Sunday, May 8, 2011

Realism vs Idealism

If I walked into the middle of an Al-qaeda terrorist camp with a mini skirt and high heels preaching Catholicism, chances are I'd be killed before I could even get to the preaching part.

I don't even need to go that far. Back when Road Rules was still on the air, one season brought the 6 strangers to Morocco. While there, one girl wore short shorts and a tank top to a mission, and was pelted with stones by the country's natives. It's inappropriate for women to wear such revealing outfits in that culture.

In those cultures, one might expect such treatment, and thus alter they way one dresses and/or acts. We change our behavior based on our faith in the people around us. Should we then, here in America, expect men to be ravenously sexual animals, and thus never consider wearing revealing clothing?

There's a whole of host of problems with that comparison. Some people, like the Toronto cop, seem to believe that rape is about sexual gratification, and an uncontrollable urge of men to descend on women like hawks. It's not. Rape is almost always about control. It's not about a man becoming so turned on by a woman's dress or actions that he simply cannot keep his hands off his date, but about a man believing it is his right to do with woman as he wants.

Has anyone ever done a research study on the outfits rape victims were wearing at the time of their assault? I'm willing to be that a majority of them were not in anything abnormally provocative. I bet a good amount of them were even in jeans. No matter what a woman wears, she is in danger of being sexually assaulted. And one outfit does not increase the risk over another.

It does however, increase victim blaming. In a study I did for a Psychology Research class in college, I asked participants to read one of 4 vignettes describing a sexual assault. The victim was either dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt or a short black dress, and was either raped by a stranger on her way home from a party, or by a friend whose house she had gone back to.

Interestingly enough there was no statistically significant difference in victim blaming between males and females. There was however, a difference in blame placement when given the change of outfit. In the date rape scenario, the girl is going home with the guy. Yet, if she does so in jeans and a sweatshirt, the man is a rapist. If she does so in a dress, the woman is an idiot.

I just don't get it. I will not expect to get raped just by walking out of my house in a skirt. I will not let people scare me into being fearful of men. If we want to change the world, it will not happen by telling women to dress conservatively. It will not happen by calling women sluts if they choose to do otherwise. It will not happen if we continue to lay blame on everyone and everything involved in an assault EXCEPT the man committing it.

If all those people who put so much energy into telling women how to dress and act, put that same energy into telling men how to respect women, maybe the former tactic wouldn't have to be employed.

Met a Slut Today? Don't Assault Her.

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