Jux said:
It's a bit more nuanced than that. While I think that society as a whole condemns rape, you have people that try to move the goalposts to redefine something as not rape ('just because she changed her mind and I didn't stop doesn't make it rape', or 'she was asking for it' or 'she wasn't really raped, it was just bad sex she regretted' or 'we had sex previously, what does it matter that she was passed out drunk this time?' for example).
Still, I don't see the incongruence. It rather makes sense to me. It goes hand in hand with victim blaming in my eyes. We constantly tell women how not to get raped, as if they need bullshit advice like 'Don't walk through bad neighborhoods alone at night'. Telling women that is infantilizing them, it's treating them like they don't know any better. Women aren't stupid, if they're walking in a bad neighborhood at night, it's most likely either because they live there, or lack the means of transport to avoid that area.
The thing is, excusal and justification is something that happens in most criminal cases. If there's a fight that results in a felony assault charge, the defendant will likely try to excuse it (he started it, etc). Even in murder cases that seem fairly clear-cut, there will factors they will use to advocate for leniency. Philosophically, our justice system also has a very high bar for reasonable doubt (except when it occasionally doesn't), based on the idea that we'd rather let 10 guilty people walk free than wrongfully convict a single person. This applies to the whole system, and should apply to rape cases as well.
We don't say that because assaults are occasionally excused or justified, that we live in an "assault culture", it's simply a function of our justice system not seeing everything in black and white. There are many ways in which systems can be improved, but again, there isn't a single justice system that every person in the US goes through. States, municipalities, and individual judges and juries look at these issues with different perspectives and interpretations. Just because people online or a commentator victim blames or commits some other fallacy, doesn't mean that rape is summarily excused and trivialized by society as a whole, if you can even talk about a single "culture" or society as a whole. The term was originally used to describe countries where rape not only happens at exponentially higher rates, but where dismissal and trivialization is a much more deeply ingrained problem.
Is there a history here of Muslim on white crime?
Well, there was the whole "9/11" thing... maybe not Muslim on white exclusively, but you get the point. But again, I was not comparing the two directly, only showing how tragic events can be twisted, and it seemed like there was a little bit of that in the OP. "Look at how dangerous it is to be a woman because of these two isolated incidents that happened close together." It demeans not only the tragedy of what happened, but also discredits the argument. If there is a real, identifiable trend, then numbers will show it and you can point to that, rather than simply making an appeal to emotion.
There is an overarching society that we're pretty much all subjected to, regardless of subculture status. But saying that rape culture exists doesn't mean that you or I personally take part in perpetuating it, it merely states that it exists.
Who decides what this overarching societal culture is, though? Whatever subjective national cultural amalgamation you or I might be able to come up with, it ultimately doesn't matter. The culture that matters is the culture that people live in, and that can vary wildly and radically. A rape case will be treated differently by both the legal system and the public in San Francisco than if you lived in rural Wyoming. Even intersectional feminists accept this, being a black woman will subject you to a different culture and different modes of discrimination than a white woman will be subject to.
I'm pretty sure no one here has personally accused you of oppressing women. If you're having a hard time separating yourself from this and viewing it impersonally, perhaps it would be best if we stopped the discussion here.
I didn't mean that to come across to you, but I have been called "part of the problem" because I don't subscribe to the exact definitions of "x culture" and certain aspects of radical feminism, despite basically believing in most of the goals and means to achieve those goals that they do, but if I don't believe in their dogma I'm no better than a standard MRA. I try to remain as impersonal as possible, my case is likely not too common. However, you can't say "well these women who shared their experiences are evidence of X" and then object when I do the same thing. None of this is truly impersonal, all of our perspectives are shaped by personal experiences. This is why "all men are rapists" style radfems and MRAs can exist at the same time in the same space and society. I pity them the same way I pity members of the Islamic State, because typically these extreme perspectives and hatred come from very difficult and sometimes extremely tragic circumstances.
But yes, in some ways I'm tired of recounting stories about how I was bullied for professing Buddhist or pacifist principles or pansexuality, and everyone acting very concerned and sympathetic, but when I say that some of the bullies were girls and I literally could not defend myself due to social standards, the same compassionate empathetic feminists from before either go silent, dismiss it outright, or use defense mechanisms (not all womanz!! bad eggs!) that they criticize others for using. But most of all, I don't like having to point these things out just to prove I'm not a cishet whitey privilege poster boy.
How is telling people not to rape and then explaining what rape is different for a rural guy from Nebraska to a urban guy from L.A.?
It's not really, but you might have to teach those concepts in different ways, and some places will be naturally slower to adapt than others. As I said earlier in this post, those two regions might treat rape very differently, as it stands right now.
This is a difference in how we approach the discussion then. As the saying 'No one wins an argument on the internet' goes, my aim isn't to convince you personally of my viewpoint. In my mind, the person I'm arguing with is already a lost cause. My arguments are for anyone reading that hasn't made up their mind yet and is still forming an opinion. I don't think you're a bad person, and we seem to agree on a number of things, especially concerning affirmative consent. But I'm not here to change your mind, just to lay an argument out there for others.
The only thing I ever look for in these kinds of debates is the occasional re-examination of beliefs. They also give me the opportunity to do so myself.
