It was a steady drumbeat in the run up to the election last year and it continues. “If you’re really raped you won’t get pregnant.” “A woman’s body has ways to shut down so she won’t get pregnant if she’s really raped.” “If you hadn’t been in that bar you wouldn’t have been groped.” “If you hadn’t been dressed the way you were you wouldn’t have been attacked.” "If you just stay in the house with the blinds closed you'll be safe."
A girl passes out drunk at a party, comes to, discovers she’s been groped and that instead of interfering everybody stood around taking pictures. And where the hell were the parents of all these kids? I mean, do you believe everything your little darlings tell you without doing some double checking? This isn't the fifties. Ward and June Clearver aren't the ones hosting the parties. And what about the pathetic, almost criminal attempts to deep six the case because the accused were star athletes? And discovering that the rumors that the “rape culture” had been going on for years. Rape and culture. There’s an oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one.
Hearings are being held to investigate sexual assaults in the military and former Florida representative Allen West opens his pie hole to announce that if women weren’t in combat units there wouldn’t be a problem. come on Allen, the military isn't a treehouse where a club of ten year olds can just put up a sign saying "no girls allowed."
Conservatives claim that lowering the age for over the counter contraceptives will make it easier for sexual predators and pedophiles to prey on young victims. As if the prey getting pregnant even crosses the predator's mind.
I was born with two X chromosomes so I can’t really say what I’d think or say if one of those little buggers had been a Y instead. I’d like to think that if I was a man I’d be really pissed off right now. All of these statements seem to have one belly crawling assumption. That men can’t control themselves. That it’s somehow “normal” for at least some men to prey on vulnerable young women. That a woman in a bar or a party is fair game. That it’s boys will be boys no matter what the situation. Rape isn’t about sex it’s about control, power and when it’s used in war telling their men that “we control everything, even the women around you.”
And that was one (one of many) things that really ticked me off about last year’s Republican candidate for president. And his running mate. They both had a chance to draw the line in no uncertain terms when other candidates were offering their unsolicited opinions about whether a woman was “really raped” or not. And they didn’t. They had a chance to “man up” and they kept silent. And we all know the saying about silence and consent. Well, "gentlemen?"
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