Sexualized War Violence: Subversive Victimization and Ignored Perpetrators

In this chapter, I will address this gap in current research and focus on male victims, perpetrators and masculinity constructs at play in the direct perpetration of sexualized war violence. Based on a combination of perspectives prom masculinity research and research on sexual war violence, I will examine court files from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) where male sexual violence is among the addressed offences. I will answer the following question: ‘How can the interaction between masculinity, sexuality and militarism help increase our understanding of sexualized war violence and its perpetrators?’ More specifically, I will look at how these constructs come into play when the victims are male rather than female. The focus of attention might help bring this conversation forward by providing a more inclusive and comprehensive understanding of the complex phenomenon that sexualized war violence is. Through its focus on sexualized war violence as a gendered experience for both perpetrators and victims this chapter addresses both the question of crime as a marker of masculinity and the subversive victimization and emasculation of men and their collectives through the sexualized violence directed at them. [Excerpt]