The Difference Is...

[woodwardiocom]

Three parallel situations:

• "You didn't have a bike lock? No wonder it got stolen, you doofus."
  
• "You walked through that part of town at midnight waving around an expensive cell phone? You idiot, no wonder you got mugged!"
  
• "You were dressed like that when you were sexually assaulted? You kinda asked for it."

My social circles regard the first two as appropriate replies, and the third as absolutely not. I agree with that, but on analysis, am having trouble articulating the relevant distinction.

Edit: Many thanks for the answers thus far. They've helped.

Comments

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

Surely in both cases both truths apply. The person who stole the bike was a contemptible thief with no respect for the bike owner's rights, and merits condemnation for their wrongful actions (though not as intense condemnation as the rapist, as the harm is almost certainly less). And the woman who dressed sexually provocatively while going into certain types of environment was endangering herself and was imprudent, perhaps culpably so, in not better safeguarding her own person. Criminals have a moral obligation not to commit crimes, but potential victims have a moral obligation not to be careless of their own security.

After all, when your daughter is old enough to carry a wallet, I expect you're going to teach her not to take out her money and count or sort it in public, right?

[nchanter.livejournal.com]

Please list for me the places where it is OK for me to dress "sexually provocatively" and the places where it is not. And please define dressing sexually provocatively. Because some people have decided workout clothes count, and some men rape women wearing Burqas. Can you please define those lines for us?

Thanks!

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

What, you want rules? There are no rules for most practical matters. At most there are heuristics. But ultimately such things are an unending series of judgment calls, and the virtue of prudence is the virtue of being good at making judgment calls.

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

What nchanter and I are trying it point out is that there are not only not rules for this particular item (what clothing will fail to be read as sexy enough to endanger you?), but there is actually, in practice, no answer. No clothing will do that. There is no outfit so plain, practical and concealing that it can't be interpreted as provocative by someone. (It doesn't have to be sexually provocative - I spent a few months with no hair, and got a certain amount of verbal abuse because I read as lesbian.)

In the course of this conversation, you've both blamed women for being raped (they should dress so as not to endanger themselves), and blamed them for not being able to make the correct judgment calls about wardrobe. In the meantime, various women have attempted to explain to you that the judgment involved is vapor. If you are assaulted, the people who do it, and possibly the law enforcement officers you report it to, will explain, in retrospect, how your outfit or demeanor or something was provocative.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

It's not a question of blame. My interest in morality is not retrospective—establishing who did something wrong and should be punished—but prospective—establishing what is a good way to live. "A good way to live" includes learning to recognize avoidable risks.

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

Welp, hate to tell you, for slightly more then half the population, rape is not an avoidable risk. It's a risk you bear for existing, and about 1 in 4 of us deal with it personally. I assure you, that's not because that 25% have questionable fashion sense.

[nchanter.livejournal.com]

I can't come up with a reply to you, or your statements in this thread, that aren't hostile. I've tried. Maybe this makes me less classically enlightened than you. I'm totally OK with that.

Your comments read, to me, as if you're being either purposefully obtuse, purposefully incendiary, or that you are so privileged that you have absolutely no concept, nor desire for empathy, of victims who have been blamed for crimes committed against them. All of those options i find horrific, and very very sad.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

I'm actually trying, just as much, to make the opposite point: That the person whose bicycle is stolen after they left it unlocked, or whose cell phone is taken when they made it visible in the wrong neighborhood, is also a victim and has also been wronged and also does not deserve to be blamed for it. I have been the victim of property crimes twice, and once it was "my own fault"—I left in a hurry and didn't close a ground floor window. And such victimization also carries a sense of personal violation. I don't doubt that it was less intense than what would be felt by a victim of rape, but the feelings are real. And I don't think it would have been helpful in that case to say that it was my own fault for not making sure the window was locked. The reactions of people who dismiss property crime victims by saying "It's your own fault for being careless" strike me as failing to deal with the real emotional issues of such crimes.

As to how women dress—I'm truly not a good judge of this: I'm male and I'm not very visually perceptive. Perhaps the folklore about some forms of dress being interpreted as a sexual invitation is entirely wrong, and what you wear does not affect the probability of sexual assault in any way. My concern is more with the broader issue of prudence and self-protection. I'm saying that both "you have a right not to be attacked" and "it's prudent for you to behave in ways that make attack less likely to occur, or less likely to succeed if it does occur" are valid ways of looking at the world, and you need both—whether or not dressing one way rather than another can have any effect on the odds. I will grant that I could be entirely wrong about the effect of clothing and appearance. But you seem to me to totally reject any sort of prudential or self-protective perspective on the matter. And I think that perspective is also needed.

I'm not saying "either/or" but "both/and."

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

I agree that the victims of property crimes don't deserve blame for their losses, and that blame isn't helpful. I even agree that locking windows and shutting doors are reasonable precautions.

I haven't kept up with the current folklore about forms of dress, but I assure that interpreting anyone's clothing as a sexual invitation is an error. If your lover meets you at the door in sexy lingerie and a come-hither grin, the invitation is the grin.

Dressing in any one way or another does NOT make sexual assault less likely - that's a myth. Dressing in any one way or another doesn't even make it less likely that a woman will be blamed for any assault she experiences. Whatever you were wearing, they'll find a way to make it wrong. You've been ignoring people making that point all morning, which makes your current explanation that you don't know if dress makes a difference come off as disingenuous.

The correct take here is not "either/or," or "both/and", it's "both/but..."

[minkrose]

Statistics and the methodology of people who are actually trying to stop sexual violence do not agree with your statements above. What you wear does not affect your probability of being sexually assaulted. See the statistics link at the end for more on that.

The Boston Area Rape Crisis Center on Prevention: http://www.barcc.org/information/facts/prevention
"Traditional approaches focus on what potential victims - often women - should do to reduce their risk of being raped, e.g. self-defense programs, carrying pepper spray and mace, and whistles. While these may be important safety precautions, none of these activities will actually end sexual violence because they are not stopping people from developing abusive behavior.

BARCC’s approach to prevention is to encourage and help communities become less tolerant of sexual violence. Everyone in a community has a role to play in making their community safer by promoting healthy beliefs and challenging sexual aggression. Ideas that could have an impact are, for example, adults talking with teens they know about respecting the personal boundaries of others; talking with friends about how abusive behavior choices are made, and having community discussions about how communities can become less accepting of sexual violence and more supportive of healthy sexuality and relationships. "


Also, the BARCC Statistics page, which clearly states that assailants target people they know, and that "Most survivors report that they used protective action against an assailant, either through physical force or by asking the assailant to stop." (citation: NIJ, Special Report, Findings from the Violence Against Women Survey, 2000)

http://www.barcc.org/information/facts/stats


If I find more useful links, I will share them. These seemed like the best place to start (on my Friday evening, after I planned on relaxing with a beer).

[dani-namaste.livejournal.com]

Again, though: LEAVING THE HOUSE IS OFTEN ENOUGH FOR A WOMAN TO BE RAPED. In many cases, you're not even safe INSIDE the house. So seriously, check your privilege and understand that no, really, this is a thing. Women can not do anything to "make attack less likely to occur."

[tamidon.livejournal.com]

personally tired of being told how not to get raped, which doesn't seem to ever work, and not hearing enough about not to be a rapist

[dani-namaste.livejournal.com]

WOW, that statement reeks of male privilege in the context of this conversation. It is really important that you stop now.

[dani-namaste.livejournal.com]

I have no comment, other than I heart this answer.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

It's not a matter of "ok." It's a matter of wise. You have a right to be secure in both your person and property, and those who harm either are criminals who should be punished. But you would be unwise to ignore the existence of criminals in the real world.

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

Wow. Okay, unpacking this one.

My obligation to my own security is practical, not moral. Every day, I make choices about what matters to me, and if I decide not to safeguard, say, my phone, that's not an ethical failing. (I have made the choice to risk my pocket being picked in order to handle some more pressing problem. You probably do the same from time to time. If my wallet goes missing in a crowd while I am, say, hustling toddlers off the train, I don't acquire moral culpability. I also sometimes choose to go into bad parts of town. If bad shit happens to me while I'm jogging my usual route, it's not because I made some ethical error.)

There is no outfit that will render me safe from sexual assault. Worse, there is no outfit that a cop or an assailant cannot claim was somehow, in some way, provocative of that assault. Since no outfit will make me safe, or even make key people think I took reasonable precautions, I have reserved to myself the right to wear what I damn well want. Interpretation is in the mind of the beholder, and no matter what efforts I make in that direction, I cannot control it.

If someone is assaulted, it's not because they were culpable in failing to safeguard themselves, it's because there was an assailant.

I have a young daughter. It is a fight every day to get her to wear clothing that covers her underpants (in fairness to her, when I wear things with my favorite characters on them, I like them to show them off too). It makes me unspeakably angry that the social consensus is that she has to wear bottoms because if she doesn't, someone might molest her. If you find preschoolers irresistably appealing in that way, the problem is not that the preschoolers aren't wearing bike shorts.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

I don't consider the dichotomy of moral and practical obligations to be valid. I adhere to the classical view (found for example in Aristotle, Aquinas, or Spinoza) in which prudence is not merely a moral virtue but the essence of morality.

[ricevermicelli.livejournal.com]

I'm not impressed by the classical view you're espousing, as it seems to elide the idea that the essence of morality might involve not committing assaults against one's fellows.