True, but if you interpret that as consent, it’s possible to go all the way without knowing what you’re doing is wrong. The victim may lock up, cry, attack you, or whatever, or she may just not fight, resign herself, or accept it. In these sorts of scenarios it would be incredibly possible for somebody not big on situational awareness or introspection to not even know they were hurting somebody if they misread a signal.
You do not understand what “sadism” means. Sadism means that causing pain or suffering is the goal, and not just a side effect. A rapist who rapes because they want sex and don’t give a damn how that affects their victim is not a sadist, but they’re still a horrible person.
You can’t prevent rape just by locking up rapists. Rapists have to have raped someone to be rapists, so locking them up is punishing the criminals, not preventing them from committing crimes in the first place. It might stop them commiting further rapes. Or, they might just become prison rapists, given American indifference to that.
Maybe telling people not to get drunk won’t help either, but locking up rapists, which we already do, is widely accepted and uncontroversial, and is no more something we can realistically do to stop rape than locking up women or legalising prostitution.
Whether women are more likely to be assaulted by an intimate partner is a controversial claim. Women who are victims of violent crime are certainly far more likely to be attacked by their intimate partners and family members, but that’s because women are so much less likely to be attacked by anyone else.
Any advice like that is probably useless anyway. What’s it meant to say, be eternally vigilant against your closest friends and greatest loves incase they decide to rape you? Be eternally on your guard and refuse to form intimate bonds? Or what about the fact that women as so much less likely to be victims of violence, and therefore not a good target for advice designed to reduce the incidence of violence.
Your definition of normal people includes rapists? How exactly could a rape almost “accidentally” occur like you posit? This almost seems to be humanizing rapists as just clueless. Ignoring a signal like “NO” or “Stop please” ?
For someone who’s been drilled all her life in guarding against rape, that’s a pretty rookie mistake.
Not all rapists are normal people, but many are. Obviously many are psychopaths, or just entitled bastards.
But there are many who are just people who end up in bad situations and make damaging mistakes. And not all rapes involve the woman saying no or stop. Sometimes they clam up, sometimes they figure there’s nothing they can do so they just sit back and accept it. Sometimes they know that if they don’t word will get around and damage her reputation (“she teases the boys but doesn’t put out, don’t invite her to any more parties”). This doesn’t mean the woman consented, but it also doesn’t mean she’s even said “no” or “stop”.
That’s not even counting the emotionally coercive rapes, things like “don’t you love me anymore?” “You don’t think I’m attractive?” “I wish you still cared about me.” Things that can change a “no” to a reluctantly spoken “okay” that’s nothing more than emotionally coerced consent. That doesn’t require the person doing the manipulation to be evil, they could actually be feeling those things and voicing their concerns. That doesn’t change the fact that taking advantage of the victim’s care or love for them is coercive even if they didn’t have negative intentions. That’s why “enthusiastic consent” is important.* It doesn’t make them evil, just misguided (unless it’s knowing manipulation of course).
Many of the people who take advantage of this situations aren’t doing so knowingly, and many don’t even know they’re being harmful. They’re normal, but misguided people. We can still punish them, and we can still retaliate and protect ourselves against them, but we can’t just lump them in the “other” category.
Now rapists who go over to their “friend”'s house with the intention of throwing them on the floor and fucking them whether they like it or not, or those that actively threaten someone with blackmail or force. They’re not normal, but many, many rapists don’t fall in those categories.
- “Enthusiastic” isn’t my favorite term, really. There is still the grey area of “I can’t really decide whether I want to or not, eh what the hell, let’s do it. I don’t have anything better to do.” That’s not rape, but it’s also not enthusiastic. But the point is that a sheepish “yes” tends to be made out of fear.
How about the much more specific and practical advice in the OP’s linked article: Avoid getting seriously drunk.
That advice should be kept in context of college parties/activities, where there is a strong correlation between sexual assault and alcohol.
To extrapolate from that, that you could fix spousal or intimate rape cases, is going beyond what was mentioned or used as evidence in the article. This is especially the case when college kids attend these parties to meet new people, socialize, and engage their new freedom.
Yet - according to the linked Slate article - it’s alarmingly common for her to ignore this advice, and to suffer the predicted consequences.
It is irrelevant to the end effect of being incapacitated, but the vast majority of people who claim to have been “roofied” have no traces of the drug in their system. They simply got very, very drunk.
Huh. I didn’t realize it until reading this that I have been raped. By my ex-girlfriend.
While I agree in general with most of what he’s saying, Jragon is mistaken in suggesting that emotional coercion of the sort he’s describing constitutes rape, for the record.
You’re qualifying this (bolded section) as “rape”? Not physically coerced rape, but still “rape”?
Oh my goodness, what a horrible, snooty thing to say. Because you or your loved ones have never let your guard down, for just a second or two?
She was sitting at the bar with her drink. She turned to watch an older couple dancing to the jukebox and was smiling and clapping along with the music. She then took a drink, and that’s the last thing she remembered. The bartender (who is someone I know and trust, btw; this was a little bar some friends of mine went all the time) said she went facedown on the bar. He went to check on her and certainly saved her from whoever had plans for her. There were witnesses to the above.
More to the point, it doesn’t matter if she let her guard down. If she or I forgot the warnings we’ve received all our lives. If we dare leave the house without a male escort. If we associate with unrelated men. That does NOT justify raping us! We don’t deserve it! No one does! I feel like I’m communicating in Tarzan-talk in these discussions. “But she was drunk.” Don’t rape her! “She didn’t listen to advice.” Doesn’t matter! Doesn’t excuse rape! “She said yes to me before.” She said no tonight. Don’t rape her! “She let me in her apartment.” Don’t rape her! “She’s my ex-girlfriend.” That’s not a ticket to eternal rides. Don’t rape her! “She’s a hooker.” Makes no difference. Don’t rape her!
Rape of a blackout drunk person is just as bad as rape of a roofied person. Do we really need to go over this? Or is this setting up some argument of “Well, bad girls get drunk/drugged. If they were good girls this would never happen. Those bad girls got what they deserved”?
Those three sentences have next to nothing to do with one another. My point was that most rapists are not motivated by sadism – but power, sex, delusions, or ignorance. The sadists we can do little about right now other than locking them up after they strike. But some of the others, who are the vast majority of rapists, we could potentially head off at the pass with education and awareness campaigns. It gets us nowhere to go on about how they’re horrible persons. Yes, rape is horrible. Yes, rapists are horrible. So what? What’s next? What are we going to do to prevent it? Giving advice to women is useful up to a point, but its not realistic to live your life following anti-rape advice. “Most rape happens in the home or near the workplace.” So never go home or to work? “Most rapists are known to the victim.” So never talk to anyone, ever? “Most rapists are males.” Especially never associate with any men! “Many women are raped at college.” So don’t go to college?
Imagine you leave your purse open, with plenty of cash in plain sight, on the driver’s seat of your car, where the windows are rolled down in a crowded parking lot, from sunup to sundown. Would that justify someone stealing from you? Of course not; you don’t deserve that; indeed, you have the right to leave said house without bothering to close any doors – maybe posting a hey-don’t-take-any-of-my-stuff note – and return a day later with all of your possessions still on the premises; that wouldn’t justify a thief, you deserve to have all your property remain where you left it, I’ll even Tarzan my comments if you like.
Having said that, I’d still advise you against doing that stuff.
Vagina as tangible property: will your rhetorical utility never cease?