Rape and Slut-Shaming: Feminism's Biggest Hypocrisy

Let's play a little game I remember from watching Sesame Street as a kid. It's called One of These Things is Not Like the Others:

"Just moved into a bad neighborhood? Invest in a good lock, and use it. Wouldn't hurt to get a dog or install a security system, either." 


Wow, great advice, thanks.


"Want a nice stereo for your car? Think about getting one you can remove from the dashboard and take with you when you park your car. And don't forget to stow any valuables out of sight."


Good idea.


"Cars these days have chips installed in the ignition keys. They're super-expensive to replace, but the car won't start without it--a great theft deterrent."


$50 well spent, in my opinion, if it means my car will stay where I left it.


"Heading to the convenience store at night? Those places usually have lots of windows for a reason--it's a good idea to check out who's inside and what they're up to before you go in. Better to err on the side of caution than end up walking in on the middle of a robbery in progress."


Hey, I never really thought about that, but it sounds smart.


"Same goes for using an ATM--always check out who's hanging around, and once you've got your money, stow it and move along ASAP."


Oh, totally.


"Drive defensively. There are plenty of crappy drivers around, not to mention drunks. You don't just want to avoid causing an accident, you want to avoid being involved in one someone else causes."


You're right.


"Phishing scams are big money for fraud artists these days. No matter how legit an email looks, never give out personal info, or use the provided link to do it--always log into your bank's website or your paypal account the usual way."


Only common sense.


"Never buzz someone you don't know into your building. Not even if they claim to be a resident who's lost his keys--if he is, he can contact the landlord."


Yeah, no need to make it easy for burglars to get into the building.


"Oh, and if you want to avoid being raped, you should not dress like a slut. Especially if you're going to a party and there's going to be guys and drinking or drugs. I know you want male attention, but when you seek it out by dressing a certain way, you're can't control whose attention you're attracting--rapists or decent guys."


OMG! You slut-shaming, victim-blaming pig! How dare you tell me how to dress? You should be telling men not to rape women! How a woman dresses has NOTHING to do with rape! Little old ladies get raped! Rape is about power, not sex! I can dress however I want and I should be able to be safe from rape! Telling women they should behave in certain ways to prevent their own rapes is like saying that getting raped is their fault!!! Are you saying if I wear a short skirt I was asking for it??!!! ARE YOU!!???

Did you all spot it? If you need to go back and read through it again, go ahead, I'll wait. If you need help figuring it out (many women seem to need help understanding this kind of thing), all of the quoted bits in blue are advice you might get from a parent, a concerned friend or the police on steps that you, as an individual, can take to minimize your risks becoming a victim of a crime or catastrophe. The typical reactions to this advice are in red.

See it now? No matter what the crime is--whether it's burglary, robbery, fraud, theft, mugging, drunk driving, or sexual assault--there are measures an individual can take to minimize their risk of being victimized. Not only are people willing to spend money on security measures to protect their valuables, they take no offense when concerned individuals educate them on how to avoid being targeted by criminals, or how to make themselves crime-proof enough that a criminal will choose someone else.

Except rape. A woman who reacts benignly at the suggestion that she not walk alone at night in a certain neighborhood to avoid being mugged will often rail against any suggestion that she enact the exact same cautionary measures in order to avoid being raped. She'll insist that any suggestion that she act in the interests of her own safety when it comes to sex crimes is tantamount to blaming victims and shaming sluts. While she can reconcile the notion that locking your doors does not make a burglar any less a criminal, while she can understand that recommending people protect their property will not encourage society to stop taking burglary seriously or place any blame on victims of burglary if they slip up and forget to turn the deadbolt...when it's rape? Don't anyone even hint that women could take steps to minimize their risks, because that's blaming victims in advance for being raped.

Whaaaa??

So why does this bizarre logical disconnect exist in women? Why do we, as a society, treat rape as a "special crime", one that requires extra-sensitive dialogue, tiptoeing around reality, and an acceptance that the entire onus for preventing rape be placed on rapists, bystanders, popular culture, movies, comedians, and pretty much everyone other than potential rape victims?

The slut-walk, an exercise in pointless bullshit and the dumbest protest ever, tells you everything you need to know. Hordes of mostly young, mostly white, mostly middle class women marched in anger over the slut-shaming, victim-blaming mentality of a Toronto police officer who had the audacity to suggest that women who dress provocatively are at a greater risk of rape. Granted, his wording was tactless and overly blunt, but the knee-jerk reaction to it was telling indeed. The problem feminists seem unable to grasp, however, is that the march itself--as a response to rape-prevention advice--represents one of the deepest hypocrisies of feminism:

The idea that rape is the most horrible, despicable violation anyone can commit against a woman, but that women should never be shamed for being promiscuous.

Think about it. Suspend your emotional center for a moment and read the following with the most logical frame of mind you can muster.

Rape is the unwanted and forcible version of an act women by the millions happily consent to every day under other circumstances. In ~80% of cases rape involves only as much violence as is necessary for a rapist to subdue his victim, and the majority of the time does not result in serious physical injury. Barring the rare severe injury, and the even rarer death, rape's long-term physical consequences (pregnancy and STDs) are largely mitigated by modern medicine.

Yet rape is seen as a greater violation of a woman's bodily autonomy than being severely beaten, which is horrible and a crime no matter who's doing it to you, can lead to life-changing physical consequences like broken bones, spinal cord injuries, paralysis, brain injury, months or years of physical therapy, and, well, serious risk of death.

Why?

Because despite the sexual revolution and despite (and because of) feminism, when it comes to rape women are still living in the 1850s, when Victorian ideals told them that their sexuality was their primary personal asset, and that once it was sullied, most of their value as a human being was gone. Under "patriarchy", a woman's entire virtue lay between her legs, and it went to the first man who stuck his dick there, whether she was willing or not. A women's sexual purity was the responsibility of society, to be protected above life and limb, because a soiled woman was worthless. Therefore rape was the direst of crimes, and women who gave it away willy-nilly were abhorred, shamed and shunned.

Say what you want about patriarchy, at least it was consistent.

But feminism? I don't think they've thought through their views on the sexual revolution and how they simply cannot be reconciled with the way they wish rape to be seen by society and treated under the law.  Because the idea that women who are victims of sex crimes are special, extra-victimy victims and that rape is the worst violation imaginable is rooted in the exact same Victorian morality that slut-shaming is--the idea that a woman's sexual purity is the most important thing she has, and that she becomes valueless once that purity is gone.

Women today may be dipping their toes in the post-sexual-revolution era where a woman's sexuality supposedly has no bearing on her worth as a human being and a woman, where women should be free to explore sex and sexuality however they choose. Yet when it comes to sex without consent, women's other foot is still firmly planted in the fucking 1850s, where a woman's sexual integrity is the MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER, where rape is the most shameful conceivable violation that can be perpetrated on a woman, and where victims must be treated with kid gloves even before they've been victimized.

And feminism doesn't realize its own hypocrisy on this issue or how much that harms women, or that we can't live in the past and the present at the same time--that treating rape as a "special crime more horrible than any other" is the exact same thing as slut-shaming.

Yeah, you heard me. Treating rape differently than you would treat any other form of assault is the same thing as saying women who sleep around are whores who should be ashamed of themselves and deserve to get treated like shit. Because both of these attitudes tell women their sexual purity is the only part of themselves that's worth a goddamn thing to anyone. If feminism wants to eliminate slut-shaming and open the door for women to be truly liberated in their sexual lives, it needs to treat rape like the simple assault it is rather than a violation of the holiest of holies. It needs to stop perpetuating the notion that half an hour of unwanted sex is in any way worse than being the victim of any other kind of assault. It needs to stop reinforcing the shame victims feel by indulging it with its systemic kid-glove handling of the issues, and allow for frank and open discussion with women as a group, while leaving it to counsellors and therapists rather than society as a whole to help victims reconcile their individual trauma.

Because if feminism is going to force all of society to treat women's sexuality as sacrosanct when they've been sexually assaulted, then society is absolutely justified in shaming women who give that sexuality away to just anyone. Do you see how that works? Doesn't anyone else see how pedestalizing rape survivors as the ultimate victims of the most heinous violation ever only reinforces the notion that a woman is merely a sexual object, whose greatest source of self-worth and most important virtue in the eyes of humanity is...well, the state of her sex? That constantly enshrouding every discussion of rape in a suffocating blanket of shame and violation is only telling rape victims they're right in feeling ashamed when they're assaulted, and justifying the assholes of the world who place women's value as sexual objects above every other aspect of their humanity?

If feminism wants women to be able to freely express and explore their sexuality, without shame, in the liberated 2010s, it needs to stop treating women like it's 1850 the moment they've been raped.