Dealing With Rape by Miracle Asuquo (Winner,...
Miracle Asuquo 1 December 7, 2020
Dealing With Rape by Miracle Asuquo (Winner, Article Competition on TALKAM Human Rights Project)
All over the world, "the act of rape" has continued to be a consistent social menace and we have seen celebrities and high profile individual falling prey to this atrocious act. Thus, rape is not a respecter of person, status, or background. The young and the old, mature and immature individuals get raped sometimes in their life. If you look around in our society, you will realise that every one in twenty persons is a rape victim. In spite of various effort put in place in addressing this issue it appears that the problem continues to linger and more rape cases are recorded on a daily basis. Thus, one can infer that to deal with rape appropriately in order to get the expected result, the dynamics of tackling this issue must be changed.
Rape is a situation where people unjustly and violently have sexual intercourse with another who doesn't consent to the act. Our legal system and ethical standard condemns such unruly way of life and admonish propagators of this act to shun such uncivil behaviors in the society but because the problem has not been adequately addressed from it cradle and the act abound and this gets both the government and private individual in a state of disarray when the incidence of rape strikes especially when the victim dies in the process.
To deal with rape, the bandwagon has to shift from mirroring the female child as a weaker vessels and potential rape victim to the male child as the potential perpetrator of this act. The narrative has always been on protecting the girl child but on the contrary it should be about educating the male child with better sex education and socialization which will make them understand that they ought to be protecting rather than hurting the girl child.
From all indications male sexuality is over exaggerated and this is seen in our folklore/legend, music videos, movies, novel and reality television shows but male folks are more fragile and feeble emotionally than the female folks as always painted and hence they need help on how to handle their body and sexual drive. The male child sees himself as being "trapped in a body he cannot control" and because he lacks the "know how" on how to battle this drive he easily falls prey to temptation of rape. It's not a crime to feel this way or to be carriers of higher level of sex hormone (testosterone) but the problem lies with what you do when the urge comes. The male child have always been deceived by their parent that they are strong and can get whatever they want because there is strength in their agility and this explains why they use force when their request are not met.
Dealing with rape is about making the society to disabuse their mind from the "blame game" such as "she was not properly dress" or " that she went to the wrong location at an ungodly hour" and focus more on helping the male child balance their raging emotional state although indecent dressing should be dissuaded by all means.
To deal with rape effectively also entails that rape culprit shouldn't just pay huge fines for assaulting anyone or be bundled and thrown into a dysfunctional correctional centre to serve their jail term but rather the need to be transformed through active cognitive restructuring process in a functional facility with professionals such as psychologist, counselors or therapist who will help them become better person if they get out of the correctional facility if not they will continue in this immoral act.
To deal with rape in our society, more foundation should be established and the focused should be on helping the male child stay away from abusing drugs such as cannabis sativa, cocaine, codeine, amphetamine, tramadol etc as well as pornographic content. Most of the rape incidence recorded in our society are aftermath of intoxication by hard drugs and pornography. Hence, if this situation is properly handled then the rape issue will be reduced greatly.
From the forgoing, the narrative has to change from "what is the solution" to "what is the causative factors" of this incidence. If the above suggested criteria mentioned is judiciously implemented the issue that has to do with dealing with rape will be greatly reduced. Thus, for this to be a reality, all hands must be on deck in the fight against rape and serving our society.
This article was writen by Miracle Asuquo. You can READ HIS PROFILE HERE