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Pennsatucky and the thousands of other young women growing up in rural communities in Appalachia, and across the American South and West, are not simply “unlucky”—they are at high structural risk for rape and sexual assault. According to 2012 FBI crime estimates, the states with the highest rates of reported rapes per capita were, in order: Alaska, South Dakota, Michigan, New Mexico and Arkansas. 

Women in rural areas are structurally at risk for sexual assault—and yet Tiffany’s story is absurdly idiosyncratic