Sexual assault in the military: What happens when the victim is a man?
The Christian Science Monitor reports:
When Staff Sgt. Noah Lubben was assigned to Air Force Special Operations Command, he enjoyed the freedom and the “laid back” atmosphere among his crew. The airmen had more freedom there and embraced the swagger of the Special Operations flying culture. “It was awesome,” Sergeant Lubben recalls. ”It was fun.”
But it was also a culture that ultimately contributed to his sexual assault, Lubben says – with “sexually charged” and “disgusting” insults that isolated him and turned his longtime fellow troops against him.
As the Pentagon released figures last week showing that incidents of sexual assault increased 50 percent between 2012 and 2013, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel vowed to take a number of steps, including some designed specifically to reach out to men, who make up half of all reported victims of sexual assault, according to a Pentagon study released last week.
