Vanguard (a documentary series) recently did an episode on sexual abuse in Native American communities, with a focus on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. According to the filmmakers, Native Americans make up only 9% of the state's population, but account for 40% of its sexual assault cases. One in three Native American women will be raped in her lifetime.
(Click here to watch the full episode - "Rape on the Reservation" - on Hulu.)
Here's a transcript of the conversations between the reporter and several high school students in Rosebud:
Male Student: My dad broke his woman's jaw before within just two seconds, he just reached sideways, just a quick snap, and she was done. And uh, she didn't even go to the cops. She was scared. But um, seeing that I guess made me realize on... how I can have control over my house. You know, the rough way. The man way, I guess. That's the way my dad put it. Be a man. Hit somebody.
Reporter: Do you see any problem in hitting, beating women?
Male Student: I don't wanna say it's OK, but if you're gonna have dominant power in your relationship, then yeah.
Reporter: And how do you guys feel when you hear that?
Female Student: Well I don't think it's okay, but like, no one can stop them.
According to NOW:
When we consider race, we see that African-American women face higher rates of domestic violence than white women, and American-Indian women are victimized at a rate more than double that of women of other races.
The Vanguard episode addresses some of the barriers that Native American women face when trying to seek justice after their assault: victim-blaming, stigma, racism, and fear of retribution from the perpetrator's family being just a few.
Male Student: Say uh, if I had raped somebody and then she wanted to go forward and press charges on me, and I got tossed in jail. See, my brother gets pissed off and goes knocking on her door - he's gonna hit her. Damn right, she gets hit. And then say he goes to jail for hitting her, well I've got another brother. And after that brother, I've got another friend. After that friend, he's got an older brother.
