firecat | rape, men as potential rapists, fear of

There's an Internet conversation about rape, one post about which is here.

After reading that post, I saw several posts in which a woman said although she intellectually understands that many women fear men as potential rapists, she doesn't have that fear, and she has never been sexually assaulted, either because no one tried or because she defended herself with words or weapons.

I'm really glad that these women haven't suffered sexual assault or fear of sexual assault.

But I don't understand why a number of women are apparently responding to this conversation by saying that they aren't afraid of rape and don't have a general fear of men as potential rapists. Do they feel they should be afraid? I'm getting the impression that they feel not being afraid of rape makes them weird. Maybe that it makes them unfeminine somehow? Is this because our culture sends the message that all women should be afraid of rape?

I'm also not sure what I think about the suggestion that a certain attitude or body language -- specifically, attitude/body language that shows a lack of fear -- can prevent an assault from happening. I think it can make a difference in some situations--maybe a lot of situations. (I gather that it's part of what's taught at self-defense classes.) But I don't think it's any kind of guarantee. I know plenty of people who have a "don't mess with me" attitude/body language who have been assaulted.

(For the record, I haven't experienced sexual assault either. I have feared it in a few specific situations.)

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At first, I thought you were talking about comments to that post, rather than separate posts. Then I read through my friends list and saw a number of posts in various women's journals, and realized that this was the kind of thing you meant.

But I don't understand why a number of women are apparently responding to this conversation by saying that they aren't afraid of rape and don't have a general fear of men as potential rapists. Do they feel they should be afraid? I'm getting the impression that they feel not being afraid of rape makes them weird. Maybe that it makes them unfeminine somehow? Is this because our culture sends the message that all women should be afraid of rape?

O.o

Sorry. That paragraph seriously boggles me. It also hits on a real hot button thing for me. I'm not sure I can be coherent about it yet. One part: people routinely use their own LJs to look at how other things (news stories, somebody else's LJ post, whatever) directly relate to their lives is a big one of them, but that lately a post ruminating on one's reaction to someone else's post is judged as off-topic if it does not conform to the parameters set by the original poster, even if that ruminating post is in one's own journal, which one presumably has so that one can ruminate sometimes if one wishes.

Your bit in the comments ("I didn't read that assumption in the post. I saw it as addressed entirely to men, and not telling women they should anything.") is what hit the button for me. The button is mine, and I own it, (says the Lioness with a wry grin), but I think there's something going on in conversations-as-aggregate I want to figure out. It'll take serious pondering, because it's connected to so many other things.

elynne's comment ("Mostly, what that post and most of the responses are doing to me is making me feel like an alien again. :P") resonates for me, though possibly differently than intended. It never occurs to me to wonder why somebody posts about their own reactions to something in their own journal.

There's a rhetorical trick (which I definitely DON'T think you're doing) where somebody "wonders" why somebody would post something, and what they mean is they disapprove. (In a sort of "I wonder why anybody would post that?" way.) While I don't think you're doing that, the speculating about motive gets my back up. ("Do they feel they should be afraid?" "Maybe that it makes them unfeminine somehow?") Maybe it gets my back up because it reminds me of people saying, "Why do you want to talk about that, anyway?" with a strongly implied "What's wrong with you?" Because maybe they want to talk about it to figure out more about what it means for them and to them.

Sometimes a person doesn't know stuff until they ruminate on it a bit in company.

Most of my ruminations are locked, these days, for reasons strongly linked to the "must conform to the configuration of the original post" attitude thing. So it's entirely possible I'm looking askance at what you say here for reasons that hadn't oughtta be brought in. But it's what I got, and here I am getting bold and commenting. I'll go back under my rock now. I miss the days when I felt bolder much of the time. But the widespread "why would somebody post X? Are they [speculation] or [speculation] or [extremely distateful speculation]?" is really grating on me on LJ these days. It keeps feeling to me like the complete inverse of consciousness-raising, if that ancient reference makes any sense.

I realize that you're just posting in your own LJ ruminating on your reactions to all these posts. Which is why I almost didn't say this. But it left me shaking, and I figured hey, I might as well get my guts together and say something.

Wish I knew a good way for all these things to get pondered. Maybe the way we're doing it is the way. Maybe reacting by wanting to hide under a rock is just my own personal problem. I dunno. But I don't wonder why they posted that way. What I wonder is why I don't have the guts to post. (And this just suddenly made a huge lightbulb go on for me about questions-heard-as-disapproval as it connects to disability stuff related to hearing loss, and I am going to have to go figure out a post about it. Huh! So thank you.)

I appreciate your commenting. I'm sorry my post poked your hot button. You're right I didn't intend to do the rhetorical trick of saying "I wonder" when I mean "I disapprove," but I see why my post could look like that.

I also agree with you that speculating about motive can be disrespectful or judgemental. I didn't intend disrespect, judgement, or "What's wrong with you?" but since it's easy to read speculation that way whether or not it's intended, I probably shouldn't have speculated at all.

I'm looking forward to your post.

Not sure it'll ever get made. As I said in a comment down the way, right now I just want to f-lock totally or, better yet, delete my LJ.

Am going to take some time away, and go breathe for a bit. But things just went cumulatively over the top for me, what with my reaction to a comment below, and

Eh. I do know that you didn't intend disrespect in your post here or any of those things. I really truly do. Thank you for that.

I go off to ponder. Or to not ponder. Not sure which I can manage just now. Lunch would be prudent, so I'll probably start there.

[hugs]

Riffing on what you said here. I miss a lot of these conversations, or see them only in bits and pieces, because apparently there's quite a large group of posters who are all on each others' friendslists, to which I am only connected via a few people. But your paragraph about "the inverse of consciousness-raising" made something go off in my own brain.

Just in the past 6 months or so, I've seen the OSBP flap, the RaceFail flap, and at least 2 others of roughly the same order of magnitude go by. I'm starting to wonder (not as a rhetorical device, but in the "hmmm..." sense) whether this largish subgroup on LJ might be suffering from a sort of collective PTSD, brought on by too many stressful conversations in too short a time period.

I saw something like that happen in an APA once -- there was one HUGE flap that got everybody wrought up, and then only an issue or two after that had mostly died down, there was a second equally-divisive one, and the APA never recovered from that one-two punch; a year later, it was effectively dead. LJ seems (to me) to share a lot of the social dynamics of APAs, so it wouldn't surprise me to find something similar happening here.

whether this largish subgroup on LJ might be suffering from a sort of collective PTSD, brought on by too many stressful conversations in too short a time period.

You know what, this is a REALLY good point. I don't know if the subgroup per se is suffering, but I know that some individuals are.

This. Some of us ponder better out loud.

rape, men as potential rapists, fear of

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