"Too Ugly to be Raped." Turning Rape into a Privilege.

In March 2015, a young man raped a 22-year old woman, his friend kept watch. The men were sentenced to three and five years prison in the first trial in 2016. The Court of Appeal in Ancona - consisting of three female judges - recently decided that the woman was too ugly to be raped. After all, the man had stated that he hadn't even been attracted to her, had saved her phone number under the name "Vikingo" which underlined the fact that her appearance was rather masculine. A victim's photograph was shown as evidence; the photograph the judges had drawn their conclusions from. The female judges called the victim "the clever Peruvian" who looked too masculine to be raped, who may have "organised" the whole evening and provoked the young man who possibly saw having sex with a masculine woman only as a sort of challenge. She was too ugly to be raped, her story was not credible.



The woman has left Italy and moved back to Peru (via). An "Italian problem"? According to estimations, 94% to 98% of rapists go free in the U.S. (via).

“The worst thing is the cultural message that came from three female judges who acquitted these two men because they decided that it was improbable that they would want to rape someone who looked masculine.”
Luisa Rizzitelli

People protested immediately, politician Valeria Valente called the decision an extremely dangerous one that would throw the country back many years, the language chosen by the judges would harm the victim and send out a wrong message to younger generations, a great many associations said it was a disgrace. The case will be reheard (via).

"She’s not my type. I would never rape her. I’m not a rapist, but if I were, I wouldn’t rape her because she doesn’t deserve it." Jair Bolsonaro, 38th President of Brazil

In 2014, shadow cabinet leader at East Hampshire District Council commented on Facebook that Serena Bowes, at the time a 21-year-old student who alleged she had been attacked in an Italian nightclub, was too ugly to be raped: "Not sure anyone would want to even think about it looking at her." (via). Female lawyers are groped in court and told that they are "too ugly to rape" (via). The list can be easily continued...

In a recent interview with New York radio station Power 105.1’s “The Breakfast Club”, Damon Wayans went on a misogynistic rant in defense of Bill Cosby. In his rant, Wayans said that many of Bill Cosby’s accusers were seeking money and exploitation of Cosby’s career. Wayans was relentless in his attempt to invalidate their claims of rape and sexual assault regardless of the fact that over 45 women have come forward with frighteningly similar accounts of their trauma. He even went on to say, “Some of them, really, is unrapeable. I look at them and go, ‘No, he don’t want that. Get outta here!’”
Ashleigh Shackelford

I was raped when I was 18 by a man who subsequently told me that I should feel grateful that anyone would want to touch me. “You should feel so lucky, you fat bitch,” he said. I never told anyone because why would anyone believe that a fat Black girl like me could be assaulted, when my own attacker made sure to mention that I was fortunate to even be considered for such violence. My attacker made sure to remind me that rape is a badge of honor that only worthy women can wear and that I was lucky to be chosen.(...)
Popular culture and media forms reinforce the standards of beauty to be whiteness, thinness, cisgender identity, heteronormative sexuality, and having an able body. Anyone else who does not fit within these identities has deviated from these unrealistic expectations and is subject to be seen as “ugly” and therefore unrapeable according to our society and folks like Damon Wayans. If the face of victimhood for sexual assault is a thin, white, cisgender, heterosexual woman, what does that mean for everyone else? What does that mean for transwomen? What does that mean for fat folks? What does that mean for gender nonconforming folks, men, and children? What does that mean for people of color? What does that mean for folks who identity as queer? What does that mean for people with disabilities? What does that mean for folks who identify with more than one of these identities?
Ashleigh Shackelford

Rape is not a flattering compliment, it is not a privilege. It is a crime. And the notion that women are raped because they are beautiful, stating that rape is just giving them positive feedback is a sick and sickening part of rape culture. Rape myths (e.g. rape is just another form of sex, all women secretly desire to be raped and enjoy it, women ask for it by the way they dress and behave, women could avoid rape if they really wanted to, etc.) "serve to objectify women, minimilize women's value as human beings, and personally and socially control women's sexuality". They "create a hostile environment for rape victims at individual and societal levels" which affects reactions of friends and family members but also of criminal justice professionals who may assign responsibility to victims (Suzuki 2014). Rape has been used as a weapon of war for centuries (e.g. during the three months of genocide, 100.000 to 200.000 women were raped in Rwanda) (via and via). Rape is used to control, to punish, to harm, and to kill women. It is no privilege. It is a crime.

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- Suzuki, Y. E. (2014). Rape: Theories. ResearchGate
- photographs by Charles H. Traub (1980s, Italy) via

"the time seems to have come for happy changes in conditions of women"

“Women’s problems have now for the first time in history to be studied internationally as such and to be given the social importance they ought to have. And it would be, in the opinion of this Sub-Commission of experts in this field, a tragedy to spoil this unique opportunity by confusing the wish and the facts. Some situations can be changed by laws, education, and public opinion, and the time seems to have come for happy changes in conditions of women all over the world (…).”
Bodil Begtrup (1946)



Begrop was the first Chairperson of the Sub-Commission dedicated to the Status of Women (which became the Commission on the Status of Women), established under the Commission on Human Rights.

Happy International Women's Day (with happy changes)!

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photograph via

Narrative images: The Last Day Women Walked the Streets of Tehran with Their Heads Uncovered

"This turned out to be the last day women walked the streets of Tehran uncovered. It was our first disappointment with the new post-revolution rulers of Iran."
Hengameh Golestan



On 8 March 1979, Iranian women protested against the new "Hijab Law" that had been introduced the day before. Women, from that day on, have been forced to wear scarves when leaving the house.



"Many people in Tehran went on strike and took to the streets. It was a huge demonstration with women – and men – from all professions there, students, doctors, lawyers. We were fighting for freedom: political and religious, but also individual."
Hengameh Golestan



photographs taken by Hengameh Golestan via and via and via

Tattoos, Beauty and Matriarchal Power

"Tattoos were a symbol of matriarchal power." 
Yumna Al-Arashi

“I remember the moment my Yemeni grandmother scorned my aunts and cousins for making fun of my tattoo. The room fell silent. She said that by insulting me, I was also insulting her mother, and all of the women who came before her. Soon after, she shared faded photographs of my great-grandmother, who was beautifully adorned with lines and geometric patterns all over her face. My grandmother told me, ‘There was a love of individuality that my mother took in pride. I thought it was lost, but now I see her in you.’”
Yumna Al-Arashi



Yumna Al-Arashi was inspired by the story of her late great-grandmother and started searching for and photographing the probably last generation of women with facial tattoos in North Africa. The main reasons why these tattoos are vanishing are the spread of Western ideals of beauty - what was one beautiful is seen as weird and backwards by younger generations - and Islam which prohibits permanent changes to the body (via). In Algeria, there is also the "French Myth" according to which tattoos protected Algerian women from French soldiers by making them unattractive in Western eyes (via).

"The custom, once prevalent throughout the Middle East and North Africa, dates back thousands of years. (...) In large part, the appeal is aesthetic. Young daughters admired their mothers’ tattoos and yearned to one day get their own, just as Western girls count down the days until they can apply lipstick like their mothers. The designs themselves held rich symbolism, communicating connectedness to the earth and the fruits it produced, as well as the cosmos that made it so. Certain images also carried spiritual powers, including the ability to protect oneself and one’s loved ones from evil spirits.(...)Women, for the most part, stopped tattooing their faces and bodies in the 1930s and 1940s. Some elderly women with tattoos have since opted to remove them because of the religious connotations. The ever-shrinking remaining generation of women bearing the traditional ink are now in their 70s and older." Priscilla Frank

“I wanted these tattoos for as long as I could remember I wanted them to show my beauty, to highlight it. Every beautiful woman had tattoos. They symbolize my power, my beauty, and my ability to connect to the Earth. It’s something I’m so proud of.”
A woman



Photograph above:
“I have the stars and the moon on my cheeks. They’re the most beautiful things my eyes have seen. I don’t know how to read or write and I don’t have any devices like you, but I know my land and my Earth, the stars and moon help me navigate it. That’s why I’m here.”
Brika, Tunisia



photographs via