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jumped-50-percent-last-year-idUSBREA400AM20140501

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May 1, 2014 / 8:15 AM / 4 years ago

U.S. military sexual assault reports

jumped 50 percent last year
David Alexander, Patricia Zengerle

5 Min Read

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Reported sexual assaults in the U.S. military jumped 50

percent last year, the Pentagon said on Thursday, and officials welcomed the spike as a
sign that a high-level crackdown has made victims more confident their attackers will
be prosecuted.

U.S. army soldiers are seen marching in the St. Patrick's Day Parade in New York, March 16,
2013. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said the jump in reported sexual assaults to 5,061 in the
2013 fiscal year from 3,374 the previous year, was unprecedented.

He announced six new directives to expand the fight, including an alcohol policy review
and an effort to encourage reporting by male victims. Men are thought to represent
about half of the victims of military sexual assault but made up only 14 percent of the
reports that were investigated.

We believe victims are growing more confident in our system, Hagel told a Pentagon
news conference. Because these crimes are underreported, we took steps to increase
reporting and thats what were seeing.

Despite increased focus on the issue over the past year, the military has continued to
face embarrassing incidents in which officers have been accused of tolerating sexual
misconduct and even encouraging it, rather than fighting the problem.

Critics said the Pentagons numbers on increased reporting demonstrated little

improvement in the proportion of cases going to trial or the percentage of convictions.

A total 484 cases went to trial in the 2013 fiscal year that ended on September 30 and
370 people were convicted of an offense, the report said. That compared with 302 trials
the previous year and 238 convictions.
You cant tell me that only one in 10 cases are worthy of going to trial. Thats like
saying 90 percent of those who come forward are lying, Representative Jackie Speier,
a California Democrat, told Reuters in an interview.

Speier and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat, have led a push to
remove prosecution of sex crimes from the military chain of command and put it in the
hands of specialized prosecutors. The effort was narrowly defeated earlier this year, but
Thursdays report revived calls for its consideration.

Todays report is deeply troubling and shows the scourge of sexual assaults has not
been brought under control and our current military justice system remains broken,
Gillibrand said in a statement.

Other lawmakers saw progress. Senator Claire McCaskill, who worked on legislation to
develop a more forceful military response to the problem, said the increased reporting
was encouraging.

We know that the majority of survivors, both military and civilian, choose not to report
their assaults, the Missouri Democrat, a former sex crimes prosecutor, said in a
statement. This data suggests that the number of brave men and women in uniform
choosing to pursue justice is increasing.

Sexual assault is vastly underreported, and a separate military survey conducted in 2012
concluded there were some 26,000 sex crimes in the military that year, from rape to
abusive sexual contact.

The survey is conducted every two years, so there was no survey with the annual report
this year to use as a basis for projecting total sex crimes in the services.

The figures last year provoked outrage and led to a broad effort across the military to
crack down on sex crimes and sexual misbehavior. But despite the push, a number of
high-profile officers are being investigated for their actions.

The Navy said last week it was investigating allegations of misconduct by Captain
Gregory McWherter, the former commander of the Blue Angels precision flight
squadron. He was accused of allowing and sometimes encouraging lewd speech,
inappropriate comments, and sexually explicit humor, the Navy said.

Major General Michael Harrison also was recently disciplined for failing to take
appropriate action in response to sexual assault allegations while commander of U.S.
Army forces in Japan. He had been suspended from the post last June when the
allegations were made.

Army General Martin Dempsey, the highest-ranking military officer, told defense
bloggers earlier this month that the department had a limited window of opportunity to
demonstrate it could deal with the sexual assault problem.

If it occurs that after a period of very intense and renewed emphasis on this that we cant
solve it, Im not going to fight it being taken away from us, the militarys press service quoted
him as saying.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/murali-balaji/theres-no-easy-answer-to_b_5609437.html

Theres No Easy Answer to Sexual

Violence in India

By Murali Balaji

Over the past two months, a spate of sexual violence in India including the brutal
rape and murders of teen cousins in rural Uttar Pradesh has raised questions about
the countrys ability to handle what some commentators call an epidemic.

Indias sexual violence is unique in some ways, but in others, it reflects the global crisis
of violence against women, particularly girls. More than a third of women worldwide
have suffered some form of gender violence. Its even reached almost epidemic
proportions in the U.S. military, according to recent reports. Moreover, gender and
sexual violence rape, forced child marriage, kidnapping, prostitution and child
trafficking, physical abuse, and even murder is so broad in definition that there isnt
a one-stop policy solution to combat it.

The grisly nature of the recent attacks on women, coupled with the high-profile
incidents of gang rape against (and often ensuing murder of) women over the last
several years, has led international rights groups and even a group of U.S. senators, led
by Barbara Boxer, to push the newly elected Indian government to act swiftly to mete
out justice. But their condemnations seem to overlook the complexity of sexual violence
in India or anywhere, for that matter and the decentralized manner in which
Indias justice system works. While Prime Minister Narendra Modi has already pledged
to act on addressing the issue (despite dealing with a rape scandal involving one of his
cabinet ministers), reactive legislation wont address the roots of the problem.

Before delving into the issue more, it should be noted that part of the reason why sexual
violence in India is more in the headlines is due to the rise of reported rapes (as opposed
to silence of rape victims and their families, as well as local authorities) and the 24-hour
news cycle aided by social media. But sexual violence in India is due to many factors,
including but not limited to years of institutional apathy towards gender equality despite
job, education, and political quotas for women; Victorian-era sexual repression; rapid
globalization and even more rapid urbanization; Indias lack of social infrastructure; and
the inability of policy makers and social leaders to address the roots of the problem.

For starters, Indias law enforcement apparatus straddled with Victorian-era

bureaucratic norms, teeming with corruption, and chronically understaffed (while being
mostly male) is often more of an encumbrance to justice in major cities, but in rural
villages, police and magistrates often act as the unofficial vassals of local leaders. Other
times, village leaders often use rape as a punishment for women who are seen as
disobedient. Just over a week ago, a 14-year-old girl in Jharkand was raped on the
orders of a village head as retaliation for a reported sexual assault by her brother. This is
why young men accused of rape (and worse) can usually duck justice if they have the
right connections through family, tribal, or caste ties.

Before casting the blame solely on Indias law enforcement capacity, its important to
note that its inefficiency was at least partially inherited from the colonial era, when
British authorities wary of giving too much autonomy to locals, but savvy enough to
recognize the importance of town/village political dynamics gave limited authority to
magistrates and other town officials.

But the colonial era also left another lasting mark: the failure of Indians to acknowledge
sex or sexuality. The Victorian prudishness that become a defining feature for Indian
society often manifested itself in punitive measures, whether it was the upholding of an
1860 law criminalizing homosexuality or the acceptance by Indians of every religious
belief not to talk about sex. Though sex was more openly acknowledged as a part of
daily life (and rape was more forcibly condemned such as in the Manusmriti), during
the colonial period it became a taboo. Womens rights were not even considered serious
points of discussion, even as numerous state level governments espoused lip service to
womens equality. The failure of the Indian education system to provide adequate sex
education re-affirms the idea that both patriarchy and male privilege were too woven
tightly into Indian society. Sexual repression was also enshrined in parochial education,
as generations of Indians who sent their children to Catholic schools (or Islamic
madrassas) werent taught anything about sex - except to not talk about it. Thanks to
conservative Hindu interpretations of social norms, many middle and upper-middle
class Hindus have become conservative in dealing with sex and gender equality, despite
there being no scriptural basis for such prudishness. This isnt to say that religion is to
blame for the conditioning of gender roles, but the silence of religious centers of
learning and religious leaders (across all faiths) themselves when it came to discussing
sex proved to be an abetting force in shaping Indian attitudes about sex.

In turn, those attitudes can sometimes lead to a blame-the-victim mentality that cuts
across economic, educational, and social lines. Womens increased role in the
workforce, and the increasing number of those getting college educations, is also
making them more visible in society. While many Indian politicians have gotten in
trouble for their tone-deafness and outright offensiveness when it comes to handling
violence against women, they are merely the public faces and voices of widespread
insensitivity and antagonism towards gender equality. It should be noted, however, that
these officials, steeped in their own patriarchy (despite Indira Gandhis prime
ministership for over a decade, Pratibha Patils presidency in the 2000s, and Sonia
Gandhis current leadership of the Indian National Congress), are becoming less
relevant in discourses as Indian women are becoming more involved in politics at the
local and national level.

Another major issue is that Indias embrace of globalization has created more
devastating consequences than just economic inequality. It has institutionalized hyper-
rapid urbanization, creating an influx of (mostly) male workers from small villages who
migrate to the big cities for work. The difference in upbringing between Indian villages
and Indian cities, while also partially dependent upon economics, is seemingly a world
apart. Migration between those two worlds, however, is now the norm. In that process,
Indias social infrastructure is woefully overmatched, as exhibited by the cases of
HIV/AIDS skyrocketing in rural areas due to the migration of married men between
their villages and the cities, where they often pay HIV-infected sex workers for sex.

While the situation in India appears to be dire, there are two major ways policymakers,
gender equality advocates, and religious leaders can at least help to address the tide of
sexual violence. For example, some womens groups have even taken matters into their
own hands.The first is actually one that doesnt directly involve acknowledging sexual
violence: upgrading the countrys infrastructure. Too many parts of the country still lack
access to sanitation, which, as some commentators note, is a major public safety issue,
as sadly exemplified in the Uttar Pradesh Badaun rapes. Building toilets, ensuring that
roads are well-lit 24 hours a day, and helping to provide safe passage for young people
to schools are both as much womens rights issues as they are national development
priorities. Thus far, Indias new central government seems to be placing an emphasis on
infrastructure development.

Working to end Indias sexual illiteracy might be trickier, because it involves

acknowledging that Indias sexual denialism is deeply rooted into its social fabric, in
part due to norms passed down from the colonial period. Perhaps introducing sexual
education in schools along with working to cultivate buy-in from conservative
parents and religious leaders can help to develop a new norm for Indian social
interactions predicated upon the premises of equality and respect. Contrary to the edicts
of some religious leaders, culturally sensitive (and religiously aware) sexual education
is possible. Moreover, systematizing sensitivity towards sexual violence to all law
enforcement officials might go a long way in addressing the problems of indifference
and animosity towards victims of sexual violence.

Hindu leaders have already begun highlighting the importance of womens equality as
inherently part of the religion, specifically through mention of Shaktism (the worship of
female divinity) and the central role women have played in both Hindu scriptures and
practice as equals to their male counterparts. And while Hinduism and the other
Dharmic traditions have been traditionally more sex positive than their Abrahamic
counterparts, theres no reason why Christian and Muslim religious leaders shouldnt
also be open to discussing the importance of sex education, considering that rape
violates their religious tenets. An interfaith movement promoting gender rights could
become an effective way of cutting across cultural lines while explaining to certain
religious groups why awareness about sex and sexual violence is the morally right thing
to do. Such efforts can also help to undercut the influence of local village leaders who
promote sexual violence. It could also help gender rights leaders work more closely
with faith leaders to constructively prevent sexual violence.

As I mentioned before, theres no easy answer to fighting and ending sexual violence in India.
While these proposed solutions may put only a dent in Indias overall challenges in combating
sexual violence, they can at least help to address a major hurdle that has thus far stalled any
constructive measures: acknowledging that a problem exists. The new government
acknowledged the seriousness of the issue, and Indian womens groups have been at the
forefront pushing for concrete policy solutions. One can only hope that such an
acknowledgment helps expedite both a collective response and proactive measures to ensure
that girls and women throughout India are treated as equals, and dont have to live with the
fear of being victims of sexual violence or institutional indifference.