{"id":1259,"date":"2019-12-13T14:23:00","date_gmt":"2019-12-13T19:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/?p=1259"},"modified":"2019-12-13T14:23:00","modified_gmt":"2019-12-13T19:23:00","slug":"rape-joke-by-patricia-lockwood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/engl113-f18\/flagler\/rape-joke-by-patricia-lockwood\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cRape Joke\u201d by Patricia Lockwood"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cRape Joke\u201d by Patricia Lockwood<\/p>\n

The Second Wave changed the discussion and legal view of rape significantly. However, antirape activists have yet to win the war. The rape epidemic continues, so poetry is once again used to confront it, as exemplified by Patricia Lockwood\u2019s \u201cRape Joke.\u201d Teenagers, however, are beginning to employ this classic method of evoking empathy to combat sexual violence through poetry with a twist. Hence, the genesis of Pain Memes.<\/p>\n

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Painting of Patricia Lockwood<\/p><\/div>\n

Patricia Lockwood\u2019s \u201cRape Joke\u201d is a modern poem about a rape incident, that addresses the same issues about rape as presented in Adrienne Rich\u2019s \u201cRape,\u201d Sylvia Plath\u2019s \u201cThe Jailor\u201d and June Jordan\u2019s \u201cCase in Point,\u201d for even though the Second Wave changed the legal landscape, rape itself has not changed. A similar element Rich\u2019s \u201cRape\u201d poem is \u201cthe rape joke said you were the one who was drunk, and the rape joke said you remembered wrong, which made you laugh out loud for one split-open second\u201d (Lockwood 5). Lockwood utilizes anaphora, repeating \u201cthe rape joke said you\u201c to emphasize the rape joke\u2019s shifting of the blame. Such is the case Rich makes in the question \u201cwill you swallow, will you deny them, will you lie your way home\u201d (Rich, line 30). The woman knows the truth even if the whole world forces them to lie. Rape has not changed. Lockwood\u2019s \u201cRape Joke\u201d connects to as well to Plath\u2019s \u201cThe Jailor\u201d in the line \u201cthe rape joke is he wants almost murdered a dude by throwing him through a plate glass window\u201d (Lockwood 2). \u201cMurdered\u201d is a strong, grotesque word. \u201cDude\u201d is a layman\u2019s term that belittles the event. This demonstration of violent, raw power cast aside through casual wording was a crucial element in \u201cthe Jailor\u201d as well, for in both poems the rape victim futilely wishes to their situations were less grim. Rape has not changed. The \u201cRape Joke\u201d and \u201cThe Jailor\u201d end similarly as well. Lockwood wrote on the last page of the \u201cRape Joke\u201d \u201cSo, you did dream of killing the rape joke for years, spilling all of its blood out, and telling it that way. The rape joke cries out for the right to be told\u201d (Lockwood 6). The girl in the \u201cRape Joke\u201d dreams \u201cof killing the rape joke\u201d just as the captive wife in \u201cThe Jailor,\u201d wishes her husband \u201cdead or away\u201d (Plath, line 38). Both women fantasize about killing their demon but neither one can. Rape has not changed. The \u201cRape Joke\u201d shares an element of Jordan\u2019s \u201cCase in Point\u201d too in the line \u201cthe rape joke is that he was your boyfriend\u201d (Lockwood 1). The reader stumbles upon the devastating realization that the man who raped the narrator of the \u201crape joke\u201d was a man who she had trusted: her \u201cboyfriend.\u201d A betrayal like this happens to the narrator of \u201cCase in Point\u201d for her perpetrator was the \u201chead of the local NAACP\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"(Jordan, lines 14). Rape is always a form of betrayal. Rape has not changed. Like in \u201cCase in Point\u201d the \u201cRape Joke\u201d tells the story of the silence that falls upon the raped woman in the line \u201cthe mattress felt a specific way, and your mouth felt a specific way opened against it, as if you were speaking, but you know you were not. As if your mouth were open 10 years into the future, reciting a poem called Rape Joke\u201d (Lockwood 4). The narrator repeats \u201cfelt a specific way,\u201d as she replays that moment in her mind. She relives the experience so acutely that she can find no other words to accurately<\/p>\n

describe it, yet she describes the silence perfectly. The victim\u2019s silence in that moment gave her a voice in the future. That is the silence Jordan states is \u201cpeculiar to the female\u201d (Jordan, lines 26-7)\u00a0 in her poem \u201cCase in Point.\u201d The silence when a girl is raped and her silence that follows her rape is what halts the outcry against the crime committed against her. One thing has changed. Through Pain Memes, these girls are starting to find their voice.<\/p>\n

Teenagers on YouTube, both young girls and young boys, are beginning to use Richard Dawkins\u2019s \u201cMeme Theory\u201d as their modern vessel to carry their uproar against the rape epidemic. Meme Theory is Richard Dawkins\u2019 principle that certain ideas have the ability to spread though cultures like wildfire if the presentation of the idea and the idea is ideal for such the conditions of the time. Teenagers have found the ideal \u201cmeme\u201d for transmitting their stories about rape: Pain Memes. According to Kaitlynn Mendes, the author of \u201cDigitized Narratives of Rape: Disclosing Sexual Violence Through Pain Memes,\u201d Pain Memes are \u201ca means of storytelling in which a script is written as a short passage, conveying painful personal experiences through the visceral means of hand-crafted signs.\u201d This multimedia storytelling device is as elegant as it is simple. In each video, words, written in informal text, appear on a screen either digitally or on flashcards. Music plays and no words are spoken as the words appear and disappear. Using this platform, rape victims make their stories known to their audience both conceptually and emotionally. The personal touch of different forts and languages, the alluring ambient music, the silent victim behind the screen all draw in the viewer and allow them to connect on a deeper level with the story they read. No longer are rape victim\u2019s words begin monitored by the patriarchy. They can share their experiences without being immediately judged to their face. The Pain Memes have proved to be a personal form of healing for those still suffering from the trauma. YouTube gives them the feeling that they are being heard, and many of them are. Millions upon millions of people have access to and actually watch YouTube. And rape victims have the access to share their story with them all. As Kaitlynn Mendes writes in her examination of the modern outcry against sexual violence, \u201cfinally, although it is unlikely that everyone who shares their experience of rape considers this to be an activist, or even a feminist, act, making oppression visible has always been a key tenet of feminism\u201d (Mendes). There is still hope.<\/p>\n

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