By Brittany Tyler

On Sept 5 2014, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, United States, 2011. The report outlined the prevalence of various forms of intimate interpersonal violence (IPV) and the breakdown of the ethnicity, age, and gender of the victim and perpetrator, along with the age of first incident.

Results of particular interest occurs in the ‘Sexual Violence Victimization – Prevalence of Sexual Violence Victimization’ section. The report states:

Nationally, an estimated 1.6% of women (or approximately 1.9 million women) were raped in the 12 months before taking the survey.

For men, […] an estimated 1.7% of men were made to penetrate a perpetrator in the 12 months preceding the survey.

This means that men’s rate of being made to penetrate during the 12 previous months is higher than the women’s rate of being raped during the 12 previous months. The study goes on to state that 71% of men who were made to penetrate were forced to do so before age 25.
These statistics expose an increase to the previous years’ ‘made to penetrate’ category and document the ongoing violation of men who experience sexual victimization. It is important that the needs and concerns of these men are addressed by the appropriate agencies, so they have the proper resources to deal with the situation.

Brittany Tyler is a full-time engineering student at the University of Toronto, who has an interest in gender issues.