Meet the Predators (men need to learn how to recognize and fight rape culture)

[TeamsterDem]

215. It most certainly IS NOT the culture despite the fact that unfortunately it does happen

Look, you're trying to tell me what MY culture is, and I'm telling you that in most circles (admittedly not all, but most) rape is most certainly not condoned. I've heard the horrific stories about what happens to some women, and in fact my own sister was raped. But that alone doesn't mean that the "male culture" is one of raping women, as that would mean that nearly every man engaged in that behavior. I'm sure that's how you view them, but your view doesn't comport with reality.

One interesting way to describe it is how "justice" gets meted out in prisons. Typically sex offenders are the first in line to get raped by some other inmate, and prison rape is almost all about dominance and retribution for something (whereas rape-rape is about that, what I think is probably a mental deficiency, and I'd also imagine there's some weird sexual desire there too). So even prisoners - male prisoners - punish rapists.

I've seen a lot of things in movies that I don't automatically assume are as widespread as a movie would have me believe. Hell I've seen movies where a regular guy was made God for like a week or something, yet you don't see me thinking that's a valid option. I DO think rapes happen, otherwise I wouldn't acknowledge the incarceration numbers and the very good evidence suggesting it's probably vastly underreported. But until you can show me that men as a nearly unified group either engage in or endorse rape, you're not going to get much in the way of agreement out of me by telling me that my culture is anything other than what I know it to be. I've heard that fraternities are much more likely spots to find endorsement of it, yet I was a member of a fraternity and NEVER saw or heard of anything like that happening. That doesn't mean it doesn't happen, I'm only saying that if it were so widespread - what? - was I the luckiest guy in the world to pick the only frat - or one of the few frats - which don't do that? No, probabilities would suggest that while a very serious problem, it's not a cultural norm but is in fact a significant minority of persons who then paint their gender mates with a very disgusting brush.

With respect to the statistics, you're telling me that a statistical minority of a population somehow equals its culture? I don't know how that works precisely, but even your own statistics - assuming they're correct - show a minority figure for what you're claiming to be the majority/dominant culture. That doesn't make a lot of sense, and frankly it's offensive that you think what those cretins do is somehow reflective of what most men believe in.

We men have our share of problems. No doubt about that. But even your own "evidence" doesn't show a majority, it instead shows a minority for which you're now suggesting the rest of us have some sort of responsibility for or some affinity with. Moreover, I've seen numbers ranging from 30%-60% on students who admitted they'd rape a woman if they could get away with it, but I haven't seen any such number on men as an overall population, e.g. 18 and over. In another thread I supported the idea of teaching students about what constitutes rape, as I think students are an at-risk population owing largely to youth, the wildness associated with being away from home for the first time, and of course the worst factor: alcohol consumption. I'm in full support of a measure to teach both male and female students what consensual sex means and where the boundary is, but I do not agree that student populations are a good overall predictor for the rest of the gender, as the wildness associated with college doesn't share a large parallel in "grown-up" society (e.g. we can't party that much or we'd lose our jobs, plus as you get older who could deal with all of those hangovers).

Rape is rape, there's no better way to say it than that. So we could always do better to teach kids who evidently don't understand that concept (according to your own sources some 60% of the surveyed females said that rape after 6 months of dating would be okay, so both groups have some work to do in my view). Yet let's not be so quick to label everyone a rapist for as it turns out those who aren't absolutely hate it.