Discover the insidious nature of gender bias with Dr. Erin Kelley, as we navigate the intricacies of its impact on society and the legal system. Dr. Kelley, a Professor at Dallas College with a keen eye on the intersection of literature and law, joins us to unravel the threads of cultural stereotypes and prejudices that contribute to systemic gender inequality and violence. From the wage gap to underrepresentation in leadership and STEM, we scrutinize the societal norms that have historically placed women at a disadvantage and continue to do so today.
Venture into the legal labyrinth of consent and sexual violence prosecution as we confront the deep-rooted rape myths that still pervade our courts. The episode unearths the chilling realities survivors face—from the hurdles in reporting to the daunting journey of prosecution. We unpack the "he said, she said" narrative that often skews the scales of justice and examine the detrimental effects of misconceptions about a victim's behavior on the outcome of rape cases. By highlighting the trauma responses, such as the 'freeze' reaction, our discussion advocates for a legal system that better understands the complexities of consent and trauma.
Lastly, we turn our focus to the powerful role of media and literature in shaping public perception and the urgent need for authentic representation. Dr. Kelley spotlights crucial works like "13 Reasons Why" and Joyce Carol Oates' "Rape: A Love Story," which push boundaries by addressing the freeze response and victim-blaming. By engaging with this episode, you become part of the movement to end the cycle of violence and bias against women, one story and one verdict at a time.
Discover the insidious nature of gender bias with Dr. Erin Kelley, as we navigate the intricacies of its impact on society and the legal system. Dr. Kelley, a Professor at Dallas College with a keen eye on the intersection of literature and law, joins us to unravel the threads of cultural stereotypes and prejudices that contribute to systemic gender inequality and violence. From the wage gap to underrepresentation in leadership and STEM, we scrutinize the societal norms that have historically placed women at a disadvantage and continue to do so today.
Venture into the legal labyrinth of consent and sexual violence prosecution as we confront the deep-rooted rape myths that still pervade our courts. The episode unearths the chilling realities survivors face—from the hurdles in reporting to the daunting journey of prosecution. We unpack the "he said, she said" narrative that often skews the scales of justice and examine the detrimental effects of misconceptions about a victim's behavior on the outcome of rape cases. By highlighting the trauma responses, such as the 'freeze' reaction, our discussion advocates for a legal system that better understands the complexities of consent and trauma.
Lastly, we turn our focus to the powerful role of media and literature in shaping public perception and the urgent need for authentic representation. Dr. Kelley spotlights crucial works like "13 Reasons Why" and Joyce Carol Oates' "Rape: A Love Story," which push boundaries by addressing the freeze response and victim-blaming. By engaging with this episode, you become part of the movement to end the cycle of violence and bias against women, one story and one verdict at a time.
Dr Erin Kelly is Professor of English Composition and Literature at Dallas College, richland Campus in Dallas, texas. Holding terminal degrees both in literature and law, dr Kelly is currently writing her first book about law, literature and discrimination of victims of violent crimes against women. She writes on the abuses and history of a culture of disbelief that fails victims of sexual assault, domestic violence, stalking and sexual harassment. She joins us today to discuss how certain types of bias, especially gender bias, perpetuates rape culture and other crimes against women. I'm Maria McMullen and this is Genesis, the podcast. Dr Kelly, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much. I wanted to talk with you about bias and about how that perpetuates rape culture. But before we do that, give us an idea of what bias is and the different types we all use or encounter, and some examples of how those impact our culture.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so when I think of bias in general, I think of prejudice or these prejudicial ideas based on some sort of very superficial kind of stereotypes that's been either created or maybe reinforced. And with that creation, that reinforcement, there's this unfairness to either an individual person or entire groups of people as a whole. So to me, we have this we versus them, or this self, like we're the self and these are the others over here. It's this group mentality when I think of bias, and it's in all different forms. Right, obviously, we talk about gender bias. We talk about gender bias here. There's bias based on race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, lgbtq and gender nonconforming, and there's spiritual and religious bias as well. But when I think of it, it's this concept of I belong, I belong here to this group and you don't. So me, in this example, I'm superior and of course this is part of our psychology. It's part of our human nature and our sense of belonging, like we want to innately belong in groups. But you know this, it's a part of our psychology that can, in the alternative, become quite damaging or harmful. When I think of different types of biases that women encounter, it's always in this underlying notion of what's the feminine ideal. What's this feminine ideal that's been perpetuated across time periods, cultures, communities, and what are those characteristics that men embody? And then what women embody? And for gender stereotypes, of course they can be positive and they can be negative. You know, one positive is oh, this idea of women are nurturing. The negative to that is women are weak. But what I have to remind myself is we women it's we've only been allowed to do certain things, like since the 1970s, like we were not allowed to own a home independently, we were not allowed to buy, you know, to have a credit card independently here in the United States. And so these gender constructions have come from centuries, you know, from centuries of norm where men had the power, the authority, the discretion over the women and children. And that norm, you know, they went out, they worked, they provided financial in women stayed home and took care of the household and of the children.
Speaker 2:And to me, even now, you know, there are still those traditional values that parts of our culture encourages and I have no issue with that whatsoever. I've got friends who stay in the home and, you know, just work on, you know, raising the children and taking care of the household. Nothing wrong with that, but me. Obviously I'm a little. I'm not that way. I'm. You know, I'm independent, I've gone out and you know, I've created a career for myself and built a life for myself, and all I ask in those in that way is that I'm just allowed the same opportunities.
Speaker 2:I don't want to use the word privileges, but, you know, can we be afforded those same type of opportunities as this predominant part of our culture, which has been historically men, white men a lot of times, not always wealthy men, I would say, now more so.
Speaker 2:But how they, how we, how these examples impact us, is here in the US, we still have the pay gap, and not all. Not only the pay gap, but also the inequality in female leadership with respect to higher leadership, ceos, bosses. In my field I'm a college professor, so right now there is a gender inequity in the STEM fields, and that's something that my institution and many other institutions in higher ed are trying to ameliorate. But all of these things go back to this idea, these age old notions that you know men are rational, women are emotional, men can handle things more than women. One thing that I see a lot recently is that men, I think, are allowed to express their anger. They're allowed to get mad and be passionate and sometimes maybe be inappropriate or, you know, extend some boundaries that they shouldn't have. But if women do that sometimes I think we're considered we're being hysterical or over-emotional.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a lot to unpack, right. So I asked you, like you know, I asked you like the big question what is bias and where does it come from and how does it show up in our lives, how does it show up in ourselves? And you've given us a lot of information to work with. If you literally if you Google bias, you can find any number of well, first of all, any number of AI responses on what bias is, but any number of internet lists that go from. There are three main types of bias, there are 33 main types of bias. There are 106 types of bias.
Speaker 1:I mean, I am not making this up. This is what I found when I started looking into bias, and one of the reasons I wanted to talk with you about bias is because it is, in fact, implied in almost every conversation that I have on the podcast. Underlying the issues that women are experiencing. Is patriarchy, is bias, is any type of bias? I mean, you named some of them, but there are many others. So let us focus in for a minute on gender bias and some examples of how this form of implicit bias plays out in different circumstances, especially within the context of crimes against women.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I like how you said that, it kind of paraphrasing. But it comes at us, these patriarchal ideas that are underneath everything. They hit us in so many different directions and it's all relevant to how we're socially conditioned. Still, and that could be our systems of family. How were we raised? Maybe we were raised in a traditional household, maybe we were taught that, but it spills over into every aspect of our life. I mentioned employment already, education as well, but also that social conditioning I think you mentioned a few episodes ago on masculinity.
Speaker 2:Pop culture, entertainment has a huge, huge, horrible effect at times and an influence on our social conditioning and patriarchy, and we even have spirituality and religious implications too. But when I think about violence against women, I think about, obviously, domestic violence, but other forms of not just even necessarily crime, but what I say, just violence in general, where women in these heterosexual, cisgender pairings and in this binary that we still, you know, not all of us live in that, but if we do live in that binary, women are just disproportionately impacted as victims and men are traditionally perpetrators. And I think about it in the lines of, of course, domestic violence, but also sexual assault, rape, of course, and then sexual harassment, even though it's not a crime, but in stalking as well. And I think many of these belief systems that in an underlying way continue to encourage this violence is this idea that women should remain submissive to men. And if we're in the household then you know these long historical cultural ideals and constructions that men have had or still have, even the authority to correct, to physically punish women and children for their incorrect behavior. And then therein comes in domestic violence and this kind of acceptability of it. Other examples are are that, you know women, you guys just shouldn't deny sex to your partners when they want it. You should give it to them. Also, sexual harassment in the workplace that's just actually normal. You know, up until the 70s, when second wave feminists began to try to fight that, it was normal, right, but it comes under this notion that women primarily and historically have been valued as wives and mothers and not necessarily as contributors to the workplace. And this idea that women should exist by this kind of this sole discretion of the masculine order for a variety of reasons.
Speaker 2:And in my research and writing with that, I have come to terms with or I argue in all these different forms of violence against women when a woman speaks out against her male abuser, especially in acquaintance crimes, especially in interpersonal violence which we talk about, she's automatically viewed under this lens of suspicion and she's discredited and disbelieved. Sexual assault cases I know you've covered the rape myths that are very, very strongly embedded in our society. We've got the rape myths such as she was lying or no, she actually consented. Even that she asked for it is still really dominant in our contemporary US society. You know she was, she was wearing provocative clothes, or she was drinking, or she was flirting, or she's promiscuous.
Speaker 2:In domestic violent cases, you know there's this notion of I think she's lying, this myth of she's lying because if it was so bad, why would someone stay in that situation? Right, we see that and we know why we've there's a whole psychological reason, you know, and trauma. You know trauma, informed reasons why women stay in these. But they're common misconceptions that continually just discredit women who are the victims and they diminish this wrongdoer. Stalking and sexual harassment You've got this. You know automatic why. You know why is someone allowing that? You know, knowing that this guy is kind of stalking her, why does she still allow it? Or she's exaggerating. You know she consented to the affair and the workplace.
Speaker 1:I just want to add to that that that is something that continues day after day after day. It's in the media, it's in personal conversations, it's on social media. Why does she stay? Why was she wearing that? What was she doing there? Why was she out that late at night? We are still making those statements in our culture and it perpetuates the continuation of both discrimination against women and rape culture. Right, just those that. There is one very simple change right there that we could make. We could all make it right now. We are never going to say those things again. Yeah, we're just going to stop and we're going to believe her and see what happens.
Speaker 2:See what happens. See what happens when you actually believe someone who already knows coming forward is probably just a bad idea because she's going to be disbelieved, she's going to be dragged through the mud. You know there's these ridiculous defamation lawsuits now that you know they're few and far between, but they're enough. I mean, just believe the victim. Just see what happens.
Speaker 1:If you believe the victim, we could make this minor change and, wow, who knows what could happen? Right, it could just all be changed overnight, or some of it. So, in addition to all of that and I'm really glad that you brought up the idea of there are women who choose to have an independent lifestyle, career, live on her own, not be married, not have children. Go for it. There are women who choose to have a stay at home, domesticated life, where they're raising children, they're taking care of the household. Go for it. Whatever makes your life the way that you want it to be is what you should be doing. That should be the opportunity that you have. There is no one right way or wrong way. What we're really talking about is when women are put in the box. If you will of you need to marry, you need to have children, you need to be domestic, you need to be a sex goddess and you know you need to be successful. You need to be all of these things. That ain't going to work.
Speaker 2:Who can do all that Goodness?
Speaker 1:me, I don't know. Even Barbie had a hard time with all of that.
Speaker 2:Barbie, the idealized version of Barbie, couldn't do it.
Speaker 1:Barbie realized that they had put her in a box and she was out of the box and they went at her back in the box and the box really sucks. Gender bias is cultivated in our society and it actually fuels sexual violence. It actually fuels tension across all gender groups and all different groups within our cultures, and it perpetuates rape culture. Help us understand a little bit how that works.
Speaker 2:It all, I think, comes from, stems from and very simplistic, this might sound a bit reductive, but it stems from this notion that women are either virgins, they're good girls or they're bad girls. They're promiscuous, they cross the lines that they shouldn't and that's where all of these rape myths come from. And in the law, what happens is that these rape myths muddy the waters of consent. Right, because the legal element of consent, the prosecutor has to prove that she the proof beyond reasonable doubt, highest standard of proof she did not consent to have. You know he forced or raped her. And that's where all these rape myths come in. And they muddy those waters of consent, especially when you have the acquaintance rapes, which are the majority of rapes and not just the stranger rapes that you know someone was kidnapped and raped or you know these were other felonies come in. It's all these acquaintance rapes that he said, that she said, and there's all of these different ideas.
Speaker 2:One of the rape myths is called the token resistance, where there's actual. We had sex, but it was just rough sex and she wanted that rough sex. The no means yes, you know, and we've already talked about she was permissuous, she was flirtatious, she was walking alone at night. Those and she deserved to be raped because of how she was acting or her manner of dress. And some even extoll the rapist good behavior. You know he's a good looking guy, he has a reputably good behavior. He would never do that, so she's a liar.
Speaker 2:In every way.
Speaker 1:In every way yeah, it's not yeah. It's not enough to say I said no or I never wanted, I didn't consent to that, that that couldn't possibly be true. You have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you said that and and he? Yet he still continued the behavior and and assaulted you. It doesn't make it. It makes no sense. It's even when you think about it.
Speaker 2:And that you know in criminal law, you know you've had such a high standard because if you convict someone of a crime you've got, you're taking away some of their rights and and that's understandable. You know criminal law is very high standard and it's very black and white. Unfortunately, as we know and as you see every day at the shelter, life is not black and white. It's all the gray area and where these rape myths come in, you know underneath the, you know underneath it to negate that element of consent.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you've you've talked about rape culture a lot in the work that you do. You have a great TED talk on this very topic and let's talk about that data, because you you presented some data in the TED talk and it may be a little different now, but it was something like out of 1000 rapes, only five rapists will receive a federal conviction.
Speaker 2:And that's of the of the victims that even report Right.
Speaker 1:The very small percentage that are reported.
Speaker 2:That are even reporting and you know a lot of that just has to do with the fact prosecutors don't like rape. They don't like prosecuting rape because they know that unless it's something you know, it's this stranger rape, or unless another felony was committed. There's this court case called us EEOC versus hometown buffet, and there was another felony committed. He broke into her house, he tied her up, he kidnapped her. You know all of these things. Okay, yes, and that's because that's all these other things happen. But not so when we've got the. He said, she said and you don't have that definitive evidence, you don't have an eyewitness, that would be another thing. Or even you know something caught on camera.
Speaker 2:It's very, very difficult and you know it's. It's something that it's expensive. Rape is also very expensive. That time I checked it was I think it costs $240,000 to to try a rape case. And then also investigators. They know all of these things and they know in order to have a good case, they have to have more than just that. He said, she said so. I don't want to knock them. I mean it's what you have to have to have a conviction. But that's why I argue anyway. And you know you'll see decades worth of studies as to why these rape convictions are so low. And that doesn't make it right. Just because it's that hard to prove, you know, it's still an injustice.
Speaker 1:No, it doesn't make it right and in fact, what it does is it says to potential perpetrators rape, you'll probably be able to get away with, go rape away. Yeah, it makes it okay and it continues to keep women, especially underserved populations of women and children, very vulnerable to sexual assault and to rape, because it is almost as if people are looking the other way.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I don't like to think about it. You know the trafficking and children I mean. They don't have a voice at all.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that I mean we could do shows on that very subject of how, how, just this one simple thing, this, how changing our minds and how we think about genders and gender bias, could actually benefit and help prevent crimes against women, crimes against children as well.
Speaker 1:So I want to talk even more about the court system and talk about family court. We talk about family court a lot on on the podcast, both podcasts, both Genesis the podcast and the podcast on crimes against women, and I've learned from experts that often mothers, or even just women in general, are less likely to be believed when they allege abuse against a male partner, whether that allege abuse is domestic violence or child abuse, whereas fathers or men tend to be both believed more often and receive custody of their children more often, even if they have been accused of abuse. So basically, what I've learned from other experts is that if he denies the allegations of abuse, that is believed by the court, and then he accuses her of parental alienation, trying to take the children from him, and then she loses custody of her children, the court will not believe the woman who accuses of abuse, but they'll believe the man who denies it. That's gender bias.
Speaker 2:And it's also a very clever blame shifting technique, isn't it? It is, it is yeah.
Speaker 1:So where does that kind of a bias come from? That she must be lying and his denial is actually the truth.
Speaker 2:I think this kind of issue has been going through law, it's been going through cultural history for centuries, basically this idea that women just shouldn't be believed, and I think it goes all the way back to the medieval time period in England and we're not going to get a lecture on that.
Speaker 1:I know you're a professor of literature so I mean we could go there and you did your dissertation on Shakespeare, so we very well could go there, but we can't see it, alas, we are not going there, we are not going to go all the way back there, but there's at least no shit but there was a time in the Middle Ages, and hopefully that was the most recent example of it.
Speaker 1:But in the Middle Ages women were considered property and they could be bought and sold. Children as well, property could be bought and sold, and even you know, a lot of times these days, as far as custody goes, children are considered property. They aren't very much so. Their voices aren't heard in family court, and so I kind of thought that maybe this bias started, you know to your point, very long ago, for short, but the fact that the courts were built on, you know, these antiquated systems that had laws where women were bought and sold and children were considered furniture, and perhaps it lingers then into present-day reality.
Speaker 2:Well, and there's a couple of 19th century court cases that kind of reaffirmed this notion that women should be chased, they should be silent, they should be obedient, and that men have this, the men in the household have these capabilities to physically abuse them. And so if a woman speaks out against that, then she's already defying that principle right. And there's a couple of court cases. There's one, there's two Mississippi cases and then one North Carolina case, and this is kind of the precedent of in US law. That's the ideas behind this notion, I think, and I argue anyway, and I'll just go through them really quickly.
Speaker 2:I won't give too many details, but the first one started in 1824, and it was Bradley versus State. It was a Mississippi case and the judge confirmed that husbands can chastise their wives so long as and they can even use a weapon so long as it's only the size of his thumb, it can't be any bigger. And then another case in 1864, and that is the dicta, and one of these case, you know, the law just does strange things and then they kind of just let things float and they never challenge.
Speaker 1:That's just so stupid. So wait a minute. Okay, now I have to ask a question about that. So is this law, was it ever overturned?
Speaker 2:No, it has not, it's just sitting around. It's just sitting around.
Speaker 1:Okay, and the weapon is the size of his thumb.
Speaker 2:Okay. So the exact language is he can use physical force to correct her and he can use a weapon. He can have Bruce's can be apparent on her body, but the weapon he has to use proper use of a whip or a retan no bigger than his thumb. That's the dicta. And then we have in 1864, another Mississippi case state versus black that reaffirmed you can beat your wife if she acts up, basically, but you cannot cause permanent injury. So you don't want to permanently maim your wife or cause some sort of ongoing physical damage, but a husband is allowed to physically correct her in this way. And then, finally, I think in 1868, the North Carolina case state versus rose rose was the one that kind of reaffirmed this fact that you know husbands, you can correct your wives.
Speaker 2:And also this is where I think we get this laissez-faire notion of the court system in general, including the family court is that domestic issues in the domestic space need to stay private and not public, of course. Then we got the family court system around 1910, I think, and that was because there was a recognized need to support women and children who are abused in the home. But it doesn't do that. It does not do that, it's ineffective.
Speaker 2:The family court system is ineffective and I, in my view, I think still it's the family court system when it comes to abuse of women and children. There's still so much of this emphasis on his intent to harm and that means physically harm, to show that he has physically hurt. You know his family and you know there's no room. There's still no room for all the other types of violence that occurs and the abuse that occurs, whether it be, you know, the financial, the coercive control, stalking, isolation, the restriction of her mobility, that complete isolation. You know the courts just don't recognize trauma and mental health the way that they should and there's that black and white notion of this is the law and this is why and this is the decision. But everything that happens in life is the gray area that the court system just does not understand well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I mean we're talking about courts in the United States, in the US, yes, yeah. So I did hear. When I talked to Dr Evan Stark recently he told me that in Scotland they were adding the words coercive control to the conversations about domestic violence and child abuse in the court, so it can be a criminal act to commit coercive control. It's much more complicated than that. I'm really simplifying things.
Speaker 1:But in his new book, children of Coercive Control, he talks about that and you know the work he's done has been tremendous on behalf of women and children. I mean he's done everything from like shelter people in his own home or homes or whatever facility it is, to like go to court with them and interview children and listen to their truth and talk about what happened to them. He does amazing work. We have yet to talk here yet today about law enforcement, because I understand that law enforcement are often the first responders to cause of domestic violence. Calls of domestic violence are often the most dangerous for law enforcement professionals to go on and their responses to women and children who explain the experience of domestic violence is really critical to how things are going to move forward, to the way a case is handled. And I'd love to hear your thoughts about how the correct law enforcement responses can really help victims and survivors of rape, sexual violence and domestic violence to be heard and believed.
Speaker 2:I think definitely that trauma-informed training for anyone who's in the legal system, just to become more and more well-versed in training and the investigatory process, in the argument portion, in even the Vordieri, in selecting the jury, that's a good time to help educate the jury. But this is all a technique, right, and I'm not the expert on any of that. But there's a way to maneuver what you guys do with your expert witnesses. You guys, a lot of y'all are your expert witnesses. That type of training needs to be the norm for law enforcement, for judges and for attorneys, and that just brings that awareness needs to be had.
Speaker 2:I don't have the perfect solution on how to implement and do that. You guys do it excellently in this podcast. So, formal and informal training, listen to this podcast, listen to the podcast on the Crimes Against Women, do more professional development around trauma-informed training and investigatory techniques. You've got to be able to recognize that this victim is undergoing some serious trauma and you've got to, I think, use your investigation and your questioning and use the report better to include that information, because that's where it would start in the criminal justice system. I think it's in that report. How is that report written?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's not. You know, it's a lot of things right. So, number one, law enforcement can help survivors by being educated. They can also, number two, help themselves. Because these domestic violence calls are so dangerous and can often be life-threatening for police officers, it's really important to handle them properly and to walk in with the right tools, people and information so that hopefully no one gets injured further and the survivor gets justice and the best response possible. Let's talk about the media, which is also can be vile when it comes to talking about victims of rape and women in general and just the way women are treated. Let's talk about the bias there.
Speaker 2:Yes, and that's the tough one, right when we start looking at the media, because I think we're the media right If we're doing a podcast. We're the good media Okay.
Speaker 1:Wait, wait, what Media? Okay, yes, so let's talk about the media. Not us, but just the media.
Speaker 2:Yes, and it's so good nowadays to see movies now that are starting to really touch on the women's experience. That's super important and I think more of that even needs to be had. But as far as negative impact, peers are really tough and you talked about this on your masculinity episode. I think that really, boys and girls, they really have a their peers are a huge influence and with that, combining with the wrong kind of music or the wrong kind of movies and the social media is really, really bad. You can find anything on social media, but it's this concept around, it's objectification Women are judged on their looks. There's nothing else. They're not judged on their feelings or their opinions and then when you start getting into that really tough adolescent and teenager age, they get mean. They get really, really mean. They feel the peer pressure and those pejorative labels that we all work for.
Speaker 1:So that's kind of like the social media side of it.
Speaker 2:That's the norm, yeah.
Speaker 1:So you've also done extensive work developing parallels between law and literature, which I love that idea and how those contribute to rape culture Give us an idea of how those fields are influencing attitudes about gender and contributing to that culture.
Speaker 2:Well, it's not a straight direction, that's for sure, because if you ask attorneys and people who have gone to law school and were law school trained, they'll tell you that you know what I write about is. I write about law, and when I say law I mean written court opinions that interpret the legislation. And typically for legal professionals, those documents are used as ruling documents, right, when they establish an issue. They have a rule of law that's being analyzed and that, according to the facts, it's analyzed and then a conclusion is reached. It's called the IRAC issue rule application conclusion method, and so that document is used for one purpose only. What's the deal here? And then how is this going to be determined? And this is how it's going to be determined.
Speaker 2:And so I don't do that. I don't look at the document through the eyes of an attorney, I look at it like I do literature, and what that means is I will find different court opinions that have themes that somehow reinforce violence against women, and so I analyze it through the theme, and then what can we learn from this theme? What's the story behind the law? And then I look at literature. I'll find novels. So say, I've got my domestic violence chapter. I have a novel that's about domestic violence and I pair it with court cases that are helping interpret in the same way, if that makes any sense. So what I look at, I'll look at gender biases that the literature, the story of the literature and the law then tells us.
Speaker 2:And one of the other things that I like to do is I particularly so, like in domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking and sexual harassment, there's this element of intent and then typically there's some kind of element of consent, whether it's implied or whether it's explicit. But I look at that and I start to argue. I start to look at the story that each one tells us and I argue that, okay, what's consent, or what was determined as consent, is actually the freeze response. It might have looked like she acquiesced, but now we know from studies in neurobiology and psychology that a lot of times when people are in especially rape victims, the majority of them will freeze, especially in acquaintance rapes. They'll freeze and it might look like they're acquiescing in some way, but it's described as something that's so.
Speaker 2:It's paralysis, and a lot of victims can't move, they can't think, they can't speak, they can't say no, and so a lot of times what I argue is that sometimes they even disassociate. It's also called tonic immobility. I know you've covered this in this before, so I won't go too deep into it. And that's what the law and so many of these forms of violence against women, that's what they don't see or recognize and it's unfair. It's completely biased because it's going back underneath this notion that if she really didn't want that to happen, she would have made sure that it didn't.
Speaker 1:Fight flight, freeze is just one example of trauma responses that, in the 21st century, we all know what they are. Right, everyone has heard of it. Who's talked about trauma at least? So it would only make sense that the law would have to catch up with the rest of the world on what trauma responses look like and how they might appear. In referring to literature, and so I can think of many examples. What's your favorite example of that trauma response in literature?
Speaker 2:There's a lot. There's a lot of them. I try now with my research in writing. I'm trying to focus on novels that may not be this historic literature. I want something that's very contemporary, irrelatable yes, very relatable, and so one that I see of the freeze response. One example, and that I use also in my writing and my research, is in the young adult novel 13 Reasons why. It was a Netflix series as well. Okay, and there's this instance where the protagonist, hannah Baker. She has been harassed over the course of time, she's been bullied, she's fearful of this antagonist who gets away with everything, basically, and everybody knows it, and when he assaults her she doesn't do anything, she freezes. And how it's described is she does not say no, she does not push him away, but she freezes, she literally freezes in fear and she clenches her jaw and she fights back tears as he says she sexually assaults her and clearly that's not consent, but not in the eyes of the law, right, right.
Speaker 1:That's a perfect example, a perfect way to kind of demonstrate what we're talking about here, because there's so many times that's happened. And when I hear freeze, the trauma response freeze that's instinctual. Isn't that the limbic system that kicks in when you're experiencing?
Speaker 1:that kind of trauma and it's instinctual. And it's not only instinctual in humans, it's also instinctual in animals. For example, if you've ever happened upon a bunny rabbit and it's afraid of you, it's very afraid of you and it'll freeze it still is a statue when you walk by it or near it because it's afraid of what's coming. So just a parallel it's an instinct. To freeze is an instinct. We're not making this up. That part is not fiction.
Speaker 2:It's not a cognitive function. No, but it's not fiction either.
Speaker 1:So it may be a literature, but that part's not made up.
Speaker 2:No, not at all. No, not at all. And then another example I can think of. I don't know if you're a fan of Joyce Carol Oates I am, yes, oh my goodness.
Speaker 2:And there's a novella that she wrote called Rape, a Love Story, and it's about this young single mother. She's attractive, she's pretty, she's bubbly and she has a young daughter and she had been, you know, having a few cocktails at a Fourth of July party and she decides to walk through the woods and go home and he is horribly, horribly assaulted by multiple men. Oh, you know, she tries to fight initially, but she realizes she's going, you know, you can, and so she freezes and she just kind of disassociates and they leave her for dead, basically. But another part to this is, even though this horrific crime happened puts her in the hospital, she's got traumatic brain injury that she recovers from, you know, on a very, very gradually. The people in the town, in this small town where she lives in, they blame her.
Speaker 2:That you know. Why was she walking at night in those short shorts and why would she do that? She's just placing herself and her child at risk and completely no sympathy whatsoever. And that's yet another. It's fiction, but it's a very, very real thing that we see every day.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, it's definitely historical fiction, if you will. If you will, yes, it's happened historically many times. I heard you're working on a book. I am. Can you tell us a little?
Speaker 2:bit about it, sure, and I've kind of given you a little bit of a glimpse already. So thank you for asking. It's due to the publisher in March. So I'm at the final stage. We better let you go. I'm not having any fun on Christmas break, by the way, I can imagine there's no real thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can imagine Okay, but that's okay. I set it up for myself, I made this choice, but it's called. It's going to be called Law Literature and Violence Against Women, plus Ending the Victim Blame Game. So I cover chapters and I pair a novel with court cases for each chapter. There's a chapter on sexual assault, on domestic violence, on stalking and harassment, and I pair the novel with court cases and legislation and then also studies in neurobiology about the freeze response and what it looks like in each of these instances.
Speaker 2:And I argue the law is very, very unfairly missing this freeze response that could actually convict wrongdoers for their wrongdoing. And also we talked about victim blaming a little bit earlier. But I also look at I don't know if you've heard of Dr Jennifer Frage. She's a psychologist at the University of Oregon, I believe and she has come up with this technique that many abusers in all of these different types of violence, many of these abusers use. You can see it on the media a lot. You can see it in our current political climate, you can see it every day, in other words.
Speaker 2:But it's the acronym DARVO and it's what perpetrators use. It stands for defend, accuse, reverse, victim and offender, and so it's a very, very effective victim blaming technique in these types of forms of violence against women and basically what the perpetrator will do is you know he'll defend. You're crazy, you're making that up. Actually, they accuse, you're just trying to ruin me or you just want to take me away from my children, and they're reversing the victim and the offender. And they do it very effectively in this society. They do it very effectively. And there's also institutional DARVO, which applies to the bigger aspects of our world. One could argue that the court system, the family court system, the criminal justice system, in these instances commit institutional DARVO. Arguably there are examples, but these are the types of examples. But I'm really excited about it. I'm looking forward to getting it done and publishing it and for me, I just I hope that it can help people. It helps one person. That's going to be enough for me.
Speaker 1:I cannot wait to read this book. It sounds so interesting. I really look forward to it. I look forward to talking to you again once it's released, and I thank you for talking with me today.
Speaker 2:Thank, you so much it was my pleasure.
Speaker 1:Attention, spanish-speaking listeners. Listen to the end of this podcast for information on how to reach a Spanish-speaking representative of Genesis. If you or someone you know is in an abusive relationship, you can get help or give help at genesisshelterorg or by calling or texting our 24-7 crisis hotline team at 214-946-HELP 214-946-4357. Bilingual services at Genesis include text, phone call, clinical counseling, legal services, advocacy and more. Call or text us for more information. Donations to support women and children escaping domestic violence are always needed. Learn more at genesisshelterorg slash donate. Thanks for joining us and reminding you always that ending domestic violence begins when we believe her.
Speaker 3:Genesis. El podcast anuncia servicios bilingües disponibles en Genesis Women's Shelter y Support. Si usted o una conocida este en una relación abusiva, puede recibir ayuda o dar ayuda a genesisshelterorg, o por llamar o mandar mensaje de texto a nuestra linea de crisis de 24 horas al 214-946-4357. Servicios bilingües de genesis incluyen mensajes de texto, llamadas, consejería, servicios legales, asesoría y más. Llámenos o mandenos un text para más información. Donaciones se necesitan donaciones para apoyar a las mujeres o a los niños escapando de la violencia doméstica. Aprende más a nuestra página de internet en genesisshelterorg slash donate. Gracias por venirse con nosotros. Recuerden que el terminar la violencia doméstica empieza cuando creemos a la victima.