August 21, 2007
Sexual Assault, Robbery in Northeast
Brookland neighborhood blog stop, blog and roll points to a pretty horrifying crime story we missed: A woman was sexually assaulted and beaten inside her basement apartment on the 900 block of Perry Place NE Friday night, and then subsequently driven by the suspect to several ATMs around the neighborhood and forced to withdraw money. The assault occurred as the woman was entering her apartment -- she was grabbed from behind, forced inside, beaten and raped.
This is the kind of story that makes single women living in D.C. especially sick to their stomachs. It's also not the first of its kind this summer -- in late July, a woman living on the 900 block of P Street NW was sexually assaulted and robbed by a man who broke into her home at night.
It's easy to feel helpless about what you can do to prevent these kinds of crimes from happening, and easier still to feel terrified by the thought of a violent and active sexual predator being out on our streets. The MPD has a section on safety tips on their web site with common sense tips on how to reduce your risk of being sexually assaulted, including not walking alone in isolated areas, not walking home alone if you're under the influence of alcohol, and wearing clothing that would allow you to run easily. They also offer this rather sobering piece of advice: "If the assailant has a weapon, you may have no choice but to submit. Do whatever it takes to survive." It's sickening even to consider. No woman ever wants to imagine that this might be true. To the two women who survived these recent attacks, DCist salutes your bravery and hopes these monsters are caught immediately.
Photo by AlbinoFlea
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Thank God the gun ban is going away.
Maybe then DC residents will be able to defend themselves.
#1, your ideology is showing. Of course! What was this woman thinking? Everyone knows that when someone grabs you from behind, sight unseen, all you have to do is reach into your purse, pull out your 9mm, and start shooting.
As unfortunate as both these cases are, too many women in this city make themselves easy targets. Instead of carousing around town with headphones on all the time, or yakking on your cell phone nonstop, paying actual attention to your surroundings might reduce these crimes of opportunity.
#2, you are right, and as a young woman living in CH I do my best to not walk around alone at night. But the woman who was assaulted in late July was the victim of a break in!
#2, listening to headphones or not, talking on a cellphone or not, being intoxicated or not, no woman (or man) deserves or asks to be sexually assaulted.
the key to stopping sexual assault isn't to keep telling women to protect themselves, to not walk alone, to not be drunk, it's to tell men to stop sexually assaulting women.
"tell men to stop sexually assaulting women"? You really think this would work? Wow, what a novel concept you've come up with. Because it's just that easy.
Tell? I think we're officially beyond the 'tell' stage onefemme.
Not to make light, but I don't know many cases where men are told its okay to rape women (or okay to rape, period).
If anything, we suffer from general cultural indifference towards rape (and other grisly acts) that shows itself in how _society at large_ treats the issue, rather than its general disposition for/against the act. Our issue therefore isn't that there are countervailing ideas. Instead, rapists do what they do because they know that they can act, knowing that the likelihood of getting caught is slim, the likelihood of success in court still remains pretty high, and the incarceration rate for most rapes remains pitifully short.
Maybe instead we should focus on 'telling' certain men (and women) -- e.g., Congress.
i agree. why should women have to bear the brunt of responsibility for this, when it's so obviously men who are causing these crimes? You ever noticed that in a college freshman orientation, they ALWAYS tell girls what to do to reduce the risk of being raped, but NEVER tell the boys how serious/harmful/wrong rape is?
just because someone has a vagina instead of a penis, we create more pressure and stipulations on them? (and btw, then blame them if they DO get raped: "pft, i told you, look at what you were wearing, you were OBVIOUSLY asking for it.") Ridiculous.
Women can control their urges. So can men. Women can't control men's urges. Why are we asking them to?
DC WHee, you make my point for me. Men are "told" every day that assault is ok by the lack of attention it receives from police and from the number of people asking victims "what they did" to cause it.
Did you listen to music sweetheart? Did you not walk backwards towards your own apartment with gun drawn to assess if someone could jump out at you? See. See what you did wrong, that I wouldn't do? I'm safe, you F%^#ed up. Crime sucks. la la la.
#7, you're being blatantly sexist. Most of us men were raised to know the difference between right-and-wrong. Is it really too much to ask women
to take some personal responsibility, be careful, and look out for their own well-being? It certainly couldn't hurt, could it?
I'm a fairly good sized guy, and I still watch 360 degrees around me when I go walking at night. If women aren't willing to be vigilant about their own safety, maybe they should move back home with their parents.
#9, i bet you don't look around in fear that you're going to get raped, do you? Women already look around in fear at being mugged/jacked/robbed/whatever- it's not about being vigilant, it's about giving up freedom for safety, which nobody should have to od.
No #9, I do not fear being raped. That does not excuse, however, the numerous women I've seen walking home after dark who are totally engrossed in their iPod or cell phone above their own safety.
Sorry. #11 meant "#10".
WOW.
"is it really too much to ask women to take some personal responsibility, be careful, and look out for their own well-being?...if women aren't willing to be vigilant about their own safety, maybe they should move back home with their parents."
who said we aren't? and who said these women weren't vigilant about their safety? as a victim and survivor of rape i'm appalled at your comments. i wasn't dressed provacatively, i wasn't drinking, i wasn't walking home alone and yet it happened to me. and it could happen to you too, regardless of your size and how often you watch the world around you.
i don't blame all men nor do i disagree with your comment in regards to how most of you are raised. but cut the victims of rape a break. if someone wants to commit the crime, they will, regardless of how much you safeguard yourself from their actions.
In response to the article: my thoughts go out to the assaulted victims and their families. Survival is the first step to recovery and moving forward.
Don't blame the victim.
And yes, in the case of someone breaking into your home in the middle of the night (as in the second instance mentioned in the post), having a gun would help you defend yourself.
"If the assailant has a weapon, you may have no choice but to submit. Do whatever it takes to survive."
Wha? Why even type this.
Also, I did not hear about the 9th & P rape until today, and I live at 8th & Q , which is pretty lame.
Crime happens. It sucks. Even despite all reasonable precautions. It's a sorry fact of life, but there it is.
And if you think that statement is cold, well, I'm only making it because we've already got poster #1 arguing (in effect) for a concealed carry law, and various other posters waging a war of the sexes.
My point being, we can't stop crime, but we don't need to allow it to cause us to argue irrationally.
::sigh::
Suddenly everyone's an expert on how to not get raped. I'm surprised nobody suggested women stop grooming and let themselves get fat to protect themselves from sexual assault.
this crime disgusts me.
i wish we executed criminals that commit this kind of assualt.
I live in the area near perry st., and my prayers go out to the Victim and her family. I honestly think that all rapist should be castrated.
What resources do women have here in DC, if they are a survivor of a rape? Also, does anyone know the statistics--what I am interested in knowing is the extent to which a person who commits a rape is likely to repeat this behavior, etc.
To the women who survived these traumas, our hearts go out to you. You are strong. You are brave. It hurts. If you feel that you are holding something back please know there is NOTHING weak about finding someone to talk to. There are therapists. There are groups. Unfortunately there are so many others who have been through similar situations. I wish you strength. I wish you healing.
DC Rape Crisis Center
@7
You ever noticed that in a college freshman orientation, they ALWAYS tell girls what to do to reduce the risk of being raped, but NEVER tell the boys how serious/harmful/wrong rape is?
Untrue. I was (for a brief moment) an athlete in college and one of the things we had to do as freshmen was attend a series of lecture/seminars on various topics like steroids, gambling, drugs, alcohol, and rape.
The one on drugs was like an updated take on Reefer Madness, but the seminar on rape was probably one of the most uncomfortable hours of my life. We listened to a woman describe being date raped and then she had the brass balls to accept questions from a bunch 18 year old meatheads. At the time I resented the fact that the topic had been presented as if we were all (it was boys only) potential rapists, but upon further review it was probably the only way to get us to pay attention to what was being said.
HR
Folks, do we really think that street rapists are 100% mentally functioning individuals who rape people because they haven't been told it's wrong?
The one on-the-street type rapist I've had the immense displeasure of speaking with was an animal-mutilating, probably sexually abused themselves, do anything violent to anyone for a dollar and rape's on the list kind of "person." It's not that society hadn't impressed on him the appropriate values, it's that he didn't partcipate in society, and society at large had not (until just then) found him and taken him out of circulation.
To tell you that in that moment, you're the only one who can protect yourself against something inhuman is no more anti-feminist than telling you the same thing about avoiding rabid dog attacks, lightning strikes, or muggings. Big city. You have to be on the lookout for an attack, no matter what kind and no matter your gender.
Bringing up BS hyperacademic arguments against anyone who seeks disseminate as widely as possible the most effective known strategies for taking their own protective actions is irresponsible and shows a fundamental detachment from reality. You don't rip down CPR posters to replace them with copies of "Fast Food Nation".
Similarly, asking what you did to *bring on* what amounts to a rabid dog is beyond stupid, it betrays a basic lack of understanding of what's happening here. Especially here, where it sounds like there was absolutely nothing this woman could have done to make things turn out differently.
The only answer for her is care. You don't lecture someone whose house just burned down on replacing smoke detector batteries. After any tragedy you will encounter morons who impede someone's recovery by doing this kind of thing. *They* can very possibly be addressed through some education.
But it is important you do that without an attitude that makes it one iota more difficult or intimidating for someone to post basic common sense information that *hasn't* occurred to many people, and *might very well* save a life. Your women's studies prof is not out there with a red pen. Someone much worse is. Let's not make it any easier for them.
It's not women vs. men. It's Team Responsible Community vs. Team Depraved. You have a responsibility to keep your head on a swivel and your ears open when you walk home - and it's not just as a lady (Dudes also get the ever living hell beaten out of them in an experience not nearly as bad as rape but still pretty horrible,) and not just for yourself. Keep an eye on your team members out there with you, too.
Perhaps briefer and more to the point:
Telling people what to do *in the future* to have some margin vs. unpredictable terrible things is different from assigning them fault for unpredictable terrible things in the past.
It's very important to avoid the latter entirely, without impacting our ability to do the former to our utmost.
A great deal of the debate seems to fail to make this distinction.
I'm also surprised that no one has yet thought to bring up the fact that the majority of rapes do not occur in circumstances such as the ones noted in this article. Rather, the majority of rapes are acquaintance rapes. Sure, men are generally raised to know the difference between right and wrong and that to violently attack a woman in the streets is a major crime. But are most men taught about consent? Its my experience that they aren't. I'm also a survivor of rape and it disappoints me to see many of these comments which clearly aren't very well thought out or well informed. I think we can all agree that what happened to these women is awful and maybe the proper thing to do is to educate ourselves about this kind of crime, rather than to argue sexist lines on whose at fault.
Check out the DC Rape Crisis Center and the Rape, Incest and Abuse National Network for more information. Or you can contact me and I'll be happy to send you some 'zines with lots of facts and statistics and stories about Consent and Rape.
That point - that most rapes actually *are* the kind of thing that could have been avoided if the man had been brought up differently - is a good one, and a different debate entirely.
(Guest 26, though, no one will be able to contact you - you're just an anonymous guest)
Thank you for your post, WOV (#24, 25). I was so disappointed in the discussion until I read it.
You are right on.
Ditto, samkay64.
You don't rip down CPR posters to replace them with copies of "Fast Food Nation".
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oh my god.
I wish I had such a great example when I was working with serious feminists in college. As a man, I knew what it took to keep men from date raping. As a man, I also knew that there were guys who were so warped in their relationships with women that they needed serious therapy. But I also knew that the dumbest of all solutions would be to approach conservative men with some Andrea Dworkin quote as if everyone was supposed to respect her as a thinker.
I only knew two people who threatened or attempted date rape:
1. a cocaine addicted football player in my high school who thought the world was his, both through his sports prowess but also drug-induced insanity
2. a pot and pill using horror movie and gangster rap collector
But I knew guys in college who were going down the path towards rapist. Total self-delusion/confusion. These guys would ask the prettiest girls we knew out. They'd never ask an average girl out. These guys were well below average: short, dumpy, mustaches, bad hair, bad clothes, no car, no interests but computers. Total confusion about how life works. I saw their 100% rejection turn into rampant sexism and anger. These guys were virgins at 20 and 21. They were SEETHING that they couldn't "get" women. Now even THESE guys had it together enough to not become attack rapists as far as I know.
But you combine childhood abuse, poverty, self-hatred, drug abuse and even homelessness and you've got a situation where a mugging could go much worse.
The answer is definitely not in Fast Food Nation.
WOV (##24, 25): Hear, hear! Thank goodness for common sense.
Let's remember too that when talking only about stranger rape we're only talking about the very small minority of sexual assaults. The vast, vast majority are perpretated by men that women already know. Stranger rape makes for great Law & Order episodes, but it's actually a small percentage of what happens, yet the rhetoric around sexual assault somehow always boils down to what women should do to prevent rape. Men need to stop assaulting their partners, friends, coworkers, children, and neighbors -- that focus would cover a lot more of the situations that lead to sexual assault, instead of going on about freaking iPods, of all things.
And it's gross to talk about gun control laws in this conversation. Ain't one violent attack in this country that doesn't get some nut job chiming in about how carrying a gun would have helped. That's just hogwash.
I agree with Everett 100% and couldn't have stated it better myself.
yet the rhetoric around sexual assault somehow always boils down to what women should do to prevent rape. Men need to stop assaulting their partners, friends, coworkers, children, and neighbors -- that focus would cover a lot more of the situations that lead to sexual assault, instead of going on about freaking iPods, of all things.
I think the problem is that preventing some men from assaulting women really takes long-term social change. Educating women about things they can do to make it less likely that they'll be victimized is not about women bearing the responsibility for preventing rape, or about blaming the victim - it's a way to empower them with ways to protect themselves TODAY.
It's important to work towards the broader social change that will change men's behavior, but that work isn't going to prevent anyone from being assaulted today, or next week, or next year. In the meantime, EVERYONE needs to have knowledge about how to reduce their chances of being victimized by crime - and this most certainly involves discussion of iPods.
If we give up on those personal prevention strategies in favor of academic or political feminist theory, then we don't really do anybody any good.
this is apropos of nothing, but I bring it up in these situations. In 1991 I met a man who had an operation to stop being a woman and become a man. He already had the operation, so I call him he. I asked him what some of the biggest changes were and he talked about people bumming cigarettes and general sidewalk behavior. But he also said that the day after he gets hormonal injections of testosterone he goes apesh*t. He gets angry, frustrated and goes out to shoot hoops until he calms down. I reminded him that for me, I went through that every day as my testosterone went wacko between age 13-17. I got angry, frustrated and turned to sports. A lightbulb went off in his transgender feminist head. THAT'S why teenage boys act this way- brain chemistry, not attitude.
I'm no doctor, but it was an illuminating conversation.
@#9:
"#7, you're being blatantly sexist. Most of us men were raised to know the difference between right-and-wrong. Is it really too much to ask women
to take some personal responsibility, be careful, and look out for their own well-being? It certainly couldn't hurt, could it?"
Your comment "take some personal responsibility" implies that the victims of rape do not take personal responsibility for thir own well-being and therefore are somehow partially at fault. Now THAT is blatantly sexist.
oh man, this sickens and depresses me.... and it also makes me wonder why (fashion and comfort notwithsatanding) so many women wear flip flops on the streets... yeah, everybody does it- but it is damn hard to run in them... should one have to, god forbid.
Well, I've heard that transmen go loopy on T argument before, and really, it's also hogwash. I am a transman myself. Are things different after T? Oh, most certainly. Women cross the street to get away from me at night. I can get nowhere near the first soprano notes I used to be able to sing. I was most definitely not ready for SHOULDER HAIR. But does T make it harder for me to be a good person, harder to keep myself from assaulting other people? Um, let me think about this now . . . NO. No. No. No. No. No.
Men are not slaves to their biology. Neither are women. Men do need to respect that they have 4 times the muscle mass of women, and they need to behave accordingly. I totally agree with the comment that said that changing what masculinity means is a long, long term goal. And I do support the idea that women take self-defense classes to learn how to drop a 300-lb. guy when they need to. But those conversations -- about prevention, awareness, and the music level in one's iPod -- need to be more carefully framed AS conversations about prevention, and not about women's responsibilities in a world where a women are sexually assaulted thousands of times a day. But thank you for the opportunity to clarify what I meant.
Everett.
Shoulder hair? Are you making fun of men for who we are? Of course shoulder hair, ear hair, butt hair and back hair. What about toe and foot hair?
When a transman tells me something that matches my experience exactly you go ahead and tell me why we both experienced hogwash. I'm old enough now that my hormone levels are a fraction of my teenage years and the anger and frustration just aren't there like they used to be. I'm not going to get all Michigan Women's Music Festival on you here, but as a one-time punk feminist male teen I know what I experienced and how my mood, even my sexual aggressiveness- the extent to which I'd ask women out, feel forced to call up women from school, even though in my teenage years I experienced 98% rejection and went on, literally, two dates in high school- seemed tied into these heat-flash waves of hormones running headlong into panic attacks. I'd hit the track for a 2-3 mile run in a second rather than sit at home buzzing with energy. What I'm talking about happened and it happened to the gay friend who came out of the closet as well as to us. Once I hit 21 it was gone entirely. And I read Andrea Dworkin the summer after high school! I always considered myself a feminist. But I also know what it felt like to have to keep tabs on myself for those years. If you don't have the testosterone aggression, the roid rage if you will, then more power to you, but... there's probably no one else on this thread who can talk about this but us.
Oh, anonymous person, whoever you are among the ranks of menly men, I didn't say your experience was hogwash. Your experience--all of our experiences--are simply that, moments of things happening. How we choose to interpret them, well, that's when I get all insistent.
I'm certainly not saying that there's no relationship between hormones and mood, or level of patience, etc. I've personally experienced that there have been shifts in my level of patience, irritibility, and such. But like I said in relation to how we talk about women keeping their iPod music level down, it's the what else gets wrapped up in these conversations that can be problematic. We talk about roid rage and someone thinks that means men have an excuse. We talk about what women are wearing and someone takes that to mean that they're not allowed to press charges if they were in anything other than a nun's habit. We talk about being so exciteable when the hormones first hit in our teen years, but hell, I've seen two-year-olds go crazy over felt because it's the first time they've touched it. (Felt is a gateway fabric, after all.)
When do we draw the line and say hey, there's no justification for this?
Anyone who knows me in real life knows I've changed after transitioning, but I'm just not going to sit here and say that I'm nothing more than the juice in my veins. I may have more aggressiveness today than I did 5 years ago, but what of that comes from the T, and what from the constant current from culture that tells me I now have to act this way? Not having grown up as a male person, I can tell you it was something that surprised me a lot -- there's so much pressure on men to stay in a limited range of masculinity. It's really amazing, and although I could see it before, it's quite different to live it. And I can't separate biology from environment, and I don't think anyone else can, either.
I grew up in the middle of the Dischord punk rock community so I guess... my community influences were far more tempered with alternative ideas and I may think of the ways I spazzed differently than if I lived, let's say, in a Texas Trailer Park where I really DID have society saying, "Dudes Rule!" [wangalangawangwang] (that's air guitar).