This thesis explores media reporting on wartime sexual violence against men, set against commonly-held notions of gender and masculinity, to uncover how male sexual victimization is constructed and discussed. A discourse analysis of several daily newspapers was conducted. Findings show that there was little sustained discussion to analyse; martial sexual violence against men was referred to more often than expected, but descriptions were fleeting and limited in terms of the information provided. An examination of media reporting on female rape during conflicts emerged from this analysis, and we see a clear difference in the way the media reports about sexual victimization of male and female victims. It was concluded that the way in which male and female sexual victimization is reported is influenced and shaped by gender stereotypes, contains gendered language, and contributes to the perpetuation of both male and female rape myths.

Thesis (M.F.A.)--Rochester Institute of Technology, 2008. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaf 19).

Thesis (M.S.)--School of Advanced Air and Space Studies, 2008. / "June 2008." Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 85-91). Also available via the Internet.

Sexuality is one of the most central elements of human existence. Throughout history, attacks on women have been common during armed conflict. Frequently military forces have viewed sexual violence as a spoil of war, a punishment to defeated populations, or as the deviance of rogue soldiers. However, there are conflicts in which sexual violence is used as a weapon. In these conflicts, sexual violence evolves from a facet of conflict to genocide. When a military force’s command utilizes systematic and widespread sexual violence as a weapon of war, in both intent and effect, it fulfills every condition of the Geneva Convention standards of genocide. Three cases are analyzed within this thesis: Chile under the Pinochet dictatorship, Rwanda during its genocide, and Bosnia during the break-up of the former Yugoslavia. Motivations for each of the conflicts varied. However, the constant in all three conflicts was the intended elimination of a specific group and the implementation of a policy of sexual violence in order to do so. In order for crimes to be considered genocide they must fulfill one of the following conditions, as stated in Article 2 of the Geneva Conventions, any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group, as such: A. Killing members of the group; B. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; C. Deliberately inflicting on the group the conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; D. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; E. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Egregious acts of sexual violence and torture were utilized by all three respective commands in order to murder, incur grievous mental and physical harms, destroy the group’s ability to procreate in the future and impose measures upon the group intended to bring about its end. This work demonstrates that irrespective of the cause of a conflict, when systematic and widespread sexual violence is used as a weapon of war, it is genocide.

The theoretical part of diploma thesis The Treatment of Prisoners of War in Afghanistan addresses the international law response to events related with the "war on terror". It also highlights the fact that the application of international law is necessary for harmonization national legislation of the states with international rules. In this case the United States of America. The empirical part of the thesis points out to the case of prison torture in detention center Bagram. The aim of this thesis is posing a question whether nowadays it is possible to capture and define the legal issues that arise with the torture of prisoners of war.

This dissertation explores the rise of transnational state torture and the efforts of the Left to resist and denounce it in South America in the 1970s. Looking principally to Brazil and Argentina, I ask how torture was understood by the officials who employed it and the revolutionaries who resisted and denounced it at a time when such calibrated violence stood at the heart of political struggle. While torture’s status as a grave violation of human rights is often taken for granted today, I show that in 1970s-era southern South America, many perpetrators and victims alike instead regarded torture as a powerful counterrevolutionary weapon, one capable of generating the raw data on which the region’s sophisticated information-management systems relied. At the same time, both revolutionaries and regime agents recognized such systematic torture as a grave liability for its practitioners. Militants and their allies abroad capitalized on this liability by disseminating testimonies that drew the world’s attention to South American torture chambers. Their efforts helped to consolidate the politics of bodily integrity at the heart of the current global human rights regime, yet they were unable to curb state violence or advance socialism. Drawing on dozens of archival collections from ten countries, I reconstruct the now-forgotten meanings of torture that defined this formative juncture, demonstrating the potential of history to reinvigorate a policy debate centered for too long on the question, “Does torture work?” Instead, I ask readers to consider the work that torture and its denunciation have performed at a critical moment in the past, in order to generate new strategies to counteract it today.

Domestic violence is now better be addressed as a global issue rather than just a family or regional problem. This research study has focused on highlighting the factors that contribute to the ceaseless occurrence of domestic violence. Besides, it concentrates on the consequences that might take place due to the various forms of domestic violence. As domestic violence has exceeded the boundary of just being an indoor personal matter, it must be dealt with precise assistance provided by the law and judicial authorities. Women should be respected and valued by all means as well as their choices and decisions have to be prioritized by men. Even if the acts of vicious domestic violence can't be eliminated overnight, the measures aiding abolition of domestic violence ought to be taken inevitably. As a whole, we must not forget that a healthy moralistic surrounding or environment can also play a significant role to combat domestic violence.

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Torture has long been denounced by the international community; the need to protect citizens from abuse at the hands of the state is a principle enshrined in international law. One area where abuse is common is within the correctional system and as a result, there is a need for oversight in places of detention. The Optional Protocol to the UN’s Convention Against Torture (OPCAT) is an international human rights instrument that acts as a preventive measure to monitor all places of detention through regular visits. Supportive of the OPCAT since its adoption, Canada has considered signature/ratification since 2002 but has yet to commit. The purpose of this study is to identify factors that have led to a delay in Canada becoming State Party to the OPCAT despite adherence to the principles that this instrument embodies. A policy analysis framework was utilized to conduct stakeholder interviews and review government documents. The concept of agenda-setting received special attention and content analysis of media reports and a review of government legislative activity were conducted to provide insight into the prevalence of the issue on the public and political agendas. The author argues that while there are real challenges that policymakers must overcome, the absence of political leadership has resulted in stagnation in the decision-making process. As a result, the issue has disappeared from both the public and political agenda. In order for progress to be made, political will must be created and the impetus to act (‘re-setting the agenda’) must come from civil society in the absence of government engagement on this issue.