“How come a man is raped?”

For several days the Indonesian people were shocked by the rape case committed by Reynhard Sinaga, an Indonesian student who took a doctoral program at the University of Leeds, England. He has raped or harassed 190 men from 2015-2017. The action was discovered after one of the victims reported his case to the British Police. Many questions such as “How come a man is raped?”.

Some people consider male rape victims to be strange or unusual to hear. There is no oddity in this case. Anyone can be a rape victim. Rape occurred because of the imbalance of power relations between the perpetrator and the victim. In the Reynhard Sinaga case, he raped a victim who was drunk or unconscious. This condition is then used by the offender to rape the victim because the offender feels he has control or can control the victim’s body. This is the root of rape.

Thus the rape argument occurs because the victim’s clothes or incident situation (eg returning late at night) is NOT TRUE. Rape is a crime that attacks human dignity and honor. Indonesia itself is facing an emergency situation of sexual violence where every 2 hours 3 women experience sexual violence. This is where the importance of ratifying the law on the elimination of sexual violence to protect all men and women as well as ensuring the rights of victims to obtain justice and comprehensive recovery.

Author: Linayanti
Editor: Mellysa Anastasya
Translator: Faye Simanjuntak