Looking at how the synergy between gender roles and ethnicity affects the positioning of perpetrators of sexual violence against men proves very instructive too. In patriarchal societies that are also characterized by ethnic divisions, social domination follows complex patterns, determined by gender, by ethnic belonging and also by position on the social ladder. Combatants who have established themselves as unyielding defenders of the group and, maybe more importantly, as successful conquerors of the enemy, can hope to secure their status at the very top of the societal hierarchy.[2] Their masculinity display is doubly strengthened, as they have proven their worth by protecting the in-group, and dominating (including sexually) the out-group (see, for instance, the case of sexual violence perpetrated by Hindu nationalists, Anand 2007). In that sense, sexual violence (against both men and women) cannot only participate in (re-)producing a societal hierarchy between dominating/masculinized and dominated/feminized groups but it can also contribute to the creation, or maintenance, of a certain gender order within the perpetrators’ group. To put it differently, perpetrating sexual violence seems to perform external as well as internal functions. It can ensure the domination of certain masculinity models over subjugated ones, as well as over femininities, be they attached to female bodies (women of both one’s and the other community), to male ones (men of the subjugated group) or to LGBTQI individuals. Thereby, sexual violence has a direct impact on hierarchies of femininities and masculinities, in relation to their ethnic and socio-economic foundations.
It is, therefore, clear that, at least in ethnic conflict settings, wartime sexual violence against men, and wartime sexual violence against women, stem from the same gender ideology, underpinned by ethnic and social differentiation processes. However, because they target the specific positioning of men and women in the social order, they seem to display different underlying logics: in the case of sexual violence against women, a logic of appropriation of female bodies, seen as “belonging” to the “other” males, is at play, whereas in the case of sexual violence against men, it is primarily the functioning of the “other” group that is targeted, with the ultimate result of preventing it from reproducing itself, and from surviving. This explains why patriarchal and patrilineal systems enhance the effectiveness of both male and female sexual victimization, and are likely to encourage its perpetration.
As we have seen, sexual violence against men also regularly occurs when States are faced with internal political and ideological dissent. In these cases, sexual violence is part of a larger repertoire of torture mostly practiced in detention, which is legitimized by “anti-insurgency” or “anti-terrorist” policies.[3] In these configurations, male sexual brutalization is used in order to strengthen or reassert the State’s socio-political dominance. It is initiated, controlled, regulated and perpetrated by agents who are motivated by ideologies and/or who are acting on behalf of a State. Whereas reports of sexual torture are often dismissed by military and political authorities as being isolated incidents committed by a few “bad apples”,[4] the regularity of such occurrences suggests that they are intimately connected to the way States enforce their domination.
So why do States, including parties to the Geneva Conventions and democratic ones, use sexual torture on men? The empirical evidence described in the previous chapter suggests that sexual torture perpetrated in detention displays different characteristics from sexual violence perpetrated in nationalist or ethnic conflicts, with fewer cases of rape and castration, and a more widespread use of sexual humiliation, forced nudity, genital beatings and other forms of brutality such as electric shocks applied to the genitals. This suggests that the primary aim is not so much the destruction of the male prisoners’ reproductive capacities (hence, patrilineality does not seem to play an important role here) as intimidating and subjugating them. In former prisoners’ narratives (see also chapter 4), sexual torture is often described as an integral, almost normalized part of interrogation procedures, which seems to frequently crown the torture process, as a way either to extract confessions that other methods of torture have failed to produce, or to signify the prisoners’ abject status.
For individual prisoners, sexual torture comes to reinforce the isolationist effect of detention by specifically targeting one of the most important social dimensions of their identity: gender. In that sense, it complements other types of psychological and physical violence used on prisoners, such as the practice of “white torture”, entailing extreme sensory deprivation and prolonged periods of solitary confinement. The isolationist effects of sexual torture can even expand long after prisoners are released, because of the difficulties they experience in talking about what happened to them. In that sense, the taboo nature of these acts further ostracizes them from the rest of their community or social group. Seeking redress, exposing perpetrators means acknowledging what one has been through, and potentially facing mockery or incredulity, thereby further reinforcing the feelings of isolation and alienation of survivors, and of their close relatives. Sexual torture is thus very effective in separating mobilized individuals from their communities of origin, and while it strips them of their dominant masculine status, it significantly weakens their capacity to act as mobilizing—and, therefore, as opposition—agents. In other words, and contrary to other repressive methods implemented by States, sexual torture is not likely to produce martyrs of the cause, a consequence which would actually enhance their social and political status, and further their community’s cohesion and determination. Instead, by highlighting the (gendered) vulnerability of prisoners, sexual torture undermines their position and contributes to unraveling the social links that rebellion might have created or strengthened. By feminizing prisoners through sexual torture, State agents also enforce their subordinate place in the gender order, and confirm the State, and its representatives, in their hyper masculine and heterosexual status. Further, within the frame of anti-terrorist or anti-insurgency policies, the feminization of male prisoners effected through sexual torture suggests a wish to depoliticize them, and to deprive them of their political agency.
2
They might not always manage to do so though, among other reasons because as they transgress taboos around sexual violence against men, they run the risk of never securing broad societal acceptance in the post-conflict society, not to mention the risk of being prosecuted for their war crimes, as the example of the ICTY suggests (please also refer to chapter 7).
3
This is not to imply that non-State actors do not perpetrate sexual violence. Among other examples, recent cases involving FARC military leaders have, for instance, been revealed. In many asymmetrical conflict settings such as Sri Lanka, however, the State has been much more likely to commit such crimes than non-State actors (see, for instance, Wood 2009).
4
The expression “bad apples” has often been used to describe the way the US administration had tried to dismiss cases of (sexual) torture committed in Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo. Donald Rumsfeld, then US Secretary of Defense, had, for instance, declared in a hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee: “It’s important for the American people and the world to know that while these terrible acts were perpetrated by a small number of US military, they were also brought to light by the honorable and responsible actions of other military personnel” (7 May 2004).