"So you believe that making whatever claims is always OK as long as you're "trying to achieve something constructive"? The ends justify the means? I do not agree with that."
I didn't say that. I already explained exactly what I think above, but oh well, I'll repeat it:
The post Ted was ultimately replying to cited some statistics on how many women have been subject to sexual abuse / rape in support of a specific point. The point was that displaying sexualized images of women in a highly male-dominated environment can be traumatizing for survivors of sexual assault / rape. The OP was pointing out that it's a statistical certainty that some of the women at any large conference have suffered some form of sexual assault in their lives and hence it is vital to consider the needs of women who've been sexually assaulted if you're trying to organize a conference to be welcoming to women.
In this context, bringing up a finicky argument about whether the assaults in the most commonly-cited studies were 'really rape' or 'rape rape' or 'bad rape' or whatever the hell you want to call it is not just not constructive, it's actively harmful. It's throwing a grenade into the discussion. Even if somehow you win the argument that some rapes aren't really rapes, what have you achieved in context? The assaults were still clearly likely to have traumatized those who were assaulted. The point that showing them sexualized images of women in a highly male conference is probably not a good idea still stands. It was utterly inappropriate to start dissecting statistics that were cited in support of a wider point which would not be invalidated even if you could win your toxic, derailing argument about the nature of sexual assault.
"And even if you think Ted's posts did not have a constructive effect, how would that justify writing libel about him being a "rape apologist"?"
I certainly wouldn't call it libel. I think Matthew could have provided stronger evidence in support of his allegation, though. Like these quotes from later in the thread, when Ted more or less went off the deep end. WARNING: triggers follow:
"OK, let's do a thought experiment, shall we? Suppose Alice and Bob have sex, and Bob is drunk. Did Alice rape Bob? He was drunk, and someone who is drunk presumably can't give consent. Is that rape? Does the gender of the two people matter?"
"Suppose Bob drank the alcohol himself, willingly. And if he was still raped, does he bear any responsibility for put himself into a situation where Alice could ask and ask him until he said yes?" (this one is *especially* bad)
"Now suppose Alice is also drunk. Now did she rape Bob? Or did Bob rape Alice now? Or did Alice and Bob rape each other? Let's throw them both in jail!"
"All aside from the legal question, there's also the question, in the Alice and Bob thought experiment, regardless of whether Alice is guilty of raping Bob (assume that Bob was inebriated and couldn't give consent, and she knew that Bob was drunk), should Bob be faulted for putting him into a situation where he was so drunk that he couldn't take responsibility for himself? What if it was pretty clear that he regularly did this *because* he could lose control and not take responsibility for what he did? Suppose he hadn't yet had sex without giving consent?"
"I'll give another example. There is no question that a huge number of incidents of very regrettable incidents occur when large amounts of alcohol are involved. Whether the women involved called it rape (73% or not) or Ms. Koss calls it rape, it was probably situations that in most cases, I'm betting both the women and the man probably regretted it the next morning. I have a very simple personal solution for this, which is i don't go out on heavy drinking binges when I am at a conference."
That whole post - http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/ted_mail/0038.html , in its full, well, glory - is _classic_ rape denial. Whether you couch it in cute 'thought experiments' with gender switching or not, when you start harping on this theme of the involvement of alcohol, _you are making excuses for rape_. If you go back and actually look at the stuff Ted cited at the start of the thread, there's some legitimate though highly sensitive debate about the methodology of some studies (which I recommend not getting involved in unless you really know your stuff, much like kernel hacking...), but none of it remotely supports the asshattery in that post.
It's even worse when you start saying stuff like "should Bob be faulted for putting him into a situation where he was so drunk that he couldn't take responsibility for himself". I mean, if when the topic of rape comes up, the first thing that seems like a good idea to you is to come up with hypothetical scenarios that allow you to blame the victim for consuming alcohol, I think you have problems. And I'm _entirely_ happy with calling the above post 'rape apology' of the highest order. I'll stand by Matthew in saying so, in fact. When I first read this blog and the comments I hadn't seen the entire thread, but now I've read through the whole thing, I think Ted's contribution to it was not just non-constructive but destructive, offensive to the women involved, incorrect, inappropriate, and definitely constituted 'rape apology'.
Re: Worst piece of libel on Planet Gnome ever
I didn't say that. I already explained exactly what I think above, but oh well, I'll repeat it:
The post Ted was ultimately replying to cited some statistics on how many women have been subject to sexual abuse / rape in support of a specific point. The point was that displaying sexualized images of women in a highly male-dominated environment can be traumatizing for survivors of sexual assault / rape. The OP was pointing out that it's a statistical certainty that some of the women at any large conference have suffered some form of sexual assault in their lives and hence it is vital to consider the needs of women who've been sexually assaulted if you're trying to organize a conference to be welcoming to women.
In this context, bringing up a finicky argument about whether the assaults in the most commonly-cited studies were 'really rape' or 'rape rape' or 'bad rape' or whatever the hell you want to call it is not just not constructive, it's actively harmful. It's throwing a grenade into the discussion. Even if somehow you win the argument that some rapes aren't really rapes, what have you achieved in context? The assaults were still clearly likely to have traumatized those who were assaulted. The point that showing them sexualized images of women in a highly male conference is probably not a good idea still stands. It was utterly inappropriate to start dissecting statistics that were cited in support of a wider point which would not be invalidated even if you could win your toxic, derailing argument about the nature of sexual assault.
"And even if you think Ted's posts did not have a constructive effect, how would that justify writing libel about him being a "rape apologist"?"
I certainly wouldn't call it libel. I think Matthew could have provided stronger evidence in support of his allegation, though. Like these quotes from later in the thread, when Ted more or less went off the deep end. WARNING: triggers follow:
"OK, let's do a thought experiment, shall we? Suppose Alice and Bob have sex, and Bob is drunk. Did Alice rape Bob? He was drunk, and someone who is drunk presumably can't give consent. Is that rape? Does the gender of the two people matter?"
"Suppose Bob drank the alcohol himself, willingly. And if he was still raped, does he bear any responsibility for put himself into a situation where Alice could ask and ask him until he said yes?" (this one is *especially* bad)
"Now suppose Alice is also drunk. Now did she rape Bob? Or did Bob rape Alice now? Or did Alice and Bob rape each other? Let's throw them both in jail!"
"All aside from the legal question, there's also the question, in the Alice and Bob thought experiment, regardless of whether Alice is guilty of raping Bob (assume that Bob was inebriated and couldn't give consent, and she knew that Bob was drunk), should Bob be faulted for putting him into a situation where he was so drunk that he couldn't take responsibility for himself? What if it was pretty clear that he regularly did this *because* he could lose control and not take responsibility for what he did? Suppose he hadn't yet had sex without giving consent?"
"I'll give another example. There is no question that a huge number of incidents of very regrettable incidents occur when large amounts of alcohol are involved. Whether the women involved called it rape (73% or not) or Ms. Koss calls it rape, it was probably situations that in most cases, I'm betting both the women and the man probably regretted it the next morning. I have a very simple personal solution for this, which is i don't go out on heavy drinking binges when I am at a conference."
That whole post - http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/ted_mail/0038.html , in its full, well, glory - is _classic_ rape denial. Whether you couch it in cute 'thought experiments' with gender switching or not, when you start harping on this theme of the involvement of alcohol, _you are making excuses for rape_. If you go back and actually look at the stuff Ted cited at the start of the thread, there's some legitimate though highly sensitive debate about the methodology of some studies (which I recommend not getting involved in unless you really know your stuff, much like kernel hacking...), but none of it remotely supports the asshattery in that post.
It's even worse when you start saying stuff like "should Bob be faulted for putting him into a situation where he was so drunk that he couldn't take responsibility for himself". I mean, if when the topic of rape comes up, the first thing that seems like a good idea to you is to come up with hypothetical scenarios that allow you to blame the victim for consuming alcohol, I think you have problems. And I'm _entirely_ happy with calling the above post 'rape apology' of the highest order. I'll stand by Matthew in saying so, in fact. When I first read this blog and the comments I hadn't seen the entire thread, but now I've read through the whole thing, I think Ted's contribution to it was not just non-constructive but destructive, offensive to the women involved, incorrect, inappropriate, and definitely constituted 'rape apology'.
-adamw