About being told not to rape

RedditBlueit · 2012-08-07T19:32:30+00:00

when people are angry, they rarely take that anger out on the source. they just look for an easy target.

Do feminists go to prisons and yell at the men convicted of rape? No, they yell at the guys going to college to get degrees.

PierceHarlan · 2012-08-07T20:50:20+00:00

These efforts are woefully misguided and ineffective. What society doesn't teach people -- our young men and our young women -- is what consent really means. It means actual consent, not assumptions; and it means that if someone is incapacitated, she or he can't validly consent.

Too often, rape advocacy devolves into an angry mish-mash of gender get-evenism where the goal isn't so much to educate as it is to shock, reprimand, scold, and to make a point about victimization. The vast majority of young men have no intention of "taking advantage" of young women, so these are wasted efforts.

We wrote an important piece about it recently: http://www.cotwa.info/2012/07/rapists-in-our-midst.html

shrodingerstherapist · 2012-08-07T20:51:02+00:00

All men are Schrödinger's rapists. This means that there is no such thing as a man who is simply a non-rapist. Every man is at best a quantum superposition of a rapist and non-rapist, until, being male, he inevitably commits rape - at which point the quantum wavefunction collapses and he becomes 100% rapist.

(Radfem theoretical phyiscs)

Hach8 · 2012-08-07T20:06:24+00:00

I think men are told not to rape, repeatedly in their lives. There could be a little more in the high-school level sexual education course on what rape is, and obviously that it's bad. But that probably already exists in most schools I think.

I remember when I was in highschool everyone understood what rape and date rape were. In fact, the sublime song Date Rape became quite popular while I was in high school...

I'm honestly not sure where the idea that society promotes rape and rape culture. It's easily one of the most vilified crimes in existence, if not the most vilified.

titanium_ · 2012-08-07T22:27:25+00:00

I don't think I've ever heard any tale of a man, when asked why he raped someone, say "I didn't know I was doing something bad".

golden_boy · 2012-08-08T01:51:31+00:00

The closest thing I've heard is a proposed explanation for why there are double-standards in dating, "Boys are told to be nice to girls, and girls are told to stay away from boys"

penikripa · 2012-08-07T18:53:30+00:00

Yeah, but I guess it wasn't working, so they had to target us specifically.

Froztwolf · 2012-08-07T21:54:46+00:00

I always find this extremely offensive. Telling me not to rape equates to thinking I am likely to rape someone, or that I am somehow complicit in rape.

Rape is a violent crime, committed by sick people. I don't take kindly to be placed among those individuals.

Edit: I wonder if this "rape shaming" strengthens the alleged normalization of rape in society. If rape is something normal guys like me do (and I know it's true, because women keep telling me so), then surely rape is no big deal, right? I would never commit a violent crime, but if people insist that I could be likely to rape someone, then surely rape isn't a violent crime, right?

DoktorTeufel · 2012-08-07T20:28:43+00:00

Feminists believe that all men are potential rapists and that if they speak out loudly enough against it, rape can be eliminated from our society. I wish I were joking.

All true rapists (as opposed to the "she had drunk sex and regretted it afterward" variety) are sociopaths, extreme narcissists, emotionally underdeveloped/disturbed teenagers, and other types of individuals who will commit rape regardless of the consequences or societal taboos.

It is no more possible to eliminate rape than to eliminate murder or poverty. Which is to say, it might be possible in a distant future where human society is highly advanced in ways that are difficult to imagine, but until that time arrives it's here to stay.

Shaming men in general as potential rapists accomplishes nothing, or very little. The punishments for rape are already very severe, and the courts strongly favor the word of a single female accuser over the word of any man.

penikripa · 2012-08-07T22:25:42+00:00

This is what I think. Men are told to respect women, they are told "no means no" and there is threat of being thrown off campus, imprisonment, yet there are still rapists. OF COURSE THERE ARE. Because you can't get a criminal to stop committing a crime by telling them it's bad. They know it's bad, they don't care.

Normal men don't rape women. Criminals do. It is absolutely pointless to tell normal men not to commit a crime they had no intention of committing in the first place.

buylocal745 · 2012-08-07T21:30:45+00:00

Or, you know, the fact that most men are basically good people.

Boys need to be told not to steal. Boys need to be told not to fight. It is absolutely flabbergasting that anyone has the idea that men are natural rape machines.

rightsbot · 2012-08-07T18:46:17+00:00

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Kiefalicious · 2012-08-07T22:12:07+00:00

An interesting point that a lot of people seem to forget is that rape isn't always about sex, it's about power (especially in cases with serial rapists). Thus, it will, unfortunately, never be purged from society. No matter how society evolves there will forever be crime, violent and non-violent, it's a part of human, not only male, nature.

AnnArchist · 2012-08-08T00:07:08+00:00

Its pretty condescending for anyone to think that they need to say "Don't rape people" to someone else.

mcmur · 2012-08-08T08:48:21+00:00

Society teaches girls not to be raped, but doesn't teach men not to rape

Yeah no, that statement is total bullshit. Society does not simply condone rape for men. That is just a ridiculous statement. It's illegal, that is the most obvious form of determent i can think of.

OCEANOLEME · 2012-08-08T00:08:05+00:00

Excellent Point. I personally think that women don't recognize this, ergo they think that were not being taught anything because they don't see it.

2012-08-08T07:19:20+00:00

The way I see it is this: "it is not in my power to stop anybody other than myself from attempting to do anything, but it is in my power to prevent them from being successful at doing them to me."

Doctor_Loggins · 2012-08-08T08:04:40+00:00

The logic behind "we don't tell men not to rape" is not "we don't tell men not to hold women at knifepoint and penetrate them." The logic is "rape is more than just violent forced intercourse." To an extent, they're right. Everybody should have the right not to be forced into sexual intercourse. But the idea is that if you convince someone to have sex when they're not sure; if you have sex while drunk, even if both of you are consenting; if she lied about her age to make you think she was older; and so on. "We don't teach men not to rape" is predicated on two assumptions: 1) that men are the ones who don't know better, the initiators, and the rapists; and 2) that the definition of rape is too restrictive, and we don't teach people not to rape because we don't call certain things rape.

It's an ugly, insidious strategy to put women on edge all the time about every man. Unfortunately, it works, and then anti-rape groups get to build their power base and attract more followers with "see how we saved you when you didn't know you were in danger?"

2012-08-08T08:12:08+00:00

It's not the question of if there are deterrents to rape, so much as do those deterrents work? For instance, Pakistan has laws promising religious freedom, but I don't think anyone who isn't a muslim will agree for a second that they work.

PurpleVNeck · 2012-08-08T11:25:06+00:00

I believe the sentiment behind this ill-phrased example is that society should instill proper morals and values within its members, such as "rape is bad" or "do not rape." We should be making an effort to teach everyone - regardless of gender - that rape isn't permissible under any circumstance (and subsequently teaching people that false accusations are not humorous).

I agree that rape can never fully be eliminated from society, but a lot of the time, when people say this, they are not feminists who think that all men are would-be rapists. When you think about it, every single person, male or female, has the potential to rape somebody. That's why, along with "don't get raped", we should be teaching "don't rape." It's important to educate people about what exactly constitutes rape, because it would eliminate a lot of grey area cases.

mayonesa · 2012-08-20T13:04:13+00:00

"Society teaches girls not to be raped, but doesn't teach men not to rape"

Do they mean other than it being a felony?

gibbon1993 · 2012-08-08T00:15:17+00:00

I agree that society constantly tells men not to rape, but one of the biggest problems with it is helping navigate the grey area of consent. There are many guys who would simply have sex with a girl after she said no if she didn't make herself clear enough or didn't physically fight back. Of course this a subset of rape and the idea that violent rapists can be taught not to is a stupid idea.

lurveloaveluff · 2012-08-07T22:25:16+00:00

Apparently it isn't, if rape continues to happen. Since when is "Don't rape other people" a bad message? You do realize women aren't the only victims of rape. Don't get raped is like saying, don't do something you have no control over doing. No one asks to be raped. Nothing is wrong with a person who is scared of getting raped taking preventative measures, but awareness pretty clearly needs to be taught to everyone on what constitutes rape, so people will be more aware of consent.

In general, though people call imprisonment a form of prevention, it is typically used more as a form of punishment and form of protection for law-abiding citizens. Rehabilitation should be a much bigger part in prisons than it is. In general, it's been found that criminals are not deterred by imprisonment.

Samurai007_ · 2012-08-08T01:55:08+00:00

Don't they know that telling a guy NOT to do something just makes them want to do it more? They should use reverse psychology and tell men that they should commit rapes, and just like when women nag us to do something like take out the garbage or clean out the garage, it'll never get done!

Title	About being told not to rape
Author	firereaction
Upvotes	120
Comments	120
Date	August 7, 2012 6:45 PM UTC (14 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/xu4cj/about_being_told_not_to_rape/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/about-being-told-not-to-rape.1016346 https://theredarchive.com/post/1016346

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