In Sharon Marcus’ article, she argues that rape needs to be understood as a language and the current popular language surrounding rape has been focused on women being the vulnerable objects of rape and legal definitions of rape. She points out that fear is one of the main factors that perpetuates rape, not the idea of men being stronger than women (Marcus, pg. 390). Women are told to fear men and to fear being raped. They are also told that there is nothing they can do outside of pressing charges after-the-fact to protect themselves, which is why we see so many accounts of women “freezing” in the face of an attack (Marcus, pg. 394). However, Marcus argues that these ideas only perpetuate rape culture because it continues to place women as inactive
