Framing the Rape Victim

Mardorossian's book brings up the problem of victims and agency. Victims are often seen as women and the agency is male. There is a focus on the word victim rather than the conditions that go along with it. Women are often gendered as passive and frail but some are too scared to fight back against their attacker because they fear for their life. Therein lies an agent-victim binary which needs to be reframed because we must question what it means to be a victim.

An important thing to consider when talking about rape is the "asking for it" argument. Survivors are often blamed for being raped. People will say that they were wearing provocative clothing, they were intoxicated, flirting, etc. which warrants rape(?!?!?!). This is a ridiculous argument and places blame on the survivor when they are not the one who violated the other. Rapists have to be held accountable regardless of gender, race, or ethnicity.