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Of course no one will think that same woman deserves to be raped just beause she was drinking but many will claim what it comes across you've been suggesting (most likely unintentionally), that she could somehow have been more responsible and thus prevented the rape from happening.
I understand what you've been trying to say but my experience is that it's not ambiguous questions that make the statistics bad, it's the fact that it tends to reflect what many people believe subconsciously.
My boyfriend has said the 'surprise sex' line to me and found it funny. I like to think it's just weird immaturity rather than any malicious intent on his part
because we don't read the mail?
Women seem to be glad. I am. Some of the ads aren't so great, because they suggest that the women in them are sexually promiscuous but the one of the bride is quite frightening.
However, the guys I've asked about it seem to say 'Oh, well she looks like a slag so she's blatantly up for it.'
Essentially, it seems to work for the wrong audience...
Do they actually say that, or is that your interpretation of what they're saying? Because (although obviously according to everyone elses experiences I'm positively sheltered) I've never met anyone with that attitude - so it seems unusual that all the guys you ask about it think they're all slags who are happy to be raped.
It's not an uncommon view from some people I know, I wouldn't say friends, but know. Though to be clear the arguement is that they would think they look like slags and therefore are always up for it. Not that they are happy to be raped - but that they couldn't be raped, especially not by someone they agreed to go on a date with.
I'd know plenty of people who (men and women) from all walks of life who'd think that once a woman's gone a certain way that 'no' doesn't mean 'no' and that she shouldn't back down.
Now i'd guess where that line is may vary (from she's made out with you in a club to your naked and cuddling in bed), but many people would regard it is alright if the man continued, despite her protestations because 'she's up for it' or 'she's led him on'.
I think its much more common than you think..
Rape and what constitutes rape has now gone almost to the point of ridicule.
Woman makes out with you in club, she goes home with you touching you in taxicab, makes out some more, she goes into your house, takes her clothes off, gets in bed then decides she is not 100% on the sex thing but does not say anything... thats rape now?
There is a certain amount of personal responsibility that women should take for themselves - not cry rape because she didn't say anything :rolleyes:
My view is very biased as i am a victim of a girl crying rape on me because her boyfriend found out about our one night stand, luckily it never got to court because i had 22 saved MSN conversations and texts saying she wanted sex.
I even said to her "are you sure" before we did it and she said yes.
It still makes me fucking angry to think that if i had not saved all that stuff i could be in prison.
Rape is a serious crime and a horrible act of violence but a reluctance to have sex and rape are completely different things.
Edit: The Ad campaign is stateing the bleeding obvious to any level headed normal man.
The laws on rape and most sexual offenses are pretty clear - you should be able to demonstrate how you judged that your partner consented to your sexual activity (whatever the gender for all the offenses other than rape). A woman getting into bed naked after making out with someone who then doesn't say she'd changed her mind isn't going to be considered rape. It's more likely to just be an unpleasant experience with someone who doesn't care about what they are feeling.
It's unfortunate that you had the experience you did, that's unpleasant and unfair - but hopefully shouldn't colour your view of the issue in general.
And to be fair, rape is sex without consent. Doesn't matter what the circumstances, what the level of violence is. If a woman if asking during the experience if she wanted to continue and would have said no, but because of the attitude of the man involved or the circumstances she was denied the opportunity to say no then that is almost certainly rape in this country.
And to be frank using a rolleyes symbol when talking about someone being raped isn't exactly a constructive tone, especially given there are many, many reasons a woman may not have felt able to say no.
Though to be honest I don't really understand why the law is so hard to understand - make sure what you do is with someone who knows what they are doing and is enjoying it with you, sadly this campaign is necessary and a good start towards changing the attitudes at least of younger generations.
I can't say I find that hard to understand.
People need to get away from the mindset that rape is dragging a stranger of the street at knifepoint, and understand that many (if not most rapes) are committed by men the victim knows (and may have known intimately beforehand).
The crap that happened to me will always change my view on the subject of people being falsely accused. Two friends of mine have been in similar situations but they were not as lucky, their names and addresses were printed in the local paper (the victim was anon.) and they had their windows put in.
Both women walked away with 400 pounds court costs.
Women crying rape does a lot more damage to campaigns like this because they have to repair the damage that these idiots do.
In defence of my ":rolleyes: " that was on the subject of people not taking responsibility for themselves rather than rape, but you are right as usual jimbob
I find it peculiar that watching something like Ross Kemp on gangs everyone in a particular group (probably 90%) would think rape is fine and women are just 'bitches' (unless ofc this is just the way its presented because of editorial bias) - whereas go to any of the places I've been (so middle class suburb/rural comprehensive school, university) and everyones attitude to it would be one of shock and horror.
But speculating on the reasons why that appears to be the case would land me in very hot water indeed
edit: regarding much earlier when I was saying how because of the shocking nature of it we can only really say one thing, but if you do a bit of googling you can find the other side of the story
I suspect that's because middle class suburbs and universities are thinking of a very narrow view of rape, ie dragging women off the street. However, I suspect if you asked whether if a woman was in pants and bras in your bed and you had sex, even if she said 'no' a fair few students would say that's not rape
The advert are challenging that view.
I don't think people are confused about rape. If she says no it's rape and that's that. Although what if the girl has no protestations but feels like she's being raped? What if they're both drunk and neither can remember giving informed consent? It's all a grey area. Remember the statistics - 97% think it's wrong to coerce a woman to have sex in any circumstance at all (doesn't say what the other 3% think is an 'ok' circumstance or even defining 'coerce' - is nagging your girlfriend when she doesnt feel up to it rape? or just being annoying?), from the same study that is proudly held as saying 50% of people think it's a womans fault for being raped if she's married.
What kind of person thinks it's wrong to coerce a woman to have sex in any circumstance, but if she's married and gets raped its her fault. A non-existent one, I would argue.
I mean, in GCSE science when I was doing experiments if results are not consistent we have to throw them out and do it again. Here, they just take a straw poll of people and ask them some questions that are - to certain degrees - open to interpretation and the results don't marry at all. Yet take the very worst statistics from that survey and just plug them into posters and put them up everywhere. It's well established the power of leading questions in manipulating the kind of answers you want to get and imo the results aren't in any way shape or form presented fairly.
There's lies, damned lies, and there's statistics. The problem is - say you have a medical problem you are expected to make an informed decision on what treatment you have despite not being a doctor or having had any medical expertise at all. So say you're the marketing manager for this rape campaign - you are going to google for the most damning statistics - because you KNOW (it's your job to know) that people are most likely to react to the most shocking statistics. Despite not being a statistician, or whatever, all you care about is the tagline.
Anyway, I'm getting too carried away. All I'm saying, is although this is a poignant issue, the agenda of this campaign is the blow it out of proportion and make everyone think about rape, not to present accurate facts (even if they have to make the implication that people / groups of people are ignorant).
One guy did use those words. But I think the feeling generally is just that if a woman puts out an appearance of wanting sexual attention, she shouldn't be so surprised when she gets it. It can't be unwanted if she's asking for it, basically is what they're saying, I think.
There are men out there that are confused about this sort of shit, if it makes them think about consent its a good thing surely?
I'm not sure she's wrong though - I don't think its all male jurors clubbing together in a 'lads club', but judgemental female jurors as well, saying 'I wouldn't dress like that and get drunk unless I was out looking for sex'. I wouldn't have thought that was too controversial and I can't see why people are complaining. Even the Jill Saward, after calling the comments 'completely destructive' then says "She might have a point about women - that they sometimes judge other women more harshly than men"
I think things like this need to be said - in that it's not just changes to men's attitude which is needed.
That said
I missed this at the time and that seems much more 'controversial'* to me
* and by 'controversial' I mean barking mad
Ah right I see. To be honest i thought the sexual jealousy thing meant - that the old feel jealous of the young and single, but I may have got the wrong end of the stick on that one.
Also I'm sure I'm not the only one who (in my pre-married days) came home with a girl, who was happy to do a bit of semi-naked kissing, but didn't want to go further. It seems she has a very narrow view of rape being by knife wielding maniacs dragging you off the street.
Welcome back btw :wave: I'm touched that I provoked you so much
And I'm not sure, sometimes I'm playing devils advocate, sometimes I do believe it, sometimes I think it's important to bring some balance to a discussion, so it's a tricky question to answer.
Do I have doubts about whether this campaign has been done in the best way? Yep. Do I think that the organisers behind this campaign might have selectively picked figures for their shock factors? Yep. Do I think this could paint a misleading impression of the reality of rape in the UK? Yep.
I have been quoting the same study that they got the statistics from for the campaign, and saying that the results seem to me to be incongruous. I can believe quite happily that 97% of people believe that it's wrong to coerce a woman to have sex no matter what the circumstances are. I have more trouble believing 50% of people blame the woman for being raped if she's married. Although, everyone has said that's just because I've not met the right kinds of people. But then I was confused about what kind of people think one is ok and not the other - it is the same survey afterall.
But then again surely the aim of this campaign is to get people talking about rape and asking questions, which is exactly what I'm doing.. so hasn't it been a success? Just because the questions I ask are based on my experience of people thinking rape isn't the woman's responsibility and this survey saying something completely different (rather than the usual knee jerk reactions) I attract your criticism?
It's like with baby P in the news, some people are trying (i wont say how successfully) to work out what happened and what can be done to stop it, but then others are just running around like headless chickens screaming about the depravity of it.
I think it's great that you haven't come across the mindset of people that believe that rape is a woman's responsibility but believe me, they exist. See Helen Mirren's disgusting comments for further proof. I think you're being hopelessly naieve in thinking most people have the same opinion as yourself.
I could indeed believe you, as evidenced by a number of people on these boards who would like to overturn a fundamental legal principle and are in support of assumed consent unless a proactive opt out has been actioned.
Imagine that applied to rape. The mind boggles.
:thumb: