Gay male rape victims: Law enforcement, social attitudes and barriers to recognition

International Journal of Human Rights

Volumn 13, Issue 2-3, 2009, Pages 233-250

  Rumney, Philip N S ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST OF ENGLAND   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Criminal justice; Male rape; Police; Sexuality; Social attitudes; Victims

Indexed keywords

EID: 77950781778     PISSN: 13642987     EISSN: 1744053X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13642980902758135     Document Type: Article

References (121)

1. S. Banbury, ‘Coercive Sexual Behaviour in British Prisons as Reported by Adult Ex-prisoners’, Howard Journal 43 (2004): 113
2. I. O’Donnell, ‘Prison Rape in Context’, British Journal of Criminology 44 (2004): 24.
3. A. Coxell, M. King, G. Mezey, and D. Gordon, ‘Lifetime Prevalence, Characteristics and Associated Problems of Non-consensual Sex in Men: Cross Sectional Survey’, British Medical Journal 318 (1999): 846.
4. S. Sivakumaran, ‘Sexual Violence against Men in Armed Conflict’, European Journal of International Law 18 (2007): 253.
5. G.C. Mezey and M.B. King, Male Victims of Sexual Assault, 2nd edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000)
6. S. Allen, ‘Male Victims of Rape: Responses to a Perceived Threat to Masculinity’, in New Visions of Crime Victims, ed. C. Hoyle and R. Young (Oxford: Hart, 2002), 23
7. J. Walker, J. Archer, and M. Davies, ‘Effects of Rape on Men: A Descriptive Analysis’, Archives of Sexual Behavior 34 (2005): 69
8. J. Walker, J. Archer, and M. Davies, ‘Effects of Male Rape on Psychological Functioning’, British Journal of Clinical Psychology 44 (2005): 225.
9. See most recently N. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape: The Emergence of a Social and Legal Issue (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008).
10. It has recently been claimed that there is ‘a small amount of research literature on male victimization’: R. Graham, ‘Male Rape and the Careful Construction of the Male Victim’, Social & Legal Studies 15 (2006): 187-188. Graham’s analysis of our current understanding of male rape and its representation in the scholarly literature is poorly researched and ignores work in the fields of law, history, psychology, and medicine. As a result, many of her observations and conclusions rest on outdated research and are either open to doubt or plainly wrong. For analysis of some of her claims
11. P.N.S. Rumney, ‘Policing Male Rape and Sexual Assault’, Journal of Criminal Law 71 (2008): 67, 81-2.
12. In a national British study of 2474 males Coxell et al., ‘Lifetime Prevalence’, found that men who had experience of consensual sex with other men were six times more likely to have been raped or sexually assaulted as adults than males who had not. In An earlier British study of 930 gay men, F.C.I. Hickson, P.M. Davies, A.J. Hunt, P. Weatherburn, T.J. McManus, and A.P.M. Coxon found that a significant number were victims of non-consensual sex. Of those surveyed it was found that 257 (27.6%) men reported that they had been ‘subjected to nonconsensual sex at some point in their lives’. Of these, it was found that 45.2% (99) had been anally penetrated, and in another 11 cases (5%) there had been an unsuccessful attempt at anal penetration; ‘Gay Men as Victims of Nonconsensual Sex’, Archives of Sexual Behavior 23 (1994): 281. In a survey of 287 gay men in Vancouver one-third ‘had been forced to have sex against their will at least once in their lives’. However, it is not clear from this study whether all these instances of victimisation occurred during adulthood
13. D.V. Janoff, Pink Blood: Homophobic Violence in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press: 2005), 25.
14. See, e.g., Human Rights Watch and International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, More than a Name: State-Sponsored Homophobia and its Consequences in Southern Africa (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2003)
15. Janoff, Pink Blood; S. Hodge and D. Cantor, ‘Victims and Perpetrators of Male Sexual Assault’, Journal of Interpersonal Violence 13 (1998): 222, 234.
16. Human Rights Watch, No Escape: Male Rape in U.S. Prisons (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2001)
17. Banbury, ‘Coercive Sexual Behaviour’.
18. J. Temkin and B. Kraché, Sexual Assault and the Justice Gap: A Question of Attitude (Oxford: Hart, 2007), 209.
19. C.N. Kendall, ‘Gay Male Pornography and Sexual Violence: A Sex Equality Perspective on Gay Male Rape and Partner Abuse’, McGill Law Journal 49 (2004): 877, 905.
20. Home Office, Crime in England and Wales 2001/2002 (London: Home Office, 2002).
21. S. Nicholas et al., Crime in England and Wales 2004/2005 (London: Home Office, 2005), Table 7.01.
22. S. Nicholas et al., Crime in England and Wales 2006/07 (London: Home Office, 2007), 36.
23. R.J. Hillman, N. O’Mara, D. Taylor-Robinson, and J.R. Harris, ‘Medical and Social Aspects of Sexual Assault of Males: A Survey of 100 Victims’, British Journal of General Practice 40 (1990): 502-503.
24. G. Mezey and M. King, ‘The Effects of Sexual Assault on Men: A Survey of 22 Victims’, Psychological Medicine 19 (1989): 205-207.
25. Coxell et al., ‘Lifetime Prevalence’.
26. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 189.
27. HMCPSI/HMIC, A Report on the Joint Inspection into the Investigation and Prosecution of Cases Involving Allegations of Rape (London: HMCPSI/HMIC, 2002), para. 6.20. In a survey by M. King and E. Woollett, men ‘found it difficult to give reasons why they had not reported to police. Six were too ashamed, 2 were trying to forget the assault, 2 were too frightened, 1 could not talk about it, and 1 saw no point in reporting’, ‘Sexually Assaulted Males: 115 Men Consulting a Counselling Service’, Archives of Sexual Behavior 26 (1997): 579-585.
28. P.L. Huckle, ‘Male Rape Victims Referred to a Forensic Psychiatric Service’, Medicine, Science, Law 35 (1995): 187-190
29. M. Scarce, Male on Male Rape: The Hidden Toll of Stigma and Shame (New York: Insight Books, 1997).
30. S. Sivakumaran, ‘Male/Male Rape and the "Taint" of Homosexuality’, Human Rights Quarterly 27 (2005): 1274-1291.
31. Hodge and Cantor, ‘Victims and Perpetrators of Male Sexual Assault’, 231.
32. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 189. It was suggested, ibid., 190, by one counsellor that some gay male rape victims may not report their rapes because they feared being arrested ‘for the activity that led to the rape as outdoor sex in groups and toilets is illegal for men.’
33. While the suggestion that male rape is less reported than female rape is made elsewhere (see Sivakumaran, ‘Male/Male Rape’, 1289-90), there is no compelling statistical evidence to support such a claim.
34. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 150.
35. Sivakumaran, ‘Male/Male Rape’.
36. Allen, ‘Male Victims of Rape’, 35.
37. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 215.
38. R.E. Funk, ‘Queer Men and Sexual Assault: What Being Raped Says about Being a Man’, in Gendered Outcasts and Sexual Outlaws: Sexual Oppression and Gender Hierarchies in Queer Men’s Lives, ed. C. Kendall and W. Martino (New York: Routledge, 2006), 131-138.
39. P.J. Isely, ‘Adult Male Sexual Assault in the Community: A Literature Review and Group Treatment Model’, in Rape and Sexual Assault III: A Research Handbook, ed. A.W. Burgess (New York: Garland, 1991), 161-164.
40. Private correspondence from Survivors UK, 8 November 1994 (on file with author).
41. King and Woollett, Sexually Assaulted Males, 584.
42. Hillman et al., ‘Medical and Social Aspects’, 503.
43. Walker et al., ‘Effects of Rape on Men’, 74.
44. Prior to the enactment of section 142 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (c. 33), non-consensual penile-anal intercourse was classed as buggery, not rape.
45. C. Donovan, M. Hester, J. Holmes, and M. McCarry, Comparing Domestic Abuse in Same Sex and Heterosexual Relationships (Bristol: University of Bristol, 2006), 21. The passage of time is clearly an important factor, and in recent years there have been attempts made by the police to improve responses to male rape and sexual assault.
46. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 211. This was a positive finding although, as with many other studies, the small numbers make it difficult to draw general conclusions.
47. Scarce, Male on Male Rape, 216.
48. Banbury, ‘Coercive Sexual Behaviour’, 126.
49. Human Rights Watch, No Escape, 152.
50. S. Lees, Ruling Passions: Sexual Violence, Reputation and the Law (Buckingham: Open University Press, 1997), 94.
51. J. Gregory and S. Lees note the following reason given by a police officer for regarding a male rape victim as unreliable: ‘He is described by his friends as very promiscuous’, Policing Sexual Assault (London: Routledge, 1999), 126.
52. P.J. Isely, ‘Adult Male Sexual Assault’, 171-2.
53. L. Johnston, ‘Homeless Sex Scandal’, Big Issue, 11-17 September 1995, 11-15.
54. L. Kelly et al., A Gap or a Chasm? Attrition in Reported Rape Cases (London: Home Office, 2005), 293
55. J. Temkin, ‘Reporting Rape in London: A Qualitative Study’, Howard Journal of Criminal Justice 38 (1999): 17
56. J. Temkin, ‘Plusa Change: ReportingRape in the 1990s’, British Journal of Criminology 37 (1997): 507.
57. It is not clear from Steve’s disclosures why the officer stated that ‘in these types of cases it was virtually impossible to get a conviction’.
58. J. Harris and S. Grace, A Question of Evidence? Reporting Rape in the 1990s (London: Home Office, 1999), 20-2.
59. There is research showing that males can experience an erection and even ejaculation during sexual assaults by male or female assailants. In their study of 11 males sexually assaulted by women either as children or adults, P.M. Sarrel and W.H. Masters found that ‘men or boys have responded sexually to female assault or abuse even though the males’ emotional state during the molestations has been overwhelmingly negative-embarrassment, humiliation, anxiety, fear, anger, or even terror’, ‘Sexual Molestation of Men by Women’, Archives of Sexual Behavior 11 (1982): 117-118.
60. See also King and Woollett, ‘Sexually Assaulted Males’, 587: ‘Just under 20% of the men were stimulated by their assailants until they ejaculated.’ In a small-scale study of male rape victims and offenders, A.N. Groth and A.W. Burgess found that ‘[a] major strategy used by some offenders in the assault of males is to get the victim to ejaculate. This effort may have several purposes. In misidentifying ejaculation with orgasm, the victim may be bewildered by his physiological response to the offense and thus discouraged from reporting the assault for fear his sexuality may become suspect. Such a reaction may serve to impeach his credibility in trial testimony and discredit his allegation of nonconsent. To the offender, such a reaction may symbolize his ultimate and complete sexual control over his victim’s body and confirm his fantasy that the victim really wanted and enjoyed the rape.
61. This fantasy is also prominent in the rape of females’, ‘Male Rape Offenders and Victims’, American Journal of Psychiatry 137 (1980): 806-809.
62. Scarce, Male on Male Rape, 191-2.
63. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 133-7.
64. Rumney, ‘Policing Male Rape and Sexual Assault’, 80-5.
65. On a related matter, an examination of arrest patterns in 19 US states found inter alia differing arrest rates for male and female same-sex domestic violence, noting that ‘[t]he offense need not be very serious for an arrest to be made in cases of female same-sex violence’, but ‘it appears that the commission of a serious offense is needed to make some police officers treat an incident involving a male same-sex couple as a serious criminal matter’: A. Pattavina, D. Hirschel, E. Buzawa, D. Faggiani, and H. Bentley, ‘A Comparison of the Police Response to Heterosexual Versus Same-Sex Intimate Partner Violence’, Violence against Women 13 (2007): 374-388.
66. I. Anderson and K. Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology: Feminism and Discourse Analysis in the Study of Sexual Violence (London: Routledge, 2008), 97.
67. M.H. Sommer, Law, Sex, and Society in Late Imperial China (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2000), 133-4.
68. T. Gillespie, ‘Rape Crisis Centres and "Male Rape": A Face of the Backlash’, in Women, Violence and Male Power: Feminist Activism, Research and Practice, ed. M. Hester, L. Kelly, and J. Radford (Buckingham: Open University Press, 1996), 161.
69. P. Novotny, ‘Rape Victims in the (Gender) Neutral Zone: The Assimilation of Resistance?’, Seattle Journal for Social Justice 1 (2003): 743-745.
70. For a critical review of this and other claims made by Novotny, see P.N.S. Rumney, ‘In Defence of Gender Neutrality within Rape’, Seattle Journal for Social Justice 6 (2007): 481.
71. L. Rees, Auschwitz: The Nazis and the Final Solution (New York: Knopf, 2005), 236-53.
72. L. Smith, Forgotten Voices of the Holocaust (London: Ebury Press, 2005), 178.
73. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 123.
74. Deputy Commissioner’s Command, Directorate of Strategic Development and Territorial Policing, Project Sapphire, A Review of Rape Investigations in the MPS (London: Metropolitan Police Service, 2005), para. 4.3. For definitions of ‘no crime’ and ‘not crime’.
75. P.N.S. Rumney, ‘False Allegations of Rape’, Cambridge Law Journal 65 (2006): 128-156.
76. There are a number of questions that arise in the interpretation of these data. It is not possible to know whether the cases that are classified as ‘no crime/not crime’ are appropriately labelled. Research that examines the ‘no crime’ of rape complaints suggests that police officers often apply the criteria inappropriately
77. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 68.
78. D. Finkelhor and K. Yllo, License to Rape: Sexual Abuse of Wives (New York: Free Press, 1985), ch. 8
79. P.N.S. Rumney, ‘Progress at a Price: The Construction of Non-Stranger Rape in the Millberry Sentencing Guidelines’, Modern Law Review 66 (2003): 870.
80. Lees, Ruling Passions, 94.
81. A. Wakelin and K.M. Long, ‘Effects of Victim Gender and Sexuality on Attributions of Blame to Rape Victims’, Sex Roles 49 (2003): 477-483.
82. B.H. White and S.E.R. Kurpius, ‘Effects of Victim Sex and Sexual Orientation in Perceptions of Rape’, Sex Roles 46 (2002): 191.
83. D. Mitchell and R. Hirschman, ‘Attributions of Victim Responsibility, Pleasure and Trauma in Male Rape’ Journal of Sex Research 36 (1999): 369.
84. K. Doherty and I. Anderson, ‘Making Sense of Male Rape: Constructions of Gender, Sexuality and Experience of Rape Victims’, Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology 14 (2004): 85.
85. Anderson and Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology, 95.
86. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 143-5.
87. J. Bourke, Rape: A History from 1860 to the Present (London: Virago, 2007), 240-1.
88. S. Hite, The Hite Report on Male Sexuality (London: Optima, 1981), 749.
89. Hansard (HL), 20 June 1994, col. 66.
90. F. Pelka, ‘Raped: A Male Survivor Breaks His Silence’, in Rape and Society: Readings on the Problem of Sexual Assault, ed. P. Searles and R.J. Berger (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1995), 252.
91. Anderson and Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology, 103.
92. Rumney, ‘Progress at a Price’.
93. For discussions of the impact of intoxication on judgments made by mock jurors, see E. Finch and V.E. Munro, ‘Breaking Boundaries? Sexual Consent in the Jury Room’, Legal Studies 26 (2006): 303
94. P.N.S. Rumney and R.A. Fenton, ‘Intoxicated Consent in Rape: Bree and Juror Decision-Making’, Modern Law Review 71 (2008): 279.
95. Negative judgments regarding victim credibility are sometimes a result of the complainant not resisting her attacker or showing little emotion when recounting her victimization
96. Rumney, ‘False Allegations of Rape’
97. Temkin and Kraché, Sexual Assault and the Justice Gap.
98. Anderson and Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology, 62.
99. H. Eigenberg, ‘Male Rape: An Empirical Examination of Correctional Officers’ Attitudes toward Rape in Prison’, Prison Journal 69 (1989): 39-50.
100. M. Davies and P. Rogers, ‘Perceptions of Male Victims in Depicted Sexual Assaults: A Review of the Literature’, Aggression and Violent Behaviour 11 (2006): 367-371.
101. Recent research suggests evidence of ‘erroneous and mythical thinking’ about male rape, along with ‘some evidence’ of homophobia: I. Anderson, ‘What is a Typical Rape? Effects of Victim and Participant Gender in Female and Male Rape Perception’, British Journal of Social Psychology 46 (2007): 225.
102. Sommer, Law, Sex, and Society in Late Imperial China, 148-51.
103. J. Boyle, A Sense of Freedom (London: Pan Books, 1977), 196.
104. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 131.
105. A. Liptak, ‘Inmate was Considered "Property" of Gang, Witness Tells Jury in Prison Rape Lawsuit’, New York Times, 25 September 2005, http://www.njbullying.org/InmateWasConsideredPropertyofGangWitnessTellsJuryinPrisonRapeLawsuit-NewYorkTimes.htm (accessed 11 March 2009).
106. A former gang member testified that if Johnson refused to comply ‘You’ll be beaten until you say yes… He’d be beaten, stabbed, whatever.’
107. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 208.
108. Anderson and Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology, 100.
109. Bourke, Rape, 247.
110. S. Kippax and G. Smith, ‘Anal Intercourse and Power in Sex between Men’, Sexualities 4 (2001), 413-418 (emphasis in original).
111. D. McGhee, Homosexuality, Law and Resistance (London: Routledge, 2001), 75.
112. Anderson and Doherty, Accounting for Rape Psychology, 104.
113. Anderson, ‘What is a Typical Rape?’, 241-2.
114. Article 3 prohibits inter alia the infliction of inhuman and degrading treatment.
115. P. Londono, ‘Positive Obligations, Criminal Procedure and Rape Cases’, European Human Rights Law Review (2007): 158.
116. For an example, see Independent Police Complaints Commission, Report into a Complaint by Geoffrey Vincent Cole against South Wales Police Regarding the Initial Police Actions Following His Alleged Rape and Serious Sexual Assault on 18 October 2005, Executive Summary, 3-5, 10, http://www.ipcc.gov.uk/coleexecutive_summary_3_7_07.pdf (accessed 17 November 2008).
117. For a discussion of Article 14 as a freestanding right (which, however, requires ratification by the United Kingdom of Protocol 12 to the European Convention on Human Rights), see P.C.W. Chan, ‘Same-Sex Marriage/Constitutionalism and their Centrality to Equality Rights in Hong Kong: A Comparative-Socio-Legal Appraisal’, International Journal of Human Rights 11, nos 1-2 (2007): 33-62.
118. Abdullah-Khan, Male Rape, 226.
119. Donovan et al., Comparing Domestic Abuse, 20-1.
120. Carol Withey, Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Greenwich, has created a ‘School Project’ in which university students go into school classes to explain the law of rape and help pupils better understand the legal consequences of sexual violence.
121. Temkin and Kraché, Sexual Assault and the Justice Gap, ch. 5.