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Creaphis

Let's talk about rape

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So, there's this idea floating around that if a female rape victim was wearing something provocative, then the rape was partially her fault. Women obviously shouldn't be held responsible for keeping male impulses in check, and I don't want anybody to start flinging their shit around in here. What I do want is some cold, hard, flavourless information: is there any proof that a woman's outfit has any effect on her likelihood of being raped?

If a study on this has never been done, that's a shame, because it would be easy enough to do. Just compare the clothing worn by rape victims to the clothing worn in the larger population by the demographics that rape victims belong to. If the same proportions of t-shirts, tube tops, sweat pants and miniskirts show up in both populations, then clothing has no effect.

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let's talk about rape, ba-by, let's talk about you and me

*ahem*

I'm not sure if rationalizing the behavior of rapists to something as simple as clothing choice even makes sense. Maybe there's a correlation, but that's not enough to explain why they do what they do. Now, there's nothing wrong with gathering the data -- the only trouble would be interpreting it to try and put blame on the victim, which would be really, really silly IMO. Not that any rational person would ever do so, I hope, but now I'm more or less repeating what the OP said. :P

tl;dr: I'm not sure what such a study would prove. Just mere curiosity.


let's talk aboooooout rape

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Creaphis said:

is there any proof that a woman's outfit has any effect on her likelihood of being raped?


Is there any proof that I shave my head, wear suspenders and Doc Martens shoes and say "Sieg Heil! Fuck you niggers!" in a black ghetto, I'm gonna get beaten/raped/maimed/killed (not necessarily in that order)? Hell, even without saying a single fucking word?

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Creaphis said:

If a study on this has never been done, that's a shame, because it would be easy enough to do. Just compare the clothing worn by rape victims to the clothing worn in the larger population by the demographics that rape victims belong to. If the same proportions of t-shirts, tube tops, sweat pants and miniskirts show up in both populations, then clothing has no effect.

It's perhaps worth pointing out that 79% of female rape victims are assaulted by someone they know - an intimate partner, friend or acquaintance (see reference, page 7). That doesn't really answer your question as such but it puts an interesting perspective on the question. Are you asking about all rape victims or just the ones raped by strangers "in dark alleys" (as the stereotype goes)?

I remember reading that rape is less common in Islamic states, but I'm not sure that really proves anything.

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hmmm... when i read local (czech) news articles on this issue, i get the idea it's not like that, at least not universally. serial rapists or those random assault guys seem to cruise around and hit on any female that happens to be in a remote location by herself. they're in it for the violence and they'll go for anything, even old ladies. i remember a recent case in which two drunk guys wanted to coerce a homeless woman to have sex with them (via even more drinking), but she kinda passed out and they had their way with her. an unconscious, drunk, smelly, homeless and probably neither young nor beautiful woman. they'd fuck a goat at that point.

on the other hand, i guess the "provocative clothing" can be a strong factor in rapes where the victim knows the attacker. like a neighbour who pretended to be a decent human being until that point when "she wanted it cause she dressed like a whore."

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Creaphis said:

is there any proof that a woman's outfit has any effect on her likelihood of being raped?

I dunno about proof, but isn't it common sense that a woman is generally going to be more sexually attractive to men if she's wearing very little? And if that man happens to be predisposed to committing a violent, most terrible crime, then I suppose you could say she made herself more vulnerable by dressing a certain way, if only unintentionally.

But yeah, I'd be interested in seeing some hard data too.

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The general rule about provoking anyone about anything is that even if you can do/say something, that doesn't mean that you should actually do it ("or else").

I personally consider it mutually exclusive with other statements or rights, not the least of which are freedom of speech.

Yet in almost every jurisdiction, provoking an attacker (or doing something that is subjectively provocative/taboo to the attacker himself) is recognized as an attenuant for the attacker, and an aggravant for the victim ("she was asking for it") etc.

DoomUK said:

But yeah, I'd be interested in seeing some hard data too.


That's kinda hard, because almost every perpetrator will try to justify his actions a-posteriori by claiming that "something" in the victim's attitude "ticked him off", and thus he's somehow partly excusable/justified for having acted that way. The justification chosen will of course be appropriate for the accusation at hand. This concept scales up all the way to global geopolitics. And of course most rapists will claim that it was the victim's provocative looks that "made them see red". This also creates a precedent for other rapists to draw upon, since it has been accepted as a factor, and the cycle continues.

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Creaphis said:

What I do want is some cold, hard, flavourless information: is there any proof that a woman's outfit has any effect on her likelihood of being raped?


Do I know of any study specifically about rape? No. But hundreds of social experiments have yielded proof that scantily clad individuals attract more attention than those who are not. The most fundamental lessons in criminology teach that the less attention one draws to oneself, they less likely they'll become the victim of crime. The degrees of risk and reward also play a major part.

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I don't like or believe in the idea of "she was asking for it" sort of thing when it comes to how provocatively a woman dresses. If a woman dresses in a sexually attractive manner, that's her choice. It's not like it changes the fact that she's a victim of an attack. If there's a greater chance of her being attacked by dressing so, that shows more about the attacker (perhaps in extension, men) than her... that men can't hold their impulses and are prone to violence to satisfy them.

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fraggle said:

I remember reading that rape is less common in Islamic states, but I'm not sure that really proves anything.

I'm pretty sure the actuality of that is that rape is less commonly reported, what with a rape victim having to either marry her rapist or be executed by stoning so as to save the family's honor.

(On the other hand, the worst punishment faced by the rapist is people angrily wagging their eyebrows at him for maybe a minute.)

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To be honest... rapists rape to rape. Not because of what they're wearing. There are fat ugly women out there wearing sweatpants and a hoody who still get raped.

I know plenty of women who have been raped or sexually assaulted and a lot of them you'd think who would want to. Rapists rape to rape. What the woman was wearing is just a hollow excuse.

By using what the woman was wearing as an excuse, by that logic why not go one step further and blame the CEREBRAL CORTEX for making them hard when there was nothing physical touching them to make them hard to rape.

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Creaphis said:

If a study on this has never been done, that's a shame,

I don't think it's a shame at all, because I think the whole discussion is bullshit. We might as well launch a study to find out if people with high, whiny voices are more likely to be murdered.

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AndrewB said:

I don't think it's a shame at all, because I think the whole discussion is bullshit.

What's the worst that could happen? A girl is emotionally destroyed? I can live with that.

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dew said:

What's the worst that could happen? A girl is emotionally destroyed? I can live with that.

Moderator.

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Holy victim blaming batman.

Rape is generally committed with some aforethought and planning, or at least in a majority of cases by people who know the victim. As such, it can be assumed in the majority of cases then that clothing didn't really matter.

But seriously, partially her fault? For wearing something that someone ELSE interpreted as provocative? And that it's partially her fault for GETTING SEXUALLY ASSAULTED by someone as a result? Fuck that, and fuck that line of thinking.

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fraggle said:

I remember reading that rape is less common in Islamic states, but I'm not sure that really proves anything.


They also tend to have a culture which overemphasizes the need for women to be "chaste" and "not to provoke", indirectly absolving males of any responsability or need to restrain themselves. That includes "effeminate" males, as an old colleague of my father recounted:

He had visited egypt in the early 70s, and had long, blong flowing hair (hey it was the 70s! Hippie power and all the rest). In one of the many suks/bazaars, there was a short, black beduin guy that harassed him continuously by grabbing his ass in public. Repeatedly.

At first my father's colleague told him to buzz off in a menacing tone anyone would understand, especially from a guy over 1.90m, however the beduin persisted, and so he got pissed and smacked his face (actually he beat the guy up pretty badly and had to be hospitalized)

Needless to say, he was arrested, and when he stated that the damn beduin was grabbing his ass in public, the reply he got from the interrogating officers was that "He [the beduin] was doing just fine. Only women have long hair, so either you cut it short and stop provoking a good muslim or you suffer the consequences".

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Do you think rape is really reported in Islamic states? The women might get killed or stoned to death for being raped.

I've got a friends that work for police and rescue. They've said their commanders take rape reports and file them as breaking & entering so their stats don't look bad.

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geo said:

They've said their commanders take rape reports and file them as breaking & entering so their stats don't look bad.


Well, in a certain sense they are right, as rape involves breaking & entering ;-)

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Yep and that's the joke about it. But I guess this means people would rather have people break in then rape them.

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eargosedown said:

Fuck that, and fuck that line of thinking.


Yes, rape this line of thinking, it's just NOT cool.

I know this is a parallel to that terrible blog by that insane person, but I'm kinda bothered by rape jokes and rape in general becoming more mainstream in our culture.

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There are certainly some situations where it is accepted that a victim was inviting trouble:

Surf the internet without virus software, get a virus, partially your fault.

Leave a wallet in plain view in a parked car, car gets broken in to, partially your fault.

Shave your head, wear suspenders and Doc Martens shoes and say "Sieg Heil! Fuck you niggers!" in a black ghetto, get beaten/raped/maimed/killed, pretty much nearly entirely your fault. ;)

etc etc.

However, I think that those are also probably genuinely cases where the actions make the unpleasant consequence more likely. I am not convinced that many women get raped because of a "provocative" choice of clothing. How many rapes are the result of a guy, who had not planned on raping anyone, seeing a woman in revealing clothing and deciding there and then "that's it, she's asking for it, I'm going to rape her"? Very few, if any, I suspect.

I have certainly heard of people expressing opinions like "what did she expect dressed like that" but those are opinions expressed after the fact when people may be trying to rationalise (or excuse) things. But how often does a choice of clothing actually lead to a rape?

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Pretty much what Fraggle, and Enjay said. Though I suppose it's possible that some rapist on the prowl could go for the scantly clad woman rather than the one not so much so. But there's not really anything that suggest that is the case. Much more likely that they go after the woman crossing the park in the dark or the being left by her lonesome while being intoxicated, or whatever possibility opens up for them to attack.

But you'd have to ask a rapist about that. They probably come in all sizes, regardless what they may say though. It's never the victim's fault for having the misfortune of crossing paths with a rapist.

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On the converse, In Italy, 1999 there had been an infamous case where an (alleged) rapist was acquitted on the grounds that "the victim was wearing jeans", which were seen as NOT inviting or facilitating rape, therefore the victim must have been consenting.

Women in jeans 'cannot be raped'

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Rape is a bit of a hard to work out IMO. It doesn't strike me as an oppurtunist crime (like stealing a wallet that's in view and similar crimes) in that it must be a bit difficult to pre-meditate the "traditional" idea of a woman taking a shortcut down a dark back-alley and happening upon a guy who's definitely having sex with her, regardless of her opinion on the matter. However, as a crime of passion - as in, a man close to a woman wants her so badly that he takes her against her will - it is something easy to imagine, particularly if they're already close or perhaps part-way there (girlfriend is holding out for marriage; guy just wants to get laid, for example). For the more insidious versions that involve "capturing" minors or drunk girls who are on a night out I'm not sure how much of that would be pre-meditated and how much would be taking an oppurtunity where it arises.

The only possible slant I can imagine clothing having on rape cases are that a nicely dressed up girl will attract more attention - particularly if they're good looking too. If the girl isn't an "easy target" through one of the means I described above though, I can't imagine the clothes would make a difference.

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Stupid side story about blaming victims >> I grew up with a shithead that used to shoot a pitbull in the face everyday. Shot the dog with a beebee gun or a pellet gun whatever. The pitbull was in an outside fence like a 10ft x 6 ft pen that was nice and high. Then after weeks of torment, the pitbull found the way out of its cage. It jumped onto the doghouse and then out of the pen which was maybe 8 ft tall.

That dog bit the fuck out of the kid. So his parents scored a lot of money suing the owner. I never knew that he shot the dog in the face until he told me 2 years later.

In the case of rape... rapists rape to rape.

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Enjay said:

However, I think that those are also probably genuinely cases where the actions make the unpleasant consequence more likely.

I suppose an argument using the "woman who menstruates in the ocean will be eaten by the shark before anyone else" scenario could apply to a degree. Like any individual, I'm sure rapists have certain standards, but probably a majority are the stock slim, big-breasted slut type.

kristus said:

Much more likely that they go after the woman crossing the park in the dark or the being left by her lonesome while being intoxicated, or whatever possibility opens up for them to attack.

Yeah, I can agree with this. You'd be more attracted to the situation than the clothing when trying to get away with something illegal. Much like mugging or vandalism.

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Xaser said:

let's talk about rape, ba-by, let's talk about you and me


I thought of this the minute I saw the thread title.

Maes said:

Hell, even without saying a single fucking word?


I was with you up until this point. You do know that there are traditional, non-racist skinheads as well as S.H.A.R.P.s and they are hard to tell apart from Nazi skins? Unless you see them brandishing swazis, totenkopfs, or 88 patches, you can't jump to conclusions.

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