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Rape culture in action. Massive Trigger Warning

163 replies

scallopsrgreat · 21/11/2014 22:19

Warning: There is a brutal rape described in the opening paragraphs. So please self-care.

The article is from RollingStone and is about the systematic erasure and cover-up of womens rape and sexual assault experiences at the University of Virginia. It is quite long but also very detailed.

From 'friends' to officials these women are encouraged to forget. They are paralysed by lack of information, informed choices and support even from those who are seemingly trying to help.

The article really doesn't pull any punches and describes really well how women's experiences are minimised. It also shows how rapists aren't monsters. They live and function (sometimes even heroically) in the community. It shows how they do plan their rapes (sometimes quite chillingly). How they feel entitled to rape these women and how they don't see it as a big deal. They don't expect to get caught. They may not even see it as rape or simply just don't care.

Just in case anyone thinks women aren't oppressed. Or feminism has gone too far. Or rape culture doesn't exist.

It's so frightening.

I also think it should be highlighted and the University of Virginia named. Because they have gone to great lengths to silence the voices of these women over decades.

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scallopsrgreat · 14/01/2015 20:09

Oh FiveLittlePeas I'm so sorry Flowers

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YonicSleighdriver · 14/01/2015 19:43

So sorry five littlepeas

We believe you Flowers

Namechangeyetagaintohide · 14/01/2015 19:41

Oh. Aside from that though it was very informative. Sigh. Sad

FiveLittlePeas · 14/01/2015 19:27

I didnt do anything though. I never told anyone, except anonimmously, like this. It was not "as bad as it could have been", but I did feel guitly about it.

FiveLittlePeas · 14/01/2015 19:21

I will not read this, I cannot. I was raped once in a wedding, in a distant town, where nobody knew me. It was rape because I said "no".

scallopsrgreat · 14/01/2015 19:09

They are now saying (when I posted the article the letter wasn't there) that they don't believe her because they spoke to a man who said it couldn't have happened for x, y, z reasons. Imagine my surprise that they believe a man over a woman when it comes to rape. Because men never lie about raping women except all the time.

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Namechangeyetagaintohide · 14/01/2015 16:07

I'm sorry I'm late to this and am confused about the article. It's prefaced with a letter which talks about discrepancies and how they abided by Jackies request not to contact the other parties.

Are they saying they don't believe her account now ?

It goes on to say :
In trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault, we made a judgment – the kind of judgment reporters and editors make every day. We should have not made this agreement with Jackie and we should have worked harder to convince her that the truth would have been better served by getting the other side of the story. These mistakes are on Rolling Stone, not on jackie

Are they saying that they let her down by not giving a full report and therefore allowing others to sow seeds of doubt or something like that ?

BuffyWithChristmasEarings · 28/12/2014 21:18

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HouseWhereNobodyLives · 28/12/2014 20:04

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HouseWhereNobodyLives · 28/12/2014 20:03

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BeyondTheTreelights · 28/12/2014 11:20

I'm okay yonic, it was another lifetime ago and my drink was spiked. I only remember flashes of it.

HQ, is there a way to preemptively ban aqui4a, aqui5a, aqui6a and so on...? Although it is kind of nice to 'know' who a pbp is when they turn up

Aqui3a · 28/12/2014 05:19

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YonicSleighdriver · 27/12/2014 20:40

I'm so sorry, Beyond Flowers

BeyondTheTreelights · 26/12/2014 23:52

Awful awful story. It does happen here though, and go unreported.
For me, it was squaddies. Stick a group of men together in a 'manly' environment, and its almost inevitable.

PoinsettiaGordino · 24/12/2014 18:24

I think it's the CE news re Hartlepool. Seems to be the current subject that causes a resurgence in our friendly visitors - any development gets their little Google alerts spidey senses tingling and they come and see what MN threads they can drag up

LiberalPedant · 24/12/2014 18:18

Sorry, I misunderstood you.

But now that I think more about it, actually the ostentatiousness of it was a large part of the problem for me. I do understand your reasons for dealing with the troll that way. But I think that it is inappropriate to move a thread about rape into a jocular vein.

BuffyWithChristmasEarings · 24/12/2014 17:36

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LiberalPedant · 24/12/2014 17:19

I did not suggest ignoring anything, ostentatious or otherwise. Angry

YonicSleighdriver · 24/12/2014 17:07

Liberal, another thing is that the troll bumped this after a two week gap - most of the food discussion was between posters who had already read the thread previously so weren't jumping from one to the other like you did Flowers

BuffyWithChristmasEarings · 24/12/2014 16:16

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LiberalPedant · 24/12/2014 15:31

To those responding to my post, thank you.

I did find the food discussion, and especially its jokey tone, very jarring. Even though I spend a lot of my MN time reading FWR threads and have thus seen some horrible trolling, including the posting of images of violence against women, I had not encountered this particular technique for dealing with trolls. It really did come across to me as trivializing a very serious matter. When the subject matter is violence against women, reporting and getting deletions might be a better way to go.

scallopsrgreat · 24/12/2014 10:52

I don't particularly want to discuss men's problems on a feminist forum, Justic. We invariably end up doing so anyway because obviously we forget that the world revolves around men and their needs and we need to be reminded.

There you go. You can go and tell your mates what meanies we are.

You can tell it's the school holidays.

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YonicSleighdriver · 24/12/2014 10:49

Another troll, I see.

JusticEquality101 · 24/12/2014 10:46

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PuffinsAreFictitious · 24/12/2014 10:09

Again, apologies, but it was in no way meant to be disrespectful to anyone affected by the rape culture on US Campus's. A large number of trolls were about last evening on this board, and one of the ways we have found works well when dealing with trolls as revolting as these is to start discussing something unrelated.

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