Author Kate Harding’s reading and discussion about her latest book Asking for It: The Alarming Rise of Rape Culture—and What We Can Do About It on Monday evening in the Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium was the first event for the It’s On Us Week of Action to shift the way people think about sexual assault on campus.
Asking for It outlines how women face sexual assault risks in today’s rape culture and what everyone can to do lower it. The book has the seven myths that Harding feels surround rape: She asked for it, it wasn’t really rape, he didn’t mean to, she wanted it, she lied, rape is a trivial event and rape is a deviant event.
While discussing number five, “she lied,” Harding pointed out that the only a fraction of rapes are ever actually reported to authorities. Of these claims, 2-8% are false, she said.
She added that the stereotype of falsely accusing men of rape is simply not true. “We live in a society where it seems like innocent men are accused thousands of times a day,” Harding said.
This perception plays into every myth on the list, according to Harding. This view makes it harder for anyone who has been raped to speak up and undermines the importance of the bystander in potential sexual assaults.
Bystander intervention is one of the best ways to prevent the types of sexual assaults that happen on college campuses, Harding said. She told two stories from her time in college when she interfered in two potential sexual assaults. In the first one, her intoxicated friend was leaving a party with a boy and Harding checked on her. She was brushed off by her friend who assured her nothing would happen because the boy was gay. A month later, Harding checked on the same friend, who was with a different boy. This time the friend was thankful Harding helped her out of that situation.
“You just go and you talk to people when you see something that’s not quite right,” Harding said. “And sometimes they’re going to tell you to piss off because it’s none of your business or they’re having fun or they want what they’re doing. But sometimes people will be grateful that you stepped into a situation.” Harding has written essays on body acceptance and rape culture that have been featured in books such as Feed Me and Yes Means Yes.
Events like Harding’s will continue throughout the week, including Vice President Joe Biden speaking Thursday [8] morning at the SU Goldstein Auditorium in Schine Student Center.
