scholarly journals Credibility Excess and the Social Imaginary in Cases of Sexual Assault

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Audrey S Yap
Keyword(s):  
Complex System ◽  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Epistemic Injustice ◽  
Victim Blaming ◽  
Social Imaginary ◽  
The Social ◽  
Testimonial Injustice ◽  
Miranda Fricker

This paper will connect literature on epistemic injustice with literature on victims and perpetrators, to argue that in addition to considering the credibility deficit suffered by many victims, we should also consider the credibility excess accorded to many perpetrators. Epistemic injustice, as discussed by Miranda Fricker, considers ways in which someone might be wronged in their capacity as a knower. Testimonial injustice occurs when there is a credibility deficit as a result of identity-prejudicial stereotypes. However, criticisms of Fricker have pointed out that credibility is part of a more complex system that includes both deficits and excesses. I will use these points to argue that we should look closer at sources of credibility excess in cases of sexual assault. This means that in addition to considering sources of victim blaming by looking at ways in which “ideal” victims are constructed, we also need to consider ways in which “ideal” perpetrators are constructed.

Are Survivors of Sexual Assault Blamed More Than Victims of Other Crimes?

2021 ◽  
pp. 088626052110374
Author(s):  
Catherine M. Reich ◽  
Grace A. Pegel ◽  
Alixandra B. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Causal Attribution ◽  
Trauma Survivors ◽  
Physical Assault ◽  
Victim Blaming ◽  
Sexual Assault Survivors ◽  
Social Reactions ◽  
The Social ◽  
Trauma Informed

Although victim blaming in the context of sexual assault is often emphasized, little research has compared rates of victim blaming following sexual assault relative to other forms of victimization. This research investigated whether there is a crime-specific bias toward blaming victims of sexual assault. Victim blaming was assessed via different methods from the observer perspective in vignette-based studies, as well as survivors’ accounts of social reactions they received. In Study 1, participants were asked to rate how much the survivor was to blame in three vignettes, each with a different randomized crime outcome: rape, physical assault, or theft. Study 2 assessed blame for a vignette that either ended in rape or theft, via a causal attribution statement. Study 3 asked interpersonal trauma survivors who had experienced at least two forms of victimization (i.e., sexual assault, physical assault, or theft) to report the social reactions they received following disclosure of each of these crimes. Across all three studies, victim blaming occurred following multiple forms of victimization and there was no evidence of a particular bias toward blaming survivors of sexual assault more so than other crimes. However, results of Study 3 highlight that, following sexual assault, survivors receive more silencing and stigmatizing reactions than they experienced after other crimes. Interpersonal traumas (i.e., sexual or physical assault) also resulted in more egocentric responses compared to theft. Altogether, there does not appear to be a crime-specific bias for victim blaming; however, crime-specific bias is apparent for some other, potentially understudied, social reactions. Implications of these findings highlight the value of victim blaming education and prevention efforts through trauma-informed services and outreach following victimization. Furthermore, service providers and advocates might especially seek to recognize and prevent silencing and stigmatizing reactions following sexual assault disclosures.

LEARNING TO LISTEN: EPISTEMIC INJUSTICE AND THE CHILD

Episteme ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 359-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael D. Burroughs ◽  
Deborah Tollefsen
Keyword(s):  
Epistemic Injustice ◽  
Race And Class ◽  
Testimonial Injustice ◽  
Detrimental Impact ◽  
Miranda Fricker ◽  
Learning To Listen

AbstractInEpistemic InjusticeMiranda Fricker argues that there is a distinctively epistemic type of injustice in which someone is wronged specifically in his or her capacity as a knower. Fricker's examples of identity-prejudicial credibility deficit primarily involve gender, race, and class, in which individuals are given less credibility due to prejudicial stereotypes. We argue that children, as a class, are also subject to testimonial injustice and receive less epistemic credibility than they deserve. To illustrate the prevalence of testimonial injustice against children we document examples of negative prejudicial treatment in forensic contexts where children frequently act as testifiers. These examples, along with research on the child's competence and reliability as a testifier, reveal widespread epistemic prejudice against children. Given that subjection to prejudice can have a detrimental impact on children we discuss ways to ameliorate this form of testimonial injustice. We argue that, both in formal and natural contexts, the child's testimony should be evaluated alongside the relationships that support (or fail to support) her development as a testifier. The adult can play a central role in creating successful testimonial interactions with children by acting as a “responsible hearer.”

Exonerating Men

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Manne
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Oklahoma City ◽  
Epistemic Injustice ◽  
Criminal Records ◽  
Female Victims ◽  
Male Perpetrators ◽  
The Social ◽  
Miranda Fricker

The flipside of misogyny’s punishment of women is exonerating the privileged men who engage in misogyny. This chapter canvasses this phenomenon, along with the flow of sympathy up the social hierarchy, away from the female victims of misogyny toward its (again, privileged) male perpetrators. This is dubbed “himpathy.” These phenomena are connected to epistemic injustice and epistemic oppression, theorized by Miranda Fricker and Kristie Dotson, among others. As a contrast with the much-discussed Isla Vista killings, the chapter considers the far less publicized case of the serial rapist police officer in Oklahoma City, who preyed on black women who had criminal records, in the belief that these women would have no legal recourse. This is an instance of systemic “misogynoir”—Moya Bailey’s term for the distinctive, in some ways sui generis form of misogyny to which black women in the United States are subject, given misogyny’s interaction with racism and white supremacy.

Personological Orientation and Victim-Blaming Attributions in Sexual Assault Occurrences

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Coppolillo ◽  
Ed De St. Aubin ◽  
Eric Vandevoorde
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Victim Blaming

Body and Gender within the Stratifications of the Social Imaginary

Hypatia ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 102-118
Author(s):  
Alice Pechriggl
Keyword(s):  
Social Imaginary ◽  
The Social ◽  
And Gender

Qeirat Values and Victim Blaming in Iran: The Mediating Effect of Culture-Specific Gender Roles

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maryam Falahatpishe Baboli ◽  
Farzan Karimi-Malekabadi
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Gender Roles ◽  
Community Sample ◽  
Romantic Partners ◽  
Mediating Effect ◽  
Moral Foundations ◽  
Victim Blaming ◽  
Dress Code ◽  
Highly Correlated ◽  
Iranian Context

Sexual assaults are a social problem in Iran; however, psychological factors that predict perceptions of sexual assault remain largely unexamined. Here, we examine the relationship between moral concerns, culture-specific gender roles and victim blaming in sexual assault scenarios in Iranian culture. Relying on Moral Foundations Theory and recent theoretical developments in moral psychology in Iranian context, we examined the correlations between five moral foundations (Care, Fairness, Loyalty, Authority, Purity), a culture-specific set of values called Qeirat (which includes guarding and (over)protectiveness of female kin, romantic partners, broader family, and country), and victim blaming. In a community sample of Iranians (N = 411), we found Qeirat values to be highly correlated with victim blaming, and that this link was mediated by a number of culture-specific proscriptions about women’s roles and dress code (i.e., Haya). In a regression analysis with all moral foundations, Qeirat values, Haya, and religiosity as predictors of victim blaming, only Haya, religiosity, high Authority values, and low Care values were found to predict how strongly Iranian participants blamed victims of sexual assault scenarios.

Commentary

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peggy J. Miller ◽  
Grace E. Cho
Keyword(s):  
Self Esteem ◽  
Social Imaginary ◽  
Active Engagement ◽  
Socioeconomic Conditions ◽  
Personal Meanings ◽  
Self Evaluation ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Past Experiences

Chapter 12, “Commentary: Personalization,” discusses the process of personalization, based on the portraits presented in Chapters 8–11. Personalization is not just a matter of individual variation; it is a form of active engagement through which individuals endow imaginaries with personal meanings and refract the imaginary through their own experiences. The portraits illustrate how the social imaginary of childrearing and self-esteem entered into dialogue with the complex realities of people’s lives. Parents’ ability to implement their childrearing goals was constrained and enabled by their past experiences and by socioeconomic conditions. The individual children were developing different strategies of self-evaluation, different expectations about how affirming the world would be, and different self-defining interests, and their self-making varied, depending on the situation. Some children received diagnoses of low self-esteem as early as preschool.

Child-Affirming Artifacts

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peggy J. Miller ◽  
Grace E. Cho
Keyword(s):  
Self Esteem ◽  
Consumer Products ◽  
Social Imaginary ◽  
Children's Books ◽  
The Social ◽  
Children’S Homes ◽  
Tv Shows ◽  
Vygotskian Theory ◽  
Electronic Games ◽  
Inherent Worth

Chapter 7, “Child-Affirming Artifacts,” uses ideas from Vygotskian theory to describe the child-affirming artifacts that populated children’s homes. Some artifacts were widely distributed consumer products. Children interacted with toys and electronic games that dispensed praise. Children’s books and TV shows, marketed as promoting children’s self-esteem, featured characters who were celebrated for their achievements, individuality, inherent worth, and potential. Several children loved Blue’s Clues, a show whose star constantly praised its characters and audience. These consumer products instantiated the same self-enhancing practices that parents believed fostered children’s self-esteem, thereby amplifying the social imaginary. This chapter also describes personalized, handmade artifacts designed by the families to celebrate their children. Photos of the children and artwork by children were on display in every household, and some adults created original homages to their children, which prompted commentary and stories that extolled the children’s achievements and reminded them how much they were loved and cherished.

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