Social Media Makes Teen Rape More Traumatic Than Ever

“[Blaming the victim] is a traditional problem that's being amplified because it's so easy to share and everyone is connected all of the time,” says Thomas Wold, a doctoral candidate in psychology at Norwegian University of Science and Technology. “All of that information is available — they were Facebook friends, they were partying, they were flirting — [to feed into] the usual strategies for blaming the victim.” “We have tons of stories going way back that the rape victim says that the shame about the rape is worse than the actual rape,” Wold said. “And the assault being shared over social media just adds to the shame.”