To Those Who Would Deny Rape Culture
To those who would deny rape culture, I have a few things to share with you today. Yes, I know, like all people of privilege, you want to deny that you have privilege. And yes, those who deny rape culture are protecting their privilege as males, socially defended male access to women’s bodies, willing or not. Indeed, we live in a country where the right for a rapist to be cheered on by their victim is enforced, where rape survivors will be used by high schools for rape bait and subsequently raped again when the school provides no protection, and where schools will under-report rapes (oh and do the rape bait thing again). Attention, men (and even, sadly, some women). If you do not personally denounce rape, act to prevent it, and restrain yourself from victim blaming, you are part of the problem.
Oh, and bonus: apparently now, trying to stop what you think is an assault is now a criminal offense and a fail.
I actually got people defending the prosecution of the above group on Tumblr. Here was a response (edited slightly as it was in response to a specific person):
Should we not attack people assaulting victims now because, oh dear me, it might be illegal? Should people sit there and try to analyze whether the screams they are hearing are screams of pain and decide they’re not sure so they won’t do anything? If you hear screams of pain, think someone is being assaulted, do the best you can to stop that assault instead of sitting in your room and twiddling your fingers and being convinced that you either shouldn’t help the person being assaulted next door or that the police will somehow miraculously show up in time if you give them a call. If I was being assaulted I would want someone to stop the assault NOW please, not wait for police to take half an hour getting there and arriving when I’m either already dead or the assaulter has taken off.
In other words, you are pro-vigilantism.
In other words, you are pro allowing someone to be raped/attacked.
Wow, you are really, really dumb. You jump on bandwagons like you’re wearing moon shoes. You’re apparently missing the point, instead focusing too much on your shiny bias to look anywhere else. And no, I’m not talking about being against rape. Anyone with half a brain is. I’m talking about making EVERYTHING an issue about race or gender. Come on. Seriously.
These guys beat up an innocent man having sex with a woman who was consenting. They could have at least checked the situation out before beating a couple with baseball bats. Let’s say you’re fucking a guy… Or girl, whichever, assuming you can’t get over your blatant hatred of anything with a penis, and a group of teenagers bust in and beat the shit out of your lover because they assume you’re being raped. Really? You support that? Even saying “Well, thanks for the concern, but I was fine and enjoying myself. My lover’s fractured skull will heal” is a bit of a retarded reaction.
No, what you’re doing is looking for ANY excuse to continue believing in your skewed world view. Kids get arrested for assaulting a person having sex? MEN MUST HATE WOMEN! IT’S A LOGICAL CONCLUSION! Really, your reaching and stretching so far to justify your meaningless beliefs is pathetic.
Sure, insult me if you disagree with me. Sure, assume I’m frothing at the mouth with hatred for men, not like it’s possible to identify male privilege without hating men. I mean, I’m white and I identify white privilege, so I must hate myself, right? Even better, accuse anyone who identifies male privilege of being a lesbian.
Yup. That’s not at all the reaction I’d expect from someone defensive of their privilege.
No. All he’s saying is a brief bit of common sense. Being against assaulting people without proof of their guilt is NOT being pro-rape.
To the kids, it was proof. Should they have gotten a search warrant first? I’m sure if someone were murdering you and you were screaming, you’d want someone to come to your aid, and not wave it off with “probably nothing”. Or to call the cops, who can help clean up the scene after you’re dead, maybe?
Just found your blog. Look forward to new posts. Don’t bother feeding the trolls.
Oh, and BTW it’s a good post. I’m sort of getting over the fence here.
Oh my. So polarized in the comments. I think we can all agree that beating someone who’s innocent is a bad thing, but there is definitely a huge problem with people in communities turning a blind eye to abuse and rape. I think the people who beat the innocent man should probably be held accountable for paying any hospitable bills and such, but at least they did something. I don’t think beating with a bat was the right something, but I think going in there and saying “alright, wtf is going on here” is definitely warranted.
I agree, Leanna. I think that the attackers took it too far, and should have taken a second to maybe ask the woman or see if it actually looked like an assault. I also think that this story is taking attention away from the more important part of the article, which were ACTUAL examples of rape culture. I think more writing should have been devoted to those examples instead of lumping them together as links and writing up about the vigilantes. I think they were rightly charged, as they attacked without justifiable force and cause (they only mentioned that she sounded like she was in distress, they didn’t say that it looked like an attack.).
I liked this post. The story about the kids that beat up the innocent guy was horrible, but it only made the news because it was so unusual. A real rape being stopped by a concerned neighbor, friend or even a stranger would probably not make it into the news. But how many women are screaming right now, and SOMEONE can hear them, but they don’t do anything because they don’t want to get involved? How many rapes could be stopped every day if people at parties, bars, etc. were more aware of their surroundings?
The kids should have tried to stop the man first in order to assess the situation and make sure the woman was OK. It is however better that they erred on the side of *stopping a rape* than on the side of *listening to a rape occur and doing nothing*.
The “Fail” story is even a little dangerous because it has the potential to feed the bystander effect. “Oh she’s probably fine. Maybe she just likes it rough. I wouldn’t want to go in there and embarrass myself.”
Also, with the way that abusive boyfriends/husbands control and dominate their victims, it wouldn’t surprise me if this was an actual physical/sexual assault and the woman simply refused to admit it to police out of fear or dependency to her boyfriend. Rape is the most common form of spousal abuse so it’s not that unlikely.
Guy, you do know she’s trolling you right? Nobody thinks we should be going around beating people at the first sight of trouble. Seriously XD