Chicago-a woman who worked for William
Kennedy Smith in 1999 has filed a
lawsuit alleging that the Kennedy
scion raped her five years ago, on
the night of her 23rd birthday. According
to the complaint, Kennedy Smith compelled
his then-personal assistant to come
to his home after an evening of heavy
drinking with co-workers, and sexually
forced himself on her. Kennedy Smith
denies the allegations and has pointed
out that he and the complainant dated
for five months subsequent to the
alleged rape.
Her allegations about what William
Kennedy Smith did, and his about her,
epitomize what scientific research
has revealed is true of sexual assault
generally. Ironically, Kennedy Smith
supporters are citing the very circumstances
of this case that typify rape, as
reasons to disbelieve his accuser.
Asked about the recent allegations,
Chicago's own Mayor Daley said that
he liked William Kennedy Smith, admired
him for doing important work, and
repeatedly observed that Kennedy Smith
was a "well-respected" man.
Daley also relied on his history as
a prosecutor to bolster his opinion
that the sexual assault claim was
suspicious because the complainant
had not made her accusation until
five years after the fact. While Mayor
Daley's comments embodied his gift
for articulating widely held views,
he did a major disservice to the public
by promoting many common myths about
rape.
When it comes to rape, truth is often
stranger-and harder to accept-than
fiction. And despite the discomfort
it is likely to arouse, people owe
it to themselves-or perhaps to their
sisters, wives, daughters, and mothers-to
consider the Kennedy Smith case, and
Mayor Daley's comments about it, in
the context of what science tells
us about rape in the United States.
First of all, Daley implied that
Kennedy Smith's likable-ness and status
as a "respected" man stand
in opposition to the allegations made
against him. According to the U.S.
Department of Justice, however, 24%
of American women are physically or
sexually assaulted at least once by
a man they have a relationship with
(usually a current or former boyfriend
or husband.) The clear implication
of this, given that women do not all
date the same man, is that a significant
minority of men engage in private
acts of aggression and domination
over women. As women mostly seek out
well-regarded men, and avoid those
who are clearly identifiable as rapists
and batterers, it is absurd to posit
that being liked or respected is evidence
that a man would not or did not violate
a woman in private. In other words,
the intimate harming of every fourth
woman in America is not being done
by a tiny subset of particularly unlikable,
obviously violent men. To suggest
that you will only find rape where
you can clearly see a monster, is
to obscure the extent and problem
of intimate violence in our country,
and drive victims deeper into their
silences.
Contrary to the myth promulgated
by Daley, rape is engaged in by men
who are otherwise kind, funny, likable,
and respected by their peers. It is
such positive attributes that induce
girls and women in the first place
to date, work for, take a ride home
or share a drink with, the men who
end up raping them. Just think about
it-if it was as easy as Mayor Daley
implies to distinguish the men who
assault girls and women, from the
majority of men who never engage in
such abuse, then the statistics on
intimate violence would be radically
different from what they are. As it
is, and despite the clear evidence
that rape is mostly done by men who
are appealing enough to secure dates,
and girlfriends, and wives, people
still insist on acting like the attractive
attributes that William Kennedy Smith
embodies would not exist in a man
who had also engaged in rape.
The attractive qualities of men who
rape don't just confound the ability
of bystanders to believe that rape
has occurred when it is reported.
Rather, their positive attributes-the
ways in which they are kind, funny,
generous, or loving-also cause enormous
difficulties for the women they harm.
Rape survivors, no less than anyone
else, are likely to have believed
that only "horrible" men
are capable of rape, and being confronted
with the lie of that myth through
forced sex does not immediately make
them able to say that men can be attractive
and funny and kind and generous and
engage in rape. "I can't believe
he would rape anyone" is not
just a sentence victims fear hearing
from other people-it is a sentiment
they know intimately. It is usually,
in fact, a sentiment they held about
the man who raped them. Frequently,
rape survivors endure an agonizing
battle with self-doubt, as the conflict
between their experience, and their
belief that "he wouldn't rape
anyone" leads them to wonder
if what happened actually did happen.
The internal pressure on survivors
to re-characterize what was done to
them is increased when a survivor
works or shares a social circle with
her rapist. In such circumstances,
victims frequently fear that rape
allegations will throw their entire
community into upheaval, and will
jeopardize everything they value and
depend on, from friendships to paychecks.
Additionally, when a rapist commands
affection and respect, or doesn't
fit common (frequently racist) stereotypes
about rapists, hostile incredulity
is the common response to women who
say they have been raped. While the
death threats that were made against
the woman who identified Kobe Bryant
as a rapist may not be typical, they
correspond to the general sentiment
most rape victims fear confronting
should they go to the police.
For all these reasons, many raped
women put a great deal of time and
energy into trying to convince themselves
that they were not raped, even when
sex was forced on them. Sometimes
they do this by calling what happened
something other than rape-bad sex,
or 'rough' sex-anything that will
allow them to identify the trauma
they are going through as something
different than the aftermath of rape.
Sometimes they do this by trying to
forget what happened altogether. Occasionally
their efforts to deny they were raped
take them through continued involvement,
and even consensual sex, with their
rapist. Although it is disconcerting,
some women choose to have sex with
a man who earlier ignored their efforts
to prevent it. Often described as
a way that survivors try to regain
a sense of control over their lives,
it is similar to the "You can't
fire me, I quit" scenario: "I'm
not being forced-I'm choosing this."
In any event, after learning the hard
way that no is not an option, some
people choose to say yes. For a while.
Ultimately, most survivors of non-stranger
rape find the strength to accept that
they were indeed raped by men who
they liked and trusted-despite what
our culture teaches about the incompatibility
of "nice men" and rape.
But the struggle to come to grips
with their lived experience in the
face of everything they had previously
believed about rape and rapists, is
tremendously difficult and time-consuming,
and the overwhelming majority of rape
victims never-let alone quickly-report
their rapist to the criminal justice
system.
This last fact, that the majority
of rape victims never report being
raped to the police or prosecutors,
has been widely reported for at least
the last fifteen years. It is, therefore,
particularly shameful that Mayor Daley
referred to the absence of a police
report as reason to consider the current
allegations against Kennedy Smith
"suspicious." Once again,
his comments played on, and advanced,
a rape myth that burdens victims:
the myth that victims of "real"
rape quickly and fearlessly report
their rape to the criminal justice
system. In reality, it takes a great
deal of effort and a significant amount
of time for most rape survivors to
come to terms with what was done to
them, let alone to consider going
public with their rape by contacting
the police. And more acutely than
all of us, rape victims know that
delay in reporting is used to discredit
survivors. Thus a myth turns reality
on its head, and plays a key role
in keeping women silent long after
their struggle to admit they were
raped.
By accepting so blindly the myth
that rape is engaged in by men who
are obviously monsters, as well as
the myth that true rape victims go
to the police-quickly, our society
does enormous harm to women who are
raped. We also do no favors to men
in our society, the majority of whom,
it should be remembered, never force
sex on the women they are intimate
with. Indeed, by supporting the myths
about rape that blind us to its realities,
we give men who commit rape no incentive
to change their behaviors. And perhaps
more importantly, the ways in which
rapists are truly different from the
majority of men continue to be obscured
and undervalued.
Kennedy Smith has said that he is
particularly vulnerable to false allegations
of rape, because of his family and
his personal history. The personal
history he is likely referring to
is the 1991 criminal case against
him for rape (he was acquitted), and
published reports that three other
women were prepared to testify in
that trial about his sexual assaults
on them. His spin on this history
is that it makes him a target for
lies about sexual violence, but it
makes more sense to see him as someone
about whom rape allegations are not
believed-even when they are put forward
by multiple women. Also, people who
have worked with Kennedy Smith since
1991 have surely regarded him as the
innocent victim of false claims, because
the alternative-believing him guilty
of getting away with multiple rapes-would
likely cause significant discomfort
for co-workers and employees. The
experience of actively believing he
"wouldn't" or "couldn't"
commit rape, and the experience of
thinking other women were liars for
accusing him of sexual assault, is
one that would make it more difficult,
not less, for any person to accuse
him of sexual assault. The exceptionally
powerful, and exceptionally successful,
group of people willing to rally to
his defense is also not likely to
be overlooked by anyone contemplating
accusing him of rape. In other words,
Daley's defense of Kennedy Smith,
while inappropriate and troublesome,
was not surprising.
I do not know the woman who is suing
William Kennedy Smith, and I am not
attempting to speak for her. I am,
however, struck by the ways in which
the reported allegations conform to
what is generally true of sexual assault
in our country. I am also struck-and
appalled-by the ways in which facts
that are characteristic of rape are
still being used to discredit victims.
It is long past time for our society
to disavow the myths about rape that
may keep us comfortable-as long as
we are not raped-but which to do nothing
to further justice, and which do everything
to keep raped girls and women silent
and hurting.
Kaethe Morris Hoffer
[email protected]
