Sexual Politics

With everything seeming to be politicized these days, the allegation of rape is no exception. And it seems like everybody has either been raped lately or has raped someone in the past. It's gotten to the point where the word "rape" has almost lost any meaning.

Shia LeBouf: claimed to have been raped back in February at an art gallery while doing a living piece of performance art (and based upon the neo-liberal, very broad definition of what constitutes rape in California, he more than likely was).

Lena Dunham: claimed to have been raped by a Republican back in college, but has refused to press charges or file a police report; admits she never said "No", but was so high on alcohol and ecstasy that she wasn't legally responsible for her actions and was unable to consent (but was able to talk dirty to him).

Now we've got this situation with The Rolling Stone article which alleged that a co-ed was gang raped by a fraternity two years ago at the University of Virginia. The article resulted in the usual "rape activists" holding "Take Back the Night" candle-lit vigils and UVA took the huge step of suspending dozens of fraternities and sororities until it could establish new policies and sensitivity training to combat sexual assaults on the campus. But Rolling Stone has had to retract the story because they no longer trust the story of the woman making the allegations, many of which could have been dis-proven with the slightest bit of journalistic work. To say Rolling Stone's standards fell short is misleading; it implies they made an effort to verify the woman's story.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/a-note-to-our-readers-20141205

To Our Readers:

Last month, Rolling Stone published a story titled "A Rape on Campus" by Sabrina Rubin Erdely, which described a brutal gang rape of a woman named Jackie at a University of Virginia fraternity house; the university's failure to respond to this alleged assault – and the school's troubling history of indifference to many other instances of alleged sexual assaults. The story generated worldwide headlines and much soul-searching at UVA. University president Teresa Sullivan promised a full investigation and also to examine the way the school responds to sexual assault allegations.

Because of the sensitive nature of Jackie's story, we decided to honor her request not to contact the man she claimed orchestrated the attack on her nor any of the men she claimed participated in the attack for fear of retaliation against her. In the months Erdely spent reporting the story, Jackie neither said nor did anything that made Erdely, or Rolling Stone's editors and fact-checkers, question Jackie's credibility. Her friends and rape activists on campus strongly supported Jackie's account. She had spoken of the assault in campus forums. We reached out to both the local branch and the national leadership of the fraternity where Jackie said she was attacked. They responded that they couldn't confirm or deny her story but had concerns about the evidence.

In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie's account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced. We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story.

Will Dana
Managing Editor



You would think after the problems that Duke had back in 2006 with the false allegations of racially-motivated gang rape on the Duke Lacrosse team, that UVA would've exercised a bit of restraint. Instead, they plunged headfirst down the rape rabbit-hole and now have got to figure out a way to salvage their reputation after what they've done. One allegation from an anonymous source and they bring down the entire Greek frat/sorority system.

No man should be named in public as having been a rape suspect until after he has been tried and found guilty. Too often women are making false claims of rape and innocent men are having their lives forever tainted and tarnished by an accusation that can never be taken back.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

No man should be named in public as having been a rape suspect until after he has been tried and found guilty. Too often women are making false claims of rape and innocent men are having their lives forever tainted and tarnished by an accusation that can never be taken back.

This is utter bullshit. However, I refuse to participate in a discussion about rape and sexual assault on this forum, as I have a pretty good idea of where it would end up.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

No man should be named in public as having been a rape suspect until after he has been tried and found guilty. Too often women are making false claims of rape and innocent men are having their lives forever tainted and tarnished by an accusation that can never be taken back.

I find the wave of accusations against Bill Cosby to be alarming. It's not just one or two, I've run out of fingers counting them. But I don't agree about not being named in public. If charges are leveled against a celeb, even discretely, they will become public, by very nature of the celeb being sued. And some of these celebs have only themselves to blame for their bullshit behaviour.

And while I'm not putting the finger on Cosby at least for the time being...like I said, to have SO MANY women doing so is very unsettling.

bitchcraft wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

No man should be named in public as having been a rape suspect until after he has been tried and found guilty. Too often women are making false claims of rape and innocent men are having their lives forever tainted and tarnished by an accusation that can never be taken back.

I find the wave of accusations against Bill Cosby to be alarming. It's not just one or two, I've run out of fingers counting them. But I don't agree about not being named in public. If charges are leveled against a celeb, even discretely, they will become public, by very nature of the celeb being sued. And some of these celebs have only themselves to blame for their bullshit behaviour.

And while I'm not putting the finger on Cosby at least for the time being...like I said, to have SO MANY women doing so is very unsettling.

Well, the Cosby situation is different not only due to the sheer volume of accusers telling the same story, but he did settle a class-action civil lawsuit almost 10 years ago accusing him of sexual assault, which violates one of my cardinal rules about being accused of a sex crime: don't settle if you didn't do it. Never, ever settle if you are innocent. I don't care what my attorneys tell me, there's no way in heaven or in hell that I'd not defend myself if someone was saying something about me that wasn't true. So I have less issue with him being accused in public.

However, too often now men are being accused of rape, their names and faces out there in the media, then it turns out the woman lied, and the media then don't reveal her name or her face like they did the man. God knows I can't stand that reprehensible Florida State Seminoles QB Jameis Winston, but he's been accused of rape based on a very, very flimsy allegation, no investigations have turned up any actual forcible rape, and while his reputation has been put up for debate, this woman's veracity has been allowed to escape any media scrutiny whatsoever. While his face is the face of a rape accusation, her face is nowhere to be found. At the very least, the media should be barred from mentioning the name or showing the face of any man accused of rape until actual charges are brought forth.

And now we've got the man accused of "raping" Lena Dunham contemplating filing a lawsuit against her (I hope he does; more men need to fight back against these things) for libel.

When the rape case against the Duke Lacrosse players was not only dropped, but they were also proclaimed to be wholly innocent of the charges, did the media then release the picture and name of Crystal Mangum, with the long list of crimes she's been arrested for? NO! It wasn't until after she murdered someone a few years later that they felt comfortable showing her face and naming her as the accuser in the Duke case.

The pendulum has swung too far the other way on these rape allegations. We've become too coddling; too "understanding"; too "sensitive" to the point where nobody is asking tough, fair, investigatory questions anymore. The Rolling Stone article got through to publication because they wanted this story to be true in the exact same way they wanted it to be true about the Duke Lacross players: namely, that white men, in this case frat brothers, are the source of all the world's evils, and need to be taken down a step or two in life to make the playing field level for everyone.

I hope the fraternity sues UVA and Rolling Stone and bleeds them dry for every penny they can get.

Salomé wrote:

This is utter bullshit. However, I refuse to participate in a discussion about rape and sexual assault on this forum, as I have a pretty good idea of where it would end up.

Yeah, it could end up leading to a discussion.

This is a thread that's sorely needed, because sex today is about more than choosing scented oils and comfortable positions. You now have to navigate through a political, legal, and social minefield.

YES MEANS YES Bill:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/09/29/352482932/california-enacts-yes-means-yes-law-defining-sexual-consent
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/dec/06/shia-labeouf-art-show-collaborators-first-interview

Under the definition of that new bill in California, what happened to Shia Labeouf would now be classified as rape:

"Lack of protest or resistance does not mean consent," the law states, "nor does silence mean consent. Affirmative consent must be ongoing throughout a sexual activity and can be revoked at any time."


Then there's the stupid, silly stuff, like this Good2Go app:
http://good2goapp.com/

If I initially used this app to give my consent to sex, but then halfway through changed my mind but could not find my phone so that I could un-give my consent, can I hold Good2Go legally liable for my being raped?

I don't make the rules up, Salome; I just protest them.

One of the best articles I've read on 'affirmative consent', written by Wendy Kaminer on Spiked.

http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/affirmative-consent-a-crime-against-liberty/15985#.VISnfWe0udw

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Largo's Shark wrote:

One of the best articles I've read on 'affirmative consent', written by Wendy Kaminer on Spiked.

http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/affirmative-consent-a-crime-against-liberty/15985#.VISnfWe0udw

Yes, quite good. Your article linked to another great article:
http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/shia-laboeuf-hasnt-demeaned-rape-feminists-have/16284#.VISrMMm9ZmM

The articles made the exact same points I've been thinking for years now; or at least since Clarence Thomas was alleged to have sexually harassed Anita Hill, which is this: the meaning of the word "rape" has become so vague and broad, that any sex act, sex joke, sex hint, sex suggestion or regret the day after can be construed as rape. Or, as the article put it:

"What is really at stake here is the shift in the meaning of rape. It is not, as Morgan contends, LaBeouf who has demeaned the seriousness of rape. No, that has been accomplished by assorted feminist campaigners and activists determined to widen the scope of what constitutes rape. It is no longer simply an identifiable injustice punishable by law – rape is now often equated with anything sexually unpleasant. It is this that has diminished the seriousness of rape – the conflation of rape with almost any regrettable sexual encounter."

This is what has happened to GIRLS creator and star, Lena Dunham. She has sex while on drugs and alcohol...wasn't the heavenly experience she was hoping for....is told the next day by coworkers that she was raped...now believes she was raped because the sex wasn't as consensual as it could have been (but it wasn't met with any resistance either) ergo now she's a "rape victim".

I love it when these feminists start eating their own.

Sadly I know too many women who got sexually intimidated, assaulted and raped. One thing they have in common is that they blamed themselves for getting into the situation. Whereas they haven't done anything wrong.

A male friend of mine got accused of rape, his male and female friends crucified her for being a liar and a slut. Several years later when having too many drinks he confessed that he had his fun with her and that her resistance made the experience so much better. When I confronted him with it he and the male and female friends all said it was water under the bridge and it suited nobody dragging that affair up as it would only cause unnecessary grief to them.
I asked them about the girl, the general consensus was that she should not make a big deal about it and live with it as a lesson.

Any time I hear people these day deny rape allegations out of hand I remember this and not some vague story about made up rapes. Too many women get assaulted sexually and any form of excuse for it is just an okay for such behaviour.

As I said I have seen the scars due to sexual assault in too many women I know and have known, and there is simply no reasoning in the world that should condone that.

It is something I wish on nobody his/her female family or friends.

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Largo's Shark wrote:

Yes, we should all rely on personal anecdotes and not unreliable and subjective things like, I dunno, statistics.

I'd like to see the stats that suggest false rape reports are a statistically relevant occurrence.

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Salomé wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Yes, we should all rely on personal anecdotes and not unreliable and subjective things like, I dunno, statistics.

I'd like to see the stats that suggest false rape reports are a statistically relevant occurrence.

I'm less concerned with the statistics of false rape reports than I am with the sheer number of cases being brought forward that allege "sexual assault", "rape" and "sexual harassment" where the perpetrator is a 5 or 6 year old boy.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/12/sexual-harassment-6-year-old-dropped_n_4435382.html

A 6-year-old accused of sexual harassment had charges against him dropped by school officials embarrassed by punishing the first-grader for kissing a girl on the hand, CNN reports.

Hunter Yelton was allowed to return early to his elementary school in Canon City, Colo. and downgraded the accusations against him from sexual harassment to misconduct, CNN said.


I was watching CNN's coverage of Rolling Stone's retraction yesterday, and the host made sure to remind us that, even if the UVA gang rape story turns out to be false, 1 in 3 women are sexually assaulted on campuses every year. WOW!!!! Really????? 33 percent of women are getting raped at college? Yearly??? If true, then I've never heard a better argument for gender segregated schooling. We probably should be doing that already, but certainly if that many women are being raped. I mean, where did these statistics even come from? Did she pull them out of her butt?

I bring up the story of Hunter Yelton because it vividly illustrates how the government now tries to criminalize all aspects of human behavior, right down to the innocent explorations of children. And who has influenced the government? Who has advocated for policies that redefine what rape and sexual harassment truly are? Who's been at the forefront of broadening the definitions of sexual assault? All these new definitions and initiatives to keep kids (particularly women and young girls) safe hasn't offered clarity, it's simply muddied the waters and led to more confusion and it's led to an environment where an actor like Shia LeBeouf feels comfortable enough with the new definition of rape to suggest he's been the victim of it?!@??!!!

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Largo's Shark wrote:

   Today in California this would be considered rape.

From what I have read about this legislation, this is not accurate, as "non-verbal cues" are also acceptable.

Erica Ambler wrote:

All rape victims' experiences should be heard. Even Fey Weldon's:

Quote :

"Rape isn't the worst thing that can happen to a woman. Defining it as some peculiarly awful crime may even be counter-productive. I'd like to see it defused for women and deglamorised for men by returning it to the category of aggravated assault."

You are far more likely to get away with rape than with aggravated assault, assuming that the woman is not seriously injured in the process.

Anyway, I am going to bow out of this discussion as my continued involvement would lead nowhere good.

I think you're right, Sabs - this thread can only end in acrimony. The fact that this discussion is dividing along gender lines shows the difficulty. I've tried to quote women to offset that and here's my final attempt, an old NYT feature by Katie Rolphie. This passage more or less sums up my position:

Quote :

Everyone feels the weight of emotional pressure at one time or another. The question is not whether people pressure each other but how our minds and our culture transform that pressure into full-blown assault. There would never be a rule or a law or even a pamphlet or peer counseling group for men who claimed to have been emotionally raped or verbally pressured into sex. And for the same reasons -- assumption of basic competence, free will and strength of character -- there should be no such rules or groups or pamphlets about women.

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/13/magazine/date-rape-s-other-victim.html

Erica Ambler wrote:

I think you're right, Sabs - this thread can only end in acrimony. The fact that this discussion is dividing along gender lines shows the difficulty. I've tried to quote women to offset that and here's my final attempt, an old NYT feature by Katie Rolphie. This passage more or less sums up my position:

Quote :

Everyone feels the weight of emotional pressure at one time or another. The question is not whether people pressure each other but how our minds and our culture transform that pressure into full-blown assault. There would never be a rule or a law or even a pamphlet or peer counseling group for men who claimed to have been emotionally raped or verbally pressured into sex. And for the same reasons -- assumption of basic competence, free will and strength of character -- there should be no such rules or groups or pamphlets about women.

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/13/magazine/date-rape-s-other-victim.html

That is a false equivalence imho, since it does not take into consideration that - on average - a man is physically stronger than a woman.
So that is one factor that is not at play when a woman is trying to emotionally manipulate a man.
For a woman in the same situation, there is always the underlying threat of the man just taking what he wants if she does not surrender it willingly.

Erica Ambler wrote:

I think you're right, Sabs - this thread can only end in acrimony. The fact that this discussion is dividing along gender lines shows the difficulty.

How is this discussion divided along gender lines? I don't know how this happens to other guys. I have a sex life since 11 (solo) and since 13 with girls. I'm no Bond but I'm active and have had several female partners over time. None of them I'd have to feel uncomfortable about if I saw them again. Some of them I do see frequently. I mean it's not rocket science, if a guy isn't a total a**hole or one of the "daddy" kind who claim she wants it this way then you should be pretty safe fom false allegations. End of story for me. Really, if you do have a problem there you've earned it.

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