mohandasgandhi:

I strongly urge you to click the link above and read the entire article. There is no excerpt I can post that does the story justice because law enforcement’s refusal to investigate cases of rape is a problem across the country, and not a small one.

For instance, the article points out that an estimated 37% of reported incidents of rape in Washington D.C. aren’t investigated by police. In New Orleans, roughly 50% of reported rapes are “shelved as ‘non-criminal complaints.’” These aren’t isolated events either.

Not only is rape under-reported already, but police refusal to investigate reported rapes has lead to new trauma for victims, indicating to other and future victims that they shouldn’t report their attackers at all because their rapes won’t be fully respected by police as crimes against their persons.

There are 5 rapes for every murder that occurs in the United States and yet, we never talk about it, aside from rare acknowledgments of publicized extreme cases. This isn’t just something that happens in foreign countries like India. Authorities are ignoring the rapes that occur in our own neighborhoods. In light of recent events in India, for example, it’s easy to point our finger and demonize them as “uncivilized” and “underdeveloped” but the very same things are happening right here and we’re not doing a thing about it.