It happens to men, too

Contrary to popular belief, women are not the only victims of sexual assault, and men are not the only predators. In some cases, the roles can be reversed.

According to one male victim of rape who requested to remain anonymous, he had consumed a very large amount of alcohol at a small party at his apartment. His girlfriend had already left for the evening. Another girl at the party had gone into his room and yelled to him from the living room if the room was his. When he had entered, the girl closed the door and proceeded to rape him.

"I was almost unconscious," he said. "I was holding myself up, but I couldn't move and I couldn't say anything. I think I knew I was in a bad situation, but I didn't know what was happening."

A few moments later, he realized what was happening and panicked. "I didn't want to have sex with that girl. It had happened so fast. I got up, put my pants on, and left the room." He sat outside on the steps with his friend and talked about what had happened. He made the decision to tell his girlfriend that he had cheated on her.

"He blamed himself for a long time," his girlfriend said. "When I started inquiring about the details, it seemed more and more like it wasn't his fault. So one day I asked him if he thought he might have been raped. 'I had thought of that before', he said. But he had never said anything about it."

Awareness of male rape seems to be growing on college campuses. A survey was conducted by interviewing people at random at James Madison University and Eastern Mennonite University to see what they thought of the issue.

When one girl was asked if she thought men could be raped by women, she said, "Definitely. I have some friends who are in One in Four. It's an organization on campus, and it's all guys that do presentations on the issue of rape and educating males that it can happen to them."

"I think a guy would enjoy being raped," one guy responded to the question. "I mean, no guy would say he was raped. Maybe it does happen and nobody really talks about it, but I think that a guy would like it."

"Lots of people think that men want sex more than anything, which isn't always true," the rape victim said. "But women are the same way. Some want sex more than anything as well."

Some are accustomed to the traditional way that society thinks, that men want sex all the time. "If a guy enjoys being raped, then it is not a rape," Iris Campbell, an EMU student, said. "It then crosses the line to consensual sex."

Others were more open to the idea that men could be victims of acquaintance rape or date rape, which is being raped by someone you know and in many cases involves alcohol, than the idea of men being victims of a rape by a woman.

However, sometimes acquaintance rape can be very vague, because if the victim is intoxicated he or she may not remember exactly what happened and therefore blame themselves.

While some efforts are being made to make people more aware of the issue of male rape, there is still a long ways to go. For those who do feel victimized, there should always be some place or someone to which to turn.

"You could look at it as an advance in feminism," the victim's girlfriend said. "Girls can rape too. Talk about equality," she said sarcastically.