Editor’s Note

Editor’s Note

Summer is winding down, which means my favorite season, Fall, will be here for a few weeks, and then it, too, will fade as the Butte Winter approaches. October is ‘National Domestic Violence Awareness’ Month. We at Safe Space work very hard to increase our community outreach, education and support during this month. One of our signature events is The ‘Domestic Violence Officer of the Year’ Award Luncheon. This will be our tenth year honoring officers who go above and beyond the call of duty to serve survivors of domestic violence. Additionally, we are planning to start a new, 10-12 week support group on Thursday evenings. For more information on this “Rebuilding” group, contact our information line at 782-8511. This group is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Same Difference Inclusive Theatre Company will be performing the “Illustrated Woman” a drama about domestic violence, sexual assault and Dissociative Identity Disorder with proceeds to benefit Safe Space. Showings will be Oct. 20th and 21st @ 7:00 pm and 22nd @ 2 pm. Admission is by donation and location is the MoFAB Building (old YMCA) 400 W. Park. For more information please call: 498-3483. In closing, enjoy the last days of summer, and thank you for your continued generosity and support.

From The Director’s (Messy) Desk

Every time I sit down to write my piece for the newsletter, I am surprised anew by all of the changes and happenings that have occurred over the past few months. Our shelter has had quite a few “maintenance” problems with our roof, and the community has stepped up and helped us out when we really needed it. Our roof had quite a bit of damage which in turn caused leaking and ceiling damage throughout the top floor of the shelter. Reverend Elton Smith rallied the forces and sought financial assistance from North Western Energy, and informed other churches and civic organizations about our plight. Thank you to everyone who has helped us through financial contributions to repair our roof; St. John’s Episcopal Church, Aldersgate United Methodist Church, Sandi Seccomb and The Sunrise Kiwanis Club, The Ministerial Association, and The Butte Exchange Club. We’re hoping to have the inside and outside repaired before the snow starts flying (which could be any day now)!
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I would also like to welcome Jonathan Figdor, our new Vista Volunteer who will be with us for a year. John comes to us from Vassar College in upstate New York where he received a bachelors degree in Philosophy with Departmental Honours. He replaced Kathryn Hurzeler, who finished up her year of service with us in August and has taken a position at Montana Tech. Thank you, Kat, for all of your help throughout the year.
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I’d like to send out special congratulations to Brad Newman, Butte-Silver Bow Chief Deputy County Attorney (and Safe Space Board Member!) for his recent recognition of his efforts in support of victim’s rights. Brad was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Montana County Attorneys’ Association’s annual meeting in July. This award was given in honor of Mr. Newman’s efforts in addressing domestic and sexual violence in our state. Brad has worked as a chief prosecutor in Silver Bow County for 18 years, and represented Butte in the state legislature from 2000-2004. During his time “Up on the Hill”, he championed several victim’s rights bills in the state legislature and worked tirelessly to see them through. We appreciate you taking a stand and speaking for those whose voices often go unheard.

Date Rape

Of all women's fears, that of being raped is the darkest. Worried parents make veiled allusions to the threat of rape by cautioning their daughters, from early childhood on, never to talk to strange men. Yet in most cases the rapist is not a stranger. Up to four of five rapes in the United States are committed by people who already know their victims. Rapists may be neighbors, coworkers, casual acquaintances, dating partners, former boyfriends—even husbands.
An underreported crime, a woman is raped every six minutes in the United States. Although that figure is disturbingly high, it actually tells only part of the story, since it takes into account only those rapes reported to the authorities. Most rapes—by strangers or acquaintances—go unreported. A 1988 survey by the U.S. Justice Department found that fewer than half the victims of attempted or completed rapes reported their attacks to the police. A 1990 study for the Senate Judiciary Committee found that only one rape victim in ten reported her assault. Many rape victims feel overwhelmed by fear of reprisal by the rapist, a sense of guilt or shame, and fear of public exposure given the social stigma attached to having been raped, and are therefore unwilling to go through the further ordeal of a public trial.
These pressures against speaking out may weigh even more heavily in an acquaintance rape. Burdened by an additional popular misconception—that the rape victim must have been "asking for it" all along—some women feel so guilty that they may themselves begin to doubt whether a rape really occurred. It is widely acknowledged that the percentage of acquaintance rapes that go unreported is even higher than that for stranger rape. Hence, the social myth that only strangers commit rape persists. Especially in acquaintance rape cases, the justice system is far from a sure recourse. Even if charges are filed and the state decides to prosecute, chances are relatively good that the rapist will escape conviction. As many as 80 percent of rapes are committed by acquaintances, but roughly 80 percent of convictions are for stranger rapes. There may be many reasons for this, according to Susan Estrich, a law professor at the University of Southern California and the author of Real Rape, a book about acquaintance rape. Juries have traditionally been reluctant to convict in cases where there is no evidence that physical force was used or where the victim exhibited "contributory behavior," such as drinking or being alone with the defendant in a car or bedroom. Most crucially, says Estrich, juries tend to take any evidence of a prior relationship—especially a sexual one—between defendant and complainant to mean that the latter consented to sex at the time, and alleged rape only later. With this in mind, prosecutors are more hesitant to take acquaintance rapes to trial—which, in turn, further discourages victims from speaking out in the first place.

When a Date Goes Awry

"Date rape," in which a date ends in forced sex, was making headlines across the United States even before William Kennedy Smith, a nephew of Senator Edward Kennedy, was tried in December 1991 on charges of sexual battery in connection with an alleged rape. The charges were filed in May based on a woman's statement to police that Smith had raped her on March 30 at the Kennedy's Palm Beach, Fla., estate, where the two had gone after meeting at a bar earlier that evening. Smith, whose defense was that the woman consented to sex at the time, was acquitted of all charges (after a sensational televised trial that drew massive media coverage); jurors deliberated only briefly and cited inconsistencies in the complainant's testimony. It was a textbook example of date rape as an issue, in all its ambiguity and complexity. The past decade has seen an upsurge of reported date rapes on college campuses, from Ivy League schools to large state universities. Increasingly, female students have alleged that they were raped by fellow students, with the attacks often taking place after parties at which large amounts of alcohol were consumed. At Brown University in Providence, R.I., female students went so far as to scrawl the names of their alleged rapists on the bathroom walls as a warning to other potential victims. Members of male athletic teams and fraternities have been implicated in a high proportion of the campus rape reports. A 1984-1985 survey of undergraduates on 32 campuses, by University of Arizona psychologist Mary P. Koss, found a third of campus sexual assault cases involved athletes.

Drawing the Line

Date rape is sometimes a gray area—especially when both parties are young people who may still be in the process of defining their own values. It is vital that a woman be able to say a clear "yes" or "no" to sexual contact, but this is not always easy to achieve in a romantic encounter, where both people may be unsure of each other's, and even their own, expectations. Mystery and ambiguity are seen by many as essential elements of a successful romance, yet mixed signals run the risk of being interpreted as consent. A further problem is the perception on the part of some men that women feel obliged to resist sexual advances even when they really want sex. Peer pressure on men to "score" sexually adds an element of aggression to dating that may contribute to date rape, particularly, for men in groups such as athletic teams and fraternities. It is not surprising that many reports of campus rape cite alcohol consumption by one or both parties as a factor. Drinking only compounds the difficulty in giving and receiving sexual signals—arguably, even to the point where a woman can be refusing sex while the man believes she is consenting. If the woman later charges rape, evidence that she has been drinking will undermine her credibility with police, prosecutors, and jury alike. Campus date rape has become so controversial that it is hard even to agree on terms. Standard legal definitions of rape apply most readily to stranger rape, and the laws themselves vary greatly from state to state. Among students and campus sexual assault counselors, there is a widespread feeling that the concept of rape as forced intercourse needs to be widened so that "intercourse" encompasses other forms of unwanted sexual activity and "force" is clearly understood to include threats and other forms of intimidation. Some people claim that any undesired sexual overture, and even verbal harassment or innuendo, constitute rape. This highly politicized view sees rape as an extreme form of a generalized oppression of women by men. On the other side, arguments run from the biological—that men are programmed to be persistent and women to resist, at least at first—to the idea that an extremely broad definition of rape would minimize the impact of the most serious offenses. Some feminists feel that greatly broadening the definition would actually undermine women by implying that they cannot take full responsibility for their behavior, as though the law had to compensate for their vulnerability to manipulation. While the political battles rage, students and the colleges themselves are taking practical action. Around the United States, students have organized their own rape forums and demonstrations, both as a warning to other students and to prod college administrations to tackle the issue publicly. Rape awareness seminars for men and women are increasingly showing up on orientation programs for new students, and many institutions now require attendance at them. The University of Rochester responded to reports of rapes by athletes by having athletic coaches participate in its rape awareness programs.

Rape Laws: A Double Victimization?

Any woman who admits publicly to having been raped encounters a pervasive belief that she must somehow have brought it on herself, especially if an acquaintance was the assailant. Many people think that if a woman has been drinking or flirting, or was alone with a man in a room or car, she was "asking for it," probably wanted sex, but in any case deserved whatever she got. The 1988 film The Accused, which won actress Jodie Foster an Oscar for her portrayal of a hard-drinking, flirtatious victim of a gang rape, examined how this stereotype compounded the victim's ordeal as it followed her from the hospital examination to the courtroom. A dramatization and discussion session on date rape at Tufts University brought another rebuttal of the myth: "Drinking," a participant pointed out, "is not a rapable offense." But blaming the victim was enshrined in much of the traditional body of law covering rape. Even as recently as 1973, California's standard jury instructions for rape cases included the following quotation from the 18th-century English jurist Lord Hale: "Rape is an accusation easily to be made and hard to be proved, and harder to be defended by the party accused, tho never so innocent." The jury instructions went on to require that the "female's testimony be examined with caution". California was not atypical in this respect. The admonition to distrust the complainant could be especially crucial in an acquaintance rape trial. Whereas stranger rape cases may raise questions of identification and use of physical force, acquaintance rape cases tend to center on consent. With the jury already predisposed against the complainant, a defendant's claim that she consented initially and changed her mind later, or that she offered no resistance so he did not realize she was unwilling, would frequently suffice to secure an acquittal. It can still be extremely difficult to get a conviction for acquaintance rape, and the complainants still risk being portrayed as vengeful or promiscuous liars. Ironically, evidence of physical injury may be required to counteract this claim—even though a common response of rape victims is to submit to the crime so as to avoid additional harm.

Donations and Contributions

We would like to thank all of the individuals, businesses, and organizations that made financial contributions or donations of goods to Safe Space and Suited for Success between July 1, 2006 and August 31, 2006.

Donated to Safe Space:
Aldersgate United Methodist Church
Evaline Ball
Lyndy Ballard
Jody Bickford
Patricia Boroni
Butte Big Brothers/Sisters
Butte Celebrations
Butte Exchange Club
Butte Ministerial Assoc.
Cassandra Chambers
Computech
Jim Conroy
Copper City Wireless
Edna Cowell
Patrick & Eileen Donohue
Janet and Jim Downey
Lou Eveland
Connie and Robert Everly
Fine Fabric Care
Mary Anne Flammand
Tricia Gallagher
Joanne Green
Cookie Jordan
Sarah Kennedy
Kids Quilt for Kids
Mollie Kirk
Mary Larkin
Kim Loberg
Deb Loewen
Colleen Mandic
Rose McDermott
Montana Law Review – UM
Diane Murray
Peter and Nancy Norbeck
Leda Nugent
North Western Energy
Bertha O’Krusch
Janet Pace
Jackie Philpot
Mike Pratt
Patti Rafish
Rocky Mountain Credit Union
St. John’s Episcopal Church
Jerome Stradinger
Heather Strickland
Sarah Sullivan
Eloise Sundberg
The Tremis Family
Carol Viche
Grace Warnke
Geri L. Wyant
Chloe YoungJan Zimmerman

Donators to Suited for Success:
Jeannette Ellen Berry
Debbie Bajovich
Ellen Donohue
Michele McCarthy
Bertha O’Krusch
Helen Ouellette
Doris Quinn
Becky Rohlich
Leonard Rundle
Teresa Verlanic
Sandy Walsh

Thank you for your thoughtfulness and caring!!