An Investigation of Feminist Claims about Rape

[Cuttlefish]

I would like to preface this post with my reasons for posting it. Basically I do not agree with the idea that 1 in 4 women are the victim of rape or attempted rape by men in America. I also take offense to the idea that many extreme feminists think of your male family members, friends, and acquaintances as "potential rapists", and think of women that have not yet been raped as "potential survivors". However, I am aware that many women here were personally sexually abused by men, and may become deeply offended by this post. If this thread becomes a flame war, and not a debate, I would like to see it locked by a moderator.

Researching the "Rape Culture" of America

"Once again we see what a long way the New Feminism has come from Seneca Falls. The privileged and protected women who launched the women's movement, as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony took pains to point out, did not regard themselves as the primary victims of gender inequity: "They had souls large enough to feel the wrongs of others without being scarified in their own flesh." They did not act as if they had "in their own experience endured the coarser forms of tyranny resulting from unjust laws, or association with immoral and unscrupulous men." Ms. Stanton and Ms. Anthony concentrated their efforts on the Hester Vaughns and the other defenseless women whose need for gender equity was urgent and unquestionable."

...

"Rape is just one variety of crime against the person, and rape of women is just one subvariety. The real challenge we face in our society is how to reverse the tide of violence. How to achieve this is a true challenge to our moral imagination. It is clear that we must learn more about why so many of our male children are so violent. And it is clear we must find ways to educate all of our children to regard violence with abhorrence and contempt. We must once again teach decency and considerateness. And this, too, must become clear: in any constructive agenda for the future, the gender feminist's divisive social philosophy has no place."

[Inspired_Neurosis]

Although I don't condone hyperbole and politically-motivated statistical inflation for any agenda, I'd be pretty carefully about this subject matter. Good of you to preface with the disclaimer, and I don't think that you mean to offend anybody. But at the same time, I fail to see the significance of debating the numbers--I think it misses the point and has potential to inflame a lot of tension for little reason. It doesn't change anything about the nature of rape from a moral or social standpoint, and we can't really pin down the numbers because it's so underreported.

Again, I don't doubt that you're trying to have a legitimate discussion. But I see this in kind of the same vein as quibbles over what percentage of people are gay, whether believers or atheists have killed more people, or how many people were at the tea party protests: irrelevant to the real substance of the issue.

[mudpuppy]

*shrug*

I don't agree with casting a blanket assumption and positing that all women are victims or all men are perpetrators.

Having probably the most unique perspective on the board...

I think sexual assault/abuse IS as common as stated, i.e., 1 in 4.

Actual rape, as we typically define it? Less common than 1 in 4.

I think the more accurate statistic would be, 1 in 4 women will at some point in their lives have an abusive sexual encounter.

[and not necessarily with a man. The person who molested me in childhood was female.]

[SashaSue]

Without knowing who authored the study you're quoting, or where it was published, I have no way of assessing its legitimacy.

[Silver]

Ah, Christina Hoff Sommers. They should totally cast her on Venture Brothers as a character. Anyway.

The Kilpatrick study (the 1:8) was actually well done. And the controversial 4th question does indeed meet criteria for sexual assault in all of the states I've lived in. Fingers or broomstick.

One reason that people (male or female) will often not describe themselves as having been raped, despite having met the criteria for rape, is that they didn't report the event. (Sorry for my use of the non-specific 'they.')

Another: they don't define themselves as victims. It just doesn't match the self-concept.

Another: if it wasn't a stereotypical media-portrayal sexual assault, it's not thought of as such. I think this is changing.

The Koss paper... yeah, I'll kick that one around a little.

eta: [i have premature send syndrome.] On structure.

Can't speak to rates. I think I have some observation bias here.

[Cuttlefish]

Ah, Christina Hoff Sommers. They should totally cast her on Venture Brothers as a character. Anyway.

The Kilpatrick study (the 1:8) was actually well done. And the controversial 4th question does indeed meet criteria for sexual assault in all of the states I've lived in. Fingers or broomstick.

One reason that people (male or female) will often not describe themselves as having been raped, despite having met the criteria for rape, is that they didn't report the event. (Sorry for my use of the non-specific 'they.')

Another: they don't define themselves as victims. It just doesn't match the self-concept.

Another: if it wasn't a stereotypical media-portrayal sexual assault, it's not thought of as such. I think this is changing.

The Koss paper... yeah, I'll kick that one around a little.

eta: [i have premature send syndrome.] On structure.

Can't speak to rates. I think I have some observation bias here.

I agree much more with the 1 in 8 study than the 1 in 4. I also definitely agree that a finger, if it is not wanted, constitutes rape (reading this article, I was kind of confused how the author seemed to count fingers as an exception).

And I do like the Venture Brothers!

[Stars]

I think that a woman may not see her self as having been violated if she has less education and low self esteem . Many religious organizations teach a woman should be subservient to the man and so it sort of sets the climate for rape to occur without any consequences.

I had several things happen to me as a child that I never told anyone. I grew up with low self esteem and in a culture that women were used by men. That culture is still alive and well.

I would say the 1-4 is probably more accurate b/c I know I never reported most of what has happened to me in my life, and I bet many woman also have not.

[Stickler]

I was in a class of about 18 and one of my classmates talked about submitting to sex with a guy because she was afraid of him when she was 17. When the professor said "But my dear, that was rape," she burst into tears.

So in a classroom of 18, that was two of us-there's one in 9 right there. And I didn't say anything because for me, the embarassment is too much.

I certainly believe that rapes are way, way under-reported, for multiple reasons.

I also think that the teenage years are when girls are in the most danger

I do agree with the author of the article in that I think rape probably does happen a lot more to people who are low on the socioeconomic scale, and that the amount of money spent on rape programs at colleges may be a bit much. They ought to lump it in with their mental-health services, really, which are apparently seeing lots of traffic:

Mental health services slammed

Not that there does not need to be prevention and awareness efforts there; that is at the top end of the prime-time to be raped, as it were. Although that rape-prevention effort really ought to be started a whole lot younger than college age (considering my experiences-preschool???)

Men getting raped, both by other men and by women is something that gets almost zero attention, except for jokes. It ought to be taken as seriously as male-on-female rape. It isn't.

Prison rape is a horror and needs, needs to be stopped. But then again, I think our high incarceration rate is causing the sort of violence that is allowed to happen (unconstitutionally, I think) in prison to become normalized to the larger society-and is part of why we have such a violent society.

[Kodos]

It is clear that we must learn more about why so many of our male children are so violent.

It's called the Y chromosome.

[mudpuppy]

It is clear that we must learn more about why so many of our male children are so violent.

It's called the Y chromosome.

Wow.

That may just be the most sexist thing I've read this week.

I'm sure the scores of men who've been abused by their mothers, wives and girlfriends, would disagree.

Wait... hmm... I'm one of them!

Yep, my childhood molester was female.

My mother, obviously female.

Y'know, maybe its XX that causes the issues.

Or maybe, people are just people, and chromosomes have not a damned thing to do with it.

[assuming that chromosomes have anything to do with gender. Which they don't.]

[Stickler]

It's called the Y chromosome.

Um, no, and that's really bigoted of you.

[Stars]

Young boys are raped to and it is equally under reported. There is a huge double standard where young men are concerned, as some people see there first sexual experience as a rite of passage and not molestation. Fortunately it's against the law in all states as far as I know to engage in any sexual contact with a student.