Old Notions About Rape Victims Persist

Sitting on my porch on a warm Sunday evening, I read Sandy Banks’ column on “rape victim anonymity” (“A Vanishing Point for Rape Victim Anonymity,” Aug. 11) ... and read it with interest, as I am a rape victim. My attack occurred more than 20 years ago, and the legacy of that horrible afternoon has stayed with me. It’s an odd legacy, equal parts rage and fear, but one that is ever present.

Would printing my name in a paper, saying it on TV, somehow lessen that pain? I hardly think so, but I can’t explain why. Nor can I explain the curiosity people have with rape and its victims, a curiosity that runs through the column.

Do people want to know our pain? Or do they want details? You make a point, early on, that an old attitude blaming victims, assuming the victim either deserved the attack or didn’t fight hard enough against it, has faded. And then (surprisingly!) the column ended with praise for the girls for the “risks they took” and their “strength.” The suggestion there--and everywhere--is still the same: The good ones avoid rape or get away, the rest of us deserve it for being weak.

The problem with rape has little to do with the names of its victims or any shame they may feel. (Most of us don’t feel shame, because we were present at the crime and know that fault had nothing to do with the violence.) And we know that rape has precious little to do with sex, and everything to do with overwhelming fear for one’s own life. It’s the public that persists in its notion of rape as a wild, dangerous form of sex, made more exciting by the fact it’s been stolen. We don’t need the public’s prurient interest to help us come to terms with rape, much less “recover” from it, as Banks suggest we must.

SUSAN HOFFMANN

South Pasadena