Basic Trope: A character who is promiscuous will have Rape as Backstory.
- Straight: Alice has lots of one night stands even though she doesn't seem to enjoy them. Eventually, she reveals that she was date raped in college.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice is raped and starts sleeping around to the point that she's literally going from one bed to the next.
- Alice is a Fille Fatale who was a victim of Parental Incest.
- Downplayed: Alice was raped when she was younger and has had more partners than the average person, but it's simply because she likes sex.
- Justified: Sexual promiscuity is common in rape and sexual abuse survivors like Alice, as they try to regain their agency.
- Inverted: Alice was very sexually active before she was raped, but afterward displays a Paralyzing Fear of Sexuality. (This may or may not be portrayed as redemption, Depending on the Writer.)
- Subverted: Alice engages in Unproblematic Prostitution, and genuinely enjoys what she does.
- Double Subverted: She lost her virginity to her Evil Uncle when she was 12, and got into the sex industry at 14.
- Averted: Alice sleeps with a lot of people and doesn't get emotionally attached to anyone. She has a terrible relationship with her family, but it's most antagonistic with her father who she won't even speak with, becoming highly agitated any time he tries to contact her. But it's not because Alice's dad sexually abused her. Instead, they're estranged because she's a free spirit and her father refuses to respect her decision to forgo medical school and marriage.
- Enforced:"The Moral Guardians might get upset if we have a woman just having lots of sex with lots of different men just because she likes sex."
"Make her a Fille Fatale with Rape as Backstory. Then they'll come off as judgmental if they complain." - Lampshaded: "Alice has been going out so much since that party. Did something...happen to her?"
- Invoked: ???
- Exploited:
- Skeezy Bob knows that runaways often come from abusive home, so he hangs around the bus depot. There, he meets Alice and convinces her that sleeping with a few guys for money is easy money and means she gets to control sex.
- Pimps go out and abduct and rape women and girls, then force them to "work" for them, because they're seen as Defiled Forever in the eyes of everyone else and won't be able to marry or pursue different types of work. The victims are all too aware of this change in their status, and end up complying. (They may also be told that prostitution will bring them financial independence, or a chance to buy their way back into society, but that never materializes.)
- Defied: "I'm still the same person I was before the attack!"
- Discussed: Counselor Carly assures Alice that increased sexual activity after the shock of an assault is not uncommon or something to be ashamed of.
- Conversed:"She's such a slut. What kind of girl acts like that?"
"You know, sometimes people who sleep around a lot were actually sexually abused as kids." - Implied: Alice sleeps around alot but freaks out any time she's approached by tall, red-headed men. Like really freaks out.
- Played For Drama: Alice's behavior is shown as a maladaptive coping technique. When she gets home, she throws up before frantically showering and then sits in the tub under the still-running water and cries while drinking.
- Deconstructed: Alice is subjected to Slut-Shaming, implying that she brought the rape on herself with her promiscuity, even though she wasn't so promiscuous before being raped.
Courtesy line returning you to Promiscuity After Rape.
