Real men get raped

As Metropolitan Police figures reveal that in London one man every hour is the victim of sexual crime, the charity SurvivorsUK is launching a major advertising campaign to show that it can happen to anyone.

The government estimates that at most 11% of male victims report what has happened to them. New Met Police figures show that in 2009/10 a total of 945 sexual assaults against men were reported in London suggesting that the true figure is closer to 10,000.

Real Men Get Raped

The campaign, featuring a rugby ball pierced by a nail and the message Real Men Get Raped and Talking About It Takes Real Strength, will be featured on 140 escalator panels in central London Tube stations from 20 February during the Six Nations rugby tournament. The adverts will also feature on two 48 Sheet billboards at Clapham Junction train station and on big screens at Waterloo stations on 25 February and 17 March, when England are playing at home in the tournament.

Challenging assumptions

Michael May of Survivors UK said: 'We’ve chosen to use an alpha male sport in our advertising to challenge assumptions about the type of men who get raped. It’s just as likely to be a rugby player as a librarian, a suited city banker as a hooded gang member. And we hope that by challenging our innate assumptions about the identity of male victims, we can make it even fractionally easier for a male rape victim to ask for help.'

Professor Kim Etherington, University of Bristol and Fellow of BACP said: 'Males are taught from a very early age that they should be ‘strong’ and ‘in-charge’. To be successfully masculine is to be sexually potent, competitive with other males in sexual matters, and dominant with sexual interactions. Being raped challenges and negates all these pre-conceptions.'

Baroness Stern’s 2011 rape report acknowledged that the vast majority of male victims of sexual violence do not report their crimes because of the common view that men 'should be able to fight off an attacker'. The review recognised that men do not come forward for fear of being ridiculed or not believed, fear they may be seen as gay and, most importantly, for fear of being regarded as less of a man.