Aloha awakea kakou. Another non-marriage-related article. HONOLULU STAR-BULLETIN P.O. Box 3080 Honolulu, Hawai`i 96802 editor@starbulletin.com June 12, 1997 SHAME SILENCES MANY MALE RAPE VICTIMS Few report the crime because they face mockery and disdain By Nkiru Asika Newhouse News Service Alan Lane, a 22-year-old artist, went to a friend's party in Philadelphia last summer, spent the night in her spare room and woke up to find a man sodomizing him. Lane, sedated from medication he was taking and paralyzed from shock, convinced himself that he was dreaming. When he got up later to use the bathroom, the severe pain and the bleeding proved that the experience had been real. "I don't think there is a real word for how I felt," he said. "I felt like I wasn't supposed to be alive anymore." On Steven Dooley's high school prom night in 1991, a male friend stayed over at his house in Atlanta. They were romantically involved but had never had penetrative sex. That night, despite Dooley's efforts to resist, the friend forcibly entered him. One early morning in 1988, David Barfield took a shortcut home through Frenchtown, a rough part of Tallahassee. A large man, reeking of whiskey, pulled a knife on him and dragged the then 17-year-old into an abandoned house nearby. The man grabbed Barfield's head and forced him to perform oral sex. The he raped him anally before letting him go. Few people believe that male rape exists outside prisons. However, thousands of men from all walks of life are raped every year. Most of the victims are gay but the majority of the rapists are heterosexual. Male rape victims attract little attention because few report their crimes; often they face mockery, disbelief and disdain from law enforcement and the community at large. Michael Scarce, coordinator of the Rape Education and Prevention Program at Ohio State University, has interviewed dozens of rape survivors for an upcoming book: "Male on Male Rape: The Hidden Toll of Stigma and Shame." His research has found that male rape can happen on the job, in the street, on a date as well as in single-sex institutions such as athletic teams, college fraternities and the military. The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics says that more than 300,000 women reported rapes or attempted rapes in 1994. That same year, 15,000 men reported they had been vicitms of rape or attempted rape. But nobody knows the true numbers. For example, out of the 213 men who have contacted the Sexual Assault Services center in San Bernardino County, Calif., only 13 have reported the attack. Fear of people's reactions and a strong sense of shame keeps most male rape victims silent. Lane and Barfield, both heterosexual, found themselves questioning their own sexuality after the rapes. Both men began to wonder if they were secretly gay or if they had give their attackers some sort of unconscious signals. Dooley, who is gay, was too wracked with guilt to consder pressing charges abd blamed himself for this failure to resist his abuser. The trauma of these men was aggravated by ther reactions of their families. Dooley's parents concluded that his abuse stemmed from being a "degenerate homosexual." Barfield's own mother still refuses to believe his story and Lane's parents said the rape was his fault for running with the wrong crowd. Male victims say they rarely receive compassion from the authorities. In the crime date it collects, the FBI has not category for male-on-male rape. In 21 states, rape is defined legally only as the forcible penetration of a woman by a man. These states count male sexual violence in euphemisms such as sexual battery, criminal sexual conduct or unlawful sexual intercourse. "Imagine how invalidating it is for a man to step forward and say that he has been raped only to be told by the authorities, 'No you haven't, you have been engaging in unlawful sexual intercourse,'" said Scarce, the Ohio State Unversity researcher. Barfield speaks with bitterness about his treatment when he reported the rape. "The doctor treated me as if I had done something wrong," he said. "The cops' first question was, 'What were you . . . doing in that part of town at that time of night?'" A local rape counselor was the first to say to him, "It's not your fault." When male rape cases go to trial, the result is often a suspended or minimal sentence, say those who work with victims and rapists. When the police picked up Barfield's attacker on drug charges, the man was to face an additional charge of sexual assault, the most serious charge possible under Florida law. Instead, he was charged with "lewd and lascivioius behavior" with a mere six months added to a 12-month drug penality. He even got out early for good behavior. The men who rape are sexual predators for whom power and control have become eroticized. Scott is a rapist now in sex offenders program in Tulsa, Okla. He is afraid to give his last name for fear of vigilantes. He has been in the sex offenders' program for more than four years after he was arrested on two counts of attempted rape of teenage boys. He admits that he had raped at least 10 others before he was caught. Scott, who is gay, said he was molested as a child and that his motivation to rape was "a combination of wanting to have sex, wanting to be close to somebody, wanting to be in control of somebody." After committing a rape, Scott said he felt exhilarated and releif, but no remorse. For his crimes, Scott only recieved a two-year deferred sentence. No jail time, no fines. Although there are many like Scott who are gay and victims of child abuse, only 35 percent of male rapists report being victims of sex abuse and the overwhelming majority of rapists are self-identified heterosexuals, according to the National Organization on Male Sexual Victimization, a nonprofit group in St. Paul, Minn. "The fact that it is largely heterosexual men who rape really drives it home that rape is an act of violence, not sex," said Scarce.