Gender-Based Violence Targets South African Lesbians

South Africa has evolved as a society, moving further away from the days of apartheid and racial inequality, but unfortunately has struggled to protect the rights of South African women. Like many places in Africa, the nation's patriarchal attitude victimizes women and children, who despite human rights campaigns and the passing of several revolutionary legislations, are still considered second-class citizens.

The 16 Days of Activism Against Violence, along with Women's Day is celebrated each year, according to the Human Sciences Research Council, but violence still rampages against women in the community. The escalating violence targeted at black lesbians in South Africa is the latest human rights misstep in South Africa. The HSRC says that many incidents are ignored or unreported like most other forms of violence against women, but some of these "corrective rapes" have gained media attention, including the rape and death of Eudy Simelane.

Bruce Fraser of the Sowetan reports that Eudy Simelane was one of the best-known female football players in South Africa before being found in the shallow waters of a creek beaten, stabbed, and raped. Simelane, a player and South African all-star on the national female football team, was also a persistent equal rights campaigner and one of the first women to become openly gay in the small town of Kwa Thema. If the Simelane family wasn't shaken enough after having their only daughter killed, they were disturbed when the results of the investigation lead to the arrest of people their daughter was closely associated with.

Annie Kelly reported in her article that "corrective rape" is the term coined to the widespread gang-rape and beatings committed by men who are trying to "cure" lesbians of their sexual orientation. According to the HSRC, lesbians, who are usually isolated away from their families and communities due to their sexual identity are targeted by men, in order to turn them towards a heterosexual lifestyle. According to Yolanda Mufwebe, most of the men that participate in these acts have close relationships with their victims. Survivors have named friends, neighbors, family members, and ex-boyfriends as their attackers. Raping the women is seen as a weird way of therapy that will teach them to "behave like a woman".

Gangs of men attack women in the age range of 16 to 35 with knives, bats, and other blunt objects. Eudy Simelane was stabbed 25 times in the face, during her attack, which shows the despicable brutality of these acts of violence. The prejudice, intolerance, and brute violence has forced many lesbians and even their families out of townships. Mufwebe interviewed a woman named Denne from Alexandra, who described her flight from the small township she grew up in. Denne was given little sympathy as a child, having been the victim of rape several times and now lives in the city afraid to walk the streets at night.

This is a common fear with 86% of lesbians in West South Africa, having the fear of being sexually assaulted in an environment where there are 10 rapes reported every week. Campaigns and human rights organizations all over the world have called for the South African criminal justice system to recognize hate crimes, including corrective rape, as a separate crime category, in order to ensure support for survivors and bring offenders to justice. But surviving victims leave the hospital badly beaten and the HSRC reports often times the women are pregnant or infected with HIV or other sexually transmitted diseases. The survivors are also chastised by police forces who blame them for the attack.

Carrie Shelver of the women's rights group Powa said women in general are targeted in high numbers in South Africa because of the increasingly macho culture, which oppress and victimize women in the name of masculinity. Despite this suppressing attitude, many organizations are still fighting against homophobia and violence.