Rape myths shape how we respond to sexual violence. What are they and what impact do they have?

NSW Premier Chris Minns has announced significant changes to the way sexual assault trials are conducted, including moving to curb “rape myth questions”.

This is a pilot program in a suite of potential reforms the NSW government says will reduce the trauma victim-survivors of rape and sexual assault experience at trial.

What are rape myths?

Rape myths are a set of false beliefs that minimise, erase or justify men’s choice to commit sexual violence.

These myths are often centred around an idea of “real rape” - a script that lists all the conditions that must be met before a rape can be taken seriously. It is only then, according to this script, that everyone can believe the person who says they were raped and demand accountability from the person who committed the rape.

This script says rape is only “real” when the victim is a young, conventionally attractive and morally unassailable woman. The textbook victim is violently attacked at night in a public place by a man she does not know. He is immediately recognisable as a monster, motivated either by uncontrollable lust for her beauty or by deviant desires that instantly mark him as separate from “normal” and “good” men. He uses physical force to penetrate her. She screams, fights back and receives visible physical injuries.

After the rape, her attacker flees, and she immediately reports the rape to police, where her story is taken seriously, her injuries are documented, her attacker is identified, and the case quickly proceeds to trial.

Whenever she is asked, no matter what the circumstances, she can recall every detail in its exact chronological order. She is tearful but not wildly emotional, numb or angry.

Alcohol and drug use are also embedded in rape myths. Typically they are used to reduce responsibility for men who commit rape, but increase blame for women who are raped.

Rape myths also weave themselves into myths about race, age, disability and sexuality.

The fetishisation of women of colour and the revolting myths that black women are “oversexed” or Asian women are “hypersexualised” immediately places them outside the pure young girl requirement for “real rape”.

Equally, racist myths about black men being incapable of controlling sexual urges (particularly their assumed desire to rape white women) cast them into the monster myth. It also highlights white men as the protective white knights who could not possibly fit the monster role.

Rape myths erase sexual violence against older women (who are presumed to have lost all sexual interest and desirability) and people with disabilities, who are also presumed to have no sexuality or desirability.

Straight men, trans people, non-binary people, lesbians and gay men are all erased from the myth of “real rape” by their separation from the ideal victim construction.

The backdrop to all these myths is the persistent belief that false allegations are common and explain every deviation from the “real rape” script.

This myth remains stubbornly rooted, even among young people, despite evidence that false rape allegations are rare (and usually not malicious when they do occur.

Research shows most people, even when they say no to questions about the false allegations myth in surveys, still start with a default position that a woman who says she was raped is lying until proven otherwise.

Men who have been accused of rape, on the other hand, are rarely assumed to have responsibility to ask for or monitor consent.

What is the reality?

There is no script and there is no such thing as “real rape”. There’s just rape. While acts of sexual violence may have some common characteristics, the experience and circumstances are different for every person. Very few of those experiences, however, fit the “real rape” script.

Rape myths are not just a harmless set of beliefs that operate independently of the people (mostly men and boys) who are committing rape – usually against women and girls but also disproportionately against non-binary, trans and bisexual people.

Research over the past three decades has repeatedly shown a connection between belief in rape myths and sexual violence perpetration.

There is also evidence that believing in rape myths is associated with deciding to not report rape and sexual assault. In 2021/22, only 8% of women who have been raped or sexually assaulted reported it to police. This rate has more than halved since 2012, when it was 19%.

In 2025, the Australian Law Reform Commission reported the system is failing victim survivors – and failing in its purpose – because it is not holding the men and boys (or anyone else) who commits rape and sexual assault accountable for their choice to commit these crimes.

This is not a new observation. The Royal Commission into Human Relationships made very similar observations of the legal system back in 1977. Both reports identified rape myths as significant contributors to these failings.

Rape myths are not simply negative attitudes to women. They are deeply held beliefs about sex, gender, violence and justice. They are more widespread than we want to believe and more damaging than we can imagine. This is the reality, not the mythology, of rape.

Jane Gilmore does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.