is there a “rape” culture out there or such thing as “date rape?”
I, maybe to the surprise of some who’ve seen my elections post, say absolutely NO. The fact is if you can be charged for murder or motor vehicle homocide if you voluntarily get drunk behind the wheel and thus are no absolved of responsibility, then if you get voluntarily intoxicated and let a guy in you, you are also not absolved of responsibility and thus consent.
This is very different, IMO, than drugging someone. I do think using GHB or something to make a girl pass out, and then without their knowledge, doing them, is rape. But that’s entirely different.
You obviously have never been in a frat, or associated with one.
You are also totally wrong about date rape, which doesn’t surprise me either. You are saying that if I don’t actively duck the sniper I don’t know about, I am consenting to my murder.
So if you get drunk and someone decides to take advantage of you by stealing your wallet, then that person isn’t a crook who shoud be punished?
If you get drunk and someone decides to take advantage of you by pushing you off a bridge for laughs, that person isn’t a murderer who should be punished with serious jail time?
Personal responsibility has nothing to do with crime. I have a personal responsibility not to walk around late at night in dark alleys, engrossed more in my podcast than my immediate surroundings. But the mugger who jumps me is still a goddamn criminal, regardless of whether I was foolish or not. A society that says “meh, you deserved it” is a society that promotes criminality.
I am not sure the analogies here are good. Murder and theft are things people generally go to great lengths to avoid, whereas having sex is something people of either sex have been known to seek out for pleasure.
I am not saying that getting someone falling down drunk in order to get them in bed isn’t rape, quite the contrary. However, if two people get quite blasted and end up having sex, with neither one more sober than the other, the responsibility has to be shared.
I think there is a bit of a sliding scale here. Not that this particularly relates to rape culture.
We can reasonably debate what behavior in an intoxicated person constitutes consent, but the idea that voluntary drunkenness itself constitutes consent to any and all sexual activity is just absurd.
If you got drunk and passed out at a party, and woke up to find some guy putting his penis in your mouth, would you feel that you were responsible for what happened?
Of course there’s such a thing as date rape. I’ve known women it’s happened to. When I was in college, there were tons of guys who felt who buying a girl dinner or concert tickets equalled being granted phallic access to her mouth, pussy, or ass, and if getting that access required a little violence it was her fault. I see nothing among today’s young me to persuade me that that attittude does not persist.
Wtf. Seriously? I must be horribly naive because this shit freaks me out. I thought you guys were semi-civilized on the other side of the pond, where the heck does this attitude come from?
Obviously date rape is a very real and serious problem. However, the term “rape culture” is one which has somehow managed to achieve near total ubiquity without ever being rigorously defined. Until it is so defined, I’m comfortable saying it doesn’t exist.
A set of beliefs and practices which, in aggregate, have the effect of establishing a status quo wherein the existence of some amount of sexual violence is expected and normalized, leading to an environment where more sexual assaults occur than would occur in the absence of such a culture.
Really. Well, I would submit that your decision not to provide a definition (or even link to one) when given a golden opportunity indicates that you’re every bit as clueless about what “rape culture” actually is as everybody else seems to be.
Jimmy Chitwood gave a good definition in the post above yours.such cu I myself have seen rape culture in action. Cops who didn’t take rape accusations seriously because the woman in question was talking about her boyfriend or husband or a boss. A city (Memphis) that let rape kits pile up into the thousands because the crime was not considered a priority. Plenty of men, including my own father, who aver that testing the kits should not be a priority because the crime just isn’t just serious unless it’s committed against a married woman or a virgin.
Whyn’t you address his definition? The term rape culture is a description of and judgment upon conditions in American society. If you think the definition Jimmy provided is not apt, tell us why.
There’s also attitudes and behavior to consider as well.
I used to be skeptical of the term “rape culture” until one day I sat down and thought of past occasions when someone made a rape joke in my presence, with numerous people laughing and one-upping and nobody challenging it at all (this was in the Army if it makes any difference). I mean, the term “struggle snuggle” exists. People think it’s funny. People put up signs like this and pretend there’s no threatening undertone. What else can you call this but rape culture?
I did tell you why I don’t think it’s apt. It’s unreferenced. That’s reason enough. If Jimmy Chitwood provides an authoritative cite showing that his definition is the definition (or, at least, the most popular) then I would be happy to debate its merits.
To be clear, I’m not saying Jimmy Chitwood is lying. I’m not even saying he’s wrong. I just need more than his say so before I accept his definition as a workable one for the purposes of a debate. I wouldn’t expect less from anybody else, and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to give me a free pass on defining such a controversial term either.