Scourge of baby rape has no race

APRETORIA University philosophy lecturer has resigned after a blog she wrote was exposed as racist.

She wrote: “Naturally it is much easier to endlessly complain about Calvinism than to ask the question why the rape of babies is a cultural phenomenon among black ethnic groups.”

This is blatantly incorrect because it suggests that black culture — whatever that is — not only condones the rape of babies, but upholds it as a standard cultural practice. This prejudice prevents us from fully and constructively exploring the reasons behind this vicious crime.

Even if it can be argued that the majority of perpetrators are black males, it still does not make the rape of babies and children a recognised and endorsed cultural norm among black ethnic groups.

The rape of any person is appalling to all decent people, black and white. I can confidently say that black elders tell stories of how “this did not happen in my time”.

I once asked my 86-year-old grandmother why the community of Orlando East did not seem to be outraged when a young woman was raped. She paused for a long moment, battling to come up with an answer.

She then related how, as a young woman taking the daily arduous walk from the train station to her home, she deliberately stayed close to the males in the streets. There were criminals around and she had to be vigilant, but generally it was not the instinct of men to harm her. I pressed her: So why the rampant rape and complacency?

When rape occurred, she said, they were all in a stupor. They had not faced anything like this before. It was alien to their way of life and so they did not know how to deal decisively with it. Invariably, the perpetrators got away.

My domestic worker who lives in Orange Farm, where most people are unemployed and have no decent housing, is emphatic that known rapists do not get away with it in that community, especially those who rape children. I assumed she would tell me that the police are efficient in investigating rape cases. But she said men and women there had their own means of rooting out rapists and carrying out their own punishment so that the perpetrator never rapes anyone again. She did not elaborate; I caught her drift.

As much as the community was breaking the law by resorting to ghastly acts of vigilantism, they were communicating a strong aversion to this crime that was foreign to their culture.

Knee-jerk responses are not going to take us out of this morass or give us a better understanding

This year, Steven Smith was executed in the US for raping and killing his girlfriend’s sixmonth-old daughter. Also in the US, Anthony Dean Blackwell was arrested in July for raping a baby in his care and leaving her hospitalised. These rapists are not black. Locating rape in cultural and racial praxis normalises an inhumane, brutal act. Knee-jerk responses are not going to take us out of this morass or give us a better understanding of why rape is rampant in our society.

We must admit, though, that we have unacceptably high levels of rape and that the rape of babies does not get us out of our comfort zones. There is no culture that endorses this. Even if the profile of the perpetrator references a particular group, it does not mean the culture from which the perpetrator comes endorses this horrific crime.

We must ask who are the rapists? Where do they come from? Why do they unleash their rage and control on the vulnerable?

The answer is far more complex than “it is their culture”.