4/9/15

Today, we talked about an NY times article about ending rape culture hysteria. We talked about the various ways in which music and the media [etc.] sort of put a permission out their into rapists minds that creates a reinforcement to their behaviors. Because all rapists think other people are rapists, when they hear such reinforcements that are found in our rape culture, they can take this more literally than others do.

This article, had many good points yet I did not agree with it 100%. The article left no room for any "in-betweens". I believe that there are grey lines when it comes to rape, rape culture, and even how we deal with it. Therefore, the article was much too left-sided, with a lacking in the right-side direction.

In class, we always discuss how once you take the label off of rape, and only talk of the behaviors, than people will admit to rape. They do not call it rape, however. There is a sort of disconnect between the actual name, and the actual behaviors that qualify as rape.

Sexual Harassment:
Sexual harassment and sexual assault are two completely different things. There are many blurred lines involved with sexual harassment, maybe even more so than sexual assault. This is troubling because, maybe the blurriness of sexual harassment is spreading to sexual assault. It is interesting to think, "What gives people the right or permission to sexually harass, vs. sexual assault?". There is something wrong with the fact that if you get someone to say yes, no matter what it takes to get someone to say yes or consent to an activity. This is a very low threshold that many people play into. The NY times article says that it is ridiculous to blame the rape culture for rapists. Although the article has a point, that we should blame rapists for rape, rape culture certainly plays to the overall acts and decisions a rapist will make. Therefore, the article is not as valid, especially due to the amount of research we have done in this class thus far. We know too many statistics of rape, to believe this article is completely valid.

I believe we are still caught up in the idea that women should be held responsible for not getting raped, while we should be teaching men not to rape.

We also watched a movie of a women walking around the streets of Miami at night. The women was hit on so many times, and the things these men were saying and doing were absolutely unacceptable. Another video we watched was on cat-callers. A women would hand them a card saying why she did not appreciate such cat-calls. Some men apologized for their behavior, however many played the "freedom of speech" card. I do not know where these men got this inflated sense of entitlement. However, even though rape tapers off at around age 30, cat-calling does not [and nor does sexual harassment]. We decided that cat-calling and sexual assault can differ varying upon different environments and their sizes. For example, and environment such as work or school is confined, versus being on the streets and having no prior relationship to a cat-caller. Sexual harassment is easier to control in a smaller, and controlled environment. It is much harder to deal with in larger areas. However, there are still "permissions" to cross that boundary, somehow, even with the certain etiquette that exists in our society.

So, how do we raise the opportunity cost? We should not be afraid of the world, yet we should absolutely be aware of it. It is nice to know that you are paying attention to the world around you. We should train cat-callers somehow, to be less obnoxious. Even though these cat-callers are most likely not rapists, they are annoying as hell, nonetheless. We should also decrease the distance between hyper-masculinity, and hyper-femininity.