Trigger warning: Germain Greer's opinion on rape...

[LokiBear]

I can't actually get my head around this. How can a woman think like this? I have two daughters and comments like hers frighten me. I teach consent to 15 year olds and this goes against everything I try to teach them. I just dont get how anyone can think like this.

news.sky.com/story/germaine-greer-says-most-rape-is-bad-sex-not-violent-crime-11390855

Pumperthepumper

As I have already said, you haven't answered those questions at all.

But unfortunately (or fortunately!) most prosecutions call for evidence of a crime and witnesses, both of which are non existent in intrarelationship rape

By what magical process will calling rape something else result in convictions without evidence?

pumper but wouldn’t the legal burden of proof remain the same? In a crime where there’s often no conclusive physical evidence to “prove” consent, or lack of, would men be more likely to accept a rape conviction because the sentence is reduced?

IIRC Brock Turner is appealing against his conviction even after his (pitifully small) punishment because he doesn’t want the label of convicted sex offender.

pumper but wouldn’t the legal burden of proof remain the same? In a crime where there’s often no conclusive physical evidence to “prove” consent, or lack of, would men be more likely to accept a rape conviction because the sentence is reduced?

Hmm, I don’t know. I think probably yes. But I think the other side of the coin is that the more convinctions there are, the more labelled sex offenders there are - do does that mean it comes with less of a stigma? I don’t know.

Such an interesting thread - I listened to GG’s speech in its entirety and feel it was nuanced and much more sophisticated than the soundbites some people/media are barking out.
Having read posts by curious earlier up the thread, feel she made some excellent points. I agree with the opinions of pumper and saile - and feel it’s good to have open debate which in turn allows the whole subject to be examined through many lenses and in a more nuanced, progressive environment. A tiny number of posters aggressively and dogmatically stating ‘their’ opinion and attempting to ‘shout down’ others is the opposite of democracy and freedom of speech....especially the constant threat of ‘reporting’.
So unnecessary and an incredibly unintelligent way in which to debate.

Luisa27 do you have a link to the full speech, please?

Pumper Sadly I don’t - I was at the Hay Festival so heard it from the horse’s mouth so to speak!

@Pengggwn you are doing an amazing job in this thread. I second everything you've said. I want to say something myself, but unfortunately I'm too close to the situation to do so effectively.
My most emotionally traumatising sexual assault was ongoing non-penetrative abuse (so not even rape,) by a family member, and it sickens and horrified me to think that feminists are now saying that because I knew him, and because it wasn't violent, it's no big deal or, "annoying".
It was precisely because I knew him that it was so traumatising - because I thought he loved me and I thought I could trust him, and he used me like an object - and it was precisely because it wasn't violent that I suffered with guilt and self-blame, and minimising from everyone else around me.
The biggest impact of rape or sexual abuse often isn't the physical, no - it's the helplessness, the impotence, the being used as an object, seen as less than human, dominated, having your fear or pain enjoyed, and in cases where you know the person, the betrayal, the crushing of your spirit when you realise you're dirt to them, the destruction of trust, and so on.
The actual rapes I have experienced by strangers or acquaintances later in life were in fact less traumatic, despite better fitting the "narrative" and being actual penetrative rape. (But were still traumatic in their own, different ways.)
Which I guess is to say that as a sexual abuse and rape victim, I find everything GG and her defenders have said to be deeply triggering, and wrongheaded, and callous. For a multitude of reasons.
And I really want to thank you and others who have posted on here speaking against GG. It's been very heartening.

Scrumplestiltskin with respect, that’s not what we’re saying. No one is arguing that what you went through wasn’t rape. We’re looking at ways that we can get better conviction rates for the men who do this.

I want to say something myself, but unfortunately I'm too close to the situation to do so effectively.

Apologies, I’ve just read this bit again. Please don’t feel you have to engage, although it would be great to hear your point of view if you can face it.

Pumper, as I said, my most traumatising experience wasn't in fact legally rape. And funnily enough when I did report it, he got community service due to pleading guilty (and because it wasn't more "serious".) I didn't have to testify, and yet I still feel to some degree like I may as well not have bothered reporting, because all he got was community service and therapy paid for. And all I got was trauma, and not-therapy.
And he got to go on with his life happy as Larry, and I had mine ruined. Not because of shame, or Victorian notions of purity, but because he took my body, and my safety, and my sense of trust, and loveablity away from me with what he did.
If I had actually been penetratively raped, that kind of sentence would be spitting in my face, to be quite frank. A slap on the wrist, that he could go laugh about down the pub - because men would take rape even less seriously if it was just a minor crime. It'd be a joke. "Oh, do you think she's fit for litter-picking?"
Yes, there is a problem with the system. No, it's not the sentencing, or what we call things. It's the fact that society doesn't give a shit about how women feel. As evidenced by this "if you don't smack her up, it's really just annoying to her, and a minor misdemeanour" type attitude. Because what women think, and say, and feel, doesn't carry weight, unless we can back it up with bruises and welts.
We are not independent agents, with our own minds, and our abilities to state the psychological impact upon us and be believed. We are objects that are acted upon, and thus for it to "count" the damage has to be visible for assessment by others.
This is the attitude that needs to be changed, and instead GG wants to perpetuate it further. Solidify it, in fact. No thanks.

Apologies, I’ve just read this bit again. Please don’t feel you have to engage, although it would be great to hear your point of view if you can face it.
Thanks, Pumper And no problem - it seems I can't stop myself now!

Scrumplestiltskin

Your post is perfectly articulated. These are precisely the issues.

Thank you, Pengggwn, I really appreciate that
I've been in a slump, reading about this issue for days - it's really depressing to see rape's psychological impact brushed aside as "just patriarchal notions of purity."
When honestly I think the idea that women shouldn't be bothered by non-violent rape is rooted in the deeply patriarchal notion that women are meant to be fucked anyway, so why should we be too upset if someone uses us for our intended purpose without permission, so long as they're not rough? It's sickening.
Men would be fairly traumatised and emotionally compromised and torn up psychologically by a gentle buggering too, I'd think. But they're allowed to be traumatised, because it compromises their manliness as penetrator, not penetrated.
It's all just an endorsement of patriarchal norms, in my view, and an encouragement of "it's so common women should be used to it, its not a big deal to them."

Fascinating thread. I just would like to re-iterate one of the points that was made earlier but now is becoming lost. I don't think GG is arguing that marital or relationship rape is not rape or that unwanted sex is not rape. I think her point is about the centrality of trauma in our understanding of rape. Rape is supposed to be traumatic, devastating, having long-term consequences. This is now many posters on this thread describe rape.

I am not saying that rape is not traumatic or that experiences of trauma should be suppressed. Not at all. What I would like to say that I agree with GG that not all rape is traumatic. I've been raped. More than once. By people very close to me. While those experiences were upsetting, I struggle to describe them as 'traumatic' physically or mentally. I don't see words like 'survivor' applying to myself as there was never any question about my actual survival. And, as some previous posters said, because my experience does not fit the established 'trauma' narrative, there is very little chance that my abusers would be recognised as rapists by courts or society. I don't confidently feel that even somebody like Pengggwn would recognise my experience as rape or my victimhood as important as I was not sufficiently traumatised. I am not the recognisable, meaningful victim in the current discourse of rape.

And again as previous posters said, I believe that my experience is extremely commonplace. Nearly every woman probably experienced what I had. One of the previous posters said that a husband who rapes his wife is not 'a normal family man'. I totally disagree. I think he is precisely normal. Low-grade violence against women, nagging them, coercing them, gaslighting them, etc. into sex is what happens everywhere. These are not out-of-the-ordinary experiences that stand out in our lives, that traumatise us more than any other shit. They are rape culture. And culture is something that is 'normal', pervasive, so acceptable that we don't even notice it half the time. Men feeling entitled to women's bodies is our normal. It is our husbands, fathers, brothers, boyfriends, etc. who commit these offenses as part of their normal behaviour. We need to recognise this.

Focusing rape discourse exclusively on trauma is counterproductive. While it is undoubtedly important to acknowledge and address trauma, defining rape exclusively through it positions rape as something abnormal. It blinds us to the fact that it's everywhere. It puts us into the 'Not my Norman" position, blinds us to the fact that pretty much ALL of us have been raped and pretty much ALL men are rapists.

And if pretty much ALL men are rapists, we can't exactly deal with rape by putting them ALL into jail for 5 years minimum each, can we?

Scrumplestiltskin yes, I completely agree with you. I don’t think anyone believes that GG’s ideas are this incredible magic solution - just that she’s acknowledging the issue and looking at ways to solve it. And I guess the bottom line is whether a punishment, any punishment, is worth it, even if it in no way reflects the severity of the offence.

I think most people are horrified by the idea of grades of rape. I hate the idea too.

Scrumplestiltskin

Of course you are right. When people talk about removing the stigma from rape, they are really about the business of removing the stigma from raping - as if men haven't done enough to make it acceptable, we now have women calling themselves feminists, collaborating to do it for them. Obviously they aren't feminists, but it's sad to see them deluding themselves and infuriating to see them try to delude the rest of us.

It's all just an endorsement of patriarchal norms, in my view, and an encouragement of "it's so common women should be used to it, its not a big deal to them."

No, I think it’s more ‘this is so common and it’s unnacceptable so what can we do about it’ NOT in any way ‘she should just put up with it’

And again as previous posters said, I believe that my experience is extremely commonplace. Nearly every woman probably experienced what I had. One of the previous posters said that a husband who rapes his wife is not 'a normal family man'. I totally disagree. I think he is precisely normal. Low-grade violence against women, nagging them, coercing them, gaslighting them, etc. into sex is what happens everywhere. These are not out-of-the-ordinary experiences that stand out in our lives, that traumatise us more than any other shit. They are rape culture. And culture is something that is 'normal', pervasive, so acceptable that we don't even notice it half the time. Men feeling entitled to women's bodies is our normal. It is our husbands, fathers, brothers, boyfriends, etc. who commit these offenses as part of their normal behaviour. We need to recognise this.

Yes, yes, yes to this. Not ‘we need to minimise it’ but ‘we need to do something about it’.

When honestly I think the idea that women shouldn't be bothered by non-violent rape is rooted in the deeply patriarchal notion that women are meant to be fucked anyway, so why should we be too upset if someone uses us for our intended purpose without permission, so long as they're not rough? It's sickening.

This is a perfect example of a trauma narrative. Scrumplestiltskin, you seem to be looking for some kind of objective definition of rape that involves all women who experience it being bothered and upset. In other words, traumatised. The fact that some of us were not traumatised does not even feature in this thinking. You want an objective definition and discount subjective interpretations, the actual feelings that women may have about their rapes. This is exlusionary and denies the women their feelings.

The point is NOT that women should not be bothered by non-violet rape. It is not normative. The point IS that some women are not traumatised. It is a descriptive point. Let's not confuse normative and descriptive categories.

AutumnMadness

I have no investment whatsoever in saying you have to be traumatised in order to have been raped. That, in fact, is what the minimisers are saying. They are saying rape is inherently traumatising, therefore anyone who penetrates someone without consent in a way they don't believe to be traumatising enough, isn't a rapist.

How you feel about having been raped is your own business. It is irrelevant to the act itself and how it should be dealt with by the courts.

AutumnMadness if you read my posts, you'll see I said I found the rapes I've experienced less traumatic than the "lesser" incident of sexual abuse.
Obviously what constitutes rape is lack of consent - the degree of trauma does not dictate whether a crime has taken place or not. But to dismiss rape as "annoying" or minor in a blanket manner, is to minimise it overall. Especially when paired with the idea of lesser sentencing.
I have been raped many, many times (prostituted while still a minor,) and most of those didn't bother me much on the whole. Because I was desensitised. Because I had internalised the idea that it was "just a fuck" instead of the fact that it was the dehumanising, invading use of my body for someone else's sexual pleasure, regardless of whether I wanted them to or not.
So really, it only wasn't traumatising because patriarchy and my experiences up until then had normalised it, and made me view it as no big deal. Which, well, on the one hand it's nice not to be traumatised, but on the other hand, how fucked up a world do we live in, where we treat it as no big deal to be raped, and brush it under the rug?
I bet most men (old stories about English boarding schools aside,) wouldn't react with the same desensitised, blasé manner about men buggering them in the arse against their will. I think it would result in a deep and painful internal crisis for them. Because it would conflict with their narrative of themselves as the fucker, not the fuckee. Whereas we are just getting what we're supposed to get anyway.
I think the fact that being dehumanised and having your bodily autonomy ripped away so some bloke can get his nut off is "no biggie" as a woman, is a sign of just how incredibly psychologically fucked up we are as a society.
And I think that is what needs to be addressed, and I think GG is oblivious to it.

Very succinctly put Autumn

Pengggwn, no, you don't directly say that I have to be traumatised. But you and posters who agree with you consistently describe rape as something traumatic. For instance, it is the trauma that creates the imperative for seeing rape as a problem and addressing it. And this disourse creates particular understandings of rape in our society that then prevent us from addressing it effectively in courts or elsewhere.

AutumnMadness

Where did I say rape was traumatic? I have made no such sweeping statement and am perfectly well aware that some people will not feel traumatised when they are raped. Please quote me and I will clarify my meaning, because there is simply no way I will have intended to be interpreted as having said rape is always traumatising.

For me, the imperative in treating rape as a problem is in the fact that it removes the victim's autonomy and right to decide what happens to their own body. How each individual feels about that is up to them, but a great many victims do find it traumatising, which I understand fully.