Community Perspective on Marital Rape & Consent in Intimate Relationships: Maitri Findings

Introduction

On April 25, 2023 Commemorating National Crime Victims’ Rights awareness week (April 23 to April 29 ) hosted by the US Department of Justice, Maitri presented its findings on South Asian community’s perspectives on Marital rape and consent in intimate relationships. The findings were the culmination of a two-year long process engaging with experts, policy specialist, advocates, survivors and other community members. Maitri offered multiple avenues for individuals to share their opinions. We conducted separate Listening sessions for male and female community members, for survivors and for advocates. In addition, the listening sessions, we also to participate in a anonymous survey to share their thoughts on these issues. Whereas the reach of Maitri’s call to participate in listening sessions reached more than 10,000 members in the community with majority being of South Asian descent, only 50 to 55 people actively participated in the process. Especially disappointing was the lack of involvement from male community members. We were also not able to facilitate multilingual conversations on this topic and the focus was solely on English speaking members of the community.

The findings thus are not reflective of general community feelings and can be seen as a mere snapshot or observance of ripples on the surface of a much deeper issue. This brief report captures our learnings and few specific action items to engage community in the future.

Purpose of the Listening Sessions on Marital Rape

Marital rape has been a crime in all 50 States in the US since 1993. The current California criminal code makes no distinction between rape by a stranger and an intimate partner or spouse. The non-consensual sexual relations within a marriage are subject to the same penalty and consequences resulting in registration in the sex offenders’ list among others. As an agency primarily serving immigrant survivors from South Asia, it has posed and continues to pose a unique challenge for Maitri in communicating with survivors and delivering a message of no tolerance to sexual violence within a marriage. In all the South Asian countries with the exception of Nepal, impunity for rape within marriage treats women as the property of their husbands and takes away their agency over their own body.

As client advocates at Maitri, we have heard several survivors talk about this but with little recourse to any form of redress. At the same time, many survivors are unwilling to report this since they do not see it as ‘rape’ – the age-old belief system that it is a wife’s duty to cater to her husband’s needs and that she cannot say No to her husband is still prevalent in our society. How can we, as advocates, address this cultural conditioning, belief system and yet be trauma-informed and sensitive to our survivors? How do we bring up this conversation with both our survivors and our community? These are the questions that we were trying to find answers to and our hope was that the listening sessions will give us the framework to develop strategies to deal with this highly sensitive topic. To this end, we decided on conducting a series of listening sessions and enable community to take part anonymously through a survey. We began this work in November 2022 which has culminated in the release of this report in April 2023.

The Listening Sessions and Survey questions revolved around three major themes. Below are major trends in the answers and few comments that stood out from participants.

Responses to criminalizing Marital rape and prescribed punishment:

Most respondents support accountability and yet wary about punishment as prescribed
Differing opinions on what constitutes Marital Rape
Many respondents mentioned culture as a factor behind sex as a right after marriage
Few respondents mention lack of education on what consent means in a marriage leading to rape
Few people mention lack of understanding of marital relationships

Comments:

“When sex within marriage is forced, and the agency and feelings of one partner is taken away or diminished, it is rape”
“Punishment has never reduced crime rate; Justice should be restorative”
“I feel it would be hard to prove rape within marriage; and it could easily be deemed as a "he said, she said" situation”
“There may be room for 2nd thoughts on how to punish the individual based on victim's request as the outcomes may be further harmful for victims”
“The criminal justice system is not consistent… (in relation to race, economic status etc)”

Personal experiences learning about consent in intimate relationship

Overwhelming majority of respondents never had formal education on sex or consent in intimate relationships
Most learnt through friends, media outlets and personal experience
Sex education involved learning biology and menstruation cycles for girls.
Most respondents have had conversation with their intimate partners about consent

Comments:

“Consent is an emotional factor- there is no yes or no. If the partner is lacking emotional content, then feelings of intimacy will not arise. Mere physical expressions of intimacy can end up feeling violent or lacking consent”
“In my opinion, a clear "no" is necessary to establish non-consent, whether it is communicated verbally or non-verbally”
“There should be a counselor system right BEFORE and AFTER the marriage to talk about healthy relationships, what is acceptable and unacceptable norms etc”

Suggestions on how to create awareness in the community:

Most respondents suggested prevention at early stages; schools, colleges and other educational facilities
Many respondents suggested creating positive media campaigns and calling out harmful influences (ex: Bollywood)
Many respondents suggested spaces for women to share their experiences and learning from each other
Few mentioned community and religious leaders discussing topics like marital rape and healthy relationships in open forums

Comments:

“Men need to get involved in the discussion”
“It's important to acknowledge that discussing the illegality of the issue in 50 states may not be relevant to South Asian countries where it is not considered illegal. This could potentially be a sensitive point for those who disagree with the standards back home, leading to reluctance to discuss the issue openly”
“Redefine marriage as a social contract where the parties will respect each others individuality and freedom, that both partners are equal in status and that both will be loyal to each other”
“There's too much intervention of legal into personal relationships. How does one cultivate responsibility and rights?”

Recommendations from the Listening sessions:
We heard the small and mighty group within the community loud and clear! There is a need for shared spaces, open communications, difficult conversations to build prevention strategies addressing domestic abuse including marital rape.
There is also a need to bridge the gap between immigrant experiences and realities in the Bay area. We will take your insight and share with policy makers and thought leaders so laws are well informed of every member of the community.
This is just the beginning; we look forward to more such conversations in one-on-one settings.

Our Task Ahead:

From this snapshot we received valuable input and ideas to explore in engaging with the community. However, it is clear to us that we were not able to reach out to the group that stands to benefit from this conversation the most; South Asian men. We also had limited reach within the LEP community and non-Indian communities as we solely focused on virtual communications. The learning from this project will provide a path for us to move ahead with this much needed discussion within the entire South Asian diaspora.

If you are interested to host a confidential listening session or discussion on “Marital rape and Consent in Intimate relationships” please connect with us - maitri@maitri.org