Yes, Women Are for Raping, for "Law & Order" Tells Us So

I am a long-term fan of the "Law & Order" franchise.  I have been watching its shows faithfully since the mid-1990s when a lull between my failed university career and a job in a bookstore left me with some time on my hands.  I would hear that famous BUM-BUM that happens before the opening scene in each episode of the original show, and I would race from whatever part of the apartment I was in, even if it meant tripping across the floor in a towel while yanking on jeans over wet legs, so that I could catch the usual gruesome opening scene in which death or an already dead body came as a surprise to some unlucky soul or another.

Over the last few years, though, I have become less and less comfortable with my attachment to one particular arm of the franchise, "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit", because it marries itself so strongly to the sexiness of raped, battered, and/or murdered women and children. Is this what we are as women in this society? Is this the definition of our class status that we want to see delivered and expounded upon so often as a part of our cultural lexicon?

By "sexiness", I of course mean the glamor extended by sheer dint of the extreme drama around and attention paid to the sexually and otherwise violently degraded lives of women.  I am not comfortable with how drawn I am to these depictions of my own sex as being so vulnerable.  We are vulnerable, because as women, we are second-class citizens, and, as such, are less humanized than our male counterparts.  It is easier to brutalize a person when you have been trained to fold them into the faceless mass of a sub-class.  What I hate is the extent to which women are made to be seen as vulnerable in "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit".

"Law & Order: SVU"'s purpose is to "...[chronicle] the life and crimes of the Special Victims Unit of the New York Police Department, the elite squad of detectives who investigate sexually based crimes", so do not mistake my upset for surprise at its sexual content.  If the intent is to dramatize the investigation of sexually based crimes, rape, assault, murder, and child abuses are par for the course.  What I question is whether this show, which depicts one hour of graphic hate crimes against women and children every week, is healthy for a society with a long history of conditionally accepted violent crime against women and children.

The argument could be made that a show like "Law & Order: SVU" actually speaks out against the heinousness of these crimes and lifts the veil on what happens to us every day.  I do agree with that argument to a certain extent, but I also believe that the argument that "Law & Order: SVU" actually creates and deepens our predisposition to expect and fear these types of crimes against ourselves and our children outweighs its public service message.

As a female, I have been raised to look over my shoulder, to listen for footsteps, to never be alone, to fear spaces within even my own home, and to assume that one-third of my female friends have been sexually victimized.  I have been trained to live as a victim, as a prisoner, if you will, by and within the culture that perpetrates this victimization, and watching more than twenty variations on the themes of rape, assault, murder, and child abuse investigated in part by Detective Benson (Mariska Hargitay), a character born of rape who is also a sexual assault victim, does nothing to disabuse more than half our population of a lifetime of training.

When I watched this season's premiere episode of "Law & Order:SVU" on Wednesday, I had these thoughts in mind, and as much as I have loved this show in previous seasons, I found the opening of the ninth season a difficult one to sit through.  In the episode, there is a child witness to rape, several unsolved rape cases, a rape victim who unwittingly marries her rapist, a rape victim who gives up her child after a rape, and Detective Benson suffers from flashbacks of her own prison sexual assault.  I felt like I was sitting through some sort of emotional rape victim porn, porn bent on being so shocking that it enlisted almost every variation of rape in its arsenal, and I wanted the show to stop, just stop, oh my gawd, please.

I, for one, no longer want to ride the huge rape rollercoaster that is "Law & Order: SVU".  This is not what we, women and children, are.  I know that the show does not set out to define women and children as a whole, but in the face of a culture that has already trained us in this belief since birth, it acts to cement our preconceived notions of ourselves not only as victims but as victims in waiting.  We are not strong and safe even when we feel strong and safe.

This is not who I am, and this is not who you are, especially since this definition is based on nothing more than one part of our anatomies.  I, for one, and I am sure I am not alone in this, am tired of being defined by and made to feel as a victim because of my vagina.  I love this part of my anatomy, and when a culture uses it to lessen me and profit from it by making it the center of emotional porn, I am, shall we say, less than pleased.  Having the apparently insurmountable handicap of our vaginas underlined and bolded for us week after week makes the project of personal reinvention from victim to commander of our own fates even more difficult than it already is.

Women are not for raping.

Comments

[Becky]

Amen!

[palinode]

When I saw that episode, I was waiting for one of the characters to say, "It's a rapity-rape-rape-rapeathon around here". Because that was pretty much how it felt.

I only hope that when you mentioned the huge rape rollercoaster, you weren't speaking literally.

[Suzy Q]

I have never been able to watch this show because all it ever depicts are abused children and women. Been there, done that IRL, so I have no desire to watch it as "entertainment."

[churchpunkmom]

I had a VERY hard time sitting through it as well.. and after being a big fan of L&O for years, started having the same questions in my mind.

have we crossed over from 'awareness' to 'exploitation'?

[Robyn G]

Oh, I am so there. I've never been able to stomach SVU, and it's for all the reasons you mention here. Immersing myself in those topics absolutely does not entertain me.

[Marie]

Amen!

For me, violence against women and children is never entertainment. I'm frankly appalled that it's (still) being seen as such. I can't even stand "comedy" dramas that use abuse or rape scenes.

As you said, vulnerability is never an excuse or invitation for aggression, and Amen to that too!

[Amalah]

Yes, yes, YES.

Rape is one of those dealbreakers for me and movies and TV. Same goes for murder/abuse/assaults on children. I cannot, WILL NOT watch depictions of these kinds of crimes for "entertainment." They upset me on a extremely fundamental level, and yet...I think it's a GOOD THING that I get violently ill and angry watching them. I'll take that over getting desensitized week after week and coming to totally expect that this shit just happens to us.

[Karen]

I am a former sexual assault crisis counselor. At first, I watched SVU a lot and even preferred it to some of the regular Law and Order shows. What I liked about it:

1) It worked to show exactly what sexual assault can do to a survivor of that assault and the havoc it can wreak on her life.

2)It tried to break the assumption that there is one "right" way for a survivor to act, i.e. not every survivor wants to prosecute or press charges or face their attacker in court.

3) It showed that sexual assault is indeed a reality for women AND men, and children, in all walks of life. Not just the poor, or the minorities, or the inner city dwellers.

4) The detectives always seemed to have a real compassion for the victims, and a passion to pursue the criminals, that I liked. All the police officers I worked with, as a crisis counselor, had that same compassion and dedication. They really did their best to help my clients.

But now it's gotten sensationalistic, and seems to go for the gruesome and the gory.
The premise was sound, but you can only go so many episodes before the script chimps start thinking "Eh, rape and murder is so passe. Let's spice it up with...a creepy celebrity who likes kids! Slave trafficking! Um....drug mules!" Or the one I saw last night, with a philanthropist who paid for sex with the very drug users he was "helping" by getting them off the streets. Um...okay.

Sexual assault is real enough, and traumatic enough, without spicing it up. So I don't watch it anymore.

[Kate]

Could we please make this the featured post?

[Hey You]

Thank you. Oh, and Dear Mama Pop overlords? I love the featured post idea, but THIS post is much more worthy of the title than Fireproof.

[Hey You]

Kate, great minds think alike and all that jazz.

[Kerri Anne]

This was so fantastically stated.

I think there is a lot to be said about how we as a society have come to expect trauma for women and children, as much as there is to be said for the large degree to which we as a society have become completely desensitized to that trauma.

[Kerri Anne]

And by "fantastically stated" I of course meant "wonderfully, great, amazingly well said." Trixy adjective, that one.

[Sam]

I've found that I can't watch this show now that I have a child of my own. I really don't know how I stomached it before. I do like Mariska Hargitay very much, though, and all the characters of this particular Law & Order branch.

[schmutzie]

Sam, I am a huge fan of Mariska Hargitay, too. I just wish that I could watch her without all the rape attached to it.

[Mother Musings]

I haven't EVER been able to watch this show. Frankly, I don't know how anyone can watch the show. Rape, abuse, or any mistreatment of women & children should not be made into entertainment. Maybe since I have never watched this show, I don't know if they treat the subject matter sensitively or not but whether it does or does not, should we be watching a show that focuses so much on negativity?

[WaaWaaWaa]

I think you broads are being way to sensitive. It's a show. Shut up and change the channel..Now get me something to eat.

[Mamalooper]

Gave up on SVU a couple of years ago. I just decided that I really didn't need to fill my head full of situations that I never would have dreamt up on my own.

And becoming a mom made it impossible to watch anything with children being victimized.

[Jessica]

As much as I love L&O, it has always squicked me out that they developed an entire spinoff based on the ladyraping and the babyraping. WTF? If these plots crop up on L&O Classis, well ok, they are crimes that happen in the real world, makes sense that they would crop in a crime drama. But to base an entire show around them seems... fetishy.

My (least) favorite is when TBS (or something) runs super-excited commercials about SVU marathons, filled with totally bitchin music and graphics, and describe it as "Extra Elliot... extra Olivia... EXTRA SPECIAL."

INAPPROPRIATE. Possibly they have forgotten that in that context, "special" is code for "rape," which isn't really that awesome a selling point for why we should watch the show. "Now with bonus child porn!" "You won't believe how many wives get beaten!" It seriously turns my stomach.

[Gina]

I would like to point out that (according to my BFF, who is an SVU fanatic because she loves the guy cop) this show has, several times, depicted men being special victims as well.

I would also like to point out that, and this is a horrible reality, women and children are the primary victims of sexual crimes. What should the show be doing? Solely concentrating on men as victims?
Yes the first episode of the season was probably sensationalistic - every first episode of every TV show season is sensationalistic and hyped up to a degree. Lots of victims in one episode? Oh! Well guess what! There are lots of victims in ONE DAY in real life.

I will admit that I don't really watch SVU all that much (it's on in reruns here all the time though, so you catch an ep now and then - and every time I see it, it disturbs me so no, I'm not "desensitized"), but I tend to think of it along the lines of it being a TV SHOW (so of course it's exaggerated) depicting THINGS THAT ACTUALLY HAPPEN.

[sizzle]

I agree with Karen's comment. I am a former sexual assault counselor as well as violence against women community educator and for a while the show seemed like a good thing because it opened people's eyes to what often was a topic that no one talked about. I haven't watched the show for years except for reruns sometimes so I had no idea it had gone to this.

I definitely agree though: Women are not for raping.

[cheapdialogue]

I hate SVU as well. For these reasons. I always thought I was alone in that.

[DianaCLT]

I actually didn't start watching SVU 'til a few years after it started. When it first came on the air, my thought was, "Oh great. Now we're giving abusers IDEAS on how/what to do to." But I started watching, because I did start to see the parallels with what was happening in reality and what was happening on the show (I think the first one I watched was during the 2nd Michael Jackson trial..but SVU changed it to make it a caucasian celeb magician or something). It's painful to watch, which tells me that, thank God, I'm not desensitized. So many people just refuse to open their eyes and see how horrible the crimes are that happen to people, that if this is the only way to educate them, even a wee bit, to the heinousness out there, I guess it's providing a bit of service...though I do realize that there are probably assholes out there, getting off on the subject matter, too.
As for the 1 in 3 statistic - 1 in 3 women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime--I strongly believe that number is WAY too LOW. That 1 in 3 are those women that actually report it. Considering that it is well known that MOST women never report it...I seriously believe the number is closer to 1 in 7. I'm not talking about rape, specifically, I'm talking about ANY kind of inappropriate fondling, molestation, etc. The subject matter doesn't come up as much between my women friends and I anymore, but certainly in college, I knew more young women that had been abused than had not.
I haven't watched last week's season premiere yet. It's still waiting on the DVR. But I am glad for the warning about it's gruesome content...I'll make sure to watch when my kids aren't even in the house, and I'm ready to sob. Then I'll decide if I'm going to continue watching the series. Thank you for the warning and the insight!

[savia]

This is an awesome post, Schmutzie. Thanks for writing it.

[jodifur]

As someone whose job is incredibly similar as to what this show is about, I applaud it. This seems crazy, but LOTS of people don't believe that stuff like this happens. As sensationalized as it is, I'm all for raising awareness of child abuse and sex crime. And Mariska has developed her own charity to help.
That being said, I rarely watch it. It's not entertainment to me since it is my everyday.