The first iteration of this post was going to talk about Netflix and its quick shutdown of House of Cards after its lead actor Kevin Spacey became the target of sexual misconduct allegations. Many of us know how hard it is to have big companies take allegations like these seriously and I am particularly familiar with it—my anti-rape activism focused on urging colleges to hold sexual predators on their campuses accountable.
I was initially stunned yet heartened by Netflix's decision to pull the plug on the show. However, as time passed, the encouragement I felt from seeing the company’s action waned. While I am glad they quickly and publicly denounced Spacey and set up resources for other potential victims, I’ve seen an increasing number of claims from numerous people in various circles stating Spacey’s predatory behavior was a well-known “secret”—and Netflix, his agent, and publicist knew but didn’t do anything about it until now.
And I believe it.
It’s easy to believe that for men like Spacey, Harvey Weinstein, Woody Allen, Louis C.K., R. Kelly, Bill Cosby (and the list goes on and on …), people decide their talent, prestige, and power makes collaboration “worth it” in spite of sexual misconduct allegations. And there are usually positive results: an actress maybe won an Oscar, a show may win multiple Academy Awards, and a new talented person’s career is launched. However, there’s a much more sinister cost to aligning with these predators: more victims are left in their wake.
Is it really worth it?
Abusers want you to think that they’re invaluable. They do their best to convince the rest of us non-rapists that somehow their existence is necessary to achieve great things. The sooner that we as a society believe that we can win awards, release great movies, and launch promising careers without assailants, we’ll see a sharp decline in having leaders and idols with a history of sexual violence.
Rape culture likes to pretend that sexual assault is normal. It’s easy to assume that’s the case considering the high rates of sexual victimization we see in every sector of society. The thing is sexual assault is common, but assailants are not.
Take campus sexual assault, for example. Students consistently show that about 20 percent of college women and 6 percent of college men are sexually assaulted. Data for trans individuals is scarce, but reports consistently show they experience sexual assault at higher rates than cisgender individuals. Yet research shows that a tiny minority of the student body is responsible for these high rates of trauma and violence. A 2002 study found about 6 percent of college men interviewed committed or attempted sexual assault. Another study from 2004 found 9 percent of college men admitting to the same.
It's clear that assailants are in the small minority. They can't thrive without community support—whether it's through active enabling or not taking action at all. So why is it that we have 90 percent of people bending over backward to accommodate and empower them by minimizing assault, blaming victims, and repeatedly employing sexual predators? It doesn’t have to be this way.
Predators keep harming because we allow them to. It’s time for us to stop asking “what can we do?” in response to survivors’ stories. It’s time to stop pretending that this is just on the shoulders of victims to bear. It take a village to protect an assailant—and that same village can destroy him. We, collectively, have the power to end sexual violence. The answer is clear: Stop protecting sexual predators.