[Question] What is Rape Culture?

Bowielee

Bowielee

However, I do feel the need to point out, that in some matters, there are things that you or I or person X, Y or Z WILL never understand. I'll never fully understand what it's like to be a woman in today's society simply because I lack that unique perspective. I'll never fully understand what it's like to be fully part of "THE CIS STRAIGHT WHITE MALE PATRIARCY(tm)" because I'm not a part of that group.

That doesn't mean that we can't at least consider each other's perspectives and try to look at them objectively.
 
Necronic

Necronic

Staff member
Yeah, and that's where things get difficult. Should I have no opinion on the Don Imus/Micheal Richards thing? Should I accept that all conservative criticism of Obama during the first election was tainted with underlying racism? Can I really talk about welfare when I came from an upper middle-class background? Am I not allowed to have an opinion on abortion as a man? Or on gay marriage as a straight man? There are a LOT of issues where my privelege affects my opinion, but it shouldn't invalidate it.

I think that this is part of a very long conversation we will be having with ourselves for years to come about how privelege affects our daily lives. The only thing we can really do right now is to simply acknowlege that privelege exists. That's the first step. And it is a DOOZY, because it puts us all on the defensive. It has taken me a very long time to get past this, and the funny thing is that when I really understood it I realized that I never actually disagreed with it, I just saw it as an attack on me instead of a simple observation of very obvious truths.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Necronic said:
Ok. Well. Not sure what your point is since you're not arguing against what we said....
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My point is, that in a situation where we're trying to build equality through empathy and solidarity, such statements are handy tools of divisiveness. It's the case, not just for certain halforumites but in the larger national and even global discussion of this topic that "privilege" is a shorthand buzzword for "what you say is invalid because of who you are, even though you didn't ask for it and can't change it, so quiet down, this is OUR struggle." IE, as you and Bowie said, it's metaphorically used as a bludgeon or shoved under noses as would be a soiled diaper.

Since role reversal is a popular tool here, let's apply it in this situation. If in a given argument about the National Football League, which is entirely comprised of males, do we need to remind a woman in the discussion of their inherent gender-based alien-ness to the subject matter, to make sure she adjusts her perspective accordingly? Of course not, it would be insulting and sexist to do so.

My point is, that those who most often point out privilege, and wield its identification as a rhetorical weapon, are most often the templars to which I refer in my first post, and the term is really of marginal utility to those of us who want engaging discourse. Of course I am aware that women, by and large, have a much more visceral and much less academic view of the concept of rape than most men. I am intimately aware of that fact. So when I'm "reminded of my privilege," it tends to rankle - and I imagine that to be the case with many other people in the larger debate outside the context of halforums. I think we as a whole should maybe not identify the privilege so often, but rather address the disparity itself which lends creation to the label.

Or maybe I just don't have enough to do at work and too many demons making me oversensitive right now.
 
Necronic

Necronic

Staff member
I totally understand where you are coming from, and its those people that use the concept of privelege as a rhetorical weapon that make it a very hard concept for people to understand. It puts you on the defensive. It says "you're opinions don't matter because you have privelege". Ironically, when used like that, it is its own form of privelege. But that's for another argument.

My point is that I don't think you actually disagree with the existence or concept of privelege, you just don't like how the term is used by some people. And, more or less, I totally agree with you.[DOUBLEPOST=1392161777,1392161495][/DOUBLEPOST]Just to put the concept of privelege into an even broader, and in some ways more important perspective, consider the privelege of being an American with regards to our concepts of foreign policy. We clearly lack the perspective of a palestinian or isrealite, but does that mean we should have no opinion on the matter? Does it mean, ultimately, that we should have NO foreign policy? No, it just means that we need to try our best to listen to the perspectives of those we try to help.

ed: To expand further. People in countries we affect with our foreign policy often just tell us to get out, that we have no business there. That we can't understand their issues and we shouldn't intervene. Yet, we are the only people with the power to intervene, and from our perspective, intervention is necessary.

Taking it back to the original frame of race, sex, etc, people of privelege are the ones with the power to affect change IN that privelege. This is why it is ultimately wrong to say we have no voice in this.
 
Bowielee

Bowielee

To shift the context to maybe make it more clear. I'll specifically use Gasbandit and myself.

We have some seriously polar opposite political views.

I'm far more left leaning, he's more right leaning.

I feel like we both understand that about each other, but that doesn't mean that we automatically reject what the other person is saying. It's entirely possible to acknowledge that my perspective is completely different, but still have a discussion that doesn't use those differences as the sole reason to reject a viewpoint.
 
Covar

Covar

Necronic said:
I don't think any of us said that it should be used to dismiss views, you're putting words in our mouths. Some people do this, but I think that goes beyond what is reasonable.
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It's been used to dismiss views. In this very thread even, back on page 3.
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

I have been watching this thread but afraid to contribute anything.

Welp, tumblr (I know, I know) has changed that.

tumblr_mwdb5oIpL61qff5ico1_1280.png
tumblr_mwdb5oIpL61qff5ico2_500.png

tumblr_mwdb5oIpL61qff5ico3_1280.png


Why don't we guess which ones are from boys magazines and which ones were said by rapists.

I think...this might be rape culture looks like in the world? Where information being sold to teens/young men looks startling close to what a rapist would say?

(I have the answer key for when a few people toss their guesses in.)
 
Cajungal

Cajungal

Staff member
Yuuuuuuuck. That's incredibly creepy. I have some guesses:

I think the "dress code" and "plasticine" ones are from a magazine.
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
LittleSin said:
I think...this might be rape culture looks like in the world? Where information being sold to teens/young men looks startling close to what a rapist would say?
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I would agree with that. I'm still not sure that makes the US a rape culture, on the whole, since such magazines are still, themselves, viewed as disreputable. But at the same time, while we do frown at those magazines, we don't do anything more than frown. They're accepted as inevitable, and so is the behavior that goes along with them. It's wide-spread apathy rather than open approval, and I know that doesn't make things better, but I'm trying to figure out if it makes things worse. Society as a whole doesn't promote, or approve of, rape, but we sit around and let a minority promote it under other names.
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

Charlie Don't Surf said:
It's a trick question - they're all rapists.
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Uhm....

Are you making a point about the fact that any magazine writer that would advocate advice this creepy is probably up to no good?

...if so, yeh, I'm inclined to agree if they follow their own advice. Though I also find a lot of guys just have no idea what they are actually saying. They just...open their mouths and stuff comes out and they don't really think about it until someone calls attention to it.

If you're making a joke...I don't get it?
 
CrimsonSoul

CrimsonSoul

LittleSin said:
Uhm....

Are you making a point about the fact that any magazine writer that would advocate advice this creepy is probably up to no good?

...if so, yeh, I'm inclined to agree if they follow their own advice. Though I also find a lot of guys just have no idea what they are actually saying. They just...open their mouths and stuff comes out and they don't really think about it until someone calls attention to it.

If you're making a joke...I don't get it?
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He's not making a joke he's saying all men are racist sexest rapers that are pig scum of the earth and deserve to have their testicles cut off without any numbing agent then fed those same testicles before being poisoned and ate by wild hyenas. I think I'm pretty close here with what he's thinking but that's our lovable Charlie...
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
British skin mags are pretty rapey in general, I'd agree. Though I have to say I've not read such things in, say, Playboy. Though it's been quite a while. Ironically, I stopped reading Playboy about the time I could buy them legally.
 
WasabiPoptart

WasabiPoptart

I've read crazy shit in Cosmo about how to turn a man on that basically sounded like that article, but from a woman's point of view. I stopped reading all of that mess years ago.
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

GasBandit said:
British skin mags are pretty rapey in general, I'd agree. Though I have to say I've not read such things in, say, Playboy. Though it's been quite a while. Ironically, I stopped reading Playboy about the time I could buy them legally.
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I used to have some second hand Playboys I used for anatomy refs (before it was cheaper to just use thei nternet). I have to say, I can't recall the language in them to be overly sexist, you know? They would talk about sex and beauty and fads...but not in a demeaning way.

WasabiPoptart said:
I've read crazy shit in Cosmo about how to turn a man on that basically sounded like that article, but from a woman's point of view. I stopped reading all of that mess years ago.
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Yeeeeh...cosmo is...weird. Like...is Cosmo written by crazy people?
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

Oh! I suppose I'll give the list now!


  • Rapist
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Lad Mag
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Rapist
  • Rapist
  • Lad Mag
  • Lad Mag
 
Charlie Don't Surf

Charlie Don't Surf

CrimsonSoul said:
He's not making a joke he's saying all men are racist sexest rapers that are pig scum of the earth and deserve to have their testicles cut off without any numbing agent then fed those same testicles before being poisoned and ate by wild hyenas. I think I'm pretty close here with what he's thinking but that's our lovable Charlie...
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nah I didn't mean that at all but nice try, champ
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

tumblr_n0j7fogXTW1r5s08ho1_1280.jpg


So, just found this via tumblr, which is fucking scary, right?

But then some one added this:

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You know what that is?

That's a map of native american/alaskan populations.

I find this correlation disturbing.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Charlie Don't Surf said:
It kind of looks like the figurative rape of Native Americans not only continues, but is more and more literal
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"Looks like" nothin, it kinda does - although it's mostly internecine.

Native american and tribal areas typically have rape rates 12 times higher than average. I've heard tribal police discourage its reporting.
 
drifter

drifter

LittleSin said:
View attachment 13912

So, just found this via tumblr, which is fucking scary, right?

But then some one added this:

View attachment 13913

You know what that is?

That's a map of native american/alaskan populations.

I find this correlation disturbing.
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Eh, I don't know what the percentages of rape are for Native Americans, but I think a lot of it probably has to do with small populations and isolated communities. Here is a map by population density.

 
LittleSin

LittleSin

I'd like to know who the rapist are. White guys taking a joy ride on a reservation? Other native Americans? I mean...I really doubt the second but I' not native so I am really and truly ignorant of how life is on a reservation despite the fact that there are ones in Newfoundland.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
LittleSin said:
I'd like to know who the rapist are. White guys taking a joy ride on a reservation? Other native Americans? I mean...I really doubt the second but I' not native so I am really and truly ignorant of how life is on a reservation despite the fact that there are ones in Newfoundland.
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I've heard both. It's said there's been a complete breakdown of the family unit among the native populations. Crime in general is much, much higher among native populations. Like, 2 to 3 times higher for violent crime. The political issues of jurisdiction often impede or outright prevent proper prosecution, due to squabbles between the FBI and the tribal authorities.
 
drifter

drifter

Just read a bit about rape in Native American communities: 1 in 3 women are raped or sexually assaulted. Geez.

One thing that stood out to me was that 70-80% of rapes are perpetrated by non-natives. Honestly expected it to be lower; I suppose that's because I presume Native communities to be more isolated than they actually are.
 
ScytheRexx

ScytheRexx

LittleSin said:
You know what that is? That's a map of native american/alaskan populations. I find this correlation disturbing.
Click to expand...
Back when I lived in California, one of my college classes required me to sit in as a observer for a local trial. The one I was assigned was a rape trial. First thing I noticed when I walked in and sat down to take notes, was that the man being charged was Native American.

Was not disturbing to me back then, but looking back on it after this thread, a bit disturbing now.
 
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