Or is this victim blaming?

You apparently live a sheltered and possibly quite socially limited life, if you never walk anywhere alone in the dark and can't even start to understand what a one night stand is or why anyone would have one.

Perhaps suffice for you to conclude that your lifestyle is so far removed from that of, for example, the victims of celebrity rapists, that you have nothing useful to say about it?

It’s very jarring how women are blamed for being alone with a man, in a hotel, bar, car etc, but then when women are wary of men, or mistrusting, they are told it’s an overreaction and “not all men”.

Patriarchal society has done a great job of making women unsafe and scared, yet criticised for acknowledging their safety and fears.

All doing a great job of keeping women down, small, quiet, passive.

I was once a young teenager and met with a man who took model shots of me (in a white big shirt, nothing else). Nobody knew where I had gone and it was before having a mobile phone was the norm. I had met him at a nightclub and we didn’t have friends in common. He took these photos and a few weeks later gave them to me in a folder. They were beautiful and I was so glad I did the shoot. Nothing ever happened, he didn’t propose anything or touch me or make me feel uncomfortable.

Looking back I was clearly naive and I can’t believe how trusting I had been but I didn’t pay a price for my actions. These women who go back to hotel rooms may have had the same expectations of their bodies and wishes to be respected and believed in the goodness of people - only to find that they weren’t safe. That doesn’t make them culpable in any way for what happened to them! Rapists rape.

Because they're drunk and drunkenness screws up judgement!!

because it is victim blaming. you should be able to go anywhere and do anything and still not be raped. it’s not rocket science.

The thing is the women who go to hotel rooms or similar private places agree to do so because they feel safe with that person in that moment. The way the guy has been behaving, what he has been saying, makes them feel safe and they believe that their consent will be respected.

Predators are masters at hiding who they are and their real intentions. Until they have a woman where they want them and the nice, respectful guy mask comes off.

Sure there are things women can do to have less of a risk of being raped. They can avoid getting drunk? They can avoid walking in the dark? They can avoid ever being alone with any man (or probably a group of men, because gang rape)? They could wear a chastity belt? They could lock themselves in their house and never go outside (and probably best never to let any man into the house either)?

We can think of loads of things, reasonable and not, but they all do the same thing, but the onus on the woman to prevent her own rape which, inherently leads to victim blaming if she doesn't. And if so why on earth is the onus on them to do those things rather than the men just not to rape?

If you can't see this you are not the feminist you proclaim to be.

Op, I also travel solo across the world. In Europe, Asia and Africa. No doubt you don't do that either. To reduce risk and all.
I refuse to lead such a limited and terrified life.

Because the reality is men wont change. Thats unfair and awful but its the fact.

Victim blaming is when something terrible happens to someone, and instead of the perpetrator taking full accountability for it, it is suggested that the victim somehow put themselves in the situation therefore it’s justified or understandable that something bad happened.
It’s like saying: how terrible he was killed while riding his bike, but he shouldn’t have ridden the bike at all on the road because he’s kind of asking for a car to drive into him.
Women are not raped because they go up to a man’s hotel room, women are raped because men rape them.

And if a woman does go home or to a hotel with a man, she’s probably already mentally done most of the safety checks possible anyway. Do I know him, yes, do I feel safe, do I trust him, does someone know where I am. Etc.
Being alone with a man in a room isn’t something most women do without any awareness of their own safety.
It shouldn’t be compared to driving down the motorway at 100mph with your eyes shut.

Go ahead and lead a small and terrified life then. You don't get to preach to other women.

This

I admire this so much. I think one day I may do this.

Because it is victim blaming. Women have free will the same as men. They should not have to accept or even factor in the likelihood of being raped or otherwise assaulted as a consequence of exercising that free will. Women are not to blame for mens’ crimes and the sooner society recognises that and acts on it, the safer women will be for it.

I agree with this. I don't think it is victim blaming exactly, but I do think it is a very short skip from here to there.
Partly because it distorts the conversation in a way that is not conductive to justice. Rapists get away with their crimes so often that it is dangerous to open the door for that kind of thinking.
Questions of protecting her safety such as:
Why did she go to his room?
Why was she so drunk?

Can so easily lead to:
Why did she lead him on?
Why didn't she fight back?

I just don't think we need to question a victims motives after the fact of an assault. She did what she did and he did what he did, and as we all agree on this thread, she did not deserve it. Questioning anything else is not helpful even if it isn't actively blaming.

I’m one of the women who thinks of you as brave. I only ever run along main roads or occasionally in busy parks during the daytime. If for any reason I end up in a quieter area, I make sure my music is turned down. I have to walk in the dark after work during the winter pretty much daily but it’s a big city so lots of people and I don’t feel scared as a result. I find safety in numbers generally, I’d be too afraid to walk or run in a secluded area in the dark. I also don’t put my AirPods in when I walk in the dark.

I also did a lot of stupid things as a teenager / young adult and thank god nothing awful happened. I and nobody else never once deserved to be raped regardless of how stupid a decision I made.

OP - you are victim blaming

Sorry, coming back to add: I always hear about female victims of domestic violence or coercive control and how terrible they are not to have left him earlier or how could she expose her children to abuse etc.
The only fkn person to blame in this situation is the abuser. It’s never the woman’s fault, no matter how long she stays and for what reasons.

Russell Brand assaulted Jemima Goldsmith too. Should we ask why she took the risk of dating him?

You can be raped by any man, usually one you do know well.

So should we just never ever be alone in the same building as a member of the opposite sex else it's totally our own fault if we get raped because it's totally fucking inevitable?!

OMG this makes me furious.

As a woman (and girl) I did try to keep myself safe. I did try to follow the rules of keeping myself safe. But sometimes things just happen. There wasn’t anyone to walk me home. Or I thought someone was a friend and they weren’t really. A housemate once had a friend that she had grown up with who came home with her to crash on the couch and he snuck into my room, and got into my bed, a stranger!!! One time at a work do I was coerced into drinking far too much because I wasn’t supposed to leave early and over hours the pressure to drink was relentless, I was young and didn’t have enough agency. Despite doing the safe thing 99 % of the time, on reflection I have ended up in some unsafe spots. Some of it was my fault for being naive. However it is a bit shit to suggest I am lucky to have never been raped and women who were deserved it. No one can live in this world and expect hyper vigilance to protect them. It will cost them opportunities, freedom and friendships. Otherwise women would have to be locked away from the world which ironically makes them even more vulnerable to rape.

It does strike me as bizarre when a man is king hit and experiences an ABI it is viewed as tragic. No one questions why a man was on the football field or drinking on a bar. Isn’t that just as foolish and blame worthy. We all know that men drink in those places and that man was making himself vulnerable.

Yes, there are some riskier situations we need to educate women to try to avoid.

However, the issue is timing. When someone has already been r*ped, bringing it back to 'why had you got yourself into that situation' is going to do nothing to help her already extremely tender mental health. How will they feel if they keep going back to regretting the actions that took them to that point.

Which is why victim blaming is such an important thing to avoid. Once it has got to that point, they have suffered enough. Dwelling on how they got into the position will do them no good at all, potentially put them at high risk of suicide (I am not an expert in this but it is something I would be hugely concerned about).

Even in circumstances where someone is in a long term relationship with their r*pist, there will likely be many red flags they will have ignored. Educating women to act on those earlier does not mean we highlight all her mistakes when she finally leaves, reports any crimes etc. It is never her fault.

I’m not preaching, nor do I have a small life. I’m simply weighing up the reality that the life I want may come with higher risks than the choices of someone who decides to avoid those risks.

I’m genuinely curious why you feel so hostile towards this perspective. I’ve been assaulted; I’m not naive about the realities of the world. If acknowledging those realities makes you uncomfortable, then you’re perfectly entitled to carry on as you are. That’s absolutely fine.

But what is your alternative? Beyond simply repeating that men shouldn’t behave this way?

Of course men shouldn’t. We all know that. Nobody is disputing it. But saying what should happen doesn’t change the fact that some men will still behave that way. So what do you actually suggest women do? Just keep repeating that men shouldn’t do it, without having an honest conversation about how we navigate the reality that they sometimes do?

I’m trying to approach this conversation as kindly and reasonably as I can, but the hostility really isn’t necessary. We can disagree without making it personal.

i’m sorry those things happened but that doesn’t mean you should just not take any precautions because it could happen anyway