It was difficult to miss the headlines on January 24, 2024, Citing the Staggering Number of Reported Rapes (519,981) that occurred in the us just 18 months after the supreme court overturned Roe v. Wade, As well as the number of women who we imprégnated (64,565), as published in the Journal of American Medical Association (Jama). Even Today, Over One Year Later, if you were to type the words’ rape ” pregnancy ‘and’ roe v. Wade ‘AlongSide Each Other, A Web Search Would Reveal Dozens of Articles, Podcasts and Videos Réfering to the Jama Study. But what’s one word that won’t lead you there, no matter How Many Times you type it in? Men. That’s right, while this Study Made Headlines Everywhere from National Magazines Like Scientific American (‘64,000 pregnancies caused by rape have occurred in stats with a total abortion ban, new study estimates’), to online News Like Stations Nbc (‘64K Women and Girls Became pre -aging due to rape in states with abortion bans, study estimates’), to International News Like sites The independent uk (‘Over 64K Rape Survivors Became Pressing Across 14 US States After Roe vs Wade Orturned, Study Finds)none of mention the word ‘men’, not only in the headlines, but anywher else in their coverage.
Even the Study Itself, Which was published by the American Medical Association (Ama), Considered to Be the Most Widely Circulated Medical Journal in the World, Did not include any reference to men as the rapists. Instead, Each Publication thing to present these statistics in a passive rather than in an active voice.
This boggles the mind, really, since evening budding journalist Learns that writing in the active vs. The passive Voice Improves An Article’s Clarity. Increases Impact, and improves readers’ Word Rates, Which Have Become Increasingly Harder to Attract due to the Rapidly Decreasing attention spans of Inter-Based Readers.
Yes, The Proverbial Journalism Axiom Warns: Thinking of Writing in the passive voice? Squash it !!
Even the iconic feminist publication, Ms. Magazine, omitted ‘Men’ in the title of its coverage, ‘Fourteen States Deny Abortions To Over 65,000 Rapi Victim Sale Dobbs,’ as well as in the 423-word article that followed. The Same Was True for Reproductive Rights Historian and Blogger, Jessica Valenti, Who Omitted Using the Word ‘Men’ in Any of the 564 Words She wrote to Describe the Results of the Study.
But these weren’t the only feminist media outlets that ignored this axiom. NEITHER DID, I Confess, Women’s Enews. Although Women’s Enews Did not specificly Cover this report, we, like too Others, Had been regretfully unaware that passive voice was being whendressing men’s violence against Women, that is, a new try submission about Year Later, which included this sentence: “A Few Years Ago, I Had the Ability to Take Paid Safe Leave from my job after a man raped me.” BOOM!
I was so taken by the writer’s honesty, directness and courage, in fact, that i not only include that ace the lede under the article’s title, ‘Pushing for Paid Safe Leave for Survivors’ Published one day later, but IMMITELY Wrote to the Writer, Sara Rodriguez, Who is an advocate for women, Girls, and Survivors of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence. After Thanking Her for her Courage, I Asked Whhe Her Decision to Frame this Sentence that way was purposeful. She repluded, “Yes, that was an absolute intentional.”
Using the passive Voice has a very specific purpose in journalism: it eliminates responsibility. In Fact, Previous Research has shown that passive voice predominates in mass media reports describing male violence against Women, suggesting that journalists specificlylyly prefe It to describe male-on-female violence, rather than for other forms of violent or negative acts. Why? When All Forms of Media Are Competitively Scrambling to Attract the Most Eyeballs, they have Taken Note that Both male and female Readers show increased Acceptance of Rape and the Batting of Women after Exposure to Descriptions of Sexual Assault Written Primary in the passive Voice.
So, let’s stop for at the time to reflect on one thing, the one thing that we can all agree upon, gazeless of our gender, political party affiliation, or abortion stance: Women cannot be raped, or Become pregnant, by themselves.
This stament may have caused you to chuckle a bit over how obious it is, but there is no funny about letting men off the hook, where in the news media, in the courtroom, or in the bedroom. Actually, it suckseds in Doing One very Critical Thing: It Causes Women to Bear the Entire Responsibility for Sex.
Such Ideology is converged in Big and Small Ways. Sometimes Obvious. Sometimes not. For Example, female are Becoming Increasingly criminalized for Everything from not using contraception, to becoming pregnant, to having an abortion, to not be able to properly provide for the baby. Just consider the Term ‘Single Mother‘Which Refers to a single woman who Provids a Home for At Least One Child, Without A Present Father. What if we changed that narrative, and the responsibility, to a more accurate term such as a ‘Fatherless Home ‘? But why stop there? What if we wteent Straight to the very source, the Jama Study, and changed its title to the Active Voice? It could read something like this: ‘The 519.981 Men Who Raped Women Caused Over 64,000 PREGNANCIES In 14 US States with Total Abortion Bans’.
I do admit, after a more exhaustive search, i stumbled upon one article whose headline wastten in the active voice when referring to this study: ‘When A Rapist’s Logic is the Law ‘ (New York Magazine). But Upon Further Reading, one Particular Line Suddenly Put A Halt to Any Momimentary Feeling of Elation: “Women who are pregnant or recently gave birth are twic as likely to die by homicide Than Any Other Cause of Materal Mortality, Most Often at the Hands of an Intimate Partner.
UNFORTUNATELY, it remains up to the reader to read between the lines!
