It’s been quite interesting to follow the comments on my two recent posts regarding rape and responsibility. While I don’t agree with all the responses, they certainly provided food for thought.
A couple of things struck me as the discussion unfolded.
It seems as if we aren’t all defining the word “responsible” in the same manner. Are there certain behaviors – like drinking til you pass out in the presence of strangers or walking alone in a dangerous area at night – irresponsible things to do? Well, yes, I consider them to be. If an individual is raped as a result of these actions, is the rape the fault of the victim? Absolutely not. We all make poor choices at time. Doing so does not mean “we get what we deserve” or that “our actions are the reason something happened”.
In taking one last view of the survey results, I find I agree with FTW – the questions are ambiguous and the numbers are probably not statistically accurate. That said, I suspect it does fairly accurately reflect the gap between how males view rape and responsibility and how women see the situation. Would you agree? If so, why do you suppose females take a much harsher position?
No related posts.
Just some perspective on “responsibility.”
Recently, the rescue teams at various national parks and state parks have proposed charging people for rescue attempts. This has been prompted by the huge increase in people who have needed such services in the last several years. Apparently, a lot of men and women have been wandering into the areas inadequately prepared, or worse, with the intention of pulling off some stunt.
When we read the stories about people who have been pulled from the bottom of a ravine, or who have been stuck out in a blizzard, all while relying on their iphone GPS, on a 1/4 tank of gas, or without adequate clothing, I do feel sorry for them. But the idea of charging for their rescue came about in hopes that others wold take more responsibility for their own safety and well-being, and not put themselves in such situations.
I have a young teen-age daughter, and I’m often having those talks with her about men – just casually letting her know that all men aren’t as nice as the ones on TV, and that she will need to keep her head and not get into unsafe situations.. It’s difficult to do this without scaring the hell out of her, and making her think that almost *all* men are potential rapists or worse (and don’t get me started on the Andrea Dworkin school of retro-feminism).
We should not confuse respnsibility with fault, but we do need to understand that everybody – men & women – needs to take some responsibility for their own safety. Like Mother Nature, human nature can also be capricious and quirky. Let’s just keep in mind that acting appropriately to the situation, whether it be hiking in the Appalachians or going home with a stranger, is the best way to ensure your own safety.
I’ve hesitated to answer because this is such an ambiguous question. Yes, people are responsible for their actions that put them in dangerous situations, but, of course, nobody deserves to be raped.
There is almost a bit of a double standard, however. If the question was, does a man walking down a dark alley in a seedy location that he has no business being in, perhaps he is looking for drugs or a prostitute, and he gets mugged, how much responsibility does he bear? If a gangster rapper with no criminal history gets shot because he is from one coast and not the other, or one neighborhood and not the other, how much responsibility does he bear? He sings about this violence and the lifestyle that goes along with it, encouraging the negative behavior that ultimately gets him shot. So, how responsible is he for his own shooting?
I think it is this line of thought that must lead women to say, “well, you dressed like a ‘whore’ and accepted free drinks from a stranger all night. That’s what happens to people who put themselves in that situation”.
Having worked in the bar industry for many years I have seen women sit at a bar drinking water waiting for guys to buy them drinks, so I know this happens. I also took a shot given to me from a female friend once, a shot intended for her, that was clearly spiked with something. Luckily I had friends there to take care of me. I don’t care what you dressed like or how you acted. Rape is assault and nobody “deserves” or is responsible for their own assault.
Tom and All for Her, I really liked your responses.
I have two daughters and I have had similar talks. I don’t want them to live in fear, but I want them to be mindful of their surroundings. It is difficult thing to balance out.
I am in favor though of fining people for doing stupid things in parks, because they put rescue workers lives in danger. Or prevent a rescue of someone who through no fault of their own needs help. Worst case they deplete the budgets for the rescue people. Plus I don’t feel like subsidizing other people’s stupidity.
If a man does something stupid and gets assaulted. The odds are good the attacker will be convicted if there is good evidence. Unfortunately I don’t think this is true for women being raped. It is a double standard and should not exist.
Mike
Women do seem to have a more unforgiving attitude toward other women. I remember listening to Dr. Laura on the radio a few years ago, and she was berating some woman seeking advice on saving her marriage. Apparently, this women worked something like 60 hours/week, and this *caused* her husband to have an affair. Had she been a better wife, the good doctor argued, such misfortune might never have befallen her.
Eminem regularly spews hateful, misogynistic, and homophobic rhetoric. Many of his lyrics celebrate violence, intolerance, and rape. Yet instead of the scorn such lyrics deserve, they’ve garnered him several Grammy awards, and well over half of his fans are female. The problem seems clear to me. Before society can ever learn that violence toward women is wrong, we’ll have to start saying that ourselves.
Rape is wrong. It’s a crime. However, several items I read in the survey appears to be evidence attorneys try to use to support a theory that the action was consensual and the lady is not being truthful.
If we start from the conclusion that a person was raped, then the attacker was wrong. However, the behaviors over half of the responders in the survey said put some responsibility on the women are those that would give trouble in proving the rape charge:
1. Performing another sexual act on them (75% vs. 70%)
2. Getting into bed with a person (71% vs. 57%)
Sure, “No” should mean “No” whenever it is said. However, in a “he said, she said” case, a women might lose her case because the the defense attorney used the above evidence to support “he said.”
I have a daughter and she was taught (and is still being taught) to avoid several of the other behaviors given in the survey:
– No, young lady, don’t you ever go to a boy’s apartment! I don’t care if you are in college!
- Never accept a drink from a boy! I’ve told you they have a date rape drug!.
- Stay out of the bars. You pick up a boy friend from a bar and you will have a boy friend who picks up girls in bars.
I asked my lady about this survey. She indicates that women are harder on women probably because “women know women better than men know women.” I’ll need some women to help explain that comment to me.
Women do seem to have a more unforgiving attitude toward other women.
Leslie, I very much agree.
In work situations, I found that quite often the people most willing to cut my throat weren’t the men.
In friendships, it seems the people most willing to turn on me were women.
With regard to forgiveness, many women seem to hold on to things forever. Most men I’ve known let things go.
Of course, this isn’t a commentary on all women – just how it has seemed to me with the ones with whom I’ve worked or been friends.
To put it in a very boiled down and simple light, there are two kinds of rape. That done by someone the woman knows, such as a date, and that done by a total stranger who is a serial predator. In the former situation, by far the most common, the man is probably capable of empathizing with the woman as he begins to become sexually forceful. Why he shuts off those feelings of caring or overrides them is the key to change for this type of person. Such men can learn to act responsibly when the urge for sex flares up. In the latter case of a serial predator all ability to empathize with the victim is likely long buried or destroyed by a history of abuse done to him. Most predators are victims of predation themselves. These men have little chance to learn correct behavior when they feel strong desire, if in fact they feel desire at all. For many predators there is not even any arousal, just a cold determination to exert control.
Women, due largely to their lesser upper body strength, have a great deal more trouble defending themselves against rape than men. That and the fact that the majority of men are heterosexual not homosexual. I imagine that IF men were victims of rape as frequently as women, (say if men and women had exactly the same upper body strength and all men and all women were equally bisexual), then there would be far less rape of either gender and by either gender. In other words, the scales are currently tipped far to one side because it is far easier physically for a man to rape a woman and that is to whom the majority of such desire is directed. Women can naturally sense they are more vulnerable to rape and perhaps are less forgiving towards other female rape victims because this is an attempt to strengthen their own conviction to be careful. It is sometimes easier to build up one’s own boundaries by chastising those of others, or so it seems.
And then, to try to look at “responsibility” from yet another angle, there is that infinitely complex tangle of cause and effect known as karma. Why does one woman who is very careful get raped when another woman who is careless does not get raped? If you believe in karma then it is easier to answer this than if you do not, but still, most people would have to admit that sometimes bad things do happen to good people for no *apparent* reason. So really, what is the best strategy to avoid being raped? Everything discussed in this thread so far. Try to be as aware of surroundings and people as much as possible, even when cutting loose and having fun. Learn to defend oneself. There are ways which do not require much physical strength at all. And if you believe in the law of karma, practice as much kindness towards others as you can in this life, especially if you are a man who doesn’t want to get raped in the next one. Responsibility, or the lack thereof, is a two way street more often than not, an interplay between one person and another, and it usually has reverberations that echo far into the future.
Arafin
I think women in general view rape more harshly than men because of what comes after the assault. The rapist may have emotional scars from inflicting pain or injury on another, and may face legal consequences, or devote a lot of time and energy to avoiding capture. A woman must face the possibility of unwanted pregnancy, STD and even damage to her reproductive capacity, not to mention the emotional trauma.
A disturbing thought comes to my mind: am I capable of raping someone? My immediate answer is no, but I recall arguments made by a woman friend that going to a strip club or a prostitute is in some sense rape, as the sex workers may not be exactly free citizens making free choices.
I think we all do stupid things sometimes, and sometimes some of those things can lead to more risk than others. I think that members of rescue teams making judgements about who may or may not be more entitled or deserving of rescue is a harsh precedent to set.
Equally, if somebody inadvertently does something stupid, and this inadvertently leads them into situations in which their safety is at more risk, then whomever chooses to take advantage of this circumstance is still entirely responsible for initiating an attack.
Yes, adults can and should take as much care as possible with their own safety.
Does this mean that adults are always responsible for themselves? Yes.
Does this mean that adults are ever responsible for what other adults do? No.
Oh, also, my social and professional experience with other women has frequently been similar to that described by Leslie and Lady Julia.
Just in case anybody thought their experiences were unusual. :p
We are all responsible for making safe decisions for ourselves. No woman is responsible for an act of violence perpetrated against her.
Dear Lady Julia,
I feel honored to communicate with you. This is in
response to the rape and responsebility postings.
First of all, rape is a dreadful crime. Is a woman
ever to blame? I do not know. I do have some insight
into why women are so harsh on each other.
Often women want to feel that they are better than
other women, hence the criticism of other women.
“Look how big her butt is…” really means, “I am
better looking than her…”
I found it astonishing that when Bill Clinton was
elected President, a journalist commented, “All the men
I know would love to have sex with Hillary, all the
women I know would like to scratch her eyes out.”
I do not understand the hostility.
I know a woman that spent three years in a convent.
When men teased her in the workplace, I came to her
defense, if I felt they were going to far. Her comment
was: “I don’t mind the teasing from men, women, can
be merciless.”
When a famous basketball player faced rape charges,
a New Yorker magazine article interviewed a female
attorney from the prosecuting attorneys office.
“The worst jurors are women,” she said.
“Worst of all are middle aged women,”
(I would never put myself in that position…)
“The best jurors are men, they see through all
the crap.”
If a woman has sex after being pressured into it,
has she been raped?
If a man has sex after being pressured into it,
has he been raped?
If a man agrees to marriage after being pressured
into it, has he been “raped”?
The following came from this link:
http://theresamacphail.wordpress.com/2008/01/20/to-all-the-men-out-there-why-women-are-catty/
Women instinctively know that men have little
power when it comes to sexual intercourse
in male and female relationships. Women know
that if a platonic relationship exists between
a male and a female, ninety percent of the
time it is a platonic relationship because the
woman does not want to have sex with the man
instead of visa versa.
Why do women hate other women?
1. Women feel that their biological prime-time
is limited. She can easily be replaced by a
new younger, more beautiful woman. Youth is
a woman’s fair-weathered friend.
2. Women feel that other women control their
man’s sexual fidelity.
3. Women feel that their level or degree of
physical beauty is based on luck as opposed
to something that she controls.
4. Women feel that other women can take something
that they have worked hard to earn by using their
beauty on the job, school and the legal system
because men will be taken by her beauty.
5. Women feel that other women can not be trusted.
They gossip too much, they are phony and they would
take your man right before your eyes.
6. Women feel that other women divert attention
away from them.
7. Women feel psychologically competitive with
other women to be more attractive.
8. Women subconsciously believe that if they merely
looked like another woman, they could inherit her
life, her diamond, her man, and people would look
at her with the same admiration.
A girlfriend of mine once said to me
“you guys fight like wimps” “When we girls
fight we go right for the areas that hurt!”
Midwest guy, thanks for your comments and welcome :)
With regard to the article you posted, I think some of those comments are true about some women, but I’d like to say that even though more of my conflicts have been with women, my conflicts haven’t been with most women. Most women, like most men, are not bad people.
For what it’s worth, I don’t hate other women, I feel as if my man’s fidelity is controlled by him, I don’t feel other women divert attention away from me, and I don’t think I have to look like anyone to inherit anything that’s theirs – primarily because I don’t want something that belongs to another person. I do think physical beauty is to a degree about luck (well, genetics) but we can all take care of ourselves and dress for success so to speak. I’m pretty average, but it hasn’t stopped me from dating or feeling attractive.
4. Women feel that other women can take something
that they have worked hard to earn by using their
beauty on the job, school and the legal system
because men will be taken by her beauty.
I think there’s some truth to that. If there is, does it say more about women or men?
“5. Women feel that other women can not be trusted.
They gossip too much, they are phony and they would
take your man right before your eyes.”
I don’t think another woman could “take my man” right before my eyes, and if they could, they could have him. I admit I don’t trust most women but I don’t trust a lot of people period. Fair enough, I don’t trust women more than I don’t trust men.
Thanks for sharing :)
Robert H. Heinlein wrote many books showing his love of women. In one, that was based on a Moon colony, he explained how violence against women by men were handled: the men were tossed out into the “Moon atmosphere” (vacuum) through an airlock. We could use a simple approach like that to take care of this problem.