http://jezebel.com/5414393/ask-amy-to-rape-victim-first-you-were-a-victim-of-your-own-awful-judgment

Ask Amy To Rape Victim: "First, You Were A Victim Of Your Own Awful Judgment"

In her latest column, advice columnist Amy Dickinson says she hopes a letter from one of her readers "will be posted on college bulletin boards everywhere." After reading Dickinson's advice for said reader, I sincerely hope this isn't the case.

A reader named "Victim? In Virginia" recently wrote into Dickinson's "Ask Amy" column looking for clarification on an event that happened during a frat party she attended, noting that she was intoxicated and agreed to go to a room with a man who promised he would not do anything inappropriate with her.

"Many times, I clearly said I didn't want to have sex, and he promised to my face that he wouldn't," the reader writes, "Then he quickly proceeded to go against what he "promised." I was shocked, and maybe being intoxicated made my reaction time a bit slow in realizing what was happening." Looking for clarification that she had indeed been raped, the reader later asks, "if I wasn't kicking and fighting him off, is it still rape? I feel like calling it that is a bit extreme, but I haven't felt the same since it happened. Am I a victim?"

Here is Dickinson's charming response:

Dear Victim?: First of all, thank you. I hope your letter will be posted on college bulletin boards everywhere.

Were you a victim? Yes.

First, you were a victim of your own awful judgment. Getting drunk at a frat house is a hazardous choice for anyone to make because of the risk (some might say a likelihood) that you will engage in unwise or unwanted sexual contact.

You don't say whether the guy was also drunk. If so, his judgment was also impaired.

No matter what — no means no. If you say no beforehand, then the sex shouldn't happen. If you say no while its happening, then the sex should stop.

She then goes on to quote a passage from RAINN's website regarding drinking and rape and encourages the girl to get tested for STDs and pregnancy, and to "see a counselor to determine how you want to approach this. You must involve the guy in question in order to determine what happened and because he absolutely must take responsibility and face the consequences for his actions, just as you are prepared to do. He may have done this before."

It's incredibly alarming that Dickinson feels the first thing an obvious rape victim needs to hear is "well, you were drunk, so you were asking for it." Closing her advice with a bit about facing the consequences of her actions, as if getting drunk at a frat party is equivalent to RAPE, is also quite disturbing; the language Dickinson uses seems to evenly place the blame on both parties and make light of an incredibly dark situation, as if the girl should just go up to her rapist and ask him to fess up at the counselor's office so that both of them can move on and he can finally stop, you know, raping people, just as she can stop drinking too much at frat parties.

Dickinson may want this letter posted at colleges across the country as a means to scare young women out of drinking at parties; after all, it's their fault if they get raped, right? It's not about a larger rape culture, or a modern masculinity that promotes the notion of "no means yes," or the incredibly tired parade of victim blamers who still insist that rape is the fault of any woman who dares to drink at a party or wear a skirt or walk down a street at night or go into a room with a man she trusts or dance a certain way at the club or, you know, be born with a vagina.

Perhaps Dickinson is right after all. Her advice should be plastered around college campuses. They could even build an entire course around it: Rape Culture And You: Victim Blaming 101.

Rape Question A Matter Of Consent [Chicago Tribune]

[Image via SomeECards]

Does a short haircut mean women have gone off sex?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1092019/Does-short-haircut-mean-women-gone-sex.html

h/t Shauna

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/jun/21/gender.politicsphilosophyandsociety

Thongs, implants and the death of real passion

Lap dancers, porn stars, big-lipped, zeppelin-breasted exhibitionists - meet the new role models for young British women. And, says feminist writer Ariel Levy, women are not just accepting this supersexualised culture - they are fuelling it. But are "female chauvinist pigs" really to blame? Interview by Kira Cochrane

• Kira Cochrane
• The Guardian, Wednesday 21 June 2006
• Article history

MULTI-DISCIPLINARY STUDENT CONFERENCE IN CELEBRATION OF INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S WEEK 2010 AND THE 5OTH BIRTHDAY OF THE SECOND WAVE

Some of you might be interested in submitting your work to this conference. . . Feel free to see me if you want some advice on getting a proposal together. jm

CALL FOR PAPERS:

THE THIRD ANNUAL MULTI-DISCIPLINARY STUDENT CONFERENCE
IN CELEBRATION OF INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S WEEK 2010
AND THE 5OTH BIRTHDAY OF THE SECOND WAVE OF THE WOMEN'S MOVEMENT

"WOMEN MAKING CHANGE"

FRIDAY, MARCH 12, 2010
BRESCIA UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON, ONTARIO

Undergraduate and graduate students and community activists are invited to submit proposals (up to 200 words) for paper, poster or artistic presentations related to the theme "women making change." We encourage students of all disciplines to share papers or presentations originally prepared as class assignments or new work based on continuing or completed projects. We also welcome presentations from community activists about their change-making efforts. This year we are especially interested in papers on the struggles and achievements of the women's movement and the new challenges it faces as it marks its 50th birthday.

Your proposal should provide
· a title and a brief summary of your presentation in no more than 200 words
· your name and contact information

Proposals must be received no later than Friday, January 15, 2010 and should be sent by e-mail to iwil@uwo.ca or to Women Making Change Conference, c/o Institute for Women In Leadership, Brescia University College, 1285 Western Road, London, Ontario, N6G 1H2.

This is a refereed conference. Notice of acceptance will be sent to you by Monday, February 1, 2010.

To learn more about the conference, please visit www.iwil.ca or call (519) 432-8353 ext. 28385.

Questions? Contact Rebecca Coulter, coulter@uwo.ca or Kim Young Milani, kimyoung@uwo.ca

http://jezebel.com/5411836/should-feminism-be-about-equality-for-males

Should Feminism Be "About Equality For Males?"

Cathy Young defends men's rights groups in Reason, and her article's subhead reads, "Feminism should be about equality for males, too." So should it?

Young takes aim at Kathryn Joyce's Double X article about men's rights groups, which we wrote about a couple of weeks ago. Young argues that these groups are not misogynistic, but that they are merely challenging "the conventional feminist view of domestic violence-as almost invariably involving female victims and male batterers." She argues in favor of sociologist Murray Straus's research into female-initiated violence — though she does acknowledge that women are twice as likely as men to get hurt in a domestic dispute, and three times as likely to fear their partners — and argues that feminists exaggerate the impact of abuse. Young writes,

Whatever minor successes men's groups may have achieved, the reality is that public policy on domestic violence in the U.S. is heavily dominated by feminist advocacy groups. For the most part, these groups embrace a rigid orthodoxy that treats domestic violence as male terrorism against women, rooted in patriarchal power and intended to enforce it. They also have a record of making grotesquely exaggerated, thoroughly debunked claims about an epidemic of violence against women-for instance, that battering causes more hospital visits by women every year than car accidents, muggings, and cancer combined.

According to Young, men's groups exist in response to real bias against men — she says, "federal assistance is denied to programs that offer joint counseling to couples in which there is domestic violence, and court-mandated treatment for violent men downplays drug and alcohol abuse (since it's all about the patriarchy)." And she winds up her piece by quoting philosopher Janet Radcliffe Richards: "No feminist whose concern for women stems from a concern for justice in general can ever legitimately allow her only interest to be the advantage of women." Leaving aside domestic violence for a moment, this statement is actually a complicated one. On the one hand, no real feminist wants to be like the straw feminists Young and others set up — hateful harridans who use lies to further their own selfish ends. But on the other, shouldn't feminism be at least mostly about women's rights? Don't men have their own movement — that is, all of Western history?

It's easy to answer yes to these questions, and some of the time, I believe that answer. But I also think that feminism should set out to change all damaging gender stereotypes, including stereotypes about men. The patriarchy — obviously the only thing my simplistic feminist ass cares about — affects everybody, and though it often benefits men, it also fucks them up. And what's more, it fucks them up in ways that are bad for women. It tells them they need to be sexual aggressors, contributing to rape culture. It tells them they suck at child-rearing and emotional connection in general, which damages their relationships and sticks women with disproportionate familial burdens. And it tells them they need to be big and strong and ready to fight, which makes them both more likely to commit domestic violence and less likely to report it if it happens to them.

All these problems are worth fixing, and feminists — who are experienced at fighting gender stereotyping, and who care about many of the ills created by a rigid social view of masculinity — are well-equipped to help fix them. But we're not going to feel like it if people cast us as the enemy. I'm unlikely to reconsider my view of men's rights groups if writers like Young use them as a peg to insult the supposedly sorry "state of feminism" or to posit some powerful anti-male gynocracy that's promulgating lies about abuse. In fact, Young does such a crappy job of negotiating disputes between the sexes that I'd like to go around her and speak to dudes directly: Hi guys. I am a feminist. I am not an evil bitch who wants to beat you up and take your money. I am your sister, your daughter, your neighbor, your co-worker, and your friend. I support your right to have emotions, to be an involved dad, to feel physically and emotionally safe in your relationships, to hold any job you want regardless of whether it's "masculine," and, if you want, to marry another man. I get that life is hard for you too sometimes, and I want to help you. But only if you meet me halfway.

Note: The image above is a group of male college students marching in high heels to protest violence against women — a "men's group" we can get behind.

Men's Rights [Reason]

Related: "Men's Rights" Groups Have Become Frighteningly Effective [Double X]

Earlier: The Misguided Message Of Men's Rights Groups

Send an email to Anna North, the author of this post, at annanorth@jezebel.com.

Rape Culture

http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2009/10/rape-culture-101.html

Rape Culture 101

| posted by Melissa McEwan | Friday, October 09, 2009

[Trigger warning.]

Frequently, I receive requests to provide a definition of the term "rape culture." I've referred people to the Wikipedia entry on rape culture, which is pretty good, and I like the definition provided in Transforming a Rape Culture:

A rape culture is a complex of beliefs that encourages male sexual aggression and supports violence against women. It is a society where violence is seen as sexy and sexuality as violent. In a rape culture, women perceive a continuum of threatened violence that ranges from sexual remarks to sexual touching to rape itself. A rape culture condones physical and emotional terrorism against women as the norm.

In a rape culture both men and women assume that sexual violence is a fact of life, inevitable as death or taxes. This violence, however, is neither biologically nor divinely ordained. Much of what we accept as inevitable is in fact the expression of values and attitudes that can change.

But my correspondents—whether they are dewy noobs just coming to feminism, advanced feminists looking for a source, or disbelievers in the existence of the rape culture—always seem to be looking for something more comprehensive and less abstract: What is the rape culture? What are its borders? What does it look like and sound like and feel like?

It is not a definition for which they're looking; not really. It's a description. It's something substantive enough to reach out and touch, in all its ugly, heaving, menacing grotesquery.

Rape culture is encouraging male sexual aggression. Rape culture is regarding violence as sexy and sexuality as violent. Rape culture is treating rape as a compliment, as the unbridled passion stirred in a healthy man by a beautiful woman, making irresistible the urge to rip open her bodice or slam her against a wall, or a wrought-iron fence, or a car hood, or pull her by her hair, or shove her onto a bed, or any one of a million other images of fight-fucking in movies and television shows and on the covers of romance novels that convey violent urges are inextricably linked with (straight) sexuality.

Rape culture is treating straight sexuality as the norm. Rape culture is lumping queer sexuality into nonconsensual sexual practices like pedophilia and bestiality. Rape culture is privileging heterosexuality because ubiquitous imagery of two adults of the same-sex engaging in egalitarian partnerships without gender-based dominance and submission undermines (erroneous) biological rationales for the rape culture's existence.

Rape culture is rape being used as a weapon, a tool of war and genocide and oppression. Rape culture is rape being used as a corrective to "cure" queer women. Rape culture is a militarized culture and "the natural product of all wars, everywhere, at all times, in all forms."

Rape culture is 1 in 33 men being sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. Rape culture is encouraging men to use the language of rape to establish dominance over one another ("I'll make you my bitch"). Rape culture is making rape a ubiquitous part of male-exclusive bonding. Rape culture is ignoring the cavernous need for men's prison reform in part because the threat of being raped in prison is considered an acceptable deterrent to committing crime, and the threat only works if actual men are actually being raped.

Rape culture is 1 in 6 women being sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. Rape culture is not even talking about the reality that many women are sexually assaulted multiple times in their lives. Rape culture is the way in which the constant threat of sexual assault affects women's daily movements. Rape culture is telling girls and women to be careful about what you wear, how you wear it, how you carry yourself, where you walk, when you walk there, with whom you walk, whom you trust, what you do, where you do it, with whom you do it, what you drink, how much you drink, whether you make eye contact, if you're alone, if you're with a stranger, if you're in a group, if you're in a group of strangers, if it's dark, if the area is unfamiliar, if you're carrying something, how you carry it, what kind of shoes you're wearing in case you have to run, what kind of purse you carry, what jewelry you wear, what time it is, what street it is, what environment it is, how many people you sleep with, what kind of people you sleep with, who your friends are, to whom you give your number, who's around when the delivery guy comes, to get an apartment where you can see who's at the door before they can see you, to check before you open the door to the delivery guy, to own a dog or a dog-sound-making machine, to get a roommate, to take self-defense, to always be alert always pay attention always watch your back always be aware of your surroundings and never let your guard down for a moment lest you be sexually assaulted and if you are and didn't follow all the rules it's your fault.

Rape culture is victim-blaming. Rape culture is a judge blaming a child for her own rape. Rape culture is a minister blaming his child victims. Rape culture is accusing a child of enjoying being held hostage, raped, and tortured. Rape culture is spending enormous amounts of time finding any reason at all that a victim can be blamed for hir own rape.

Rape culture is judges banning the use of the word rape in the courtroom. Rape culture is the media using euphemisms for sexual assault. Rape culture is stories about rape being featured in the Odd News.

Rape culture is tasking victims with the burden of rape prevention. Rape culture is encouraging women to take self-defense as though that is the only solution required to preventing rape. Rape culture is admonishing women to "learn common sense" or "be more responsible" or "be aware of barroom risks" or "avoid these places" or "don't dress this way," and failing to admonish men to not rape.

Rape culture is "nothing" being the most frequent answer to a question about what people have been formally taught about rape.

Rape culture is boys under 10 years old knowing how to rape.

Rape culture is the idea that only certain people rape—and only certain people get raped. Rape culture is ignoring that the thing about rapists is that they rape people. They rape people who are strong and people who are weak, people who are smart and people who are dumb, people who fight back and people who submit just to get it over with, people who are sluts and people who are prudes, people who rich and people who are poor, people who are tall and people who are short, people who are fat and people who are thin, people who are blind and people who are sighted, people who are deaf and people who can hear, people of every race and shape and size and ability and circumstance.

Rape culture is the narrative that sex workers can't be raped. Rape culture is the assertion that wives can't be raped. Rape culture is the contention that only nice girls can be raped.

Rape culture is refusing to acknowledge that the only thing that the victim of every rapist shares in common is bad fucking luck. Rape culture is refusing to acknowledge that the only thing a person can do to avoid being raped is never be in the same room as a rapist. Rape culture is avoiding talking about what an absurdly unreasonable expectation that is, since rapists don't announce themselves or wear signs or glow purple.

Rape culture is people meant to protect you raping you instead—like parents, teachers, doctors, ministers, cops, soldiers, self-defense instructors.

Rape culture is a serial rapist being appointed to a federal panel that makes decisions regarding women's health.

Rape culture is a ruling that says women cannot withdraw consent once sex commences.

Rape culture is a collective understanding about classifications of rapists: The "normal" rapist (whose crime is most likely to be dismissed with a "boys will be boys" sort of jocular apologia) is the man who forces himself on attractive women, women his age in fine health and form, whose crime is disturbingly understandable to his male defenders. The "real sickos" are the men who go after children, old ladies, the disabled, accident victims languishing in comas—the sort of people who can't fight back, whose rape is difficult to imagine as titillating, unlike the rape of "pretty girls," so easily cast in a fight-fuck fantasy of squealing and squirming and eventual relenting to the "flattery" of being raped.

Rape culture is the insistence on trying to distinguish between different kinds of rape via the use of terms like "gray rape" or "date rape."

Rape culture is pervasive narratives about rape that exist despite evidence to the contrary. Rape culture is pervasive imagery of stranger rape, even though women are three times more likely to be raped by someone they know than a stranger, and nine times more likely to be raped in their home, the home of someone they know, or anywhere else than being raped on the street, making what is commonly referred to as "date rape" by far the most prevalent type of rape. Rape culture is pervasive insistence that false reports are common, although they are less common (1.6%) than false reports of auto theft (2.6%). Rape culture is pervasive claims that women make rape accusations willy-nilly, when 61% of rapes remain unreported.

Rape culture is the pervasive narrative that there is a "typical" way to behave after being raped, instead of the acknowledgment that responses to rape are as varied as its victims, that, immediately following a rape, some women go into shock; some are lucid; some are angry; some are ashamed; some are stoic; some are erratic; some want to report it; some don't; some will act out; some will crawl inside themselves; some will have healthy sex lives; some never will again.

Rape culture is the pervasive narrative that a rape victim who reports hir rape is readily believed and well-supported, instead of acknowledging that reporting a rape is a huge personal investment, a difficult process that can be embarrassing, shameful, hurtful, frustrating, and too often unfulfilling. Rape culture is ignoring that there is very little incentive to report a rape; it's a terrible experience with a small likelihood of seeing justice served.

Rape culture is hospitals that won't do rape kits, disbelieving law enforcement, unmotivated prosecutors, hostile judges, victim-blaming juries, and paltry sentencing.

Rape culture is the fact that higher incidents of rape tend to correlate with lower conviction rates.

Rape culture is silence around rape in the national discourse, and in rape victims' homes. Rape culture is treating surviving rape as something of which to be ashamed. Rape culture is families torn apart because of rape allegations that are disbelieved or ignored or sunk to the bottom of a deep, dark sea in an iron vault of secrecy and silence.

Rape culture is the objectification of women, which is part of a dehumanizing process that renders consent irrelevant. Rape culture is treating women's bodies like public property. Rape culture is street harassment and groping on public transportation and equating raped women's bodies to a man walking around with valuables hanging out of his pockets. Rape culture is most men being so far removed from the threat of rape that invoking property theft is evidently the closest thing many of them can imagine to being forcibly subjected to a sexual assault.

Rape culture is treating 13-year-old girls like trophies for men regarded as great artists.

Rape culture is ignoring the way in which professional environments that treat sexual access to female subordinates as entitlements of successful men can be coercive and compromise enthusiastic consent.

Rape culture is a convicted rapist getting a standing ovation at Cannes, a cameo in a hit movie, and a career resurgence in which he can joke about how he hates seeing people get hurt.

Rape culture is when running dogfights is said to elicit more outrage than raping a woman would.

Rape culture is blurred lines between persistence and coercion. Rape culture is treating diminished capacity to consent as the natural path to sexual activity.

Rape culture is pretending that non-physical sexual assaults, like peeping tomming, is totally unrelated to brutal and physical sexual assaults, rather than viewing them on a continuum of sexual assault.

Rape culture is diminishing the gravity of any sexual assault, attempted sexual assault, or culture of actual or potential coercion in any way.

Rape culture is using the word "rape" to describe something that has been done to you other than a forced or coerced sex act. Rape culture is saying things like "That ATM raped me with a huge fee" or "The IRS raped me on my taxes."

Rape culture is rape being used as entertainment, in movies and television shows and books and in video games.

Rape culture is television shows and movies leaving rape out of situations where it would be a present and significant threat in real life.

Rape culture is Amazon offering to locate "rape" products for you.

Rape culture is rape jokes. Rape culture is rape jokes on t-shirts, rape jokes in college newspapers, rape jokes in soldiers' home videos, rape jokes on the radio, rape jokes on news broadcasts, rape jokes in magazines, rape jokes in viral videos, rape jokes in promotions for children's movies, rape jokes on Page Six (and again!), rape jokes on the funny pages, rape jokes on TV shows, rape jokes on the campaign trail, rape jokes on Halloween, rape jokes in online content by famous people, rape jokes in online content by non-famous people, rape jokes in headlines, rape jokes onstage at clubs, rape jokes in politics, rape jokes in one-woman shows, rape jokes in print campaigns, rape jokes in movies, rape jokes in cartoons, rape jokes in nightclubs, rape jokes on MTV, rape jokes on late-night chat shows, rape jokes in tattoos, rape jokes in stand-up comedy, rape jokes on websites, rape jokes at awards shows, rape jokes in online contests, rape jokes in movie trailers, rape jokes on the sides of buses, rape jokes on cultural institutions…

Rape culture is people objecting to the detritus of the rape culture being called oversensitive, rather than people who perpetuate the rape culture being regarded as not sensitive enough.

Rape culture is the myriad ways in which rape is tacitly and overtly abetted and encouraged having saturated every corner of our culture so thoroughly that people can't easily wrap their heads around what the rape culture actually is.

That's hardly everything. It's merely the tip of an unfathomable iceberg.

20 days to end violence against women campaign

http://www.canadianlabour.ca/action-center/20-days-20-days-end-violence-against-women

20 Days - 20 Ways to end violence against women

Send a postcard a day to the Prime Minister to remind him that for 20 years women have been waiting for action. Each year, women across the country commemorate the fourteen young women who were killed on December 6, 1989, at the École Polytechnique in Montreal and all the other women who have died as a result of male violence.

Twenty years is too long. Government attention to violence against women is long overdue. A law and order agenda is not the answer. Women need economic and social security to be safe at home, at work and in our communities. We need support for women's services and equality. Now is the time for action.

On November 16th, send the 1st of 20 postcards to the Prime Minister from our action centre.

Related News and Events

Postcard campaign targets violence against women - Thousands of cards being sent to prime minister

Posted: Thursday, 12 November 2009

OTTAWA – The Canadian Labour Congress is asking Canadians to send 20 postcards in 20 days to the prime minister telling him to take action now to end violence against women. “On December 6th it will be 20 years since 14 young women … Read More