Kesha is a wealthy, beautiful, white celebrity working at the upper echelons of an elite industry. Yet, even these privileges don’t set her apart from other victims of sexual abuse who face a justice system that often doesn’t protect them. Her story sheds light on why rape remains one of the most grossly underreported crimes.
Women (and men) often wait years to speak up about sexual abuse. Consider Bill Cosby’s victims, some of whom didn’t feel safe coming forward until multiple decades had passed. Still, that fact doesn’t stop people from questioning why victims don’t come forward sooner and suggesting their hesitance makes them liars.
The truth is that there are few incentives to coming forward with an allegation of sexual assault. It means having to recount a trauma over and over again, to people who may not even believe that what you say happened actually happened. It means facing the judgments of those closest to you, and in Kesha’s case, the judgments of the public who determine the success of her career. It means being picked apart, as people try to find just how “perfect” a victim you are. It may mean dealing with law enforcement officials and members of a jury who have been socialized to believe myths about rape.
“You’ve already been violated,” Madonna told Howard Stern last year when he asked why she never reported a violent assault to the police in the late 1970s. “It’s just not worth it. It’s too much humiliation.”
And most of the time, even after all of that “humiliation,” an abuser will never see the inside of a jail cell. According to RAINN, just 2 percent of rapists serve jail time, and though it’s somewhat easier to win a civil suit than a criminal one, nothing is guaranteed.
Confused Why Women Don’t Report Sexual Assault? Ask Kesha.
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