Rape doesn’t happen in Utopia.
Unless you have been living under a cyber rock today you would have read this article by Mia Freedman, which basically says that women going out and getting drunk puts them at a greater risk of being raped.
And then this in reply by Kerri Sackville which disagrees with the above article by saying alcohol doesn’t cause rape, rapists do and that there shouldn’t even be a link between the two.
I have to say whilst I can see Kerri’s point that a woman is never responsible for her own rape, I also agree with Mia that there are certain factors which can increase the chances of it happening.
I have been mulling over it all day and have come up with some sort of analogy for my thoughts.
Lets take a Shark Attack victim as an example.
Sharks live in the ocean, it is a natural thing.
A Shark Attack victim does not ask to be attacked.
We do not blame the Shark Attack victim; blame lies firmly on the Shark.
There are precautions the swimmer could have taken to avoid being a Shark Attack victim.
Not taking these precautions is considered foolish.
A swimmer who doesn’t consider that there are sharks in the water and the possibility that they could be attacked is naive.
Simply put, using that analogy; there are men who think rape is OK in our society.
Women do not ask to be raped.
Victims of rape are exactly that, VICTIMS. The rapist is firmly to blame for the act.
There are precautions that women can take to avoid being raped.
Not taking these precautions is foolish.
A woman who does not consider the possibility of being raped when she goes out is naive.
Alcohol does NOT cause rape, no, it doesn’t. But it certainly can put you in a position where it could occur.
But by NOT getting inebriated, you could prevent yourself making alcohol-affected and unwise decisions, and being vulnerable to a potential rape situation.
We do not live in Utopia people and we need to be responsible for our own actions.
Going out on the town and righting yourself off, staggering home on your own wearing a skimpy outfit will definitely attract attention from the wrong sort of man who, like it or not, IS OUT THERE.
You are naive if you think otherwise.
You would be a negligent parent/friend if you glossed over it like the Sharks aren’t out there.
They are, and we SHOULD fear them – we are negligent parents if we do not instil fear of people like that out there in our daughters. By instilling fear, we encourage protective behaviour in our daughters and women friends.
Yes, we all have right to walk home wearing whatever we like in whatever condition we like without being raped. We ALL have that right, I get that. But it doesn’t mean it is sensible, it doesn’t mean it is smart and sadly, in a non-utopian suburb it doesn’t come without potential consequences.
If I had daughters I would definitely be linking (not saying it is the definitive cause) naive behaviour and rape.
I would try to help them protect themselves against the arsehole sharks in our society.
Naivety is not Protection.
The Sharks are out there.
You’ve summed up my thoughts exactly on this issue. Of course no one deserves to be raped no matter what they were wearing or how drunk they were. Rapists should be punished to the full letter of the law with no excuses. But I don’t see it as being “anti feminist” to suggest that women use some common sense to protect themselves.
Its often overlooked that the streets can be dangerous at night for men also. There’s no end of terrible stories about young men being beaten up and left for dead. Indeed there was a well publicized incident where an Irish backpacker was put into a coma by a gang of thugs – this happened on the corner of my street. Would it be outrageous to suggest that men need to keep their wits about themselves too when out on the town?
Thanks for the comment – yes, I kind of equate a womans rape to men getting king hit. There are so many dangers involved with going out at night, sadly, and alcohol seems to lead up to most of them. Terrible.
I seriously think you just nailed it on the head hun xx
Nope. Comparing men to sharks? Can we give men more credit than that? Are we really so wrong to expect more from men than ‘well, they’re just hungry so we need to protect ourselves’? Is expecting society to teach men better really that hard?
And the second-last sentence. Any ‘links’ you make between women’s behaviour and the ‘result’ of being raped apportions some blame for the rape to the victim. Nope, nuh-huh, never. Rape is the result of a rapist’s decision to rape. End of.
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