@krellin - There is a small difference between our views on this. I don't blieve Joe has any reponsibility (blame) for his death. But I believe we should use Joes tragic death as an example to teach others so they might avoid making his mistakes in the future.

It reminds me of the discussion in the Jewish community after WW2. Many were talking about what they think pulled them through the war, like persistence, or light-heartedness, or keeping their head down, or whatever. An understandable discussion. But once people realised that they were implicitly saying that the Jews who died were responsible for their own demise by not being persistent enough, the talk kind of stopped. Now people usually say they were just lucky, no more, no less.

In any way, analysis of what can lead to crimes doe not equate to responsibility to a victim, in either case.

OK, you guys, we all seem to be in agreement that a wise and worldly woman ought to be educated on how best to defend herself. But what I'm asking is whether you think we as a society should be doing anything ELSE to make rape less of an issue? And if so, what? I really don't pretend to have the answer, but I seriously doubt raising risk awareness on the part of the woman is the only thing we can/should be doing. Is it?

YJ - Did I not already ask that question? What *specifically* is being asked of me? And how shall I split my time between this and every *other* very important issue of life and death...?

@YJ - Absolutely. We should be prosecuting vigorously any who commit the crime as well as any who try to cover it up. Same thing with pedophilia. No one should be immune from prosecution and covering up a heinous sex act should carry the same label as committing the act: sex offender.

OK Draug, I think that's a definite start. Do you think there is anything re: prevention rather than punishment though? The thing is, most rapists aren't your "typical" criminal. Most rapists aren't lurking in a dark alley. They are guys who are generally otherwise normal guys, and they perpetrate their crimes most often on women they know socially. How do we spread awareness to them, as opposed to just spreading it to the victim? And should we?

How do you prevent sick bastards from commiting a crime? We are a free society so until a crime is commited or we at least have enough evidence to arrest someone on conspiracy to commit, we can't do anything. Sick bastards will be sick bastards. And that is not like saying "boys will be boys" as it is not an admonishment of their action but a recognition that no amount of "edumacating" the sick bastards are going to change what they do. Rapists are like serial murderers. Thjey are fucked in the head and all we can do is pray we catch them before they do it again and when we do catch them, put them away for a very long time.

You spread awareness by handing out stiff sentences to the ones who get caught. I also take issue that they are generally normal guys. That's a bit like saying Osama Buin Ladin was generally a normal guy aside from the 'death to the west' fundamentalist chip on his shoulder. They are not normal guys. The normal guys picked up that hurting people was wrong back in kindergarten. These guys are scum who put their own desires before the lives of others and need to be either locked up or have the fear of God put in them so they don't do it.

"Rapists are like serial murderers"

See that's where I think our disconnect is, draug. I don't think they are, at all. Most rapists don't even realize they're raping when they do it. Most rapists aren't psychopaths, or necessarily even sociopaths. That's the argument of the "rape culture:" that our society is such that one doesn't have to be a "sick bastard" to commit rape - and that much is true. There is no supposition of true mental illness in a rape crime, and this particular crime transcends the poverty correlations that you see with typical criminal behavior. In addition, most rapists have a relatively clean past crime history, so I don't think you can make the argument that typical "stiffer sentences" will have an impact.


A rapist is not, in general, either your typical criminal or a mentally ill person.

Surely people with no criminal record will be the most effected by harsh punishments?

I don't buy the argument that a rapist isn't a typical criminal or mentally ill. Either they can tell by the actions of the woman that they are doing wrong and they just don't care (in which case they are traditional bad guys) or they are incapable of picking up the most obvious emotional and linguistic signals (in which case they are mentally ill or handicapped). What other options are there?

As to rape jokes:

http://dbzer0.com/blog/feminists-dont-think-all-men-are-rapists-rapists-do

As to this persecution-complex of not wanting to be lumped in with "rape culture":

Do you also claim no responsibility for civilians killed in drones strikes if you're American? Without examining the context in which crimes occur no substantive solution or preventative mechanism can be devised. You will be stop-gapping until the end of time.

"A rapist is not, in general, either your typical criminal or a mentally ill person. "

You are right. We disagree. A rapist, by definition, is both a sociopath and mentally deficient. A child knows it is wrong to hurt another person and feels bad when they do it. When these frat boys do it, they don't think anything of it. Therefore they are sociopaths and mentally deficient.

Oh, and YJ, what you *think* doesn't matter as you are neither the law nor a psychologist/psychiatrist. The shrinks are the best ones to analyze this criminal behavior and characterize it and every study I've read to date indicates that rapists *do* have a different mind set, typically a sociopathic disconnect, from the normal person. This can be a temporary thing brought about by circumstances (frat boys think they are better than and above everyone else because they've been told that so many times they believe it for instance) or it can be triggered elsewhere, but it does exist.

You want to know where a big part of the problem is with the *typical* rape (i.e. date rape on college campuses), just look to the whole Greek system in our colleges. Do away with that shit and outlaw it. Quit telling frat boys they are better than others and above the law. I deal with some of those mother fuckers here. One of them even got fired for sexual harrassment - a guy in his 30s who thought he was above it all and still joked about hazing pledges in his frat days. That system fucks up young men and women and is way more responsible for college crime in general than any other environmental facotr out there. It is also why you see that rape doesn't cross the poverty lines. These fucktards don't need to steal as they have daddy's money or their scholarships for sports or whatever, and they have been told "don't worry about it, we can get you out of anything" so they develop a sense of superiority with absolutely *no* remorse or compassion for others.

Do away with the greek system. Do away with sports scholarships. Guess what? You'll be doing away with the core components that convince young men (who need little convincing anyhow) that they are superior, can get away with anything and "the 'bitch' wanted it". Just do away with them and see if college campus rapes don't drop radically. *That* is what is promoting and continuing to foster a reape subculture.

@octavious
"Surely people with no criminal record will be the most effected by harsh punishments?"

Yes, on an individual basis, after the fact. What I'm asking is what is most effective as a *preventative* measure. If you agree that the typical rapist isn't aware he's committing a crime (you might not, and we should talk about that, then), then you should also agree that the stiffness of the penalty would have no bearing at all on whether he chooses to go through with it.


@draugnar
"A rapist, by definition, is both a sociopath and mentally deficient."

With respect to your pedantic nature sir: no, it isn't. A rapist is, by every definition I know of, one who has committed rape.

"....every study I've read to date indicates that rapists *do* have a different mind set, typically a sociopathic disconnect..."

That's an interesting claim, Draugnar. Can you tell me which studies have said this? That definitely goes against my understanding. I'd very much like to hear what the professionals you have read have to say about the mental state of the typical rapist.

The "debate" over whether a rape culture exists while 25%+ of women in the US are victims of sexual assault is, itself, an example of rape culture. Actual assault statistics speak for themselves. If sexual violence wasn't normalized, it wouldn't exist to the extent that it does.

@YJ - Show me yours and I'll show you mine. You claim they aren't and did so before I claimed they were. Unless you provide evidence of your assertion, I do not feel compelled to waste my time searching for something which you will jist argue is flawed in some way anyhow.

Erist. I know lots of women and only one I know has ever been raped or sexually assaulted. Please provide a source for your 1 in 4 statistic or I call bullshit on it.

25% of women in the US are victims of sexual assualt? Where does this figure come from and what is the definition? I'm not disputing the figure - and frankly I've seen higher numbers...which is the problem.

So...girl gets drunk at a party and decides she wants to screw around...wakes up in the morning and has regrets and calls foul - is that sexual assault?

Disgruntled ex-girlfriend wants to get back at dude...cries foul...is that sexual assault?

Because *these* things happen to. The double edged sword of sexual assault is that is has empowered women to use sex as a tool to *destroy* men.

This is not to diminish *at all* the real problem of sexual assault against women - and frankly, it is all the more reason that men should be wary.

But - where do these assault figures come from? It would be very interesting to see the details and examine exactly when/where the majority of these assaults come from.

At Draug - in all fairness, how many women do you know close enough that they would out of the blue confess that at some point in there life they were assualted?

I knew a woman once - had known her for years - and then she revealed to me that she had been sexually assualted by her brother, who used to urinate on her and he and his friends forced her to give them blowjobs....it was only a very particular circumstance that cuased the conversation to turn to this - meaning under any other circumstance it would not have been revealed and there is not reason that I ever would have suspected it (since somehow she still has a relationship with the asshole brother and the fucked up parents that knew about it and allowed it to happen....bizarre...)

Bottom line - you have no idea how many women you know have been assualted...especially since the definition of assault is so fluid...

No need to get defensive, Draug. I said it was my understanding, I definitely haven't done any real research into this. I have some friends who are more motivated by it far more than I am, and their conversations have trickled down a bit.... I'm trying to have a discussion, not press my viewpoints on you. That goes two ways, and I would not at all just dismiss what you have, I'm genuinely interested! While you're trying to remember I'll see what I can find on the subject. Here's a couple I found on a quick search.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/dsm5-in-distress/201104/most-rapists-are-not-sadists (peer reviewed)

http://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/10/science/new-studies-map-the-mind-of-the-rapist.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm (I can't verify the validity of the survey cited, sorry)

Basically, the trend that I've noticed seems to be that most rapists are of sound mind before and after their crime, but for whatever reason are able to suspend their reason or awareness during the rape.

"I know lots of women and only one I know has ever been raped or sexually assaulted. Please provide a source for your 1 in 4 statistic or I call bullshit on it."

I'm just aghast at that, man. Here's the result. 1 in 5, it says.

http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/nisvs_executive_summary-a.pdf

Are you really not aware of how huge of an issue this is?

If you were actually interested in the stats you could simply put in a google search and see for yourself what the consensus is, even though it is known that it is a terribly underreported phenomenon and numbers can be hard to come by. But yes, consensus is usually between 1 in 5 to 1 in 3 women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

Last national surveys were than 1 in 4 women reported surviving at least an attempted rape by the time they were in college.

And I can pretty much guarantee there are women you know who have been sexually assaulted and haven't bothered to tell you about it.

This ones is really telling. It's *absolutely* reliable, as I can't find the sources with a quick search, but I'll leave it to your judgement whether this is worthwhile or not. I, for one, am not surprised with the numbers at all.

http://www.holysmoke.org/sdhok/rape019.htm

sorry, I meant to say it ISN'T absolutely reliable.

"How do we spread awareness to them, as opposed to just spreading it to the victim? And should we?"

This is where I fully agree with you YJ. Yes, we should, by having good sex ed, and making sure all groups in society including jocks and universities know that this is a non-negotiable crime, and making sure law enforcement sees it that way too. There is a lot to be done in awareness raising, and I think in general many European countries can be an example, prevention is much stronger there.

On that topic, the experience on awareness raising is that it is generally a good idea to be concrete in what behaviors should be exhibited and a bad idea to accuse your target group out of hand. The whole debate on "rape culture" is really an awful, godawful and counterproductive way to raise awareness.

So I read the report and onebthing stood out... This was results repprted by interviewing women but the didn't say where these interviews were conducted or across what age groups. This is unusually shoddy, even for the CDC. But at least I can accept you have soemthing to back up your numbers.

Oh and Google searching from a phone while cooking dinner can be a challenge to say the least.

@YJ - Your site (with a clear bias) confirms what I have said. Nearly every instance and survey in it was of college women. Rape culture is not prevalent in all of society. It is a subculture prevalent in college.

http://bit.ly/Z9KmBu

--

If you can argue that stats need to be backed up from your phone, you can google some damn reports.

MoW: I think so too. I have mixed views on the term "rape culture" because people feel like it's a personal attack on them. I hate the "if you aren't with us you're part of the problem" type arguments. Fortunately, it isn't necessary to get people to agree on that term to convince them that we need real changes. I've tried to steer this conversation in a productive direction without insisting that that terminology must apply.

@Draug, no need to force it man. If you find something feel free to PM me later. I suspect that rapists who are also "sociopaths with mental deficiencies" do indeed exist, but I think they are largely a minority, i.e. the man in the alley, or the serial rapist, etc. are only a very small fraction of the real rape cases.