Marital Rape

... Globally, the nature of marriage is changing and so are notions of individual choice, love, intimacy, and rigid gender roles. [This book] documents wide ranging and fluid understandings of sex, consent, and rape in marriage. Such an array of perspectives demands an international and interdisciplinary approach to the study of sex and gender-based violence ...

The phrase marital rape not only refers to rape but also indicates how a marriage, where the husband and wife are expected to live together for the rest of their lives and have complete faith in one another, violates one’s right to life and dignity. Our culture has been raging about how a wife should keep her husband happy to discourage him from looking for or engaging in other illicit relationships with women since the beginning. But if he does, our culture suddenly rises up to defend the husband’s actions. By criticizing women for failing to give males the caring, love, attention, mental, emotional, and particularly physical support they need. Among the most horrifying crimes is Marital rape a crime that is committed not only in India but across the entire world. Marital rape is not a lesser crime than rape or we can address it as a subtype of rape. Married women are in most of the cases the greatest victims of marital rape. One of the biggest threats to India’s gender justice system is posed by it. It is one of those societal illnesses that has been in India since ancient times and still has a negative impact on society. Indian society has never had a bad attitude about marital rape. It is rarely opposed by anyone in Indian society for a variety of reasons. The Indian legislative position is similar in this regard. In order to ensure the security, the Indian Constitution has given the Indian government the most arduous task of creating legislation. The security of the country’s overall prosperity in this context is given into the hands of the legislature which is however, is not particularly interested in ending marital rape which it very evident because they tend to delineate an extremely casual approach when it comes to marital rape. Although the Indian judiciary expresses some hope in this regard, it is limited by the fact that the legislature, not the court, is solely in charge of passing laws. There are no effective laws in India yet that will prevent marital rape. Whatever regulations exist in India, they are insufficient to stop a horrible crime like marital rape. India needs to enact some strict legislation to stop marital rape.

- The Cautionary Rule

Marital rape stands at the intersection of the socio-legal issues arising from both domestic violence and sexual assault. For centuries, women who suffered sexual assault perpetrated by their spouses had no legal recourse. A man's conjugal rights included his right to have sexual intercourse with his wife regardless of whether she consented. This right has been recognised in law, and still is in some jurisdictions today. This book emerges from the research undertaken by an innovative, multi-country, academic, collaborative project dedicated to comparatively analysing the legal treatment of sexual assault in intimate relationships, with a view to challenging the legal impunity for and inadequate legal responses to this form of gendered violence.

"This is a groundbreaking contribution to the literature of sexual assault and family violence." -- Susan Brownmiller "[Russell] has done a superb study which yields comprehensive and undeniable findings about a subject no one had even whispered about before... a classic work." -- Phyllis Chesler One out of seven American women who have ever been married has been raped by a husband or ex-husband. Written by the principal investigator for the National Institute of Mental Health study that discovered this shocking statistic, this book is a monumental, eye-opening work that dispels misinformation and illusions about a previously ignored aspect of family violence.

Examines the issue of sexual violence from various perspectives, including sociology, criminology, anthropology, public health, and women's studies. This collection analyzes social and institutional factors that contribute to their occurrence and provides strategies for prevention and change.

The criminal justice system is a key social institution pertinent to the lives of citizens everywhere. Fundamentals of Criminal Justice: A Sociological View, Second Edition provides a unique social context to explore and explain the nature, impact, and significance of the criminal justice system in everyday life. This introductory text examines important sociological issues including class, race, and gender inequality, social control, and organizational structure and function.