 2018, where consent is included in the provision on rape does not constitute a substantive change since lack of consent was already an underlying element of the act as previously written and the methods that exclude consent are the same as the ones in the provison from 2007.
 The article addresses these changes from 2007 and 2018 and the effects they have had on judgments in rape cases, as well as in society.

RETHINKING CONCEPT OF RAPE UNDER THE ISTANBUL CONVENTION: UKRAINIAN EXPERIENCE

The article provides a comparative legal analysis of rape in the criminal law of Ukraine and some foreign countries. The paper aims to analyse countries that share the same historical backgrounds, such as Russia, Belarus.  The study of foreign experience in the criminal legal protection of sexual freedom and sexual integrity has become essential for Ukraine. By comparing the same legal norms, principles, and institutions, it is possible to determine the general patterns of development and prospects for improving the country's domestic criminal law.The author draws attention to the advantages and disadvantages of the previously existing definition of rape in the criminal law of Ukraine as sexual intercourse with the use or with the threat of violence against the victim. The article separately analyses the norms of rape in foreign countries, where the concept of rape as forced sexual intercourse still exists.In Ukraine, rape is now defined as the commission of sexual intercourse (penetration) with another person without the consent of the latter. Among the shortcomings of the existing concept of rape in the criminal law of Ukraine, the author names the unresolved legislative issue of qualifying an act when the perpetrator has sexual intercourse with a victim whose behaviour he thoughtlessly took as a consent.  Keywords: rape, crime, criminal law, subject of a crime, voluntary consent, victim, actus reus, sexual intercourse.