In response to dialogue regarding collegiate sexual assault
On Feb. 19, a judge declined to free pop star Kesha from her contract with her producer and accused abuser, Dr. Luke. On Feb. 28, at the 88th Academy Awards, Lady Gaga gave a powerful performance of “Til It Happens To You,” which was written about her experience being raped. That same evening, Vice President Joe Biden spoke out against sexual assault on college campuses before he introduced Lady Gaga to the crowd. This week, the USC Women’s Student Assembly is hosting Take Back the Night, a week dedicated to ending the stigma around sexual assault and helping survivors.
I’ve written about sexual assault for this column previously, but considering the increase in attention the issue has been receiving in national media, I thought it was time to bring it up again.
When Lady Gaga’s “Til It Happens To You” music video came out in September of last year, I avoided it. I had heard through the grapevine that it has several graphic depictions of rape, and I was worried about the voyeuristic responses it might receive. Not that I thought people might get off on it — although, there are people who do — but I was more concerned with the possibility of people watching it with the sick fascination of ‘I’m glad it’s her and not me.’ It happens when we watch horror movies: We’re always grateful that the person being torturously murdered on-screen is not you or me, and that turns us into voyeurs.
After watching the chilling Oscars performance, I knew I should watch the music video. What I didn’t expect, however, was for the video to be a PSA for sexual assault on campus.
“The following contains graphic content that may be emotionally unsettling but reflects the reality of what is happening daily on college campuses,” prefaces the video.
It ends with, “One in five women will be sexually assaulted this year unless something changes.”
What’s potent about Gaga’s performance and music video, however, is that both end with a ray of hope for survivors. Often, depictions of rape in popular media are bleak and horrifyingly real. Think: Law and Order: Special Victims Unit and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
In Campus Sexual Assault: College Women Respond, author Lauren J. Germain gives a voice to the voiceless — the women who are raped. Too often, sexual assault is discussed with little to no input from the survivors, who should be the ones we listen to.
Germain’s book breaks down the statistics of college campus rape beyond just the numbers. Take, for example, USC. Being told that 30 percent of undergraduate females at USC have reported being sexually assaulted or harassed is different from realizing how many women that number refers to. There are 19,000 undergraduate students enrolled at USC, 53 percent of whom are females. That’s 30 percent of 10,070 female students, which is roughly 3,021 students.
Can you comprehend that? I can’t.
If around 3,000 female students at USC have reported being sexually assaulted or harassed, it stands to reason that in my large class of 100 people, at least one of my classmates will have experienced that. It could be that girl who sits in the corner of the class and never speaks up, or it could be the girl who always sits in the front row with a macchiato at her elbow.
Germain also bases her book around action rather than despair.
“Rather than concentrate exclusively on themes around hardship and hopelessness, which are present in many of the narratives, the book illustrates how women exercised their agency following attacks,” Germain writes in the first chapter.
Germain defines agency as “an equation […] the socioculturally medicated capacity to act + intention + action,” adding, “my hope is to contribute to the creation of a safer and more supportive higher education system where campus sexual assault is not a norm.”
What’s fascinating about Campus Sexual Assault: College Women Respond is that the author reframes the conversation about sexual assault by focusing on the aftermath rather than the attacks themselves, a rarity when it comes to such a sensitive topic.
Noorhan Maamoon is a junior majoring in print and digital journalism. Her column, “The Hijabi Monologues,” runs on Thursdays.