Facebook supports rape?

I did have the brains to argue back. But you didn't have the brains to understand where the hell I, or any of the other feminists, were coming from.

And please refrain from calling me "twunt". I won't stand for slang about women's genitals being used as an insult, thank you

Right. I apologised for the mentally not all there bit - which incidentally does NOT mean mentally ill as I went to great pains to point out, particularly as I have a brother with severe learning difficulties and I suffer depression myself.

I have agreed to disagree on the criminology front. It is my belief (from what I was taught) that all crime has a motive and all criminals a pattern of behaviour. To say that this means victims are to blame is ridiculous and the fact that this is what you inferred from that point is outrageous.

Yes research is always changing. However I was stating my beliefs and opinions and your response was to accuse me of not believing rape victims and blaming them - do you think that was an appropriate response? Is that how you conduct debates or argue with those who have a different opinion? To presume the worst of them?

Research is still ongoing as is forensic psychology. You have a different opinion to mine and you quote stats to back you up. That's fine and that's how a debate should go. But to accuse me of those things?

I am always the first to apologise for upsetting anyone and I am now getting pissed off at others not bothering to do the same. It's a simple ask.

You're pissed off with taking time to explain your points?

your point was that all rapists have something in common (re being mentally not all there) A victim can and WILL read that as "well, I missed the signs, so I've got myself to blame". It may not be what you mean, but that is how it comes across.

Add to that, the "mentally not all there" thing perpetuates so many mental health myths. My ex was very much there. Ironically, I was the one with bi-polar disorder. He spent his time trying to make out I was crazy. Do you get how damaging the things you are saying are?

I am pleased this thread has ended on a calmer note. However I am quietly seething still I'm afraid.

I hate to sound picky, but it would be polite to acknowledge when someone has apologised. It would also be nice for those posters who accused me of the most horrendous things to do with rape, to apologise.

Because believe it or not, those things were completely untrue and hurtful.
You cannot tell someone that they do not believe victims of rape and that they think rape victims are themselves to blame and then just walk away and leave it.

I am pissed off with taking the time to explain my points, to answer accusations and to be the first to apologise and then to be expected to just accept all the crap that has been hurled at me.

So childish as this sounds, I am not willing to let this one go. Not this time.

I can see you too! (waves at Amor) and also want to give the thumbs up to Prolesworth's post.

But you have to know they are criminals to profile them.

With the number of rapes unreported that are - I don't see how they can do that.

Serial stranger rapists I'm sure have traits in common and share them with other extremely violent criminals.
Acquaintance rapists without "form" for anything - the "nice normal" ones who don't beat their wives or whatever - no-one knows who they are. And they would not self-describe as rapists. So how can you ever profile them?

Fair enough then SQ. But no, it doesn't only study those who have been caught. It is concerned with criminal profiling. However having said that, how could you study those who have not been caught? I guess what they do is fit together a profile of a rapist - either a violent stranger one or a domestic one (by that I mean someone who violates their partner) and compare traits.

No doubt they will be doing the same for those who rape drunken women or who think it's ok to carry on after she has said no. It is a science concerned with mapping out the psyche of a criminal.

No I said "If you're doing forensic psychology then presumably you are studying people who have been caught" and you didn't say different. I did not state categorically what you have been studying, how would I know?

Good post wamster. I agree.

Aye, yes I think that is true as well.

Perhaps the problem here is that referring to criminology studies of convicted rapists and believing that they represent the mindsets of all rapists is too narrow. It is estimated that 40% of rape victims never tell anyone about their crime and a pitifully small number of convictions result from reporting of rape, so studying those rapists in prison (which is where most of those studies take place) only gives a part of the picture. So many rapists are never revealed to anyone (except their victims) and so are never studied.

Rape is simply (I don't use the word 'simply' to downplay the act) having sex with somebody against their will.

The problem is that I think some men (and women, I'm afraid to say) do not see this.
They have opinions on what is 'acceptable' rape and what is 'unacceptable' rape.

'Acceptable' rape= could be a man and woman agreeing to go to bed together and he has sex with the woman even though she refused him.
'What did she expect?' Would be the attitude.

Then there is 'unacceptable' rape- the sort that happens in a dark alley with a woman having a knife to her throat, or the abuse of a child.

The vast majority of people would -RIGHTLY, of course- think the latter to be unacceptable while thinking the former to be somehow OK.

Attitudes need to change so that BOTH are unacceptable.

I still believe that a properly decent man would actively want a partner's consent to have sex, and this is why I think only those predisposed to rape would rape while those brought up to respect women would would not even if they could. In fact, I know this to be true of many men- thank goodness, but, in the climate in which we live, it is easy for a man predisposed to get away with raping a woman he is in bed with her because the attitude will be 'well, what did she expect, leading him on like that'.
Attitudes need to change, I think. What does it matter what a woman who has been raped wore during the attack or where she was? It's all wrong.

BTW, the Haven's study was in the UK. Some of the others are international - lots more research from the US, for example, but still quite relevant. If I had the time, I could provide more examples, but perhaps someone else can step in and do this.

It was about 1993 when I first read a survey conducted in Islington that showed the high proportion of teenage boys who believed it was acceptable to hit a partner or force her to have sex in some circumstances. There's been plenty similar studies since then.

Rhubarb, if you are interested, here are some references so you can see the numbers surveyed and the methodology used.

Wake Up to Rape Study by The Havens, 2010
Report of Davies and Rogers study about male lack of sympathy for rape victims Sorry - no immediate access to the full study.
role and attitudes toward rape in male and female college students www.springerlink.com/content/q2148372h4vk0170/ (sorry, again just an abstract atm.)
Epps, et. al 1993 - an old article, but cites useful evidence that contradicts the idea that rapists have uniquely deviant ideas about women.

I would be interested to know how many men were questioned for that and under what circumstances.

I don't buy the ignorance excuse. I believe it is just that - an excuse.

Sorry, I thought what you were saying is that in some cultures rape is normal and therefore not thought of as a crime?

I don't know where I am being contradictory, I am trying to make my posts as clear as I can.

We are not talking about other countries. This debate started off from an article talking about men in THIS country. My point is that men in this country know that rape is not only a crime but completely and utterly unacceptable. Are you saying that they believe some rape is acceptable?

Yes some rapists do use the defence claim of ignorance "I didn't know that having sex whilst she was asleep was rape" and I do believe - not sure but I think I remember? - that someone has got away with the crime with that very defence. In this country. I will try to find the case later on but right now I have to make tea.

I think with so much media coverage or rape and rape cases, men cannot claim to be ignorant of what constitutes rape and we should not give them that excuse. In my opinion, when a rapist rapes, he knows exactly what he is doing and also in my opinion, in this country where rape is not accepted, is not culturally normal and is not common, rapists do have criminal characteristics as Jamma stated earlier.

I know you disagree with that and so I am happy to disagree on that issue.

I hope you accepted my earlier apology for upsetting you.

from here

"New statistics have revealed nearly half of young men still think sex with women too drunk to know what is going on is not rape.

And 46% of men aged 18 to 25 also do not consider it rape if the woman changes her mind during sex."

GAH Some men don't connect it. Or women for that matter.

Sorry for multiple posts.

To clarify

Men know what rape is
They just don't connect it with situations outside stranger rape/dark alleyway/violence etc