1 / 34
Mar 2020

Due to my profession and domains of interest, 95% of people, with whom I communicate on regular basis in real life, are guys (believe or not). Many of them are smart and capable for empathy; and yet, some of these guys surprise me by blatant lack of understanding how women feel about sexual violence.

This ignorance is manifested in different ways; for example, I met:

guys, who mix rape jokes with reality;

Obviously, I'm not against black humor in general. I'm also glad to mock on rapists (sometimes cruelly enough) by myself. Yet, I have to note, that jokes, which are mocking their victims are mostly primitive and monothematic: humorous part is almost always about "surprising" discovering, that the rape victim wanted it herself. But, anyway, I don't take it serious if a guy made jokes about rape victims once or twice randomly. I understand that people may laugh on stupid things.
From the other side, if a guy makes them too regularly or, even worse, if they are made in the context of discussing real sexual crimes with a real people, THAT causes me some questions. In these cases I start to discuss the topic further and often discover in the process, that a guy really doesn't fully understand why rape is a serious deal for women IRL.

guys, who mix porn and role play with reality.

Knowledge of these guys about rape is fully based on kinky games with their girlfriends and/or on porn videos they look, while they don't fully realize the line between these make-believe games and real things. You can discover that in the process of discussing different things, connected with real sexual violence, with them. A couple of times, after digging deep enough, I caught a guy on attempt to apply a cliche from rape porn in a reasoning about real life events. I confirmed my guess by asking: "Where did you get that idea? Did you see that in porn?". After guy answered: "Well... ahem... actually... yes, I saw it once...", I told directly:
- These videos are just acting. Acting!

And a guy answered: "Yes, of course, I'm not idiot, I understand". But then, he told things, which clearly show that he just thinks that he understand, but actually doesn't...

So, when I faced that, I tried to use two main strategies in attempts to knock some sence in their heads: a) Analogues; b) Personal experience.

a) When I tried to base my explanations of why rape is traumatic, solely on analogues alone, it didn't impact anybody much. Probably, abstract speculations, which are not founded on something more concrete, don't have enough strength by themselves to break through the wall of people indifference. I even feel to lazy to list the list of analogues I used... you can find examples in the Internet in feminist's blogs.

b) When I want to base my explaining strategy on personal example, I abruptly make my voice serious and tell the following story:

Sexual violence event (short version)

It happened to myself 15 years ago, when I studied at college, where some guys harassed me. I found them very repulsive and tried to avoid them, but one day they caught me. It happened after lessons, at deserted backyard of the college. One of these guys pushed me against the wall and touched all my private parts under the clothes, while his friends held me, made mocking comments and laughed. I still remember burning powerless anger, extreme sense of helplessness and even more extreme sense of disgust. That disgust was the strongest disgust I ever felt. It felt approximately like being tied up and get bogged down into liquid stinky shit with thick squishy white maggots, which cover your body, crawl under your underwear and get in all your holes...
After understanding, that I can't break free by myself, I started to scream (despite of quickly followed punches and attempts to close my mouth with threats). I was very lucky that a teacher managed to hear it and came to backyard to see what's happening. Don't know how far it would escalate otherwise.

I told it like a matter of fact, without moralization, but instead implying the position: "I told you how it truly looks and feels in reality without hiding anything; now do whatever you want with this information". And when this story was told in that way, face-to-face, with abruptly serious, firm voice (in contrast to my casual voice, when I talk about casual things), nakedly explicitly with all disgusting details, looking directly in the eyes of listener, sometimes it managed to make an impact!

Yet, the impact on different people was different.
  • When I told it to guys, who were my friends or had relationships with me, they were seemingly impressed and made very angry comments with toward these guys (some of them were almost furious and used a lot of obscene language). But more importantly, after it, I noticed shifts in their attitude toward rape-related topics (the shift was bigger or lesser, depending on the person, but not zero), to my great satisfaction (I didn't even hope to make such an impact, to say honestly).
  • I also told it to one guy, with whom I didn't have relationships, just sex, in responce at his suspicious joke (?), which was something like "Why are you afraid of being raped? Knowing you, you'll like everything anyway" (don't remember his words exactly, it's their approximate meaning). I decided, that this was too much. So I answered sharply: "Oh, no, it's super-easy to do something, which I will not like" and told that story. Probably he didn't expect such serious answer to his trolling, so he became silent for awhile, and then told: "I'm sorry". I don't know if anything in his mind changed after it, because I didn't see him since then. But at least, he learned, how does it look like from my side. (sigh)
  • When I told it to people, indifferent to me, they weren't impacted at all. Instead they answered with cliched absurd things like: "You provoke them" or "They just flirted with you". In responce, I asked "How is it even possible to provoke people by clearly trying to avoid them?" Or "How is it possible to not see a difference between friendly flirt and clearly violent actions?" these people just ignored it, rolled their eyes and told that I'm wet blanket, who takes everything too serious. These times I totally failed to convey my experience and felt like I tried to talk with the wall.

So... I can conclude that:

0) Direct pointing out that guy lives in imaginary world of porn and kinky games, doesn't work;
a) Analogues don't work (at least, in the way I used them);
b) Telling about personal experience works, but ONLY with people who feel empathy to me personally (and are capable of empathy in general). Especially if they see contrast between my positive attitude toward normal sex and disgust to clear rape.

Small note about the grey area

Of course, I'm totally aware that there is a big grey area between rape and consentual sex; yet, comparing things from the opposite sides of this spectrum (100% consentual sex and 100% rape), you can be more expressive by the biggest contrast.


I also want to say about ways of "explaining" harm of a rape, which I NEVER want to use:

c) Trying to forbid all rape jokes and all talks about it except condemning rapists. It's ridiculous. You can't just make shut up everyone who tells things you don't like. Not even mentioning my hate toward censorship in general.
d) Trying to directly moralizing or/and make hysterics. Nobody will take hysterical screams like "How can you say such a horrible things?! How dare you! Shame on you!", serious. People will just roll their eyes (understandable).


So... any thoughts, how else can I explain, that the water is wet, and the skies are blue, to guys around? :joy:


P.S. Some additional thoughts and notes bout unhealthy depiction of sexual violence topics in fiction
  • First of all, I don't take blatant porn with rape seriously (despite of the fact that it can disturb me, if it's really cruel). As I told, I see much bigger problem in people, who can't draw a cler line between that acting and reality. I.e. in lack of critical thinking... and lack of thinking about serious things in general.
  • I feel very irritated, when author of fiction writes about rape seemingly without having any idea what they're writing about. For example, when relationships, started by rape, eventually turn into happy aliance, full of hearts, sparkles and butterflies.
    I can believe that highly unhealthy relationships between rapist and victim are possible under some specific circumstances: for example, if the victim's mental sphere is already mutilated by previous bad events and/or if she is currently in desperate position, or if events happen in society, where women are considered like a things, belonging to men, and thus can't choose the partner by themselves. Obviously, all these cases can't lead to anything but mutilating woman's emotional sphere further...
    But love and hapiness? I see no way how relationships with rapist can they lead to this. Makes no sense to me.

Once more: I don't think that it should be forbidden or anything like that. I just wish people would become smarter and start to understand that it all is bullshit.

UPD: The purpose is not to explain rapists that they shouldn't rape. :joy:

Or how we say in Russia

It's to make normal guys feel why sexual violence scares women so strongly, and let them understand better what women feel because of these things. I want to make guys around me understand women's problems better in general and take them more seriously for a simple reason: just because I am a woman myself.

  • created

    Mar '20
  • last reply

    Mar '20
  • 33

    replies

  • 1.8k

    views

  • 12

    users

  • 65

    likes

From JUST a dark humor aspect, the intrinsic logic problem comes into play with the idea that going outside moral lines are exactly what the dark humor is aimed at. It's meant to be offensive or over the line.

Individually, everyone can set their own lines that shouldn't be crossed but those lines are exactly what dark humor is meant to dance with.

You can "explain" all you want... It's not really an information issue for the most part.

Cannot make person empathize with rape victim if person has never felt powerless or objectified in their life.

I read somewhere that the reason guys don't get it is that they have never felt physically intimidated before. Men in general, even old men and trans women who used to be men are way stronger than women. Men don't have to worry about a woman assaulting them unless they're especially physically weak for some reason or the woman has a gun. In the latter case I assume they can still be overpowered in the right circumstances. Women are biologically more cautious just because they can easily be overpowered physically so even women who have never experienced assault are more alert in certain situations.

I remember someone saying that they realized a TV show was written by a man when two ladies in a car in a dark parking lot left their car to angrily confront someone in another car. As I woman I have to agree this is a terrible idea, but a man might think it's a reasonable thing to do just because they can handle it better.

In conclusion, yeah I get it's hard for some people to put themselves into that headspace. If they're really being assholes though maybe they're just bad people. I feel like it's rare for people to be like this, but I do know it's common in certain work environments because it's sort of become part of that particular place's toxic culture.

The thing I think some good hearted guys miss is that girls are often looking for signals. You can't just ask a guy 'hey, are you going to rape me' or 'if I tell you somebody who you like made me uncomfortable or attacked me, will you take it seriously'

I think a lot about guys who get confused when girls who are clearly looking for a hookup get put off by a guy being direct, but I think this is often what's at play. Does this guy respect boundaries. Does this guy listen when I say stop. Ignoring conversational boundaries doesn't make you a rapist, and being a gentleman doesn't make you safe, but sometimes it's the best you have to go on.

So guys, when you make rape jokes, I'm not just thinking they aren't funny. I'm taking notes in the horrific mental calculation most girls I know carry of who to be alone with. Who I can trust if I get attacked. Who would listen and help protect me, and who would tell me it's not a big deal, I'm probably imagining it, it's fine. And this isn't just gendered. There are male rape victims trying to figure out who they can talk to and who will treat their experience as a joke, and women who dismiss scared women.

Almost every guy says he takes real rape seriously, that he'll stand up for women if they're in danger, but in my experience the guys who actually do? They aren't the guys who make rape jokes.

This.....people need to be more aware of this.

Rape is a crime then it's bad. That's it.

And about personal experiences stories and all this stuff, those things don't touching me and can't change my mind on any subject, if say seriously.
Because my own life is a never ending bad experience (sometimes violent) with whole world is against me or at best it doesn't cares about me, so why I should care about others and their experiences in advance? Call it lack of empathy or whatever, I'm fine with this anyway : P

Sorry about what happened, it disgust me the fact that this kind of human beings exist.

Unfortunately, if you teach a criminal that making a crime is bad, it doesn`t mean they will have a change of heart. Probably they already know it is bad.

Truth is that different people have different degrees in empathy. Some may be moved by your story and be more careful, others may try to downplay the pain or even justify it. The problem is not that people don`t know rape is bad, most of the time the problem is that they dont care.

At least their answers can reveal many things of their true character, so you can at least know whom you should be away from.

Why is this a male thing though, women are far more terrifying given the stigma around it and I personally nearly got attacked by one who told another women she preyed on she "wanted me" and i'm still terrified to this day what the hell she was planning. People laugh it off when you talk about a female predator and act like its funny or not as serious and its underrepresented in reportings of crime statistics. Should be analyzed regarding both sexes because women are seen as pure and harmless especially if they're lgbt with regard to what happened with me.

Me feel there are no taboos in comedy and that it still possible to make light of horrible things that you have personally experienced.

@skicoak I see what do you mean.
To show more clearly, why such doubts appear, let me provide an example of the last case, when I doubted, was it JUST humor or not quite. :thinking:


Once I discussed variety of things about society problems with my ex, and the subject of sex workers came up. Among the other things, I noted that prostitutes are very vulnerable part of society, both because they're despised and considered as "less humans" by many people, and because their work is illegal (in our country). I told, that when a prostitute comes to the home of a client, she has increased chance to be robbed, beaten or raped.
The guy told in response: "What do you mean by "rape" a prostitute? To fuck her and not give her money after it? :smile: "
I had doubts, is it joke or not, because, as I already noted, dehumanizing sex workers is common. So I just looked at guy, trying to understand if he's serious or not.
He asked: "What now? Why are you looking at me, like I told something stupid?"
I told: "Because you really told something stupid".
After uneasy pause, I started to explain him the difference between sex for money and rape.
He told: "Yes, yes, I see. I was just joking, don't take it too serious".


If he would talk that it was a joke immediately, when he saw my reaction, I would not even remember this case. But these pauses made things look less than a joke and more like he told something between joke and what he really thinks and waited for my reaction, to turn it into more joke or less joke accordingly to it.
Of course, it's more than possible that all what I wrote is overthinking, I took his reactions too seriously and annoyed him by explaining him things he already understands well. :nerd: But if I have a suspicious, I think I'll better explain just in case... I don't think it caused him (or any other people in similar situations) any problems, except that they'll think that I'm tedious and take some topics too serious.
But I think I have a right to overthink this topic sometimes, considering my background :stuck_out_tongue:

Uggh.
Surely, cases of female harassment also worth to be taken seriously. It's annoying to hear that people mocked on you, when you felt so bad, instead of trying to understand you and to do anything about that girl. I don't talk on topic of harassment, made by females, just because I personally don't know much about this topic and didn't face it in my life. NOT because I find it unimportant or something.

ok whoever said this really needs to get their head cracked. Men are phisically intimidated constantly in highschool, the scrawny kid who gets picked on by the jock, or with teachers.

hell there is a video of a female teacher picking up a small kid by the neck and chastising him.

also here's a shocker about half of rape cases are men victims, wanna know why?
prison rape, yeah men get raped just as much as women, the diffrence is society dosen't accept it and dismises it cause men are stronger than women.

like you are doing right now actually

sounds like he was making a joke and it fell flat, it happens from time to time, I think you are looking to much into it or you thought it was in bad taste which is ok, though saying he doesn't empathise with rape victims is kind of reaching.

to me at least

Haha. Of course, I'm not going to go and tell "rapist, don't rape!" to the criminals. :grin: I'm more than aware that people, who do sex-related things by force, understand only a language of force by themselves. What I'm trying to do is to talk with normal guys, who have lack of understanding on this topic (see the update of the main post :joy: ).

That's why I want to make them care in a bit more degree.

that's literally misandry, what the heck?

look if women are living in fear 24/7 cause a guy might rape them then that says more about the woman who equates all males are rapists

look rape is horrible but let's not turn the coin like this and blame it all on men, and fear monger like this, it's not helpful and the only thing your gonna achieve is to disenfranchise 50% of the world population for what 1% does

@33rdCenturyCaveman @IdiotWithPencil Rate between men's and women's chances to be an object of violence are all relative and depends on particular men and women and particular society.
It's just... particular guys around me never were in jail or in any other places, where they could experience a "joys" of being harassed or raped. I can't tell about the whole society.

Sorry, didn't understand what did you mean here.

Me not blaming all men. But when women disguise themselves as men, one thing they notice is how much more personal space they get as men, even very effeminate ones.

well I can affirm that here in Mexico it's worst like hella worst than in Venezuela XD

Venezuela rapist would go to court with black eyes and broken bones cause the police would break them and the prisoner would destroy them.

we hate rapist like crazy, and we as a culture disown any rapist, though we will make rape jokes and laught at the victims if we find it funny. we will laugh whill buying a bat to break the legs of the rapist