No Namers

The No Named Woman is a story that has the ability to relate to todays world. It is unfortunate to say that what happened to the aunt in the eyes of the mother; who concurs that the aunt must have been raped and impregnated, is relevant in society today. There are many instances in which women are raped but they do not have the ability to speak out and defend themselves. This story speaks loudly of the actions that were taken between men and women. It is scary to say the least. One of the worst quotes I ran into states, “No one talked sex, ever. And she might have separated the rapes from the rest of living if only she did not have to buy her oil from him or gather wood in the same forest” (Kingston, 7).  This really grabbed my attention in realizing that this type of action happens all around the world and even on our college campus. It has come to my attention that this story is relevant in today’s society.

            At the beginning of this story I thought there would be a different intro into why the aunt is having the baby and out of nowhere, bam, Kingston hits you with the possibility of rape. It is frightening to read what happens to the aunt and how she was treated even though it was not her fault in what the outcome was. What caught my attention in the earlier quote was how it the possibility of the rape scandal to be coming from a man that is active in her everyday life. Furthermore, she would not be able to mention anything due to the social stigma that would bring on both of them. To me this relates straight back to actions that happen on college campuses all around the country and world. Girls are sexually abused at a rate which is sickening, but, what is even worse is that the person doing the actions are everyday people that walk around the campus with that girl. Yet, these girls are afraid to come forth and tell people what happened because the social stigma would still follow that she was lesser of a human. I am not saying that rape victims are the less of a person because that is not what I am saying at all. I am saying that rape is a very touchy and uneasy topic that people aren’t familiar on how to react or go about consolidating or facing the fact that it happened to some one they know.

            I know this blog post isn’t as connected to the reading as it could have been but I wanted to take the time and point out that this story grabbed my attention in the way that the content is such a relevant topic in society. It was hard for me to read the rest of this story with a clear mind as to what happened to the aunt. Between the aunt in the story and people around campus, it is clear that rape is not dealt with lightly and that it is important to speak out unlike the aunt in the story. We do not live in China during the early 1900’s; there should not be a social stigma on being raped. It should be dealt with in the most professional way possible.