If a woman feels she was raped, then she was raped...Rape does not require a rapist...
It's compercated.
But the point is you don't have to have intent to commit rape. You can just be a horny dude not really listening to the fact that she's not really game.
The definition of rape hinges on the detail of consent. If she didn't really want it and you just sort of LA LA LA NOT LISTENING did it anyway, it's rape.
Where it gets complicated is that our entire culture expects men to initiate and women to say yes or no, alcohol is very frequently involved and sometimes women aren't sure how they felt or what they wanted because all their boyfriends have been troglodytes using them as a cum sock and not making sure she had a good time.
I've seen a woman ask for advice on the internet after being plied with alcohol to the point of being falling down drunk and clearly taken advantage of who said "I know I need to drink less." and "How do I tell my bf I was unfaithful?" who had to have an internet stranger TELL her "Girl, you weren't unfaithful. You were raped."
I've seen something along those lines several times. It wasn't just that one gal who was simply "dumb."
It's an artifact of our culture that too many women have been taught to think that way.
I'm certain some men commit rape and are genuinely surprised to learn after the fact that she is calling it rape. He saw it as run-of-the-mill getting laid.
And sometimes that's sort of an "innocent" misunderstanding and sometimes it's the sexual equivalent of white supremacy where what she wants doesn't matter to him AT ALL. It only matters what he wants.
The crux of "rape culture" is that men are supposed to ask and women are only supposed to say "yes" or "no." This leads to lots of weird stuff in terms of women not having adequate voice or even sometimes adequate awareness of what they WANT because they aren't really supposed to set their sights on a particular man and it leaves giant openings for things to go very wrong when male shorthand rubrics fail to assume her opinion really matters.
This is also likely where we get "Look how she was dressed." as a claim that she supposedly wasn't raped: When women aren't supposed to ask for sex, the standard practice is she signals her interest passively by things like how she dresses.
If she dresses sexy and is married and only her husband will see her dressed like that, yes, she was "asking for sex."
The problem is if you're not married and you dress sexy and go to a club, no, it's not reasonable to claim she was asking every random guy who saw her to just throw her on the ground in a back alley and rape her. Instead, she was saying she's open to being asked for sex and then she will decide if she likes you and whether or not she will say "yes."
AND it's still not that cut and dried because maybe she dressed that way to go out dancing with her friends and that's just how you dress at a club. She may not have been trying to signal "I'm open to being asked for sex."
This is why people decry rape culture and want something to change. When women are required to be coy and not communicate clearly about wanting sex, it actively fosters this shit where men don't know what she thinks -- because she isn't telling them -- have to guess and may just be oblivious to the fact that what she wants matters at all.
A critical part of this is women not knowing what they want and not being allowed to figure it out because "good girls don't." And I really don't see other sources talking about that.
I feel like I'm the only person saying that and it makes it feel like it's dangerous to try to say it.
Most things critical of rape culture insist male behavior needs to change and ONLY male behavior. This implicitly agrees with fundamental aspects of rape culture with regards to explicitly denying women agency and actively assuming "She did nothing wrong!"
But I'm not saying "She's guilty of something and it's somehow her fault she got raped."
I'm saying that all people who participate in a culture help create it and our current standard is to insist women need to be PASSIVE about sex AND we also propose that women remain passive as our intended "cure" for the current mess.
And I'm telling you that is stupid and won't work.
Comments