Rape Fantasies By Margaret Atbeck Summary

The author agrees with the idea of women as victims through the characterisation of women in the short story. The women are portrayed as helpless to the torment inflicted upon them by the boy in the story. This positions readers to feel sympathy for the women but also think of the world outside the text in which women are also seen as inferior to men. “Each season provided him new ways of frightening the little girls who sat in front of him or behind him”. This statement shows that the boy’s primary target were the girls who sat next to him. This supports the tradition idea of women as the victims and compels readers to see that the women in the text are treated more or less the same as the women in the outside world. Characterisation has been used by the author to reinforce the traditional idea of women as the helpless victims.

On September 27th, 2017, we watched a documentary made by Priyanka Boghani called, Rape on the Night Shift, which was made June 23rd, 2015. This document discusses the issues with a large number of women getting raped while doing their jobs, more specifically janitors, who aren’t protected by the company that they work for in the way that they should be. The documentary also goes over how rape is one of the most common crimes to go unreported, and unprosecuted. These rapes still occur because when a rape is reported, companies are taking very little to no action in making their workplace a safer environment and don’t give each employee the necessary education and tools to allow them to stay safe should they ever be in a rough situation. The investigators interview and reach out to many women who have been raped and sexually abused allowing them to tell their stories, including Maria Bojorquez, Maria Magaña, Erika Morales, Leticia Zuniga, and many more.

Sexuality has an inherent connection to human nature. Yet, even in regards to something so natural, societies throughout times have imposed expectations and gender roles upon it. Ultimately, these come to oppress women, and confine them within the limits that the world has set for them. However, society is constantly evolving, and within the past 200 years, the role of women has changed. These changes in society can be seen within the intricacies of literature in each era. Specifically, through analyzing The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, one can observe the dynamics of society in regards to the role of women through the lens of the theme of sexuality. In both novels, the confinement and oppression of women can be visibly seen as a result of these gender roles. Yet, from the time The Scarlet Letter was published to the time The Bell Jar was written, the place of women in society ultimately changed as well. Hence when evaluating the gender roles that are derived from sexuality, the difference between the portrayals of women’s oppression in each novel becomes apparent, and shows how the subjugation of women has evolved. The guiding question of this investigation is to what extent does the theme of sexuality reflect the expectations for women in society at the time each novel was written. The essay will explore how the literary elements that form each novel demonstrate each author’s independent vision which questions the

Rape is a grotesque topic, but in The RoundHouse by Louise Erdrich the subject is a necessity for Joe to comprehend what happened to his mom. Joe is a 13 year old boy that has to grow up faster than he expected. With the attack of his mother and his father's inability to rehabilitate her, Joe steps up and begins to take an active role in trying to find her attacker. Normally a 13 year old would remain oblivious to the turmoil surrounding his family. Joe does not. He takes the attack of his mom personally and becomes more serious. As a reader there are not many scenarios where he is portrayed doing child like things. This is why I believe Erdrich includes the scene with Grandma Thunder. She is the comedic relief and the readers opportunity to

Both Hughes and Atwood present an extreme representation of their contextual concerns and issues of their respective times and worlds. Ted Hughes’ poems, “Your Paris and “The Shot” published in the “Birthday Letters” collection in 1998 explore issues regarding conflicting perspectives and control, Hughes wanted to illustrate Plath’s mental state to prove his innocence, as he was blamed for Plath’s suicide. Similarly in Margaret Atwood’s 1985 “The Handmaid’s Tale”, there is an exaggerated exploration of a patriarchal society and the conflicting perspectives of both sides, written to reflect the 1960s being a period growth in religious right power which threatened to reverse women’s rights advancements. In comparison both these texts go in depth to examine two of the major themes of the modern world, hence influencing

In Atwood’s depiction of Sondra, she draws a comparison between her and the many rape victims that remain silent. Sondra is described in terms of how she plays bridge. “Sondra is not the world's best bridge player” (Atwood 102). This gives Sondra an insignificance to the narrator and the other characters. She is ignored and made to seem silly even though she is the only one who actually knew what rape was. Sondra responds to the notion of rape fantasies by saying “‘You mean, like some guy jumping you in an alley or something,’ Sondra said” (Atwood 102). This is dismissed by the other characters because it doesn’t fit into the setup Chrissy, the woman who asked everyone what their fantasies were, established. Nancy Workman, an English professor

Amber Mauldin reflects on her past through the narrative, Perfectly Broken: A Memoir of Rape and Redemption, about the experiences surrounding her rape. The incident occurred when she was at the age of fifteen and happened in Norfolk, Virginia in 1998. The book itself was published in 2014, leaving a massive gap between the incident and the date of publication. She recounts the event briefly and mainly focuses on the fallout from the incident along with her experience in building herself back up again. Through the curiosity of her brother and the liberation she felt, she tells her tale by giving an explanation to her younger brother at the very beginning of the novel. It is through that sort of lense in which the structure of the story and

MacAulay in this article discusses the misunderstood conception of communication. More specifically, he critiques the analysis of Kitzinger & Frith (1999), and O’Bryne, Hansen & Rapley (2008) on the notion of communication issues and the causation of rape. Summarizing the findings of those authors is the explanation of how women refuse sex; in other words, how they work around simply saying no. It has become very common for women to convey refusal without actually using the word “no.” This can be very problematic in a number of ways. For example, if a woman were to apologize and say she can’t go out tonight because she has work in the morning, it leaves a glimmer of opportunity in the eyes of men; meaning they could keep asking in hopes of her not having to work early on a given day. That could be prevented by a simple no. However, the reason behind this way of refusal is explained by women as a way of refusal that removes the arrogance and rudeness from a rejection. MacAulay states that this is the main problem. He states that rapists are very opportunistic; they wait for a chance to do or say something and pounce on it. Therefore, by refusing sex without actually saying no, you are allowing them to attempt to persuade that refusal into a yes. Their main purpose is to see if they can talk you out of a no. additionally, a major note is that it doesn’t

First, this book talks about the sexuality of women. Back in those days, women were considered lower than men purely on the fact that medical doctors had the notion that women had the sexual organs of men but inside out (Wiesner, 56). Second, I chose to target the issues of rape in the past. Women rarely came forward to accuse a man of rape (Wiesner, 61). This leads to the thought that more women were raped than that came forward, directing

“On Date Rape” is an article written by Camille Paglia, which argues the young women of today pay not much care about their safety while they’re enjoying the freedom with men. The author points out that a woman should pay more attention to their safety while they spend their time with men, because a woman is likely becoming a victim in a rape case. In this article, the author also implies that even the law will protect women from the rape, but women themselves should build up a self-protection awareness to keep them away from the rape crime. However, even this article points out a main argument about self-protection awareness is necessary for a woman, but more or less of its points become fallacies of this article. In additional, the focus of my article is about to analysis the article by Camille Paglia, “On Date Rape”. For the following paragraphs of my article, I’ll summarize her article paragraph by paragraph briefly and analysis main fallacies of her article in detail.

When one looks at a glacier, it is impossible to tell the depth. It is only upon closer inspection that the true extent can be known. This superficial example can be applied to the vast majority of literary works. The first time reading something, it is easy to miss out on the importance of certain phrases, themes, or even the entire purpose. Upon reading “Lust” by Susan Minot, it is easy to just write this story off as a girl’s sexual journey through adolescence, but that analysis merely scratches the surface. “Lust” cleverly discusses both misogyny and rape culture through its narrative told from the perspective of a nameless teenage girl. Minot discusses double standards and gender roles which enables her to shed light on the normalized

Rape Is All Prospective In comparing Camille Paglia’ essay Rape: A Bigger Danger than Feminists Know and Susan Jacoby ’s essay Common Decency, it is clear that both of them feel rape has many factors that involve a male and a woman and the lines of sex between them. Is it mixed signals? Is it respect?

. Zipes confirms that we are now voyeurs, intruders even, at a point of seduction; the two, in almost touching proximity are absorbed in each other’s gaze.(cite), but it is more than that. This pivotal meeting that takes place in the woods, in nature, to follow Carl Jung’s theory, represents a threat opposed to and outside of societal control and the preferred model of the institution of marriage and Christian love. The wolf, already preconceived as the epitome of the devil and temptation in the minds of the audience, casts the dark shadow of insatiable male sexual desire to dominate over our girlish Red, but her fearless gaze holds him. In Zipes’ mind, Red’s unwavering stance settles Perrault’s accusation that she is complicit in her own seduction, rape and murder; the innocent child shifts to femme fatale confirming the held misogynistic view that women want to be seduced and even raped and that they incite men to act on their animalistic desires. Dore’s expression of the two figures resonates with Perrault’s transgression intent and confirms their male attitude; that stupid and disobedient women who entertain their own sexual desires deserve to be punished. Whilst there is a nod of recognition in the passivity of the wolf, that men are weak beasts and easily fall prey to the sexual allure of a woman, the primary inference is that the role of men is to uphold dominant control over women and the ideological patriarchal moral order and maintain that sex remains in its proper reproductive function in society, (1987, pgs. 90-92).

In Isabel Allende’s short story, “The Judge’s Wife”, she uses fate to perpetuate her theme of the irony of rape culture, which justifies a rape by focusing on the flaws of the victim. Allende centers on the childhood of Nicolas Vidal, and leaves out details Casilda, the victim of the rape, in order to make the reader sympathize with Vidal; she gives humanity to him, and makes Casilda subhuman in comparison. Vidal is exempt from his crimes due to the “fatal omens” (186) that have been thrust upon him since his unwanted birth, and these omens are what serve as justification for these actions. Furthermore, Allende describes Vidal’s past with a strikingly negative connotation, noting that the “the street had made him merciless and the solitude

To explore the legacy of rape as a tool in war Nancy Toping Bazin’s and Jane Harmovit Lauter’s philosophy of domination is important to know. The philosophy of domination is the underpinning of all patriarchal institutions from domestic institutions, to government, and the military. Another usefully theory is one succinctly described by Katrina Lee Koo in “Confronting a Disciplinary Blindness: Women, War and Rape in the International Politics of Security”. Koo says, “the nation, the state, allies, and enemies intersect with gendered identities…sexual enslavement is politicized violence against women’s bodies that is both state-sanctioned and premeditated” in effect, during war time there is an intersection of gender with religion, ethnicity, nationality and anything else that represents the opposing side as an “other”. In this sense an assault on the women of a nation is a direct assault on their state, their culture, their religion, their ethnic group as well as the men in it. In her essay “Revisiting the Issue of Korean ‘Military Comfort Women’: The Question of Truth and Positionality” Hyunah Yang says, “by invading women’s bodies, rape attempts to possess the enemy’s property and leaves a rift in the most fundamental ground of the symbolic system that sustains the enemies group identity…belief that the woman’s body is a field underpinning the family, ethnic group, and/or nation” (61). During the comfort system the Japanese army was not only in control of the Korean