Want to stop rape?
Aug. 25th, 2010 12:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumDon't rape
It's not a great campaign, but the idea is sound. Men rape. Women don't need to change what they do, the people who rape them do.
Yes, I l know the arguments... people need to take care of their surroundings, not do stupid things, etc.
It's all true, and none of it is relevant to the real issue. No one will really say, "it was my fault" if I do something which increases my risk, and I get attacked.
Example: A kid was murdered down the block from me. The word on the street is he was killed over money. What money? Stuff he won in the illegal dice game the folks next door used to run (they stopped, just after the killing... I wonder why).
No one is blaming him for playing in the local game, nor for being on a streetcorner. They blame the people who shot him.
Which is as it should be. They also don't have campaigns up saying, "If you hang on the corner, you are asking to get shot/robbed/thumped." When the Klan rolls into town and beats someone for being "uppity" we (no longer) blame the victim.
But rape... we still do that. She was in the wrong bar. She went out alone. She wore, "provocative" clothing (which is to say, she wore clothes). She "led him on", etc.
All of it is nonsense.
Rape isn't a con-game. It's not a Nigerian scam. It's not a case of the victim being beguiled into doing something. It's a guy who doesn't take no for an answer. It may be force, it may be subterfuge (the "get them drunk" trick). It may be social pressure. It may be any number of things.
But the root of it all, the rapist didn't take no for an answer. It may have been in advance (force, drugs) it may have been soft-pedal ("if you loved me", "you know you want to"), it may have been thoughtless (she says, "maybe this is a bad idea").
The simple fact of the matter... the consent you want, if you are going to avoid rape; the consent we need to teach our sons (before they get confused messages from the culture), the message we need to make the norm...
Consent = enthusiastic consent.
It's that simple. If one's partner is enthusiastic, then the question of rape goes away. If one doesn't pressure, then the question of rape goes away. If one sets rules (when I started having sex, my rule was, "if one of us is impaired, and we don't have an extant physical relationship, we aren't starting one now." As I got more experience with sex, and impairment, I modified it some. I have a pretty good idea when my ability to decide is starting to get fuzzy, and at that point the rule kicks in. For my partner, I do a slightly less nuanced version of this. I look at age, and what I've gleaned from conversation; while not impaired, to decide. I try to err on the side of, "we can wait." First times are, IMO, better sober, in any case).
Enthusiastic consent = no rape.
Non-consent (no matter when, nor how mildly expressed) = rape.
It's that simple. The same way the thief steals, the murderer murders and the liar lies: the rapist rapes.
It's not a great campaign, but the idea is sound. Men rape. Women don't need to change what they do, the people who rape them do.
Yes, I l know the arguments... people need to take care of their surroundings, not do stupid things, etc.
It's all true, and none of it is relevant to the real issue. No one will really say, "it was my fault" if I do something which increases my risk, and I get attacked.
Example: A kid was murdered down the block from me. The word on the street is he was killed over money. What money? Stuff he won in the illegal dice game the folks next door used to run (they stopped, just after the killing... I wonder why).
No one is blaming him for playing in the local game, nor for being on a streetcorner. They blame the people who shot him.
Which is as it should be. They also don't have campaigns up saying, "If you hang on the corner, you are asking to get shot/robbed/thumped." When the Klan rolls into town and beats someone for being "uppity" we (no longer) blame the victim.
But rape... we still do that. She was in the wrong bar. She went out alone. She wore, "provocative" clothing (which is to say, she wore clothes). She "led him on", etc.
All of it is nonsense.
Rape isn't a con-game. It's not a Nigerian scam. It's not a case of the victim being beguiled into doing something. It's a guy who doesn't take no for an answer. It may be force, it may be subterfuge (the "get them drunk" trick). It may be social pressure. It may be any number of things.
But the root of it all, the rapist didn't take no for an answer. It may have been in advance (force, drugs) it may have been soft-pedal ("if you loved me", "you know you want to"), it may have been thoughtless (she says, "maybe this is a bad idea").
The simple fact of the matter... the consent you want, if you are going to avoid rape; the consent we need to teach our sons (before they get confused messages from the culture), the message we need to make the norm...
Consent = enthusiastic consent.
It's that simple. If one's partner is enthusiastic, then the question of rape goes away. If one doesn't pressure, then the question of rape goes away. If one sets rules (when I started having sex, my rule was, "if one of us is impaired, and we don't have an extant physical relationship, we aren't starting one now." As I got more experience with sex, and impairment, I modified it some. I have a pretty good idea when my ability to decide is starting to get fuzzy, and at that point the rule kicks in. For my partner, I do a slightly less nuanced version of this. I look at age, and what I've gleaned from conversation; while not impaired, to decide. I try to err on the side of, "we can wait." First times are, IMO, better sober, in any case).
Enthusiastic consent = no rape.
Non-consent (no matter when, nor how mildly expressed) = rape.
It's that simple. The same way the thief steals, the murderer murders and the liar lies: the rapist rapes.
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no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 09:06 pm (UTC)Ok, I'll cop to that.
But you know what won't happen? No one will refuse to prosecute.
No one will put you on the stand and convince the jury you "deserved it".
No one will say, if I didn't fight, and kick and scream and come nigh unto death, then I didn't really get robbed.
So yeah, I'm pehaps glossing a bit, but the core.. that it's my fault, and I deserved it, isn't carried the same way.
And glossing the part where I said being aware of one's surroundings matters, well that's bullshit too. Because yes, the same way one has to not flash a roll of ones wrapped with a twenty, one has to pay attention. But there isn't anything a short skirt, or going out alone, or wearing any other thing which trips someone's switch is justification.
As to the problem of rape by violence; it's the least of the categories of rape, so it's actually not the rape I care about most. Most guys who commit non-violent rape get all sort of comforting apologists who say, "it's not as if he was violent, it wasn't, 'real' rape."
Yes, there are degrees of murder. Until, and unless, the culture sees rape as being in degrees, and insists that it all needs to be punished. When the courts stop accepting things like, "It's impossible to rape a woman in "skinny jeans", then I'm going to keep saying things like this.
Because, for all that there is "sex decided on poorly" there is also traumatic rape which doesn't involve violence, and until that granularity is understood, explanations which depend on it are fruitless.
So, OK, you think it's bullshit. Got that; but your arguments don't persuade me, because, while mine may not be perfect, when expressed in symbols, yours don't fix the problem either.
Of the two, I'll take this bit of hyperbole, to the casual dismissal of everything which isn't, "rape by violence".