(First, kudos to Amanda Marcotte whose comment and link here in the Daily Kos Kerfuzzle thread served as the inspiration for this post)
How ingrained is our culture’s prominent “past-time” of ‘guilt tripping the sexual assault/rape victim for the attack’ in our psyches–especially the victims’? Whenever we begin to talk about the perpetrator (usually a guy) it seems as if we just throw up our hands in surrender and say, “yeah well, he’s a guy. Guys do that so watch out ladies.” Once again we slam the victims and women with all the responsibility for the attack, as if they raped or sexually assaulted themselves. When we list whose to blame for the attack and crime, we list everyone, including the victim, but rarely–if ever–the attacker. Or he’s at the bottom of the list and is portrayed as the least responsible for the attack. It’s the “we can’t help what guys do, but women should bear all the burden when it comes to prevention of sexual violence,” mentality of our culture. Rape Culture 101; guys are entitled to get sex on demand, to sexually harass, commit sexual assualt, and rape. And it’s all your fault if it happens to you. Guys can’t help themselves after all.
No one–I’m certainly not saying that women shouldn’t take precautions to protect themselves, but that’s a mere ‘band aid’ solution to the problem. The root of the problem here is that we barely or don’t at all take steps to educate young men about sexual violence prevention. While girls and young women are lectured on what not to do in certain scenarios in social settings, what do we do with the guys? Why are we so afraid to lecture them on “why they shouldn’t rape or sexually assault?” Why do we keep making up excuses for their behavior and crimes, but continue to scold the female victims for their attack? Boys will be boys; a tenet of the Rape Culture. Steve Gilliard’s post on the missing young woman in Aruba and his comment are prime examples of how we make up excuses for guys’ behavior towards women, and expect women to foresee their own attack. Never mind the guys’ responsibility in the attack at all–that doesn’t count.
I don’t think it’s not so much that “she got what she deserve”, but a media refusal to look at their conduct and say these girls were placed in a less than optimal situation. I would also bet no one had an honest discussion with them about acting like adults and making adult choices. Of course not. It was a “Christian” school. So they could get drunk, fuck any cute boy and no one would say things like:
“Be careful. Don’t just go off with any cute boy. He may not act that cute when you’re alone.”
“Carry condoms and lube”
“When you get drunk, you tend to make shitty decisions. So stick together and don’t let someone go off alone.”
Now, I’ve always been confused as to why a girl would go off with three guys. Was she going to pull a train? Or did she have two spare sex organs for them to use? Because otherwise, that sounds like a really bad decision. One which she should have been warned against. Boys in groups tend to do things they wouldn’t do alone. And the expectation of sex must have been high.
And we continue to gloss over the perpetrators and focus our blame squarely on the victim. Yes she didn’t make very good decisions but how does that warrant rape or sexual assault? How are rape and sexual assault “okay” decisions for guys? It’s okay to rape or sexually assault if the young woman made a poor decision? Is that what we tell guys? And his comment…
[…] Because you can’t tell someone to not brutalize women. Most men won’t do that, but if they do, you can’t say “hey, you know rape is wrong”. Most guys know that. The ones that don’t aren’t going to listen to a lecture.
The best we can do is say “look, some guys are assholes and you need to watch out for them.”
Now, you can tell boys that it isn’t OK to screw the drunk or hit women, but most guys aren’t going to do that anyway. But the problem for women is the guys that do and dealing with them.
[…]
I think women have a more idealistic view of men than men do. Chris Rock summed it up: “if a man comes up to you over the age of 13 and asks you if you want help, he’s saying ‘you want some dick with that?’
Women tend to resist the idea that most men size them up sexually. I can assure you that if there’s a boy in your daughter’s life and he’s a “friend”, he’s either not interested in her, or is just biding his time. But the idea of sex has crossed his mind.
The same applies to all your coworkers and opposite sex friends. If they’re straight, they have either thought about having sex with you or reasons why they shouldn’t.
But the issue is on the table.
Have you ever been out with a friend and then suddenly he got grabby or romantic and you didn’t expect it. Now, you might have written that off, but it happens because men rate women sexually, and that one time might be the time he actually acted on his feelings.
So when I say men will do anything for sex, I’m not just saying that. It’s observed behavior.
We continue to ignore the elephant in the room whenever we talk about sexual violence and prevention. We conveniently forget all about the perpetrator and focus on the [female] victim, and lecture them on why it’s all their fault. So much for those karate lessons and pepper spray–it’s still your fault. Gee, why don’t we just come out and say, “well if you didn’t have a vagina you wouldn’t have been attacked.” That’s the hint if you really think about.
And here are some questions about violence to ponder, that ties into our rape culture. Via V-Day: Until The Violence Stops…
What frightens you about giving up violence?
What are you afraid of losing?
What do you secretly like about violence?
How will sex change when there is no more violence?
What stories will you have to give up when you give up violence? what parts of your past will you have to release?
Why do you think ending violence is impossible?
Do you know anywhere in the world where there is no violence? describe.
Do you know anyone who truly lives non-violently? describe.
What is violence?
Where does it come from?
Do you believe violence is part of human nature?
Do you believe violence is taught?
What is the relationship of violence to patriarchy?
Do you think violence has to do with race, class, a particular place?
What would have to change in the world in order to end violence?
What would have to change in you in order to end violence?
What makes you violent?
What stops you from being violent?
Who has been violent towards you?
How did this change who you are?
Do you believe it is possible to end violence? why? why not?
You may believe what you want, piny, but I think that we want to believe ourselves incapable of violence because it helps us sleep at night. There comes a point where methinks some just protest too much.
If we return to the race issue, acknowledging capacity for rape is the same as acknowledging receiving the benefits of white privilege – claiming that you’re not a racist becasuse you don’t burn crosses doesn’t help anyone. Ditto claiming that you can’t imagine a scenario where you could rape someone, so therefore you’re not a potential rapist.
As a woman, I can’t afford to believe you. I’ve heard it before.
Umm… not to split hairs, but aren’t “capacity” to commit a violent act and the society one lives in two different things ?
I’d be the first to agree that I benefit from having White skin, that I’ve done stupid, thoughtless things as a result of racism, etc. But, no, I would never burn a cross on somebody’s lawn, even if I am racist by dint of racist acts. All racist acts, from confusing one Black person for another because “they all look alike” to cross-burnings, are part of one continuum. They all take place in a racist society. But they are not identical acts. They do not have identical results, and the latter would indicate a great deal more malice than the former.
Thomas
Thank you for the great example. You saved me the trouble of having to come up with one of my own!
Slightly off the main topic but still relevant – I used to be very much involved in the S&M scene in London, and that’s the one and only place in which I’ve never felt even the slightest fear of rape. The whole idea of mutuality and knowing EXACTLY what your partner does and doesn’t want is so ingrained into the culture that the idea that someone might try to do something against my will just never occurred to me. Another thing I noticed is that in that scene men as well as women stringently police the whole idea of consent ie the idea that it’s the job of women to be the gatekeepers and that men just can’t be expected to exercise any self-discipline just isn’t prevalant. Which to me proves that anyone who claims that gender roles are inherant, men are unable to learn not to rape etc is talking crap. I’ve seen the proof.
The mainstream has some wierd ideas about S&M though. One anecdote that shows how deep the whole gender roles brainwashing goes. I was once sitting in a bar having drinks with a few male co-workers who I was pretty friendly with. Somehow we got onto the subject of S&M. One of the guys was spouting off about how dangerous it all was and how I as a tiny little woman was crazy to even think about getting involved. It wasn’t until we were well into this conversation that one of the guys said something about how I would be so vulnerable when I was all tied up that I realised that they were all assuming that I must be a sub. When my answer was “but I’m a dom, I would never be in that position anyway” they all looked at me like I had two heads until finally one broke the silence and said “but you’re a girl…”
Which is funny because most of the subs I know are men.
And Alsis – I don’t get the “I was drunk” thing either. Smoking pot makes me horny, booze just makes me chatty and inclined to spill a lot of info that I should probably keep to myself (see above co-worker example).
Ginmar, you said
“I forsee another round of people complaining about how it’s unfair for them to be sandbagged when they answered a question honestly. The answer was honestly revolting. ”
I’m curious if you were referring to my intial freaked-out response to Robert’s posting. I got several “how can you say that!” responses in a row and genuinely didn’t understand why, as I thought my response was a lot less harshly worded than it could have been.
Tuomas – this isn’t directed at you since I think you and I have already figured out what both of us were actually trying to say.
Actually, that analogy is as flawed as the analogy between “Calls self vegan but would eat flesh if starving to death,” and, “Calls self not a rapist.”
Saying you’d never burn crosses on someone’s lawn is not the same kind of pr0testation as saying that you do never and would never benefit from white privilege or engage in racism. The former is a specific act; the latter two are broad categories that the speaker and hearer might not agree on. One benefits from white privilege merely by being white; one is not a rapist merely by virtue of being male, although men do benefit from rape culture.
When a man says that he would never rape a woman, and you know that you both define “rape” the same way, it’s irrelevant that things might be different under circumstances so extreme as to be virtually impossible. What he would do is nowhere near as important as what he will do. It would be valid to dispute a man who says that he has never benefited from male privilege, engaged in sexism, or been complicit in rape culture, but that’s still not the same as saying that he would commit rape under extreme circumstances.
If you are saying–as you now seem to be–that you _don’t believe_ men when they say that they would not commit rape under normal circumstances, then that’s different. If that’s your position, then concentrating on the potential for human abuse and violence in situations that none of the men here have to deal with–partly because they are men in a culture which privileges and protects men–makes no sense. Like I said, rape is not something that happens in extremis.
Kim
“Interesting thing to say, it reminded me of a ‘discussion’ I had on another board last year. I had replied to a thread discussing sex, most of it a bunch of men od’ing in bravado, and I said something along the lines of ‘well when I fuck my husband blah blah’. It was met with a kind of uncomfortable shock. I got chastised, as well as a few choice words being tossed my way”
What do you mean by “chastised”? I ask because whenever I talk about sex (in person rather than online- I don’t talk about sex online much at all) I always use the active voice, ie I fucked person A, rather than person A fucked me.
The only time I ever use passive terms is if I’m referring to receiving oral. And I’ve heard a few uncomfortable silences, but I don’t think anyone has ever actually scolded me. Maybe it’s because they know me and they know that I would mock them without mercy if they did. What exactly did they say to you?
Regarding the Nazi example that Amp raised, I actually do believe that some people know what they would and wouldn’t want to do in terms of abusing power. For example – I lived in Libya as a child, and also in Saudi Arabia. In both of those places most men could have gotten away with doing pretty much anything they wanted to the women in their lives. Rape definately, even murder. And yet there were many men who I knew well who didn’t do these things and who treated their wives and daughters (and their sons, who are also relatively powerless in that environment while they’re children) even though they knew beyond a doubt that they could get away with it. Most of the people I knew there(women as well as men, even kids) also had servants who, again, they had almost absolute power over and could have easily gotten away with mistreating. And yet, very few of them did. So, I suppose that I have more faith the basic decency of most people because I’ve seen people who have the opportunity to abuse power and choose not to do it. Not because they’re afraid of being punished, but because they don’t want to.
Britgirl, that was in refernce to Robert’s remark. Also the original sin thing from somewhere squicked me out. But that’s a whole other issue—-Eve, temptation, anybody see some probelms with this?
I don’t understand what the deal is with theory, frankly. Rape isn’t like stealing food or medicine. Is rape higher or lower on Maslow’s pyramid? Rape isn’t a survival need. It won’t kill you to not rape. That’s what’s squicking me out.
Brit, you are welcome to it, but I will warn zuzu made up the phrase Pussy Oversoul.
Alsis,
<inexcusable thread drift> Never apologize for bringing up MST3k. Just the MST3k Mole People episode alone is clearly relevant to any possible subject on this or any other blog, pilgrim</inexcusable thread drift>
“It’s that whole “‘no’ means ‘no,’ but we’re not going to teach you what a ‘yes’ is for fear that you’ll actually have sex”? issue. It encourages men to treat anything but an unequivocal rejection as an invitation, and means that a lot of people who don’t think of themselves as rapists are doing an awful lot of harm. ”
Bingo. I think that it would be a very productive feminist project to try to teach people what a real “yes” looks like, and to try to shift the consent standard to that instead of “well she’s not threatening to call the cops so it must be fine to proceed”. This would also mean teaching women that they have a RIGHT to say yes as well as teaching men what that looks like.
>>I don’t understand what the deal is with theory, frankly. Rape isn’t like stealing food or medicine. Is rape higher or lower on Maslow’s pyramid? Rape isn’t a survival need. It won’t kill you to not rape. That’s what’s squicking me out.>>
Yes, exactly. Nor does it usually occur in situations where the rapist’s otherwise-active moral center is overriden by some kind of aberrant circumstance. It’s usual, commonplace, mundane: women are normally vulnerable and men are normally in a position to take advantage. Your average rapist is a guy at a party or on a date. He doesn’t have to concern himself with the violence he’s capable of any more than a vegan has to concern himself with the eat-flesh-or-starve question during a trip to the grocery store. That’s why all of these Philosophy and Human Ethics 101 scenarios are so…weird. And a wee bit unsettling.
And why all these potentialities where the rapist’s autonomy is compromised, or where the rapist is threatened with injury or death? I don’t really care what a man would do if the gun were pointed at his head. That’s not how it works.
AndiF
“and though the “Would I rape”? discussion has drifted off into extreme circumstances, back in the real world the more likely question probably is “Would I call what I did rape?”?
Excellent idea. I know I keep repeating this, but I still think it’s the crux of the matter. I think that the majority of men who rape define what they did as “Not rape”, and that’s the real issue.
Jake
“I believe that not understanding that other people have feelings & emotions & physical sensations just like you is what allows people to rape & kill & oppress & torture and all the other billions of horrible things that people do to each other.’.
Precisely. A long way back at the beginning of this discussion someone (I think it was Tuomas) thought that I was saying all rapists are crazy. I don’t think that they’re crazy in the “need to be in an institution because they are liable to jump off a building because they think they can fly” sense, but crazy in the sense that whatever part of the brain it is that allows us to empathise with other people and react to their pain and fear does not appear to be working properly.
I think the reason all these bad things happen so often in war, or in cases like the Janjaweed, is because the victims have been quite explicitely defined as “not people”. Which also partly explains why in our culture rape happens to women (and children) more often than it happens to men.
BritGirl,
Naturally I agree. While there are certainly men who intend to rape and hurt women but more of them are ones who accept this idea that fucking is something that men do to the women they decide are fuckable. These men aren’t likely to believe that they’ve committed rape. Instead, I think they see it as just ‘bad sex’ as if it was just one of those instances where the woman didn’t climax.
And why all these potentialities where the rapist’s autonomy is compromised, or where the rapist is threatened with injury or death? I don’t really care what a man would do if the gun were pointed at his head. That’s not how it works.
Gee, because it lets them off the hook, maybe? Keeps the idea of rape away from the norm, away from them, lets them not think about it as part of the day to day lives of people? Of women?
I notice nobody here has come up with real-life hypotheticals that would strike too close to home.
My son was accused of rape.
My daughter was raped.
My best buddy who, okay, tells sexist jokes, was accused of rape.
My best buddy was accused of rape by this total slut!
My brother, my uncle, myself—we were all accused of rape, and we didn’t use guns or anything, but, hey, she didn’t say no, really, c’mon, she was into it for a while there—
Yeah, it’s all Rwanda and Nazis, and nobody here lives in Africa or has a time machine.
Interesting fact–Steve’s girlfriend came into the thread at his place and said that no matter how hard she followed instructions to prevent her colds, she still got them. She likened people’s tut-tutting of her for not “taking care” of herself when she takes scrupulous care of herself to the way people treat rape victims. Despite this, one commenter who blamed the girl and her parents for the rape seemed to think Jen was siding with him. I don’t see it myself, but it’s worth checking out. Towards the bottom.
Can I make a sugestion to get this thread back onto a more potentially productive thread? How about if we’re going to talk about whether men would or would not rape we stick to whether they would do so in the circumstances in which most rapes actaully happen (meet drunken stranger at the bar or party, someone you’re already involved with decides on a specific occasion that she doesn’t want to fuck right now, girl you’ve been flirting with for months at work and you are alone together and you make a move and she pushes you away)? Because I don’t think there’s much point to talking about extreme circumstances, since we all now that’s not how most rapes happen.
Also, about the survival analogies…this is bullshit. Killing in order to eat, in order to save your own life etc is in no was similar to rape. Food, not allowing yourself to be shot etc are matters of life or death. Going without sex isn’t fatal. Like I said before, men have hands too.The survival analogy isn’t really relevant.
Sorry if that last post sounded preachy. by the way. Everyone is of course entitled to express their opinions, I just thing it would be more useful to talk about rape in the context where it typically occurs. Also I think we’ve been arguing apples and oranges – the “what I might hypothetically do if I were a Janjaweed” group versus the “what I would actually do in real life group.
Good point, BritGirl. I started a thread at Pandagon so that men could express their frustrations with other men for acting like assholes and moving onto the next step–how to turn those frustrations into action. Rape thrives in large part because men casually condone the attitudes to perpetuate it, like Steve did when he said that a girl who is alone with three guys should be able to play train or whatever. A lot of men are appalled by statements like that but are afraid to speak up. I think that’s a useful vein to mine for productive action.
I would not rape someone in ordinary circumstances. Rape is morally wrong, for a variety of reasons; most immediately, because it contravenes another person’s will over something which their will ought ordinarily to control.
However, I would not characterize my belief that I would not rape in absolute terms. If other men say they know their own potentialities so well that they can speak in absolute terms, then civility requires me to take them at their word; though, if I had something on the line other than politeness, that belief would be entirely superficial and I would be very open to contradictory evidence.
Here’s a radical plan of action for (sexually active straight) men to try that would take care of the “consent” issue and strike a blow against the cultural view of women as passive “receivers” to boot: next time you find yourself in an intimate situation with a woman that seems as though it’s about to progress into sex, instead of plastering yourself all over her like an overeager puppy, make her come and get it. Sit back, smile seductively and invite her to take you as she will. Take your own clothes off, not hers. Better yet, invite her to take your clothes off. Don’t make the first move — hell, even try putting your hands over your head and not touching her at all until she asks you to.
This foreplay strategy certainly flies against all social conditioning men receive to be the instigators and “doers” during sex, and the conditioning women receive to sit back and not actively express their desire/pleasure. It also forces the woman to make a clear decision and send a clear message.
Sure, she might get turned off. She might say no. She might not be able to get over her own inhibitions and preconceived notions of how men and women should behave. And the answer might have been no all along, regardless. But if she says yes, you know it’s a yes, because she’s the one reaching for you.
Not necessarily applicable in all situations, but it could be interesting and informative for men to experiment with taking a more “passive” role and allowing themselves to be “taken” and enjoyed, instead of being the “doer” all the time. I know lots of men already engage with women this way as part of their normal repertoire of sexual behaviors/styles without even giving it much thought, but many more would be stepping far over their comfort zones to act the way women more often do.
Amanda
Good idea, will check out the thread on Pandagon later, and I hope it doesn’t get hijacked by trolls. Do you have any way to bounce trolls if they do start to overwhelm the discussion?
Robert
This time I agree with you. In fact it would probably have been better to be more specific about what I meant in my original question.
I don’t like absolutes either because I can usually think of an exception. For example, in general I am not inclined towards murder. I find it morally repugnant. However, if I had a child and someone hurt or killed that child I admit that the thought might cross my mind, even though I like to hope I wouldn’t act on it.
Giselle, I’m sorry but I don’t see how your line of thinking differs significantly from that of the people at Gilliard’s site. You’re treating rape like its the natural product of being a man. Like I need to be in a 12-step program just so I won’t run around raping women. I’m really personally offended at the suggestion that saying I cannot rape a woman makes me MORE suspect or is in any way an easy way out.
SOME men may just use it as a knee-jerk response, but that doesn’t mean it cannot be a fair response. I don’t say I can’t rape a woman because I just don’t want to think about it. I say it because I have seen what rape does to a woman. I have seen the impact of it up close and personal and I have seen it far too often. I don’t make excuses for men. But I do believe that on sobering self-reflection that I can say that I would never rape anyone. I believe that I can say that it disgusts and horrifies on me on such a base level that it simply will never happen. And I feel that is a point that men can come to honestly.
The whole arguement here was not about giving rapists an excuse. What better excuse than to treat rape as the inevitable product of gender. Something every man must live with every day of his life. This is only going to discourage men from participating in the discussion and being engaged to take proactive steps in their own lives and in the lives of those around them to stop rape. The situation you present sounds hopeless. If I were to believe it, I don’t know how I could function. Under constant fear that I would commit such an act. We may all have a darkness in our hearts, but I don’t think its fair to say we are all capable of horrible evil. What we must realize is that there is nothing innate about us which prevents evil. It is our will and mind which prevents it. It is knowing rape. Knowing evil. This is what can allow us to say, no. That is not who I am. I don’t see how we can have a conversation on how some men self-justify rape if we conclude its something we all can do. If we are all the same, what hope is there? If we cannot make ourselves into something different, what can hope to achieve? The first step is not admitting you have a problem. I think its wrong to create a culture of presumed evil and I think this only sends people away from the discussion. It makes it easier for them to dismiss the matter out of hand. We need to get men to confront rape, not on the premise that they must be constantly aware of their rapist tendancies, but because knowing rape can prevent rape. Knowing the horror of it, knowing the consequences, this is what can undo rationalizations of rape. This is what will weaken the attempts at self-justification. And I think it is perfectly fair for a man to conclude through such introspection and understanding that he cannot do this. I think its what he must conclude.
Branding all men as potential rapists just strikes me as non-productive. I don’t think its going to spark reflection. I think its going to spark the kind of easy denial you say is so wrong. If that’s the framework of a discussion of rape, I know I wouldn’t participate because it strikes me as fundamentally wrong. Men can rape. Men have this power. No. Saying “no, not I” should not be the first step for a man confronting this issue. But I absolutely think it can be the last step. And I think the men who have expressed that in this thread have come to this place through thoughful deliberation of the issue of rape and from experiences with people in our lives who have been victims of rape. I do think the end of that journey can be a self-awareness that one is incapable of rape. Not through their natural state, but through their understanding and awareness of it. At a basic level, are men capable of rape? Obviously. But that’s no reason to call it a cop out should any man who concludes that the cannot, must not, commit rape.
I don’t think its fair to say we are all capable of horrible evil…
What we must realize is that there is nothing innate about us which prevents evil.
I have to admit, this formulation confuses me. It’s not fair to say that we can all commit horrible evil, but it’s nonetheless true?
If we are all the same, what hope is there? If we cannot make ourselves into something different, what can [we] hope to achieve?
This is a standard crisis point for the non-theist. Your conclusion follows with inexorable logic from your premises. However, your conclusion is intolerable to you. You’re left with three possibilities:
1) decide that logic is invalid, load a bowl, and stop thinking about it
2) embrace the (nihilistic and evil) conclusion and give up on humanity, or
3) abandon one or more of the premises.
Good luck with it.
(I am assuming you are a non-theist because of the philosophical predicament you lay out. It’s easily resolved by theists, very hard for non-theists. Apologies if I’m misreading you.)
Gisele:
“If we return to the race issue, acknowledging capacity for rape is the same as acknowledging receiving the benefits of white privilege – claiming that you’re not a racist becasuse you don’t burn crosses doesn’t help anyone.”
It’s not quite the same thing. Receiving the benefits of white privilege is probably more analogous to receiving the benefits of male privilege. And I don’t quite see “capacity for rape” as a male *privilege* (I suppose “capacity to live one’s life without fearing being raped” might be, but even then I’m not quiet comfortable with defining a right as a privilege).
Robert, you leave out:
4) Conclude that we are not incapable of making ourselves something different, that we are not all the same.
5) Everything that BStu says after your second quote from him.
Hope your theist superiority mode of thought works out well for you.
“Hope your theist superiority mode of thought works out well for you.”
He’s pulling that shit again? First he ‘kinda-sorta-but-not-really-but-still’ drops hints of being a potential rapist and now this–again? Come on!
No superiority involved. Theistic philosophies are going to be better at handling some kinds of problems than non-theistic philosophies; this is one of them. Non-theistic philosophies have their own unique advantages.
Of course, if your commitment to non-theism is shaky enough that you view any articulation of a different worldview as an attempt to assert superiority, or vice versa, then you’re probably not going to see it that way. They don’t read a lot of Nietschze at Oral Roberts University. It was not my intention to claim the higher ground; I simply see someone struggling with a problem that a lot of people end up struggling with.
P-A, do you believe that all-slash-most men are potential rapists? And if you do believe that, then your attempted slam at me for acknowledging that I am indeed prone to the sins and crimes that beset our species is based on what, exactly?
If you don’t believe that, then I’d be genuinely interested to see how you integrate the belief with your other espoused philosophies.
“And if you do believe that, then your attempted slam at me for acknowledging that I am indeed prone to the sins and crimes that beset our species is based on what, exactly?”
Your past comments on this thread. Apparently, some are more prone then others, as you demonstrated with your comments and personal sentiments within them. Potentiality is one thing. But your willingness (or how strong or weak is your proneness) to act on it and fulfill that, is quite another thing. I should have focused on the issue of the strength or weakness of ‘proneness’ rather than the pontentiality. My_bad.
However your comments leads me (and has led others) to believe that since you seem to have such a low opinion of humanity in general, acknowledge humanity’s capability to commit such horrors (which is true, it happens) but seem to believe that we’re far too barbaric and “sinful” at heart to exercise restraint (and hope your deity will forgive you for it and if that happens then all is well and no skin off your back because you were forgiven by your deity), or exercising restraint is futile due to the strong “sinful” urges of human nature (and why bother when your deity will forgive you anyway), then you in particular are very prone to commit violence–such as rape. Which is why not only are you a “potential rapist” but are pretty damn prone to it as well, given your own sentiments of the nature of humanity–males in this case. Because you know, you just can’t help yourself.
Robert, it ain’t your articulation of a different world view that’s a problem. The problem is your snide and condescending method of articulating that view. The combination of your giving only 3 options for resolution of a view that isn’t yours while ignoring what BStu had to say after the snippet you quoted with, “Good Luck with it,” is both disingenuous and dismissive. I honestly don’t care if you pray to the Easter Bunny. I do care about your dismissiveness and false representation of the possible conclusions of what BStu had to say.
BStu wrote the following. All I can say is, Amen. THIS is how we start addressing the problem.
“The whole arguement here was not about giving rapists an excuse. What better excuse than to treat rape as the inevitable product of gender. Something every man must live with every day of his life. This is only going to discourage men from participating in the discussion and being engaged to take proactive steps in their own lives and in the lives of those around them to stop rape. The situation you present sounds hopeless. If I were to believe it, I don’t know how I could function. Under constant fear that I would commit such an act. We may all have a darkness in our hearts, but I don’t think its fair to say we are all capable of horrible evil. What we must realize is that there is nothing innate about us which prevents evil. It is our will and mind which prevents it. It is knowing rape. Knowing evil. This is what can allow us to say, no. That is not who I am. I don’t see how we can have a conversation on how some men self-justify rape if we conclude its something we all can do. If we are all the same, what hope is there? If we cannot make ourselves into something different, what can hope to achieve? The first step is not admitting you have a problem. I think its wrong to create a culture of presumed evil and I think this only sends people away from the discussion. It makes it easier for them to dismiss the matter out of hand. We need to get men to confront rape, not on the premise that they must be constantly aware of their rapist tendancies, but because knowing rape can prevent rape. Knowing the horror of it, knowing the consequences, this is what can undo rationalizations of rape. This is what will weaken the attempts at self-justification. And I think it is perfectly fair for a man to conclude through such introspection and understanding that he cannot do this. I think its what he must conclude.”
Oh, and Robert, on BStu’s comment, I’m an atheist and his thinking makes perfect sense to me. One need not believe in God in order to have a clear sense of morality.
A point I made earlier but no one has picked up on.
We blame people who are the victims of horrible acts (rapes, murders) or occurrences (floods, fires) partly because it reassures us that it won’t happen to us.
“Oh, that girl got raped. But she was slutty anyway, so it was bound to happen. Lucky for me, I/my daughter/my sister am not slutty, so I don’t need to worry that it will happen to me/my daughter/my sister. “
I have to admit, this formulation confuses me. It’s not fair to say that we can all commit horrible evil, but it’s nonetheless true?
You mistake me. I acknowledge that humanity has shown the capability of evil. Therefore I reject the notion that we can simply assume ourselves to be incapable of acts of extreme depravity. That doesn’t mean it is wrong for an individual to confront the issue and come to the conclusion that they are not capable of such acts. Human potential is a very different thing than an individual’s potential. We shouldn’t make the mistake of dismissing the notion of doing evil, but we should also not feel bound to such potential. We have the freedom of will to compel us to act differently.
This is a standard crisis point for the non-theist. Your conclusion follows with inexorable logic from your premises. However, your conclusion is intolerable to you.
Pardon me, but I believe if you read above you will see that I do reach my own conclusion. I do believe we can make ourselves into something more through self-reflection. If I was a theist, I might refer to this action as prayer or meditation. I can see that humans of committed great acts of evil and those acts disgust and horrify me at a basic level. I do not shy away from confronting those acts. I feel it is vital to understand them and to understand the horror that lies in their wake. I do not dismiss the human potential for rape. I confront it so that I can reject it. Humans are also clearly capable of great acts of kindness and good. You have concluded that evil is our natural state, while good is not. I can see that neither is a natural state. We are shaped partly by genetics, yes, but also by the world around us and our understanding of that world. We are not slaves to biology. We have our minds and our wills to shape who we are and what actions we will take. And it is perfectly appropriate to conclude that there are some actions we simply will not take.
Now, maybe my Catholic education deceived me, by I seem to recall my theology professors touching on the subject of free will. The idea that God has endowed humanity with the ability to think and act for oneself. How is it not possible for a person of faith to conclude they are incapable of rape through their own thoughful contemplation and prayer on the matter?
You were right that I am not a theist. I am agnostic and have been for all of my life. However, your reasoning was nevertheless flawed. A person of faith could easily view these issues in much the same way as I do, although with different guiding principles. But not as different as you seem to imagine. I am thankful for my Christian friends who do not dismiss me in such a manner for my own acts of concience.
Though, I do admit I got quite a laugh from your “I’m not superior. I’m just better,” self-justification. Rather made it worth it, I would say. I’m glad you find faith valuable to your own life, but I will thank you not to presume to know what is best for me. That you have found morality through your chosen path is by no means an indication that it will be impossible or even more difficult to find it by my path. I’m not going to engage in a moral philosophy measuring contest, so I will simply say that I am quite satisfied with my beliefs.
Sorry I failed to close an HTML tag there.
“Sorry I failed to close an HTML tag there.”
It’s okay, I got it BStu.
What does having the ability to do something have to do with accountability and respect for others? Whether or not one is capable of evil has nothing to do with subjecting another person to something against their will. It is wrong to act in a way that causes harm or restricts someone’s freedom and integrity. It doesn’t make any difference if it is war and you have the bigger guns and a certain moral imperative (all war is evil in my mind), or if one is independent, weaker, stupid, trusting, honest, or showing poor judgment. There is no justification to forcing sex, (which is more about control, dominance and violence) theft, lying or any other deception that harms another, especially over the weaker ones.
It is obvious that many men are unclear, and see a role they seem to ascribe to, and believe that it is threatened and needs to be defended. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could come in off the margins and let it be OK, and in the process stop marginalizing women? What a relief that would be, so much wasted energy and happiness. We wouldn’t need 200+ blog entries trying to rationalize an indefensible position. Just think of the possibilities of another half of the population made available to be friends and coworkers in the fields, instead of someone to fear.
Well, obviously I didn’t make my intention or meaning clear. However, it’s also obvious that its a complete digression from the main line of discussion, so rather than keep yakkin’ about it, I’ll drop the matter with “sorry, Btsu, no offense was intended”.
Blast. BStu, not Btsu. Me smart. Me goed kolege.
Gisele (re: 191) – yes of course even the strictest vegetarian would eat meat if it was the last thing available and the only alternative to starving. It wouldn’t be a rationalisation, it would be a real necessity. I just don’t see how rape is in the category of necessity!
I thought of that example of people who are genuinely repelled by the idea of eating animals because of the nature of that repulsion, which is not just or even necessarily physical; it’s repulsion at the idea of harming a living being even if it’s not human. Maybe some people are vegetarian by fashion; maybe because of diet reasons; maybe because of a lot of other ‘superficial’ reasons; but many do genuinely dislike the thought of harming animals, period.
Point was, there is such a thing as a genuine desire *not* to harm others. Sure I agree with being suspicious of people who say they could or would never do anything bad or cruel to anyone and only see themselves as good and generous and nice, but that’s not the question here, no one was saying such a thing; the question is specifically rape.
The question “would I do it?” doesn’t mean “would I be capable of doing it at all” but “would I want to do it”. Otherwise, why ask that question at all. Everyone is theoretically capable of anything; murderers are often the nicest neighbours (“oh I could have never guessed!”). Not everyone has to the same desires to do the same things, though.
Not everyone even has the same ‘heart of darkness’. Some people’s heart of darkness is more suicidal rather than homicidal; depressive rather than aggressive; masochist rather than sadist. They’d sooner hurt themselves than others. Anyone could ‘flip’ and do horrible things, to themselves and/or others, of course. No one comes with safety instructions and there is no neat divide between ‘normal’ and ‘sick’ people, only between healthy and sick behaviour. But in every day life, which is where rapes do occur, and where rapists do get away with it, as you unfortunately know from personal experience, well there is no such extreme ‘flip’ switch. Rapes are the most ordinary crime sadly.
To translate “would I do it if I could get away with it” as “would I do it if I flipped/if I was in an extreme situation where my personality was fundamentally altered/if I was living in a completely lawless society and had no sense of empathy or humanity” is to turn the question into a silly game. Plus, no extreme scenario ever justifies the condition of “necessity” by which people can be forced to alter their desires, behaviour and moral codes (as in the vegetarian example).
I’m just wondering, again, out of sheer curiosity, how can anyone envisage a situation in which rape would suddenly become something they would do (would want to do), without meaning they do think it’s an extreme version of sex, so that it becomes an extreme form of necessity or desire, like a substitute for sex.
And I don’t have to be a man to wonder about that question too. It’s not like women are incapable of picturing themselves as doing something usually and predominantly done by men. It’s not like we can’t crack the mentality behind rape unless we’re man and/or rapists. We should all shut up if it was so and only let certified rapists speak to enlighten us.
And yes, women rape too, just like children kill their parents. It’s a bit rare for it to register in the debate about rape. Plus, we’re talking specifically of men raping women.
On the one hand, the attitude of saying “only some men do it, most don’t” in the way Steve Gilliard put it is a convenient excuse to avoid all social and cultural notions that allow rapists to get away with it, socially and legally, or their actions to be put in the background while we counter-examine the victim’s lifestyle. It’s a way to put it down entirely to individuals and to individual responsibility and avoid looking at the bigger picture. But it does not follow that we should equate “every man is capable of rape” or “there is a mentality that allows men to get away with rape” with “every man would rape if only they could get away with it”. That assumes that rape is an extension of sexual desire; that it’s a “temptation”, that it’s a desire as natural as wanting to fuck, and only a strict sense of morals or Christian notions of a punishing God would restrain you from doing it. That’s bullshit. That’s a puritan, hypocrite notion of morals. It’s also a reinforcement of the notion of rape as a natural, biological inclination or urge that’s part and parcel of male sexuality and needs to be tamed. That is what I personally call righteousness, the idea that refraining from harm is all about morals one has imposed on one’s unruly nature. Look at me, I’m a sinner, but I make a great effort at domesticating the wolf in me.
Well, I don’t believe in that concept of morals, I don’t believe in the good/evil dichotomy in Christian or Bushian terms, and I don’t believe refraining from harm is a simple matter of having an external restraint whose removal would turn us automatically into wolves. I don’t quite believe anyone is born automatically 100% good and saintly, or 100% evil bastard. There’s varying degrees of good and bastard in everyone. I do believe in both individual responsibility and social and cultural influences; I do believe, barring extreme cases and circumstances etc. etc., in the ordinary, we all, or most of us, have a capacity for empathy which is necessary for our own survival, not just for social life. What can silence, or kill, or manipulate that empathy is not a lack of restraint, but ideology, especially the us/them mentality. Which is, IMHO, the real “heart of darkness” that leads to violence, rape, wars, etc.
I don’t think saying “who me? oh no I’d never ever do that” is necessarily to be taken at face value; but denying it’s even possible to be truly repelled by doing harm to others (or calling it ‘righteousness’) is denying the existence of empathy, which is independent of a belief in the existence of a god. Actually, I think people who deny the existence of god can often have a lot more empathy with others because they don’t need an external validation for it.
(I’m not responding only to Gisele, of course, but to a series of points in the discussion.)
piny – I think it’s equally important to recognize how strained some of these scenarios are. It’s like the “Well, what if you knew that this particular suspect wasn’t only a suspect but a confirmed terrorist operative”“no, um, wait, wait, actually, he’s Osama bin Laden himself!”“and he knows the locations of several nuclear devices planted by his followers in major metropolitan areas all over the country! Some under orphanages and petting zoos! And there was no other way to find the bombs in time! And he’s a total wuss, really, just turn on the Christina Aguilera and he’ll fold! Then would you use torture?”? argument.
Exactly! And it’s an attempt to validate the use of torture.
(Piny, you’re only slightly exaggerating some of the hypotheticals used in pro-torture arguments. The famous ticking bomb scenario. )
BStu – Look, I’ll admit that I can’t know a lot of things in an absolute sense. I don’t think I could murder someone, but I can’t say for certain that a hypothetical circumstance couldn’t arise where I might. I don’t think I’ll ever steal, but I know I can’t say it for certain. Rape is different. And I think that’s why a lot of the people here are taken aback by the lack of an absolute answer. I am, too. I functionally understand what motivates the reluctance, but from my personal experience I simply can’t understand how someone could feel that way.
Rape is a sadistic crime. It is not something one does in a passion or out of fear.
Absolutely, that’s what I was thinking too, and thanks for putting it so clearly and perfectly, BStu (I’d missed that comment earlier on).
Rape is a sadistic crime. It is not something one does in a passion or out of fear.
Wouldn’t you say that some fraction of rapes are motivated, partially anyway, by a fear of women? It’s always looked that way from here.
I know this is late — I have a job, family and sleep which require much of my time.
To clarify my statements about 200 posts ago — Amp came to my rescue:
“How many of the mobs who contributed to or directly committed mass-murder and mass-rape in Rwanda would have said, “If I could get away with it, I would rape and murder”? if someone had asked them that in 1990? I bet lots of them would have said “I could never do something like that. I could never rape. I could never kill if it wasn’t self-defense.”?”
I know he may not have wanted to come to my defense, but it is stupid to not acknowlege that people do stupid things when they are drunk. Yes, perhaps you live in the biodome and have never seen people do stupid things when they are drunk, however if you live in Austin I challenge you to say you have never seen people do stupid things when they are drunk.
Also, Jake, who hung me on a spike so I may die an aggravating Aztec conquered tribe death sentence, but managed to support me — of course he then went on to insult me personally:
“Dad shows Junior “Playboy”? when Junior is 5. Dad tells Junior how women are different than men (on the rag, a slave to cock, etc.). In school, Junior’s playmates (who have been taught the same things) reinforce not only these beliefs, but the need to act as if women are a different species. In highschool & college if you don’t talk about how you’d like to fuck this girl or that, you are suspect. When you enter the workforce, on your breaks the guys will ogle women and say things like, “I’d do her.”?
That was my point — we (as in men) cannot change the way men think unless we change the way we raise our men. I am not saying that men are born that way Jake (notice the lack of personal attack everyone — “tact” goes a long way) I am saying that MANY young men ARE that way. It is not because they are wired to think that way (does it really matter — it is just bad enough that enough young men during their early years will do the drunken creep if given the chance. Isn’t that enough?). Most of the problem is the definition of RAPE. If everyone was on the same page on that definition things would work out better. However, personal attacks, name calling does nothing in making it better for women. The best way to reduce sexual assault and other gender issue problems is communication and understanding. You cannot get your point across to the other side unless you understand what the other side is thinking and why. Robert pointed out the problem (not all men Jake, but the one’s who are a problem is what we are talking about)
I am currently prosecuting my 20th date rape case by the way. I have defended many others. So before you criticize me, I can tell you I know what THEY are thinking because I have been able to get both sides of the story. I actually asked my defendants — what the fuck were you thinking! I also tell my victims the problems that they will face, to prepare them for cross-examination. Isn’t it possible when you said on the videotape “I really want to be taped having sex” or the time on the videotape where you were on top and said “This is like a porno; I love pornos!” — isn’t it possible that he could have mistook those phrases for consent? That is how I have to prepare her — am I blaming the victim, no. However, I am trying to make it clear that her STUPID statements may derail the prosecution of this potential sexual predator.
Next time you rail on someone — do a better job of trying to see what they are saying instead of flying off the handle on the first possible negative analysis and calling that person a name.
The castration issue was probably because I have become jaded due to the stupid things I have seen young, immature men do.
I wholeheartedly concur with the suggestion that men need to be taught not only that “no means no” but what constitutes a “yes.”
In discussions about rape, pornography, and sexual harrassment (ie throughout the “pie fights” and the Gillard post that inspired this one), far too many people seems to be operating under not only the assumption that men have more sexual desire than women, but also that women’s sexuality is synonymous with what men find desirable in women. Sexuality is a combination of having sexual desires and being seen as sexually desirable, but the common perception is that male sexuality is defined only by male desires, and that female sexuality is also defined only by male desires.
As others have already pointed out, the false assumption that men need sex but women don’t really even like it all that much makes it easier for many people to argue that focusing only/mainly on victim initiated prevention is not blaming the victim, as if it is simply natural for women to always be on guard and working to abstain from sex. The perception that only male desires define sexuality makes this argument, and other arguements defending rape, easier too, because it ignores the idea that a woman could discover that the encounter being offered was not what she thought it would be, and instead focuses on the stereotypes of women constantly changing their mind or being submissive.
These assumptions also make it easierfor people to see sexual harrassment as merely a side effect of men liking sex, and women not liking it, rather than sexism.
They also allow people to assert that pornography that does objectify women (but not men) is either inevitable or automatically empowering for women, as if being seen as sexual is the same as expressing one’s own sexuality.
A couple of times, BritGirlSF has brought up the question of how men and women define rape, and I’ve been meaning to address that, but it’s difficult. When I was younger, before the first time I’d had sex, I read Andrea Dworkin’s Intercourse and grossly misunderstood it — I actually thought it proved that all sexuality was rape. On a recent rereading, I found it was quite clear that’s not what Dworkin was saying, and I had to wonder why I’d misunderstood it. I think that, having no experience at the time with the reality of sexual activity, I’d simply accepted the widely held belief that men were always active, women always passive, and agreed that that model amounted to an assumption that normal sexuality was rape, and completely failed to understand Dworkin’s suggestion that we could have sex that was an expression of mutual desire.
I had heard women friends describing their sexual desires for men, but I’d never heard anyone describe a sexual experience in which a woman was active. Until my first sexual experience, it had never occurred to me even as an abstract possibility. I was astonished, to say the least, when my first partner initiated sex. I was delighted, but totally surprised.
The notion that woman are always passive, men always active, is incredibly pervasive. There are a few places in Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex where she insists it’s impossible for a woman to enjoy sex unless she’s passive, for instance.
My second sexual partner, also a woman, didn’t have any idea that women could be active in sex. I never touched her without her consent — but I never knew if she really wanted to have sex, and I didn’t get the impression she enjoyed it at all. I tried to be as kind and gentle and giving as I could, but it didn’t seem to help. I gave up trying to have a sexually intimate relationship before long, and I was very upset by the entire experience — I think it’s a large part of the reason I’ve been single ever since.
If the “normal” view of sexuality is male active, female passive, then it’s all too easy to skip over that bit about consent. I think these attitudes are very common, and that often men initiate sex when it’s murky whether consent was actually given.
I think there’s a range of distorted sexual events — from miserable sex with pro forma consent, to sex in which it’s not clear whether consent was given, to sex without consent. Many men, talking about the violence they’d like to see done to rapists, think of rape only in the most extremely violent form — in order to distance themselves from the nagging feeling that they really shouldn’t have had sex with their girlfriend that one time when she was really drunk.
I do think part of the problem is that men and women don’t have a clear sense of what it means to say “yes,” or that women can initiate sex, because it leaves female sexual agency out of the picture. And rape is about denying a women’s agency and autonomy.
>>Gee, because it lets them off the hook, maybe? Keeps the idea of rape away from the norm, away from them, lets them not think about it as part of the day to day lives of people? Of women? >>
Now you’re just being paranoid.
>>piny – I think it’s equally important to recognize how strained some of these scenarios are. It’s like the “Well, what if you knew that this particular suspect wasn’t only a suspect but a confirmed terrorist operative”“no, um, wait, wait, actually, he’s Osama bin Laden himself!”“and he knows the locations of several nuclear devices planted by his followers in major metropolitan areas all over the country! Some under orphanages and petting zoos! And there was no other way to find the bombs in time! And he’s a total wuss, really, just turn on the Christina Aguilera and he’ll fold! Then would you use torture?”? argument.
Exactly! And it’s an attempt to validate the use of torture.
(Piny, you’re only slightly exaggerating some of the hypotheticals used in pro-torture arguments. The famous ticking bomb scenario. )>>
Yup. To be fair, I don’t often hear men objecting to the insistence that men not rape with, “Well, but, but, what if they were gonna murder my whole family? Then I’d have no choice!” This is the first time I’ve ever encountered the drift, and I understand that it’s not a straight-out excuse for rape in the situations we’re actually discussing. But why focus on it? Vegans usually discuss the justice of meat-eating without wondering what would happen if they were marooned on a barren desert island with a chicken.
“…it is stupid to not acknowlege that people do stupid things when they are drunk. Yes, perhaps you live in the biodome and have never seen people do stupid things when they are drunk, however if you live in Austin I challenge you to say you have never seen people do stupid things when they are drunk…”
Trouble is, jstevenson, that doesn’t account for those who manage to not rape anyone while they are drunk. Or do you think that on the occasion that I did go drinking with a male friend, or several male friends, I just got lucky. [shrug] I do regard myself as a lucky woman for never having had a man rape me, but I wouldn’t go so far as to think that the guys I was drinking with who didn’t rape me just happened, by strange coincidence, not to be in a raping mood that day. That would just be too damn strange, even for a natural-born cynic like me.
I tend to agree with others in this thread who said that alcohol might provide an excuse to someone who already intended to prey on someone else, but by itself, no– I don’t think it can do a Jekyll/Hyde number on the average adult man– IF he has a healthy view of sexuality and women.
To compound the confusion of any MRA who might be passing through with his pre-conceived notion of feminists as man-haters, I’d also like to comment on:
“…The castration issue was probably because I have become jaded due to the stupid things I have seen young, immature men do.”
Excpet that castration doesn’t necessarily destroy the urge to rape, if one considers that urge something other than just an amplified sexual urge. I certainly do. Furthermore, it’s tough to imagine how chopping off a rapist’s balls would lead overall to a less violence-oriented relationship between men and women. If anything, I fear it would give rapists one more excuse to indulge their hatred for women. Some clues as to why this might be the case were provided nicely by this thread on the Black Looks blog that talks about a supposed “anti-rape” device and its quite obvious drawbacks as a “training tool” to keep rapists at bay.
http://okrasoup.typepad.com/black_looks/
I’ll back up alsis on the subject of drinking and it’s role in rape. In my exprience drinking doesn’t make anyone do anything that they didn’t already want to do. It lowers inhibitions to be sure, but it doesn’t produce voices in people’s heads telling them to do bad things. In fact I think that many people who drink too much do so precisely because they want to use it as an excuse for doing things they wanted to do anyway. I’ve been around plenty of drunken men in my time, and many of them have indeed tried to make passes at me, but all of them have still been able to understand the meaning of the word “no”.
Brian, thinking of all my own misconceptions about female sexuality when I was younger, I’m not really surprised that young men have so many misconceptions about female sexuality.
you said:
“A couple of times, BritGirlSF has brought up the question of how men and women define rape, and I’ve been meaning to address that, but it’s difficult.”
And I agree, it’s difficult and important.
I grabbed a copy of Dworkin’s “Intercourse” and Susan Brownmiller’s “Against Our Will” to skim during my breaks today. (the joys of working in bookstore – and yes, I got some very odd looks from co-workers) Brownmiller talks about how men and women define rape differently. For women, rape is simply being made to have sex, in any form, when she doesn’t want to. (paraphrased)
I don’t think that men and women would disagree with the that definition of rape, I think that the confusion comes into play with words like “being made” and on what type of burden of proof there is that she doesn’t want to have sex. If she says no, but doesn’t fight, is it still rape? If she didn’t say yes, but didn’t say no either, it is rape? I would say yes, because both deny women agency and autonomy, but I have a feeeling that a lot of people would disagree.
Because, as you said:
“If the “normal”? view of sexuality is male active, female passive, then it’s all too easy to skip over that bit about consent. I think these attitudes are very common, and that often men initiate sex when it’s murky whether consent was actually given.”
When male sexuality is defined as inheirently aggressive and female sexuality is considered to be nothing more than capitulating to male desires, how can you define rape as a violation women’s autonomy? It seems to me that you can’t, and this is a big part of why our culture and legal systems fail so miserably in addressing the problem of rape.
I agree with Alsis on the castration issue…
Also, (I’m not an expert on legal systems but anyway) I think the castration penalty would make it more hard to convict rapists, if the jury thinks the rapist was just a nice guy who made a mistake and victim was a lying slut (or, maybe I should say it would create a certain pressure to see things this way, as I think most people wouldn’t be happy to castrate people unnecessarily). Such change in the law is, IMO, good for nothing without a cultural change to a culture that doesn’t minimize rape and blame the victim.
More rapists would get off the hook, even though those convicted would get a truly memorable punishment (and I fear this would become a matter of getting the best defense lawyer, racial prejudices[ a rapist of “scary” race would probably be convicted more easily] etc.)
And I’m not exactly happy about the idea of cruel physical punishments (though It would be a fitting punisment in some sense, if you ask me), because of pragmatic reasons like irreversibility etc. But that would be a variation of the death-penalty discussion, which is kinda off-topic, and I don’t have interest in it anyway right now.
The threat of severe punishment as a means of preventing rape isn’t likely to be effective. First of all, as the never-dwindling prison population shows, you can’t prevent crime with the threat of punishment. Secondly, the more severe the punishment, the more likely the resistance to prosecution (which is already fairly high). And finally, if a man doesn’t think that what he is doing is rape, then the potential punishment for the act isn’t going to deter him.
I’m all for teaching women not to do stupid things but that advice also isn’t going to do much prevent rape, unless one of the stupid things we are going to avoid is breathing. What’s more I’m not willing to curtail my freedom so men can behave in any way they choose. If I wanted to live like that, I’d move somewhere they had purdah.
The solution is, as has been stated here, better sex education for both men and women from both parents and schools (and the religious institution of your choice should you be so inclined). Any being with the capacity to learn calculus ought to be able to learn to respect each other’s needs, wants, and desires. The real problem is getting society to believe that we should do so.
Brian, thanks for the response. I think we’re starting to get at the heart of the matter here. Which, IMHO, is what we actually mean when we use words like rape and consent. We don’t all mean the same things, and it’s hard to have a conversation when you’re not actually sure what other people mean. Or maybe I just read too much linguistic philosophy!
Still, I think that everyone defining what the terms mean to them is a start. I think that talking about the frames we grew up with (ie the ones that we had before we ever even came close any kind of sexual contact with anyone other than oursleves) would also be a start. The more people’s responses I read on this thread, the more convinced I become that we all have an idea of what we think the words mean and what we think is considered “normal” within our culture, but that each of our ideas of what “normal” is is slightly different.
For the record I have a great deal of respect for Dworkin but I don’t think that anyone should be reading her books at a young age, and certainly not before they have had any real sexual experience. I first read them in college (I started with Men Possessing Women) and in my case I responded with a freak-out so monumental that I was terrified of men for months – even my nice feminist boyfriend, even the guys I’d know for years. Her books scared me, and it was a long time before I could take anything useful away from them rather than just fear. Before anyone jumps all over me please note the stuff I’ve already written about this – I’m not an apologist for rape, or for patriarchy, or for porn. But I do think that Dworkin is heavy stuff that most people just can’t really comprehend until they’re a bit older (and note that it was still too much for me at 18 and I was reading Orwell and A Clockwork Orange at 11). Brian, I’m not surprised that you reacted the way you did, but I’m glad that you went back to it later and were able to make sense of it at that point.
Something that really struck me reading Brian’s post was how different his frames are from mine. (Out of curiosity, how old are you, and where did you grow up?) I don’t recall ever having the idea that women were “supposed” to be passive or that men were in any way “entitled” to sex (which was probably why Dworkin was such a shock to the system). I do recall being taught that it was the man’s “job” to initiate in terms of making the intitial introduction, but the idea that men were supposed to make the first move each and every time in terms of initiating sex definately wasn’t part of my frame. I did get the message that women didn’t necessarily have orgasms and that for some women this was “normal”, but I also got the message that women were supposed to enjoy sex too or why bother doing it? I also always assumed that it was Ok for women to initiate, and it never occured to me that some men might not like it if you did (which interestingly enough I never experienced in the UK, but I’ve heard plenty of women complain about it in the States). But the whole idea that sex is something done by a man to a woman was never part of my frame at all, even as a kid. I think I know why but I’m going to stop babbling at this point as I don’t think anyone’s really interested in my childhood.
I also always assumed the Brownmiller idea of what rape means, ie any sexual act that a woman doesn’t want. The idea that a man could be raped by a woman never occured to me, and I still have trouble imagining how that would work (although sexual assault of the kind Thomas described is pretty easy to imagine and I always assumed that that could potentially be done by anyone to anyone). I still think that idea of rape still sounds right. However, the legal definition of rape is often very different, though, and frankly I think it needs to be brought more into line with the Brownmiller version.
I would be interested to find out what the average male definition of rape is. It’s kind of hard to do this in hypothetical terms though, unless it’s a definiton as simple as the Brownmiller one. If anyone wants to take a crack at it (Brian? Tuomas or Thomas?) please do.
I still think that framing the issue in the terms “sex may proceed as long as the woman consents” is inherently problematic. Firstly, because this frame implies active doer/passive person who is done to. Secondly because it also assumes lack of any real desire for sex on the part of the woman. It just kind of seems like it makes the woman’s body into a toll booth – her only role is to say yes you may pass or no you may not. The idea that she’s a participant is missing. It just doesn’t resemble my real-life experience of sex at all. Where’s the idea of pleasure, or of sharing, hell, even of interaction? Where’s the idea that sometimes the woman can be the dominant party, or that sometimes there actually isn’t really a dominant party? I think that we need to work on reframing this in a big way.
There’s so much discussion here about rape being a result of male sexual desire, which I find a bit hollow, to be honest. I think this is used as an excuse, as discussed, but I sincerely doubt it’s at the heart of the issue.
If you’re fucking someone who’s upset about it – and you get gratification from the experience – that’s a power issue. Like, a way to “Fuck you/Shut up/How could you do that to me?/Take that!” someone.
I do agree that the reason a lot of men get away with their behaviour (to themselves, and to their friends, not in the legal sense) is by pulling the gender get-out-of-jail-free card.
I think the power issue also helps to explain female-female rape, of which I’ve been a victim (but which NEVER FUCKING gets discussed, because many feminists want to sweep it under the rug and pretend it doesn’t exist because it doesn’t fit their 101 of why rape exists).
IMHO, the two questions: “Can you ever imgine yourself torturing someone?” and “Can you ever imagine yourself raping someone?” are very similar.
I worry most about the people that don’t see these questions as more or less equivalent (along with the ones that answer with an enthusiastic “yes!” of course…).
ginmar wrote:
1) I don’t have children, so I’m taking the liberty of changing my son, into my brother. Very unlikely, I might say, but I would wait for the trial and evidence. Maybe I could hear her story as well?
2)Im changing this to a a friend (a woman), all support for her and I would encourage her to press charges. And support her when the inevitable: “she’s a slut” comes (and if I were to hear such stuff from, say, my other friends, they wouldn’t be friends anymore.)
3)Wait for evidence… Dismissing sexist defenses (like if he told me that okay, she said no but you know women really mean yes or shit like that, be suspicious of my best buddy…)
4)Wait for evidence… Not dismissing the case because her sexual promiscuity even if the police/jury does. Actually, that would probably make the rape more likely (easier to get away with, and attitude of “she’s having sex with everyone, so it’s not fair I’m not getting any” -> rape) be suspicious of my best buddy…
5) Now, this would mean I would have been doing stuff I find repulsive/wrong (if we used force/coercion), ditto for my uncle and brother (I would strongly suspect that for my brother and uncle)… That would mean that all of us were different persons than we are, so hypothetical at best… If I were a scumbag like that I’d probably loudly proclaim my innocence, but this is a far-out scenario, even more so than the extreme circumstances discussed earlier (wars etc.).
There… I can discuss situations like this just fine, however, since none of them have happened they too seem hypothetical. This is of course, how I would do things in ideal situations and I’m not sure just how far I would go if it’s against my interests. I would hope that I would do the right thing no matter what (for self-respect among other things).Anyone else care to give it a try, the questions were good…
Of course my best buddy isn’t like that, I don’t hang out only with feminists but neither do I hang out with blatant sexists.
I don’t want to put words in Gisele’s mouth, but I think I understand, in part, what she is saying.
She’s not saying that all men are inevitably rapists, she’s saying that a woman cannot afford to assume that the men with whom she interacts are not rapists. That’s a reasonable statement, at least in my opinion. If you assume that the men you know are all ‘nice guys’ it leaves you very vulnerable to the danger that they are not.
And I don’t think rape is a question of evil at all. I think it’s a question of power. Rapists aren’t evil, with all the dismissive end-of-story connotation that entails. They’re men who, for whatever reason, do not believe that a woman has the right to control. It doesn’t have to be some stalker in an alley- all a rapist has to be is a man who chooses to keep going when his partner doesn’t want to continue. The consequences of that action are terrible and life-altering for the victim, but that doesn’t make that man a mustache-twirling Snidley Whiplash. Somehow that makes it more horrifiying to me.
I really dislike the use of the word evil in most instances, simply because it is such a distancing, Other-signifying kind of word. Evil makes it simple. It’s not simple. A person can be a good friend, a good coworker, a good parent… and a rapist. And not see anything strange about that, unless it’s a guilty, back of the mind rationalisation about how ‘she really wanted it’ or ‘she was just a slut, anyway’ or ‘she was too drunk to know what she was saying’. And calling it evil helps that man put his act even further into the background, after all, he’s not evil! Look, he gives to charity! He cares for his family! Evil makes a Manichean distinction that is unecessary and potentially harmful because every human being likes to think of themself as ‘good’.
Don’t mean to lecture or sound preachy, it’s just one of my pet peeves.
Oh and I hope I didn’t sound whiny on the I can discuss situations like this just fine, that would not be my intention.
BritGirl:
I cannot say I’m qualified to answer the question: What is the average male definition of rape is, but I might have some insights (because many misogynists have the idea that you can’t really talk to a woman, that all talk with a woman is useless if it doesn’t lead to sex, and I am a man so they might confide things to me, especially in the past when I was considerably more misogynistic than now, few are open with very misogynist attitudes in Finland).
I’d say plenty of men define rape by the amount apparent suffering. If there is no clear woman screaming to the man to stop/fighting back, it seldom is seen as rape. Coercion/bribes/threats of non-physical variety (like I won’t pay for the taxi unless I get something in return, threatening to drop a woman out of taxi if she has second thoughts when paying), having sex with a drunken or even passed out woman are not thought as rape. They are considered slightly, or very distasteful, but sometimes “funny” in a rude way. Ultimatums are seen as rude (you came to my apartment, now you’d better have sex with me) but not rape. Please note that these are all real-life situations that I’ve encountered in the past, not hypotheticals, as are the responses/attitudes to those cases, and lately I’ve been feeling quite alienated from discussions of the “sexual exploits” of some of my second-hand acquintances, especially when friends discussing them feel it clear that they are completely different from rape.
Happily, many finnish women are quite strong-willed and willing to stand up in such situations, but plenty aren’t, and are probably raped in such situations (and drunk/passed situations…). There was quite a conroversy few years back with a reframing of rape law to include “forcing to an intercourse” (? different from rape?) as a distinct crime from rape (the excuse was that many rape cases were dismissed because of lack of violence), and also including aggravated rape in cases of much violence and/or threatening with a weapon. Critics claimed that this was giving in to attitudes that minimize rape (and I agree with them…).
Again, I don’t know about different cultures and I’m not qualified to speak for my entire gender, or my whole country.
Now you’re just being paranoid.
I hope there’s a smiley missing from there or something because otherwise….
BritGirlSF- But the whole idea that sex is something done by a man to a woman was never part of my frame at all, even as a kid. (…) It just kind of seems like it makes the woman’s body into a toll booth – her only role is to say yes you may pass or no you may not. The idea that she’s a participant is missing. It just doesn’t resemble my real-life experience of sex at all.
Same here. But when I hear the word ‘consent’ in this context, I do read it in that sense, of actual active participation, so to speak. It’s a cold, dry (frigid?) term because it comes from a legal context but I don’t it necessarily refers to something like that when used to talk about sex.
To add to Tuomas’s point, I think a lot of men dwell on the physical harm done, and to a lesser extent the use of physical force, because that’s more easily understood, and because we still privilege physical harm over psychological.
I don’t think acknowledging what a heinous act rape is really offers rapists an out. These people have already self-justified their behavior and condemning it in appropriate terms isn’t going to make that easier. But it might make it more difficult for another man to start down that path. It might make another man recognize their actions.
I think some rapists can be rehabilitated, but I see no good coming from minimizing their actions like some kind of natural consequence of maleness. By acting like is just like any other crime, we contribute to that attitude. Rape is different. Evil, if you will. I don’t think those who commit it require any assistance in ignoring the consequences of their actions. They are clearly perfectly adept at this to begin with. We coddle them if we refuse to condemn them in the strongest language simply because we feel it might put them off.
As to how we would define consent (what means yes), I must admit I am at a loss. Consent is so flipping obvious, that I don’t get why some men don’t understand it. Its often easier for me to simply assume all rapists knew what they were doing, but I can recognize that some did rationalize it as okay and we need to find out how that process took place. Its an important question, but I’m not sure I have an answer. How do some men manage to not understand consent. Obviously, anything except no is far too broad. I’m hampered by my fundamental lack of understanding of how a man can justify his behavior in that scenario that I don’t know where to begin in defining the process.
Experts in sexual assault say that the alcohol factor in so many acquaintance rapes has more to do with making the victim helpless, not lowering the inhibitions of the rapist. I sincerely believe that people don’t do things while drunk that they didn’t want to do anyway, or make people do things they are morally opposed to.
Like I told Steve, I’ve had male friends try to “steal a kiss” after drinks more times than I care to admit. But as soon as I resisted, they immediately stopped, every single time. And I don’t mean resist like I had to fight. Just the resistance of pulling away was enough to make most of them really, really ashamed. Because consent isn’t as hard to figure out as the sexists will have you believe.
>>As to how we would define consent (what means yes), I must admit I am at a loss. Consent is so flipping obvious, that I don’t get why some men don’t understand it. Its often easier for me to simply assume all rapists knew what they were doing, but I can recognize that some did rationalize it as okay and we need to find out how that process took place. Its an important question, but I’m not sure I have an answer. How do some men manage to not understand consent. Obviously, anything except no is far too broad. I’m hampered by my fundamental lack of understanding of how a man can justify his behavior in that scenario that I don’t know where to begin in defining the process.>>
Yeah, it requires the premise that sex is something that women put up with, not something they engage in.
Maybe this is part of the, “Would you…?” disconnect. (I’m trying to come up with a way of phrasing this that doesn’t sound cold-blooded or just plain self-ignorant.) For me, sex without mutuality is not…sexy. Even setting aside the morality of violating someone, stripping them of dignity and bodily integrity, and giving them emotional scars they will bear for the rest of their lives, none of that is attractive. It’s repulsive. And not to other or narrow rape, either–the put-up-with kind, the “nonviolent” kind, the Care and Feeding of Husbands kind is also not something I can sexualize. Maybe that’s because I’ve been on the receiving end of that kind of attention and pressure. Maybe it’s because I’ve been socialized to base my sexual gratification on the gratification of my partner.
But as soon as I resisted, they immediately stopped, every single time.
Yet they thought it was OK, in the first place, to try something they knew you wouldn’t accept sober.
Jstevenson #243, Thank you for sharing that personal data.
I think it helps to illustrate a larger point, and that is that as people we do some very crazy things that are often motivated out of difficult circumstances in our lives. I administrate a large Residential Rehab for men. One recurring theme is that many of our guys have been sexually and emotionally abused in childhood. The shame and debasing nature of these acts cause them to suffer from PTSD, Arrested Development, personality disorders like NPD and BPD and a host of other issues not limited to using drugs, cutting, overeating etc. One thing that is apparent, many women have suffered the same sort of abuse. One of the byproducts of the abuse is to seek out relationships where this abuse is all but assured to reoccur. We deliberately teach and model that respect for ones self and respect for others is essential to recovery and making a way through the world in serenity. There is however great difficulty in doing this because the world sends so many terribly slanted messages to our folks. The myths that women love domination, that men are to be the agressor in things of this nature, the distorted Biblical messages of penance and subservience make all of this very difficult. The popular medias reinforce this at every opportunity. There is an emphasizing of the competitiveness between men and women and less focus on the compatative aspect.
I believe we suffer from a societal PTSD, this is evidenced by the Gov. use of force when it is unwarranted to meet our needs; the justification being hung on moral rectitude. Our culture reinforces the entitlement mentality to such an extent that one that goes out and gets what they want or need by god or by gun is held up as a hero. The defining of human beings as “consumers”? does very much to minimalise our humanity. It is easy to treat people poorly when we teach they are less then human.
I am deeply saddened when my faith is minimalised as causing less compassion or empathy in my fellows because there is abuse of the Gospel that I know, that does not in the least way call for anyone’s freedom to be abridged but fulfilled. The call of my faith is to share in the suffering with others and share the first love I know, it is for me liberational. The messages preached from movies and television and sadly from feminists at times as well are ones of exploitation and not compassion.(Some men read the covers of women’s magazines that say, 25 ways to better sex and believe that is all women want… How about, 25 ways to serve each other and have a better relationship?) The omni presence of sex and violence in our society can be argued is causative or reflective, however it is symptomatic that many are deeply troubled in this area. The fact that men rape women and the tacit approval by marginalizing women who are raped is not difficult to understand, in a world where men and women receive the same broken messages. (Carl’s Jr. anyone?) Many of the messages that men get about women are from women. It is said, the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. It is going to take a lot to change the messages that are being perpetrated to all of our suffering.
This is a good dialog; it has shown where I have need of checking some attitudes. It also shows how little progress we have made with the very best the world has to offer in our freedoms. Perhpas it is not about doing what we want as oposed to doing no harm.
Beats me, myth. I have no clue.
Mythago and Amanda,
I think that the ‘stolen kiss’ and similar activities are just normal ‘when I’m drunk I’m not as worried about being embarrassed’. I’m not going to condemn anyone for that when I will have to carry the memory to my grave of getting up on a table at a bierstube and dancing the hora to accordion music (polka, of course). But what we are talking about is a lessening of the awareness of embarrassment and I don’t see any way that can translate into a willingness to harm another person.
My son was accused of rape.
My daughter was raped.
My best buddy who, okay, tells sexist jokes, was accused of rape.
My best buddy was accused of rape by this total slut!
My brother, my uncle, myself…we were all accused of rape, and we didn’t use guns or anything, but, hey, she didn’t say no, really, c’mon, she was into it for a while there…
1. If he did it, he’ll have to live with the consequences of that, including prison. And when he gets out, he doesn’t have a father. I’ve cut people out of my life for less, and if that’s the kind of monster I raise, knowing him will only rub my nose in the shame of my failure. I’d rather deal with a meth addict as a son than a rapist. The latter can, in my view, fully redeem themselves.
2. I’ll do whatever she needs. My desire for prosecution or revenge cannot be more important than her healing process.
3. My best buddy does not tell sexist jokes. He respects women. He’s engaged to a feminist. My other friend who does tell sexist jokes once had to flee prosecution after beating the hell out of two men in a foreign nation for groping a black-out drunk woman in a hot tub. He used force only after hotel security refused to intervene. He’s willing to endanger himself to protect a woman’s right to decide who has access to her body. I’m not worried about him.
4. I don’t doubt that he could prove that he was never alone with her, never had sex with her, and that the accusation was motivated by money (he’s a trust fund baby). If, on the other hand, for whatever reason I’m wrong about his fundamental character after twenty years, and I think he did it, I’ll never speak to him again, and I’ll change my will to remove him as executor.
5. Any of my piece of shit convicted felon relatives that get themselves in trouble are on their own. I don’t speak to most of them anyway.
I think that the ‘stolen kiss’ and similar activities are just normal ‘when I’m drunk I’m not as worried about being embarrassed’
We’re not talking about merely embarassing behavior. If Amanda’s male friends had a couple of beers and asked her on a date, that might be alcohol-fueled “Who cares if she laughs at me?”
But doing something physical to another person that you wouldn’t do sober is completely different. I don’t get how you have such a problem grokking this. As we’ve been discussing, there are plenty of people who hide behind alcohol to do what they really want to do anyway, and there are plenty of men (and, of course, women) who think alcohol is a substitute for the other person’s consent.
So I don’t have issues with thinking the reason Amanda’s guy friends tried to “steal a kiss” is not just that they were drunk, but that they figured Amanda wouldn’t object as much as she would 100% sober. It’s the same mentality.
I’m 34, and grew up in the California Central Valley, which is adjacent to the San Francisco Bay Area. It’s much more conservative, and at least at the time was sparsely populated — I had little social contact with peers outside the context of formal school functions until I left for college. I didn’t start dating until I was 20, and my first sexual experience I was 21. The second relationship I was describing was about ten years ago, when I was 24.
I never had the idea that men were “entitled” to sex, and I was surprised to learn later that some of my friends who were women had conflicts in relationships because of that attitude.
On the idea that women are supposed to be passive in sex: in high school, I’d hear stories from my friends who were women about sex, but they’d leave the details blurry. It was always implied that their male partners initiated sex. My first partner initiated sex occasionally, and would take an active role, but kept expressing shame at her desire to be assertive and resentment that I wasn’t dominant enough. A few times, she insisted I must be gay, because I wasn’t sufficiently dominant or aggressive in sex. My second partner just didn’t seem to have any idea that anything but passivity was an option for her. I think her background was significantly more conservative than mine, and I think part of the problem was the “Asian fetish” — her previous male partners apparently expected her to be completely passive.
My sense is that, at the time, there was something of a taboo to admit that women could be as sexually assertive, and I would occasionally hear women complaining that they’d had to initiate sex, that this was some sort of denial of their desirability.
I have the sense that things have shifted a great deal since then, and I hear my younger female friends describing themselves as sexually assertive as a point of pride. This is not universal, however: one of the recurring phrases I’ve seen in Internet personal ads is that the woman is looking for someone “pro-feminist but sexually dominant,” and a few weeks ago, I saw a string of rants on Craigslist from women complaining that men in the Bay Area would expect sex to be slow and gentle and mutual, and that men in the Bay Area weren’t really men.
One thing that strikes me as I write this is that most of what I’ve ever heard about the real sexual practices and desires of other men, I’ve heard from women, not from men directly.
Thank you, werefish, for being the one person who understood my point. FWIW, I did not bring up the point about vegans and flesh, but was responding to a direct question that had been posed – nor was I personally responsible for hypothetical extreme rape scenarios.
The notion that rape is “evil”, I will say again, is not helping. Nobody wants to believe themselves capable or willing to do evil, and the notion is so repellant that most men – and women – will say that they would not, could not rape because it is so utterly foreign to their understanding of themselves. How can you acknowledge your capacity for violence against another human being as a potential risk (no matter how small) if understanding that potential means you have to admit yourself “evil,” that term filled with so much brimstone and other socio-cultural baggage?
It is the notion that rape is evil that encourages many women to keep silent about rape, because the men (and women) we know and love could not do such a thing to us. They are not evil, they are our partners, friends and colleages. In many cases of date rape (like mine), feelings do not change overnight, simply because of a horrible encounter. You cannot press charges on someone you care(d) about when you know that that will villify them as evil, especially if you are a woman who has been conditioned to nurture and protect others. I am not a rape apologist. I am merely trying to point out that a villification of rape as “evil” serves to hinder many of the victims it ostensibly trys to help.
I’m glad that some people have the self-awareness to know in know uncertain terms that they could not rape – but this does women (and children, and other men with less power) no damn good. It serves no purpose except to inflate the speaker’s self-importance as a feminist or compasassionate human being or a Christian or Theist or whatever they want to call themselves – by itself it has no practicality. How can somebody who says “I could never rape” begin a dialogue with a man who has, as somebody said, a “guilty feeling in the back of their mind about that one time with their girlfriend when she was too drunk…”, or one who genuinely believes that women are of a lower order? You can start a grassroots campaign to erradicate rape by raising sons and daughters to challenge gender stereotypes, but that doesn’t do anything about those who can and do abuse their ability to oppress and harm right now.
Maybe I’m talking about something different than what other people are talking about – I’m wondering how you change men who have raped (even though they don’t think they have raped, such as my rapist) into ones who can consciously understand how to stop themselves from doing it again. Or how do you engage with men who may rape in the future, but just don’t know it yet because they think they are immune to taking the advantage they pretend not to have? Or is such a thing not even possible? Is the only answer to raise new generations of feminist men and watch rape die by attrition?
>>How can somebody who says “I could never rape”? begin a dialogue with a man who has, as somebody said, a “guilty feeling in the back of their mind about that one time with their girlfriend when she was too drunk…”?, or one who genuinely believes that women are of a lower order?>>
How does someone who can’t use “loaded” or emotionally-charged words get into a dialogue with _anyone_ about something emotionally charged? How do we confront those evil attitudes in the here and now, and describe the deep harm they do to others, and dismantle the idea that there’s any excuse for them whatsoever, without calling them evil, wrong, bad, terrible, horrible, damaging, and way the fuck out of bounds? I gotta say, I’m really freaked out by this idea of gentle diplomacy towards _men who rape_. Outrage is totally useful in communicating the idea that something is outrageous.
Probably, myth, though I would point out that the attempted stolen kiss usually goes like this–he leans in, hesistates to see your reaction, you pull away, he apologizes. No actual kisses in this way since I was like 18. So I still classify it in that hazy area of someone’s inhibitions down and trying to find out if it’s going to work without actually violating my space.
Gisele, I think the answer it to pressure men not to rape. Progressive and feminist men need to stay on-message — that consent is the presence of “yes”, not the absence of “no,” that there is nothing acceptable about sex with a woman who is not into it, that too drunk to make good decisions is too drunk to consent, and that their friends will not forgive or excuse unacceptable conduct. Just getting that said, a lot, can influence other men a lot.
There are differences in how people communicate. Not everyone is verbal. Some people are more visual or more kinesthetic. The non-verbal are unlikely to preface sexual initiation with conversation, and are unlikely to respond positively to someone else initiating with conversation.
The verbally strong seem to have a powerful cultural value that tells them that only verbal communication counts; if you can’t say it, then you can’t do it. Much of the species just doesn’t work that way, however, and they have to find other means of discerning intention and interest.
It behooves any initiator to know how their intended prefers to communicate such information. And of course there’s a burden of communication on all parties involved.
I’m glad that some people have the self-awareness to know in know uncertain terms that they could not rape – but this does women (and children, and other men with less power) no damn good. It serves no purpose except to inflate the speaker’s self-importance as a feminist or compasassionate human being or a Christian or Theist or whatever they want to call themselves – by itself it has no practicality.
I can understand why you think that, but it seeems to me you are projecting a sense of egocentrism and holier-than-thou attitudes into what might, at least for some, have been a genuine statement of genuine repulsion, of wishes vs. non-wishes, and maybe some of those who said so even know what abuse and rape is.
I don’t understand why one single answer should do for all. Most of all, I don’t understand why the “well I cannot know for sure” answer has to be the one and only sincere, brave, genuine reply, and the others are just deluding themselves.
I don’t know. Maybe we are indeed speaking of different things.
(Then again, maybe I really should not even try to wonder about that question myself because we’re talking men raping women and since I’m a woman I probably can’t think of the question in the same way a man would, I guess? But my problem with that is that it means I’d need to take for granted this idea that men are from mars, women from venus, blah blah. I can’t see how that doesn’t get close to saying, male brains are hardwired for rape. Because if we see the difference is cultural, then we have to take into account that culture doesn’t work in automatic fashion like biology does. So there are going to be variations within the same gender, no? Is that even a possibility?)
I really don’t think that’s a proper comparison, mythago. Given that the men themselves are drunk, it may simply be that their inhibition is lowered and they think it might be a good idea to try to kiss her. Unless they forced themselves upon her, I don’t think there is any relation to that behavior and to rape. The resistance to rape is more than inhibition. It must be something a man views as fundamentally wrong. Its an act of sadistic and arrogant violence. That’s simply different from leaning in to kiss someone. And this is coming from a man who won’t even kiss a woman without a confirmation that she wants to.
Concerning who gets to start a conversation with potential rapists, I’m not sure I understand how “you’re a potential rapist and always will be” is a better way to start the dialogue. That approach will cause a lot of men to shut down and fall onto a knee-jerk “well, I never” instead of one born out of introspection. I do not say I would never rape a woman out of some sense of pride. There is nothing to be proud of in simply not committing horrific acts. Nor do I understand how humanizing rape is going to work to anyone’s advantage. Normalizing rape just provides rapists with a comfortable justification. Far more comfortable than “well, I’m good in other ways so I guess this doesn’t count”. Its telling them directly that their behavior is the norm. To treat rape like a natural and unavoidable consequence of humanity is a breath way from excuse it. It may not be a step you approve of, but it’d be far liklier for a rapist to make it if the subject were handled in that manner.
We need to challenge men to think about these issues and to reflect on them. Someone who has thought about and reflected on them is hardly unqualified for the job. Someone who finds rape to be abhorant doesn’t suddenly become incapable of campaigning against it. This is a daunting task and there are no easy answers.
You say you cannot trust me when I say I will never rape someone. Well, if that’s what you need to do, then so be it. But to think that insisting men can never trust in themselves as some kind of answer to rape? I don’t get it. So, then everyone thinks everyone is a rapist in waiting, including themselves. How does that get to be productive? You may not be able to trust a man who has engaged in sobering reflection on these issues, and I’m not going to blame you for that. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have value and that it can’t encourage people to change. Our conversation about rape can’t just be with the people who are going to rape any day now. It has to be with the people whose attitudes can be shaped and changed. Who can listen and empathize on this issue. We need to increase awareness of rape and why its wrong. We can’t confine ourselves to not explaining why its wrong. We can’t lay blame upon all men and think any man will listen. We need to find ways to communicate the impact of rape to these men. Yes, those who have raped, too. We have to try, but I’m afraid there may not be easy answers. I know my understanding came from seeing the aftermath of rape in people I care about. It shock me from, “well, I’d never” into a full understanding of why I would never. Giving them a why. That’s what we need to do. We don’t get there without acknowledging rape for what it is. It is an evil, but we can’t afford to just write these people off. And in the meantime, we use much the same means to engage younger generations to confront the issue for what it is. A horrible crime of violence and humiliation. We can’t coddle them. We can’t say they are like everyone else. The truth is, they aren’t. That’s their problem.
The issue is, though, that there is a lot of expectation from women for a man to be sexually aggressive so I’m not going to say that the answer is necessarily the sexual passivity that Brian and myself may exhibit. I’ve only had one partner who really found me to be timid, but she was also willing to be fairly aggressive herself. But still, there is surely a balance. Indeed, I think its a balance most men do find but often it comes back to how obvious consent seems to most people. What’s the disconnect between us and the far too sizable minority? Surely, popular culture deserves some of the blame for promoting the notion of the aggressive male and the “mysterious” female. But also I’ve witnessed a boys culture where these attitudes ferment. Is rape always a product of hatred of women? What of these men who genuinely believe they haven’t raped, yet who have? What fuels their self-deception? Telling everyone else that they are no different from rapists doesn’t seem likely to yield solutions, but I will grant you that I struggle with solutions as well, simply out of a fundamental lack of understanding for these rationales and thought-processes.
I think there’s not just a quantitative, but a qualitative difference between men insisting on sexual dominance and men raping women. But, there is a sense in which they are related, in terms of matter of degree, or quantity — and I think that’s part of why many men are inclined to condone all but the most brutal forms of rape.
Accepting male dominance and female passivity as norms makes it difficult to talk seriously about rape, and we need to overcome that problem.
I don’t think I said this clearly enough: I don’t really know, from my direct experience, how other men behave sexually. I haven’t had sex with them. My experience only revealed that some women expect men to be dominant and that they should be passive — and that this made them miserable. I don’t blame women for this — it doesn’t make sense that women, on their own, would choose that sex take a form they don’t enjoy. There’s some external pressure being placed on them to accept that sex take that form, and I think it’s transmitted by men.
I think the real question here is, how do we get these men to look at women and see someone who’s a human being, deserving of respect, and not to be treated like an inanimate object or an animal.
The best answer I have is to keep repeating these facts loudly, and with conviction, and to get other people in power, and in the public eye, to repeath these statements loudly and with conviction, and to condemn the ideas that are to the contrary.
If someone came to me with guilt or worry over consent issues, I’d give them the best advice I could: be cautious, ask multiple times, try and be sensitive to your potential partner’s desires, and allow yourself to be patient.
I can’t see how admiting that I don’t have those feelings is proclaiming anything about myself personaly, because I’m not doing it reflexivley, I’m doing it in response to a discussion about the topic.
This sounds an awful lot like name-calling of people who politley disagreed with you.
“Why, why, why are you men so capable of extracting women’s lived realities into hypotheticals? ”
Seems to be a common theme in discussions on women’s issues.
““Why, why, why are you men so capable of extracting women’s lived realities into hypotheticals? “?”
It’s very easy for them. Kinda like an armchair psychologist or sociologist who makes all kinds of claims and postulations, without getting up off his smug ass and doing some real research with the subject group (ie: women) he’s making all kinds of claims about. Besides, I’m sure doing that reinforces their sense of, “by virtue of my dick, I know I have a far better grasp of the situation than the women it directly effects, because I’m more rational and civil due to my sex, unlike theirs’.” Crude, but whenever talking about women’s issues with certain guys with certain views about women and gender, I pick up on that attitude from them.
Brian
I’m in the Bay Area too, so I know what you mean about the Central Velley. I have a friend from Modesto who complains bitterly every time she has to go home and refuses to stay from more than a few days (she’s usually chased of by family asking why she doesn’t have a husband and kids yet).
I’m not sure about the age/time difference though. I’m not much younger than you (31) and I think that the women I grew up with and went to high school with were actually much more assertive than the younger women I know now. I also wonder how much of the assertivenes I do see is more about bravado than anything real. I think that some women are doing the same kind of faux-bravado thing that men have been doing for years.
You raise a good point – why don’t men talk to each other about sex? I mean in an honest way not just as a competative, prove you’re a stud way.
I’m also a bit puzzled about what’s going on with the people on craigslist. It seems as if both men and women in the Bay Area are miserable with the current dating culture, but nobody seems to know what to do about it.
Slightly off topic, but I think the Asian Fetish thing is really creepy. I have enough Asian girlfriends to have seen it in action, and one of my best friends in London was Japanese and she used to get the same thing there too so it’s not just an American phenomenon. Or actually when I think about it maybe it’s not entirely off topic at all – it seems to be a sort of extreme manifestation of gender stereotypes mixed up with some equally messed up racial stereotypes.
Tuomas Writes: (#259) “Please note that these are all real-life situations that I’ve encountered in the past, not hypotheticals, as are the responses/attitudes to those cases, and lately I’ve been feeling quite alienated from discussions of the “sexual exploits”? of some of my second-hand acquintances, especially when friends discussing them feel it clear that they are completely different from rape.”
—
I rather suspect that it’s not that unusual for men bragging about their “sexual exploits”? to be crossing over the line into rape.
I expect the guy who raped me was all about bragging to his brother, his friends about all the women he “did” or whatever he called it. I clearly said no, he clearly understood that I said no and he proceeded anyway. Later I heard from someone else how many he bragged about.
I think as far date rape goes – that this notion that some men have that the more women they fuck the more of a man they are or something CAN be influenced by acquintances. That if guys didn’t encourage each other in that regard – that the loose canons with antisocial tendencies would not be reinforced in their delusions of status.
I suspect that these “bragging rights” would be a difficult notion for many men to give up.
I am leaning towards Ampersand, Robert, Tuomas, and Amanda in this discussion.
Another way to describe the “heart of darkness” concept would be the more primitive regions of the brain, such as the limbic system. A basic concept in neuroscience is that the brain is a bunch of interconnected modules which monitor each other. For instance, your cerebral cortex (specifical the prefrontal lobes) regulates your limbic system. That is why one often has impulses that must be suppressed, and why people with damage to the prefrontal lobes have problems with impulse control.
I agree on all counts.
I think what Ampersand has been getting at is a well-documented phenomenon in social psychology: that human behavior is massively influenced by the situation and social context. In the right (or the wrong?) social contexts, people can behave in ways that are shocking, and even at odds with values they held before they entered that context. Hence, psychologists like Dr. Phillip Zimbardo at Stanford claim that evil is not always dispositional, but situational. Examples: Abu Ghraib, the Stanley Milgram’s shock experiments that Amp alluded to, Nazi Germany, Rwanda, and Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment. Zimbardo studied one of the commanding officers who came back from Abu Ghraib, and the guy was completely normal. In The Trial of Eichmann: A report on the banality of evil, Hannah Arendt mentions that the psychologists who interviewed Eichmann found him to be more sane than they felt after interviewing him. Hence, I agree that I could never never rape in normal situations, but in extraordinary situations? I cannot even guess.
These are good questions, and nobody has properly addressed them so far. I think the answer is that finding rape repugnant depends on having empathy and sympathy for the pain of others (note wikipedia’s interesting distinction between empathy and sympathy). Without these, then you would be like a sociopath and have no emotional deterrent to hurting someone. In the above examples of negative social contexts, clearly sympathy (and probably empathy also) can be suspended. So, I don’t think it’s as simple as saying that the desires were there all along, and they were just repressed. For people normally experiencing empathy and sympathy, the desire for rape would simply not emerge, because those feelings would make hurting someone unappealing and unarousing. Once hurting someone is no longer so repugnant, then desires for rape might emerge, but I don’t think that means there were there all along.
Well said.
Wait a sec, women definitely have the equipment to rape (although this equipment is not as effective as male equipment). For example, a woman can envelop a man when he is passed out or sleeping but happens to be erect (and an erection does NOT necessarily mean consent, because it is simply a physiological response controlled by primitive areas of the brain). And women can use objects to rape.
Oh, God, and here’s Aegis to save the day with talk of brain centers. What next?
“Oh, God, and here’s Aegis to save the day with talk of brain centers. What next?”
Do note, Aegis will not be allowed to usurp this thread and spam it with his usual smug and completely unfounded, false bullshit postulations about women, gender, and other subjects, as he usually does on other threads dealing with women, gender, sociology, etc. We’ve heard all of his ridiculous boasts of having vast wisdom in particular areas of sociology and psychology, and women and gender before anyway–all steming from the sadly deluded fanatasies of a egotistical, ignorant, sexually frustrated adolescent male of course. It’s embarrassing that I share the same age group with him.
Oh, but now he’s delving into neuropsychiatry and women raping men with foreign objects (which is possible and does happen–but rarely)! What_a_surprise. This should make for some good laughs. I can’t wait to see his other comments on this subject, that he’s brought to the discussion. ::rolls eyes::
BritGirl,
I do have to wonder how common that idea of female passivity really is now, but my point was that it’s out there, still in circulation, still believed by at least some members of both genders.
There was a heated debate about the “Asian fetish” on http://www.pandagon.net a few weeks ago, but I can’t find the link. But yes, I think that’s a related issue — a racist and sexist stereotype at once. And I just got around to reading the thread on Gilliard’s blog — part of what was sickening was it quickly turned into a discussion of whether American or Scandinavian women tourists were “easier.”
Actually, that’s a discussion I’d like to have about whether the rise of the wingnuts is actually succeeding in pushing young women (and men) back into more old-fashioned gender roles.
I gave up on the thread at Gilliard’s blog a while ago, but the fact that they’re discussing Scandanavian women as “easy” is pretty funny. I knew a lot of Finns in London and did tend to find them to have less sexual hang-ups than most other people (ie to be less prone to the religiously motivated “sex is evil” idea), but anyone who decided that those girls were “easy” and tried to make an unwanted move on them would have gotten a nasty shock. I once saw a Finnish girl I knew hit a guy over the head with a bottle of vodka after he kept following her down the street trying to talk to her and then invaded her space (he eventually called her a “stuck up bitch” and grabbed her arm, which was the point at which she hit him). Isn’t it interested how people seem to view all other races/groups as inherantly more slutty?
Isn’t it interested how people seem to view all other races/groups as inherantly more slutty?
Many cultures implicitly or explicitly encourage exogamy, so the viewpoint is probably based on experience. IE, young Ruritanian comes to Urbopolis and does better with the people of the interesting sex (and vice versa) than back at home; heshe returns to Ruritania and reports that the Urbopolans are “easy”. And when other Ruritarians visit, they find the reports to be accurate – at least until the Urbopolans get used to those sexy Ruritanians in their tight overalls.
My contribution to the “Would I rape?” discussion.
If, at this moment, I had a chance to rape someone, and that rape would satisfy a desire of mine (i.e. I am not thinking about raping for rape’s sake, but rather let’s say I really wanted to have sex with someone but she didn’t want to have sex with me), and I knew I could get away with it, I know for a certainty (at least as certain as a person can be) that I would not do it.
But if I lived for a prolonged period in a situation where I could do things without facing any consequences; if I had for a prolonged period absolute power over another person or people; I don’t know if that would change me.
I don’t think anyone on this board is saying that the threat of punishment is the only thing keeping them from raping at this minute; but they are saying that the threat of punishment may be necessary over the long term in order to keep them from going down a path where they could become the type of person who would rape.
I think part of the reason for the disagreement on this is that one side is interpreting the question as “would you rape someone right now if you could get away with it?” and the other side is interpreting it as “if there were no sanctions on such behavior, could I ever become the type of person who would commit rape?”
Glaivster
That was a pretty good summation. I don’t think the two sides are nearly as far apart as they initially thought.
I’m just going to throw something out there since it’s been on my mind recently and Glaivster’s post made me thing of it again.
Kobe Bryant. I’d say that pro athletes are about the best example of the premist that Glaivster gave above that you could find.
“But if I lived for a prolonged period in a situation where I could do things without facing any consequences; if I had for a prolonged period absolute power over another person or people; I don’t know if that would change me.”
Not absolute power, but certainly a lot of power, especially in a small town where the local football team is the only thing that anyone has any real sense of pride in, or on a college campus. Could it be that pro athletes are actually a pretty good test case for the “what if I could realistically assume that I would get away with it” scenario.
I’m not quite sure where I’m going with this, but it’s been at the back on my mind this whole time. I do know that I’ve run across a few pro athletes in my time and almost every one of them has scared me – not in terms of anything they’ve actually done so much as in the kind of on-edge feeling you get walking through a bad neighborhood late at night. I instinctively didn’t trust them. What does that mean? And what does is mean about our culture that we do habitually let them get away with rape?
And just to clarify, this isn’t about being intimidated by big people, that part I’m sure of. I like big guys. But these men scare me, and I don’t think I’m the only one. I just wonder what it tells us about rape in general that the one group who CAN rape with impunity often DO.
BTW, I think that this also gets into the idea of how we define masculinity in general, I’m just trying not to complicate things by going there.
Actually, the incident that Aegis hypothesized is how my husband lost his virginity. He’s very much a feminist, and yes, he was ‘acquaintance’ raped by a woman he had not given consent to. He woke up with her on top of him, and him inside of her. He was 17, she was 19 and he states that he only barely recollects the situation, other than horror as she ‘did her thing’. He didn’t talk about it as a ‘rape’ for a very long time, because often times people did not want to hear about how men can be victimized too. While he point blank will never attempt to pull it off as an ‘equal’ crisis in terms of the percentages of women being raped to men, he certainly would take offense at being snubbed as a victim.
Oh – also, he’d turned down his rapists offers to have sex earlier in the evening. They had ended up sleeping at the same place after a party, and despite his vocal lack of consent earlier, she went ahead and initiated unconsentual sex when he was sleeping.
Not a lot of time to read the rest of the responses ;) so I’ll just inject a little of my own so-called “wisdom” into the veins of this thread. A major problem here is that this is one of those issues that people like to look at in black and white. Also, blame is always thrown around like it’s going out of style. It is convenient to say that the victim is never at fault, yet it is also convenient to say that the victim is always at fault. This convenience principle applies to the rapist as well. (Note that I do not use “man” or “woman” in determining who is the victim and who is the rapist.) There have been a good number of cases where the “victim” has done something on purpose (but not necessarily for the effect that follows) to trigger the control aspect in the “rapist”…where do we point the finger here? Well, most people only seem to have one pointing finger, so they have to choose which side to point it at! It doesn’t work that way in real life, people…a rapist preys on those who are weak. Even if you get the best martial arts training in the world or you carry that pepper spray like you’re gonna douse everyone who looks at you cross-eyed…sorry, this just isn’t enough. If you are perceived as weak, those who would control you have the means to do so.
Sorry if this brings up points already referenced…like I said, I don’t have time to read the rest of the responses…wifey is waiting. :)
I couldn’t agree more. If feminism had done this, I think there would be lot less guys complaining about the “ambiguity” of women.
When I was a sophomore in highschool, anti-date rape advocate Katie Koestner (who is a feminist, btw) came to give a seminar on date rape. During this seminar, she described her rape in graphic detail and broke down in tears. She talked about her injuries and chewing out the inside of her cheek. Now, I have no objection to anti-date rape education on principle, but I think this was the wrong way to handle it. It was overkill, it was inappropriate for the age group (freshmen were in the audience), and it was emotionally bludgeoning (kind of like reading Andrea Dworkin, now that I think about it, but in a different way). That seminar was presented in a way that made it impossible to think critically about it: so I think some people (like me) took its messages to a paranoid level, while others probably dismissed it completely. It contributed to me being afraid to even flirt with girls (because I though I would somehow be molesting them if I was to “hit on” them).
At one point, someone asked her how a guy should initiate sex in a way that wasn’t date rape. She said she didn’t know! But she said the only way to ensure consent was if the woman said “yes.”
How do you think that made me, and probably many other young men in the audience, feel? Here we had spent ages hearing about all the terrible things men could do wrong with women, but we were given absolutely no practical suggestions on how to actually do things right. Except for getting verbal consent.
I don’t think the speaker was being purposefully unhelpful. After all, what did I expect, that she would give me a step-by-step guide on what to do with women sexually? She wouldn’t know how to do that, and of course there is no way she could give a lecture on how to get going with sex to a highschool audience (because then they might go out and start having it!). What I find revealing about her comments is a general cultural problem: our culture expects males to initiate sex, but really has no idea how males should go about doing so in a way that is comfortable for women! This seems like a recipe for disaster.
You don’t go about teaching someone by telling them everything they can do wrong, but giving them no useful guidelines to doing things right. If you applied that approach to, say… teaching driving, it would be like giving someone a book of traffic violations, and telling them to figure out how to drive by themselves (or that they should know naturally). In a situation like that, someone would probably become extremely paranoid and never learn to drive at all, or they might throw away the rulebook out of frustration and try driving on their own, which would probably lead to disaster because nobody has bothered to show them how. Now, I am not claiming that getting into a car accident is analogous to rape, because rape is not just an “accident.” The point I am making is that approaches to teaching people that focus on all the horrible mistakes they can make, without showing them a better way to go about things (or expecting them to figure that out on their own), is not going to work very well. Since men don’t pop out of the womb knowing how to interact with women and initiate sex with them in a way that women are comfortable with, it is something they must learn, especially since some women are taught to be sexually passive. It may not be rocket science, but it’s still something that men need to learn; the big question: are men being taught how to do those things in a way that leads to positive experiences for them and for the females they interact with and have sex with?
Btw, that seminar is one reason I distrust feminist attempts at social engineering: I think they have uncovered very real problems with gender roles, but sometimes their cures are almost as bad as the disease. Though I do try not to judge all feminists based on that experience, and I have talked to feminists who agree with me that such an approach to educating males is problematic. Since then, I have been trying to find the answers to the question of how males should conduct interaction with (specifically sexually) in a practical and empathetic manner, because my socialization failed to teach me this. That is why I have so many wild theories. In my opinion, it’s better to think about gender and risk the possibility of sometimes being wrong, than to not think about it at all.
Exactly. I think the way verbal communication is put on a pedestal as the only valid way of doing things, especially sexually, is both inaccurate and counterproductive. It isn’t good enough to focus on words, you have to see the person behind them and what they are feeling. There are at least a couple problems with the strange emphasis on verbal consent:
Verbal consent alone is not sufficient for creating a positive sexual/emotional experience for both people. As BritGirl put it:
Hence, a half-hearted “yes” from the woman might constitute verbal consent, but is it really a valid basis for the guy to initiate sex? Not necessarily, especially if she obviously isn’t into it. I don’t know about other guys, but I wouldn’t want to feel like a woman was just tolerating having sex with me while staring up at the ceiling and wishing it was over. Part of the enjoyment for me is feeling desired and knowing that she is enjoying herself also. I might even go so far as to say that it is inconsiderate, and maybe even unethical for a man to have sex with a woman who obviously is getting nothing out of it, even if she gives verbal consent (because he is just using her body to get off).
Yet according to the verbal consent standard, no amount of “enthusiastic participation” from the woman can be regarded as consent, which just seems idiotic to me. That is the other problem with the emphasis on verbal consent: despite what the date rape speaker said, it is simply incorrect that consent can only be given verbally. Otherwise, if a woman takes the man’s penis, and inserts it into herself enthusiastically but without a word, then she somehow hasn’t consented to sex.
Encouraging males to focus only on verbal consent actually encourages them to ignore women’s body language, physical responses, and emotions.