Monday 9 November 2009

rape culture

News flash people!

None of the following cause rape:
- university colleges
- sports culture
- different ethnic groups
- alcohol
- drugs
- women (or men) walking home alone / flirting / wearing provocative clothing / sleeping around
- unclear consent

Rapists cause rape.

And rapists are found everywhere, in all professions, in all socio-economic groups, all ethnicities and all age groups. Rapists do not rape people because either party are drunk or drugged, they rape because they live in a culture that teaches them that they can.

I don't have the energy to rant more about this.
See Rape Culture 101

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EDIT: I shot this off quickly and a friend has pointed out that it looks like I am suggesting that rapists are individuals acting without cultural influence.

Quite the opposite! I am suggesting that our entire culture is a rape culture (as in blog link above) and that claiming that only certain spaces are at fault suggests that this problem isn't widespread; doesn't permeate EVERY part of our society; is the fault of "bad egg" groups.

I don't mean to say that the media shouldn't highlight groups and causes as they arise, but that the discourse shouldn't claim that these little groups or catalysts cause rape in a vacuum. Rape Culture is everywhere.

1 comment:

Ali H said...

Hey fancy seeing you write about this here! I've had a long-ish blog post about rape culture sitting in my 'drafts' for weeks now, since I first read that post at Shakesville. I keep shying back from actually publishing. I suspect this is because one of the things rape culture is really good at is making it feel shameful or weird to talk about it. Probably I should just publish the bloody thing.

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