Against the Tide
To begin with, this post is definitely of the "flogging a dead horse" variety. If there is an issue I'm having a lot of trouble getting over, it's that of sexual politics. First of all, it informs our lives more than most issues do. Second, it's very hard to ignore if a large portion of your work week is devoted to sexual assault awareness education and rape prevention.No topic that I speak on, and I speak on plenty, stirs as much reaction as rape. If you wish to believe that we do not live in a society riddled with misogyny, this should not be your field of endeavor. The anger and viciousness behind many of the comments is breath-taking.
A week or so ago I was speaking to a group of school resource officers. I wasn't even attempting to discuss the need for sensitivity when dealing with rape victims, or outline why having sex with an unconscious woman is by definition rape. My entire spiel was simply to describe sexual assault prevention programs in the schools, and suggest ways that my staff could collaborate with school resource officers.
It would have been safer to go up against a pack of feral, snarling dogs. The faces turned toward me were hostile and menacing, and I could not string two words together about mentoring programs for at-risk girls without being interrupted with statements of "fact" such as how 95% of all women who claim to be raped are lying; how men who are falsely accused of rape are ruined for all time, but women get off scot-free; how women who have sex with underage boys are treated with kid gloves, but men who have sex with underage girls are persecuted mercilessly, and yes, how those teenage girls have it coming to them anyway.
I get the same reaction from at least a minority of those present at every venue, from the local health departments to the military bases. I learn that men have to band together because it's "bros over hos," meaning that men have to protect themselves from lying, conniving women even if it means lying and conniving themselves.
What saddens me the most, however, is that so few women are decent caretakers of each other. A highly talented and gifted rape prevention educator uses a film taken from the TV show "20/20" of a 14-year-old girl who sneaks out of the house to attend a party given by boys of the fast, popular set. She drinks, gets sick, and finds herself in a 16-inch pool of blood, the victim of a gang rape. Very few people, men or women, who view this film think that the boys (one of whom is 18) have anything but minor culpability for this situation. The men blame the girl, but the women want to flay her alive. This young girl crept out of bathroom window, she drank, she made herself vulnerable. How could the boys do anything but take advantage? They can't think of one negative thing to say about the boy who instigates the rape, then turns on his "friends" to avoid jail time, but they can raise hell about the nerve of the girl who led these boys on and then called the police.
Listening to women, especially those working in male-dominated environments, is very depressing. Women hear men putting women down all the time, and think to score points by being even harder on their sex than the men are. Men may form teams to support and mentor each other, but there is no corresponding female network. There are men who have more women as friends than men, but they don't see the need to attack men as being unworthy of their time. But women proudly boast of having no female friends, and only attaching to men because they have "superior" conversational styles, are never catty or ugly, and apparently are a purer species altogther.
Many years ago, I was at one of those appalling parties where everyone is supposed to buy something from a vendor so that their friend the "hostess" can win a prize. A woman there introduced herself to me by commiserating with my miserable luck in having three daughters and only one son. She, however, was blessed with three sons and only one daughter. She went on at length about how horrible having a daughter was, and how if she had three of these bitchy, spiteful creatures in her house she would have to jump off a cliff. All I could say was that my heart broke for her daughter, who sadly had no choice of parent.
Obviously, there are many women who are kind to one another, who value their daughters as the gifts that they are, and who treasure their friendships with each other. Just as obviously, there are many men who value and respect women, and who find women are stimulating, passionate and logical.
But the men who seethe with anger at the perceived injustices heaped on men by society, and the women who collude with them, are not isolated cases. They may not rape, but they promote a culture of rape and domestic violence, and a business community still dominated by men who put power above all else.
And I, determinedly cheerful and optimstic as I am, don't have a clue as to how to change it.
posted by Lenore Wilson @ 8:06 PM
3 Comments:
Lately, I hear a lot of people saying how girls are so much less desirable as children than boys. Before I moved to the Florida Panhandle, I had thought that idea was only held in China, due to the restrictions against having more than one child. I wonder if this is a regional thing or something.
If I choose to drive through a bad neighborhood, and someone murders me, it does not mean that they are not morally responsible for the crime. Why should rape be any different?
I am more surprised that the women would also criticize the victim. I think that maybe women who view the video might want to deny that it could happen to them. If they have no control over it, then that is very scary. On the other hand, if they can avoid rape by not doing X, then that might make it seem safer.
It really does not make them safer in the long run though because it contributes to a culture of blaming the victim.
Take the recent stripper that got raped at a party recently. I read an article about the scandal this morning. Over half the article was dedicated to talking about "Duke haters" and how they will use this as an unfair opportunity to put down Duke University. And they talk a lot about privilege. I think this story is about rape, and not about her occupation, her race, or the fact that these people were athletes.
I don't really know if the preference for boys extends beyond the South or not, having never lived anywhere else. But judging from comments I have read from women who have made it big, it probably permeates corporate culture at least. Women may be nurturing of their husbands, children, family members and friends, but not of their feminine colleagues.
Your comment about why women blame other women for being subjected to rape could have been lifted directly from one of my anti-rape presentations.
Also, the Duke story, whether it is eventually proven or not, mimics a very large number of rapes. Prominent men rape women of inferior socio-economic status (and often of a different race). The community falls into line behind the accused rapist, and the woman is treated with scorn. It's pretty scary.
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