At least one in six women will be raped over the course of their lives; actually the numbers I see are usually significantly higher than this (rape statistics suffer due to extreme under-reporting).
That only holds if the fact that rapes are under-reported was not used in calculating the estimate that one in six women will be raped. The site you linked to gives no reason to think that’s the case, it’s pretty likely that less than one in six women reports a rape, and then estimates of reporting rate were used to get an estimate of one in six.
(Edit to add) That is, if the “1 in 6” is an actual estimate of rapes; the Eric Raymond piece Eugine Nier linked seems to indicate that there never was such an estimate, the 1 in 6 number originally also included attempted rape, and then turned into a number of actual rapes by a game of Chinese whispers.
Actually, most of the numbers I’ve seen in my researches are in the ballpark of one third to one half, with about one quarter of women being raped before they turn 18. The site I linked to was simply the first that came up in a Google search, so I wouldn’t have to dig for references, and so that I could give an estimate on the conservative side.
It’s true that such statistics are methodology-sensitive, but everything I know about rape seems to suggest that the weight is heavily toward under-reporting. Women who report being raped are liable to face an onslaught of abuse and victim-blaming from the criminal system and even from their own peers, and rape trials rarely end in conviction, so a lot of victims never bother. Even then, many rape victims suffer from psychological problems (which contribute to their being targeted), and therefore come to believe that they deserved what happened to them, no matter how degrading or violent. In this case they may not conceive of it as rape, especially if the rapist is their partner or spouse.
Even if the actual measurement is 1 in 6 rapes-AND-attempted-rapes, that’s still horrible, and still connotes chronic psychological trauma to an entire category of human being.
That only holds if the fact that rapes are under-reported was not used in calculating the estimate that one in six women will be raped. The site you linked to gives no reason to think that’s the case, it’s pretty likely that less than one in six women reports a rape, and then estimates of reporting rate were used to get an estimate of one in six.
(Edit to add) That is, if the “1 in 6” is an actual estimate of rapes; the Eric Raymond piece Eugine Nier linked seems to indicate that there never was such an estimate, the 1 in 6 number originally also included attempted rape, and then turned into a number of actual rapes by a game of Chinese whispers.
Actually, most of the numbers I’ve seen in my researches are in the ballpark of one third to one half, with about one quarter of women being raped before they turn 18. The site I linked to was simply the first that came up in a Google search, so I wouldn’t have to dig for references, and so that I could give an estimate on the conservative side.
It’s true that such statistics are methodology-sensitive, but everything I know about rape seems to suggest that the weight is heavily toward under-reporting. Women who report being raped are liable to face an onslaught of abuse and victim-blaming from the criminal system and even from their own peers, and rape trials rarely end in conviction, so a lot of victims never bother. Even then, many rape victims suffer from psychological problems (which contribute to their being targeted), and therefore come to believe that they deserved what happened to them, no matter how degrading or violent. In this case they may not conceive of it as rape, especially if the rapist is their partner or spouse.
Even if the actual measurement is 1 in 6 rapes-AND-attempted-rapes, that’s still horrible, and still connotes chronic psychological trauma to an entire category of human being.