Rape Logic

Despite all evidence to the contrary, I seem to have nothing to do. My torts exam, could it speak, would have a different opinion about that. Anyway…

Grant has a long post about rape… and, at the risk of sounding like a gigantic asshole, I have to say… saying “Just don’t rape people” is no substitute for taking precautionary measures.

A lot has been said about how to prevent rape.
Women should learn self-defense.
Women should lock themselves in their houses after dark.
Women shouldn’t have long hair and women shouldn’t wear short skirts.
Women shouldn’t leave drinks unattended.
Fuck, they shouldn’t dare to get drunk at all.

Instead of that bullshit, how about:

If a woman is drunk, don’t rape her.

He goes on at length on this… and it would be great and awesome advice if… the people suggesting the precautionary measures were rapists. But, really, they’re not. At least, nobody I’ve ever heard advocating protcetive measures is a rapist. I simply don’t understand this logic, though.

Ignoring, for now, the assumption that sex with a drunk girl is (or should be considered) rape, let’s look at how this logic applies to some other crimes:

• Don’t tell people to lock their car doors; just don’t steal shit.
• Don’t tell people how to defuse a tense situation; just don’t fight people.
• Don’t tell people to carry a gun for self-defense; just don’t kill people.
• Don’t write new DRM software; just don’t pirate music.
• Don’t teach kids how to escape from a trunk; just don’t kidnap people.
• Don’t wear your seatbelt; just don’t get into car accidents.
• Don’t be careful when you click on links in email; just don’t send fradulent emails.

You can play this game all day long, but what it comes down to is that crimes are going to be committed, and we should all take reasonable precautions to avoid being the victims of said crimes. A guy who tells his female friends not to leave their drinks unattended or take drinks from strangers is not a rape advocate… he’s simply not a fucking moron.

It’s true that precaution-taking will not eliminate rape, but saying “just don’t rape people” is going to be far, far less effective because, despite society’s horror at different types of crime, they continue anyway.

This is not to imply, however, that women who don’t take precautions, or are simply careless, deserve to be raped any more than someone who leaves their car door unlocked deserves to have their stuff stolen because very few people deserve to have crimes committed against them, but when it comes to crimes, we all get things that we don’t deserve, and if we don’t want them we should take precautions.

The problem isn’t the advocates for being careful, Grant, it’s the rapists — it would serve you well to (be able to) make that distinction.