Holly at the Pervocracy also did one of these things: http://pervocracy.blogspot.com/2011/05/answering-slutwalk-faqs.html You both did great jobs!

I, for one, totally encourage all young, nubile females to continue wearing skimpy outfits and revealing in their sexuality.

I have long said that I need neither the conservative slut shamers nor their liberal analogs concern-trolling my sexuality. 

This is a brilliant response. 

I could not believe that jack-off host asking for calls from men who felt as though the way women dressed “caused them to do things they regretted later” or whatever.  AAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!  WTF?

In 1976, as a 14-year-old boy, I did a 12-mile walkathon for the ERA, from Bethlehem to Allentown.

“What do we want?” “Equal rights!” “When do we want them?”  “Now!”

I’m not sure I could go on a slutwalk now.

I encourage all women to wear whatever the hell they want to and have as much or as little sex as they like.

I encourage all men to enjoy with their eyes and not their penises, unless invited. And to stop making asses of themselves in attempts to receive invitations.

Zif, you say that, but the creepy tone you took actually is discouraging.  If I were around you, I would immediately put on more clothes, just from that slobbering, asinine comment.  See how that works?  Disrespecting women puts you right in the same camp as Gail Dines and everyone else trying to control women’s behavior.  And it does make the world a less fun, less sexy place.

On a personal note, my city’s having a SlutWalk on June 5th, and I’m conflicted about going. I wrote a a big ol’ blog post about it but I’ll try to give you the gist here. Arguments for going: meeting local like-minded people, recreating a sign that says “Sex is something people do together, not something someone does to someone else”, Jaclyn Friedman’s awesome speech here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMicqYFVL5A&feature=player_embedded Arguments against: the whole thing going over the average person’s head, and media misconstruction. Examples: leering dudes, Gail Dines, the cavalcade of chowder-heads calling into the BBC program eager to share their personal rules for ladies. I think of the word slut not just being a nebulous term to cut down women for stepping out of bounds and to excuse violence. I think of a slut being a sort of character or archetype in most people’s minds. One chowder-head decided to comment on a local SlutWalk organizer’s page that a “SlutWalk” sounds like some sort of parade of Snookis. I remember all the dudes that thought it was just hurr-larious when Snooki got punched in the face. Slut got what was coming to her. People see the word “slut” and go into Salem Witch Trial mode, ignoring arguments and logic and going into a sort of magical thinking where clothes can consent for you, and they start looking around for this sub-human primeval monster called slut to burn. There’s so much shit attached to “slut” that a single click moment is unlikely; it takes a while to untangle it all. Slut is a character, a scapegoat, a boogey-woman, a stuffed Guy Fawkes meant to absorb the shit and the ire and the scorn from a thousand hearts of darkness within the cultural morass of gender and sexuality. I think Jaclyn Friedman gets it, and is good at chiding people for believing in witches in the 21st century, but I just worry that people are too attached to their boogeyman or interested in leering to listen to a goddamn word she says.

Seriously, Zif are you Gail Dines in disguise, trying to prove her point that men can’t be expected to act like anything but leering asses if women let loose a little?

Jill, I think it’s helpful to let go of the illusion of control Gail is awash in it.  She keeps chasing this elusive hope that there’s a way women can conduct themselves that will somehow make men respect them, but there is not.  Men choose to respect women.  A man who turns into a leering ass the second that people start being playful about sexuality has revealed that he doesn’t respect women, not that women should control themselves and act like ladies. 

I agree that people go into witch trial mode.  Because witches are threatening. The fact that the word “slut” being used by women themselves has so much power to disrupt and anger—-even when people don’t get the joke!—-says to me that this has legs.

Also, Jill, I do think simply saying, “Even if a woman dress like a ‘slut’, she should not be raped” can actually blow someone’s mind if they haven’t considered it before.

I used to hate the word. Now I like throwing it around, usually about myself and usually joking. It makes it easy to find the people with dark, self-deprecating or twisted senses of humor in a crowd. I often wonder if it’s not just that misogynists/authoritarians miss feminist jokes because they don’t expect humor coming from women but that it’s so far over their head they couldn’t touch it with a reachin’ pole.

The word I hate now? Panties. blechhh

I encourage all men to enjoy with their eyes and not their penises, unless invited.

And not to be assholes about it, even then.

Yeah, Zif, thanks for reminding us that only nubile, young women are meant to be seen.

This concern troll drives me fucking nuts.  I interpret this all as saying that the word “slut” is meaningless.  Dines is pretending like it has a meaning, getting all upset about all the slutty sluts slutting around in the name of oh god, sluts.  It’s just a slur, having little to do with what women actually do, and so its lack of meaning needs to be mocked.

People see the word “slut” and go into Salem Witch Trial mode, ignoring arguments and logic and going into a sort of magical thinking where clothes can consent for you, and they start looking around for this sub-human primeval monster called slut to burn.

So go dressed primly and conservatively with a sign reading

“Real Sluts may include your well-dressed neighbour…”

The word I hate now? Panties. blechhh

“...who isn’t wearing any underwear.”

(In deference to Amanda’s bollocking of Zifnab, I’ll refrain from making the obvious joke about real sluts not walking.)

(BTW, the ever-so-NSFW Oglaf has a very amusing storyline at the moment involving sluts.  Ivan can explain everything.)

Dines is fascinating.

She’s done some great work on porn, and I say this as someone who has a pretty libertarian bent on the subject. The porn industry’s reaction to the criticism of MacKinnon and Dworkin in the 70’s and 80’s has been to go out and prove them right by making more and more misogynistic material over time, and Dines does a great job documenting this especially for people who haven’t seen (and probably don’t want to see) the films she is writing about.

But somehow, she can’t understand that the SlutWalks are the antithesis of what she is condemning in porn. In one corner, the porn she is condemning is for the most part produced by and for men, and involves underpaid women, often desperate, working in extreme working conditions where they are often valued precisely for how degrading an act they will submit to on camera. In the other corner, the Slut Walks are the product of young feminists who are promoting sexual and personal autonomy where women, not men, set the conditions for female sexual activity.

She’s really missing the point in a big way, and I hope it doesn’t end up detracting from her valuable research on porn (as I would argue happened to MacKinnon and Dworkin with some of their more infamous public stands).

Zif, you say that, but the creepy tone you took actually is discouraging.  If I were around you, I would immediately put on more clothes, just from that slobbering, asinine comment.  See how that works?

You know, I actually thought about that before I typed it.  Because it’s the obvious knee-jerk response.  And it is creepy.  I kinda expected your reaction.

But then it occurred to me that your reaction was likewise silly.  Because what you’re basically saying is, “I am a sexually liberated woman, who can dress and behave however I damn well please, but OMG!  STOP SEXUALIZING ME FOR THE WAY I DRESS AND BEHAVE!”

That’s ridiculous.

Disrespecting women puts you right in the same camp as Gail Dines and everyone else trying to control women’s behavior.  And it does make the world a less fun, less sexy place.

A woman runs outside in a skimpy outfit, and she’s liberated.  A guy shouts out, “Hey I like the revealing outfit you are wearing!” and he’s disrespecting her?  How does that make any sense whatsoever?

You can claim “patriarchy” when men get to dictate how women dress or act.  You can’t claim “patriarchy” when men react to how women dress and act.  You don’t get to be Lady Godiva, riding through the streets of Coventry naked, while demanding no one look at you.

@Phoenican I love Oglaf!
@saraeanderson I hope I don’t come off as a concern troll.

I’m also looking for ways to equate slut-shaming with witch trials on a sign, because it’s such an obvious and powerful parallel. Would something like “17th Century: Witch Trials, 21st Century: Slut-shaming” be too vague or not punch-y enough?

Zifnab,

It’s not the patriarchy that makes you an ass, it’s you.

Ziffy the pinhead: Any asshole who feels the need to shout out in public about the outfit of a woman who doesn’t know him, is just that: an asshole.

A harassing asshole, at that. A stalkerish asshole.

Nobody’s dressing for you, asshole. We don’t give a crap what you think about our clothing, and we aren’t inviting you to comment on it, any more than we’re inviting you to rape us if you think our outfit is somehow giving you the come-on.

“Skimpy” by whose estimation? It’s hot we’re wearing shorts, or bearing any other part of our body we like, what’s it to you, asshole? Go away, before I call a cop.

I went to the Boston Slutwalk last week. I left when the rain started, but I was there for the main event and took a few pictures of signs and buttons. IMHO one of the best pictures I took was of two very different-looking women (sisters, apparently) who were both wearing buttons saying “This is what a feminist looks like”.

Zifnab:

Why is it so difficult to understand? The point of Slutwalk is for women to demand that their sexuality is left to them to control as they see fit. If a woman is a prude, that’s okay, as long as it’s because she wants it that way. If a woman goes out wearing a cut-off tank top and daisy dukes with no underwear and proceeds to sleep with three dozen different people in one day, that’s okay as long as it’s because she wants it that way. And if a woman wants to go out wearing a cutoff tank top and daisy dukes with no underwear and doesn’t want to sleep with anyone, well, it’s not my place or yours to give her shit for going out minimally clothed (especially if it’s 90 degrees out). I don’t know about you, but to me at least “look but don’t touch” is a reasonable assumption for any woman, no matter how scantily clad or promiscuous, until you actually break the ice and determine that she’s up for it.

Zif, I think that “young, nubile females” shit contributed to you coming across as a fuckhead.

Zifnab, maybe she’s not wearing the skimpy outfit for you?

I recently had a man comment to me that my short short hair must have some kind of story behind it (as in, did I recently have chemo? or some such), as I am a straight woman and he assumed that the haircut turns off a lot of straight men (which isn’t really true, anyway, but beside the point). It was then that I realized the widespread expectation on the part of men around me that I am making choices about personal style in a calculated attempt to appeal or not appeal to them sexually. On a profound level it is a way of making everything I do with my clothing and my body all about them, not about me.

Zifnab, your comment was irritating to me because you seem to believe that we care what you approve or do not approve in our choice of clothing - indeed that it is so important, every woman reading this comments section ought to hear about it! You are also quite clear that some kinds of clothing are specifically approved, by you, for women you personally find sexually attractive.

In other words, dude, you missed the point if you think this is in any way, shape, or form about what you approve or disapprove in women’s choices of clothing.

Copy. Print. Adding this to the list of things to internalize. Thanks!

Like many (probably most) women, I’ve been pressured into going a lot further with a guy than I wanted to.  My very first sexual experience was something I wasn’t planning on and regretted later.  Hell, let’s not mince words: I regretted it during.  So I dare say I’m exactly the sort of person whose welfare Dines and Murphy are so concerned about.

Yet somehow, it never once occurred to me to blame other women for what happened.  Where the hell does that kind of addlepated thinking even come from, anyway?  I think it’s a sure sign of someone who’s thrashing around, desperately trying to blame anyone but the man.

I mean, try to imagine if this logic applied to other situations.  After all, a lot of teenaged boys also feel pressured into sex before they’re ready—usually by their male peers.  Is the libido of the average adolescent male to blame for that?  Do Dines and Murphy think that men should be shamed into asexuality for their own protection?

Or imagine if a sleazy car salesman pressured Dines and Murphy into buying a car they didn’t want.  Would they blame other car owners?  I can just picture them sitting in their new convertible as they pull out of the lot, realizing they’ve been scammed, but shaking their fists at passing motorists and screaming, “This is all your fault!”

http://youtu.be/piDvki6X6KQ

This is about rape, not dressing up. Even if they do dress just for men’s attention, women still get raped. Even if they don’t, they get raped. Even if they wear exactly what their mother sets out for them, they get raped. Women get raped. Clothing has nothing or so very little it may as well have nothing to do with which woman gets raped and why. The reason why women get raped is because the rapists make the decision to rape them.

“Real sluts may include your well-dressed neighbor . . . ”

Bwhahahahaha!!!!! Brilliant Piator!!!

I will go to my local Slutwalk carrying this sign and dressed in flowered dress, pearls, and a Queen of England style hat!

Yet somehow, it never once occurred to me to blame other women for what happened.  Where the hell does that kind of addlepated thinking even come from, anyway?  I think it’s a sure sign of someone who’s thrashing around, desperately trying to blame anyone but the man.

It’s that powerfully seductive illusion of control.  Even feminists who apply rigorous examination to everything fall prey to it at times.

I so want one of these in my town. I want to heard all my cosplaying, theater-folk friends together in period garb brandishing “SLUTS FOR POSTERITY” signs. Maybe I’ll add that picture of great-grandma rocking out in full flapper gear, flask in hand, for effect.

Is there any evidence that scantily-dressed women are at increased risk for rape? Even if there aren’t any statistics from rape complaints, one could look at numbers for summer versus winter or resort communities versus cities or suburbs, for example.

My impression is that other factors are more important, that one is at risk of rape in the same circumstances in which one would be at risk for mugging. It might be useful to know.

I so want one of these in my town. I want to heard all my cosplaying, theater-folk friends together in period garb brandishing “SLUTS FOR POSTERITY” signs. Maybe I’ll add that picture of great-grandma rocking out in full flapper gear, flask in hand, for effect.

Please forgive me, but I read that as “SLUTS FOR POSTERIOR”.

Even if a bunch of bona fide porn actresses marched dressed half naked but waving signs, sexist men would be threatened as hell, and probably would think they were unionizing or something

Maybe not port actresses, but strippers did just that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lusty_Lady I can. only guess that the sexist men in management were threatened as hell. Men like that, be they douchecanoes or management (those are non-exclusive groups, I assure you) need to have their positions threatened.

#32 DonnaDiva and #28 ZenPoseur,

There’s a natural desire to achieve control over such a situation. There’s enough questioning done by the person who was raped, but what’s asked by others (friends, family, and not always but unfortunately even by medical professionals and police) is done in an attempt for them to figure out how to make sure it doesn’t happen to them. There’s not just a desire to find an easy answer for what made the rapist pick that victim, but there’s an even more powerful desire to know not to do whatever it was that that victim did. It doesn’t really seek to excuse the rapist so much as it ignores the basic reality that the rapist raped that person because he damn well wanted to rape (though probably not as consciously as that, though certainly fully responsible.)

And what do I mean by “not as consciously as that”? One thing that’s ignored in the quest to determine why any particular woman got raped is the statistics on rapists. It seems that in many cases the victims were drunk, but it’s an even higher number of cases where the perpetrator was drinking. That may be a good thing to focus on in future anti-rape campaigns. Drunk driving isn’t socially acceptable, but that wasn’t the case thirty years ago. There used to be funny/laughed at jokes about how someone had to drive home because he was too drunk to walk. I have no freaking idea how a campaign against drunk sex can work, but it could and should. I fear the usual MADD/AA/nannystate crowd will take things too far, but it really would be an effective ad to have someone in prison explaining how he got drunk and hurt someone contrasted with a man who got drunk and raped someone. Maybe a little note about how one, upon release, has to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life might make someone think before fucking.

@Jim: I’ll come up with citations later, but there is quite a bit of evidence that dress doesn’t effect risk for rape. For one, countries where it is compulsory or customary for women to cover up more typically have higher sexual assault rapes. For another, rapists are rarely confused about whether they had consent. They typically know they didn’t get consent, so there aren’t so much misunderstandings where people think “short skirt means she wants to have sex with anyone/me” more like “I will assault this unwilling person.” I’m tying to dredge up that series of studies because it had a lot of useful information. All I remember is that the researcher’s name started with an L and that I found it on Shakesville about a year ago… Anyway, as I recall most men chose their victims based on how they responded to low level boundary testing. For instance, standing too close to a woman or attempting a small grope to see if she’ll tell you off or laugh nervously and do nothing.

Holly Pervocracy says “Speaking anecdotally from three years of experience as an EMT and an ER worker, most of the sexual assault victims I’ve seen were wearing jeans, sweatpants, pajamas, even hijab. (Or little footie pajamas with Elmo on them.)” This is because most assaults are committed by people known by their victims, in houses. A substantial number of women are assaulted while wearing pajamas, because the assaults are committed by their intimate partners at home. Also that last parenthetical statement makes me hate the world.

A woman runs outside in a skimpy outfit, and she’s liberated.  A guy shouts out, “Hey I like the revealing outfit you are wearing!” and he’s disrespecting her?  How does that make any sense whatsoever?

What do I have to wear (especially in hot summer weather) that is NOT considered “skimpy” or “revealing” so assholes like you don’t yell at me in the streets? I’ve tried nearly everything and it doesn’t seem to work. I admit, I have not tried a burka yet.

If changing the way we dressed actually changed the way men treated us, it’d be one thing, but I see NO evidence this is true. It seems to me there are some assholes that treat women bad and some nice folks who treat them nice and it is entirely up to the man. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN BEHAVIOR. I fail to see why this is so hard to understand for some people.

Ok, the man I’m looking for is David Lisak. Most of his research is on college-age men, but the sample sizes are pretty big. Here is some relevant stuff from him: http://www2.binghamton.edu/counseling/documents/RAPE_FACT_SHEET1.pdf and a summary of a major paper here:http://yesmeansyesblog.wordpress.com/2009/11/12/meet-the-predators/

“You can claim “patriarchy” when men get to dictate how women dress or act.  You can’t claim “patriarchy” when men react to how women dress and act.  You don’t get to be Lady Godiva, riding through the streets of Coventry naked, while demanding no one look at you.”

I don’t care if men or women look, but I won’t take responsibility for how a man or woman acts. I don’t think men are slobbering beasties who turn into ravaging animals at the site of naked flesh (or covered flesh that they then imagine as being naked). I think men and women want a willing partner while rapists could give a fuck about willing or not.

Besides, stop making rape about sex. It’s about control, punishment, and anger. That it may have orgasm of the perp involved (and very often does not) doesn’t define the act as being sexual

Sigh.  The resistence to Slutwalk screams of brainwashedness.  This stuff should be common sense -.-

Thanks, Jillie. Those pieces were pretty informative and damned depressing. I hate this subject. I do have a better understanding of why rape is so heavily under-reported: the victims tend to feel somewhat responsible for going out with someone or for drinking or whatever.

Wikipedia has a page discussing Factors associated with being a victim of sexual violence. Guess what? Attire doesn’t make the list.

I’m harping on this because part of the outrage in Toronto concerned a police officer who suggested women can avoid sexual assault by not dressing like a “slut”, and it’s treated as conventional wisdom in many quarters. I think it’s worthwhile to point out that it’s ignorant bullshit.

I will go to my local Slutwalk carrying this sign and dressed in flowered dress, pearls, and a Queen of England style hat!

Underwear?

@Jim #37 - About drinking and rape:  Admittedly my experience is anecdotal but the sheer volume of anecdotes involving myself and others speaks to the deliberate use of alcohol on women as a rape tactic.  Sure, in most rapes involving alcohol the male rapist is drinking but there will usually be a great disparity in the level of intoxication with the woman being a LOT drunker than she is.  He either encounters a drunk woman and takes advantage or he plies he with drinks until she blacks out.

I’m sure there are men who get highly intoxicated and rape as well but I honestly think the planned scenarios I just described are a lot more common.  It’s why cops call alcohol the #1 date rape drug.

I meant to say “drunker than HE is”.

Wendy Murphy has been so wrong so many time by my lights that I react with revulsion whenever she is consulted by any media outlet. 

Zinfab, if you don’t understand the difference between looking and silently appreciating on the one hand and shouting out fI like your revealing outfit on the other, there’s no hope for you.

#45:

I think both things happen. I definitely knew guys in college whose seduction strategy, if you could call it that, was to take advantage of drunk women. I have no doubt that at least some of what they did would qualify as forcible rape, and some of what they did that might not have been forcible rape might well have been rape by intoxication.

I also heard of incidents where people got plastered and did things they later regretted, where people got drunk and didn’t remember what they did, where people got hammered and later charged sexual assault where there was insufficient evidence.

Alcohol is horrible for sexual consent issues. On the one hand it clearly is a rape drug, no doubt about it. On the other hand it is often taken by people of both sexes to deliberately lower inhibitions, and it is further often taken by people who DO NOT want to engage in sexual contact but with insufficient concern for whether it will lower their inhibitions and make sexual contact more likely. It can also induce people who do intend to have sex to engage in riskier sexual conduct (unprotected sex, group sex, etc.). Plus, it clouds people’s memories, making matters of proof as to what happened more difficult.

It’s just really hard to cut through the fog sometimes—and I suspect the guys you are talking about know this and take advantage of exactly that fact to ply women with alcohol and rape them.

Unfortunately, people also use alcohol to get to know other people and to get themselves in the mood for sex. A good friend told me that she met her future husband in the usual way: they got drunk together, fucked, and decided that they actually liked each other. Knowing them, I suspect that they spent a few hours talking manically before going off to make love.

The problem, then, is that the most dangerous behavior is pretty common and widely accepted.

The papers Jillie cited suggest that a relatively few predators are responsible for a great many rapes. It’s not obvious how to detect them beforehand, although aggressiveness could be a clue, but it would definitely be a good idea for their victims to let their friends know who their assailants are, even if they don’t report the crime.

Here’s a slogan: “Getting raped is never your fault.”

Just found out that Westboro Baptist Church is planning to protest the Seattle Slutwalk.  I was trying to make up my mind about going, and that announcement guarantees that I’ll be there.  And love the dress-pearls-hat outfit…. I may borrow it.

Just found out that Westboro Baptist Church is planning to protest the Seattle Slutwalk.  I was trying to make up my mind about going, and that announcement guarantees that I’ll be there.

“God loves Sluts - Mary was one!”

I do think simply saying, “Even if a woman dress like a ‘slut’, she should not be raped” can actually blow someone’s mind if they haven’t considered it before.

I had a very frustrating conversation on FB with someone who self-identifies as a feminist and who was making fun of slutwalk as if it was only about dressing in tight, low-cut shirts and expecting men not to stare.

I explained the origin of it and what it’s intent was.

She kept saying that of course a woman shouldn’t be raped even if she dresses like a “slut,” but that dressing like a slut increases your chances of getting raped, and it only makes sense to take precautions.

The weird thing is that she’s a very open person sexually and wears pretty flattering, form-fitting clothes. I’m sure lots of people would consider her a “slut,” yet I’m pretty sure she doesn’t genuinely believe she is increasing her risk of rape with her clothing choices.

And as much as I buy into the idea of rape culture existing on a continuum, acknowledging that wearing a low-cut shirt might lead to men looking at your boobs IS NOT the same as saying wearing a low-cut shirt makes it more likely that you’ll be raped.

But she insisted on seeing herself as some anti-PC truth speaker.

Like I said, very frustrating.

I recently had a man comment to me that my short short hair must have some kind of story behind it (as in, did I recently have chemo? or some such), as I am a straight woman and he assumed that the haircut turns off a lot of straight men (which isn’t really true, anyway, but beside the point). It was then that I realized the widespread expectation on the part of men around me that I am making choices about personal style in a calculated attempt to appeal or not appeal to them sexually.

For many years, I had very long hair, all the way down to my butt. When I cut it short (not even short-short, but short), several men I knew professionally expressed their disappointment that I had done this to them.

PiaToR, I’m sure you’re well aware that Mary Magdalen and the woman taken in adultery are not the same.

I don’t know why women dress the way they do. I presume that they wear things that make them feel good, as I do. While I suspect that provocative clothing may sometimes be intended to draw the eye of any male, I’m certain that it isn’t always: bikinis are simply conventional beach wear, for one thing, and preteens who think boys are gross still dress like pop stars.

Wearing clothes that shriek “Look at me!” isn’t even necessarily an invitation to look; I suspect that many if not most of the things that turn me on were not worn with that intention.

I support this, because even though I have no intentions of ever being sexually active and cover most of my body most of the time, I’m still a slut.

Why am I a slut?  Because I dress fashionably, I wear makeup, I wear skirts above my knee (always with tights), I’m independent and I do my own thing.  THE HORROR!!

It sounds ridiculous, but I’ve found that women like me, especially around my age, are just naturally assumed to be raging whores regardless of what we’re doing with our vaginas.  If you have any sort of presence online, it’s not too hard to find people talking about you and saying these sorts of things.  “I bet she ...” even though I’m pretty up front about my lack of sexuality.

Additionally, the word’s come to be just like calling a woman a bitch because she has an opinion or calling her ugly ... because she has an opinion.  You call her a slut because she’s not catering to your ideas of womanhood.  It’s kind of like how every woman who won’t date you is a lesbian.  I’m not aware of any slutwalks here, but I’d like a “Chaste Slut” sign.  But someone would misread it and then chase me everywhere. 

I gotta different question: I plan to go on the Chicago Slutwalk in early June, but am not sure what to wear. What should a male (who’s not that great at dressing up) wear to one of these things? I’m thinking maybe a t-shirt that says “SLUT”?

@Comment #55: BonAppetit on 05/12 at 05:30 AM

I’d like a “Chaste Slut” sign.  But someone would misread it and then chase me everywhere.

Sad thing is, I can totally picture that.

This was one of your best ever, Amanda.

Random dorm dude in college, ~25 years ago: “X is a total slut.”
My then-GF: “No, she’s not; she just likes to fuck.”
RDD: “Right. She’s a slut.”
MTGF: “You mean she just doesn’t want to fuck YOU.”
RDD: “No, we did; but she just gives it up to whoever she wants.”
Me, very stoned: “Good for her.”
MTGF: “She’s only a slut if she’s using sex to manipulate people. Make them pay for stuff or make them feel bad or make them say they love her or whatever.”
RDD: “Right. She gets off on all the attention.”
MTGF: “No, she gets off on the sex.”

I read a comment on Wordpress by a radfem woman of color that summed up my disquiet about these marches: “POC never took to the streets to act like the racial stereotypes white people have of them but said they were protesting the opposite.”

“Slut” for many women is not a label that can be shrugged off on and off like a coat; it’s not fashion, it’s not meaningless and it is actively harmful, on a continuum of psychological discomfort to self-hatred to rape and murder. The word itself is just one piece. It can be an arbitrarily-defined character, or a set of behaviors, or mannerisms - the rules of which women have no real power to define, and those rules can be shifted at a moment’s notice. “Slut” was never ours, and it never will be. It is one of a multitude of female-specific slurs that is enacted from the outside with the express intent of causing some degree of harm to the recepient, making them responsible for hatred and violence meted out to them, because women are always responsible for the behavior of others.

That you can claim your sexuality and skimpy clothing as yours alone and ask the world forget the patriarchy and interpret you how you want them to is a privileged position. According to this all women and girls are ‘sluts’ because according to patriarchy all females are ‘sex’ and nothing else. Any or all of our behaviors and actions, passive or active, can be used to justify that we really like it, really want it. It’s nice to think you have your choosy choices, but the option to not be seen as a sexualised commodity - no matter how they dress or behave - is not on the menu at all for many women, and privileged women need to remember that choosy choices are available to them only provisionally.

[The Toronto police officer who sparked the whole concept]... was insulting to both men and women. But women, in response, have not made the connections between our individual choices and the structures of domination within which those choices have been made. This walk is not about shaking the foundations, or dismantling those structures of domination. This walk is only about the legitimacy of the individual choices made within those structures.

—bit.ly/k1Iihd

Why do we need a word for a woman who has or is perceived to have had, lots of sex? I understand why men would want such a word, but why do women? There is no equal word for men who are promiscuous. Why it is that the focus once again is on women defending themselves from misogynistic slurs rather than putting the focus where it rightly belongs? SW and everything like it is not, at it’s core, really about female sexuality; it’s a futile attempt to change male perception of female sexual availability and change when, where and how you’re objectified by, umm, the magic words of consent, or something… I don’t know, I’m lost in the incoherence. SW is, by my lights, not so much about the multitude of rapists and the epidemic of male-on-female rape as it is about the survivor not being at fault in some way. As if sexual violence is something to be expected, but you aren’t at fault if it does happen, not that it is inherently wrong in the first case!

I can’t disassociate myself from the notion that SlutWalk is really just a pomo, feelgood flash-in-the-pan that has gotten traction because all women, to a greater or lesser degree, are the sex class and are commodified. In the same way that the “I like it on the…” meme for breast cancer awareness got popular; not because cancer is a disease that kills women and it cancer research is beneficial to us… but because it appealed to hetero male sexuality and allowed horndogs to openly slaver over their female friends and acquaintances without any backlash, though they unironically claimed later that it was okay because we really talking about handbags, you big silly, not women’s bodies!

It won’t change any rapists’ minds, indeed, SW’s supporters on Facebook are getting 95% of comments from porndog dudebros saying HERPDERP I LUV SLUTS LET ME SHOW MY BONER. They have a complete mental compartmentalization when it comes to women. As much as it is comforting to believe in your individual individuality, they have no reason to even believe in your basic humanity. For that reason, I’m not convinced SW has any of the humor Amanda says it does, because female autonomy and femininity are already considered inferior and inherently a joke.

I assumed Phoenician was referring to Mary, Mother of Jesus, as she was knocked up by someone other than her betrothed prior to getting married.

I was raped wearing pajamas.

I wish a SlutWalk would come to my neck of the woods.

I assumed Phoenician was referring to Mary, Mother of Jesus, as she was knocked up by someone other than her betrothed prior to getting married.

Indeed.  Stated she was a virgin, but spread her legs for the first guy with wings and a slick story.  No other word for her.

Did you laugh out loud when Gail Dines worked herself up to the verge of hyperventilation when describing girls in low-cut jeans with belly button piercings on “World Have Your Say”?”

Dines made the SAME MOVE during her interview on the CBC earlier this week, right down to the hyperventilation—it seems it’s something she’s rehearsed. Repeatedly, since the late 90s, when Britney Spears’ video for “Stronger” first started making her uncomfortable.

I’m a big fan of Gail Dines, though I’m not 100% with her on this article.

However, I think what she’s trying to argue is basically the point made by a number of feminists and radical feminists that extolling “sexiness” (as defined by the Patriarchy) isn’t exactly helping feminism or women. I don’t think she argued it particularly well, but she’s basically worried about the slippery slope that seems to be sexualizing our culture and specifically girls. And sexualizing it in a way defined by not just men, but increasingly the most loathsome dregs of the sex industry.

Frankly, I am also worried about that.

Really, this is not much different from the arguments made in “Female Chauvinist Pigs,”  “Pornified” and other feminist attacks on how porn is seeping into pop culture.

I think she’s wrong that Slutwalk is about embracing Raunch culture, but I do understand why she’s worried about RC generally.

I’m also a bit disappointed that the Humorless Radical Feminist canard is in play again. Ugh.

POC never took to the streets to act like the racial stereotypes white people have of them but said they were protesting the opposite

During the civil rights era, it was common practise to show up to demonstrations wearing one’s “Sunday best.” Deliberate choices in attire were made for those protests, too. Then as now, it’s effective to undermine superficial preconceptions, and that’s exactly what’s going on with these SlutWalks.

It won’t change any rapists’ minds

It’s not intended to do so. From what I understand, the first SlutWalk came about in reaction to a police officer’s “helpful” advice regarding dress and demeanour to women at an anti-rape seminar. This is aimed at changing a toxic institutional mindset in the criminal justice system—that rape victims sometimes “ask for it” by dressing or walking in a certain way. That attitude is a very serious problem, and it has to be slapped down very quickly and very publicly.

Women are showing up at these marches dressed in a variety of outfits, and conduct themselves in variety of ways at the event—the only commonality is that they proudly appropriate the supposedly derogatory (per that police officer) label “slut.” So at one of these rallies you might have a demure woman dressed in tight and revealing clothes standing alongside a woman in a hijab who’s speaking loudly to a camera about how much she loves sex. That’s going to be a lot more effective toward addressing the problem described above than other approaches.

“Slut” was never ours, and it never will be. It is one of a multitude of female-specific slurs that is enacted from the outside with the express intent of causing some degree of harm to the recepient, making them responsible for hatred and violence meted out to them, because women are always responsible for the behavior of others.

The gay community and African Americans have famously re-claimed two far more ugly terms for themselves, while acknowledging that outsiders who still use those terms as earnest epithets are the same bigots they always were. Also, it’s not only Carmen Ghia clones or gangbangers who use those terms. It’s a “both/and” situation, as they like to say around here. So why can’t women do the same?

Really, what we have here for the most part is the usual batch of second-wave feminists (often privileged ones in terms of economics and social class) reacting badly to any protest that addresses a real problem with humour and levity, and to anything that’s driven by feminists—especially younger ones—who may not have bothered with (or may not have had access to) a college gender studies course.

There’s nothing wrong with a pomo protest if your goal is to manipulate (as opposed to pander to) the ultra-pomo institution that is the MSM. There’s also nothing wrong with a feel-good and (heavens forfend!) fun protest as long as you’re making your point effectively and peacefully. This Toronto protest was (unlike so many modern street demos) focused and effective and peaceful all at once. More to the point, it looks like this one demo did more to shift the police department’s public stance on this issue than did 20 years’ worth of mandatory sensitivity training seminars.

If a canard is a baseless assertion, then Humorless Radical Feminists must not exist.

Unfortunately, they do. So while it can be a slur against all feminists to call them all humorless, “canard” isn’t the word you were searching for. Some radical feminists have no sense of humor. Deal with it, since it’s reality.

As for the overall Raunch Culture thing, I see it as something that exploits young women. But I also see it as something where young women have the freedom to explore their sexuality. I can’t point to any one woman and say “fashion victim” and another and say “free-thinking” without knowing them very well. And that’s kind of the joke about “slut” in the Slutwalk context: it doesn’t fucking matter. Childhood/young adult-hood is about learning, while parenting (or surrogate parenting via media) is about teaching. As a culture, we suck at each when it comes to too many of the important things.

Most of the Raunch Culture thing is about saving young women from heartbreak. Just like the Conservatives and the other would-be chaperones of teenage girls, there’s a strong desire to save young women from their sexuality and hope they’ll emerge from little cocoons as fully-grown somethings. (Conservatives have different end-result wishes than most feminists, but the meddlesome desires can be just as annoying coming from either.)

I think she’s wrong that Slutwalk is about embracing Raunch culture, but I do understand why she’s worried about RC generally.

Being publicly worried or concerned about Raunch culture as a threat to society is different from not liking it. I personally don’t like it for a number of reasons, but I’m not going to demand that people who do enjoy it censor themselves.

I take the same approach toward the various religious fundie “modest garb” strictures for women. I personally don’t like them, but I’m also not in favour of outlawing the hijab across the board as they did in France.

People should be able to wear what they want. People do not “deserve” to be raped. These are two related but still separate issues. Which is the point of this protest.

I’m also a bit disappointed that the Humorless Radical Feminist canard is in play again.

Here’s a case where it’s fair to say that Dines brought the label on herself. The only things missing from that piece were “kids today” and “get off my (protest site) lawn.”

I went to the Toronto Slutwalk (it was great), and as Gracchus says, the point is to wear whatever you want to, from skimpy outfits to jeans to a burqa (yes, there were lots of Muslim women participating) to a full-on wedding gown (there was a lesbian couple dressed as bride and groom). Because ‘slut’ as a word can and will be applied to many or even most women no matter what they wear, because it’s convenient and a way to victim blame. For the police, which the protest was targeting, it’s a way to get out of taking a victim’s story seriously, or having to look at themselves seriously to find the misogyny within. There is no agreed-on definition for slut - does it refer to a certain type of behaviour, a certain style of clothing? Just like bitch, everyone will answer differently. It’s impossible for a woman to 100% avoid being called a slut, because it’s an insult like ‘ugly’, which people will default to when they don’t know what else to say but want to hurt a woman. The only way to fight that is to take away the word’s negative power.

There were lots of great signs and lots deflating the ‘slut = skimpy attire’ idea. “I was raped wearing a snowsuit”, “Jesus loves sluts”, “Blame rapists for rape”, “When you meet a slut, remember not to rape her”. Also deflating the idea of being a slut as bad - “Proud Slut”, “We love sluts”, “Slut Power” - using a silhouette of Rosie the Riveter. People came with their families and kids. There were some musicians in an ad hoc marching band.
The speakers included someone from the local Rape Crisis Centre and a local sex activist.

Huh, I hadn’t heard about Slutwalk, though I remember the toronto policeman’s comment.  I just looked up one for my city (Philly Sluts represent!) and signed up (and posted a link to my facebook, which will be… interesting).  Now I need to find a good shirt that pithily makes the point that “it’s ok for guys like me to be a slut without fearing rape, why isn’t it ok for women?”  Anyone who knows of such a shirt, let me know!

But then it occurred to me that your reaction was likewise silly.  Because what you’re basically saying is, “I am a sexually liberated woman, who can dress and behave however I damn well please, but OMG!  STOP SEXUALIZING ME FOR THE WAY I DRESS AND BEHAVE!”

Bullshit.  I said stop leering.  If you can’t find a way to be sexual and respectful, then instead of scolding women for finding you creepy, work on yourself.  I promise you, many, many men manage to be sexual without being creepy.  You just aren’t one of them.

An easy way to pull up research on rape and attire is by going to GoogleScholar and typing into the search bar “rape clothing.” It’s clear. A woman’s attire is not only not causation for rape, it isn’t even correlated. Re: the question about more rape in the summer (skimpier clothing), the answer is also scientifically clear: Heat increases aggression. There’s a rise in *all* crimes, including rape. Again, clothing doesn’t play a role.

coycaw,

Or as an elementary school teacher taught my class: Ice cream sales are correlated with the murder rate.  Clearly, ice cream causes murder!

You can have my ice cream when you pry it from my cold…er, um…hot dead hands!
.
.
.
Oops, this isn’t the ice cream control debate?  My bad.

You know, I actually thought about that before I typed it.  Because it’s the obvious knee-jerk response.  And it is creepy.  I kinda expected your reaction.

In other words, you deliberately trolled.

And no, the reaction isn’t silly. Acting like the kind of leering, drooling cat-calling mope featured on Hollaback NYCand expecting not to be called on it in a feminist blog—that’s ridiculous.

Your problem seems to be that you’re still mired in the teenaged boy’s (and the PUA’s) perception that expressing casual appreciation of a woman’s sexuality is by its nature transgressive and dirty. Grow up, get over that, and all sorts of good things will start happening.

Girls just wanna have fun—watch from the start or scroll to 2:30 when they run the guy gauntlet:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIb6AZdTr-A

In the other corner, the Slut Walks are the product of young feminists who are promoting sexual and personal autonomy where women, not men, set the conditions for female sexual activity.

Further, the women who go topless at the annual Dyke March in San Francisco are not doing so to solicit any male reaction. Feeling sexy is good for its own sake.

Humourless?  Really?  There is a difference between not getting a joke, and just not finding it funny.  I imagine most people reading would balk at a racist joke, not because they are humourless beige people who don’t get it, but because they don’t find it laughing material.

For the record, I don’t disagree with this post, but branding people who don’t join in this particular attempt at humour as therefore lacking in humour altogether is a bit lazy.

This is slightly tangential, but relates to the comment regarding alcohol as a factor in so many rapes. Alcohol is a factor in many violent crimes. The DOJ has estimated that approximately 35% of violent crimes are committed under the influence of alcohol. Two thirds of violent crimes at the hands of intimates are commited by intoxicated assailants. Since rape is a violent crime, and often committed by intimates, it follows that rape is highly correlated with the consumption of alcohol.

And I have to say I find this comment disturbing for a couple of reasons:

“POC never took to the streets to act like the racial stereotypes white people have of them but said they were protesting the opposite.”

First, I didn’t realize that women need to restrict themselves to previously accepted protest methods, as if we need permission from Civil Rights demonstrators to protest. Second, the point of a Slut Walk is not to act like a stereotype - it’s for women to act like themselves to demonstrate to everyone that however they dress, whomever they chose to fuck, and however frank they are about their sexuality they (we) are still people with rights. That applies to women in suits as much as women in hot pants. If you take a look at the picture Amanda posted you’ll see a bunch of women who are wearing jackets and sweaters (probably because they’re in Toronto and it’s cold, but still).

As far as the idea that women just can’t reclaim the word slut, that’s just wrong. The LGBT community has nicely co-opted the word queer, by saying that, however crude the term, they own the behavior it implies, because there’s nothing wrong with the behavior and nothing wrong with them. Women can do the same with the word slut by saying that, however hurtful the term can be (and yeah, I cringe when I hear it), there’s nothing wrong with women having sexual agency and therefore nothing wrong with women who enjoy acting upon their sexual agency.

I have always said I love men (usually) using “slut” or “puta”, (which amounts to the same in Spanish), to try and end of an argument, because it means they have lost it, but they still want the last word. It loses power as soon as you call them on it, but it´s an ugly threat. Thanks to all the walkers for helping take it back; I also hope to be able to attend a walk near home.

Since rape is a violent crime, and often committed by intimates, it follows that rape is highly correlated with the consumption of alcohol.

Rape is simply sex without consent, which includes the cases where the victim is too young to give effective consent, or where the victim is too intoxicated to give effective consent. Violent crimes are characterized by the use of force. So rape is not always a violent crime, because rape can occur in the absence of force. Use of force is an aggravating factor in rape, however.

So rape is not always a violent crime, because rape can occur in the absence of force. Use of force is an aggravating factor in rape, however.

As a crime against a person (as opposed to property) rape is categorized as a violent crime. Rape is explicitely included in that survey (which I should note measures offender intoxication as a function of the victim’s impression of the offender’s use of alcohol). Moreover, rape cannot occur without force - any violation of someone’s body by definition involves force, whether or not the victim ends up with bruises.

Then all sex is violent, per rivki’s definition.

Then all sex is violent, per rivki’s definition.

What the fuck are you talking about?  There was nothing in rivki’s comment to suggest consensual sex should be considered violent.

Then all sex is violent, per rivki’s definition.

Uh, no. What I said is that all violations of someone’s body are violent. Look at that sentence, the root word just jumps out at you (apparently the roots of both are in the Latin word for force). Seriously, all sex involves physical force - two people can’t passively have sex. Force absent consent equals assualt/violence.  Of course, you can consent to forceful contact, which makes it not rape/assault. If someone grasps me roughly by the hand, spins me around and throws me through the air without my consent, that’s assault. If he’s my dance partner, that’s a really awesome tango trick. If someone hits me in the face out of the blue, that’s assault. If we’re in a ring sparring, I just missed a block and will hopefully do better next time.

I find it disturbing that you don’t think a man raping an unconscious woman is a violent act.

Physical interference combined with a lack of consent is generally considered criminal assault under the law. Non-rape sex, including BDSM, would fall under the category of consensual physical interference—perfectly legal.

Put another way: criminal assault is always assumed to be physically violent, but physical violence (e.g. accidentally hitting someone or spanking in a consensual S/M scene) is not necessarily assumed to be criminal assault.

So yeah, “making love” to an unconscious woman, even in a “gentle” way that doesn’t involve hitting, involves both physical interference and a lack of consent. This makes it criminal assault which, in turn, makes it a violent act.

I find it disturbing that you don’t think a man raping an unconscious woman is a violent act.

Don’t you know, it’s only rape-rape if you end up in the ER needing stitches.

/snark

For certain folks it seems like, just as a “slut” is “someone who’s had sex with two more people than I have,” “rape” is “one step further than I’d go to fuck someone who isn’t into it.”

I hate the world.

I was thinking of showing up to support Seattle’s Slut Walk, but fist I need to know that Zafnib’s penis thinks about me.

that=what

Though, it kind of works the way I typed it as well….

@ PrincessRot:

It won’t change any rapists’ minds, indeed, SW’s supporters on Facebook are getting 95% of comments from porndog dudebros saying HERPDERP I LUV SLUTS LET ME SHOW MY BONER.

For my own part, I don’t see SlutWalk as being about the rapists at all, so much as about society in general and the particular tenancy to excuse rape in whole or in part by arguing that some kinds of clothing are an invitation to sex and that women wearing these items are somehow perpetrating a fraud on the men around them by failing to grant sex to anyone who wants it - and that the appropriate punishment for this “fraud” is rape.

@ Zif: You’re gross - and, judging by your subsequent comments, stupid as well.

“Humourless?  Really?  There is a difference between not getting a joke, and just not finding it funny.  I imagine most people reading would balk at a racist joke, not because they are humourless beige people who don’t get it, but because they don’t find it laughing material.

For the record, I don’t disagree with this post, but branding people who don’t join in this particular attempt at humour as therefore lacking in humour altogether is a bit lazy.”

Thanks, Katherine. Exactly.

I find it disturbing that you don’t think a man raping an unconscious woman is a violent act.

Intoxicated =/= unconscious.

Maybe alcohol and its effects are what rivki is unfamiliar with.

Gracchus’s circular definition fails to persuade.

Gracchus’s circular definition fails to persuade.

Tell me how it’s circular. I start from a general premise, and I go on to point out how non-rape sex is excepted from that premise. So we have a legal definition, which doesn’t seem to be a matter of controversy.

I then bridge that legal definition to the more general concept of violence. By most standards (yours apparently excepted) criminal assault necessarily involves violence—it’s an easy bridge to cross.

It’s a straight-line argument:  rape -> criminal assault -> violent act. It would be circular only if I then claimed that all violent acts are forms of rape.

Part of the problem here is that you seem to be equating lack of consent on the victim’s part exclusively with physical coercion on the part of the perpetrator. Lack of consent is a lot broader in actual definition, and often the perpetrator is simply taking advantage of an existing situation rather than creating that situation.

Otherwise, perhaps you can give us relevant examples of non-violent criminal assault on a victim’s person.

Intoxicated =/= unconscious.

Seriously? That’s how you’re going to parse this? I offered up a study that shows that violent crimes are often committed by intoxicated offenders, and thus it’s not suprising that rape is often committed by intoxicated offenders. You then mansplained to me that rape totally doesn’t have to be violent, and thus…ok you didn’t actually have a point, but gosh, women who can’t give effective consent sure aren’t being subjected to violence by their rapists. So let me ask you, what the hell is your point?

And yes. I stand by the statement that an act of violation of someone’s body is violent. Sexual assault is assault. I don’t know why you’re disputing that.

Intoxicated woman:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZGFthZLznk

Non-rapist Mike, the next morning:

George denounces her, feeling that he has a right to be angry: “On the very eve of your wedding, an affair with another man.” Finally, Mike speaks up, confirming that nothing happened:

  Kittredge, it may interest you to know that the so-called ‘affair’ consisted of exactly two kisses and a rather late swim…All of which I thoroughly enjoyed, and the memory of which I wouldn’t part with for anything… After which I deposited Tracy on her bed in her room, and promptly returned down here to you two - which doubtless you’ll remember.

Looking at Mike all the time during the explanation, Tracy is astonished and suddenly turns on him - angrily demanding to know why he didn’t advance on her. He replies that he didn’t want to take advantage of her when she was drunk:

  Tracy: Why? Was I so unattractive, so distant, so forbidding, or something - that - ?
  George: Well, this is fine talk, too.
  Tracy: I’m asking a question.
  Mike: You were extremely attractive, and as for distant and forbidding, on the contrary. But you also were a little the worse - or the better - for wine, and there are rules about that.
  Tracy: Thank you, Mike. I think men are wonderful.

And yes. I stand by the statement that an act of violation of someone’s body is violent.

Then you’re arguing that any act of penetrative sex is violent, because rape can be effectuated with no more force than the most tender of consensual sex acts. Or you’re applying a circular definition: “It’s violent because it’s sexual assault, and all sexual assaults are violent.”

As far as “mansplaining,” I would be happy to let Bitter Scribe or any other XX lawyer weigh in.

Otherwise, perhaps you can give us relevant examples of non-violent criminal assault on a victim’s person.

Pickpocketing.

A 1930s-vintage screwball comedy—even a top-notch one with Kate Hepburn—isn’t exactly convincing in this context.

In any case, the reason that Mike says that “there are rules about that” is because a decent person doesn’t have sex with a woman who’s drunk to the point of clear inability to consent. Notice that he doesn’t say “laws” but “rules”—he doesn’t need laws to tell him that this would be an act of violence.

Pickpocketing

That’s prosecuted as non-violent theft, not assault. More specifically, it’s designated as felony theft from (not on) the body of another person.

Try again.

Pickpocketing.

Money is not a person. I award you no points, and may the flying spaghetti monster have mercy on your soul.

Then you’re arguing that any act of penetrative sex is violent, because rape can be effectuated with no more force than the most tender of consensual sex acts. Or you’re applying a circular definition: “It’s violent because it’s sexual assault, and all sexual assaults are violent.”

No, rape is violent because it’s non-consensual. The question of whether an act involving force* qualifies as violence depends entirely upon whether the person being acted upon consents to that act. The exact same physical act is rape or fun sex depending only on the consent of the parties. Just as the exact same physical act is assault or dancing depending only on the consent of the parties. Since the victim of rape is by definition not consenting to the force being used, the force qualifies as violence. In fact, really vigorous and awesome enthusiastically consented to sex can involve a lot more force than the forcible rape of an unconscious victim - the question of whether the act is violent/rape revolves not around if there are bruises, but whether there is consent.

As for your confusion regarding the definition of assault. Assault is generally accepted as a crime that includes an intentional, unconsented to, application of force to a person (we’re not talking strict legal definitions, because those vary from state to state).  Assault is considered to be “violent.” There’s no reason why “violent” should drop out of that definiton of assault once the word “sexual” is appended to the concept. Since assaults are violent acts, and sexual assaults are assaults, then sexual assaults are violent acts. This is about as simple as stating that since mammals are warm-blooded, and cats are mammals, cats are warm-blooded.

*I’m talking force - like the concept in physics where you apply force to an object to make it move.

No, rape is violent because it’s non-consensual.

No, rape is rape because it is non-consensual.  It’s already been established that sex by deceit or fraudulent identity is rape, and it is engaging in sophistry to redefine these as “violent”.

Rape is usually violent, sure, but consider the case of a women who has consensual sex with her supposed husband, only for his twin to announce two days later that it was, in fact, him.  At what time was she subjected to violence? On the night she had sex willingly, but not in full knowledge of the facts?  On the day she was verbally informed what had happened?

Sigh.  Rape is classified as a violent crime, regardless of whether someone slips the victim a roofie and very gently rapes them, or beats the fuck out of them.  If you have a problem with the classification of the crime of rape as violent, please feel free to take it up with the authorities. 

And never talk to me again.

Quit being a bunch of pedantic jerks.

At what time was she subjected to violence? On the night she had sex willingly, but not in full knowledge of the facts?

Correct. The moment she was physically interfered with by a man she did not knowingly consent to have sex with. “Knowingly” is the key word, as it implies consent—if she didn’t want to have sex with her brother-in-law, the deceit has the same effect under law as a large quantity of alcohol or drugs or coercion at gunpoint. That is considered criminal assault under the law—a crime of violence.

On the day she was verbally informed what had happened?

Here’s another hypothetical: a woman has too much alcohol at a frat party and passes out. A frat brother comes along and has sex with the unconscious woman. The next morning she wakes up, goes to hospital and gets a pelvic (with samples taken as a result). A week later, the frat brother brags to his friends about what he did, and she hears about it.

Is she within her legal and ethical rights to press rape charges at that point?

My point here is that the duration between the alleged criminal assault and the victim finding out about it is irrelevant to criminal law.

Is she within her legal and ethical rights to press rape charges at that point?

Yes, completely.

My point here is that the duration between the alleged criminal assault and the victim finding out about it is irrelevant to criminal law.

I am not making a point about timing.  I am making a point about the sophistry of defining rape as inherently violent.  There was no point in that sequence of events, in which the woman was raped, where she was offered violence or felt coerced.

Correct. The moment she was physically interfered with by a man she did not knowingly consent to have sex with. “Knowingly” is the key word, as it implies consent—if she didn’t want to have sex with her brother-in-law, the deceit has the same effect under law as a large quantity of alcohol or drugs or coercion at gunpoint. That is considered criminal assault under the law—a crime of violence.

*sigh*.

A bit of research shows that the definition of “rape” for prosecution is left to the States in the US, and varies (this is why NZ removed “rape” as a crime, replacing it with a broader “sexual assault”).

The Federal definition of rape doesn’t include rape by fraud:

Forced sexual intercourse including both psychological coercion as well as physical force. Forced sexual intercourse means vaginal, anal or oral penetration by the offender (s). This category also includes incidents where the penetration is from a foreign object such as a bottle. Includes attempted rapes, male as well as female victims, and both heterosexual and homosexual rape. Attempted rape includes verbal threats of rape.

California’s penal code enumerates circumstances for rape, and seperates out violence:

  (2) Where it is accomplished against a person’s will by means of
force, violence, duress, menace, or fear of immediate and unlawful
bodily injury on the person or another.

from rape by fraud:

  (4) Where a person is at the time unconscious of the nature of the
act, and this is known to the accused. As used in this paragraph,
“unconscious of the nature of the act” means incapable of resisting
because the victim meets one of the following conditions:
  (A) Was unconscious or asleep.
  (B) Was not aware, knowing, perceiving, or cognizant that the act
occurred.
  (C) Was not aware, knowing, perceiving, or cognizant of the
essential characteristics of the act due to the perpetrator’s fraud
in fact.
  (D) Was not aware, knowing, perceiving, or cognizant of the
essential characteristics of the act due to the perpetrator’s
fraudulent representation that the sexual penetration served a
professional purpose when it served no professional purpose.
  (5) Where a person submits under the belief that the person
committing the act is the victim’s spouse, and this belief is induced
by any artifice, pretense, or concealment practiced by the accused,
with intent to induce the belief.

Thus, when GeekGirl states “Rape is classified as a violent crime,”, she is ignoring the fact that at the federal level, they only consider rape if it is a violent crime. 

My contention, in line with California’s code, is that rape can involve several circumstances, including ones which are non-violent.  Rape is not defined by violence; it is defined by lack of consent.

PIATOR Not true:  Right in the definition you quote it talks about psychological coercion which need not be violent. 

“Forced sexual intercourse including both psychological coercion as well as physical force.”

Besides, how often does the federal government get involved in rape cases, not all that often unless the crime involves other extenuating circumstances, i.e. crossing state lines.

I wish the Feds got more involved in rape cases when they have jurisdiction. Has anyone seen the rape rates on Reservations? It’s horrific. Absolutely horrific.

PIATOR Not true:  Right in the definition you quote it talks about psychological coercion which need not be violent.

but doesn’t include sex by fraud.  (I personally would consider psychological coercion to be a type of violence, but it’s iffy).

Besides, how often does the federal government get involved in rape cases,

It doesn’t, generally, which makes appeals to classification difficult.

We seem to have a problem with looking at it by definition vs classification.  I’m stating that rape is defined by lack of consent, not violence.  You seem to be claiming that it is classified as a violent crime - by whom, exactly?

The reason why this matters is that I would much much much rather have somebody who was wondering conclude “I was raped because I didn’t consent” rather than “I was not raped because there was no violence”.

PIATOR I honestly fail to understand why you’re arguing this. I think any person who rapes someone else is engaging in a violent act. Flat out. No matter how they manage it: by physical force, by trick, by drugs, by threat. Anyone who intentionally violates someone else’s body is engaged in violence.

Moreover, how useful is it to start talking about an incredibly unusual exception to the rule as part of this discussion? Because I’m pretty sure there aren’t a ton of twin brothers crawling into their sister-in-law’s beds trying to trick them into sex.

I am not making a point about timing.  I am making a point about the sophistry of defining rape as inherently violent.  There was no point in that sequence of events, in which the woman was raped, where she was offered violence or felt coerced.

Right, and there’s no point in time during the rape of an unconscious woman where she feels coerced. Do you still, in your gut, think of the rape of an unconscious person as non-violent? Why? Why must you define the rape’s violence by the victim’s perception when that perception is being deliberately tampered with by the offender? Rape requires an intention to rape - doesn’t it make more sense to look to the that? It’s a violent act because the rapist intended, and carried out, violence.

I just. Yeah. I’m having one of these moments. I’m out.

PIATOR I honestly fail to understand why you’re arguing this.

“The reason why this matters is that I would much much much rather have somebody who was wondering conclude “I was raped because I didn’t consent” rather than “I was not raped because there was no violence”.”

If I went around zifnab I’d just carry a pepper spray/taser/stun gun and wear how little damn clothes I wanted.

Totally love jilliefromchillies response! I totally agree! Slut isnt real and its just a character used to excuse treating a woman like shit and unleashing misogynistic violent crap onto her.

#39 slingshot-even if dressing with no skin showing did anything it would not be something to do. Guys are responsible for their own behavior and dress up or down there is never an excuse for shitty treatment and I sure as hell aint wearing no burka even if it would work. If its guys with the problem then THEY wear the burka. In many cultures women are near naked as are the men and the men dont go and start randomly raping women and in cultures where women wear burkas men do. Nudist colonies dont have men going around and randomly raping women so it is always the guy. I also bet no guy would ever turn it around and apply it to himself and feel that it is justified. Because he dresses ‘sexy’ (which would be I guess up to the woman-so he could be in sweats and tee) does not mean he’s asking for me to shove my 8 inch dildo up his ass and when he says no or stop, it does not mean that he is ‘playing hard to get.’

Regarding wearing a burka I would think that would go along with the essence of the protest since thats a very sexually objectifying outfit. Its like going along with the theme ‘you are either a slut or whore’ and displaying that in the protest. Perhaps a habit?

The links Jillie provided suggest that most rapes aren’t particularly violent. While they may involve coercion they more often involve intoxication, and often include poor judgment on the part of the victim, which is one of the reasons they typically go unreported. PiaToR is right, the defining characteristic is the lack of consent.

I’m watching the vid of the debate with Jaclyn and Gail Dines, etc. and I can’t decide who is annoying me more, Dines (um, you do realize that “perp walk” is an actual term already?) or Bresslin (wtf? who the fuck are you to tell other woman who were sexually assaulted what “the reality” of sexual assault is about?).

****

PIATOR

If that’s really your goal, U R DOIN IT WRNG

Dismissing the violence of rape because the common factor in all rapes is not the violence of fists, but instead the violence inherent in shattering a person’s right to autonomy and physical boundaries, does not do what you <strike>seem</strike> claim to think it does.  It just feeds into victims fears that one is making a big deal out of nothing.  Like we are upset over someone borrowing our favorite sweater without our permission or something.  Like it’s totally ok cuz hey! they put it back in our closet looking good as new.

“It’s already been established that sex by deceit or fraudulent identity is rape, and it is engaging in sophistry to redefine these as “violent”.”

Somehow I have a feeling the victims of these crimes would disagree with that assessment.

Who am I to speak for them, you ask?  Well, I’m not speaking for them, I’m speaking for me.

While I, fortunately, have never been physically sexually assaulted, I have had my right to privacy deliberately and repeatedly violated while in the comfort of my own bedroom and bathroom.  I’m sure we can all agree that by your definition of violence, voyeurism is about an unviolent as you can get.  Even sex by deceit involves actual physical boundaries being violated.  So if that isn’t violent, than how can my experiences be considered violent?

Yet I can say without a doubt that it was the most violent experience I’ve ever had to endure.

People who argue with me on whether or not what I experienced was violent are essentially telling me that I am mistaken about what was done to me.  I don’t see how that can be interpreted as anything but persuading me to doubt myself, my experiences, and my right to define them.  Which would in turn erode my own trust in my ability to assess if what was done to me was really all that wrong in the first place.  Whether the “what was done” was merely a violation of privacy, sexual assault by coercion, or sexual assault complete with bruises.

Assault is by definition violent.  To assault someone is then, by definition, violent.  Sexual assault is no more or less violent than any other assault then.  Are you saying that it isn’t sexual assault if some one rapes someone else who is intoxicated, too young to consent or tricked into consenting, PiaToR?  I don’t think that was what you meant to say, but that is basically what you said, granted through a series of comments rather than in a single one.

Lack of consent is the item that makes it a violation and hence violence and hence assault.  Pretty damn linear.

I’m with PIATOR on this argument.  To call all non-consensual touching, which defines assault*, as violence trivializes real violence.  Rough sex can be violent and not be rape, just as a football game or a boxing match or a hockey game can be violent and not be assaults.  It’s not the consent that defines the violence, it’s the rough bodily contact.  Rape by fraud (sneaking the condom off or puncturing it ahead of time to ensure its breaking, lying about identity or HIV status) is still rape even if it is gentle or all the force applied is by the victim.  I would even say that rape by verbal coercion is not necessarily violence but rather the threat of violence.  It’s still rape and inexcusable and criminal, just not violent.

(*Actually the correct term is “battery” while assault is an attempted battery combined with a reasonable chance or fear that an unconsented touching could occur.  Someone angry at me from across the street can shadow box my direction but that is not an assault, since the battery cannot be accomplished.  The word “assault” has been bowdlerized into including battery by frequent misuse.)

The reason not to expand the word “violent” to include non-violent, non-consensual bodily contact is that misuse undermines credibility.  We should want to stop all rape and sexual batteries, not just the violent ones.

Okay, let’s try it this way.  All assault is violence; not all violence is assault.  Intintional action with lack of consent, however, makes the touching assault and the act of denying bodily integrity is in and of itself violence.  All rape denies bodily integrity and so is violent, even if there aren’t hysical bruises.

Okay, let’s try it this way.  All assault is violence; not all violence is assault.  Intintional action with lack of consent, however, makes the touching assault and the act of denying bodily integrity is in and of itself violence.  All rape denies bodily integrity and so is violent, even if there aren’t hysical bruises.

No.  You’re confusing legal, philosophical and common sense definitions.

Violence is the application of force against a person.  Violence is not a denial of bodily integrity, per se.

Assault is a legal term for a criminal act of violence.

Intentional action with a lack of consent does not make the crime assault at least under NZ law.  It makes it sexual violation (which carries a penalty of up to 20 years).  Throw in violence and you may have either aggravated assault (3 more years) or indecent assault (7 more years) as well.

If you claim that it does make it assault, then show the applicable law and realise that laws differ on this matter.

helen, we’re not misunderstanding your position, we’re disagreeing with it.  For me, trying to broaden a legal and common definition of violence for a political end, i.e. so that all rape by definition is violent, is both wrong and unwise tactically.

PIATOR

Since the study whose mention started this whole line of conversation did not occur in NZ, wtf is your point?

As rivka said, the study in question includes rape.  There isn’t any actual debate about that because it’s an effing fact.

And you can try to argue that her conclusion doesn’t apply to rapes in general for whatever reason suits your fancy.  Including the fact that not all rapes are classified in all places by the legal definition of “violent crime. ”  But clearly several of us call bullshit on that particular argument on the grounds that there is a violence inherent in raping someone - whether by coercion, force, or even fraud - that is not present in crimes like simple theft.

The problem is not that we are confusing legal and common sense terms, the problem is that you are pretending that everyone here is only debating legal terms because that makes you look like less of an ass.

I mean, really, you don’t get to say “oh, but helen, we are just talking legal terms.  sorry you can’t keep up with the technical stuff” after having stated that your goal in making this argument is making victims feel more comfortable in deciding they deserve justice - a goal that has much more to do with internal and social dialogue than legal terms.  That’s just goalpost moving bullshit.

Or maybe you are under the mistaken impression that victims of rape spend a lot of time wondering what the legal term is for the crime committed against them?  And that the low percentages of rape being reported is due to women thinking “oh, but I’m not sure I’ll know the correct term for this when I go to the police report.”

Rather than, you know, constantly hearing people saying shit like “calling that violence trivializes real violence” or “...most rapes aren’t particularly violent…and often include poor judgment on the part of the victim” or interrogations like “At what time was she subjected to violence?”

WTF does it matter when I discovered the “peeping tom”?  Or if I ever learned about him at all?  It’s still wrong and criminal and whether or not it’s considered violent has nothing to do with when I learned about it.  Likewise with the woman who was raped by deceit.  Irregardless of whether or not rape by deceit is violent or not, your insistence on needing the act to fit the same script as a “typical” rape in order to be called violent by you isn’t really bolstering your argument.

I’m disappointed that so much of the dialogue around Slut Walk has revolved around rape and harassment. I’ve never been raped as an adult, but I have suffered plenty for being viewed as a slut, and I wish there was more talk about those repercussions - social ostracism, not being respected professionally, the emotional distance in relationships because you know your partner would judge you if he knew some of the things you’ve done. And it’s never about the actual number of sex partners, but things like having large breasts, or having a casual attitude toward sex, or just generally ignoring all the social rules designed to curtail women’s sexual freedom.

I know discussing rape and harrassment is important and they are a huge part of the slut concept, but there are other insidious repercussions and policing that I hope people realize go into women’s daily lives in all kinds of ways.

The male perspective on this is usually to draw distinctions between, for lack of a better word, “creeps” who might engage in some unwanted touching of women short of rape, and rapists who force them to have sex. But many feminists have convinced me that this is wrong—from the standpoint of the victims, “creepy” unwanted touching short of rape is often experienced as violence, it often triggers the same emotional responses as rape (especially among rape survivors), and it thus needs to be seen in the same light. And this is true even though not every episode of unwanted touching is going to be perceived as sexual assault—I’m sure some women are able to shrug some of this stuff off. “Some people don’t always find this such a big deal” seems to me an awfully bad defense for sexual assault. So I’m with the people in this thread who classify this as “violence”.

Also, it seems to me that if one does NOT classify this as violence, it’s pretty easy to end up at the point of minimizing things such as what sometimes happens to females riding the Tokyo subways, which is obviously systematic sexual violence and assault whether or not it is classified as rape.

@jennygadget

I mean, really, you don’t get to say “oh, but helen, we are just talking legal terms.  sorry you can’t keep up with the technical stuff”

I’m not entirely sure this is addressed to me but what I was doing by addressing helen at my #119 was reacting to her “Okay, let’s try it this way” which I took as a suggestion that I simply didn’t understand her argument.  I didn’t suggest she wasn’t understanding my points.  I assume she did/does.

Rather than, you know, constantly hearing people saying shit like “calling that violence trivializes real violence” or “...most rapes aren’t particularly violent…and often include poor judgment on the part of the victim”

I stand by the first quote but I have never said anything like the second one.  I find that conflation offensive, FWIW. 

Also, it seems to me that if one does NOT classify this as violence, it’s pretty easy to end up at the point of minimizing things such as what sometimes happens to females riding the Tokyo subways, which is obviously systematic sexual violence and assault whether or not it is classified as rape.

I completely disagree.  A behavior or violation does not have to be violent to be offensive to the point of illegality.  There is a significant difference between someone threatening to bash my face in and his actually doing it.  I don’t minimize the offense of an assault (in the sense of attempted battery) by saying the battery of actual crunching bones in my face is a much worse offense, the first being a mere threat of violence and the second actual violence.  Similarly, there is a significance difference between someone groping me on the subway and someone kicking me in the nuts.  Both are offensive, non-consensual and likely illegal, but only one is violent.

To call all non-consensual touching, which defines assault*, as violence trivializes real violence.

I think what trivializes violence is saying “I don’t think what happened to you is bad enough to count.”

PIATOR: Your comment about some ‘dude with wings and a slick story’ just gave me the mental image of a dudebro Gabe, drinking it up with the rest of his frat, thumbs pointing back at his wings and bragging ‘yeah. Chicks dig the wings.’

Random thought: for some reason I always assumed Zifnab was female… the name isn’t too far from Zainab/Zeynep…

Middleageliberal, if you were in a situation where you were at a party and fell asleep and woke to find a man fellating you (and you did not want that action) or you woke to find your anus sore (but not damage) and clear signs of seminal fluid on your boxers, would you say that the act was not violent to you?

Would you be able to say, well that was a non consenual act but I was not assaulted?

It appears to me that many are differentiating between physical damage as violence and mental and emotional damage as not-violence, whereas I think others are not seeing a difference.

Perhaps this is split along gender lines?

I will also say that I think if someone gets up in your face, MiddleAged, and screams, threatens, etc that that is a form of violence. It might not be physical assault, but it’s a form of assault.

There are all kinds of torture…sleep deprivation, light and sound manipulation, photos of family members being hurt, threats of damage to others near and dear.

That’s not violent? I think it is.

It appears to me that many are differentiating between physical damage as violence and mental and emotional damage as not-violence, whereas I think others are not seeing a difference.

I see we’ve reached the point where people are reading their own narratives rather than the words on the screen.  And with that, discussion rapidly becomes useless.

PIATOR: Your comment about some ‘dude with wings and a slick story’ just gave me the mental image of a dudebro Gabe, drinking it up with the rest of his frat, thumbs pointing back at his wings and bragging ‘yeah. Chicks dig the wings.’

Chicks always dig the wings.  Or pirates.

Would you be able to say, well that was a non consenual act but I was not assaulted?

It appears to me that many are differentiating between physical damage as violence and mental and emotional damage as not-violence, whereas I think others are not seeing a difference.

Non-consensual contact is assault but not all assaults are violent.  In the scenario you described, I would have been violated and likely raped but could not say without a witness whether the assault was violent or not. 

Your verbal barrage is a good example of where there is danger in expanding the meaning of the word “violence”.  No matter how offensive words are, they cannot be violence.

So, and I’m not trying to be barraging here (truly I’m curious), do you think that words can have a violent emotional impact? Or not? If someone tries to punch you but misses, or I don’t know…does something with an intent to cause damage even if verbally, how does your body respond to it? Calmly?
Or do you have a fight or flight reaction?
I think that there is such a thing as being emotionally violent.
I think there is such a thing as emotional abuse, yes?
I’m trying to work out where the conflict is coming from here.  I think that if a woman was passed out and was nonconsensually penetrated, and there was emotional and psychic damage…where did that damage come from? Her? I’d say him and his actions were violating. And violent.
But I’m kind of figuring you won’t agree.

“The word ‘assault’ has been bowdlerized into including battery by frequent misuse.”

...including the laws of the state of Oregon, which call battery “assault” and assault “attempted assault”.

Jules,
Yeah, I disagree.  “Emotionally violent” is a contradiction in terms.  It’s converting “violent”  into “terribly bad”. 

Here is why I think it matters.  I imagine a consensus in a community (town, state, country) could be formed around a law against non-privileged violence against of one persons our group against another.  Privilege in this context means recognized exceptions, like self-defense, defense of others against severe bodily harm or where all parties have consented to violence, like full-contact sports.  The consensus would be based on commonly accepted notions of what actions are considered violence.  If people in charge of enforcing those laws decide to expand the term violence to include any action causing emotional injury without physical injury, those enforcers markedly gain power to punish acts such as yelling at someone the same as punching someone in the face.  And people feeling aggrieved by gentle touching or offensive speech could engage the community’s powers against an adversary.

Just in communication of non-witnessed events, expanding the meaning of “violence”, can lead to miscommunication of what actually occurred.  Suppose there are counter-demonstrations of some highly charged emotional issue, such as abortion.  If yelling at someone can be considered violence then anyone reporting that violence broke out at a demonstration would be reporting truthfully, even if no one on opposite sides at the demonstration touched each other. 

Certainly words can cause hurt.  What could be more hurtful to a parent who has lost a child in military service than to have those bozos from Westboro Baptist show up at the funeral saying the things they do?  It’s awful and hurtful, but it’s not violence.  The Supremes have recently decided that that “terribly bad” speech is protected from government prohibition. 
Speech can incite violence, but is not in itself violence. 

Saying that violent rape (which might include a bones-breaking punch to the face) is worse than rape by trickery or fraud, doesn’t argue that one action is rape and not the other not.

MiddleageLiberal, there is a huge difference between verbal abuse (or hate speech, etc.) and rape.  What makes rape violent is not merely the fact that it’s nonconsensual.  It’s the fact that it’s nonconsensual and it is done to the someone’s body.  This isn’t rocket science.

Let’s say someone gives you some poisoned food, but you don’t realize it’s poisoned (it looks, tastes, and smells fine), so you eat it up.  The person who gave you the food has perpetrated an act of violence against you.  The fact that you didn’t perceive it as violence while it was happening is immaterial.

The person who gave you the food has perpetrated an act of violence against you.

In some jurisdictions, using poison is considered using a weapon like a gun or a knife, even though, as mtthw points out, it isn’t perceived as violent by the victim.

Similarly, there is a significance difference between someone groping me on the subway and someone kicking me in the nuts.  Both are offensive, non-consensual and likely illegal, but only one is violent.

No, middleagedLiberal, both of these would be violent, IMO; though one is certainly more so.  Grabbing someone without their permission (groping) is inherently violent.  I get your point (though I disagree with it), but this was not the correct situation to use in comparision.  A more corect one would be brushing against someone’s breasts or butt while sliding past in a crowd or a catcall.  Trust me in that a large number of people here would call that violent (or a threat of violence/intimidation) as they have previously. 
I was not talking about legal terms, and I’m pretty sure both you and PiaToR were well aware of that.
Yes, Jules, it seems to mostly be being broken down along gendered lines, though I’d bet it also is by who has been molested or threatened sexually as well.

A more corect one would be brushing against someone’s breasts or butt while sliding past in a crowd or a catcall.  Trust me in that a large number of people here would call that violent (or a threat of violence/intimidation) as they have previously.

Once I was walking down the hallway with a friend discussing the Botany exam and he brushed against my breast. I really didn’t mind because: Accident! Barely felt anything! Didn’t even stop talking!
He interrupted me afterwards and said “I did that on purpose. Your breasts are so soft.”
You bet I felt attacked.