Sunday, August 30, 2015

Fading Pop-Star supports popular 'rape myth': Blaming the victim.

Clothes to be modest need not only to cover the body 
but also not to cling too closely to the body. - Cardinal Siri


Works for me.

Women who walk around drunk and provocatively dressed should expect to be sexually assaulted, Chrissie Hynde, the lead singer of the Pretenders, has suggested.

The former chart topper claimed in a Sunday newspaper interview that scantily clad women were likely to “entice a rapist” and that it is their “fault” if they are attacked.

She discloses in a new memoir how she was abducted and sexually assaulted by a motorcycle gang in Ohio in the early 1970s – but concludes it was “all my doing” because of the way she was dressed and the fact that she was under the influence of drugs.

She also claimed that pop stars who call themselves feminists but use their sex appeal to sell records were effectively just “prostitutes”. 

“If I'm walking around in my underwear and I'm drunk? Who else's fault can it be? – Er, the guy who attacks you? 
“Oh, come on! That's just silly." - Source

I totally agree.

A recent case featured on national news of a prep-school student claiming rape by an upper-class man - the details are rather complicated - the young man was found guilty of sex charges, but not rape.  She consented to meet him, things progressed, he claims to have decided against going through with consensual sex.  She claimed he raped her.  She lied about her age - she met him - knew there could be some intimacy - evidently some clothes were off?  Like I said - not sure of the details.  Point is, girls often put themselves in vulnerable positions - is it deliberate enticement?  Teasing?  Whatever it is, men fall for it.

Modesty and discretion is called for.  Women can't always cry victim.  Chrissie Hynde makes a good point - which is sure to get her condemned - if only by man-hating feminists and pop-star prostitutes.




And now, a word about sex abuse victims.


I also don't believe all the sex abuse victims who came forward to sue the dioceses were always victims - especially if they had been teen boys.  Call me Fr. Groeschel, but the poor old priest had a point when he indicated something counter intuitive to the current standards of victimologists and rape culture.

Asked if his work involved priests accused of sexual abuse, Fr. Benedict replied:
A little bit, yes; but you know, in those cases, they have to leave. And some of them profoundly — profoundly — penitential, horrified. People have this picture in their minds of a person planning to — a psychopath. But that’s not the case. Suppose you have a man having a nervous breakdown, and a youngster comes after him.  A lot of the cases, the youngster — 14, 16, 18 — is the seducer. - NCR
I posted on that here.

These ideas do not exonerate the perpetrator of course.  Nor is it always blaming the victim - there are often mitigating circumstances however.

Oooooohhh!





9 comments:

  1. I was apoplectic at Mass today. (OK, I hid it well.) A liturgical minister in her twenties was wearing a light-colored dress that was halfway up her thighs and appeared painted on. I'll use a cliché: it left nothing to the imagination of all the men who went to church with the intention of praying and worshiping. How uncharitable toward them, I thought. You're handing out Communion wearing THAT?

    The thing is, she dressed according to the world's standards for what is cool for young women today. The standard is based, I'm sure, on an idea of showing pride in one's body. But what it shows to me is extreme naïveté about men's sexuality--about how much they react to visual stimuli, much more than women. When girls from good Catholic families walk around in short skirts and hooker heels and no adult with sound judgment stops them, something has gone seriously wrong.

    I'm not touching the question of blame for sexual assault. I will say that just because a man is sexually stimulated, it doesn't mean he has to act on it. But young women's dress habits today contribute to a hypersexualized society. I know I'm going on with this, but you hit a nerve because of my experience this morning. I'm not a biddy, really.

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    1. There was a woman like that at Mass in my parish too - distributed communion as well. I'm not for blaming the victim and agree with what you say about men.

      It's a body culture - no doubt about it - there is a relationship to genderless issues as well.

      I just thought the POV of a former rock star was interesting considering Miley Cyrus is hosting the VMAs tonight. That should be salacious.

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  2. Here's commentary from another blog I read on the same subject:

    http://clevelandpriest.blogspot.com/2015/07/monday-diary-almost-excruciatingly-true_19.html

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    1. I like him. Thanks for pointing that out.

      His take is funnier - the heat and humidity shrunk their clothes - very clever.

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    2. He is a clever little bunny.

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  3. On a more sobering note, this story from Vatican News about rape in India's Madhya Pradesh state - 13 women a day - is completely different. The victims are oppressed:

    "Socially poor people are attacked for daring to violate caste-based social systems. "When a woman is at the receiving end even men remain silent fearing further backlash.""

    http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2015/08/28/rape_in_indian_state_much_higher_than_reported/1168072

    This is on par with Islamic terrorism.

    My apologies for having treated the subject so lightly as I've done in the cases cited above.

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    Replies
    1. The situations are very different, Terry. You were making a serious point about choices we make in our society--where we actually have a choice. Don't beat yourself up.

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    2. Thanks Maria - today has been like that.

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  4. "it is their “fault” if they are attacked"

    I cannot wrap my mind around this way of thinking, "she was intoxicated, wiggled her hips while wearing short shorts, therefore she deserved what was coming to her."

    Wow ... are there no men left with even an ounce of honor? Are there no men who despite being "turned on" by such a spectacle would instead take the high road, assist in getting her to safety and make her cover up? Or are men so weak that they let their johnson do all the talking?

    Well, with the anything goes attitude these days, many are excused into taking women "by force" cause to take a woman against her will, to force yourself on her, to hear her scream and wail ... well, she's really saying, "yes! yes! yes!"

    After all ... she deserved it by her manner of dress and behavior.

    What a sad mindset. A form of machismo at its finest and its ugliest.

    P.S. I have brothers who need to get themselves cleaned up due to their addictions but one thing stands in their favor, they have never tried to disrespect nor rape any woman as far as I know. Al contrario, they have come to their defense if some guy was bothering a woman.

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