The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo
by Latoya Peterson
The Greatest Silence is a documentary about rape in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and specifically about how rape is a weapon of war. The film premieres tonight at 10 p.m. on HBO.
More information can be found on the HBO website and the filmmaker’s own site.
I poked around the internet to get some perspectives on the documentary - I have presented some of the write-ups below. [Trigger warning.]
Washington Post - The Brutal Truth
In a 10-year-old conflict that has left some 5 million people dead, the tens of thousands of women and girls who have been systematically raped and mutilated by an array of combatants are the silent victims among the living, Jackson tells us. What makes her documentary more stunning: She goes into the forest and confronts the rapists.
“I slept with some women,” says the rapist, a gray sweater wrapping his head, the sleeves tied around his neck.
“Did they want you to sleep with them?” Jackson inquires, her voice incisive, a bit on edge. A translator repeats her words in Swahili. Is it about control? Sex? Why violate a woman, leave her to bleed in her village, while her husband watches, tied to a tree? Why would 20 men line up and take turns, one after the other, raping a girl until she passes out and separates herself from a pain too evil to imagine?
[…]
In another scene, the gray-sweatered rapist doesn’t flinch at Jackson’s question: “If she says no, I must take her by force. If she is strong, I’ll call some of my friends to help me. All this is happening because of the war. We would live a normal life and treat women naturally if there was no war.”
San Francisco Chronicle (SF Gate) - Film captures rapists and their victims in Congo
When Lisa F. Jackson was 25 and living in Washington, D.C., she was gang-raped after leaving work in the upscale Georgetown district. Her story was front-page news, but the three perpetrators were never caught.
Jackson, a documentary filmmaker, kept recalling that trauma last year, when she visited Congo to interview victims of sexual violence. Tens of thousands of women and girls are raped each year by armed militiamen who often mutilate the genitals of their victim with guns and sticks.
Why, Jackson wanted to know, if her rape was considered news, does the huge wave of Congolese atrocities go unreported and unacknowledged? In her devastating 75-minute film, “The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo,” Jackson searches for the answer by speaking to the victims; to physicians and aid workers; to U.N. peacekeepers whose numbers are inadequate to the problem; and, finally, to the rapists themselves.
Jackson, 57, calls the crisis “a holocaust in slow motion.”
Interestingly, the New York Times takes a completely different view of the documentary:
What has driven Ms. Jackson isn’t the tragedy itself but her own status as a rape survivor, which leads her to take an aggressively central role. She is motivated not simply by her reportorial instincts but also by her unfortunate wish to relate.
Hundreds of thousands of Congolese women, many tortured, sodomized and left incontinent, become their society’s pariahs. Ms. Jackson was raped years ago by a group of men as she was coming home from work late one night in the Georgetown section of Washington. Comparing herself to the impoverished women she finds, women shunned and abandoned by a nation of men who condone the prevailing, systematic brutalities, Ms. Jackson tells us that when she was married, her husband referred to her as “damaged goods.” While he may have meant that her emotional wounds left her unprepared for the trials of marriage, Ms. Jackson leaves the phrase dangling there to suggest that the anguishes of sexual violence are experienced universally and that all shame is essentially the same shame.
Now, I can understand that viewpoint. We have yet to see the documentary, so this reviewer could be right. However, this next section gave me some pause (emphasis mine):
The warrior-rapists Ms. Jackson finds through her translator speak in the chilling language of hypocrisy, and she presses them toward a logic they are incapable of. They see rape as patriotic, necessary. While they admit freely to taking women by force, at the same time they explain that they would never stand for the same treatment of their wives, mothers or sisters.
Ms. Jackson, imagining perhaps that her subjects had read Susan Brownmiller, asks them if they consider their crimes acts of sex or power. “These are complicated questions they can’t answer,” her translator tells her.
Is it just me, or does that passage reek of condescension? I get where the writer was going with this - many rapists tend to distance themselves from the crime, either by using circumstances (we were in a war, rape just happens) or the woman’s identity (she was a whore anyway.) A lot of rapists distance themselves from what they have done so well that they are loathe to call what happened rape.
But those lines in particular make me think the reviewer really wanted to write “what do you expect of these savages?”
Then again, the reviewer could be responding this way to the documentary because the filmmaker is white - which may have cast the reviewer’s perception of the film in a different light.
This is how the NY Times piece ends:
There are certain kinds of art that obviously benefit from egocentricity. This kind of filmmaking almost never does. “The women of the Congo gave me a new definition of grace,” Ms. Jackson says at the end of her film, as if that were the point.
Your thoughts?
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
atlasien wrote:
The problem of these documentaries is when the voice of a privileged narrator appropriates the voice of the subjects.
However, I think that putting herself more in the center might actually work against appropriation. It’s saying, “I’m aware that my voice and my experiences are filtering the voices and experiences of these Congolese women, and I’m making sure the audience is also aware of that.” In some circumstances, it might be a more honest approach than typical “invisible narrator” style. It’s hard to judge without seeing the documentary.
I also think that rape in wartime is very much a universal subject. It’s happened in almost every corner of the world.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 11:21 am ¶
ceecee wrote:
NYT…NYT…NYT
They have a special brand of twisted-truth writing at that paper.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 11:38 am ¶
nola wrote:
Yes, it’s condescending….It’s just ingrained into our culture to have this paternalistic attitude towards Africa in general.
It’s also difficult to view such brutality as anything but monstrous…
This seems like an important film I hope it can transcend the whole “intillectual vs. savage” bull shit.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 12:04 pm ¶
Treacle wrote:
While I’m glad women in the Congo are finally getting this kind of international (read: Western) attention, I can’t help but wonder if the only reason we’re even hearing about this documentary at all is because the filmmaker is white.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 12:25 pm ¶
Black Canseco wrote:
i’m gonna check this out as i’ve read about it quite a bit and even blogged about it on occassion. there’s a potential ken burnsian factor–great white hope must tell ethnic stories or the stories will lose their value), but that’s another issue.
people just aren’t interest in foreign black women , black women in general, unless there’s something in it for them. (you can believe if women in ireland or the netherlands were being raped at such extreme and common rates, it’d be international news. even the mistreatment of women int he middle east is becoming “passe”.)
this story needs to be told and discussed and i’ll be curious to see what the outcome, if any is.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 12:31 pm ¶
FranSky wrote:
These days I take the NYT as seriously as I do Fox Newz.
~F
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 12:49 pm ¶
Tarah Sweeney wrote:
Oh man, and I have only just discovered, and started to like NYT.
But, this is the view of one journalist, so I’ll carry on reading NYT for now.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 1:43 pm ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
Hmmmm…Latoya, I see your point about the NYT reviewer’s condescendingly racist attitude (and condescending toward feminists, esp. those involved in anti-rape activism) in the statement of the rapists being “pressed toward a logic they’re not capable of,” especially a logic about rape informed by reading Susan Brownmiller. WTF, NYT?
At the same time, I can also see NYT’s critique of Jackson not answering the question of the reason why her rape was widely covered and there has been silence about the Congelese women being raped: her white-skin advantage. Instead, it comes off as (again) the white person taking a story about people of color a re-positioning herself as the center of the story (”the women of the Congo gave me a new definition of grace”–umm, you’re welcome, Nice White Lady? WTF, Ms Filmmaker?)
Again, I’m going by what’s written on this post, not by seeing the doc itself. I think I’ll watch it, just to see….
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 2:40 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
TCS -
Yeah, I’m on the fence too. I prepped the piece wondering what the hell was wrong with the NYT - and then I found out (looking for a pic) that the filmmaker was white.
(I had also wondered what rape would be major news…)
So I am not sure how this one is going to go, but I will probably watch the documentary at a later showing. Today isn’t a great day for me - I don’t see how watching a documentary about rape will make it better.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 2:43 pm ¶
maia wrote:
i visited the eastern congo 2 years ago and investigated the war, focusing on the impact of the war on congolese women. unofortunately i do not have hbo so i cant evaluate the film in and of itself. what i can say is that the women who were rape survivors that i met were incredibly intelligent and stated clearly time and time again that rape was used as a primary weapon of war. when we asked why they said that for many of the militias who could not afford military weapons, rape was the available weapon. in other words that poverty was a primary reason that rape was used in this war. they also made clear that for many militiamen rape was an issue of male power. i did not read susan brownmiller’s book until after visiting the congo and i found that book incredibly racist. especially in the context of describing rape in africa and in black urban communities in the states.
as for her documentary: there is a prevailing meme in white folks who go to the eastern congo war that they are ‘giving a voice to the voiceless’. which often tends to center the voice of the white western ’speaker’ as she becomes the mouthpiece for the oppressed. i should probably tell you that i am a black/native american rape survivor and human rights worker (just so you know who i am) . i will need to read the entire nyt piece, but the parts excerpted here are incredibly irresponsible of the nyt journalist toward any rape survivor either a white us citizen or a congolese woman. furthermore i would like to point out that 100’s of un workers have also raped these congolese women whom they are actually there to protect.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 3:11 pm ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
@ Latoya–Hugs from here, friend.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 3:15 pm ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
@ maia–”furthermore i would like to point out that 100’s of un workers have also raped these congolese women whom they are actually there to protect.”
*jaw drop*
Whoa, whoa, whoa–are you serious, friend? (I *know* you are; I’m just really, really, really stunned by what you stated. I mean no disrespect.) Wow, now *that’s* a documentary right there. Or, at least, an article or blog post.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 3:31 pm ¶
Torontonian wrote:
There is an easy way for the white reporter to avoid making herself the mouthpiece of the Congolese victims. Just interview the victims and let them speak. I’m sure they are capable of critical commentary on their own situation and have spent some time thinking about why it happened. It’s not like non-white people are incapable of critical thinking.
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 9:50 pm ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
I’m watching the doc now…I’ll comment tomorrow…..
Posted 08 Apr 2008 at 10:00 pm ¶
Michelle wrote:
Is it just me or does anyone else feel incredibly helpless.
And to hear that some UN workers are actually perpetrating the crimes is devastating. Maia, would you care to elaborate?
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 12:59 am ¶
Linda wrote:
@Maia,
“when we asked why they said that for many of the militias who could not afford military weapons, rape was the available weapon. in other words that poverty was a primary reason that rape was used in this war.” This has always been true! During times of war rape is used as a form of humiliation, and power trip. It’s used to make the enemy feel week and defenseless and powerless. This happens all over the world.
I’m glad that you did bring up the fact that UN workers have done the same, this is a well known fact! The story came out several years ago.
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 7:28 am ¶
*M* wrote:
For the love of God! She was rape, the women she interviewed was raped, they share an horrible experience. It was here rape the prompt her to do this documentary and share the stories of the Congo women.
Before any of you talk about how these women and other rape survivors shamed and silence. Before you talk about how 1 in SIX American women will experience attempted or completed rape in their lifetime or how 17.7 million American women are raped. Or how the Soliders who raped the Congo women feel no guilt for what they have done, but would kill a man if they did it to their sisters or wives. You talk about how the Narrator is privileged! How is she privileged? Its beacuse she is white, no! Its beacuse she is a rape survivor
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 8:40 am ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
@ Michelle–no, I don’t feel helpless. Enraged, but not helpless.
@ maia–I watched the doc. The filmmaker mentioned what you told us yesterday. What the filmmaker says is the UN has been implicated in sexually abusing the women; about 20 of them were said to have forced the women to exchange sex for food. Friend, thank you for the head’s up and, like Michelle, I look forward to hearing more from you about the UN’s role in this atrocity.
–###–
Here are my long thoughts: OK, y’all, like I said, I saw it. Staying on the thread, IMO, even though the condescension was uncalled for, NYT called this one. The filmmaker, Lisa Jackson, committed the fatal Second-Wave feminist flaw of not examining why her crime received press while the continued raping of Congolese women didn’t: her whiteness. Jackson subsumed her whiteness under the mantle of “woman” and therefore, her film’s premise is “the Congolese women and I share the same female experience of being raped. Period.”
To me, Jackson really didn’t help her case with how she interacted with and her commentary about the women and men. An example: she gives the women at a hospital that treats rape survivors some perfume and soap samples she and her friends collected. The women smile and show Jackson their gratitude for the gifts. She states that she realizes the women need more than perfumes; they need help. Instead of heeding her own observation, Jackson turns around and gives another group of the survivors nail polish–even painting their nails–and the next cut is the women laughing. Jackson’s conclusion: that was what was missing during her visits–laughter! She even extends the joys of nail-polishing to her translator’s family, who himself tells the story of losing his first wife, a Rwandan, in this complex conflict and how translating the women’s experiences made him cherish his baby daughter all the more…
…which would have been a fantastic “aha” moment for the man–in the midst of a film about the vicious yet banal misogyny exhibited by the men who raped the women–if Jackson didn’t film the man singing with his bros on the side of house. And the women singing at church, at one of the hospitals treating the survivors, at their survivors’ meeting, and after Jackson told a group of survivors/interviewees her own story. To me, these scenes reeked of the Happy Darkies Made Happy with Trinkets from the Nice White Person and Singing Through Their Tribulations.
I also had problems with Jackson’s confrontation with the rapists, specifically with the way she labeled them. An example: as one group walks away into the forest, she states, “This is what sexual terrorism looks like.” Point-blanket. If she would have added, “…in the DRC…” she would have mitigated that statement for me. (Better yet, she should have left the statement unsaid.) Did these Black men rape; yep, by their own admittance. Jackson’s statement, coming out of her white American woman’s mouth, just has that stench to me of the Black Rapist, applied worldwide. (What was that old adage about the one thing America successfully exported was its racism?)
I think, in this particular case, Jackson should have been more “invisible.” She’s right in stating her interest why she wanted to do the project and how she used her story to connect with the women who survived at the outset; and she’s right in finding and interviewing the rapists and hearing them say why they committed the atrocities they did. (Trust me, the men got the logic. The translator, IMO, ran some interference not out of the men not understanding the words Jackson was saying but more for out of weird sense of protecting them from Jackson’s anger.) At that point, she should have edited the film such that, after her opening statement, she should have let the victims and the violators speak for themselves. She should have also examined her initial question…and her own white-liberal racism and how it informed how she approached the subject and the interviewees.
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 10:26 am ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
…let me amend my statement: “She should have also examined her initial question…and the blind spots in her liberalism and how it informed how she approached the subject and the interviewees.”
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 10:32 am ¶
ceecee wrote:
One thing that has not been pointed out (or perhaps I missed it), which might be one other factor to consider as well as the point of priviledge opinion, is how easily miscommunication can occur. Which results in things getting lost in translation on the parts of all parties (the reporter who created this documentary, the people she interviewed and the NYT journalist who penned this article).
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 10:35 am ¶
meownette wrote:
I don’t want to get too off-topic in this comment, and without having seen the film in question I can not comment directly on its tone or content, so I’m relying on The Cruel Secretary’s rundown. It seems like this doc suffers from some of the same problems I perceived in “Born into Brothels” which I happened to watch yesterday, namely, the overreliance on the white narrators’ perspectives/struggles at the expense of the voices of the people of color who the films are ostensibly about.
I am so conflicted about white and/or privileged aide workers’ presence in “developing” regions and nations. It just seems inevitably paternalistic, even if ultimately good-hearted. I think I do understand the impulse to do this kind of aide work, and I really don’t want to downplay that Jackson is a rape survivor and thus perhaps even more empathetic to the suffering of the victims of this disgusting genre of systematic crime, but I think that has to be reconciled with any racist under/over tones.
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 12:29 pm ¶
Chris wrote:
I didn’t think she needed to retell her story to tell their story with validity. I didn’t find it racist as much as ego centric on her part.
I also am a rape survivor and nothing I went through compares to these women’s suffering. Rape is typically about power in our western society, but what is going on over there is of a far darker design. The culture is about violence, survival and bizarre beliefs. These children and women are tortured, mamed, brutalized - repeatedly. It is a mass horror and I wanted something in the end to show how an average person can help - on any scale. I too was very startled by her last line “these women gave me a new definition of grace.” HUH? Nice words, but not fitting for the summary of this documentary. Maybe “these women gave me a new definition of the word RAPE.” Or these women’s survival and suffering puts to shame any complaint I could ever have in my life time! These women clearly have not the benefit of “grace” as in God’s blessing.
Her frequent references to her own story irritated me, but I tried to let go of it realizing it was her ego and her need to tell her story that got her there - and their story is the real story. But again, her final comment was dissapointing as was the lack of connection to help. I want to scoop of handfuls of those souls and help them. Truly.
Posted 11 Apr 2008 at 2:18 am ¶
MJN wrote:
For a documentary which focuses more narrowly on long-term consequences and voices of the victims, I would recommend “Lumo,” which aired on PBS several months ago. I don’t recall that it received much press, and I don’t know the race or background of the filmmaker, but it was more a documentary about the Congolese women than about the filmmaker’s relationship with the crimes being committed.
As a disclaimer, I do remember substantial narrator voice-over, but can’t remember how much was filmmaker’s framing and reinterpretation, versus how much was simply translation.
Posted 29 Apr 2008 at 4:58 pm ¶
jlr2269 wrote:
I just finished watching this documentary on HBO, and it’s effected me more than you know. I googled the doc to see if there was any way to help these women. What is happening to them is a terrible, unspeakable, “silent” truth, and something needs to be done. Does anyone know if there’s a charity that helps these women directly?
Posted 30 Jan 2009 at 12:07 pm ¶
R.L.C. wrote:
Yes, there is a charity that helps these women directly. http://www.womenforwomen.org.uk allows you to make donations or directly sponsor a woman in the DRC (or other war-torn regions). 79% of your donations go directly to the women which is pretty good. The work that they do is impressive. Even if you don’t wish to donate the website is still well worth a look.
Posted 09 Apr 2009 at 5:26 pm ¶