***Trigger Warning*** Rape Culture and its discussion Online

[eumelia]

In the beginning of June cereta wrote a post titled: On Rape and Men (Oh yes, I'm going there), in which she basically lays out what it is that men can do to prevent rape.

Because make no mistake.
Rape is not something that happens.
It is a crime committed upon a victim who is will, almost every time, be a part of a group that is less powerful in the very unequal power dynamic in which we live; that is, women of almost every intersection, queer men, people who are gender variant, children, the elderly, prisoners, etc.

I qualify the above with "almost every time", because straight cis men are also raped and women can assault and molesters as well.

However, the epidemic of Rape as it stands now, makes that a small qualifier.

The culture in which we live, which is that of under reporting of the crime and the derailment of the issue time and time again to:
#1 This is a women's issue you deal with it. (Despite it being done by men)
#2 What about those who are falsely accused of rape. (Despite the fact that it is a crime that is falsly reported no more or no less than any other crime, that is, a minuscule amount compares to the actual crime being committed).

Do not negate the fact that Rape happens.

All the time, every day, to - according to current statistics - 1 in 4 women and this is just what is reported.
As I said, this is a crime that is under reported.

One of the foci of cereta's post was the fact that we barely hear about the men who do not rape. That is, about the men who are in the presence of a woman who is in a vulnerable position and do not take advantage of this.
Those men, she says and I paraphrase, need to speak up and educate others and tell them that you do not invade another persons body, that drunken consent in not consent, that a woman walking around in a mini-skirt and a plunging neck line is not "asking for it".
That no woman is silently asking to be taken against her will.

Just as an aside: anybody who wants to mention Rape Fantasies will be smacked down. This is not what I'm talking about and has very very little do with the discussion at hand. Keep your thoughts and ideas about Rape Fantasy to an entry in which I discuss sex politics, not here, when I am talking about a crime that is too often relegated to the realm fantasy and disbelief.

The strategy that cereta suggests in her post and others in her comments is a bit of a double edged sword. And it suggests a reality which we don't really want to contemplate, because the majority of us (as in women, but people in general) do not want to consider Rape the norm and the avoidance of rape as something special.
Decent human behaviour should be the norm, mentioning how you (a guy in a position of power) were once in a position to violate a girl but didn't, in fact even did your best to make sure she wasn't harmed while she was in this state, shouldn't be an incident worth telling in ones honour.
It should be what every man in that situation would do.

Women have been told, time and time again, don't be a victim. Don't go out late at night. Don't drink too much. Don't accept rides from strangers. Don't do this, don't do that.
Basically, policing our living space in the name of our own protection.
But that's just another way of reducing our lives in general.
Boys should be told, from childhood, as girls are, don't be an aggressor, you do not have the right over someone else's body. Women's bodies are not something you are entitled to.

You get the picture.

I have a story of my own about being in a vulnerable position and was not assaulted. I no longer allow myself to be so intoxicated that I find myself waking up with hazy memories.
I don't feel the need to recount it here because this was over five years ago and it really isn't a story.
But you know, it kinds is, because I was very fortunate.
I may not be so lucky in the future.

This post is only one of many that have been inspired by cereta's post - in the comments (of which there are 22 pages) there is a thread with links to other posts on this subject.

It's awfully telling that while this is being spoken about in the feminist blogosphere a South African survey shows that 1 in 4 South African men admit to committing rape. These are just the men who admitted it.
This is very illuminating considering the fact that in March a report about the "corrective rape" of South African Lesbians was published in the Guardian.
Both these articles may be triggering.

Rape and violence are always compounded when it is committed within and upon a population is still recovering from a very long period of oppression, suppression and is basically backlashing against the history of it's own violence.

That's very academic, and is really of no consequence to the victims and survivors of the culture in which they have to live.
So moving on.

It would seem that despite feminism being around since the turn of the 20th century, not much good has been done for women who are still systematically put in the "weak" box.

But we are talking about this.
We are writing the stories and telling them.
We are owning them and trying to get the myths regarding them eradicated.

Once, the articles linked above wouldn't have been stories worth mentioning. They would have been part of that culture.
Once, anyone talking about the systemic culture of rape would have been labelled as crazy, now I think we may be slowly but surely getting somewhere.
So very slowly, but very surely.

That's all about this at this point.