and it’s still both a hijack and done to death. milroyj
I suppose if you consider men to be rapists in some unfixable intrinsic way you could develop and espouse the attitude that men rape, and that therefore the prudent female does what she needs to do to work around that fact (including coping with it when it happens). Sort of like saying that the sky tends to rain from time to time, so sometimes you have to know when to carry an umbrella and a tough traveler doesn’t complain about getting rained on. And it is women’s responsibility to avoid being around men except where men are unable to rape (and perhaps ultimately women’s responsibility to cage men and control them so as to make it safe for women to walk the streets at night).
However, if we are unwilling to say that men are intrinsically rapists (even if some of them never actually do it, etc), and that therefore it is not a dangerous and foolish thing for a female to cease to treat all men as such, then we can’t turn around and blame the rape victim for trusting males and relaxing around them and regarding them as people rather than as enemies.
If, in fact, we make fun of or disparage or complain about women if and when we find them reluctant to be around men under any circumstances other than those where behavior is monitored and policed and chaperoned, and we say that women should enjoy life and be fully sexual and be spontaneous, then we can only blame the rapists, not the victims, for it is the rapists, not the victims, who have violated the social contract.
In my humble opinion, and in accordance with my political perspective, I’d like to say that with every fibre of my being I want to share life and society with women who feel free to enjoy life, to be spontaneous, to be sexual, and no more afraid of me and other men than I am of them. Therefore the rapists are inevitably and always to blame whenever rape occurs, period.
If a female promises sex, overtly and in so many words along with lurid and provocative expression of same, and coaxes a guy into following her into her apartment whereupon she disrobed and plays with him and gets him aroused and they prepare to have sex, and then she changes her mind because he starts acting like an asshole, if he forces sex upon her at that point he is guilty of rape. His responsibility to not rape, not her responsibility to avoid situations where it might happen.
I’m sure most women realize that it’s very likely that a man is after sex if he invites you to his hotel room after you’ve been partying at a bar. If these girls didn’t realize that then yes, they were pretty dumb. But maybe they did. Maybe the thought of having sex with these guys initially seemed acceptable to the girls, but something happened to change their minds – like finding out that they’d been lied to all evening. I don’t think these girls were responsible for the situation they found themselves in, because their assailants were deliberately trying to trick them.
Rape is a foreseeable outcome of getting into a car with a man only if most men are rapists. Most of the time, when a man offers a woman a ride, his intention is not to rape her.
Rape is a foreseeable outcome of getting into a car with a man only if most men are rapists. Most of the time, when a man offers a woman a ride, his intention is not to rape her.
>> At what point do you stop calling it ‘assuming a risk’ and start calling it ‘living one’s life’?
There is no such thing as living one’s life without risk. There is only degrees of risk. You can be locked up in your home and still you have some risks. It is only a question of degree. There is no magic line where on one side there is no risk. Living one’s life is managing risks and the risk differs depending upon the circumstances. The fact that the risk comes from criminals, nature or other factors is irrelevant. The fact that the risk is unknown to you is also irrelevant. The risk is there and the consequences might get you.
I have been the victim of several crimes. The criminals were absolutely responsible for their crimes but the fact is that by living my life the way I did I was assuming certain risks which I could have diminished if safety was my prime concern. Living life is managing risks. There is no way around it. When you buy car A instead of car B because car A is cheaper even though car B has a better safety record, you are managing risks. When you smoke or not smoke you are managing risk. Pretty much the definition of “living your life” is choosing what risks you assume and to what degree. Do you have a home alarm or not? One way or another you have made a decision which entails managing risk.
In this specific case I feel especially bad for the victims because they are so young and probably did not realise what they were getting into. I feel the parents bear some responsibility if they were not adequately supervising them. If the girls were warned but chose to go anyway, then they assumed the risk, and made a mistake by doing so.
I think you guys are on to something. One of the main acheivement of the Taliban was that they seriously diminished incidents of rape in Afghanistan. I think we might be coming up with an answer rolls eyes.
One group should never be restricted from doing legal activities under the threat of violence by another group. Anything else is letting terrorism prosper. If you would like to make it illegal for women to ride in cars, drink beverages and talk to men, and make women who violate those laws go through a legal process leading to them being raped…well…go for it, I guess. But meanwhile vigalante “justice” against women who wear short skirts (or whatever) should not be tolerated, and should not be even indirectly considered acceptable.
It’d be intersting to get a sex breakdown on posts in this thread. I don’t think a lot of guys understand how much the threat of rape already affects women. It affects what I wear, what classes I take in school (I can’t be getting out of class late, after all), when I see my friends, what kind of shoes I wear (I never wear anything I can’t run in) what jobs I’ll consider working, what kind of recreational activities I’ll do (my favorite thing in the world- hiking- is pretty much off limits if I can’t get a guy to go with me), where I travel to, if I can fall asleep at night if I am home alone…almost every aspect of my life, and certainly every aspect of life that I enjoy. It’s not just a matter of not putting on my leather mini-skirt if I’m going to get drunk in the middle of the night in the center of town. It is something that affects me, and almost all women, on an everyday basis.
This is not reasonable. This is not risk-management. This is being forced under the threat of violence to live less of a life. It sucks. It is unacceptable. It upsets me greatly that people still believe that it is acceptable and expected for women to live a life that is less rich, with less oppertunities, and with less freedoms than men.
>> Rape is a foreseeable outcome of getting into a car with a man only if most men are rapists.
No. If that were true car accidents would be a foreseeable event only of most trips ended with a car accident. Car accidents happen seldomly and yet we require parents to use car seats for infants and seatbelts for themsleves because even though the chances are small the consequences are very grave.
Most people are not thieves but I lock my money in the bank because it only takes on thief to ruin your whole day.
Again, it is a matter of odds and risk management. If you get in a car with someone you have known for a long time your chances of being raped by him are significantly smaller than if you get in a car with a guy you just met in a bad part of town. If you get in a car with your boss to go to a business meeting across town, your chances of being raped are significantly smaller than if you go out with a guy on a first date and after you have both had a few drinks you invite him into your apartment and then tell him to take off his clothes so you can give him a massage.
Well, rephrase it to say simply “mauled” instead of “raped” and "group of bears’ instead of “gang of thugs” and see how it plays.
Okay, what can I say. I’m a father of a 20 year old girl. If she pulled a stunt like those girls I’d wring her neck. Not really.
And sailor, have you ever heard of an 18 year old girl going out being supervised by her parents?:rolleyes:
>> This is not reasonable. This is not risk-management. This is being forced under the threat of violence to live less of a life. It sucks. It is unacceptable.
Welcome to the real world. Now tell me what solution you propose to stop criminals from commiting crimes. I also would like to be able to walk safely anywhere at any time and to be able to carry valuables without having to worry about my safety. Please tell me what you plan to do to end crime and make this the perfect world we all want. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter and I will vote for you in the next elections.
Yay, AHunter3 and even sven.
(Now if we could just get the government to apply sven’s logic to the gays-in-the-military issue . . .)
>> And sailor, have you ever heard of an 18 year old girl going out being supervised by her parents?
yes, it happens all the time in cultures where the incidence of rape and other violent crimes is much lower than it is in the US.
“”“Do rape victims bear any responsibility for stupid decisions that endanger them?”"""
No.
Although, I’d add that neither do the rapists bear responsibility.
Rape is not logically consistant. However, not everyone understands why it is more logical to kill oneself than to rape.
You cannot fault either of these individuals for lack of knowledge.
-Justhink
I doubt many people on this board have stated that the Jewish student sitting in the cafeteria was responsible. Aren’t you confusing the responsability of the student and the responsability of the Jewish state?
However, if you want me to say something which will probably irritate you, I do think that the settler who decide to live in, say a new settlement in the occupied territories is partially responsible if he gets killed, since I believe he commited a wrongful action at the first place.
No. That’s kind of like asking:
Do people who have their houses burglarized bear responsibility for not having good enough locks?
Did the Jews bear responsibility for provoking Hitler into killing them?
Gee Sailor, I never thought of it that way. In the real world, gay men get tied to fence posts and left for dead. Black men get beat up by police and dragged to their death by trucks. In the real world. In the real world, transexuals get shot, Jews get beheaded and people that look vaguely Arab get beat up in the streets. In the real world women get raped for doing just about anything. shrug. Nothing to be done, I guess.
Walking down the street with valuables is something that you do. Being a woman is something that you are. The two situations are not at all analagous. I refuse to listen to an argument stateing that I am doomed to a life of fear and restrictions because I was born with a vagina. And I really really refuse to listen to your “arguments” that you live with the same sense of fear and restriction as a woman. You very cleary don’t. You insult 52% of the human population by claiming that you do.
Oh, Ok, so you DO blame the victim. I see. Now we all know where you’re coming from. Thanks for being so clear.
Some of you may recall (or not) much to your dismay (or not), that I do not believe (as a male) that sex with females is possible without rape, unless one pays for prostitution.
I use a tic-tac-toe example to illustrate the point:
Tic-tac-toe is a fairly simple game. There are only so many combinations in the game which yeild a win. The worst a person could do if they do not want to lose (and have memorized all the combinations) is to force a draw; which is always possible! Two people who have the game completely memorized will neither one, win or lose; should they desire the best possible outcome in that sense.
For example: One who knows all the sequences for tic-tac-toe, understands that if an opponent starts on any of the middle squares on the outside rows (not the corners); that the game is over.
The point, is that people who win with sincerity, (not violating trust); still must fundamentally do the same exact moves as someone who is given no credit because they have memorized the game (assuming they let people know that they have memorized the game). A resource has been mapped extracted and thus turns a persons concept of free-will into a commodity. To this person, winning at tic-tac-toe, is ALWAYS cheating. From their moral perspective, this is absolute: Winners can only be ignorant or ravaging rapists. If tic-tac-toe becomes the sole determiner of value; the most valuable person will be the one who lies, or the one who reveals how they did it (thus collapsing the game). However!! The most logically consistant person will do neither of these, because they have abstracted a complete map of human value, and would thus still be deceptive in the process of claiming value.
Females are evidenced by their need for personality, that they do not ‘reward’ (deterministic feedback) behavior with logical consistancy.
This is a natural law. What females consider shallow and superfilcial is in actuality an expression of integrity, fostered by people who have consolidated the entire behavioral and personality system into commodity, rather than as: who_they_are; more importantly! who_YOU_are. To make as necessity personality an evidential means of sexual validation, immediately signals that you are a minor in terms of cognitive age.
Anyways, I can go on for days and days about this subject - one that suprizingly becomes more difficult to deny over time, regardless of your current or past impressions of how I have articulated this currently or in the past. It is an exceedingly true phenomenon; and ties into some of what I mentioned in the thread about “Male superior to females?!” (or something like that).
I wanted to clarify the stances a bit in regards to how I percieve this, in regards to the OP and my first reply to this thread.
-Justhink
Are you sure your attitude is that common? I mean, I know many women who come back home late, who wear shoes they can’t run in, who sleep like babies when alone at home, etc…They’re not necessarily raped on a regular basis.
I think we’re coming back to the current debate between sailor and wring : risk managment. Most people consider that sleeping alone at home is a very acceptable level of risk.