Apparently, Krista Ford doesn't dress like a whore...stupid tweet!

[superfly]

Yeah it's pretty insane that some people still think a rape victim can cause the assault in any way, shape, or form. It's been proven over and over and over again how a woman looks or dresses or acts has absolutely no effect on whether she'll get sexually assaulted. People like to blame the victim cause it's easier than knowing there's that many fucked up people in our society that would actually rape someone, but facts are facts. If clothing did cause rape at all, sexual assaults would be 0% in places like Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia where women are covered head to toe. Clearly that's not the case- why? Because it's about how men are raised in a given society, whether they're taught to disrespect women or treat women as the equal human beings we obviously are. Only rapists cause rape- period. This isn't rocket science lol.

thats so true
i dont think the average gut just goes out and see a girl and decides her going to rape her cause of what she has on.. hes gone out for do it and has planned it if hes a rapist.

 

[vancity_cowboy]

In a society where the vulnerable don't fear or suffer attack, imagine how much more productive and happy they could be!

...and imagine what a nice place vancouver would be if it rained kool aid all winter

but it doesn't, and it ain't going to, so we have to deal with the real world instead

otherwise i agree with what you and others are saying here, but let's stick to realities and not cloud the issue with impossibilities

society doesn't have the money to hire enough policemen to guard each and every one of us 24 hours a day. nor does it have enough money to hire enough cousellors to keep potential rapists thinking about nice things. nor apparently does it even have enough money to put actual rapists behind bars for extended periods of time

so we are left with looking out for ourselves, and that is what we should concentrating on

 

[PlayfulAlex]

...so we are left with looking out for ourselves, and that is what we should concentrating on...

I completely agree...concerns for personal safety are high priority. Helping (young) ladies make wise decisions in that area is real. Let's just not muddy the waters with thoughtless, hurtful comments, such as Miss Ford's. This thread started out as a statement on how stupid her Tweet was...

 

[vancity_cowboy]

Let's just not muddy the waters with thoughtless, hurtful comments, such as Miss Ford's. This thread started out as a statement on how stupid her Tweet was...

a lot of us see the stupid part, but we also see the grains of thoughtful discussion that should be explored - not everything she said was bad... poorly expressed, yes... but totally wrong and stupid, no

 

[PlayfulAlex]

a lot of us see the stupid part, but we also see the grains of thoughtful discussion that should be explored - not everything she said was bad... poorly expressed, yes... but totally wrong and stupid, no

I concede...and stupid is as stupid does...

 

[vancity_cowboy]

I concede...and stupid is as stupid does...

i think 'concede' is wierd - 'agree' denotes positive personal strength, and that's what we're talking about isn't it?

chuckling over the quote from forrest gump though...

 

[bcneil]

It's a proven fact the vast majority of sexual assaults are perpetrated by someone known to the victim. So, in that case clothing wouldn't have anything to do with it. Walking alone at night wouldn't have anything to do with it. It's not about sex, it's about power. And YOU guys are missing the point: rapists don't rape sluts, they rape women. Having a vagina is what puts you at risk, not what you wear or how you act. This is not just my opinion, this is a fact. Based on dozens and dozens of studies by dozens and dozens of different organizations over years and years. We're not just making this up cause we want to, THESE ARE FACTS.

I'd also like to add that for all the time our society wastes trying to tell victims how not to be victims (an impossible task), why don't we start trying to teach rapists not to be rapists? Rapists are not some creepy guy you can spot a mile away. Rapists come in all forms, and the scariest part is that we probably all know someone who has raped somebody. So why don't we start devoting all our valiant efforts of ending rape to something that would actually end rape: targeting the only people who cause it.

I read a good study that indicated statistically rapist actually don't prefer women that are dressed sexy.
Most rapes are by a man the woman knew. The other rapes are more about power. There is a higher level of this "high" raping say the 35 year old mother who possibly has only had sex with 1 or 2 men in their lives. Over the girl at the nightclub rubbing up on men on the dancefloor, who possibly might go home with a different guy each night.

Rapes are not about sexual enjoyment, so the appearance of the women is moot.
In Alex's post about the woman in gastown. Does anyone think he was hiding in a stairwell cause he was horny?
For $80-$300 you can get an SP. The punishment levels you can get for rape far outweigh this value, if it were just about sex.
If it were just about sex, its almost like stealing sex. And not to sound offensive but its basically like stealing a 15 minutes one position osog session. Can you imagine someone stealing $80-$300 of say DVDs from the bestbuy, knowing that if you get caught you would get 10 years??? If the man in Alex's post was just horny.....why not get an SP? If he was broke....he would be far better off robbing that woman and using her money to get an SP. Cause if he did get caught, he would get a slap on the wrist for mugging her.

Option 1...You can get a cute Chinese girl to expertly ride you for 45 minutes then suck you off for $140.
Option 2...You rape a girl for 3 minutes, knowing you are causing her incredible emotional harm, knowing that if you are caught you are fucked big time.

Anyone that picks option 2, is not just some horny guy who wants to fuck a hot chick.

If a man is intent on raping a stranger he will. It doesn't matter if every woman in the city dresses like she's going to a funeral or stays home after dark, or never goes out in public alone. He will find an opportunity somewhere and won't care how short her skirt is.

 

[Volpina Vance]

society doesn't have the money to hire enough policemen to guard each and every one of us 24 hours a day. nor does it have enough money to hire enough cousellors to keep potential rapists thinking about nice things. nor apparently does it even have enough money to put actual rapists behind bars for extended periods of time

so we are left with looking out for ourselves, and that is what we should concentrating on

You know what? I agree. We can all ensure that we respect other people enough not to bodily violate them, if only for their continued well-being and the well-being of society. We can call others out when they defend the occurrence of rape as inevitable, and educate those around us who don't understand that more than anything, rape is an issue of power and disrespect. We can help those more vulnerable to rape feel safe around us by demonstrating that we won't put up with their violation.

Using safe calls as an SP and taking other measures to ensure the random men I encounter are not violent with me are things I do, yes, but my own safety should not be in my hands. The responsibility not to be attacked is not mine. I can never ensure universally that I am safe, just as a civilian woman/girl/-- can't. What I can do to protect myself is limited. Teaching society not to rape - that violating others is not ok! removes that limit.

From Eve Ensler:

I am over rape.

I am over rape culture, rape mentality, rape pages on Facebook.

I am over the thousands of people who signed those pages with their real names without shame.

I am over people demanding their right to rape pages, and calling it freedom of speech or justifying it as a joke.

I am over people not understanding that rape is not a joke and I am over being told I don't have a sense of humor, and women don't have a sense of humor, when most women I know (and I know a lot) are really fucking funny. We just don't think that uninvited penises up our anus, or our vagina is a laugh riot.

I am over how long it seems to take anyone to ever respond to rape.

I am over Facebook taking weeks to take down rape pages.

I am over the hundreds of thousands of women in Congo still waiting for the rapes to end and the rapists to be held accountable.

I am over the thousands of women in Bosnia, Burma, Pakistan, South Africa, Guatemala, Sierra Leone, Haiti, Afghanistan, Libya, you name a place, still waiting for justice.

I am over rape happening in broad daylight.

I am over the 207 clinics in Ecuador supported by the government that are capturing, raping, and torturing lesbians to make them straight.

I am over one in three women in the U.S military (Happy Veterans Day!) getting raped by their so-called "comrades."

I am over the forces that deny women who have been raped the right to have an abortion.

I am over the fact that after four women came forward with allegations that Herman Cain groped them and grabbed them and humiliated them, he is still running for the President of the United States.

And I'm over CNBC debate host Maria Bartiromo getting booed when she asked him about it. She was booed, not Herman Cain.

Which reminds me, I am so over the students at Penn State who protested the justice system instead of the alleged rapist pedophile of at least 8 boys, or his boss Joe Paterno, who did nothing to protect those children after knowing what was happening to them.

I am over rape victims becoming re-raped when they go public.

I am over starving Somalian women being raped at the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya, and I am over women getting raped at Occupy Wall Street and being quiet about it because they were protecting a movement which is fighting to end the pillaging and raping of the economy and the earth, as if the rape of their bodies was something separate.

I am over women still being silent about rape, because they are made to believe it's their fault or they did something to make it happen.

I am over violence against women not being a #1 international priority when one out of three women will be raped or beaten in her lifetime -- the destruction and muting and undermining of women is the destruction of life itself.

No women, no future, duh.

I am over this rape culture where the privileged with political and physical and economic might, take what and who they want, when they want it, as much as they want, any time they want it.

I am over the endless resurrection of the careers of rapists and sexual exploiters -- film directors, world leaders, corporate executives, movie stars, athletes -- while the lives of the women they violated are permanently destroyed, often forcing them to live in social and emotional exile.

I am over the passivity of good men. Where the hell are you?

You live with us, make love with us, father us, befriend us, brother us, get nurtured and mothered and eternally supported by us, so why aren't you standing with us? Why aren't you driven to the point of madness and action by the rape and humiliation of us?

I am over years and years of being over rape.

And thinking about rape every day of my life since I was 5-years-old.

And getting sick from rape, and depressed from rape, and enraged by rape.

And reading my insanely crowded inbox of rape horror stories every hour of every single day.

I am over being polite about rape. It's been too long now, we have been too understanding.

We need to OCCUPYRAPE in every school, park, radio, TV station, household, office, factory, refugee camp, military base, back room, night club, alleyway, courtroom, UN office. We need people to truly try and imagine -- once and for all -- what it feels like to have your body invaded, your mind splintered, your soul shattered. We need to let our rage and our compassion connect us so we can change the paradigm of global rape.

There are approximately one billion women on the planet who have been violated.

ONE BILLION WOMEN.

The time is now. Prepare for the escalation.

Today it begins, moving toward February 14, 2013, when one billion women will rise to end rape.

Because we are over it.

 

[violetblake]

^^ What a fantastic quote Volpina!

 

[Miss*Bijou]

Glad to see the Fords are still bringin' the stupid.

Gawd, are they all-trash-and-no-class, or what?!

“Krista regrets it, that’s not the way we raised her, and to be very blunt, we chewed her ass out from one end to the other and she learned a good lesson.”

Councillor Doug Ford, speaking to AM640 Arlene Bynon, on daughter Krista Ford’s infamous “dressing like a whore” tweet.

Right. I'm not even going to ask *how* they raised her. Absolutely mind boggling.



Can I just say that Barbara Kay is a TWAT? Not exactly news to anyone but I have the urge to say it right now. A TWAT. And why is anyone still paying her to write shockingly moronic drivel she typically inflicts on readers? I'm asking honestly? Is it truly that easy to get that gig? If it is, then where do I get hired? Hello? Let her clutch her pearls in retirement.

Has no one pointed out to her that the year is 2012? Not 1912. Or 1952. I mean, really? Why does she have her job? She's the best they can muster up? - I know, I know, it is the National Post and her son is the editor (and very much the TWAT TOO - must be genetic) so what am I expecting?

Anyway- that's what keeps repeating over and over in mind since I read this this morning: that woman is a TWAT.

Barbara Kay: Twitter critics get it wrong on Krista Ford


I remember when the vogue for jeans that were strategically ripped at the knee and other places first appeared on upscale women, my perplexed mother could not quite get her head around the fact that women would pay good money for rags.

I explained to her they weren’t rags: they were a “fashion trend.” She didn’t understand it. She said – and I have not forgotten it because she hit the nail on the head – “But it’s like making fun of poor people who can’t afford nice clothes.”

Poor people don’t want to wear rags. Poor people with any self-respect want to wear clothes that make them look like they’re not poor. Because even though it is no shame to be poor, it is no great honour either.

Only in a heavily ironized society, where transgressive inversion of traditional beliefs and mores are chic — like, say, a crucifix in a bottle of urine — could one arrange one’s outward appearance to mimic the status of someone you would be horrified to be in reality.

Which brings me to sympathy for Krista Ford, niece of Toronto mayor Rob Ford, who had to apologize Thursday for the advice she gave to women on avoiding sexual assault. She said, “Stay alert, walk tall, carry mace, take self-defence classes and don’t dress like a whore.” If she had stopped at the word “classes,” her life would be a whole lot easier. And her own clothing choices didn’t help her argument. Instead, she was subjected to a barrage of criticism and was forced to apologize on Twitter. In her tweet she seems bewildered by the fuss: “I didn’t mean to cause such an alarm and I apologize if I did. I just want women to be safe.”

Many of Ms Ford’s Twitter critics accused her of blaming the victim, just as the Police Constable Michael Sanguinetti was in January, 2011 when he counselled women to “avoid dressing like sluts” if they didn’t want to be victims. Neither the constable nor Ms Ford, who don’t understand the ironized ways of the culturally hip, deserve the blowback they got.

We all know what they were saying, and we all know they have a valid point. It is political correctness that fuelled the reflexive righteous anger. For of course it is a woman’s right to dress like a whore, just as it is a woman’s right to dress like a poor person. But the difference is that dressing like a poor person does not look like an invitation to a sexual advance, and dressing like a whore does.

Mark my words, please. I did not say dressing like a whore is an invitation to sexual assault, nor – contrary to comedian Alice Moran’s accusation against Ms Ford – does a call for fashion prudence suggest that anyone who has been sexually assaulted is in fact a whore. Obviously many modestly dressed women are sexually assaulted anyway. But I agree with Ms Ford that dressing like a whore – that is, dressing like the kind of woman whose professional sartorial fashion sense is premised on the need to maximize male lust – is to send a message that extremely high sexual interest from males is not only welcome, but very welcome.

So yes, a woman has the right not to be sexually assaulted. And dress codes don’t prevent all assaults. But what if they prevent one or two? Isn’t prudence good advice? I have the right not to be mugged, but there are certain areas where I wouldn’t take a bankroll out of my purse and hold it so everyone could see it. It’s my money and nobody has the right to it. But I also know it’s not a good idea to draw potential muggers’ attention to it. Likewise, if she has any common sense, a woman would not walk around in certain areas where dressing like a whore evokes certain kinds of ideas in certain kinds of men that are not evoked by women who project a well-groomed but sexually modest image.

Dressing like a slut – and nobody has to define it; we know it when we see it – may have started as an ironic fashion trend, the same as ripped jeans, but it has now become an activist costume, and strutting one’s sexual charms in a mimicry of prostitutes’ behaviour an act of political theatre.

What is forgotten in this “rights” performance is that real women — the ones most at risk of assault by men who crave their services but who have nothing but contempt for them as people — are being mocked. Most prostitutes would give their eye teeth to be “respectable” women wearing respectable clothing. They dress the way they do, because they have to. When women who don’t have to dress like prostitutes do so anyway, they are mocking society’s their most vulnerable sisters.


http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...-twitter-critics-get-it-wrong-on-krista-ford/

THAT. FUCKING. TWAT.

Is this woman for real??



Btw - Barbara Kay does have some sort of weird fixation on hookers, whores and women who "dress like them". Some past beauties:

The danger to prostitutes will continue, because the kind of men who frequent prostitutes and the kind of men who control them don’t have a lot of respect for them on the whole. Nor should they. Being a prostitute is a shameful, indecent activity, and any sex worker who demands respect as a matter of course is fooling herself. She is not respectable. Politically correct people will say she is, but she isn’t.

Nice. (TWAT)


http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com...l-doesnt-have-to-mean-dressing-like-a-hooker/



TWAT.

Does anyone really believe that the likes of those women, the human wreckage who were killed by Robert Pickton, are going to spend their money on an “office,” advertise their services, keep accounts, submit to regular health testing and pay taxes on their income? Dream on.

TWAT.

 

[vancity_cowboy]

Is this woman for real??

with respect mj, like her or hate her, her attitude represents the attitude of a large majority of people, women included, in the us - and as such her words should not be dismissed out of hand

in the social struggle we are involved in on this board, she represents the enemy, and her words should be read carefully and taken to heart, as they represent the credo of the enemy

just sayin'...

 

[Miss*Bijou]

with respect mj, like her or hate her, her attitude represents the attitude of a large majority of people, women included, in the us - and as such her words should not be dismissed out of hand

in the social struggle we are involved in on this board, she represents the enemy, and her words should be read carefully and taken to heart, as they represent the credo of the enemy

just sayin'...

Hm yah. I read it, I posted it and I commented on it...

Just sayin'...

lol

 

[PlayfulAlex]

i think 'concede' is wierd - 'agree' denotes positive personal strength, and that's what we're talking about isn't it?

chuckling over the quote from forrest gump though...

Well, I think that concede is the correct term in this instance...I concede that your perspective is correct. From her comment, however ill thought-out, a thoughtful discussion has ensued.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=concede

"in the social struggle we are involved in on this board, she represents the enemy, and her words should be read carefully and taken to heart, as they represent the credo of the enemy..."

And vcc, I think what you're saying here is...keep your friends close, and keep your enemies closer...is that right?

 

[vancity_cowboy]

"in the social struggle we are involved in on this board, she represents the enemy, and her words should be read carefully and taken to heart, as they represent the credo of the enemy..."

And vcc, I think what you're saying here is...keep your friends close, and keep your enemies closer...is that right?

you got it...

 

[wilde]

if you put yourself in a situation that you know is dangerous, then you would have to be stupid not to expect something dangerous to possibly happen

unless they were sent there by our gov't, it was their choice to go, just like Amanda Lindhout

it's called personal responsibility for a reason

So are you saying that if you took a road trip up the sea to sky and get hit head on by a vehicle which crossed the center line, you should take personal responsibility because after all accidents do happen on the road everyday?

 

[overdone]

So are you saying that if you took a road trip up the sea to sky and get hit head on by a vehicle which crossed the center line, you should take personal responsibility because after all accidents do happen on the road everyday?

once again short bus, not the same thing

going into a war zone and driving on the streets of Canada not quite the same

well maybe in BC

 

[myselftheother]

So are you saying that if you took a road trip up the sea to sky and get hit head on by a vehicle which crossed the center line, you should take personal responsibility because after all accidents do happen on the road everyday?

Really...this is totally out of context of the actual situation that's being discussed, and you're just trying to bait a ridiculous hook. Everybody ought to be responsible for their own safety and actions, and shit does happen...horrible things happen to nice people regardless of how prepared you are. BUT you can mitigate the risks by not putting yourself in situations where bad shit can happen to you....personal responsibility, they call it. Sure, you can get hit by a drunk driver on the Sea to Sky, random shit happens. Nothing you can do really can shange that, but you don't be the drunk driver, or walking down dark alleys at night with wads of cash hanging out of your pants either, or hang a steak around your skinny little neck before you enter a lion's cage.

Right? I may be wrong, and everyone deserves to be safe and secure, but there are dangers in the real world and people must take reasonalbe precautions to be safe...you just don;t go running out into traffic without looking...that kinda stuff.

 

[Tugela]

This operates on the false assumptions that rape occurs between strangers and as a result of lust. I'm not going to devote time to posting easily searchable literature. I feel very comfortable asserting that 1) Most rapists know their victims (as in, something like 80% of rape cases...) and 2) the most identifying feature of "random" (predatorial) rape is the rapist's attitude of vengeance about some perceived harm done him by a woman/ by women combined with a despicable lack of respect for the personhood of [his] victim.

Are you suggesting that rape never occurrs because of lust? Do women never hook up with a guy in a bar who then molests them? There are two extremes here, one is the guy who goes out specifically looking for someone to rape. Obviously they don't care what she is wearing. The other extreme is the guy who knows the victim, and the rape is a consequence of their personal relationship. Obviously clothes dont matter there either. But inbetween there is a middle group, where the rapist knows the victim after a casual meeting (in a bar, on the street, whatever). The basis for THAT type of rape is allmost allways motivated by lust. The guy feels attracted to her, she feels differently and he resorts to caveman tactics to get his way. He chooses her and not the other girl primarily because of the way she looks. What other criteria is there, he doesnt know her? That happens a lot, and yes, clothes play a role in that. The primary motivation is sexual attraction, so it is not specifically about clothes, but what you are wearing and how you are wearing it. It will send out signals about your intentions, values, attitudes and such things, and people are going to react to you in one way or another on that basis. If you are in a crowd and stand out, you will attract attention. And if you stand out because you are projecting sexuality you will attract sexual attention. Some of that will come from the wrong guys who have poor boundaries.

Just because some types of rape are not motivated by appearance doesn't mean that all types of rape are not motivated by appearance. What you are doing is lumping them alltogether and treating it as though it is one monolithic behaviour, when it is not. There are things that people can do to mitigate risk. They can't eliminate it however, because the risk factors are not allways the same.

 

[Tugela]

It's a proven fact the vast majority of sexual assaults are perpetrated by someone known to the victim. So, in that case clothing wouldn't have anything to do with it. Walking alone at night wouldn't have anything to do with it. It's not about sex, it's about power. And YOU guys are missing the point: rapists don't rape sluts, they rape women. Having a vagina is what puts you at risk, not what you wear or how you act. This is not just my opinion, this is a fact. Based on dozens and dozens of studies by dozens and dozens of different organizations over years and years. We're not just making this up cause we want to, THESE ARE FACTS.

I'd also like to add that for all the time our society wastes trying to tell victims how not to be victims (an impossible task), why don't we start trying to teach rapists not to be rapists? Rapists are not some creepy guy you can spot a mile away. Rapists come in all forms, and the scariest part is that we probably all know someone who has raped somebody. So why don't we start devoting all our valiant efforts of ending rape to something that would actually end rape: targeting the only people who cause it.

More specifically, people rape because they are sociopaths. Telling them not to will be completely ineffective because they allready know not to. These sorts of people do lots of other bad things as well, such as stealing, assaulting, being ruthless etc etc, and telling them not do that is equally ineffective. This is not something that is just men, women do it to. There is no simple solution because that type of personality is deeply embedded in society, and while some aspects of it are despised, others are admired. What you want to do is eliminate anti-social behaviour, but are you really prepared for how broadly that would have to cut to be effective?

The best solution to a problem is prevention. One part of that is education, but an equally important part is personal responsibility in not placing yourself in a situation where it might happen, because there is no way to stop it without the sort of social engineering nomally associated with autocratic societies.

 

[violetblake]

More specifically, people rape because they are sociopaths. Telling them not to will be completely ineffective because they allready know not to. These sorts of people do lots of other bad things as well, such as stealing, assaulting, being ruthless etc etc, and telling them not do that is equally ineffective. This is not something that is just men, women do it to. There is no simple solution because that type of personality is deeply embedded in society, and while some aspects of it are despised, others are admired. What you want to do is eliminate anti-social behaviour, but are you really prepared for how broadly that would have to cut to be effective?

The best solution to a problem is prevention. One part of that is education, but an equally important part is personal responsibility in not placing yourself in a situation where it might happen, because there is no way to stop it without the sort of social engineering nomally associated with autocratic societies.

A lot of rapists aren't sociopaths. Rape is complicated, as I've said, it's not always (and in fact rarely ever is) a creepy guy who hangs out in alleys and you can tell just by looking at him he's a rapist. I completely agree that prevention is key in stopping rape, but preventing people from raping, not preventing people from getting raped. The only possible way for a woman to prevent herself from being raped is to never be around another person again in her entire life. Here's a recent article about members of the site reddit admitting to rape and explaining the situation. It's really interesting, and of course very disturbing. But you'll see the men and the situations are varied and it's probably not what you'd expect.

Rapists and would-be rapists are opening up about "the other side of the story" — theirs — on a massive Reddit thread about the motivations behind sexual assault. The conversations range from exasperating to disturbing, and the whole of it may make you want to roll your eyes in disgust. But you shouldn't dismiss the thread as mere rape apologia. There's plenty of that, sure, but there's also a lot more to it.
Yesterday, a Redditor solicited stories of sexual assault from assailants. "Reddit's had a few threads about sexual assault victims, but are there any redditors from the other side of the story?" he asked. "What were your motivations? Do you regret it?"

Given the disturbingly high amount of men's rights activists and rape apologist Redditors — a recent Reddit thread counted the many, many ways the site is "anti-women" — it's easy to see why some would be skeptical about the possibility for productive discussion. "In other words: Yeah, yeah, enough about rape victims, let's hear from the REAL VICTIMS here: the POOR MENZ," Shit Reddit Says lamented. A commenter added, "The thought that my rapist is PROBABLY a redditor and could very well be getting patted on the back RIGHT NOW by HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE for relating how rough raping me was for him is making me literally nauseous."

But it's impossible to talk about the reasons people rape without involving rapists in the discussion. Rapists aren't hiding in the bushes: around two-thirds of rapes are committed by someone known to the victim, and 73 percent of sexual assaults are perpetrated by a non-stranger. It's a mistake to think we're justifying rapists' actions by listening to their stories. Some of them are tough to read, but their brutal honesty illustrates how a lack of communication and education perpetuates rape culture. Ignoring or dismissing these men (and women) out of hand may be an effective coping strategy for a given individual, but not for society. It gets us nowhere.

So why'd they do it? What were they thinking? Here are some of the reasons why rapists said they raped or almost raped from the original thread.

(What they perceive as) mixed messages:

She ran to my bed and didn't want me to touch her. I didn't understand what had happened. This hypersexual person who had offered to give me head suddenly didn't want to touch me.

Or:

I was a freshman and hooking up with this girl who got naked in bed with me, then said no. I think she just wanted to do oral. I was extremely horny and already close to doing it, so I ignored her and did it. She realized what was happening and tried to clamp her legs shut, but it was too late and I was much stronger than her.

Or:

Sue had always been quite flirty, she was a cop's daughter and I feel that lead to her being a bit rebellious. I remember instances from years ago (possibly 8th grade or freshman year) where she would make jokes about different bras or thongs she was wearing, and was always freely talking about sexual desires and experiences. She just had this unusually sexual way of carrying herself, I don't know if anyone knows what I'm talking about, but she'd kind of leave her mouth hanging open/bend over quite a bit/almost unreal-porn star like.

Remember though, this was all happening in my high school library during study hall. Not a whole let ever happened more than some dry groping. I wanted to take it further though, she had really begun to turn me on...

Or:

I can't remember how it happened, but me and the girl (she was maybe 17) ended up play wrestling with me pinning her down. We were all laughing, but we when made eye contact...it was "that" look we exchanged. The.."I'd fuck you" look.

Now, I remember exactly what I was thinking at the time. This girl gave me "the look" earlier, she invited me into her bed. What teenage girl would pass up the oppertunity to be with a 22 year old guy? She MUST want it. I tried again, and slid my hands over her body.

Peer Pressure:

I got peer pressured in to hooking up with this girl. I kept saying I didn't want to and my friends kept saying I had to lose my virginity. They say this for about a week and finally new years come so I figured might as well. We are both completely wasted and go to a room. I was to drunk to get it up so I fingered her and ate her out but she wasn't really into it. So I stopped and then threw up all over her and I passed out. I guess she ran out and told them I raped her. She never said stop or anything but I could see how she could have froze up in fear. I don't doubt she feels molested and I feel like an awful person but it wasn't rape as SnugglesWithRuggles pointed out it was rape.

Women are objects for the taking:

Ended up happening again after a party. She was a good friend. I was drunk and super horny. I looked at her and knew I could never be with her. She had already hooked up with my friend. It was that feeling of never being able to do something, or have something. I looked at her and just saw something I would regret not trying for. So I thought if I could feel her I would know what it was to be with her. I grabbed her boob, over the shirt. I touched her lip and she moved her head. I stop dead thinking I woke her up, but she relaxed again. I started going upstairs but felt a sudden urge to lift her skirt. I ran my hand across her ass and between her legs. I was so drunk I turned on the light to get a better look, then quickly realized that it would wake her up and turned the light off.

Biology (The "I can't help my dick!" argument):

Most girls don't really understand how horny guys are, how much stronger guys are, how guys will rationalize what they do. I see feminists and women on the Internet saying that no means no and women should be able to get as drunk as they want and not be sexually assaulted, and I couldn't agree me. But the reality of the situation is that women have to be careful because guys are one way when they're hanging out and another way when they're horny or worse drunk and horny. That doesn't make what happened okay, but it is what it is.

Bad influences:

I was an extremely isolated youth who came from a broken home. My escape was the internet. At about sixteen I was exposed to alot of PUA material, which (not having a father or mother really around) shaped my life up until I was about 20. Most of the material was very objectifying and sexually aggressive towards women.

Multiple men said that they didn't end up going as far as they had intended once they actually looked the woman they were with in the face:

I'm a good man. I have a wife and a couple of kids now and I'm a good father and husband. I'm a pretty moral guy. But I think the thing that has always stuck with me...is how close I came to actually doing it. If I hadn't looked up at her face and seen what she was feeling, I might have continued. In my mind, at the time, she wanted it. I can remember staring at the ceiling while on the couch thinking "in a couple of minutes she's going to come out here and get on top of me."

Or:

...It was then I looked at her face. She was petrified. I at that point pulled myself together, rolled off her and apologized. My hormones were RAGING. I asked her why she didn't want to. I told her what I thought above. She started to cry.

That's arguably the most disturbing takeaway from the thread: these guys are so disconnected from reality that they don't even feel the need to look women in the face to be sure they're interested.

It's very clear that many of these people didn't feel like what they were doing was wrong because they didn't (and/or still don't) think of themselves as rapists. Rapists are the scary strangers hiding in the bushes. Rapists don't feel remorse. Rapists prey on pure girls, not sluts who show cleavage and want to fool around. Some even say that straight up; "I didn't want to be the kind of guy who pressured girls, so I said it was fine [when she asked if she could stop performing oral sex]," says a man who had literally just pressured a girl who had "always been quite flirty" to go down on him.

Many stories end with Redditors expressing how horrible they feel about what happened:

I have never in my life felt as shitty and depressed as when she told me that she felt what happened was rape. The depression made me have to drop out of school and go live back home. My parents thought I was gonna try to kill myself so I started taking medication and going to therapy and it actually helped a little. I'm over my depression now but I never, and will never, feel as low as I did because of that night.

I still think about it sometimes, and I feel terrible. It took a very long time for me to get over her. Dated another girl immediately after for many months, wishing it was this first girl the whole time. Then I met someone who really helped me get past her. I've never done anything like that ever again, and never will. I just wish I hadn't learned that lesson in that way, and that she had to suffer for it.

It's not hard to see why some people would dismiss this thread as a circle jerk of rape apologists, especially because some quality Redditors assured the storytellers that "it's not your fault." (This is Reddit, after all.) And certainly this isn't light reading for everyone. But I think it's a mistake to write it off. Charlotte Shane put it well in a recent essay for The New Inquiry on moving past rape by being able to talk about it in non-victimizing terms:

...our culture is unable to address rape with the sobriety and clarity the topic deserves because we are still unable to address sex with the sobriety and clarity it deserves. The contention that rape should be regarded as an asexual act has done nothing to remedy this. Nor will it. As activist and writer Wendy McElroy points out, "there can be as many motives for rape as there are for murder and other violent crimes … Rape is every bit as complex." Insisting that no rape is ever "about" sex but is rather about an individual man acting on a patriarchal mandate to sow terror by exercising "power" does a disservice to us all.

This sorry state of affairs should foster honest conversation, not suppress it. We should not be so desperate to establish the seriousness of rape that we stigmatize intelligent discussion of it.

(Emphasis ours.)

"Let me leave you with this message, you never know who someone truly is, so be careful," said one man who posted a particularly disturbing account of how he used to repeatedly rape women. "I'm going back to my main account to do normal reddit looking at cats and posting pictures of bacon, and I think it's kind of funny that no one will ever know if the person they're talking to on reddit, or someone who moderates their subreddit, is me on my main account... just food for thought."

He's right — not about the "be careful" victim-blaming, but about his multifaceted identity. We have to acknowledge that the people telling these stories and making these decisions are the men (and women) next door, not necessarily inhuman savages. Otherwise, anti-rape campaigns will continue to tell victims to dress and act differently as a matter of "prevention," college campuses will continue to report high rates of sexual assault, and people will continue to take advantage of others without even looking them in the eye while doing so.

Nothing will change if we discuss rape culture in a vacuum. Taking the discussion beyond that vacuum, however, means opening it up to a wider audience that isn't necessarily sympathetic. Reddit may not be the best place for that, but it's certainly a start — and that's important. It's in these less-protected, less-sacred spaces where the conversation is needed the most.

http://jezebel.com/5929544/rapists-explain-themselves-on-reddit-and-we-should-listen