Rape Culture vs. Chivalric Code

It seems harder to get Feminists to challenge their belief in Rape Culture and Patriarchy than it is to get a devout theist to question the existence of perfect beings capable of creating imperfect worlds and then abandoning the inhabitants to go it alone. Both usually come by their beliefs through indoctrination and intense psychological abuse. Religious people are indoctrinated in churches, synagogues, temples and mosques. Feminists receive their beliefs from government institutions called schools.

Both groups have unfounded beliefs and customs that seem bizarre to the uninitiated. Religious people believe that they must adopt certain formalized manners of dress and behaviours as dictated by the leaders of their faith. Feminists have no formalized codes of dress, but many have fashions that could be described as counter-cultural identifying their members through rebellion against perceived oppression. Feminist orthodoxy states that adherents must believe that women are oppressed by the Patriarchy. This Patriarchy is not indestructible, but, it is enduring, ever-present and oppressive, a bit like the omnipotent beings believed to exist by many religious people.

Well, I am not trying to draw comparisons to famousphilosophers, but, this has to be said:

The Patriarchy is dead.

How do I know that Patriarchy is dead?

Women can vote.

Women can own land.

Women can hold positions of political power.

Women can work anywhere.

Women can start businesses.

Women can hire people.

Women can fire people.

Women can marry a man and keep her original name.

Women are not considered property.

Women can divorce their husbands.

Women usually have custody of children after a divorce.

All of these things were not true under the patriarchy. Today, women have equal or greater rights in every modern Western country. Due to intense indoctrination techniques feminists still believe that patriarchy exists, despite the evidence to the contrary.

Another odd belief related to Patriarchy, Rape Culture. Oddly enough, I’ve never seen it. Somehow, these feminists have grown up in another culture within the same culture in which I grew up.  I grew up in a culture of chivalry. There was nothing rapey about the culture in which I was raised. The rape narrative went something like this. If a member of your family was raped, your whole family was destroyed and shamed. You failed to protect her and you must avenge the act to achieve justice.

Here are two examples of common narratives of this culture:

1. A girl is raped. Her brother kills the rapist. He now lives in jail where he is regularly raped by the scum of the earth who also reside there.

2.  A father dies in jail where he was spending time for fighting. His last words to his son are that there is no honour in fighting and it shows more character to be passive. His son lives by these words, but, this perceived cowardice means that worthless thugs believe that his girlfriend is unprotected. He becomes enraged when he discovers she’s been raped and realizes that his ethos must be adjusted in certain circumstances and enacts his revenge.

How is rape excused in this culture? Did I miss something? I find this behaviour rather chivalric.

Feminists in this case are kind of putting the cart before the horse. They assume that rape exists because it was allowed by society. Well, this is completely backwards. Rape has always occurred since the dawn of humanity. As society became more civilized, it began finding ways to reduce the risk of rape, first, by civilizing men. Institutions like marriage were developed to protect women from opportunistic men. Chivalrous knights and later security forces, police and courts were formed. Of course, incest and other types of rape still occurred, but, as society became aware of more types of rape, and more techniques were invented to prevent rape more efforts were put forth to stop it.

The risk of rape is reducing as time and civilization progresses, much like the risk of being eaten by predatory animals has been all but eliminated. Every decade, fewer and fewer lives are lost due to predatory animals because we are dealing with the problem with increasing knowledge and techniques. 200 years ago, the land where I live was populated by bears, wolves and probably other predators that caused the residents a certain amount of realistic fear. These days, people react with hysteria when a coyote approaches their pet dog's kennel. The risk has been largely, but not totally, reduced due to the increase in civilization. If you were to say that coyotes attack dogs because society allows it, I'd say you're attributing a little bit too much power to the organs of society. We are trying to deal with coyotes, but, dammit, those creatures are wily and their nature makes them much more difficult to eradicate than wolves were.

If you don't believe that society is dealing with rape better than ever, look at the amount of furor and the level of punishment leveled for the Stubenville assault case.  If this type of assault is treated with every bit as much outrage as a brutal, traditional rape, we must realize that the world is much nicer than at any time in the past. Mind you, the publicity of You Tube makes this case unlike any other in the history. The outrage over rape is actually increasing even as the expanding definition of rape makes the crimes covered by the term less extreme and traumatic.

It doesn't matter if the rapist is the Gattlin boys in the Kenny Rogers tune or football players, rapists are considered the lowest form of criminal.

A burgeoning Rape Culture (later snuffed out by Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little)