The 'Provocative Clothing' Rape Defense

[Phasmal]

Wow, many of the responses in this thread are completely disgusting. Incidentally Escapist, how the fuck is "slut" not considered a sexist slur? Remember that clause in the Code of Conduct, eh? The bit about sexism not being tolerated? Please tell me what 50% of thread consists of.

What the fuck is dressing or behaving "like a slut" anyway? Showing ankles, wrists and hair? Having bare knees and arms? Showing thighs and cleavage? What is "acting slutty"? Smiling at a man? Being friendly, also known as "flirting"? Having had sex in the past?

I've been moderated for this before but I'll be damned if I'm not saying it again- This community has some serious fucking issues with women.

Yep. I've been kinda disappointed in the Escapists complete lack of moderation on these particular subject.

I also think it's hilarious how I've been accused of hating men, but the people suggesting here that clothes can be `asking for it` clearly think of those men as little more than animals.
Nobody asks to be raped.
If you have trouble with that concept, please do not date. Ever.

And I will take my warning like a boss if you wanna throw one at me.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

Si There is a man out with the intention of raping a girl. Wearing provocative clothes is just bringing attention to you, wearing unprovocative clothes isn't going to make you invisible, but you may put yourself higher on the list of potential targets if you wear clothes that provoke.

But this still isnt a solution. No matter how many times you "swap" the target by wearing more nunlike clothes that man is still there and a rape happens. When you give advice like this all i hear is "Make sure he rapes the other girl". Youve not solved the issue at all in the slightest. If, we take your hypothetical and ran it a billion times, no matter what clothing ANY of them wore even if ALL were nuns one would still get raped because according to you that man has a mission. So the harm is equal no matter what you make the women wear. Being told to wear conservative clothing so "He rapes someone that isnt you" is so fucking abhorrent i feel sick. If something awful is going to happen you do EVERYTHING to PREVENT it not try and shift the horror onto another person via different tactics.

"So by not wearing such clothing, you have had no effect on the amount of rapes happening. You've just redirected it to an equally undeserving person. So it's still a really silly argument."

And this guy nails it.

I hate to use a slippery slope fallacy but telling women never to go places or wear things, taken to the ABSOLUTE EXTREMIS, will NEVER solve the issue because its all just mirdirection. How about police work HARD AS HELL to catch and punish ALL rapists to the FULL extent of the law. How about in society we make coming forward to talk about rape or a crime a show of STRENGTH rather than something to be ashamed of.

This is a HORRIBLE analogy and im so sorry. But when i was mugged i felt like shit. I was weak. Another person controlled me, took what was mine and let me go because THEY wanted to. I had no power. I didnt want to tell people because i was ashamed this happened to me. I imagine for rape its a quadrillion times infinitely worse. That sucks. I DIDNT TELL THE POLICE about it :C I can see why a woman might not want to either. And thats wrong. I was wrong to not tell the police. I shudder to think that people are scared to not raise their voice about these things. Do not let scum act with impunity. They deserve to be ashamed not you. You are innocent, they broke the law to pretend they are better than you, more WORTHY and then YOURE the one who is ashamed. Thats awful.

 

[Thaluikhain]

The basis of the supposed defense mentioned by the OP feels something along the lines of a person justifying an attempt to shoot IndyCar champ Scott Dixon on the basis of seeing him in his racing uniform (as he is sponsored by Target, he sports a literal bullseye on his chest) and saying he was just asking to be shot.

Heh, I'll remember that one for the next time this comes up.

This is the furthest thing from anything resembling a mainstream opinion, so if you really think this is something that "needs to be fought" you're almost as much of an idiot as the peanuts who think that's a legitimate argument.

No, it's a very common and serious problem. Various jurisdictions (in the West) ban defence lawyers from mentioning what the victim was wearing because of this.

 

[Lilani]

Probably for the same reason people will confront you with not having locked your front door if a burglary takes place.

Obviously a victim of burglary, which left its front door unlocked, is not to blame for the burglary; but exercising a little caution might still have been wise.

Except provocative clothing has never been proven to have any impact on a woman's likelihood to get raped. Rape is about dominance and a need for control, not satisfying sudden sexual urges.

And even if it were true, as someone else pointed out, it doesn't prevent a rape. It just deflects it to the next scantily clad woman nearby. So unless you're going to require all women to wear frocks and chastity belts, nothing is being prevented.

 

[Colour Scientist]

Wow, many of the responses in this thread are completely disgusting. Incidentally Escapist, how the fuck is "slut" not considered a sexist slur? Remember that clause in the Code of Conduct, eh? The bit about sexism not being tolerated? Please tell me what 50% of thread consists of.

What the fuck is dressing or behaving "like a slut" anyway? Showing ankles, wrists and hair? Having bare knees and arms? Showing thighs and cleavage? What is "acting slutty"? Smiling at a man? Being friendly, also known as "flirting"? Having had sex in the past?

I've been moderated for this before but I'll be damned if I'm not saying it again- This community has some serious fucking issues with women.

Yep. I've been kinda disappointed in the Escapists complete lack of moderation on these particular subject.

I also think it's hilarious how I've been accused of hating men, but the people suggesting here that clothes can be `asking for it` clearly think of those men as little more than animals.
Nobody asks to be raped.
If you have trouble with that concept, please do not date. Ever.

And I will take my warning like a boss if you wanna throw one at me.

Yeah, I'm gonna show some solidarity with these two posts.

A lot of posts here seem to take the line that women have to watch what they wear so that they don't provoke the poor rapists who just can't help themselves when they see a flash of leg. I mean, suggesting that a slut (whatever that implies) is asking for it is just... Ugh. What, because they're flirty and show off their body they're fair game? Yuck.

Comparing a girl getting raped due to the clothes she's wearing to someone's house getting robbed because they left the door open makes my fucking skin crawl.

 

[omega 616]

I don't get why people still use this as a defense for rape. Why do people try to shift the blame onto the women in a situation where the man is still entirely at fault for, you know, having such little self-control that he has to fuck a woman the second that he gets a boner. This is a defense that's still used, and yet, it's one that already assumes that the man is guilty of rape; it simply tries to shift the blame for the crime onto the victim. How do people still believe in this?

People don't say it as a defence, they say it as a contributing factor for the rape occurring. It's not "ooh, I can see a lot of that girls flesh, must rape her", it's more like "I'm having issues, I see a woman wearing very little, so I'm thinking of having sex with her (cos every male does it), if I try to flirt I may get turned dow.. But rape is a sure fire way".

I take this view point only cos I belive its a contributing factor to rape. It's still the guys fault, undoubtedly! I just think women should be more cautious and try not to bring so much attention to themselves.

I'm 23 and for the first time I went out on a Saturday night, never drank alcohol though. I saw girls and women dressed up like cheap hookers, so drunk they couldn't walk straight, grinding there ass into guys crotches but refusing to kiss them and all I could think is "you're sexually teasing drunk men (so there not in there right mind), then turning them down. You're dressed provocatively and are in a vulnerable state" . These girls are so easy to rape its scary, I actually was nervous for the girls and didn't even know them.

The way I see it is if you leave your house empty and the door wide open, don't be surprised when you get robbed, to put it another way, don't run red lights and expect not to get in a car crash. Take precautions, be in a group, don't get legless drunk, don't be a dick tease, dress sexy but not like hooker (slutty sexy) but more like Helen Mirron (classy sexy).

Like I said it's still down to the guy but depending on the situation, 0.5% of the responsibility could be pointed at the woman. That's just my opinion though.

 

[Milanezi]

Do you actually mean to say that people can honestly get away with raping someone just by using this excuse?

Nope, but a defense lawyer, a good one, needs to try anything, even when it's clear bullshit. When it's clear there's gonna be a conviction the lawyer might not spend his time and effort trying to plead innocence, but rather "mitigate" the situation and get a smaller sentence. In a rape case, that would be ONE (bad, in my opinion) argument to get an easier sentence, saying crap like "the victim was using extremely provocative clothing, which my client, a sick man who can not always keep hold of his urges, found impossible to resist the assault" basically, the blame was shifted slightly to the victim and the accused was turned into "a sorry bastard who can't hold himself". Don't blame the lawyer, it's his DUTY to do what he can for every client, even when he's 100% sure the dude is guilty, rather blame the few judges who accept this lame defense...

Depending on the country (or even the judge sometimes) that defense CAN and WILL free the agent of the crime, but that's a more complex matter, many times it will involve costumes and culture, maybe religion even, meaning that the people of that place a whole will most likely agree with the rapist and not the victim, but I believe this topic is talking about "western culture".

So, I can stomach the excuse as a desperate legal defense attempt. What I cannot stomach is such excuse being absorbed and accepted by SOCIETY. In Brazilian law, the crime "rape" used to have a term in its definition, it was "honest woman", meaning a whore, for instance, could not be raped (!!!) because she wasn't "honest". As culture changed, so did the law, and the term "honest woman" was taken away, it became "the forceful, non-consensual act of coitus (ONLY penis in vagina), with use of violence, physical or not" thus it was understood to some legalists that man COULD be raped by a woman, it was only hard to do so (due to the coitus definition), however women COULD be an active agent as the one who commits the violence (against another woman) while a man commits the penetration.

On a side note: oral sex, anal sex, the use of objects, and whatever your mind can fathom (sexually speaking), when done with no consent and with any form of violence was NOT considered rape, it was "Pudency Aggression" (roughly translating), and it was GREAT that things were this way (both men and women could be agents and victims): say a criminal grabs a woman, he forces her to do oral, and then follows to penetrate her vagina. Most judges would accept that the perp committed not one single continuous act, but TWO different crimes, what's more, both crimes (Rape and Pudency...) had the same penance, the same everything basically, meaning a rapist would get a heavy sentence, after all, he committed two crimes, two of the worst crimes in our Penal Code by the way.
Only good stuff don't last forever... A few years ago a this political figure or something (a WOMAN nonetheless), fucked it up, she proposed a change to the law and the congress accepted her changes (certainly she was just looking to make a name). Well, she decided it was better to condense both crimes as "rape", so nowadays men and women can be victims of rape because raping means not only penetration of the male genitalia in the feminine genitalia, but also anything else that holds a sexual nature to it and is one by means of violence or threat of violence. I AGREE it's cleaner now, easier to understand, etc nut this means that if a man grabs a woman and does hell to her in terms of sexual perversion, he only committed ONE CRIME, sadly it's easier on the criminal now, a few old school judges accepted the law but are willing to judge in accordance to the "old way", punishing two crimes, but it's harder because now they need the accuser to manage and point out that between one act and the other enough time passed that the crime ended and another brand new crime, albeit the same type of crime, started, thus allowing for another penance to be added.
In my opinion, rape is a crime to be treated with seriousness, I'm not talking about rape scenes in anime, or games like other topics are discussing, I'm talking about the real deal, real life, it's dirty and humiliating, justice must be swift and brutal towards the criminal, attempts to simplify the system, as I've pointed out, might just turn out for the worst. It's such a heavy subject that many women NEVER come forward, that's the reason, in Brazil, this crime can't be automatically "moved" by the public authorities, but rather requires the victim to come forward and inform the crime and her/his willingness to give start to the due process of law (in other words, if your neighbor was raped you can't go to the cops for them, the authorities can't do shit, of course there are exceptions, such as child/mentally challenged rape, rape followed by murder, so on).

 

[lapan]

Most people who see use this argument don't want to shift blame, they just see it as advice since they think it would make rape more likely. This may not actually be the case, but twisting it to them advocating rape or wanting to blame the victim is equally ridicolous.

 

[itsthesheppy]

Yeah it's dumb.

There is no scientific evidence to suggest that provocative clothing increases or is even involved in the likelihood of rape.

The argument that provocative clothing and rape have a significant link is pretty much entirely made up by people who have no idea what they are talking about.

The analogy usually goes "it's like leaving your house unlocked at night, you'd practically be asking to get robbed". Wearing conservative clothing isn't a measure of precaution one can take against rape. It literally has nothing to do with whether a rapist chooses someone as their victim.

I get that society has taught people that dressing "slutty" and getting raped are somehow linked, but fuck, do some research first.

Ding.

Thread really didn't need to go past the post I've quoted above, and it was on page 1.

Rapists don't care how you dress. They just want to exert power over someone and abuse people. The clothing or personal appearance of the victim is statistically irrelevant.

 

[Yan007]

My sister has been a victim of rape. Long story short : he got her drunk, brought her to his place and touched her in places and ways that made her feel uncomfortable. And that's nooo good.

Sister went to the police. Long story short : trial- guy is convicted.

Except that's not what realy happened.

4 years later my sister started feeling guilt over "a little lie". Apparently, she dressed provocatively because she wanted to get laid, she drank with the guy and told him she just had to get fucked by him. They went tohis place and had a good time. A few weeks later he was accused of rape, tried, and convicted. Guy losteverything and probably won't be able to work as a teacher ever again although his name is technically cleared.

What happened to my sister? Nothing, and this disgusts me to no end. My family decided to forgive and forget, but I can't. I could have been that guy.

 

[Therumancer]

[

Your argument here is a little flawed. Yes, what you're claiming is possible, but the entire point becomes a little questionable when you consider that Rape cases have notoriously low conviction rates. (roundabout 5% or less in most countries).

This kind of undermines the assertion that it's easy to claim you've been raped. It isn't, and compared to other crimes it's actually easy to get out of it if it even goes to trial in the first place. (which isn't necessarily that likely, because a lot of actual rape victims feel ashamed, or find the thought of the legal process too traumatic.)

It's an interesting idea, but reality shows otherwise.

Not really, because your also labouring under the assumption that most, or at least a lot of, the people who "get out of" a rape accusation were guilty. Something which of course goes back to the entire question of sympathy for those who claim to have been raped (mostly women) and how it loads the justice system.

Rape is one of those crimes where being found innocent isn't nessicarly the end of it, being an accused rapist is almost as bad as being a convicted one, and that can be the entire point of why someone might want to make a false accusation to begin with, and also helps bring into question quoted statistics in this arguement like how "only 4% of rape accusations are false" and so on.

Ask yourself, if it wasn't an accusation of rape, do you think people would be quite so picky about the results on average when someone is found innocent?

It is also very easy to claim you've been raped, and comes with a lot of positive aspects (sympathy) especially when it's not true. All you need to do is bring the charge, especially seeing as it's a crime you can accuse someone of where there is little expectation of physical evidence, and even if the guy gets off he's going to suffer a major stigma just from having been accused. Everyone shows up to white knight the alleged victim as we see in this case, and nobody wants to believe that someone claiming to have been raped is a liar. A society wide issue.

Which of course all gets back to my central point about the presumpsion of innocence and how our legal system works in all cases (not just rape). Whatever the actual statistics might be, or what are simply societal notions, become irrelevent, we can argue all of that and it's been rendered irrelevent by intent. At the end of the day the US Justice system as far as goverment mandated punishment goes works entirely based on evidence with the burden of proof being placed squarely on the shoulders of the accuser when it comes to criminal matters. In any case, whether it's as petty as Jaywalking or as extreme as Rape or Murder, the accused goes to trial under a persumpsion of innocence and the accuser whether it be the state, or the state representing a crime against a citizen, is forced to prove otherwise beyond an innocent doubt, facing a major disadvantage in court.

As I said, whether you think it's right or wrong, and what happens in society as a result, the crux of the US legal system is that it's better to let 1000 guilty men go free, than 1 innocent man be convicted. That's it's principle. How well it functions in practice, and as I said what it does to society, those are other questions. As are what changes you could in theory make to the system.

Also understand that in the US there is huge backlash towards any suggestion that the system be changed, as anything more assertive tends to create visions of police states and inevitably leads to Godwin's law coming up in a discussion sooner rather than later.

Case in point, let's say I suggest we legalize profiling and blank warrents. Something a lot of european countries have done, and actually comes close to how law enforcement worked (even if it wasn't formalized) back in the 1940s and 1950s in the US... you know the generation that actually went to war and STOPPED Hitler and represented freedom and all that good stuff. People would scream bloody murder. After all this would mean that by being a creep some guy going on trial for say rape could have his profile used as evidence to prove the likelyhood of guilt, and that profile would also have allowed the police to say search his house/crime scenes/etc... almost immediatly under a blank warrent system without needing to delay to get permission from a judge, making it far less likely the guy could conceal the signs of say raping someone in his bedroom and more evidence could be uncovered faster. Likewise it also means that you could do things like single out Muslims for airport security and the like and not harass tons of other people and create a lot of these problems we see making the news due to some symbolic gesture being nessicary to make liberals happy.

See, in the US Law Enforcement and things like it's presumsion of innocent and the game that we're turned search and seizure into is something that people have grown used to. We've basically trained ourselves to want relatively powerless police, and so that using common sense in law enforcement and count proceedings has become almost an anathema. The US has basically taken the approach that the privacy of some gang banger and not having the police check him out pre-emptively based on patterns of behavior, or consider things like religious affiliation when conducting searches, etc... is MORE important than things like murders, the proliferation of drugs, human traffiking, and other crimes, INCLUDING rape (understand profiles tend to include far more than just race and/or religion or whatever despite stereotypes).

Given the political leanings on this site, you see outcries about rapes and such, but anyone who actually suggested changes to the laws (understand they have to be universal and apply to everyone) that could make a differance, would also be attacked as some kind of facist that wanted to turn the US into a police state. Even if ultimatly those changes simply borrowed ideas from law enforcement in the rest of the western world, or involved simply dialing policies back a few decades. Putting the genie back into the bottle so to speak.

While it's a side point, understand that this kind of thing that we're argueing about is the price being paid for a lot of those "civil liberties victories" of the past. What happens with rapists and such is one small part of it. An idealogy that was supposed to lead to a lot more peace, freedom, and safety, arguably had exactly the opposite effect. Sure the stereotypical "pig cop" might not be ruining your fun as much as he used to, but as a result we also have more rapes, murders, gang activity, human trafficking, and everything else because in many cases the police can't even begin to investigate despite common sense due to what is oftentimes a crazy criteria, and when they can, the time it takes to get permission to search (warrents, etc...) gives the criminals plenty of time to prepare. People talk about police corruption, in terms of empowering law enforcement being a problem, but the ironic thing is that dirty cops hide behind the same protections the criminals do, in reality IA and other protective watchdogs need to jump through the same kind of hoops. You can't weed out dirty cops effectively for the same reason someone can run a crack house and shoot rival dealers periodically with relative imputiny, it all comes down to playing the game and bureaucratic protection.

 

[Thaluikhain]

It is also very easy to claim you've been raped, and comes with a lot of positive aspects (sympathy) especially when it's not true. All you need to do is bring the charge, especially seeing as it's a crime you can accuse someone of where there is little expectation of physical evidence, and even if the guy gets off he's going to suffer a major stigma just from having been accused. Everyone shows up to white knight the alleged victim as we see in this case, and nobody wants to believe that someone claiming to have been raped is a liar. A society wide issue.

Not true. Society will often rally behind the rapist and demonise the victim. The 11 year old girl in Texas gangraped by 21 men and boys comes to mind, not only did the defence lawyer try to blame her, he (and members of the community) expressed the view that it was terrible that the rapists would have to live with the consequences.

Shortly before that, the cheerleader in Texas kicked off her cheerleading squad for refusing to cheer for her rapist, was harassed by her community because she brought them into disrepute.

Hell, look at people like Mike Tyson and Roman Polanski. There's no question that they are guilty, but they've got plenty of apologists and they've gone on with their film careers. That's exactly what would not happen if the mere accusation was enough to stigmatise a rapist.

 

[maddawg IAJI]

I like how the subject of the woman being flirtatous and leading the man on is not included. You think women only DRESS a certain way or do you think it follows that they also act a certain way when dressed (lets not pull any punches here) like a slut. Try to act like booty shorts at the club instead of the gym is somehow not slutty if you want to but then youre just being dishonest.

Yeah, you're being led on, still not a defense for rape.

Before you say (like a retard) that Im actually defending the rapist: False. I am not defending the rapist. Rape is so obviously wrong it is insulting you accuse me of thinking otherwise.

You're right, you're not defending the rapist, you're blaming the victim, which is just as bad. "Oh, did you hear? Bob got mugged!" "Well he was asking for it! I mean, he was wearing his fancy watch! He's leading muggers on!" Also, the bolded part, yeah, not cool. I would suggest you stop using ad hominems against people who disagree with you before you start attracting the wrong kind of attention yourself. We don't tolerate insults here.

Where I am going with this is that the victim is often the "victim" with a case of buyers remorse.

Right, because when I put my phone down on a table for a second while I grab something out of my bag, I'm obviously the one who should be remorseful when an asshole takes it and runs off.

That means that if you dress like a slut you deserve to hear for the millionth time "maybe you shouldnt dress like a slut" and that is all you deserve, not to be raped.[/b] And if you ever said that to another women, she will tell you and I believe she is in the right in this case that you should "Mind your own buisness." It is not your job to force moral standards or dress codes onto society. They're adults, they will make their own decisions.

I hope it is clear the difference betweeen those 2 things because you are likely thinking with your emotions right now instead of actual thinking.

Actually its thinking with a Libertarian stance on life.

Perhaps women do have some actual amount of fault in dressing a certain way the same as I would have some actual amount of fault if I went to a gay bar dressed like the male version of a slut. Nevermind that I dont, nevermind that Im straight, it would be flat out dumb to do such a thing and then say "I can dress however I want".

They're free to dress however they wish and go wherever they wish. If it is not hurting another individual and if it is not illegal, then whether or not its a smart move is none of your concern. Also, you're stance that "You shouldn't dress like an X in Y setting" has several holes. Should I place fault on the transexual who dresses like a boy if they get bullied at school? Should I place fault on the jew who is assaulted by Anti-semetic's simply because he is wearing the star of David as a necklace? No. I shouldn't, because the victim should never be the found at vault.

Again not defending the rapist and its sad I have to repeat this for you to remember this far down the post that I already told you that. Posters are on what is so obviously a witch hunt here that unlikely would be a kind outlook on this group having actually thought about the post instead of just flaming like you're about to.

You're not defending them, but taking blame that should be aimed at them and transferring it to the victim is just as bad.

 

[Phasmal]

Ok, this is for real getting pretty disgusting in here, so I'll probably just post this and leave the thread.

Rapists are not boogeymen, they are people. People who look like everyone else. They do not come with a sign above their head, you could know one and never be the wiser.
So, when these conversations come up, and they do, what are we saying when we direct the conversation towards what the woman did?
And who is hearing it?
Who is hearing that aggressive and predatory behavior towards these women is justifiable by what they wear?
It's time to stop the fucking pointless derailment.
I could stand naked in a room full of people and not get raped, do you know how?
If the room had no fucking rapists in it.
And say you do believe that wearing more clothes leads to less rape.
You're not helping.
You aren't.
Let's say you tell someone not to wear a mini skirt and they don't get raped, but someone else does.
What the fuck have you changed?

Nobody asks to be raped.
There are no ifs and or buts.
Engaging in sexual behavior with someone without their expressed consent is wrong.
I don't care what they wore, or what they said. It does not matter.
If you feel you are incapable of respecting those boundaries, please follow these guidelines.

Spoiler: Just in case

 

[itsthesheppy]

Genius. I love that image.

I don't leave my car unlocked when I drive through the ghetto.

I don't leave the door to my house open while I'm sleeping.

I don't keep my money hanging out of my pockets.

I don't walk through dark alleys in the dead of night.

I avoid doing those things because if I did people would think I'm an easy mark, and I'd rather not have a gun shoved in my face again.

If you fail to take proper precautions against crime, the odds the crime will happen to you increases.

I don't think you don't quite get it. See the above image, it might help you. Also, if there is a statistical link to clothing and rape likelihood, you're welcome to provide it.