No! For men, rape is NOT the default.

[Prism]

4. I think the culture introduces the idea later in adolescence

Especially where alcohol is concerned. I'm almost certain some of my then-friends were not taught that rape was ok. Normally, they'd treat people decently. But once we hit our twenties, and getting tanked on the weekends became the regular thing, there was definitely a shift in thinking among a sizable portion of people I was acquainted with.

Now, this is gay male culture I'm talking about. Maybe it's significantly different in straight male culture, but somewhere in the late teens or early 20s, the thought that drunken sex was a desirable norm arrived in a not easily dismissed segment of the male population.

I've gotten drunk (especially in my early 20s) and then found a guy with his hand down my pants (or more). Before meeting my partner, I had an encounter where a guy gave me drink after drink at a party. I collapsed into bed, woke up in the morning, and started wondering where my pants were. My friends? If I told them that, they'd say it sounded like I had a good time. Well, no, I remember face planting into a quilt and waking up pantsless.

But here's the odd trick of this thing. I don't actually think much of it. It doesn't particular bother me. I wasn't scarred. It doesn't haunt me. I never even think about it. My only concern was "Oh god, did we do anything unsafe!?" and then waiting on test results.

I'm not saying the behavior was ok because I reacted indifferently. I'm asking why am I reacting indifferently? Why do so many of my friends and acquaintances act indifferently? "Well, it happens sometimes when you're shitfaced, haha!" Why is that not a big deal? What part of the culture and expectations of male behavior have conditioned me and other males to not have any particular emotional response to those things?

And therein is the question and the problem. I honestly think there are a portion of males, conditioned somewhere in adolescent culture, who get it put into their heads that drunk sex with someone who is in no condition to consent is fine. Even if part of them knows what they're doing is shady and wrong. And that inculcation is so strong, that many of us males who are on the receiving end of the unwanted sexual encounter shrug it off, chalk it up to a regrettable night of partying.

There is something involved there, and I think that is what people are trying to get at when they talk about "teaching men not to rape." They're talking about a culture (and peer pressure) that plants this idea in people who did not have it before. That makes it seem desirable, acceptable, or even expected. I still see it in a segment of adult gay men. I was at a bar without my partner about six months back. I had been drinking, but I was not drunk. I was exhausted from a 13 hour shift. Next thing I know, a not-very-drunk guy had tried backing me off to a corner and started putting his hands in places. He'd misread my level of inebriation quite clearly.

It's a thing, Bonobo.