Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
History of Feminism
Related: About this forumWe must fight the voice that says: stay home, keep your legs closed and your eyes lowered
Its always sad to see young women become victims of sexual offences, wrote Heather Keating, the head of Hastings Police, on her Twitter feed on the last day of 2012. Dont Drink too much on New Years Eve [sic] and regret your actions! Theres a slim chance she could have been talking to men, telling them not to get drunk and assault someone, but thats not a message that law enforcement has yet managed to promote successfully in the 21st century. Sadly, Keatings meaning was as clear as it was predictable: women should take responsibility for protecting themselves from sexual assault because sexual assault is just a fact of life.
It was a good year for rape apologists in 2012. We had American politicians telling us that there is such a thing as legitimate rape, that some girls rape easy; we had a British politician telling us that date rape is simply bad sexual etiquette. But as Jessica Valenti wrote in The Purity Myth, being responsible has nothing to do with being raped. Women dont get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they werent careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.
Keatings words, by contrast, recall the depressing dogma of Constable Michael Sanguinetti, who told a group of female students in Toronto in 2011 that they should avoid dressing like sluts if they didnt want to be raped, kicking off the SlutWalk protests around the world.
Protection
Keating later qualified her tweet, insisting that I am trying to protect victims of crime. Undoubtedly she is. Structural sexism does not always come from a place of hate. When our great-grandparents generation urged their daughters to marry young or face social purgatory they thought they were doing so in their best interests. A hundred years later, when we tell our friends and children and younger sisters not to stay out late, not to walk in certain areas of the city after dark, and not to go out and get hammered in Hastings, we are thinking the same thing. We tell women and girls these things, not always because we secretly hate them, but because we care about them, we want to protect them, individually, from a world that we know isnt as equal as we sometimes pretend.
This is what we are fighting when we fight rape culture not just career misogynists spreading their bile over the airwaves like so much tacky mucus, but the quiet voice inside us that whispers, Not so fast. The voice that tells us that if only we stay home and keep our legs closed and our eyes lowered well be safe.
Unfortunately, however, rape culture gets you coming and going. It is precisely about fear, about creating a culture where women are afraid to participate in public life as men do. A life lived in fear of sexual violence, a life where you cannot take the risks that men take without anticipating physical attack or, worse still, being attacked and then blamed for it, is not a life lived freely. It isnt even going to protect you or those you love: in a recent study, more than half of all rape victims in the United States reported being raped by an intimate partner, a boyfriend, husband or lover. Most rapists are known to and trusted by the person they assault. Behaving responsibly is not, ultimately, any protection against sexual violence.
It was a good year for rape apologists in 2012. We had American politicians telling us that there is such a thing as legitimate rape, that some girls rape easy; we had a British politician telling us that date rape is simply bad sexual etiquette. But as Jessica Valenti wrote in The Purity Myth, being responsible has nothing to do with being raped. Women dont get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they werent careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.
Keatings words, by contrast, recall the depressing dogma of Constable Michael Sanguinetti, who told a group of female students in Toronto in 2011 that they should avoid dressing like sluts if they didnt want to be raped, kicking off the SlutWalk protests around the world.
Protection
Keating later qualified her tweet, insisting that I am trying to protect victims of crime. Undoubtedly she is. Structural sexism does not always come from a place of hate. When our great-grandparents generation urged their daughters to marry young or face social purgatory they thought they were doing so in their best interests. A hundred years later, when we tell our friends and children and younger sisters not to stay out late, not to walk in certain areas of the city after dark, and not to go out and get hammered in Hastings, we are thinking the same thing. We tell women and girls these things, not always because we secretly hate them, but because we care about them, we want to protect them, individually, from a world that we know isnt as equal as we sometimes pretend.
This is what we are fighting when we fight rape culture not just career misogynists spreading their bile over the airwaves like so much tacky mucus, but the quiet voice inside us that whispers, Not so fast. The voice that tells us that if only we stay home and keep our legs closed and our eyes lowered well be safe.
Unfortunately, however, rape culture gets you coming and going. It is precisely about fear, about creating a culture where women are afraid to participate in public life as men do. A life lived in fear of sexual violence, a life where you cannot take the risks that men take without anticipating physical attack or, worse still, being attacked and then blamed for it, is not a life lived freely. It isnt even going to protect you or those you love: in a recent study, more than half of all rape victims in the United States reported being raped by an intimate partner, a boyfriend, husband or lover. Most rapists are known to and trusted by the person they assault. Behaving responsibly is not, ultimately, any protection against sexual violence.
http://www.newstatesman.com/laurie-penny/2013/01/we-must-fight-voice-says-stay-home-keep-your-legs-closed-and-your-eyes-lowered
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
1 replies, 778 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (5)
ReplyReply to this post
1 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
We must fight the voice that says: stay home, keep your legs closed and your eyes lowered (Original Post)
ismnotwasm
Jan 2013
OP
historylovr
(1,557 posts)1. This:
Unfortunately, however, rape culture gets you coming and going. It is precisely about fear, about creating a culture where women are afraid to participate in public life as men do.
As long as this is true, we are not free. We are instead shackled by thousands of years of patriarchy that says if you're female, you're property, a sexual object. Subhuman. This must end.
As long as this is true, we are not free. We are instead shackled by thousands of years of patriarchy that says if you're female, you're property, a sexual object. Subhuman. This must end.