Intergenerational Sex and Rape

(written on January 30, 2011)

There is a phenomenon in Botswana referred to as “intergenerational sex,” where young people (usually girls) become sexually involved with adults who are much older than they are – decades older, usually at least the age of their parents. Although an age gap between men and women is fairly common in marriages in Botswana (typically with older men and younger women), the age gap and unequal power relations in intergenerational sex are vast, generally not condoned, and their consequences are almost always negative for the younger individual. It is especially common among children with vulnerable backgrounds, and a social worker I talked to in Tlokweng gave me his views about intergenerational sex and the motivations behind it:

“The thing is, let me give you a scenario. In the farms there is a household, with the mother, boyfriend and then children. There is a drinking spot and a farm in general. Do you know what happens at the farm? There are men at the farms who are taking care of livestock, this mother and the boyfriend spend 23 hours together in the drinking spot, and the children spend 24 hours at home, so it means that the children and the parents have about an hour together. In this one hour the parents are asleep and meanwhile, the men come to the children.

Because there are little girls here, they start to bring them food and water, and these children who are young girls get attached to these men and the next thing is that the girls become pregnant. They start at an early age because there is neglect from the parents, because they spend most of their time at the drinking spot and nobody is taking care of the children. These men in the farms end up taking care of these girls and at the end of the day, they develop an attachment to these men who will make them pregnant. That is why is there is a connection between neglect and sexual contact.”

I asked him why about gender relations in Botswana and why men would choose to go after girls who are much, much younger than they are, and this was the response:

“Gender in Botswana is still very problematic, men are men and women are women and women have to be submissive to men. Everything is still far from fair. You know, when people don’t want to do things right, they will always hide behind culture. People use culture to correct their mistakes, always! When you talk about intergenerational sex, people will always tell you that in our culture a man should be older than a woman; someone is 40 years old while the girl is only 16 or 17 when they get married and people will hide behind culture.”

Me: Do you know maybe how to alleviate [the situation of intergenerational sex]? Because it seems like the campaigns now are just telling the girls ‘don’t do this, don’t do this’?

“If we can empower these men – and we need to empower these men, because having these little ones means he has low self-esteem.”

Me: Is that so?

“Yes, otherwise why can’t you go to your age mates? It is all about low self-esteem.

Power and self-esteem go together. If you want power you need to have somebody that…is in the same level, and you show through your works and skills that you are as powerful as that person. But if you go to somebody who is powerless, does it show power? It shows that you are a person with low self-esteem and cannot fight with those in your own level or rank. I want to believe that it is because of low self-esteem. So if you empower them with knowledge and skill, you will be uprising their esteem. If they have high self-esteem they will know between right and wrong and they will choose right, that’s my conviction.”

This also offers more insight on the motivations behind rape in general, and some ideas about how to lessen its occurrence – most anti-rape campaigns have focused on empowering girls and possible ‘victims’ rather than the aggressors. In addition, it should be noted that according to an article in 2004, most child rape cases occur within family circles. Also, abortion is illegal in Botswana – although unlicensed procedures are performed, the inability to safely obtain an abortion, as a result of intergenerational sex, also contributes to the phenomenon of teen pregnancy.