Rape is not a matter that can be joked about or trivialised

I REFER to the ongoing news articles on the case of the student who lodged a report that a classmate had threatened to rape her after she called out her teacher for making jokes about rape in a TikTok video. Since then, some have attempted to play down the issue with comments like “Female teenage students are a bit sensitive and emotional.”

But this is a matter of major concern. Why? Because a growing body of research has revealed that exposure to and tolerance of sexist humour fosters a social climate of discrimination against women (Woodzicka & Ford 2010, “Framework for thinking about the effects of sexist humour”, Europe’s Journal of Psychology 6(3), pp 174-195). In fact, men who were exposed to sexist jokes reported greater acceptance of rape myths and violence against women.