I heard this joke from my mother, when I was about 11 or 12.
Two nuns were walking through the woods when they were set upon and raped. One said to the other, “Whatever shall we tell Mother Superior?” The second replied, “We’ll just have to tell her that while we were walking through the woods, we were set upon and raped twice.” The first one said, “Why twice?” The second replied, “We still have to walk back through the woods again.”
By the logic of this joke, women, however uninterested in sex they may appear to be, are desperate for sex and simply dare not admit it. Therefore, the man who gives them sex despite their apparent objections is doing them a favour. Rape is just a form of sex, and women enjoy it enough to hope it happens to them again.
Jokes like this one reinforce the idea that when a woman says “no”, she really means “yes”, that reluctance is nothing more than a pose women adopt, that there is no meaningful distinction between sex and rape, that rape doesn’t really do any harm. And jokes like this one get told all the time, not behind closed doors, but proudly, out in public.
That’s the kind of thing we mean when we talk about rape culture.
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America is not just bland white middle class culture either. We’ve got everyone from Uzbeks to Magyars living in enclaves all over the US. These people are American, but all cultures have a different set of rules about rape.
Also, in pondering, I think there’s a lot of fear of what a person accused of rape says about a community that has them in it. I think there’s a tendency to cover things up, not beucase people benefit from rape or a woman’s fear of rape, but from the communities desire to maintain stability.
For some reason, rape is different than breaking in to someone’s car and stealing a stereo. If someone did *that* in some small community, the reaction would be universal condemnation. People are more affraid of having been seen to be friends with a rapist than with someone who breaks into cars.
At least that’s my take.
In the 1967 comedy Waterhole No. 3, the hero (played by James Coburn as an very charming rascal) describes rape as an “assault with a friendly weapon”. The audience was clearly expected to treat this as a laugh line and it got plenty of laughs in the theater I saw it in. This experience has stuck with me all these years and I’m still not sure if I was more upset by the line or the laughter.
I’m betting that line would still get laughs today.
Not really true. When a gurl gets raped its da man’s fault for being a dumbass. But I ain’t scared to say I’m interested in sex, just not rape.
N u act as tho it’s OK to be raped. Would you like to be raped?
I’d never heard that joke, but when I read it, I read it differently. I thought that the nuns would have to walk back through the woods and expected to get raped but had no feelings one way or the other about it. They didn’t secretly want it (which I think is Nick’s reading), they didn’t fear it, it just happens. Like rape is a given. Interesting.
i would imagine that i have a somewhat unique perspective on the rape culture in which i was raised. you see, i’m transsexual. i was born and raised as a male, and lived as male for close to 45 years. for the past 5 years, i’ve been living as female.
up until i transitioned, i was exposed to what i would consider typical male rape culture elements. i consider these elements typical, because they were rather consistent no matter where i was, or who i was with. every part of what i see as rape culture, from the jokes that my male friends and co-workers told, to the way that they spoke about women, to the media images i saw, to the very language we, as a culture, use, seemed quite the same. i’ve done some extensive traveling in the u.s. in my last job as a corporate sales trainer, and these elements seemed very much the same regardless of where i was, or who i was with – at least when i was with men, who were the primary customers of the business i worked in.
as a man, i never feared going out by myself. while i did employ a certain degree of caution while, say, out at night in new york city for example, i’d never think twice about going to the mall at night, and never thought about my safety while i walked from the mall to my car in the parking lot.
i was definately socialized as male. i never was “coached” with regard to personal safety or sexual encounters, other than to receive the cultural message that the more sexual encounters i had, the more “manly” i was. my friends and co-workers often spoke of their sexual “conquests”, and they were always congratulated with each “victory”.
i feel i have a fairly deep understanding of male culture, having been exposed to it on a first hand basis for close to half a century.
my perspective with regard to my personal safety was shattered on the first day i began my “real life test” – the period of time during transition of most transsexuals when they begin living in their target gender everyday, all day. i wrote briefly about it in the “my rape story” thread.
at that moment, i realized how vulnerable i was, how i no longer had *any* power over my own body, and how at any point, most men could simply take me for their own purpose and use. it was a moment of clarity in a very real sense, as all those years of hearing my male contemporaries’ exploits came rushing through my memory. it was at that moment that i saw their stories in a very different light. it was then i realized the impact of their stories. they were talking about me.
i suppose i am part of a privileged section of the trans community. i seem to have been able to integrate fairly well into society as a woman. based on how people in general treat me, it would appear that i am taken as a woman, at least most of the time. i don’t hear any negative comments like i did while i was transitioning, the time during which my body was still changing from the hormones i was taking, and while i was in the process of removing my beard through electrolysis. people refer to me as “ma’am” (or “miss” on a good day) without any prompting on my part, and use female pronouns to reference me. and i don’t get any stares from passers-by. well, except for the bolder men who look at me with lust in their eyes, if i happen to be wearing tight jeans. and i totally recognise that stare – i saw it on my contemporaries on many, many occasions.
for the past 5 years, i’ve seen that stare from the other side, as the recipient, instead of an observer. and i never realized how uncomfortable and unsafe it could feel.
up until very recently, i hadn’t gone out at night by myself in close to five years. and when i go out alone during the day, i’m very aware of my surroundings. i always park my car as close to the door as possible. i always have my keys out when i walk back to my car. i always lock my doors. when i put gas in my car, i’m always scanning the area for danger. no one told me to do these things. i just do them, because i feel i have to, just to be safe. or safer. even though intellectually, i know that my efforts will probably do me no good.
when i moved to phoenix this past january, i noticed on the news that a serial rapist was working my general neighborhood. he’d enter apartments of women through their windows or sliding doors, and rape them in the early morning hours. even though i live in a house, i was always uncomfortable leaving the window open. so i didn’t. i was *very* happy when they caught him, just a few months ago. of course, now there’s another rapist in the neighborhood. he attacks women as they walk down the street at night. so again, i feel very unsafe when i go out at night alone. i restrict that now to only going to the gym after dark when i get home from work, where i can park in a well-lit parking lot, in view of the front desk attendant.
perhaps there are some who would call me paranoid. but i can’t help the way i feel, based on how i *know* men think of, speak about, and perceive women. while it’s true that not all men are potential rapists, as far as i’m concerned, most are, or at least most actively contribute to the rape culture in which we live. i believe this, because i am (or perhaps was) as much a part of it as any other man.
These jokes no more prove a societal approval of rape than telling fairy tales demonstrate a belief in witchcraft.
Krupskaya, I got the same impression from the joke that you did. Either way, it’s an unfortunate joke.
Brett, I have to disagree. Jokes are often humorous because we recognize some truth in them, we see ourselves in them. They make sense for our reality. Fairy tales, while sometimes conveying a truth, are meant to be more escapist. They provide a fantasy world divorced from reality.
If rape-jokes don’t show some approval of rape myths, why do we laugh? Would we laugh if they were about a violence other than rape? My dad often reads me sexist jokes or cartoons, and I always ask if he would find it just as funny had it been about race and not gender. He usually acknowledges he would not. I think the same can be done about rape jokes. Would it lose its “humor” without the stereotype that women want this particular attack?
nexyjo, thanks for sharing that.
Brett:
Fairy tales aren’t about witchcraft any more than Narnia is about talking animals. Fairy tales, folk tales, and urban legends do say something about the cultures that create, accept, and transform them.
Virginia, I agree (except for fairy tales only being escapist – but it depends on the situations). An all-male a cappella group from Harvard or Yale came to perform at my dorm once (all women’s college – very feminist culture). In between songs they did funny skits that really weren’t all that funny and always involved women getting hurt in some way. The polite laughter and clapping had pretty much disappeared by the last skit. Needless to say many people would take this as proof that feminists don’t have a sense of humor and definitely take themselves too seriously. However, we laughed hard enough at the Middlebury group’s enthusiastic performances of the latest N’Sync hits. In both we were the butt of the joke, we just happened to be smart enough to realize that the former was misogynist and the latter was all-inclusive.
I interpreted the joke in the “rape is inevitable” way, but neither interpretation seems funny. Not because it offends the sensitivities; I mean it’s not funny the way the cut scenes in Serious Sam aren’t funny.
Could someone explain to me what is meant by “rape culture?” Some men have tendency to view women as conquests (at least among male friends), but it doesn’t translate into approval of actual rape. Consent is part of the victory for most guys who think in these terms: any loser can force himself on a woman, but you are a real stud if a woman wants it from you, or so the thinking goes.
I wrote about what I mean by “rape culture” here in this post. I’m not sure that Nick means the same thing I do, though.
Krupskaya and sparklegirl,
I’m wondering how anyone would find the joke funny if it is merely interpreted to mean that rape is inevitable. If it is interpreted to mean that rape is better than no sex, then it is not funny if you understandably find the claim of the joke to be grotesque and vile. However, if you think that rape is ‘bad,’ but that some women want to be raped so that they can have sex without having to admit that they want sex, then the joke is funny.
Given that jokes are intended to be funny, I have to imagine that there are enough people who take the last reading for the joke to still be in circulation.
It is the combination of the “rape is bad” and the “some women would rather be raped than be celibate” ideas that makes the joke funny.
Not denying your reading, just suggesting why I think the joke is intended to be read otherwise.
I thought the point of the joke was specifically about nuns. That is, it was suggesting that nuns were desperate for sex (as it was not allowed for them to have it).
The humor may come from the fact that a lot of people find nuns rather scary, or have memories of nuns being scary when they were kids (as they can sometimes be austere authority figures). Particularly “mother superiors” are often seen by people as terrifying.
As rape would be the only way that a nun would have sex where she (presumably) would not be condemned as she did not choose to have it (I’m using sex here to mean the act of sexual intercourse, whether or not it is consensual) the joke here appears to be (a) trying to portray nuns as wanting sex, thus humanizing them, and (b) putting the nuns in a situation where they could not be seen as threatening.
The humor in this case appears to be directly related ot the fact that the women in question are nuns.
sometimes jokes dispel the sting that comes along with a particular subject – you laugh because it’s an uncomfortable subject, and laughing makes digesting the subject matter more bearable. some people deal with taboos by repressing their responses, some scold others and point fingers, some crack jokes.
but i’d have to admit that this joke wasn’t really funny. maybe it’s because i didn’t get it. maybe i’m missing the absurdist humor here.
I can think of plenty of jokes that imply that rape is inevitable, and that the humor is based on that implication.
emily2:
I remember a joke in the “Official Jewish Joke Book” where the punchline was that the old Jewish grandmother is Russia wanted to make certain she wasn’t excluded from the raping during the pogrom.
That would probably be a good example of the type of humor you cite; where humor is used to deal with a subject that may be too painful for lot of people to face seriously; in other words, where it is a coping mechanism.
Glaivester,
I think that the Jewish grandmother joke actually falls partly into that category, but also partly into the category of the nun joke as you described it. Just as nuns aren’t allowed to have sex for religious reasons, old women are thought of as not being allowed to have sex because they are old (and scary and unattractive). So both the nuns and the Jewish grandmother are imagined in the jokes as hoping to be raped, so that they will get to have sex.
Krupskaya,
Can you give some examples of other jokes where the inevitability of rape is part of what is intended to make them funny? I’m not sure I understand what you mean.
I also interpreted the joke to be about the inevitability of rape – but I guess so much goes into how one inflects the last line – if heard said in a certain way there could be no doubt that the joke is about nuns wishing for rape.
As for jokes that deal with atrocities – I posted about this one last year.
Can we joke about rape? Are there certain ways that are acceptable, and ways tht are not, or is it all wrong?
Where are the boundaries?
i think all jokes about rape are inappropriate. just like i think all jokes about the holocaust are inappropriate.
I dunno – I still find this to be quite hilarious. (scroll down to “get your exx on”)
Though it’s not so much a joke about rape as it is a joke at the expense of callous condoning of rape (among other things).
Oh and I forgot to mention how great nexyjo’s first post was – so pip pip cheerios all around.
I’m not so sure I would find this joke reflective of the “wink, wink” understanding that all women “are desperate for sex and dare not admit it,” but (coming from an ex-Catholic) that nuns, who really, really, really should not be even interested in sex, might enjoy it if they ever had the chance, and, given the strictures of their vows, being raped in the woods might well represent one of the few “forgivable” opportunities.
I just read your original post about rape culture. There’s a lot of insight there, though I don’t agree with all of it. You describe three main components of rape culture:
1. Fragility of masculinity
2. Devaluing of women
3. Women “own” sex until they give it up or it is taken.
I agree about the first part, but it seems to be getting less pervasive nowadays. Or maybe I have a biased perspective since I hang with a pretty nerdy crowd. Most of my male friends are (like me) in their early twenties and still virgins, and not particularly upset about it.
Ditto the third part. It is true in general, but women are more often viewing men as sex objects than they were, and (hopefully) men doing so less to women. I attribute this to the recent commonality of young men and women being friends. Also that dating is much more casual, less like prostitution. And I don’t think that glorifiying the female body necessarily means we think women are inferior. The terribly misogynistic ancient Greeks glorified the male body instead. Women are just what is considered beautiful right now–I’m sure it’s a phase that will pass in a thousand years or so.
I take the most exception to the second clause, about men not valuing women as people. It is true that men are on the whole considered more competent, but we are also considered more expendable.
Your concerns give me pause, but I think that these factors make up at most a rape subculture. A large and fairly macho portion of male culture considers hurting women to be the ultimate cowardice. That is why you need not be surprised rape doesn’t occur more often (though it is still to much. Any amount of rape would be too much.)
Sandra,
I don’t really see the difference between the two bases for the joke that you mention. One is more detailed, and makes it specifically about Nuns, but both are statements that women would like being raped more than not having sex.
Amp: I don’t think we’re that far apart on what rape culture is. You’ve broken it down into three specific elements; I see it more in terms of a whole bunch of interrelated ideas about men, women and sex, but I think we’re agreed on the main point: rape culture is a set of cultural assumptions that lead to rape being the problem that it is.
Forget what I said about portrayals of female vs. male bodies. I have since realized it was irrelevant to my point.
Nexyjo – thank you for that insight. I’m a 50’s white woman in a small town; most of what’s discussed here and in Ginmar’s LJ hasn’t touched me. But now that I’m reading the discussions and looking back, I see that I have restricted myself in many ways, because of the things that girls are taught are “safe” or “not safe”. I remember walking across my small-town college campus after dark, feeling somewhat nervous, and trying to convince myself that there was no danger. And – there wasn’t. But I suspect that a male of the same age, in the same situation, would have no feelings of doubt or nervousness – and that does indeed say a lot about our culture.
Brett – On the contrary. Most jokes are a way of belittling the “butt” of the joke, whether it’s about Aggies, lawyers – or women. So, the unpoken assumption is that it’s “okay” to tell a joke about Aggies because “everyone knows” they’re stupid. Similarly, it’s “okay” to make lawyer jokes because “everyone knows” that they’re scum-sucking bottom feeders. (Apologies to any Aggies or lawyers reading this. If you can’t tell, I don’t approve of these jokes.)
By this thinking, it’s “okay” to tell jokes about women being raped because “everyone knows” that they “really want it” or that it’s “no big deal” or there’s “nothing we can do about it”. And thus, tacit approval for regarding women as “less” and rape as “insignificant” is perpetuated.
Words *matter*. If they didn’t, African-Americans wouldn’t object to being called “nigger”, or whites to being called “honky”. Words convey our beliefs, and teach the next generation. In the guise of jokes, the wrong words perpetuate sterotypes that should be abolished, and teach the children to continue the culture – in this case, that it’s “okay to rape”. Just – no.
Has anyone heard jokes like this lately? I haven’t in the US, but I heard them all the time in L America. Haven’t we done a good job here of getting most people to see that rape is a real crime?
Maybe it’s your age or maybe it’s your generation but frankly I have not really heard jokes like this told “proudly out in public”, in my family or among my friends or close acquaintances. That having been said I do believe that jokes like this , or jokes that in any way perpetuate stereotypes or make light of something that is a violation of another human being, would be a very significant part of the problem if they were happening. I just don’t see it happening.
Haven’t we done a good job here of getting most people to see that rape is a real crime?
Stranger rape, maybe (although the turnout on the thread with Nick’s personal story, as well as the continuing prevalence to blame the victim in court cases despite it being illegal, speaks otherwise).
The most common rapes, however, are not taken nearly as seriously as they should be. Acquaintance rape, for instance.. Or spousal/date rape. Heck, the very idea of rape is not taken seriously, seeing as it’s common to throw around the word “rape” as if it’s an appropriate substitution for other words (ex. “oh, man, I just got raped by Pikachu in Smash Bros!”).
Boys aren’t taught to hear it when girls say “no”. Girls are taught to fear going anywhere alone – walking, driving, etc. It’s common to slut shame, or to ask what a woman was wearing if she got assaulted, or to bring up her personal history – as if consenting to sex in one situation means that she consents to it in all situations.
Rape cannot be seen as a “real” crime if we don’t understand what rape really is in the first place.
Nexyjo: thankyou so much for telling us about your experiences!
So, was Mel Brooks’ re-make of ‘To Be Or Not To Be” inapropriate? It certainly referenced the Holocaust?
Hell, last night on TV on The Family Guy they had a rape joke — part of the joke being Kelly McGillis (who was herself raped) giving a lecture to first year college students. She told the women in the audience to look to their right and then their left; then she said “both of those guys will rape you”. The student to the right said “I don’t want to rape you.” The student to the left said “I want to rape you.”
Where was the humor?
Q Grrl, I didn’t see Family Guy, and that joke doesn’t sound funny, but I think it may have been intended the right way: It begins as what looks like a shot at feminists: making an outrageous claim about hte prevalence of rape. But then, the claim turns out to be essentially right. The audience member is sitting next to a rapist. Reading the joke as text, it seems to say, “the feminists are right, there’s a lot of rape out there.”
I’m just going on the description here, though. Timing, context and delivery may argue for a different meaning.
Stranger rape, maybe (although the turnout on the thread with Nick’s personal story, as well as the continuing prevalence to blame the victim in court cases despite it being illegal, speaks otherwise).
This is a distortion. The issue being discussed on Nick’s personal story is whether or not her behavior should be considered dangerous and foolish and whether or not it should be discouraged. It had nothing to do with whether or not what the man was trying to do should be considered a crime; everyone seemed to agree that it should.
You may argue that those who disparaged Nick’s behavior were blaming the victim or that their criticisms were unwarranted, but do not accuse them of making arguments that they were not making.
Glavister, read the bolded sentence of my first statement. That is what I was saying by my quoted part. I don’t give a crap if people say “oh yeah, it’s a crime and he did wrong” because blaming the victim negates the reality of the crime and is used in real court cases to discredit the victim’s claim of rape.
But, since you either missed it the first time or chose to ignore it, I’m going to reiterate my point: Rape cannot be seen as a “real” crime if we don’t understand what rape really is in the first place.
Eeryone seemed to agree that what the man was doing should be considered a crime? Really? Lot of poeple on that thread—including you—seemed way more interested in discussing victims disparagingly at great length. Oh, yeah,a nd you know what? We already know why women don’t leave, Glaivester. The fact that you don’t know is your own problem. Just thought I’d toss that in there before I forget.
Lots of people on that thread…including you…seemed way more interested in discussing victims disparagingly at great length.
Including me? Really? I never posted on either of the two previous threads discussing Nick Kiddle’s experience.
I assume you are actually referring to the post about McDonald’s. Can you explain to me what I said that was disparaging about the victim? My point was that the entire system had apparently convinced her that she had no choice but to submit, either because authority must be submitted to, or because McDonald’s would fire her if she didn’t. As long as we allow the system to convince people of this, we are making it easier for people to victimize other people.
There’s a similar joke told by Irish comedian Dave Allen back in the 70s:
An old Italian nun is interviewed about WWII, and she talks about how one army after another – German, Italian, American – swept through the countryside where the convent was located: “and then-a the Germans-a come and they rape-a all of the nuns, except-a Sister Mathilda. Then-a the Germans, they retreat, and then the Americans come, and they rape-a all the nuns, except-a Sister Mathilda. And then…” etc., etc., etc. Interviewer: “That’s incredible. All these different armies – why didn’t they rape Sister Mathilda?” Nun: “Sister Mathilda doesn’t like-a that sort of thing.”
Is this any funnier or more defensible than the “raped twice” joke?
First of all rape is a crime, rape is statistically committed by men against women, and it is never, ever the victims fault.
Having said that, I was not socialized to be afraid of rape. My father taught me to defend myself from the bullies in the school (mostly girls). We discussed that my body was my property and I was the one that said yea or nay to any sex. But, I’m not afraid of dark parking lots. I travel lots by myself, I walk across the campus alone at night. I’m not afraid of being raped in those situations. I do not however drive my car through areas where I know that there is known drug and or gang activity. Not for fear of being raped, but the fear of being carjacked.
Am I so alone in this feeling of strength and power? Because reading these posts and threads, I get the impression that women all across the country are hiding in closets and only going out in groups. I don’t see that here where I live. I live in a medium sized city in Louisiana with a fairly high crime rate.
Mendy, I think some of what you’re sensing comes from our life experiences. I know that after I was mugged at my front door, I wasn’t as confident as before the mugging, and it was months before I was comfortable being alone in a parking lot after dark. I’m back doing most of the things I used to do, the way I used to do them, but with that little extra awareness of my surroundings because of my experience. Plus, I’ve started taking Tae Kwon Do.
I was fortunate that my parents taught my sisters and me to be assertive and self-confident, and it appears that your parents have done the same with you. But that is not the case for many women, and I believe that for them, it is an ongoing process to go beyond the messages of caution and deference that they have heard all their lives. And that may be the other part of what you’re getting from some of the posts on this blog – many of us are working out how best to fit feminism into our presents and our pasts by sharing what it has been like for us.
Thank you for that Lee. It makes me wonder about parents that I see today with their daughters. The moms and the three and four year olds in the beauty pageants. I sometimes wonder if my upbringing was totally different from everyone else’s, because I wasn’t constatnly reminded how “pretty” I was but how “smart” I was.
I’m not sure how to fix the problem on a large scale, but I’m doing it in my own small way. I’m raising my daughters to be confident and assertive, and my son to be respectful of everyone. We don’t have boys toys or girls toys…come to think of it we don’t have that many toys at all really. Mostly we have balls, board games, and books. Things that require cooperation, communication, and sharing. Education through play time. I wonder if my contribution will help in the long run though.
Noit Me: it’s less funny, because you did the accent.
Mendy
I think it’s both upbringing and outside experiences – which includes the larger culture. Some people are also more sensitive to social influences than others.
I know that my parents raised me much the same way you describe yourself as being raised, but because of things both unrelated to my gender (fairly ill as a young child – possibly my inherent personality as well) and related to my gender and how society tends to treat me because of it, I’m probably more fearful and cautious than you are.
I also know, though, that I’m still the one insisting to my female peers that it really isn’t that big of a deal for me to walk a few blocks alone at night.
Just out of curiousity – how old are your kids and have they ever asked for gendered products? (barbie, bionicle, etc?)
Jenny,
My children are 11, 7, and the baby will be 6 in another couple of months. The eldest two are girls and the youngest is a boy. They do on occasion ask for gendered toys, but the odd thing is my daughters are more likely to ask for Bionicle than my son. The girls don’t care much for Barbies, but they do have some dolls, and all the kids enjoyed playing with them when they were younger.
Legos are wonderful and we have quite a few of those for the kids, but mostly my children are into music, bikes, and books.
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