Sorry, that should have read "of the number of women I personally know, including myself, who have gone through this trauma…
Blue John,
Rape, and the fear that it breeds, affects women in many ways that you’d never imagine. Ask a woman close to you if fear of rape enters her day-to-day life. I betcha it it does. To some degree or another, it affects where we go, when we go out, where we work, what we wear, who we talk to and what we feel comfortable doing. I think you’d be really really surprised to see how pervasive it is, when you might have never noticed it before.
Don’t you think Israelis understand suicide bombing a little better than say, Swedes?
I actually neglected to apply for a job I might have gotten, because it would involve getting the buses to and from the North Side at night because of a fear of being raped. And it’s not as remote as you might think-there was a serial rapist on my very busline a few years back-he was caught, thank god.
People told me it was unreasonable, but I don’t want to be walking around in downtown Pittsburgh or the North Side waiting for buses that late at night. Call me paranoid. I don’t care.
However, the PPD have yet to catch the notorious East End Rapist.
I don’t take Blue John seriously.
His/Its ideas are so ludicrous, that they could just be a game. I mean he refers to Otto Weininger! Hello? This is a joke. Admittedly, a rather sick joke. His/its whole thread is meant to provoke, not to enlighten. I would use the word t-r-o-l-?, but politeness forbids such open expression of my opinion.
Who is Otto Weininger?
re-read blue john’s posts.
word by word.
rather than scanning them because of a lack of paragraphs and coherence.
amazed at the stuff he HASN’T been called out on. can only assume it’s because no-one bothers to read what he posts.
am glad.
Another Doper checking in to say “rape survivor”
So you guys can judge whether it was rape or not, he was my boss, he threatened my job, and he held me down. He did not hit me, and although I said No and struggled, I did not hit him. I did not wish to escalate the violence of the situation.
I’m sure it affects some women that way, but please don’t generalize that it affects all women that way.
There are those of us who don’t even consider the idea before going out or putting on our favorite clothes or getting the job we want or striking up conversation with someone.
To imply that every woman weighs those decisions with ‘But I might get raped’ is disingenuous.
Everyone has to do what makes them comfortable. People told me I was crazy to take a job where I worked in the middle of the night and often walked 3 miles through Pittsburgh (part of it through East Lib) because I had no concern over being attacked. Either way it seems there’ll always be people who think another person’s choices are unreasonable.
Blue John is most definitely taking the piss. Anyone else smell “troll”?
irishgirl, blue john had a point. that your posts are only emotional based and not based on facts.
you still seem so angry and hurt. I sincerely hope you evolve from this.
I’m just curious, don’t you think that ALL people have been raped felt those feelings that you listed?
I’ll just point out that, when Blue John was challenged on calling the UK Home office “cryptofeminist,” he responded by saying that it was “overtly feminist.”
I do not think “crypto” means what Blue John thinks it means.
Daniel
You lose all credibility and expose your true motives if your going to cite Weininger.
For those who don’t know, Otto Weininger was a misogynist and an anti-Semite who’s views had a direct influence on National Socialism. Here’s a little gem from Weininger which should illustrate his views on women:
No men who really think deeply about
women retain a high opinion of them;
men either despise women or they have
never thought seriously about them.
I guess Blue John has thought very seriously about women. :rolleyes:
Miss Bungle, i’ve never tried to be factual.
my first post was basically in answer to the people who said they don’t know any rape victims.
and i was trying to say, that if they know me, they do.
(…and it all went downhill from there)
really, i’m not as much of an emotional wreck as i come across in this thread, mostly because i don’t allow myself to be.
it’s coming up to 3 years now, and believe me i’m better than i was.
only 2 people in my real life know, and they’ve only known for about year, so i don’t get the chance to vent much.
i don’t feel comfortable presuming how other people feel, certainly not how “all” other people in a given situation feel. that’s why i keep it personal.
hope that clears things up a little.
MixieArmadillo, the statistics don’t lie.
I’m not a misogynist, I love women, I don’t hate women, although if I said what I think about women you would think I do. I love women and want only the best for them but even if I hated women it wouldn’t change the nature of objective reality.
“I have only a woman’s reason, I think it so because I think it so”, to slightly paraphrase Shakespear.
I believe there are many differences between the sexes, I don’t believe women are more likely to connect sex and emotion. I’m sure it’s a commonly held view, that doesn’t make it true. It’s a popular myth. I think a man would be more likely to understand the ordeal of rape than a woman, possibly excepting women who have been raped themselves, but this can’t be proven either way. You could put this down to my admittedly sexist views.
I’m glad my use of “hysteria” amuses you, amusement is healing, to paraphrase David Icke.
Your view “old fashioned attitudes”, as I called them, are a reflection of the larger society. A Victorian attitude towards women mixed with modern feminism. Just look at the knee-jerk reactions in this thread and the draft thread. The draft thread contains the idea that women should be “independant”, whatever that means, and have the choice to do what they want but the neo-Victorian notion that they must be protected. There’s an example for you. Hypocrisy of the highest order.
I stand by my views from the draft thread, especially the ones you cite. Do you really mean to argue that it’s alright for your views to be sexist if mine are too?
I’ve never understood why women should be barefoot and pregnant, according to the sexist of modern folklore. I support the subordination of women, for their own protection as much as anything, but I still see the benefit of shoes and the dangers of overpopulation.
evensven, Susan Brownmiller said “[rape] is nothing more or less than a conscious process of intimidation by which all men keep all women in a state of fear”, this is the same paranoia. The only reliable statistics suggest rape isn’t a common crime.
Men are more likely to be victims of murder and assault, massively more likely, that doesn’t mean every man is or should be afraid of walking alone in the dark. I do it all the time. Not just murder and assault, all violent crimes apart from rape (even rape if "Stop Prison Rape is to be believed, but that only applies to those men in prison).
I don’t see what’s so wrong with Otto Weininger, apart from the anti-Semitism, of course. He was a genius, a brilliant man. He was a product of early twentieth century Austria so it would be expected of him to be anti-Semitic. The anti-Semitism in “Sex & Character” is mostly aimed at likening Jews to women as a way to “badmouth” women, he was using what would be understaadable then and there to point out how women are. Even Jesus spoke in ways understandable to those around him to point out greater truths.
His opinions on women are alright, though, although I don’t really think he went far enough. He made it clear he didn’t believe the “absolute woman” to exist, nullifying all of his words up to that point. He refused to follow his own reasoning to the obvious conclusion, that women should not be treated as fully human.
He wasn’t a misogynist, either, he merely voiced unpopular views of women. He was a visionary. He was an intellectual coward who killed himself because no-one bought his books, until he was dead anyway. He was still brilliant.
The quote by Diogenes is from book two of Sex & Character, his greatest work.
Would someone pit this guy already? I don’t have the stomach or the vocabulary for it.
Daniel
This thread seems to be spinning off into some weird areas.
I have no idea who this Weininger cat is, but I was quite shocked by the quote by BlueJohn regarding women’s role as lactating, and making the new generation. Yuk, I just hope that was taken out of context somehow.
At the same time I view the quote by Mixie that women are more empathic about rape than men as doubtful. In my experience women tend to be harsher on each other than men are. I actually did an experiment for grad school regarding college student’s perceptions of domestic violence…basically whether people viewed male or female perpetrators as more culpable in domestic violence scenarios. One finding that was interesting was that, for domestic violence at least, male respondents were more sympathetic toward female victims of domestic violence than female respondents were. Of course this doesn’t necessarily generalize to rape (or outside of a college population for that matter). But I found the results interesting nonetheless.
Someone suggested that I ask a woman that I know whether rape is involved in her day to day decision making. As it so happens I have discussed this with my wife (who is not a rape victim by the by) on several occassions. Basically, she indicated that she doesn’t particular think about it from day to day, but that she is aware of “high risk” circumstances…for instance she doesn’t like to answer the door when she is home alone. I suspect that this may be a common sort of thinking pattern (though I may be wrong)…if so this occupies a middle ground, in my opinion, between those who think that rape is “no big deal” for women, and those who consider it to be a daily pressing issue.
I have known a good number of women (be they family members, friends or whatnot) who have been comfortable enough with me to share a number of personal or embarrassing details about their lives. I think that I am the most reasonable judge of the quality of these relationships and how likely these women would have been to disclose to me…not anyone else reading this. I would estimate that perhaps 1 in 16 reported to me some form of rape, attempted rape or sexual battery. I didn’t go around taking a survey mind you, and I am sure that this number is likely much higher among “high risk” women…most of my compatriots were suburban highly educated folks that are at lower risk than urban low SES folks. the argument that “well maybe the rest didn’t feel comfortable enough to mention it”…but most of these women seemed comfortable enough to mention other situations…so I find that line of argument to be somewhat facetious. the point is well taken…and yet it is fundamentally unfalsifiable. you could use the same arguement to suggest 1 in 4 people have been abducted by a UFO. If I point out that I seem to be aquainted with very few UFO abductees, you merely need suggest my friends are uncomfortable disclosing this information. Not only do you challenge my argument, but you slyly suggest that I am such a troll that my friends won’t open up to me.
As we all know rape is by an large a crime commited by a minority of men against women. Some rapes are homosexual male crimes…fitting about the percentage you would expect given the proportion of homosexual males in the population. I am curious as to people’s feelings regarding a much less common phenomenon…female perpetrated sex crimes. While rapes by women of adult men or women are rare (although not unheard of)…some researchers (Finklehor stands immediately to mind, as do Mathews, Mathews and Spetz) report that female perpetrators make up roughly 10-15% of sex crimes against children. Any thoughts on how that fits into this debate on sex crimes?
Consider it done.
I was just thinking a bit more about this. I don’t know if this phenomenon is common among men (as I study forensic psychology, I tend to be a bit more “in tune” for lack of a better word with some of these issues than other folk might be)…but I find myself monitoring my own basic behavior in some situations. for instance if I happen to find myself walking in a secluded area (such as a parking garage or similar locale) in the vicinity of a woman with whom I am not aquainted, I will usually try to allow for as much distance between us as possible so as not to cause any undo alarm. I know that is far different from monitoring such situations as a potential victim, but I think I can partially understand what it might be like to always be aware of the potential for threatening circumstances.
It’s not an all-consuming obsession or anything. Fear of rape is kind of a vague set nearly invisible bounderies based on a lot of feelings that are rarely put in to words. I never realized how much it affected me until I got out on my own and hung out with guys more. They didn’t understand it when I said I didn’t feel comfortable walking around the river alone or through the park at night. I had never even noticed that I avoided these things. It was second nature.
MixieArmadillo, falsely attributing words to someone who didn’t actually post them is against the rules. Don’t do that again.