Bodies to Be Raped, Disposable Bodies. Women Who Inject Drugs and Prohibitionism in Mexico

This article analyzes how the punitivism y and prohibitionism in relation to drug use function as structural conditions that naturalizes the sexual violence experienced by poor female who users. The analysis is based on nineteen in-depth interviews with women who inject drugs in Ciudad Juárez and He...

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Bibliographic Details
Author: Ospina-Escobar, Angélica
Format: article
Status:Published version
Publication Date:2023
Country:México
Institution:EL COLEGIO DE MÉXICO
Repository:Revista Interdisciplinaria de estudios de género de El Colegio de México
Language:Spanish
OAI Identifier:oai:oai.estudiosdegenero.colmex.mx:article/1018
Online Access:https://estudiosdegenero.colmex.mx/index.php/eg/article/view/1018
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:punitivismo
estigma
violencia sexual
uso problemático de sustancias
política de drogas
punitivism
stigma
sexual violence
problematic drug use
drug policy
Description
Summary:This article analyzes how the punitivism y and prohibitionism in relation to drug use function as structural conditions that naturalizes the sexual violence experienced by poor female who users. The analysis is based on nineteen in-depth interviews with women who inject drugs in Ciudad Juárez and Hermosillo. The results show that drug use appears both as a survival strategy and as a space for experiencing pleasure and autonomy in an extremely violent context. The punitivism associated with substance use among women is represented by extreme sexual violence, the denial of access to justice and the psychologization of problematic drug use. These mechanisms establish a daily grammar of cruelty against drug users, reinforcing the disposability of their bodies and achieving their social and political demobilization. Recognizing sexual violence as an effect and consequence of the construction of women living in poverty and drug users as a disposable population is fundamental to progress in the recognition of their rights as citizens.