My New Schtick - "Woman Hating Creep"

I just checked out my stats, in the wake of my post comparing the reactions toward child abduction and rape being tweeted by Lenore Skenazy (thank you very much), and found that I was getting a lot of hits from a post by Rebecca Odes at babble.com.  Rebecca does a great job of expanding on my point being careful to avoid the implications toward the issue of rape.

Ultimately, the reason I think we hold parents responsible when something awful happens is that it gives us a sense of control. When we look to the details surrounding a tragedy, what we really want to do is find out how to differentiate ourselves: I’m different. I’m smarter. This happened because the child’s mother made a bad choice, because he lives in a big city, because he wasn’t educated properly. Anything but the truth, which is that we are all vulnerable.

Yes, we are all vulnerable - women, more so than men, children even more so than women.

Looking at the comments, we see why I decided not to submit the post on FreeRangeKids.  When I typed the post, I realized that most people will spot the hot-button issue and become angered that I wasn't making it abundantly clear that I absolutely tow the PC feminists line. 

Commenter BunnyTwenty attacks me outright and twists my words around completely.  (The ability of some people to twist others' words around to paint them as straw-villains of cliched rhetoric is the primary deterrent for honest debate).  Don't worry citizens.  The culdesachero, with his skin of incredible thickness, is able to fend off such hateful, childish insults and dirty fighting tricks.  He has even foreseen such an attack.  Although, "woman-hating creep" came as a big surprise.  Don't tell Mrs. Culdesachero or I'm sure she'll ... well, she'll roll her eyes and say "Geeze, what has he said now?"

So, on to battle.  What does the ever so thoughtful BunnyTwenty say about our hero?

FYI: cul-de-sac hero isn’t the best guy to be linking to on this. His point, at least judging by other posts of his that I’ve read, isn’t that parents aren’t responsible for their kids getting murdered (not my opinion! his! his!), but that women ARE responsible for getting raped because of what they wear or how much they drink. I skimmed through his blog and he’s kind of a woman-hating creep.

Here we see the typical knee-jerk response that has been programed into most people these days from feminist (gender-feminist) indoctrination.  One inkling of the thought that women can do anything to raise or lower their risk of rape by their behaviour is seen as tantamount to excusing the rapist and  BLAMING THE VICTIM. 

My point was that it is completely hypocritical to blame the parents 100% for their choices that may have contributed in any way to something that happens to their child, even if it is the result of a deranged psychopath, or stand by while people make such claims, while you are not even allowed to discuss the choices that women make that may increase or decrease their risk of rape. 

Women are adults, and as such, are responsible for their own decisions about safety.  I have said this, and I will say it again, that a woman can walk around the street without clothes and it does not provide an excuse rape.  She can stand in a crowded room without clothes and it does not excuse rape.  There is no excuse for rape.  However, the behaviour she chooses sends signals to those around her.  She can draw attention from the wrong man and put herself at risk.  There are plenty of high risk activities that increase the risk of rape.  To deny this fact and prevent it from being heard, is to put young women at greater risk.  They must learn that it is not a good idea for a young woman to become so intoxicated that she blacks out in a male dorm.  They must learn and understand that some streets are not as safe to walk as others.  They must understand that dressing in a certain way attracts attention to themselves, which, although not dangerous under most circumstances, can lead some off-balance individuals to draw the wrong conclusion.

If we compare the rhetoric regarding rape safety to the comments and reaction about of child abduction, it becomes clear that there is a disconnect.  If you say that it is safe and reasonable to let a responsible, street-educated child walk 2 familiar blocks in a safe neighbourhood from his house to a pre-arranged destination in broad day-light, it does not follow that it is safe to let a child walk alone for two blocks if he has to pass a half-way house with known child molesters flanked by taverns, licquor stores and porn shops riddled with loitering drunks, prostitutes and pimps.  But if we applied the same mindset that is applied to rape, we'd say that the child should be able to walk anywhere and to say otherwise is to excuse the child abductor and blame the parents.  But, in the child abduction case, it is OK to blame the parents even if the child was doing something considered "safe" and reasonable.

There are some interesting  parallels between the nature of these two crimes, although, they are not identical. They both involve living victims (the parents are living victims in child abductions), they usually involve violence and they involve sex as the motive (although child abductions sometimes have other motives, such as ransom).  The last point is the heart of the matter for the rape issue.  Gender Feminists have sold the idea that rape is not about sex, but power.  Certainly, the victim feels a loss of power.  The power to choose a sex partner is central to the identity of a woman which is what makes the act so horrifying.  But, for the perpetrator, the motive is to gain sex.  It is a theft of sex.  Another similarity is that both crimes can be random.  This is the case of the relatively safe behaviour still resulting in victimization as in the sad case of Leiby Kletzky.  I'll reiterate Rebecca's point that we are all vulnerable.

Now, I'm still trying to figure out why Bunny thinks I'm a woman-hating creep.  Is it the last post where I pointed out how insulting it is to women to imagine that they are mindless slaves to advertising?  Or, is it the one about the Slut March in which I said I'd never carry a sign that might imply that dressing slutty invites rape.  Or maybe my anti-sexual harassment post.  I sometimes feel like most of my posts are about feminism, but reviewing, it only appears that roughly 1 in 3 have feminism as a topic, although it is my most used label.  Please keep in mind, that I love women.  I just don't agree with a group of intellectuals known as gender-feminists.