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“A dream you dream alone is only a dream; a dream you dream together is reality.” — Yoko Ono
“In my heart, I think a woman has two choices: either she’s a feminist or a masochist.” –Gloria Steinem
Jul
18
How much is a sexual assault worth?
Filed Under class and economics, media, rape and sexual assault, sexism, sexual exploitation and harassment, violence against women and girls, women’s health | Posted by Cara |
The state of Minnesota has, for the first time, calculated the annual cost of sexual assault in their state. The figure came out to be $8 billion. In 2005, there were approximately 61,000 sexual assault victims; the cost includes medical bills, mental health care, lost time from work and pain and suffering.
I have to say that this whole thing makes me really uncomfortable. Maybe I’m being too harsh. The study was actually designed to generate a broad discussion about the frequency and effect of sexual assault in the state. That is a highly admirable and unassailable goal. But good intentions have never necessarily meant good methods.
I have an issue with placing any monetary value on human suffering. That is precisely what this study has purported to measure. $6 billion of the total $8 billion cost was for pain and suffering. That’s a huge number. But who gets to decide? Who gets to put a monetary value on the experience of rape or childhood molestation? Who decides how much the potentially lifelong damage is worth? And who is to say that every victim’s suffering is the same? Everyone has a different experience. If one size has to fit all, whose size is it? The woman whose boyfriend rapes her? The women whose father rapes her? The little girl whose teacher rapes her? The little boy whose uncle rapes him? The woman who is raped by a stranger? The woman who spends the rest of her life in therapy? The woman who feels “normal” again in a few months? The woman who pressed charges? The woman who stays in a relationship with her assailant?
Yes, I very much understand that the monetary value is supposed to be symbolic. That’s clear. And it’s also precisely the problem, here. Pain and suffering is not symbolic. It is very real. And so I don’t get the point of symbolic amount of money that survivors are never, ever going to see.
It also shifts the debate. Instead of pundits discussing the horrors of sexual assault, it’s incredibly high prevalence and its effect of those who were attacked, those from the right-wing are going to try to shift this to a question of numbers. They’re going to ask where the $8 billion figure came from, and isn’t $6 billion for pain and suffering a bit high? Especially since some of these “victims” were surely Dirty, Lying Whores, etc?
You’re also going to get statements like this:
“We know how much it costs when we have sexual assault. The question is, are there credible ways to reduce the incidents and thereby reduce the costs?” [State Senator Linda] Berglin said.
The fact that you have to throw money in people’s faces to get them to care about the fact that men are raping women is disgusting. Even more disgusting is that once they finally do take notice, they still want to talk about the money more than they want to talk about the women who are assaulted. I’m pretty damn positive that I don’t give a flying fuck about the cost– I care about women’s lives that are being torn apart by rapists. I don’t care if it costs the state $8 billion or just $8 each year when they ignore it; there are far better reasons than money to take action on this issue.
At least, I would sure as hell like to think that there are.
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“Men, their rights, and nothing more; women, their rights, and nothing less.” — Susan B. Anthony
Especially since some of these “victims” were surely Dirty, Lying Whores, etc?
Exactly. And I’m foreseeing a new incarnation of “I am justified in hating fat people, they are a drain on the system, those are my tax dollars!” As in, “If that Dirty Whore hadn’t gotten herself raped, she wouldn’t be using up my tax dollars!” or “We should make those Lying Whores really prove it before we give them my tax dollars!”
Oughta be swell!
You mean Capitalism doesn’t solve everything? Curses!
Seriously, this seems to be yet another instance of it being easier to persuade people to care about others if you actually take the others out of it. In research and study, the stories of the victims (even when there are MASSES of them, properly recorded, talking about the same abuse) being dismissed because they’re ‘too close to the subject’. Now we turn people into money and voila! It’s okay to talk about rape.
God forbid we treat people as human beings and bloody talk to them. That would be depressing and real.
I hear where you’re coming from, but I was personally very happy when this story hit the news. Yes, its deplorably that humanity seems incapable of empathy. I wish I could stand on the top of the universe and scream every two and a half minutes when a person is being sexually assaulted in America and people would actually pay attention. Alas, no. such. luck. Unless there is a $ and a billion after something no one pays any attention. So, I’ll be sad that humanity sucks…but I’m happy that we’re talking about ways to reduce sexual assaults at all rather than the soul shattering silence I normally hear.
From the actual article:
“It also includes victim services and criminal justice costs, some costs related to treatment of sexually transmitted infections, some pregnancy costs, substance abuse, there’s some costs association with sexual violence that ends up resulting in suicide,” says Kinde.
Wow – there are “some costs association with sexual violence that ends up resulting in suicide”.
That just sounds so incredible cold and diassociated. Suicide = cost to the state. Nothing about the emotional “cost” to that person’s family and loved ones, and nothing about the loss that society may experience from losing that person.
http://www.ketv.com/news/13670904/detail.html
On a related subject, this is a rape case in Omaha where the victim was not allowed to use the words to actually describe what happenned. Keep an eye on this one, it should go to a higher court. I think it is ridiculous of the judge to censor the victim when the charges against the criminal are spelled out, yet she can not say certain words that would bias the jury.