Not what I said, in the least. But ok. I think we’re done.
3 Likes
This thread reinforces my disgusted awareness that no matter how many times that kind of truth gets said, a lot of people simply don’t hear it.
7 Likes
I’m pretty sure I’ve repeated the same sentiment at least 5 times in this thread now.
8 Likes
Nothing will stop their bizarre idea that on some level, the woman “should’ve known better” and therefore had the power and responsibility to prevent their own rape. And yes dudes. That is literally what you’re saying. It is all that you’re saying.
You are not cleverly dancing around it.
You are literally giving someone sole responsibility for their own rape. And your shame-avoidance circuit is dead or working overtime, I can’t figure our which.
8 Likes
Let’s never give up. Some day…
Plus:
11 Likes
Internet dot jaypegg.
3 Likes
I’ll grant that you mean well, but I’m then forced to imagine how you can be so insistent on a point nobody’s refuting.
Because even if you are well meaning, pedantically insisting on personal responsibility for ones own safety strikes me as odd, as if logically stating that potential victims have it in their best interest to avoid putting themselves in risky situations somehow addresses that in this argument they are potential victims merely by existing and that they put themselves in potential danger if they don’t buy the right clothes or live in places where they can avoid the wrong sorts of people.
5 Likes
I hope you’ll at least do me the courtesy of reading my response, as you’ve mischaracterized my arguments and I’d like to set the record straight.
If you want low quality crap the crotch of which will split a few months in when you try to do anything the least bit athletic, sure. No more than $100. Some martial arts involve larger forces and require sturdier gis.
I’m not sure “it’s empowering”. I think that depends on a lot of factors to which neither you nor I have any access.
But a thought experiment. Suppose I exit my house one day and a safe drops from the sky, landing on and horribly crippling me. A few years later, reflecting on the event, I say: “I am completely responsible for that safe falling on me. After all, I had the unmitigated gall to step out of my front door.”
Empowering?
It depends on what you mean by “absolved” and “responsibility”.
In my view, if someone steals my ice cream cone and, in retribution, I punch them in the face then I am completely responsible for having punched that person in the face. The reasoning here is pretty clear: I had an opportunity not to punch them in the face, but I did not avail myself of that opportunity.
Now, the other person is completely responsible for having stolen my ice cream cone. But person A stealing person B’s ice cream cone is not in any way equivalent to or the same action as person B punching person A in the face.
If person B is acting in self defense – well, then part of the responsibility might very well fall on person A. We’d have to parse the situation in light of the details.
But strictly as a matter of logic: since the victim of a rape (by definition) does not consent to it, he or she cannot be responsible for the rape. I’ve asked you to clarify the sense in which we could say that the victim could be responsible for the rape, but you have either failed or declined to do so.
If my friend is an idiot and goes skiing on a double black diamond trail, then my friend is indeed responsible for any negative outcomes. Similarly, if my friend leaves trash around his campsite and is mauled by a bear, it is difficult not to assign him a great deal of responsibility for the outcome.
But a rape does not involve the mindless action of gravity, rocks, and trees, nor does it involve the amoral instincts of wild bears. It involved a human being making a decision to rape someone.
To the extent that I can understand the argument you’re making, you seem to be saying that some human beings should be considered forces of nature like an avalanche or a bear – that they’re not capable of making moral choices the same way other human beings do and cannot be held fully responsible for their actions. I reject this perspective. I do not think it is true.
You’re pulling a subtle bait and switch here. “Completely faultless” is not the same as “not responsible for one’s own rape”. I argue that a person is never responsible for his or her own rape because the rape was a decision made by another human being. I don’t argue that the victim was necessarily completely faultless. There is no contradiction in saying that the victim was doing something stupid and dangerous and at the same time the person who decided to rape the victim and then carried out that decision is fully responsible for both making that decision and perpetrating that action.
And recognizing that the perpetrator of an act bears full responsibility for that act (excepting highly contrived situations) is not to declare them “irresponsible little children”. On the contrary – putting responsibility on the victim is declaring the perpetrator an amoral and inhuman force of nature, not subject to the same moral expectations as other human beings. You are, in effect, declaring that the perpetrator " can’t make their own decision and bear the consequences of these decisions" with this argument.
10 Likes
I fucking love you dude, so much. 
1 Like
Nah, all I’m (somewhat) trying to add shade to is the pure black/white perpetrator/victim dichotomy you describe here. We are all participants in our own lives, not just pawns.
To describe a punkster who had been touring and partying for years, epitomising the Rock & Drug lifestyle of the 70’s as a naif who just “didn’t wear the right clothes” is unfairly and disdainfully diminishing her choice to be who she was, mix with who she wanted to mix with, and take the risks that were hers to take.
We acknowledge that she took risks with the company she chose,
and I also acknowledge that the choices were here, and she took responsibility and dealt with those long-ago consequences on her own terms.
Outsiders choosing to label her an entirely innocent victim, decades after the event that she herself treats as an unfortunate incident that could have been avoided in retrospect - actually diminishes her agency and independence.
I applaud her resilience (and her risk-taking) more than I applaud anyones concern-trolley hand-wringing. It is stronger to admit you are at least somewhat responsible for your own fate than it is to blame a single bogeyman stereotype for your woe.
Then there’s no point in doing anything, right?
I don’t think it’s a question of whether it’s more likely that assholes will police themselves or that regular people will police themselves. I think that oversimplifies the issue to a point of being not even wrong.
This perspective seems to imply some sort of “law of conservation of assholes” – that culture, the economy, education, etc. have no impact whatsoever on the occurrence of assholes – assholes are a given and all of society must accommodate that fact. I don’t think this is true. It may be that some people who are already assholes cannot be turned from being assholes, but that does not mean that other people who are not yet assholes may not be influenced to become not assholes.
But perhaps more importantly, if we decide that assholes are inevitable and we decide to structure society to accommodate assholes to the expense of the freedom and joy of everyone else in society, would that not create a huge incentive for more people to be assholes? If, on the other hand, we try to structure society in such a way that non-assholes are allowed to have a good time and that assholes will be held responsible for any harm they visit upon non-assholes in their pursuance of a good time, does that not create some incentive not to be an asshole?
And, of course, the approaches aren’t strictly mutually exclusive. We can all do what we can to try to be safe while still holding assholes responsible for their actions. The only part of the “conservation of assholes” worldview that is incompatible with this approach is blaming the victim rather than the perpetrator. I believe it is possible to encourage people to assess risk in smart ways without blaming them when something bad happens to them.
6 Likes
It is weakest of all to straw-man people’s arguments to try to shame them into agreeing with you.
5 Likes
I’d say there is too much of that already in many places 
Ab-so-fucking-lutely. It’s called modern society with police and laws, yah?
I’m not endorsing that assholes be inevitable or desirable forever or anything. I don’t think you should be thinking I’m saying it’s a good thing, dunno how you got that. I’m just acknowledging that is the sad reality. If there were no assholes anywhere, nobody would need a lock on their door, a signature on their cheque, or a password for their facebook account, YAY.
Until that day, we DO have to take common-sense precautions against bad things happening. And if that means shielding your PIN number, not lending money to strangers, not leaving your handbag unattended, and not walking down an unlit alley in alone in the bad part of town - then don’t do that.
Or you end up being a bit of a dipshit.
Not necessarily. Police and laws sometimes create more opportunities for people to be assholes. And people are capable of not being assholes even in the absence of laws and police.
I wasn’t accusing you of thinking it is a good thing. I’m arguing that resigning yourself to a world full of assholes, as you seem to be doing, ensures their survival and even proliferation. Another way to say this is that low expectations are self-fulfilling prophecies.
Sure, none of which contradicts my argument. As I said, trying to be safe is fully compatible with holding people responsible for their actions.
For example, if someone fails to shield their PIN number and another person takes all their money, we still hold that latter person legally and morally culpable for the actions they took. We might gently chide the former for being so foolish (but realistically most people seem to be polite and observant enough to realize they’re probably already chiding themselves pretty hard). But that doesn’t change the fact that the latter party is the one who took the immoral action.
Not shielding your PIN may be foolish, but it is not immoral.
Edit: You and others seem so worried about the potential negative effects of not assigning to victims their fair share of the blame. How can you not see the rather more drastic negative effects of not assigning to the perpetrator their share of the blame (which you do when you treat their actions as inevitable forces of nature rather than as conscious choices of human being)?
8 Likes
So much to unpack there… for 1) stranger-danger is not a thing, most sex assaults victims knew their attacker, most attacks take place within a mile of or inside the victims home, the narrative of stranger-danger/dark-alley is false and extremely damaging. 2) someone is certainly a dipshit and it is not the victim of a sex assault.
You want to talk about “facts” then you best be getting yours straight.
5 Likes
Good point! But even I am not that cynical.
I actually think that we are gradually weeding out the worst of the assholes as time goes on. Which is why i’m OK with allowing a little more leeway for mistakes made 40 years ago to not be judged by todays changed social standards. People are dicks, but they were even bigger dicks to each other the more generations you go back.
We are making progress!
Or maybe just shifting the goalposts…
1 Like
I apologise - I have never trained as a campus security guard as was merely casting back to the handouts, posters, TV ads, guidebooks and awareness campaigns I’ve been exposed to over time that advise that in certain parts of the world, it is inadvisable to travel alone through certain parts of certain cities carrying cash, being female, unclothed, foreign, the wrong color, inebriated, or combinations thereof.
Clearly that advice is entirely incorrect, and the world is an entirely warm and loving place.
My “facts” (which I cannot remember quoting) must be wrong, I’m glad to know that this threat has been entirely dissolved world-wide now. Good news!
I don’t know why you’re getting pissy with me because the stats don’t match up to the PSAs about sex assault. These kind of out of date attitudes is what led to the first SlutWalk, and what has started this whole thread in the first place.
To me it shows how woefully out of date our PSAs and attitudes are towards sex assault. But hey, if you want to walk around unclothed at night in dark alleys in certain parts of certain towns, I won’t stop you, and I will support you pressing charges against anyone that messes with you.
7 Likes
Should’ve known better than to have been born in an area where one is likely to be raped.
Were you born shameless, or did you have to work diligently at it?
4 Likes
