Feminists in the U.S. coined the term rape culture in the 1970s to describe a society where sexual violence is normalized and victims are blamed for sexual harassment and assault. Rape culture emphasizes “don’t get raped” instead of “don’t rape.”7 Emilie Buchwald, Pamela Fletcher, and Martha Roth, editors of Transforming a Rape Culture, describe rape culture as: a complex system of beliefs that encourages male aggression and supports violence against women. It is a society where violence is seen as sexy and sexuality as violent. In rape culture, women perceive a continuum of threatened
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