Since the 2012 Delhi rape case,
there has been widespread public
outrage across the world, and
specifically
Asia.
Public
demonstrations have rocked civil
society and it can be argued that
they have achieved leeway as far as
laws are concerned. But the number
of rape cases reported have seen
little change, and as many cases
remain unreported, the success of
public outcry is debatable.
Renowned freelance journalist Aella
Callan looks at the opposite side of the
spectrum for her award winning
documentary ‘It’s a man’s world’ (for
101 East, Aljazeera) focusing on the
rapists rather than the rape victims.
She says that she decided on this
premise as the usual angle of rape
reports and articles felt insufficient and
redundant, “Story after story has been
written on women as victims. To be
honest, all of the gang rape stories I'd
ever read left me with a sense of
helplessness and despair.” Instead,
Callan and her team decided to look at
the men committing the crimes,
questioning their motives in an attempt
to reach some potential solution.
Talking to the rapists; Aela Callan on her award
winning documentary for Aljazeera
By Ushah Kazi Photos by Lee Ali
Keeping with the idea, Callan’s
documentary focuses on men’s
attitudes towards rape in
Cambodia. On the streets of
Cambodia’s capital, in the
brothels and face to face with
admitted rapists and gang
rapists, she unravels societal
norms and taboos. The 25
minute film explores a society
coping with trauma, which, as
journalist Tong Soprach put it
in his column, is ‘oblivious to
rape’.
Peers, pressure and rape
In ‘It’s a man’s world’ it is
evident that a reason for the
large number of gang rape in
Cambodia is what Callan calls
‘pack mentality’, whereby
situations escalate because of
peer pressure. In Cambodia, the
cultural practice of ‘bauk’ is
prevalent amongst men and
boys. A word which means
She says that the foundation of the ‘plus’ and is used to refer to a
documentary is linked to research group of men having sex with
conducted by Dr. Emma Fullu at one woman, bauk is also the
the UN in Bangkok. Fullu’s study
titled, “Why do some men use
violence against women and how
can we prevent it?” is an in-depth,
cross-country investigation across
Asia, looking at men’s reasons for
and experience of violence against
women. Essentially it looks at an
issue that impacts all women, but
focuses on those committing the
acts of violence. The study found
that Cambodia has twice the rate of
gang rape as India, where 5% of
men admitted to have participated
in gang rape.
local word for gang rape. The
documentary explores how bauk is
treated as a sport-like, male bonding
activity, whereby peers may pressure
peers into taking part in gang rape.
Many men are so used to bauk that they
subject their girl-friends and wives to
the same, and a large percentage of men
do not consider bauk to be rape.
As the UN study showed, many of the
men who committed gang rape did so
for the first time, a large percentage of
these were boys aged below fifteen
when they first raped a woman, and peer
pressure was a pivotal reason for their
actions.
But the same mentality maybe part of a
possib