The invisible/visible claims to justice: sexual violence and the university camp(us)

Legal responses to rape and sexual assault on university campuses are often framed as being protective of victim’s human rights but are only enacted when threats are made to masculine privilege. This is especially the case when gender identities and behaviors challenge or violate state- sanctioned institutionalized hetero-patriarchal gender norms. Building on Agamben’s Homer Sacer by examining the state of exclusion and abandonment within the context of sexual violence, the recent case of Brock Turner is analyzed as a starting point for a broader theoretical discussion of the treatment of rape and sexual assault on university campuses in the United States.