[blogathon] Restorative Justice for Sexual Assault

This is the eighth and last post in my SSA blogathon. It was requested by a reader. Don’t forget to donate!

[Content note: sexual assault]

Restorative justice is a word you sometimes hear in discussions about how to reform our criminal justice system. It refers to “an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of the victims and the offenders, as well as the involved community, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender.” As you can see, it would probably look quite different from the system we have now.

Someone asked me to write about what restorative justice might look like from the perspective of a rape survivor. To be clear, I am not a survivor of rape, although I am a survivor of sexual assault. In any case, I can only speak for myself.

But when I think about justice, this is what comes to mind.

I would want a perpetrator of sexual assault to have to learn about the roots of what they did. It’s not as simple is “Sexual assault is bad, don’t sexually assault people.” I would want them to understand rape culture. I would want them to understand all of the factors that might have contributed to their decision (because, yes, it was their decision) to sexually assault someone. I would want them to understand that their socialization has prepared them to become a person who sexually assaults people, but that this can be undone.

I would want the perpetrator to listen to the survivor talk about what they want through (if the survivor is comfortable). This doesn’t need to be a face-to-face conversation, of course, and I don’t think that many survivors would be willing for it to be. It could be an audio- or video-taped recording. It could even be a written account.

If prison is involved, I would want the prison to be humane. Regardless of whether or not we switch to a system of restorative justice, prison violence (including rape) must be addressed. This isn’t (just) because I’m concerned for the welfare of prisoners; it’s also because violent environments are much more likely to create violent individuals. For both selfish and altruistic reasons, I want perpetrators to serve their sentences feeling healthy and safe.

I would want the perpetrator to receive help with integrating back into their community afterwards–with finding a job, getting a place to live, and so on. Again, this is not because I think they “deserve” help. This is not about what they do and do not deserve. This is about what will make them the least likely to offend again.

But enough about the perpetrator. What about the survivor?

I think it goes without saying that in a system of restorative justice, there will be no victim blaming. The past “behavior” of a victim should have no bearing on the outcome of a trial. Not even if they had been sexually “promiscuous” (whatever that even means) in the past. Not even if they are a sex worker. Not even if they have committed crimes. Not even if they are an undocumented immigrant. Nothing makes someone deserving of sexual assault, and nothing makes it not worthwhile to pursue justice following an assault.

In a system of restorative justice, a survivor should not have to pursue any legal action that they don’t want to pursue. If a survivor doesn’t want to testify, they shouldn’t have to. That’s what it would mean to prioritize the needs of the survivor over our desire to punish the perpetrator.

Hopefully, in a system that focuses on reforming the perpetrator rather than punishing them, community members would be much less likely to blame the survivor for “ruining” the perpetrator’s life–which, tragically, often happens now when survivors of sexual assault speak out. But in any case, a system of restorative justice would also help community members support and affirm the survivor. Friends and family of the survivor would learn–both directly from the survivor and in general–what sorts of challenges survivors of sexual assault may face in dealing with the aftermath of their trauma. Rather than blaming the survivor for their feelings and expecting them to “get over it,” community members would learn how to help them cope.

Of course, this is all probably incredibly naive and the cultural shifts it would require are immense. But that’s a bit of what it would look like for this survivor of sexual assault.

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That’s the end of my SSA Blogathon. If you haven’t yet, please donate to the SSA. Thank you for reading!

[blogathon] Restorative Justice for Sexual Assault
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