I have been listening to all the stories about the Duke team and the young woman who says she was raped.
I have no idea who to believe in this one, the facts are troubling.
I do know that rape is a terrible thing, it should never happen to anyone. To be accused of this crime, and to be innocent, is also a terrible thing.
We do not have enough information yet to form a reasoned opinion here.
Hopefully, this will come out at trial.
Your commentary is absolutely right on target. I have worked in the rape crisis center movement for over 15 years and I am never more amazed at what I hear coming out of commentator's mouths.
If a car is stolen, does anyone ever blame the owner for being flashy and flaunting its curvy chassis? Or claim that they are making a false report?
I first became aware of the backlash against feminists and feminism in the 1990s. Susan Faludi wrote a great book called, appropriately "Backlash," detailing the attack on women from the charismatic right, who want to restore gender roles in the family, end abortion and the sale of birth control, and basically restore the primacy of white males to their rightful position of old school power.
I loved you before I figured out you weren't Tom and I still love you.
Great analogy to go with the post. Men are entitled to sex even when asleep or drunk and women are guilty for not making it pleasant.
Grr.
Larkohio, I don't see why we have to be so delicate. Again, think of car theft. Would you say "It's terrible if it's true, but it would be terrible to be accused of stealing a car if you're innocent. Let's wait and see if the supposed "victim" is telling the truth."
No, of course not. This line of argument is used only for rape and child molestation accusations. And while I know you're well-meaning and thoughtful, it's a line of thinking steeped in patriarchy, and in the subconscious, cultural assumption that women are sexually poisonous.
Glenda, Backlash is a great book.
Debra, Tom is more loveable, and smarter, but I'm cuter and funnier, so it's a trade-off.
Terrific post, Deborah; and welcome!
This whole thing has me so upset that I'm not even sure what to say. I agree - the car theft analogy is spot-on. But we have come a long way; at least people are able to talk about rape as a crime.
Then again, we get to hear a rape victim referred to as a "stripteaser" on the evening news for almost a week now, without anyone even raising an eyebrow.
Karen, I agree with both the positive and the negative. We are having a dialogue as a culture, and yes, that brings the evil misogynists out of the woodwork, but that doesn't mean the dialogue isn't lifting up.
As long as we're playing analogy, I wonder if any other job would be used as the continual identifier; would she be persist in being "doctor" or "secretary" or "journalist" or "maid"? I think not. Every bit as much as she is a stripper, she is also a student and a mother; indeed, the hours devoted to those are greater. It is all about how screwed up we are about the idea of women being sexual.
I'm going to have to agree with larkohio here. And I'm normally all for the victim in rape cases. THIS one tho, there are just TOO many things that don't fit in. And now there is a taxi driver that says he was driving around one of the accused at the time the rape was to have happened.
Is it not possible that this one rare time, someone is lying about being raped? That perhaps we are all jumping to conclusions.
I've stepped back from my assumptions that all those boys should be strung up. Now I'm waiting and seeing.
Is it not possible that this one rare time, someone is lying about being raped? That perhaps we are all jumping to conclusions.
It is possible that this is one of rare occasions. And we are not jumping to conclusions. We are treating victim-reportage as generally reliable but subject to the vetting of the judicial system. That's what's appropriate, and that's what we'd be doing if it was a car theft.
This is not a car theft tho. And comparing the two just doesn't work. No matter how you try.
Any sexual assault is damaging to a victims life. Just as is a false accusation.
Car theft is not. Plain and simple.
And if my boys were on the wrong end of a false accusation, you can bet I would not want people jumping to conclusion when there is so many things out there that looked questionable.
This one time, I am doing what is out of the norm for me, and I am waiting for more info.
Who came up with the car theft analogy? Why does there even need to be an analogy???
Michelle, I don't recall who came up with the car theft analogy, otherwise I'd have posted a link. I read quite a few excellent feminist blogs (including Feministe, Pandagon, and I Blame the Patriarchy). It might have been any of them, or another one.
As to why we need an analogy, it is so that we can look at the crime as a crime, without enormous layers of societal baggage about sex and gender and entitlement. I think it's a very useful way of examining our own thinking processes.
You make some good points, Deborah, and this is such a story caught up with violence, race, class, and everyting else, that it is hard to sort out.
Excellent post, De.
Excellent post regarding the Patriarchy.
As long as they can maintain common social mores imposing their will over the sexual rights of women, the demonizing of Rape will continue.
There are varying degrees of rape that range from the gal saying "stop it" in the middle of an act (as was alleged in the Kobe case) to a stalker using force to initiate contact with the victim.
The same Patriarchy which hopes to regain control over a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy seek to condemn anyone having/simulating/thinking consensual sex outside of marriage.
Doing so emboldens their hold over the minds and will of everyone else.
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