Simply put, rape culture defines an environment within which rape and sexual violence are prevalent due to its normalization, excusability, and glamorization. Rape culture roots in the standardization of misogynistic language, the repeated objectification of women’s bodies, and the romanticization and euphemizing of sexual abuse. A plethora of factors play their part in upholding our society’s rape culture, but today, I will focus the spotlight on victim blaming. I want to make clear that victim blaming is genderless. However, I will be focusing on its impacts on women due to the mentality’s primarily misogynistic nature.

Denotatively, victim blaming is known as the phenomenon of placing a portion or all responsibility for the crime upon the victim. This practice is deeply problematic and devastating for numerous reasons.

Most prominently, victim blaming blatantly diverts culpability from the abuser to the abusee, firmly preventing the perpetrator from ever facing accountability for their actions, thus allowing them to continue their behaviors. By apportioning part of the abuse onto the back of the survivor, room for defense is made on behalf of the abuser. This practice is seen in the infamous phrase, “Boys will be boys, so girls must take care”, which implies that men are innately unable to suppress their rapist tendencies and that it is the responsibility of women to prevent such abuse and that it is subsequently their shortcoming if they are unsuccessful in this pursuit. Such propaganda allows rape to be seen as inevitable and a natural process, warranting rape culture’s growth.

Further, victim blaming thrives in diffusing blame onto female clothing. For example, in a 2018 rape trial in Ireland, the lawyer acting in defense of the accused man pointed out that the victim was wearing a thong in an attempt to justify his client’s actions, ultimately leading to the defendant’s acquittal. This widely circulated notion that a woman’s clothing is an indication of how she wishes to be treated is utterly false and ridiculous. A woman’s lack of clothing is never (emphasis on NEVER!!!) even close to an invitation for physical contact. Moreover, it is not a rationale for demeaning labels popularized by common societal practices of slut-shaming and cat-calling. This toxic ideology of victim blaming must be exterminated and the blame for sexual abuse must be properly placed on the abuser rather than the survivor.

Somehow, being raped has been universally deemed more shameful than being a rapist. Such a mindset is appalling and must change. Society as a whole must move past warping the fault of the abuser into that of the victim. We must create an environment that does not perpetuate rape culture but instead helps victims to feel safe in sharing their stories and aid them in receiving care to heal their wounds, both physical and mental. Both men and women must take action to educate themselves in demoting rape culture through uplifting survivors and shunning abusers and abusers only.