victim training

 from susan brownmiller's Against Our Will:

i strongly recommend this book to everyone, whether you're a victim of rape & abuse or not..
it's very insightful..

women are trained to be rape victims. to simply learn the word 'rape' is to take instruction in the power relationship between males and females. to talk about rape, even with nervous laughter, is to acknowledge a woman's special victim status.

we hear the whispers when we are children: girls get raped. not boys. the message becomes clear. rape has something to do with our sex. rape is something awful that happens to females: it is the dark at the top of the stairs, the undefinable abyss that is just around the corner, and unless we watch our step it might just become our destiny.

rape seeps into our childhood conscoiusness by imperceptible degrees. even before we learn to read we have become indoctrinated into a victim mentality. fairy tales are full of a vague dread, a catastrophe that seems to befall only little girls.

sweet, feminine little red riding hood is off to visit her dear old grandmother in the woods. the wolf lurks in the shadows, contemplating a tender morsel. red riding hood and her grandmother, we learn, are equally defenseless before the male wolf's strength and cunning. the wolf swallows both females with no sign of a struggle.

but enter the huntsman - he will right this egregious wrong. the kindly huntsman's strength and cunning are superior the the wolf's. with the twist of the knife red riding hood and her grandmother are rescued from inside the wolf's stomach. 'oh, it was so dark in there,' red riding hood wimpers. 'i will never wander off into the forest as long as i live.'

red riding hood is a parable of rape. there are frightening male figures abroad int he woods and females are helpless before them.

better stick close to the path, better not be adventurous. if you are lucky a frindly male may be able to save you from certain disaster. ('funny, every man i meet wants to protect me,' says mae west 'i can't figure outy what from.')

those who doubt that the tale of red riding hood contains this subliminal message should consider how well peter fared when he met his wolf, or even better, the survival tactics of the three little (male) pigs. who's afraid of the big bad wolf? not they.

the utter passivity of red riding hood in the teeth of the wolf is outdone by sleeping beauty, who lay immoblie for one hundred years before she was awakened by the kiss of the prince. as a lesson in female sexuality, sleeping beauty's message is clear. the beauteous princess remains unresponsive until mr. right comes along.

snow white in her glass coffin also remains immobile until her prince appears. cinderella, too, needs a prince to extricate her from her miserable environment. thus is female sexuality defined. beautiful passivity.

wait, just wait, prince charming will soon be by; and if it is not prince charming but the big bad wolf who stands at the door, then proper feminine behavior still commands you to stay immobile. the wolf is bigger and stronger than you are. why try to fight back?  

susan brownmiller

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'every summer, my mother would set jam jar traps for wasps near the dustbins in our driveway. baited with smears of stickiness and primed with water and a drop of detergent, the poor insects would be tempted, tumble in and drown. but not if ...i was there. i would sit among the buzzing throng and offer my little fingers as lifelines to the doomed creatures. soon i learned that wasps would never sting their rescuer, just climb up, clean up, shake off the water and buzz off. my reward was to meet a little animal that no one else seemed to want to know. black and yellowin simple but startlingsymmetry, so neat, so purposeful - a triumph of form and function, a beautiful piece of deco design. with a face of fury and superlative predatory prowess, it performs essential duties, creates a nest of extraordinary delicacy and yet is universally loathed and ruthlessly persecuted because of complete ignorance. but the common wasp, vespula vulgaris, is one of my oldest and best friends. in saving those doomed individuals i learned to love wasps. and i learned to love life - all life.
it was much later that i learned why life has a collective value; why each and every organism is implicitly important to the community and ecosystem that it has evolved a niche in.'

c. packham

 a post taken from http://www.2ndcouncilhouse.co.uk/blog/

It was Germaine Greer who said that women never really know how much men hate them. Thanks to the internet we’re starting to find out, as “banter” comes out of the backrooms and spews itself over the web. Unilad has just been shut down after it pointed out approvingly that rapists have rather good odds, with the “lads” blaming humourless feminazis for spoiling their fun. A week or so ago, a friend posted up a list of the things that Mens Rights Activists quote out of context to demonstrate how nutty feminists are. Among them was a quote attributed to Marilyn French stating “all men are rapists“. This statement as a view of how feminists see men is often given as evidence of the misanderous nature of feminism and how ludicrous it is, but the full quote, given below, which comes from “The Women’s Room” and is spoken by Val – a radical feminist character in the novel, bears further inspection. Over the years, I have argued many times with (primarily male) comrades as to the meaning of this statement, with many taking considerable offense at the implication that I consider them individually to be rapists/potential rapists. Frequently accompanied by denials of individual responsibility and/or temperament to commit something which is – at least in name – so transgressive and stigmatised.

‘…all men are rapists and that’s all they are: they rape us with their eyes their laws and their codes.’

The contextualisation given in the full quote above demonstrates the structural nature of male sexual violence, and it is well worth unpacking the eyes, laws and codes which entrap men to this role. Mere denial, is simply a refusal to see, yet the gaze lives on; assertions of legal behaviour does not negate the judicial structure which enables violation, and a cultural stance in opposition does not challenge the codes which sustains it. Only by a careful examination of the power structure which sustains patriarchal heterosexual relations is there the opportunity to destroy it. The concept of “the Gaze” originates with Satre. Satre explore the concept of “The Other” – that which is not us. That when we are alone, we are a self-contained active subject, but when we share space with someone else we become aware of ourselves as an object in the Other’s environment. Because we objectify the world around us, we are aware that “The Other” as a sentient being, does likewise, and we view ourselves no longer as purely an active subject but as an object which is gazed upon. Lacan took this concept further, Lacan’s gaze does not require the physical existence of another, as the gaze is not something which belongs to the other, but is within ourselves, as a perception of being viewed. Thus it is not the act of being seen which creates the gaze in our heads, but the epistemic knowledge that it is possible that we may be; and from that there is no escape. Laura Mulvery coined the term the “Male Gaze” in the context of film studies, exploring how film makers produce narrative from the point of view of male subjects. Yet it has a broader application to all forms of media. Men are the primary producers of media, and the texts they produce primarily for a male audience while women are the spectacle to be gazed upon. When women consume male orientated media, they must adopt the gaze as intended, yet at the same time identify with the female. They see themselves as Others see them, this gift given not by a theological God, but by the omniscient patriarchy, eradicating the foolish notion that they may be active subjects in a world controlled by men. Women internalise the Male Gaze, everywhere they go and in everything they do they are subject to the knowledge that they are the objects viewed through a patriarchal lens which dictates their behaviour and the limits of their agency. Until the Male Gaze is castrated, free and genuine consent is impossible in a world where the agency of the subject is constrained.

‘because penetration by males is what women are for, if we are raped we have to prove not just that we didn’t say yes, which is impossible to prove, but that we specifically and emphatically said no, which is also impossible to prove..’

Women exist in a legal state of permanent consent. Consent is an automatic defense to a charge of rape and unless there is sound evidence that consent was withdrawn, it is frequently assumed that it was not. If a woman did not actively withdraw her consent, there is no case to answer – the legal status of a woman is that of consent to sexual intercourse. Furthermore, the presumption of innocence over guilt in effect means that it is insufficient for a conviction to be upheld purely on the basis that a woman asserts that she withdrew her consent in the absence of such evidence. For some women, the withdrawal of consent becomes in effect a legal non-option. Crimes of sexual violence against sex-workers are notoriously difficult to prosecute, as the assumption is that they payment has brought the agreement not to withdraw consent. Any evidence that a woman may not have withdrawn consent, is evidence of the innocence of the accused. Such evidence may include payment; sexually arousing dress; prior sexual activity; drug or alcohol use; being asleep; being sexually unattractive, or being insufficiently aware of danger. Up until 1991 the majority of women lived within a formal legal state which denied her the right to remove her consent: a woman could not withdraw consent to sexual intercourse from her husband; marriage was an automatic defense. Although that has thankfully been repealed, most married women today, entered into a legal contract which removed their right to say “no”. Within such a legal framework, consent is compromised. If you are a sex worker and you know that there is little chance of obtaining retribution because you were paid, there is equally little point withdrawing it. In circumstances where you know that what will be done to you will be seen as quite acceptable in the eyes of the law, resistance is futile. When your consent is irrelevant, why bother withdrawing it. Until the legal state of permanent consent is revoked, free and genuine consent is impossible in a world where that consent is a legal irrelevance.

‘A rape culture condones physical and emotional terrorism against women as the norm… This violence, however, is neither biologically nor divinely ordained. Much of what we accept as inevitable is in fact the expression of values and attitudes that can change.’

The term “rape culture” was first coined in the mid-70s, but has gained a new popularity recently as feminists have looked to the cultural modes which sustain and perpetuate sexual violence. Much of the money devoted to popular campaigns to prevent sexual violence has focused on what women should or should not do to avoid becoming victims – seeking to impose limitations on their dress, behaviour, alcohol consumption and travel arrangements. By implication transgressing these rules implies a recklessness which has invited attack and any public sympathy or support for such transgressive women who meets with such violence is tempered with an “I told you so” undertone and restatement of how important it is to follow the rules. Related to this is the sexual epithets, “prude” and “slut”. Two sides of the same coin they seek to define women’s sexuality in reference to the patriarchal power structure – they are not opposing descriptions of womens sexual behaviour, but demands upon it. The “slut” challenges patriarchal norms which consider women to be the gatekeepers of sexuality, that sex is something done to women. The slut, as an identified sexually active woman is [an] easy [victim]. The “prude” challenges patriarchal norms which considers the purpose of women as being for fucking. The prude, as an identified sexually inactive woman is [a] frigid [bitch]. The effect of rape culture is to deny women control over their sexuality in combination with excusing male violations of female sexual boundaries; to reinforce the patriarchal definition of the purpose of women as being for fucking while simultaneously reinforcing the patriarchal definition of fucking as something done to women. Until rape culture is overcome, free and genuine consent is impossible in a world which indoctrinates women to be the objects of male sexuality. This combination of the male gaze, the permanent legal state of consent and rape culture conspires to produce an unhealthy sexual environment within which all individual sexual encounters take place. When McKinnon said “In a patriarchal society all heterosexual intercourse is rape because women, as a group, are not strong enough to give meaningful consent”, it is the weight of the eyes, laws and codes which bear down on each interaction, shaping its direction.

fine objects

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many men claim to practice what they preach when they merely preach what they would have you believe they practice. in the last analysis we must be judged by what we do and not by what we believe. we are as we behave – it is our actions which reflect our characters - with a very small margin of credit for our unmanifested vision of how we might behave if we could take the trouble to.

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Rape culture is a term or concept used to describe a culture in which rape and sexual violence are common and in which prevalent attitudes, norms, practices, and media normalize, excuse, tolerate, or even condone sexual violence. Examples of behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming, sexual objectification, and trivializing rape.

this week Alison Saunders of the Crown Prosecution Service confirmed that how jurors see women and victims of rape is often influenced by rape culture and the media’s portrayal of victims. While steps are being taken to address it Ms Saunders concedes that many jurors “still subscribe to the myths and stereoptypes that we have all had a go at busting”. In other words jurors look at the victim’s behaviour - was she drunk, what was she wearing, did she flirt with him, did she go home with him… the list goes on. As most rape victims know their attackers, jurors focus on ways she may have lead him or the warning signs she should have seen. This culture is reinforced in many ways. We would all advocate people looking after their safety and wellbeing but the annual Christmas ads reminding women not to drink too much, or get in dodgy cabs endorse the view that if something then happens to her, it’s her fault for putting herself in that situation. Young men aren’t taught what rape is. Men are never reminded to not drink to the point where they don’t recognise consent.

In a recent case in Ireland a man admitted rape and said “I’m sorry, I’m not a bastard. I have feelings”. He said he drank 13 cans of beer, three pints, six shots, three double vodkas and smoked a cannabis joint before the incident. In fact, his drunken behaviour was taken into account when being sentenced. Mr Justice Paul Carney said it was the “experience of the court” that a young man taking the amount of drink that he had, along with a cannabis joint, could wake up the next morning unaware that he had committed homicide or rape. However, the Irish Times website makes sure the reader is in no doubt that the woman, the woman who had been raped, had drunk ‘large amounts’. As always, a judgement is being cast on her character.

It was this kind of reporting that was raised recently at the Leveson Inquiry. If you weren’t lucky enough to be able to hear the evidence as it was given, I would strongly encourage anyone to read the full hearing transcripts online. As part of their evidence Marai Larasi from End Violence Against Women raised a Daily Mail report about six footballers who were jailed for gang raping 12-year-old girls. The rape was described by the Mail Online as an ‘orgy’ and the victims as ‘Lolitas’. The clear implication is that the girls - not women, girls - invited the rape. It was their behaviour that had allowed the rape to happen. This article was problematic in placing some blame on the girls, but also in sensationalising what happened to them. It’s no longer a rape, it’s an orgy, something exciting and sexy. This just feeds opinions already in the media about the sexiness of youth and girls and the abdication of responsibility on the part of men who rape. What does reading this teach young men? What does it teach women about their behaviour and value?

I like to try and be optimistic. I believe that things can change. Just today a friend reminded me that she’s hoping to change the world two people at a time by teaching her 2-year-old son and soon-to-be-born second child how to treat people with respect. It’s hard to know how to address rape culture in our society. You’d like to think that the media can change but tabloids love a sensational story. Today, my heart probably sank lower than it’s been in a while with the storm that erupted around University Lad’s site unilad.com. The site’s now gone down, with an attempt at an apology on the holding page but the rape ‘jokes’ and violence against women discussed on the site was appalling. The example which provoked the storm ended

And if the girl you’ve taken for a drink… won’t ‘spread for your head’, think about this mathematical statistic: 85% of rape cases go unreported.

That seems to be fairly good odds*

*Uni Lad does not condone rape without saying ‘surprise’.

Much of the site seemed to centre around ‘lads’ telling tales of their conquests, but the references to rape just being ‘surprise sex’ or a ‘struggle snuggle’ and the attitudes towards drunk or vulnerable women were a constant. This, if it needs saying, is the next generation of educated, young men. These are university students, a few years from entering our workplaces. These are the young men that the current generation of young women are meeting in bars, online, in class. It would be nice to dismiss the site as small but their Facebook page is ‘liked’ by over 69,000 people - a staggering number - and the apology statement quickly attracted over 280 comments, most in support of the site and dismissing rape jokes as ‘banter’ and ‘lads talk’. This is rape culture in action. This is a showcase for attitudes towards women and rape amongst educated, young men in the UK. Still, I have to believe it can change. The reaction to the vile nature of the stories on Unilad gave me hope that the people who were disgusted by it far outweighed the people who support it. Plus, in drawing attention to their site and forcing them to take it down for a while maybe, just maybe, some of these men will rethink their comments.

Rape culture is something that urgently needs addressing in our society, but maybe by continuing to talk about it and call it out, we can change it.

Lori Halford

soul rebel

In order to escape accountability for his crimes, the perpetrator does everything in his power to promote forgetting. Secrecy and silence are the perpetrator's first line of defence  If secrecy fails, the perpetrator attacks the credibility of his victim. If he cannot silence her absolutely, he tries to make sure that no one listens. To this end, he marshals an impressive array of arguments, from ...the most blatant denial to the most sophisticated and elegant rationalization. After every atrocity one can expect to hear the same predictable apologies: it never happened; the victim lies; the victim exaggerates; the victim brought it on herself; and in any case it is time to forget the past and move on. The more powerful the perpetrator, the greater is his prerogative to name and define reality, and the more completely his arguments prevail.

It is very tempting to take the side of the perpetrator. All the perpetrator asks is that the bystander do nothing. He appeals to the universal desire to see, hear, and speak no evil. The victim, on the contrary, asks the bystander to share the burden of the pain. The victim demands action, engagement, and remembering.

Judith Herman - Trauma and Recovery

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"The theory of aggressive male domination over women as a natural right is so deeply embedded in our cultural value system that all recent attempts to expose it - in movies, television commercials or even in children's textbooks - have barely managed to scratch the surface. As I see it, the problem is not that polarized role playing (man as doer; woman as bystander) and exaggerated portrayals of the female body as a passive sex object are simply 'demeaning' to women's dignity and self-conception, or that such portrayals fail to provide positive role models for young girls, but that cultural sexism is a conscious form of female degradation designed to boost the male ego by offering 'proof' of his native superiority (and female inferiority) everywhere he looks.

critics of the women's movement, when they are not faulting us for being slovenly, straggly-haired, construction-booted, whiny sore losers who refuse to accept our female responsibilities, often profess to see a certain inexplicable Victorian primness and anti-sexual prudery in our attitudes and responses. 'come on, gals,' they say in essence, 'don't you know that your battle for female liberation is part of our larger battle for sexual liberation? free yourselves from all your old hang-ups! stop pretending that you are actually offended by those four-letter words and animal noises we grunt in your direction on the street in appreciation of your womanly charms. when we plaster your faceless naked body on the cover of our slick magazines, which sell millions of copies, we do it in sensual obeisance to your timeless beauty - which, by our estimation, ceases to be timeless at age twenty or there abouts.

If we feel the need for a little fun and go out and rent the body of a prostitute for a half hour or so, we are merely engaging in a mutual act between two consenting adults, and what's it got to do with you? when we turn our movie theatres into showcases for pornographic films and convert our bookstores to outlets for mass-produced obscene smut, not only should you marvel at the wonders of our free- enterprise system, but you should applaud us for pushing back the barriers of repressive middle-class morality, and for our strenuous defense of all the civil liberties you hold so dear, because we have made obscenity the new frontier in defense of freedom of speech, that noble liberal tradition. and surely you're not against civil liberties and freedom of speech, now, are you?'

"ALL WOMEN WANT TO BE RAPED

NO WOMAN CAN BE RAPED AGAINST HER WILL

SHE WAS ASKING FOR IT

IF YOU'RE GOING TO BE RAPED, YOU MIGHT AS WELL RELAX AND ENJOY IT"

these are the deadly male myths of rape, the distorted proverbs that govern female sexuality. these myths are at the heart of our discussion, for they are the beliefs that most men hold, and the nature of male power is such that they have managed to convince many women. for to make a woman a willing participant in there own defeat is half the battle. cloaked in intricate phraseology, the male myths of rape appear as cornerstones in most pseudo scientific inquiries into female sexuality; they are quoted by many so-called 'experts' on the sex offender. they crop up in literature; they charge the cannons of the dirty jokesters. they deliberately obscure the true nature of rape.

There is good reason for men to hold tenaciously to the notion that 'all women want to be raped.' because rape is an act that men do in the name of their masculinity, it is in their interest to believe that women also want rape done, in the name of femininity. in the dichotomy that they have established, one does and one 'is done to'. this belief is more that arrogant insensitivity; it is a belief in the supreme rightness of male power.

'She was asking for it' is the classic way a rapist shifts the burden of blame from himself to his victim. The popularity of the belief that a woman seduces of 'cock-teases' a man into rape, or precipitates a rape by incautious behaviour, is part of the smoke screen that men throw up to obscure their actions.

The insecurity of women runs so deep that many, possibly most, rape victims agonize afterwards in an effort to uncover what it was in their behaviour, their manner, their dress that triggered this awful act against them.

Do women want to be raped? Do we crave humiliation, degradation and violation of our bodily integrity? Do we psychologically need to be seized, taken, ravished and ravaged? Must a feminist deal with this preposterous question? The sad answer is yes, it must be dealt with, because the popular culture that we inhabit, absorb, and even contribute to, has so decreed. actually, as we examine it, the cultural messages often conflict. Sometimes the idea is floated that all women want to be raped and sometimes we hear that there is no such thing as rape at all, that the cry of rape is merely the cry of female vengeance in post-coital spite. either way, the woman is at fault.

'but the irony, of course, is that while men successfully convinced each other and us that women cry rape with ease and glee, the reality is that victimized women have always been reluctant to report the crime and seek legal justice - because of the shame of public exposure, because of that complex double standard that makes a female feel culpable, even responsible, for any act of sexual aggression committed against her, because of possible retribution from the assailant, and because women have been presented with sufficient evidence to come to the realistic conclusion that their accounts are received with harsh cynicism that forms the first line of male defence.'

Susan Brownmiller

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bones

'Consent' has yet another role to play in a case of sexual assault. in reviewing the act, in seeking to determine whether or not a crime was committed, the concept of consent that is debated in court hinges on whether or not the victim offered sufficient resistance to the attack, whether or not her will was truly overcome by the use of force or the threat of bodily harm. the peculiar nature of sexual crimes of violence, as much as a man's historic perception of their meaning, has always clouded he law's perception of consent.

It is accepted without question that robbery victims need not prove they resisted the robber, and it is never inferred that by handing over they money they 'consented' to the act and therefore the act was no crime.

..handing over money at knife point, or dipping into one's wallet to assuage a weapon-less but menacing figure on a dark, deserted street, may be financially painful or emotionally distressing, but it hardly compares to the massive insult to one's self-determination that is sustained during a sexual assault.

in a sexual assault physical harm is much more than a threat; it is a reality because violence is an integral part of the act. bodily contact and physical intrusion are the purpose of the crime, not appropriation of a physically detached and removable item like money.

Under the rules of law, victims of robbery and assault are not required to prove they resisted, or that they didn't consent, or that the act was accomplished with sufficient force, or sufficient threat of force, to overcome their will, because the law presumes it highly unlikely that a person willingly gives away money, except to a charity or to a favouite cause, and the law presumes that no person willingly submits to a brutal beating and the inflictions of bodily harm and permanent damage.

but victims of rape and other forms of sexual assault do need to prove these evidentiary requirements - that they resisted, that they didn't consent, that their will was overcome by overwhelming force and fear - because the law has never been able to satisfactorily distinguish an act of mutually desired sexual union from an act of forced, criminal sexual aggression.

Susan Brownmiller

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rape 'jokes'

"You can't do jokes about black people or Asian people," the Australian comic Jim Jeffries told me last year, "but you can do a rape joke onstage now and there's not a problem." Interviewing several comedians for an article about offensiveness in comedy, I heard the same story time and again. American standup Scott Capurro told me that "talk about raping women [is] like the new black on the comedy circuit". Edinburgh comedy award-winner Brendon Burns talked about comedy's favourite neologism "rapey", meaning sleazy. "Only Britain," said Burns (another Aussie), "could make rape sound twee."

Examples of rape comedy are easy to find. Reginald D Hunter has a routine that begins, "civilisation couldn't have arisen without rape . . ." Jimmy Carr, of course, has several one-liners on the subject ("What do nine out of 10 people enjoy? / Gang rape."). In a characteristic play on his words, Carr has called his current show Rapier Wit.

When the Andrew Sachs controversy was still a twinkle in Jonathan Ross's eye, Russell Brand caused an outcry in Northampton when he prank-called the police live onstage claiming to have spotted a man wanted in the city for serious sex attacks. Even the women are at it: Geordie comic Sarah Millican has a skit about fetishistic rape roleplays with her boyfriend.

Various defences are cited for this new comedic fashion. It is comedy's job, say some, to probe the boundaries of the sayable, and to breach taboos – although some taboos are easier breached than others. It is taken as read, say others, that no harm is meant by these jokes; that they are funny precisely because everyone present – performers and audience – instinctively senses that rape is a shocking thing.

Some comics argue that rape jokes are justified as long as the joke's on them. Jeffries talked to me about his joke "about a girl who won't have sex with me . . . And the punchline is 'so I raped her'. But," he added, "I also have a joke later on about being in the toilet of a gay bar, and the punchline of that joke is 'so he raped me'. I throw it back and forth."

The counter-argument, expressed most forcibly by Jo Brand, is that today's comedians pose as plain-speakers and PC refuseniks in order to smuggle in the kind of misogynist comedy last seen in the 1970s. The likes of Carr, says Brand, "appeal to all the people out there who think, 'Where have all those delicious anti-women jokes gone? We miss them.'" Brand identifies "almost a desperation to make [comedy] more unpalatable than it was before".

But what's striking is how palatable the rape joke in comedy now appears to be. The young sketch troupe Late Night Gimp Fight were entirely unapologetic about their scene at Edinburgh last month, in which Sleeping Beauty wasn't kissed awake by her prince, but raped instead. Jeffries maintains this kind of thing is "not a problem". But, as rape becomes ever more commonplace a subject for comedy, it no longer seems terribly funny either.

Brian Logan

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/sep/10/rape-jokes-in-comedy

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As far as I can tell, the “joke” is usually that it wasn’t really rape at all, or it wasn’t a “real” rape, or it was a fun rape, or it was a deserved rape. Which, seeing as how rape victims get to hear that shit, completely seriously (and with completely serious consequences) from their rapist, friends, family, and cops, you might see as how it doesn’t come off as a joke so much as it comes off as... same shit, different day.

Let me tell you a thing you might not know: the inability to hear rape “jokes” without flashbacks, Hulk rage, and “air quotes” is one of the enduring parting gifts of a rapist.

Harriet J

to read the rest (do!) follow this link: http://www.fugitivus.net/2009/06/24/a-woman-walks-into-a-rape-uh-bar/ 

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- Street Harassment has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with power. Whether it's "Hey baby girl" or “You’d look good on me,” groping, public masturbation, or worse, these “compliments” aren’t about flirting or about chivalry either.

- If it makes you feel uncomfortable, it's not okay.

- If you feel intimidated, you DON'T need to 'take it as a compliment.'

- Street harassment is a gateway crime that makes other forms of gender-based violence OK.

- Studies conducted show that between 80-90% of women have been harassed in public.

- Street harassment may be the social and cultural norm, but it is far from OK. Street harassment teaches us to be silent, that taking action will only escalate the situation. While this isn’t bad advice, it has led us down a dangerous road. Ultimately, perpetrators realise they won’t be held accountable and continue to harass.

- Hollaback! was designed by a group of young people who were tired of being silenced and sought a simple, non-violent response. What has emerged is a platform where thousands of stories of street harassment have been told.

- We believe that by continuing to tell and map these stories, our voices will chip away at a culture that makes gender-based violence OK. Together we have the power to end street harassment, one Hollaback at a time.

http://ldn.ihollaback.org/about/

a submission from 'hollaback':

Was on my daily jog at 7.30am. Just to be clear, not that it matters but I was wearing a sports bra, long sleeved top and jogging jacket. I was just coming to my house so stopped running and I saw a car coming out of a garage. The car seemed to stop as it pulled out and the driver, a man in his late 30′s indicated he wanted to say something. I thought he wanted directions so I went over and he said

‘your tits look great jogging up and down the street’ I was shocked and said ‘f**k off’

He laughed at me and said ‘I could watch that all day!’ and he drove off. I was so angry. He seemed so happy with upsetting me. I felt exposed. Why should I be harassed as I am minding my own business jogging before work. I didn’t get his car registration, otherwise I would have reported it to the police. This man was scary and it worried me what he was capable of. However also it was just another example of harassment we experience throughout our lives. This has to stop. 

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pornography

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"the industry-standard of pop-video crotch shots of girls in bikinis make it very, very clear: there should be nothing there. it must be smooth. empty. whilst some use the euphemism 'Brazillian' to describe this state of affairs, i prefer to call it what it is- 'a ruinously high-maintenance itchy, cold-looking child's fanny.' they're making us pay for maintenance and upkeep of our lulus, like they're a communal garden. it's a stealth tax. fanny VAT. this money we should be spending on the electricity bill and cheese and berets. instead, we're wasting it on making our chihuahuas look like a skanky Lidl chicken breast. watch any porn made after, say, 1988, and close-ups are like watching one of the Mitchell brothers, with no eyes, eating a very large, fidgety sausage.
hardcore pornography is now the primary form of sex education in the western world. this is where teenage boys and girls are 'learning' what to do to eachother, and what to expect when they take eachother's clothes off. as a result, we are at risk of a situation in which every boy expects to undress a girl to find a thorough wax job, and every girl - terrified by the idea of being rejected, or thought abnormal - waxes for them. my beautician told me she has had girls of 12 and 13 coming in for Brazillians - removing the first signs of adulthood as they appear, in a combination that - with overtones of infantilisation, and impetus in hardcore pornography - is pretty creepy, whichever way you look at it."

caitlin moran

“In spite of hopes to the contrary, pornography and mass culture are working to collapse sexuality with rape, reinforcing the patterns of male dominance and female submission so that many young people believe this is simply the way sex is. This means that many of the rapists of the future will believe they are behaving within socially accepted norms.”

susan g. cole

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germaine greer on the etymology of the word 'cunt'..  

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The Stranger Rape Myth is the idea that most rape is random and that rapists don't know their victims. The image that follows is of a crazy rapist waiting in the bushes or lurking in dark alleys. Stranger does happen and it absolutely real. Statistically, most victims and survivors are raped by people that they know. The Stranger Rape Myth is based on our societal need to distance ourselves from rapists. By calling them strangers, we can place perpetrators in the “other” category. This is much more comfortable than the darker truth of sexual violence: that the people who are raping our friends and abusing our children are our own friends, neighborhoods, coaches, and even family members. Perpetrators of sexual violence are not “other.” They are within our communities and are people that we know.

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'Women are told they are not supposed to do a lot of things, lest they will get raped and/or murdered. Most women have heard these messages. Don't wear provocative clothing. Don't leave your house at night. Don't walk alone. Don't travel alone in unfamiliar places. Don't go running in the park alone. Don't go camping alone. Don't do anything alone. As someone who has traveled alone by bike, backpacking and hitchhiking, I cannot count how many times people have told me that I am “lucky” that I wasn't raped.

If women follow all of these “avoid being raped” messages, they severely limit the ways in which they can move through the world. The question is, does this practice actually protect women from violence? Just like the myth of stranger rape, these warnings are not based on the violence that is being perpetrated or experienced. 64% of women who reported being raped, physically assaulted, and/or stalked were victimized by a current or former husband, cohabiting partner, boyfriend, or date. (Full Report of the Prevalence, Incidence, and Consequences of Violence Against Women, Findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey, November, 2000). The most dangerous place for a woman, statistically and ironically, is the same place women are told to stay to protect themselves. If we were basing our violence prevention messages in reality, we would be telling women to carry mace in the kitchen and into the bedroom. Because the “don't walk through the woods alone” message is so divorced from reality, it does nothing to protect people from actual violence. So, what purpose does it serve? The fear of rape is used to control women and limit their lives. The threat of rape is used as an excuse to narrow what women ought to do and limit women's personal freedom.

The narrative of rape that we hear in the media is the story of a man overpowering a woman: with a knife, gun or sheer physical force, a man aggressively violates a woman as she tries to stop it, but cannot. The problem with the pervasiveness of this narrative is that, although it is one of the ways in which rape happens, it is not the only way. The experiences of survivors of rape and unwanted sexual experiences that fall outside of the paradigm of “forcible rape” are left with their experience unrecognized and delegitimized. If the sexual assault did not involve penetration, if the victim was drunk, if they said no but didn't really mean it or didn't say it enough-- then it’s not really rape. This inaccurate and narrow definition of rape creates the dramatic under-reporting and prosecution of rape in the United States. The US Justice Department estimates that only 26% of rapes and attempted rapes are ever reported to the police. And only 5% of perpetrators will ever spend a day in jail (US Dept of Justice, 2001)

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This “all or nothing” definition of rape hurts survivors. Most survivors of sexual violence experience Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). One of the first steps of healing from PTSD is naming and labeling the trauma. Survivors who don't meet the narrow definition of rape struggle to name what has happened to them. To even begin the process of healing, “imperfect” rape victims must overcome a culture that says what they have experienced does not meet the definition of rape; that what they have experienced has no name.

To adequately support survivors of sexual violence, we need to embrace fact that rape is not clear nor obvious. It is complicated. It can be ambiguous. It is often infinitely subtle. For example: you are my date and I have consented to having sex with you, but not consented to having sex with you without a condom. As we are both excitedly getting ready to have sex, you slip it in. I ask you to get a condom and you ignore me. I ask you to get a condom again and you hold me down. Is that rape? I would say yes. What would the police report say?

The problem with defining rape based on the victims words and actions is that everyone's sexual boundaries are different and any standard will leave some survivors in the “maybe it isn't” category. By this kind of measure, the experience of survivors can easily be determined to be invalid, their rape not traumatic enough.

But (people will say) if we abandon having a clear standard for rape how can we prevent it from happening? Instead of emphasizing whether or not a situation is technically or legally rape, let’s emphasize that all sexual encounters should clearly and obviously be consensual. The standard for measuring the health and integrity of sex should not be whether one of the parties acted in a criminal manner- but rather, the standard should be that the sex was pleasurable and empowering for all parties (however those parties experience pleasure and empowerment). We must shift the responsibility from the “perfect” rape victim who does everything in their power to fight off a rapist, to the responsible sexual partner who always obtains clear consent.'

after silence

The ordinary response to atrocities is to banish them from consciousness.... Certain violations of the social compact are too terrible to utter aloud: this is the meaning of the word "unspeakable".... Atrocities, however, refuse to be buried....Remembering and telling the truth about terrible events are prerequisites for the restoration of the social order and for the healing of individual victims....When the truth is finally recognized, survivors can begin their recovery. But far too often secrecy prevails, and the story of the traumatic event surfaces not as a verbal narrative but as a symptom....

Judith Lewis Herman, Trauma and Recovery

Words seemed to make it visible.

But speaking, even when it embarrassed me,

also slowly freed me from the shame I felt.

The more I struggled to speak, the less power

the rape, and its aftermath, seemed to have over me.

Nancy Raine, After Silence: Rape and My Journey Back

I survived this torture which left me paralyzed for years. That's what that night was all about, mutilation, more than violence through sex. I really do feel as though I was psychologically mutilated that night and now I'm trying to put the pieces back together again. Through love, not hatred. And through my music. My strength has been to open again, to life, and my victory is the fact that, despite it all, I kept alive my vulnerability.

Rape's not something where you just go, "Well, get over it" or "Believe in love and peace, my child, and it'll all be over." Well, fuck you, that isn't the answer. It's a great thought, OK, but you can go and stick crystals up your butt and get on with it. I'm all for love and peace, but that's not the side I work on. If somebody would talk about it, or worse, joke about it, I would be ready to kill. That's not healing. It was a very long time after that before I was able to be with anyone again. And it has never been the same as it was before.

People out there must be told about the self-loathing that follows rape and how it's the greatest breakage in divine law to mutilate themselves, as I have done.

Tori Amos

In this moment I'm not defined by the other things, the things that happened to me, the things I didn't choose. This is the part of me that defines me for all time, for always. The thing I choose completely.

Daisy Whitney

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