Name suppression: protecting victims’ rights

There is a woman, a victim of rape, who knows that every time any acquaintance  looks at her they know what her husband did to her. When she walks through the supermarket every shopper may be looking at her and thinking about her terror, fear and shame.

In a healthy society she would have no reason to feel ashamed, but ours is not a healthy society: most victims of rape do feel shame, embarrassment and humiliation.

When a blogger decided to court fame and media attention by making a political point about name suppression he not only outed the man whose name was suppressed, he also revealed the victim’s identity – he revictimised a woman who has already suffered enough.

[The blogger’s name has been removed as suggested in a comment as the name of the blogger, in turn, leads toward the woman’s identity]

2 thoughts on “Name suppression: protecting victims’ rights

  1. Which would lead to the idea that where the victim of a crime would prefer to retain their privacy, they would be more likely to come forward to lay a complaint if they had some assurance that

    1. they would not be re-victimised during the court case

    2. they could retain their privacy after it concluded, so where identifying the perpetrator would also identify the victim, there is a place for name suppression.

    Which is a factor in deciding where to draw the line, between freedom of information and privacy, in the area of court cases.

  2. What concerns me is that the victim feels shame when it is about sex where she wouldn’t if a car crossed the centre line and crashed into her car. You are correct in saying we have an unhealthy society with individuals lacking self confidence to hold their heads up high when they have done nothing wrong. I wonder if that is a result of the niggling question in many cases “Did she change her mind?” Even the victim asks this question? There are not many I suggest like the blogger who writes that she was raped. But why do I say ‘she’, males get raped and sexually abused too and sadly they feel they must hide in shame.

    It is a male originated problem and hypocracy that female virginity is valued so highly which in turn causes the problem for women. Most unhealthy.

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