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Military officers must stop turning a blind eye to rape

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Kym Levesque

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I have a love affair with the military. What can I say? I just love those uniforms. But what's going on right now with the Air Force Academy in Colorado has dampened my spirits.

After a Colorado newspaper, Westword, exposed many hushed-up sexual assault accusations at the academy, the Air Force began investigating the allegations. The investigators have since identified 56 cases of rape or sexual assault involving cadets that have occurred in the past 10 years.

Though terrible, that is not the part that gets me. Being a cynic, I expect rapes to happen in the military. What I don't like is the lack of prosecution.

Several factors contribute to the persistence of sexual assaults against women in the military. In the scheme of things, women have been there a relatively short time. They have yet to become integrated throughout all the branches and positions, and continue to be in the minority of enrollment.

In the past 10 years, two cadets at the academy have been charged with rape. One was acquitted; the other pleaded guilty and served seven months in jail. Of the 56 reported cases, only one could be convicted?

Mix that with a healthy dose of the violent aspect of military mentality, and you've got a perfect formula for sexual assault. Ignorance plus contempt plus physicality equals injured women.

Here comes some more cynicism: A woman entering the military should anticipate an element of sexual harassment. Hell, women walking down the street anticipate sexual harassment.

This is not to say that a military enlistee, officer or cadet should be harassed - or that women should not enter the military at all. In fact, the only way to solve the problem is for brave women to continue taking blows for the rest of us.

Men in the military will one day understand that women are there to stay. No level of harassment will stop them from enlisting.

When that day comes, sexual assault and rape will cease as a scare tactic, though they may not cease entirely. Not all sexual assaults come as an attempt to scare women out of a male domain; some people are simply evil.

Until the switch flips in these guys' heads and they realize a woman is more apt to watch his back during combat if he doesn't rape her in the shower room, military officials need to do their job and punish their cadets.

According to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, only about 38 percent of rape victims come forward. Time often lapses between the time of the crime and the reporting of it, which makes witnesses and evidence hard to obtain. All this combines to make rape and sexual assault a tricky thing to determine in a courtroom.

However, there are ways around these issues. First, create an atmosphere where a woman can understand that if she is sexually assaulted, she will be helped. That means bringing charges against offenders, even if they can't be convicted, and offering crisis-counseling services to victims.

Second, train military medical personnel how to properly handle a rape, so that collected evidence won't be thrown out in court. These practices will help to ensure that more than one out of 56 sexual assaults result in a conviction.

In the end, though, the biggest change is that military officials must CARE that a crime has occurred. Instead of paying lip service to the idea while the topic is hot in Washington, they need to remember their code of honor and hold those in their command to that same code.

Kym Levesque is a journalism junior. Reach her at kymberly.levesque@asu.edu.


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