The History Of Rape In The Military

“Few northern soldiers raped…True manhood was characterized by sexual restraint not sexual assertion; even mutually agreeable intercourse would have threatened masculine identity. Letting anger toward women break out in unsanctioned violence against women would have been unmanly,” read a passage in Reid Mitchell's book The vacant Chair: The Northern Soldier Leaves Home.

This and many other records of the civil war denies that rape was a problem during the civil war. Suggesting that soldiers weren't even having sex. But looking at the records of disease during the civil war shows that there were 109,397 cases of gonorrhea and 73,382 cases of syphilis, and these are only the ones reported among white U.S. troops, the confederate records were destroyed.

There, also was at least 450 cases of rape or attempted rape cases in Union military courts. The laws outside the courtroom made it hard for women to report rape cases because of the emphasis on chasity. If a woman were to get consent  in the face of a severe beating or at gun point, it would still be considered consensual sex, and the attacker would not be punished, leaving the accuser ostracized.

The Atlantic interviewed Kim Murphey about the research she did on military rape. Read Below:

Why does war, in general, tend to breed rape?

Because, basically, men can get away with it. Very few men are prosecuted for it during war, and commanders usually do not come down very hard on it. I mean, it’s kind of like the military right now, what they’re going through. Military women are being raped and they often have to report to the person who may have been the rapist, or who may have been friends with the rapist. So it really hasn’t changed. [Ed. Note: In a 2012 survey, 6.1 percent of active duty military women reported they had experienced “unwanted sexual contact” in the past year. Of these, 67 percent did not report the incident.]

You mention a lot of difficulties with determining what happened during the Civil War in particular—for example, many of the Confederate records were destroyed. How do you go about extrapolating what may have happened that was not reported?

Unfortunately, because we don’t have all the records, we don’t really know. But when I uncovered several hundred cases [of rape], I think that speaks loudly because very few women would have come forward. Very few women come forward during peacetime; it’s even fewer that come forward during wartime, so we know that this is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what’s being reported.

"If he was holding a gun to her head and she was scared to death, that was still considered that she had given her consent."

Also, the thing that most people don’t recognize is that most of the records, like the court-martial records that we do have, were reported during times of occupation. That means that the troops were there, they weren’t in an active battle situation. That’s when women could find someone to go forward to. During times of battle, the chances of them even knowing who they could report to would be almost nil, and even if they did find someone, the chances that the officer in charge would be able to find enough officers to take on a court martial at that time would be next to impossible.
In the book, I mention [a rape that occurred during] Sherman’s March, when the army was on the move. The victim did report it. But by the time the case made it to court martial, they were 100 miles away, so she could not testify. That’s what people don’t understand—it was totally against the women to even be able to report it.

Can you give an overview of how the rape laws worked at the time?

The court martial tried to do by the state laws of the time. During the time, women had to essentially prove they had been raped, and that meant that she had to give the ultimate resistance against the attacker’s force. One thing that was different in the Civil War era was that girls as young as 10 could often be considered as trying to entice men.
Women in court settings also were often barraged with questions of how she had resisted his advances. If she consented because he beat her, or if he was holding a gun to her head and she was scared to death, that was still considered that she had given her consent.

Do you know what would have been an acceptable answer?

As far as resistance? Well, the woman usually had to go out of their way to say how much they had resisted. That’s where the title came from, “I had rather die.” A woman was testifying that she “had rather die” than be raped, and it was during those resistance questions.

Explain the distinction between “persuasion” and “force”—it seemed like that was a very nebulous thing.

Basically, if a man could persuade a woman in any way to have intercourse, then it was not considered rape. Again, it didn’t matter if he beat her silly in order to “persuade” her, or if he had a weapon and persuaded her that way. In other words, a man could use as much persuasion as he wanted in order to have intercourse and it not be considered rape.

There’s a sort of double standard, especially if you think about the idea of what was considered “being a lady” at the time. Now you have to be able to fight off a man—even though normally society thought you should be dainty.

Even if it was an upper-class white woman, who was more likely to believed, sometimes judges would dismiss it because they would feel, “Oh, [if she were really a lady] she would have been too ashamed to actually come forward.” So everything was stacked against the woman.
That’s the other thing: both the North and the South rarely thought it was rape when it was a black woman. It wasn’t until the Civil War when black women were actually able to come forward and call it rape. Before that time, even in the North, they would make it a lesser charge [for black women], if at all. I do have at least one record where a black woman was able to testify about a sexual assault in New York or someplace like that, but that was very rare. For the most part, black women’s voices went unheard.

It seems there was every kind of hurdle: race, class, and whether or not the person had a weapon, or witnesses to corroborate the story. And the more factors you had in your favor, the more likely you’d be successful.

And if you had a white male witness, you generally were more likely to be believed.
Most of the black men that were found guilty of rape and executed, generally speaking, they were gang rapes, so it was multiple men against a white woman. And with the white men, most of them had other crimes [on their records], and a high percentage of the white men that were executed were foreign born—so there’s an obvious prejudice there, too. They tended to have a history of desertion or other crimes that they were guilty of in the past.

Can you talk a little bit about this quote:

“It is true that rape is a most detestable crime, and therefore ought severely and impartially to be punished with death; but it must be remembered, that it is an accusation easily to be made and hard to be proved, and harder to be defended by the party accused, tho never so innocent.”
-- Sir Matthew Hale, The History of the Pleas of the Crown (1736)

It seemed, from your book, that all the laws and attitudes at the time revolved around this idea.

Yeah, that came from the judge, Matthew Hale, in the 18th century. He was saying that men had it very difficult to prove that they hadn’t raped. That woman was vindictive so, therefore, she would “cry rape.” His words were used in the court martial records and civilian records in the 19th century, and were still used in courtrooms well into the 1970’s.

Whether or not those [specific] words are used, do we see this attitude continue today?

For sure. There’s no doubt about that. It seems like so many times women still have to prove that they’ve been raped when they shouldn’t. I think we have made some steps forward, but unfortunately women don’t go forward enough because they still feel like they’re going to be lost in the justice system. And I know we’ve had several cases recently where athletes were considered more important than women who had been raped, and that’s essentially the same thing that was going on during the Civil War era. It was more important to have a good soldier, whether or not he had committed rape.

So you can see parallels between now and then?

Mmhm. And I see it more and more each day, it seems like, where people keep saying, “Oh, we need to say a woman had been forced in order to be raped.” Well, rape is rape, and any kind of rape is forced.

Russian Trying to Hide the Environmental Costs of Hosting Winter Olympics

Vladimir Putin promised that hosting the 2014 Winter Olympics will not have a negative impact on the environment. According to several environmental agencies Mr. Putin has not lived up to his promises to host a 'green Olympics'.

According to the Agency France Presse, Wetlands that provide habitat for several different types of wildlife including dozens of bird species, have been covered with 6.5 feet of crushed rock. Though, Ornithological Park was created as an alternative for the birds to migrate, they have not taken to it.

And it only gets worse from there. Olympics organizers have been accused of illegally dumping construction waste in Sochi national parks. This is destroying parts of Sochi National Park and blocking migrating routes for wildlife. Environmental Watch of the North Caucasus have monitored the activities of  the construction sites for the last two years and in response to their reports, they have endured harassment of its members.

Yevgeny Vitishko is the latest victim of this harassment getting a two week jail sentence for swearing in public.  This would be just long enough for the games to continue without his intervention. He is not the only one who has been to detained, according to The Guardian Igor Kharchenko after finding his car smashed was grabbed by police in Krasnodar. The police then took him to the police station and charged him with resisting arrest. He was put on trial and sentenced without any legal counsel.

Vitishko has been very vocal about the changes in environmental laws in Russia, from 2006, 2011 and 2013, Russian authorities have weakened the laws to facilitate the Olympic related construction. If he is convicted for other charges he could face up to three years in a labor camp.

It is unfortunate that despite Vladimir Putin's promise to have a 'green Olympics', he could not deliver on that promise. If he could have delivered, it would have helped normalize greener practices for future countries that host the Olympics.

CVS to Stop Selling Tobacco Products!

When you think of a Pharmacy, what is the first thing you think of? Maybe prescription drugs, beauty products, health to name a few. But what about cigarettes? Is this something you think should be in a pharmacy? CVS Caremark, doesn't think cigarettes should be sold by a company that advocates health and wellness.

CVS announced that starting Oct. 1st they will no longer be selling these products in their stores. That includes cigars, cigarettes and any other tobacco product that goes in that category. By eliminating these products CVS will be giving up a big chunk of money, at least 2 billion dollars.

“Every day, 26,000 of our pharmacists and nurse practitioners are on the front-line of healthcare,” CVS Pharmacy President Helena Foulkes said. “They’re working with our patients and our customers who have chronic conditions like high blood pressure and high cholesterol and diabetes. We know that smoking is extremely antithetical to helping people with their healthcare needs. So, it’s the right thing to do, and it’s also underscoring our position as a healthcare player.”

Though, CVS maybe losing a lot of money by discontinuing tobacco products, they are making room to take on a changing health care scene. CVS will be hiring clinicians to offer care onsite, keeping the community healthy; selling tobacco products would prove to be a conflict of interest and cause people to question their creditability as a provider of healthcare.

“It’s very important to us, as we’re working with doctors and hospital systems and health plans, that they see us as an extension of their services,” Foulkes said. “So it’s virtually impossible to be in the tobacco business when you want to be a partner in the health care system”

Though, CVS will reduce the number of retailers that sell tobacco products by about 7,600 between now and October 1st, experts believe that this will not stop smokers from buying tobacco elsewhere.

This big change will put on the pressure for other retailers that sell the product to follow their example. The more the retailers join in the fight the less places people can buy the product encouraging the abandonment of tobacco all together. Not only will this make smoking inconvenient but change social attitudes about smoking making it unacceptable.

As CVS Medical director Troy Brennan and UCSF tobacco researcher Steven Schroeder write in a medical journal commentary released in tandem with the announcement, “Making cigarettes available in pharmacies in essence ‘renormalizes’ the product by sending the subtle message that it cannot be all that unhealthy if it is available for purchase where medicines are sold.”

Pharmacist and the American Heart Association have long opposed selling tobacco in pharmacies and California has stopped it all together.

“If other retailers follow this lead, tobacco products will become much more difficult to obtain,” Brennan and Schroeder write. “Moreover, if people understand that retail outlets that plan to promote health, provide pharmacy services, and house retail clinics are no longer going to sell tobacco products, the social unacceptability of tobacco use will be substantially reinforced… . If pharmacies do not make this effort voluntarily, federal or state regulatory action would be appropriate.”

Thanks CVS for helping the rest of us breathe a little easier.



 

Free Speech: How Far is Too Far

The First Amendment, most people feel is one of or the most important part of the consitution. It stands for what democracy really stands for. And to take that away would be to deny us our human rights. Or does it?

What if this part of our democracy is denying others their rights?

France and Israel have come to an agreement that free speech is very important to society, too much free speech can also be the exact opposite. In response to this revelation they have put limits on the use of certain types of speech, even banning or fining anyone who uses it. In France, Dieudonne M'Bala M'Bala has been banned from playing in two cities and has been fined repeatedly for hate speech; being charged with intent to disrupt public order. The French have even made the encouragement racial discrimination a crime.

Israel has taken action against free speech by banning the word Nazi, unless used in an education context. Using this word, or even referring to the Third Reich with intention of hurting another person, can land a person jail for several months, along with some hefty fines. Israel did not stop there though, they have also made it illegal to deny the Holocaust. 

France and Israel are not alone in their efforts to control the harm done on society due to unbecoming speech. Six other European countries have also put restrictions in place.

This leaves America on it's own.

Coming back to America, this may seem excessive, even undemocratic. Federal court has held up the free speech law in a big way. In 1977 they upheld the rights of Neo-Nazi's to march right through a town in Illinois whose residents were survivors of Hitler's regime. Even when West-boro Church decided to picket outside the funeral of a gay soldier with signs that says "God Hates Fags" there was no repercussions. Though America seems to unlimited free speech there are some limits, for example slander, defamation, obscenity and the incitement of imminent lawlessness. This is a small portion of the hateful words that are hurting people everyday.

When is it too far?

"Recent studies in universities such as Purdue, UCLA, Michigan, Toronto, Arizona, Maryland, and Macquarie University in New South Wales, show, among other things, through brain scans and controlled studies with participants who were subjected to both physical and emotional pain, that emotional harm is equal in intensity to that experienced by the body, and is even more long-lasting and traumatic. Physical pain subsides; emotional pain, when recalled, is relived,"  reports the daily beast.

Physical wounds may last a long time, it's the psychological wounds that last a lifetime, and like physical harm, emotional distress can make the body sick. Even when these emotions are brought back, the person will relive the incident over and over again. This causes mental trauma, not just for the one person it may be directed too, but to everyone that can relate.

There, of course, is nothing wrong with trying to express your ideas in public, but this can be done without shouting obscenities at a gay soldiers funereal, or burning a cross in an African American neighborhood. 

"Free speech should not stand in the way of common decency. No right should be so freely and recklessly exercised that it becomes an impediment to civil society, making it so that others are made to feel less free, their private space and peace invaded, their sensitivities cruelly trampled upon."