These are some rather disturbing statistics. It seems that 24% (or about one out of every four) of veterans say they personally know a victim of sexual harassment, assault, or rape in the military. That's 6 points higher than the number of nonveterans who say they know a victim in their workplace, and 3 points higher than nonveteran men. But the biggest difference comes among women -- where 60% of women vets say they know a victim, while only 19% of nonveteran women know a victim.
While these figures show we have a society-wide problem with sexual harassment, assault, and rape, they also show that this problem is much bigger in the military. Some may try to explain this away by saying the military is traditionally a job for men, but that excuse simply won't fly. Sexual harassment, assault, and rape are crimes -- and they are inexcusable in any workplace, even those traditionally occupied by men.
Congress recently tried to address this problem, but they chickened out at the last moment and left the decision on whether charges would be brought in the hands of military officers. In other words, there was little change since it left the "good old boy" system intact -- and lets officers go easy on those they like and harder on those they don't like. These decisions should have been put in the hands of legal professionals (just like it is in the non-military society).
This brings up the question of what does the American public think. Do they think the military's implementation of this weak law passed by Congress is enough to solve this problem, or should more be done. As the charts below show, the public does not think the military (or Congress) has adequately addressed to problems with sexual harassment, assault, or rape. I have to agree. More needs to be done.
All of these charts were made with information from the Gallup Poll.
1,268 veterans were questioned between June 16th and 20th (with a 3 point margin of error).
1,016 nonveterans were questioned on July 2nd and 3rd (with a 4 point margin of error).
