Slut Walk: what a disappointment

DanGrover

In her defense, she *isn't* a house.

mattghg

But is there actually any evidence of a correlation between how women dress and their likelihood of being raped? In other words, was the Canadian police chief even right?

and I'll go to bed at noon

Rape isn't about sexual release; if it were, the men who commit it would simply masturbate or hire a prostitute instead. It's an act of violence, an assertion of power.

Your burglary analogy is flawed. A woman who wears revealing clothes may very well be deliberately signalling willingness to engage in sexual intercourse - consensual intercourse. There is no "invitation" to rape. A better analogy would be if you put a sign outside your house advertising your homemade jam and marmalade and inviting passersby to call in to purchase it, then someone seeing that sign and taking it as license to break into your house, steal everything of value and wreck the place.

For the last time: rape =/= sex.

Ian Walker

It's a side-effect of the modern 'intelligence (sic) led policing' that means looking at crimes statistically.

So if (made up figures) 50% of rape victims are wearing a short skirt at the time, then by convincing women to not wear short skirts, you in theory reduce rape.

Of course, this ignores the fact that this should be a free country, and that the cirminals are the ones whose activities should be curtailed, but who cares about that, when there's statistics to manipulate?

Wily Seacole Trout

Bet she was built like a house.

Dan Cooper

Maybe you would have been better off with a 'bling' argument, Rod.

Yes, you would have felt violated when that horrendous diamond sparkler was stolen from you.
And the wholesale manner in which it was removed was unnacceptable too. A bloody Stanley knife and unwanted finger in addition to the ring do seem an unnecessarily cack-handed mugging technique.

But you really should have taken some responsibility for donning it at that Hatton Garden jewellers when you were ambushed by that crazed 'foam-flecked' harridan...

more tea vicar

so it's burkas all round in the Liddle house.. or have I missed the point.

DeadSeaNavigator

Ok, a direct and simple question: would you have sex with a woman who gave no indication that she wanted to have sex other than wearing clothes that led you to believe she was 'up for it'?

Mr. Green

She sounds semi-detached (sorry, had to be said)

Noa

I was practicing my own slut walk in the hope of bumping into that Bryony Gordon on the march. But then she said she wasn't going to be there and the thought of being stuck between Jackie Smith and mad Hattie Smith has made mowing the lawn a most appealing prospect...

All decent men quail when faced with an implacably and irrationally enraged munter, I don't suppose a reply of 'nice house, shame about the boat race.." would have placated her any..

Oh well. Perhaps the Daily Mash's famed agony aunt, Holly Harper, has an answer.

TSR Helper Monkey

In her defence, you are an idiot.

se1man

please can the Spectator do that thing where if you click on an image it pops up in a much bigger size, even (if we're very lucky) full screen?

Thank you.

Tiberius

Did you consult Dominique before writing this blog, Rod? I admit you would probably have only got his messaging service.

Woodbine Willy

A house is not a ho.

DeadSeaNavigator

The analogy with a house being burgled when the owner has gone out and left the windows open isn't sound. However, to stick with it, you rightly say that 'leaving the windows open' (dressing like a slut) doesn't lessen the culpability of the burglar (rapist). Surely, then, it has no bearing on the verdict (guilty) or the sentence (good and long, please, irrespective of what the useless Ken Clarke says). So why bring it up at all?

Sir Graphus

I think you've fallen down the same hole as Ken Clarke.

There is something in what you say, but you've got more trouble than it's worth to say it.

James Murphy

Rod speaks the truth! Can't believe the usual Whiney Anglo Saxon Protestants are still weighing in on this page with their impotent pseudo-liberal rationalisations of sexuality. Protest all you like, the fact is, we must consider human nature is as it is - not as we might like it to be. Yes, it would be nice if i could walk down a dark street in a shady part of town singing "money, money, I've got lots of lovely money" without being set upon, but the likelihood is that I well be set relieved of my dough afore I finish my ditty. We are not an enlightened species. Bad things happen to good people. Those who do not take precautions based on this principle are fools or simpletons.

James Murphy

@ and I'll go to bed at noon - your analogy is ludicrous. Sex is more powerful than jam - or hadn't you noticed?

Floof

Didn't you beat your wife?

A

Definitely, Rod. I reckon you should tell your 'open windows' story to the elderly male and female victims of the recent Nightstalker rape case, they were probably dressed like sluts too.

DeadSeaNavigator

The problem with Rod's analogy and James Murphy's post is that it isn't reasonable to put how people dress in the category of 'taking sensible precautions over one's personal safety'. Quite apart from the logical end to that argument being burqas all round, who is going to adjudicate on what style of dress constitutes a risk? (Should there be a sliding scale?)

No, best to keep it simple: no means no and how someone's dressed has bugger all to do with sexual consent. Failure to grasp this (and it really isn't difficult, is it?) could lead to a long spell in the slammer.

eyesee

Rape isn't related to sex except in a tangential manner. It is an act of violence usually perpetrated against women who appear weak or vulnerable. A woman who is displaying in a sexual manner may well appear 'desperate' or weak to the mind of a male who is intent on violence to satisfy HIS sexual urges. Can women who barely dress understand that?

Tom Piperson

I wish that I'd said that James Murphy. Damn!

Austin Barry

Joe Orton in Entertaining Mr. Sloane similarly compared women with buildings:

“Women are like banks, boy, breaking and entering is a serious business.”

I hope, Rod, that you escape an Ortonesque, murderous bludgeoning from chimney-breasted harpies.

and I'll go to bed at noon

@James

You're missing the point. The point of the analogy was not to compare sex to the purchase of fruit preserves (not a sentence I ever expected to type), but to highlight the difference between a consensual, mutually beneficial arrangement and a brutal violation. Your characterisation of sex as "powerful" implies that some men simply can't help themselves; they see an attractive woman in revealing clothes and immediately have to force themselves on her. That's not how it works. They can help themselves.

Some people will always find a way to blame the victim, especially if the victim happens to be a woman.

John birch

Welcome back rod , where have you been.

Noa

James Murphy 5:58pm

"..Sex is more powerful than jam - or hadn't you noticed?.."

Er James, I confess I prefer jam today and probably tomorrow. Cheaper, quieter, sweeter, more satisfying...yum!

Herbert Thornton

I've often wondered how feminists' logic works.

Her shouting "I'M NOT A HOUSE" demonstrates why I remain puzzled.

Fergus Pickering

Well, What Rod says seems quite sensible to me. Any of you lot got teenage daughters? I only asked.

A lot of you seem quite sure what goes on in the mind of a rapist. I'm not sure that I know.

Men who want to have sex with children don't usually attack ugly children. The two girls Huntley killed were both pretty. Is that relevant?

Quentin Crisp was in no doubt that the way he dressed enraged the anti-poof brigade and caused them to beat him up. He didn't care, though. Brave man!

old fogey

So the woman you were debating with failed the Harriet Harman test I presume? Sensible men, or at least those who prefer a quiet life, will avoid talking about rape in public, because we'll always come off being abused.

Charles

Isn't the issue not so much the clothes, but where they are worn?

I suspect (best guess, no data) that women who are at a specific time wearing "provocative" clothing are more likely to be (a) out late at night (b) in an environment where they or their attacker may be drunk or have used drugs (c) in an environment that may be a night club or somewhere higher risk than a library or their home.

None of this is to mitigate in anyway the crime that is committed by the rapist (although, if I recall correctly, "stranger rape" - which is about power not sex as someone noted above - is a small proportion of the overall number of rape cases). That said, it is also the responsibility of the women to make an appropriate risk assessment of any given situation: getting bladdered and wandering about in a state of undress does increase their risk of being attacked

AY

Sorry Rod - slut walk idea is way more pleasant and correct than your unintelligible macho moo.

Jenny

Ok, Rod.
Which clothes make it more likely for a girl / woman to get raped? Let us know so the female population can adjust their wardrobes accordingly.

Let me contribute some facts.
As a school girl in correct uniform I was sexually assaulted, twice.

In a park in full cycling gear my friend was sexually assaulted.

Some men find nurses' outfits a turn on. Better get rid of them.

Last week a woman was sexually assaulted by a parademic in the back of an ambulance. I guess she should stop wearing resuscitation gear?

The point is, in case you still haven't got it: rapists rape REGARDLESS of what women wear.

So, you'll have to think of another way to lay the blame on victims.

Jenny

Herbert Thornton:
Let me explain it for you.
Women = human beings.
Women =/= property.
Got it yet?

GIlbert Pinfold

Some definitions may be in order:

Slut - someone who sleeps with everyone including you;
Bitch - someone who sleeps with everyone except you.

Jennifer 8

No house analogy. On a dark seedy street, woman#1 walks wearing a hoodie, jeans & sneakers. Woman#2 walks down wearing a low-cut tank top, stilettos, mini skirt, no panties. Who do you think the sicko in the bushes is more likely to attack?
Does this mean woman#2 will definitely get raped? NO. Does she deserve to get raped? NO. Does it mean woman#1 definitely will not get raped? NO.

IT IS A REALISTIC, COMMON SENSE PRECAUTION TO AVOID A HORRIBLE SITUATION IN AN IMPERFECT WORLD. What was insensitively worded advice about PREVENTION has been misinterpreted as "blaming the victim" - this polarizes thought & skews the discussion of an important topic, it does not help it.

Jon Orton

She sounded like she had the intrinsic intelligence of a pile of bricks and mortar. Are you sure she wasn't a house?

Stephanie Tohill

Except Liddle, I doubt very much that most, if any rapes are provoked by attire (in most rapes the attacker is known to the victim) and people ever comment on the attire of the male victims of rape. It's a ludricous comparison! And it is seeking to lay blame on a woman. Even with your burgled house comaprison, you leave a window open and you better believe your insurers will see it as contributory factor. It's from the same school of though which states if she wears a mini skirt she is 'asking for it.' No wonder so many women are reluctant to report rapes. They fear people will think they did something to merit it.

We also have the use of the word 'slut'. Or somehow 'dressing like one.' Once again we allude to the fact that behaviour which is pretty neutral in men is somehow bad for a woman.

Stephanie Tohill

"But is there actually any evidence of a correlation between how women dress and their likelihood of being raped? In other words, was the Canadian police chief even right?"

Exactly.

Graphite

"But is there actually any evidence of a correlation between how women dress and their likelihood of being raped? In other words, was the Canadian police chief even right?"

It wouldn't matter it he was the rightest police chief in the history of rightness and in the history of policing. It wouldn't matter if he had a Pulitzer Prize in Rightness, a PhD from Oxford in Rightness and was a shoo in for the Nobel Rightness Prize.

He's a man, so he's wrong.

Titus Andronicus

It seems pretty clear that many female comments are based on the assumption that men no have no right to suggest that women need to ‘mind how they go’ or ‘mind’ their own behaviour, while insisting that men should be held responsible for the behaviour of some.

The feminist agenda has loomed up once again - and it is a totalitarian one – now denying free speech to men and calling for the restriction of their rights. The zealots are insisting that society should prevent rape from happening at all. How could that be attempted without preventing men from about moving freely under massive police surveillance?

Female extremists want to remove the presumption of innocence before the proof of guilt in rape cases and they deny any possibility of false reporting. We’ve long had a situation obtaining in education in which a male teacher can be suspended and finally lose his job if a girl makes one complaint – that’s why a lot of men are reluctant to become teachers. The feminist push wants this effect to spread as insist on a right to do as they please anytime, anywhere, without let or hindrance or adverse comment.

It’s bad out there
High water everywhere

At the present time Ken Clarke is going under for daring to suggest that some incidents are less serious than others. He was very foolish to say this but it does happen to be true. The lobby though want all incidents to be treated with equal severity: even incidents by women who initiate the act and later change their minds.

EyeSee

It is unfortunate perhaps that feminists are women. Have cake and eat it, I want what I want are not very communal-oriented thought processes. When a girl goes out wearing very little she is saying that she considers herself sexually attractive and all the men SHE finds attractive should pay her attention and all those she doesn't find attractive should ignore her and that they should know this in advance. This is exemplified in the 'nightclub' scenario; the 'right' guy staring starts fits of giggles and the 'wrong' guy gets 'what are you f***ing staring at?' This an extreme outcome of the in-built mechanism that says we look for people we feel are at our level of attractiveness. The 'wrong' bloke should know he is way too ugly for the girl who has taken great effort to put her flesh on show, this being a natural proof that she is very attractive.

Clearly women are not very clear on why they want the ability to dress in any manner, without it having any consequences except those they have in their head, at that moment. If the phrase 'dress to impress' means that you can mould other people's perceptions by the way you dress, in this case usually to achieve something work related, what is the intended consequence of dressing 'sexily'? Because the feminist says it means nothing at all. Surely it is very similar to the Derek and Clive 'Hello' sketch. Saying hello is OK surely, but should I also have the right to say anything I want to someone, without them getting all huffy about it? They shouldn't think it means anything. It is only a message, can't help it if you took it the wrong way.

old fogey

Slightly related; how do we stop MEN ( mostly youngish) from wearing trousers so low that we are confronted with about 6 inches of undergarment; I find that so offensive; in fact even on the not infrequent occasions that I see women apeing the habit it makes me come over all Jonathan Swift-ish. Even worse, perhaps is the habit of men of all ages to go bear chested on even slightly sunny days; that is both vain and horrible. And as for postmen in shorts..in January. Perhaps if the sluts campaigned for men to show more modesty, on aesthetic grounds..

Titus Andronicus

Notes to old Fogey,

Agreement, unreserved and absolute, need for dress codes, how about moral education? (OK, that's chancing it so disapprobation instead)Swift absolutely most esp. The T of T.

We all want pulpits. And tubs too!

Another Rod

Yes, as feminists say, 'rape is rape'. But, for that matter, burglary is burglary, fraud is fraud, GBH is GBH, and speeding is speeding. And so on. We all know that some burglaries are more serous than others, some cases of fraud are more serious than others, etc. Are we seriously supposed to believe that, apparently uniquely among all categories of crime, whether they relate to property or person, rape is the sole example of a crime where it is impossible to discern differing degrees of seriousness?

Obviously not. Nothing Clarke said - read it - was at all disputing the fact that all rape is serious. He merely asserted the truism that some cases are clearly more serious than others, which is why there isn't a single standard punishment for rape, but sentences vary according to its perceived seriousness. As with all other crimes. Clarke's mistake was to assume that it is still possible today to have a rational and logical discussion about important social issues. Sadly, all too often, it just isn't. His case wasn't helped by being a male talking logically and sensibly about an issue which mainly affects females.

Chaps - ever tried having a rational and logical discussion about abortion?

smell the glove

Perhaps the young ladies in question, should take a leaf out of the Mayan or Aztec ladies book. They used to smear themselves in excretion when the conquistador's rolled in to town.

Titus Andronicus

And what' your comment on 'the habit of men of all ages to go bear chested' is most certainly right A real turnoff that is, especially for bares who never go manchested, not even the grizzlies.

Hexhamgeezer

The women in that picture are undeniably comely but are a disgrace to wimminhood. They spend money on foreign holidays or fake tan but neglect to buy clothes or hairdriers.

DougS

RL: "...I mentioned this in a radio debate earlier this week and the woman I was debating with shrieked at me: “I AM NOT A HOUSE. I AM NOT A HOUSE”"

You had two options Rod, viz.

1. Say 'calm down dear' (MW accent) or

2. Say 'caarm down, caarm down (Liverpool accent)

How did you respond?

Seacole Seamore

“I AM NOT A HOUSE. I AM NOT A HOUSE”.

Is this related in anyway to last year's MPs expenses scandal?:

I am not a duck house, duckie

Baron

a woman should be able to walk stark naked without getting raped, arrested for indecent exposure in public, perhaps, raped never, the pseudo-liberal attitude towards the wrongdoers, rapists including, stinks, we, the law abiding, get to be at least inconvenienced, more often punished for the reluctance of the governing elite to punish the miscreants.

when common sense ruled in this country, there was no need for locks, those who broke the law, broke in, were lucky if they got a one way ticket to down under, now, if they’re unlucky to get caught, successfully prosecuted, they get a couple of months in a 4-star establishment equipped with gym, snooker rooms, the chance to sue if they harm themselves during the burglary, an outreach worker to look after them when they’re freed. Any wonder the number of burglaries in the 60s last century hovered over 30,000 annually, today it’s the number for a fortnight. Madness.

chela

it is always interesting to see the fury and intolerence that comes spewing out when someone says what they think, these awful women show themselves up to be hysterical harpies everytime. incidently, i was raped, not great but im still here, keep up the good work darling speccie

Martin Sewell

She's not a real brick either!

Would said cop have been sued if he had failed to give sound risk management advice?

Anna

Ken Clarke did express himself badly. There is a difference between a man who attacks a woman he doesn't know and a man who has sex with an underage girl. Clarke says that's rape because she's too young to give consent, even though no force has been used. Why not call it 'unlawful sexual intercourse'. (In fact, I thought they did.) Both violent rape and unlawful sexual intercourse are serious crimes, though different in manner and execution. Sex with a minor might involve all kinds of manipulation and emotional abuse even though no violence or physical coercion is used. All rapes are serious but they can be serious in different ways. I think that's what Calrke meant.

On the subject of women being responsible for titillating men by their dress - women in burkas in Saudi Arabia complain of sexual harrassment as do women in Egypt who also dress 'modestly'.

Mrs Mugabe

Well Rod. It's monumentally difficult to understand - if you happen to be a disaffected, vicious, man-hating, crypto-Marxist lesbian. But for normal, boring, middle-class women, such as myself, I can but conclude that there's an obvious reason why the concept of modesty exists. Perhaps these sistas should consider that we're not living in Lala land and perhaps the sensible approach is not to flaunt something you don't want to sell.

Herbert Thornton

Jenny (May 19th, 1:16am) -

No, Jenny, I have not "got it". Instead you've made me more puzzled than ever.

And I might add, that in your May 19th 12:37am posting, where you told Rod that he would "have to think of another way to lay the blame on victims", you made an entirely false accusation that Rod was blaming the victims. He was not.

It makes me think that if you accidentally spilled boiling water on yourself, and somebody advised you to be more careful, you would become indignant and claim your rights had been violated and say that the adviser, instead of showing sympathy, was 'laying the blame on the victim'.

angisofia

and if a woman is too beautifull she defenetly should where a burka because you never know what can hapen to women when she is beautifull...

John Steadman

I can't see anything wrong with Rod Liddle's logic - "It doesn't lessen the guilt of the burglar that I've left my window open, or even remotely suggest that I was deserving of being burgled.Just that it was more likely to happen."
What is wrong with that?
And what is wrong in Ken Clarke (with whose general attitude to sentencing I am most emphatically out of sympathy) suggesting that the circumstances of a rape - which can vary widely - should be taken into account when sentences are passed? Jumping on him because of his use of "serious" might give the "sluts" something to rail about, and hopefully shed a blouse or a potato sack, but does it really detract from his argument?
Clarke is right to cite artificial indignation as a factor here - we live in a society where victimhood is avidly sought, and where too many idle, fat and hypersensitive backsides have too little to occupy their time.

Jenny

Herbert Thornton
May 19th, 2011 5:54pm

Are you sure about your analogy? If I had 'accidentally spilled boiling water on myself' I would have to take some responsibility as I spilled the water. In short, the attacker and the victim are the same person. If I had been raped, however, I would NOT have been the person who did the raping. The victim and the attacker are different people.

If I accidentally spilled boiling water on someone else, I would not expect a third party to tell the poor burned victim that s/he should have been wearing a jumper!

Herbert Thornton

Jenny (May 19th, 9:27pm)

Of course it wasn't an analogy - it was a more extreme example of the kind of flawed logic that you earlier tried to use against Rod.

The fact is that the world is full of hazards. One hazard is that because you are a women you run a risk of being raped. That doesn't mean that being raped is your fault.

Nor does advising you how best to avoid being raped amount to blaming you if you are raped.

A. MacAulay

Policemen are not famous for being bright, and mostly they don't need to be. If you ask a policemen the way to Charing Cross, for example, and get an answer that helps get you there, then, "your friend and helper" has done a good job and everyone is happy. If you ask a policeman how not to get attacked on the street, if he's clever he will say, don't make yourself look like a target and then you are less likely to get hit. That is actually what this officer said, he just didn't formulate it very well. He spoke from experience and also a goodly portion predjudice and his advice was well meant and probably sound. So where's the problem? We like our policemen to be somewhat stolid, dependable, value conservative, law & order types. This is the model person who defends our life, property and freedom best. (Consider the alternatives?) People like this will always, without in any way condoning a crime, feel that a bourgeois women who dresses like a street whore has in a real way contibuted to her own misery when she gets attacked. In this they simply reflect the society they live in and also protect.

Any one care to disagree?

As usual with Rod Liddle there are a numer of different questions here, apparently seeking the same answer.

Mrs Grundy's nieghbour from Hungary

A. MacAulay
May 20th, 2011 9:46am

"Any one care to disagree?"

No, it's refreshingly uncommon sense.

Shakassoc

Don't complain about the nasty remarks people are making about you, Rodders. Writing a post like that means you were asking for it...

A. MacAulay

@ smell the glove
May 19th, 2011 12:40pm

Actually Germaine Greer said something along these lines in a Telegraph commentary the other day. She posits that "slut" doesn't mean sexually incontinent, but simply dirty and that a "slut walk" demonstrates the inherent right of women not to wash. But, I think GG has either left her brains on the bus somewhere or she is a shameless hypocrite. No where have I read that the walking sluts were prepared to make themselves disagreable in terms of personal hygiene.

"wafts me thus" doesn't mean, I can smell her upwind a mile off.

Tom

Another bandwagon another Germaine Greer insight.She might even get another book out of this one

John Montague

Actually, Rod, I really object to police ads telling me that if I don't lock all my windows, I'm a mug asking to be burgled. It's the police force's job to catch criminals; I don't welcome them spending our money telling us that we're at fault if we don't live in a fortress.

Advising women not to be sexually attractive in public is a similar impudence.

It may or may not be sound advice, but that's not the point. It's a question of tact. The police should never convey the idea that the victim's innocent behaviour contributed to their victimisation. Everything they say should make it clear that the bad guys are contemptible; once that's clear, some very apologetic advice about precautions may be appropriate.

Herbert Thornton

LATEST NEWS

Owners of several makes of car allege that their cars have been raped and seek superinjuction against this man -

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/2000899/Man-admits-having-sex-with-1000-cars.html

The preliminary hearing of the application had to be adjourned amid uproar, after one of the distraught owners cars shouted -

"MY CAR IS NOT A WOMAN".

Amanda

Very interesting responses. Women -- and men in prisons, for that matter -- are raped all over the world, by strangers and (mostly, we're told) by people they know or at least have met, whether they are short, tall, fat, thin, old, a child, lovely or ugly. No rapist ever said: 'God, that dress is *so* last year, don't think I'll bother'. Or: 'She's wearing trousers and not a crochet peek-a-boo: don't think I'll bother'. If he thinks he can get away with it, he bothers.

What you are doing, who you are with, and especially *where you are* is much more important than what you're wearing in terms of your risk of attack. As a young girl, I worried about rape rather a lot (when out babysitting, going out for the evening, and so). Probably very natural. And, having read the papers, I was always worried about being murdered as well: men that are capable of that are capable of anything. Have a look at my friend's comment on James Delingpole's blog of yesterday (Daily Telegraph) on this subject: she fended off an attack in her home and tells us (very coolly) about her fears. Her screen name is Msher.

My husband was attacked while walking in the early morning -- having a constitutional before work -- while it was still dark. (I had mildly warned him about this, not that we lived in a dangerous place.) Anyway, the attackers saw a lone man and were after his wallet. (Who takes his wallet on an exercise walk? They were not too bright, and now they're not too free either, I'm happy to say.) Anyway, the point is that they didn't give a monkey's jockstrap whether he was a gent in the latest Brooks Brothers fashions, or some slob in bleached jeans and builder's bum with a t-shirt from ten years ago and breakfast down the front. They were after his wallet. And a rapist, most of the time, doesn't care what a woman is wearing, either. He is after that other kind of wallet.

Scary Biscuits

The trouble with a debate about women's clothes or rape is that it involves discussing with women.

In my experience you can sit in a pub all evening debating politics with men and generally still be friends at the end. Try that with a woman or, even worse, a group of them and the chances are that before too long they'll take something you say personally. Then your chances of sleeping with them are dramatically reduced. Worse, other men who would normally have followed the logic of your argument and understood you, would instead leap to the defence of the women and join them in their emotional disapproval of you(I speak from bitter experience!).

A Conservative is a Liberal with a teenage daughter and what that Canadian Chief of Police said was no more than any loving father would say. However, getting mixed up in a grown woman's daddy issues probably isn't wise.

James Murphy

"I'll go to bed, etc" - rape isn't about sexual release (but is) ... an assertion of power.." Flawed logic. If this were the case, the rapist would simply beat up the victim without sexual congress. Actually, rape is about the power to force intercourse on a woman regardless of her consent. Lust IS involved.

A. MacAulay

I can't imagine walking past Rod Liddle's house, seeing a left open window and taking the chance that he is out buying fags, climbing in to see if there's anything worth stealing. It just doesn't occur to me, and I don't think I'm suppressing my inner-burglar, and that really I'd like to do it if I didn't think I'd get caught. Statistically, I probably wouldn't.

Nonetheless this type of crime takes place a thousand times a day. I can imagine doing it but the chances of me really doing it are zero. I can also imagine how awful it must be to have someone break into my home and rummage my family's belongings and steal something precious to me. I would find it embarrassing to stand in the midst of someone elses home without their permission and knowledge. I think this in order to try to understand why I'm not a burglar, finally though, I may have 100 opportunities to steal something every day, but I don't ignore them or avoid them, I simply don't see them. Maybe I missed a career in the Police?

The idiots who tried to mug Amanda's husband weren't simply opportunists, they were looking for an opportunity. In their favour were that the potential victim was alone and it was dark. I suppose that the local police said to Mr. Amanda afterwards, if you want to go for a stroll, get in your car, drive to the Smoky Mountains where there are numerous trails you can walk on all you like, but don't wander about in your neighbourhood in the dark!
Right?

And that's about all any of us here knows about rape. Anti-social, egocentric, empathy incapable men are out there, or even in there if the majority of rapes happen within the personal social field, waiting for their opportunity. This is why these people are pilloried and punished when caught. When caught.

Amanda

A. MacAulay: Well said. Can we have you as Chief of Police? How about Justice Minister?

The police didn't say anything to Chris. He'd already got the message on that one, believe me. He stuck to doing jumping jacks in front of the computer after that. Funny thing is, in the Smokies we have to worry about bears! LOL

[The following is off-topic -- those that hate off-topic talk should avert their eyes:]

By the way, I don't recall mentioning the Smokies on Liddle's blog (or anyone else's here). You've been reading that Telegraph, ancha? Perhaps you post elsewhere by another name.

Incidentally, some people think that one can't really know anyone on the Internet because we're all just made-up names and hide behind avatars and even made-up personalities. That claim makes sense but reality belies it. I find that even though some people play games, or change their screen name for one reason or another (as I've done), the players and changers tend to be discovered soon enough. Wittingly or not, they give a tip-off. Last year, there was a time when trolls used the commenting system to impersonate frequent posters -- me included -- but we realized very quickly from various clues that we were reading imposters. (Apart from coming on right away and saying 'that's not me!', which of course prompted the imposter to make the same charge.) Clues ranged from times of posting to icons used to sentence structure to tone and attitude. So much for being interchangeable ciphers on the Web.

A. MacAulay

No, I was in the Smokies in about 1979, found it wonderful and know that it is a nice place to go hiking. There's no other connection beyond my remembering it.

Brent

There is no statistical correlation between provocative clothing and rape.

It's a ruse used by those who want to control women's behaviour. My guess is that you're either religious blowhards or homos.

If you like women with their heads covered who cower in fear of every man they see, there are many countries you can go to. Why try to ruin the good thing we have going on here?

Amanda

MacAulay: Well, that's a coincidence, I'd say. Of all the gin joints and all the mountains in the world.... Guess where I'm spending two months this summer -- as usual? Been to Murphy, N. C., or Highlands?

[Cue grumpy reader: 'What is this -- a travel forum?' Whereupon, cue classic comedy Honeymooners' line on my behalf: 'You shut up!' Trust me, it was the way she said it.]

P. S. Why aren't you reading the Telegraph, then? Good 'paper'. Though personally I think the 'Contentions' blog of Commentary magazine is not to be missed. To say nothing of the Realclearpolitics website (a grab-bag of punditry and reporting, in case you don't know it already. As you probably do.)

10:30. Good time to shut up.

Eddie

I object strongly to the Americanism 'slut walk'. Couldn't we British have rejected the PC Canadian/American name 'slut walk' (though slut is a British word too of course) and made more use of our own super-rich language (and British English has far more and far juicier bad language than north America too)?

How about 'Slag Walk'? 'Dirty Old Slapper' walk? Then, next week, we can have a 'Good Old Wanker Walk' for the boys? How about it girls? How bout some gender equality eh? Or do you actually think it's OK for there to be female-only organisations but for you to try and ban all male-only ones?

Fergus Pickering

Brent, do you know there is no statistical correlation or are you just saying so? Where are the sudies? If I suggest to my eenage daughter that she not go out wearing THAT, am I automatically homosexual or religious or both? Do you have now, or did you ever have, a teenage daughter? If you did and she didn't shock you sometimes with her attire than she just wasn't trying.

A. MacAulay

Meanwhile, back at the sluts....... I think it is part of the feminisation of society that vanity, once considered when not a sin but at least a fault, has been turned into a virtue. Let's not pretend that the right to dress like a slut was ever in danger, despite the timid fears of the likes of BRENT. (more confidence in your culture, sir!) The truth is that anyone can wear anything they want. Even men dress up as sluts and go to the Christopher St. parade. Besides, follow the rigours of fashion and one sees that women can be persuaded into wearing just about anything, en masse, that sets their T's & A's in an interesting light. The "Slut Walk" is just a personal PR opportunity for a bunch of prancing nitwits who have found an excuse to strut their stuff and moralise at the same time. This is why one feels slightly queezy about it. Here is pure, show-off self regard placed under the burka of Politically Correct feminism. Vanity and hypocrisy; will this help safeguard women from rapists? Answers on a postcard to Germaine Greer.

By vanity I mean self-definition in a hierarchical obsession with personal appearance and removed from any general, social context. That one sees so many men who "pump iron" and otherwise in a narcissistic way beautify themselves is proof to me of the march of feminisation. This is tedious and witless and part of the medial parade of folly and weakness that passes for entertainment.

And Amanda I was on an assignment to photograph a house somewhere in the backwoods; no idea where. Drove along a road that gave a panorama of the Smokies, which was memorable and wonderful.

Graphite

Amanda
May 21st, 2011 3:15am

Everybody knows that clothes have no bearing on whether you're attacked by total strangers, be it for a wallet or whatever.

Apart from living like a hermit or hiring bodyguards, we're all in danger, to a greater or lesser extent, depending on where we live, of being mugged. That's been true throughout history.

But a young woman who goes out for a good time, to a bar or nightclub or a party, seeking to pick up a bloke, or be picked up by one, is in far greater danger of becoming a victim of "date rape" if she is dressed like a whore rather than dressed like a librarian.

My educated guess is that the predatory types of male out there will be targeting the hooker lookalikes and passing on the librarians.

zeusgoose

This is (to me anyway) one of those pointless blogs where no one is wrong in what they say but looking as it from different directions.
However ,at the end of the day,`sh*t happens`...as the American slang would have it. So most sensible people modify their behaviour according to the environment they are in at the time and. It`s an instinctive thing which most learn by the time they are adults.
Those that are caught out, hopefully learn something from it. Hence Amanda's` hubby now forgoes his walk and does jumping jacks instead (whatever that is!)
Personally I would have opted for one of the interesting self defence options freely available in her country. (The best ones start with Colt or S&W)

manuel escott

for god's sake,rod, get it right. the slut walk , now gone international, started in toronto when a police officer(NOT the chief of police) made his remarks to a largely female law school audience. as an old newsman, you shld look at the files before writing.

Amanda

Manuel Escott: What you say rings a bell with me, though I'm not a journalist -- and if that's true, it's very old news indeed. Because I lived in Toronto 20 years ago. And there was a stink at the time when a policeman of rank said that very thing. It wasn't 'let him have his pleasure' -- though now that I think about it, there WAS a policeman that gave this 'advice'. It was reported in the papers. It caused an outcry. Wonder why?

rod liddle

Brent: there is a correlation in every single study that's been done. This ranges from a very small minority of rapes (Utah University study) 5 per cent, to more than 60 per cent in some other studies.

WB

Plus don't forget the perfect right of a certain person much in the news presently to emerge total naked from his bathroom and have his way with the maid come to clean his room provocatively dressed in a maid's uniform the little slut just begging fot it.

Stuart Seacole Smith

Quite like the picture on this one, intriguing combo of boob-salad and plastic bowler patriotism.

WB: a certain someone apparently did not have that right. Hence the "movement restrictive jacket" etc etc.

A. MacAulay

Yes, the shapely buttocks right made me overlook that the young lady far left has covered her right breast with what appears to be a bikini type, Danish flag. Who or what is she trying to provoke?

Why she's not a house

The thing that I hate about all of these ridiculous metaphors is that having your house burgled (regardless of the status of your windows) is in no way similar to the act of ultimate violation that is rape. Nor does it carry the severely psychologically damaging consequences that does rape. (And as inarticulate and emotionally-charged as your fellow debater may have been, this is presumably the point she was trying to make).

When a man in an Armani suit walks back to his Mercedes Benz after work and is stabbed and killed on the street by a mugger, no one says "Well if he'd been wearing a bargain basement suit and driving a Honda, he'd still be alive..." That's are more accurate analogy.

And that Police Chief was not wrong because he was a man. I've heard women maintain the same point of view and they've been wrong too. Rape shouldn't be treated like it's a fact of life that we should all anticipate, plan for or tolerate like we do the possibility of a flat tire. It's not simply one of these "things that happen in life" that we should just get used to.

A. MacAulay

@Why she's not a house
May 28th, 2011 4:43am

Burglary and rape are crimes for which our society has a mostly inadequate answer. Neither the causes of nor the punishments for leave any of us with anything other than deep unease. In that the one is a crime against property and the other against a person, it is clear that the latter is more serious. No-one here disputes this.

Despite that much in feministic thought projects a crypto-macho, "men think women are chattels", attitude on us men in general, actually, if you want to find a man who thinks that women are property and rape is therefore a sort of vandalism, then you have to go to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, etc. where this point of view is anchored in law.

Some years ago an American freind, a New Yorker visited me and we enjoyed a sunny street-café coffee in a wealthy south european city where a mass of strolling passers-by enjoyed a relaxed lunch hour. My friend noted the ease and confidence of the strollers and that they appeared to her to be festooned with, for a New Yorker, dangerous amounts of jewellry and were just asking to get mugged. The Armani suit analogy is just nonsense. Ask any N.Y'er why they don't wear their earings in the subway.

The analogy only makes sense if one understands that women are in themselves the "Armani suit", the signal being the signals that nature gave them in making them female. The signals they also assiduously enhance to increase their effeciveness to either attract men or demonstrate their status to other women. Therefore rape is probably one of those facts of life that we know to be anti-social, an abuse of relative weakness, an abuse of trust in many cases, yes simply criminal and that one should take precautions to avoid. These precautions may sound tedious from the mouth of a policeman, patronising from one's father, but really what else shall they say?

Rod Liddle says that appearance plays a statistical role in rape. At a university it is samll because there are attractive young women there in overabundance. In other situations up to 60%. Clearly the best advice is don't make yourself look like a target and don't put yourself in a place where targets get hit.

Hope

Rod Liddle, you really are a disgustingly ignorant and small-minded man.

Rachel

I wonder if you would be so proud of your quip if you'd been suggesting to a black man that if he went around displaying his wares (ie. his skin), he was leaving himself uninsured against race hate crime? Maybe you'd feel a little ashamed of the comparison to leaving the window open?

It is a human right to have and to exercise one's sexuality. This extends to women, not just to men. Asking women to keep it under wraps is a big ask, the woman was right, she's not a house.

Saski

I think the main problem here is that people are not differentiating between sexual interest and sexual violence, they are not one and the same thing. While it may be true that dressing in a sexual way elicits sexual interest in various people, I don't believe that it is the next logical step that it elicits sexual abuse such as harrassment and violence. The former may be a natural and kindly reaction, the latter is a criminal and hateful reaction.

Expecting any victimised group to amend their appearance to avoid hate is an unethical expectation. While expecting anyone to eliminate a central part of their humanity such as their sexuality in public is doubly so. This is not on a par with not wearing gold earrings in public or leaving the window open.

And where does it stop? Do women get respected when they wear dresses below the knee? When they wear them to their ankles? When they cover their arms? Their hair? Their faces? Their left eye? Their right eye? When they never leave the house? No, they are STILL attacked. So the answer is not to imprison women, but to deal with men's attitudes towards females and female sexuality.

Amanda

Rachel and Saski: Hello, and thanks for your thoughtful contributions. I enjoyed reading them.

SK

They just love fancy dress..

Jack

I think it would be helpful to identify certain forms of criminal behaviour by men against women as sexist crime rather than sexual crime. ie. Gender-inspired hate crime. I think this would change the social consciousness around it. It might also be a first step to reigning in some of the discriminatory and negative propaganda about females that is quite endemic through the entertainment industry.

I think the first step should be to add gender to the list of protected groups under anti-incitement to hatred and violence legislation. Curiously only race, disability, sexuality and religion are covered by this.

Elizabeth Head (Slutwalk Organiser)

Questions: If I am in bed - naked - with my male partner and I don't want sex, are you saying its understandable for him to perpetrate a violent assault upon me? He would be appalled at the thought, but you seem to think that any state of female undress is an invitation to crime.
If you come round to my house for dinner which I have cooked for you and you don't eat it, am I within my rights to shove it down your throat?
Would you prefer to be burgled or raped, Ron?

A. MacAulay

Rachel, Saski, Jack, Elizabth Head, your argumentation boils down to legistlating for a different world. One would say, good luck, but should you succeed then the liberty which is yours of right would be more curtailed than it is now and it is very doubtful that you would be safer from criminal attacks.

The majority of men are not rapists. The majority of women do not get raped. That is the societal norm and the law (however inefficiently) protects that norm by punishing offenders. Making "Hate" a crime leads to a state where denunciation alone brings conviction.

In your future, sexual realtionships will be governed by contract law, each partner signing a declaration of consensuality before any clothes are removed. First the formalities and then the fun. And don't forget the condom!

Rachel

A. MacAulay: "Rachel, Saski, Jack, Elizabth Head, your argumentation boils down to legistlating for a different world."

I rather think that's the point isn't it? The status quo isn't serving women well. We're rather fed up of not having the same civil rights as men do and people making excuses for it. It's not a hopeless situation, it's one that everyone is colluding in perpetuating.

Jack

"Making "Hate" a crime leads to a state where denunciation alone brings conviction."

Both Incitement to hatred and hate-motivated crime are already crimes. The problem is that they only apply to ethnicity, sexuality and religion. For some reason not gender. It seems like a gaping oversight given how many attacks are gender-motivated and how much of the media is occupied in perpetuating damaging gender stereotypes and incitement to violence. I'm curious to know what the reasoning is. I think it's because people are still labouring under the misapprehension that violence against women is just a form of generalised crime that happens to more vulnerable people.

Saski

There is a difference between property rights and human rights, Rod.

Besides, it's quite different for somebody to give private advice to somebody to take care by avoiding a certain location or dressing a certain way, and quite another for the authorities to give official advice of this kind to an entire designated group. For example, can you imagine the response if a police man was giving a safety talk to a religious group and
told them not to dress like [insert suitable banned word here] in public if they didn't want to get harassed.

I find it rather depressing how amusing men like yourself seem to find women's attempts to get their civil rights recognised. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I can't imagine you writing a comparible headline for any other group that included such an insulting epithet. If we took the approach that's served men so well in the past of causing civil unrest and using extreme violence we might be taken more seriously? Is women's problem that they are far too reasonable and not foam-flecked enough?

A. MacAulay

Rachel, women have the same civil rights as men. If you feel that your rights are not protected, then demanding more and diverse rights will still leave you unprotected. Who is colluding with whom? And who is making excuses, for what and to whom?

Jack, most people know when they commit a crime that they are committing a crime. They can also choose not to do it. In light of this the motivation, be it hate, greed, lust, etc. is secondary. It is every persons right not to be assaulted. The point about equality is that it makes people equal, so whilst women are in general the victims of rape with its also specific to women, character, the right to choose one's partner and not to be coerced or assaulted holds for both sexes. It's universal. So, giving minorities special case rights when their rights are already guaranteed, even if not effectively protected, simply muddles the general awareness of what is right and what are Rights.

Saski, "In that the one is a crime against property and the other against a person, it is clear that the latter is more serious. No-one here disputes this." No where did Rod Liddle imply that this is not so and his analogy cannot be understod another way and the lady who declares herself not to be a house either did not or chose not to understand him. That is surely clear?

The foolish policeman, stopped an official seminar and interjected a personal opinion, meaning it well but completely misjudging his audience. Big deal!

Your rhetorical question about the possibility of women using civil unrest and extreme violence is daft. Why set off bombs for rights you already have? Might not a bit of political engagegment in our democracy, even though it will take time, be more effective?

Blah

A right is only a right if you're able to exercise it. Otherwise it's just an idea.

Women clearly do not currently have the right not to be attacked by men, they only have this right if they stay indoors and never show any sign of a sexual identity.

A. MacAulay

Hallo Blah, "A right is only a right if you're able to exercise it. Otherwise it's just an idea." Wrong! Start by reading this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_and_legal_rights

Woman clearly do have the right not to be attacked otherwise society would't put rapists in gaol. Is this really too complicated?

blah

bit like saying to somebody with no legs, you have a right to walk.

blah

You assume A. MacAulay that women are campaigning for a change in the law so they have more rights. They're not. They are campaigning for their current rights to be implemented.

Once upon a time black people had the right to be treated equally under the law. The murder of Stephen Lawrence showed that this right was worthless until it was demanded.

A. MacAulay

Blah: "You assume A. MacAulay that women are campaigning for a change in the law so they have more rights. They're not. They are campaigning for their current rights to be implemented." I understand that the "Sluts" are campaigning for rights they already have rather than campaigning to have those rights respected. That's my reading of the pro-Slut contributions. Rachel says it best, " We're rather fed up of not having the same civil rights as men do and people making excuses for it. It's not a hopeless situation, it's one that everyone is colluding in perpetuating." What she actually says is that she is unhappy at being treated equally with men and feels, being a woman, that she deserves a bit more equality, and that some un-named forces, presumably "the establishment" are conspiring to deprive her of her extra-rights. That's why dressing up as a slut, something she would never dare to do on her own, is puffed up as a RIGHT and something to "fight" for.

During the middle-ages on fair days in boroughs, all the guilds, including the Guild of Prostitutes would march through the streets. That was a slut walk!

Rachel

Actually AM, I want the right to have a sexual life and for the police not to conflate that into a mitigating factor in crime against me.

I think you've rather missed the point about it being called a "Slut" walk, it's called that because this demeaning terminology is used to set up a two-tier value system for women: those who deserve to be mistreated and those who don't. Any woman can tell you that this division is one that serves men much better than it serves women.

A. MacAulay

Yes, Rachel we are just edging around a larger debate about liberty and the nature of human behaviour. When the discrimination, between "wives" and "sluts" is a moral one then it serves definite social and economic norms, then the hierarchical self-interest of the "wives" will rigidly uphold the "two tier system". Their men also have an absolute interest in fathering and raising their own offspring. That our human culture has great difficulty in finding a balance beween the inherent conflict of society and sex is witnessed by the prurient obsession in the media for sexual fidelity, the hysterical need to deflate tension with dirty jokes, pornography and aggression, principally against women. Women's Liberation has changed our society greatly, but hardly the conflicts that are held submerged by it.

That's why I'm sceptical that legislating for utopia will make things better. Parliaments are there to uphold a status quo, a balance in society with just enough liberty and just enough order, and only make change when absolutely necessary. Ideally!

In the end, liberty is bound to danger. You don't have to like and are free to protest against discrimination, but I doubt if you'll ever be free of it.

James Roberts

Charming.

Sarah Maple

You are such an idiot! and so wrong! rape is about POWER, not about anything you are wearing. You are such a total arse.

A. MacAulay

Sarah Maple
June 13th, 2011 12:45am
"You are such an idiot! and so wrong! rape is about POWER, not about anything you are wearing. You are such a total arse."

I'm still waiting for any of you lot to put any one of my arguments to the test. No show! Why not learn to think, sometime. It helps with what's called understanding.

Rachel

AM: "I'm still waiting for any of you lot to put any one of my arguments to the test. No show!"

Which arguments? The one that says there's no point trying to legislate to improve society? Or the one that says there's no point removing obstacles to the existing legislation being applied properly?

Rather than us lot putting those to the test, why not read John Stuart Mill because he already did it.

Saski

I'm Slutticus

A. MacAulay

Yes, Rachel J.S. Mill is not a bad place to start and gives a perspective as to how far we've come and I take your point that at Mill's time, his philosophical direction would have been understood by an undoubtedly male, also Christian dominated establishment as "legislating for utopia". Nonetheless, women's rights and much else are now guaranteed in such a way that would have seemed utopian to Mill's world. You don't seem very pleased about it, though. (Dystopia?) But, obviously there is a point in trying improve society, but where Rights are guaranteed as Rights for everybody then nothing is won in demanding even more Rights.

My point is, just because you don't like something, is it reasonable and sensible to make your dislike the basis for a "Right"? Would you accept a proposition, for instance that placed a curfew on all men who would be forbidden to leave their homes after 9 o'clock unless in the company of a woman? Which men would stay at home? The nice guys or the rapists?

Anyway, I didn't really say that ther's "no point trying to legislate to improve society." Or "that there's no point removing obstacles to the existing legislation being applied properly?" I didn't really say that, did I?

Rachel

Well when I read this "That's why I'm sceptical that legislating for utopia will make things better. Parliaments are there to uphold a status quo, a balance in society with just enough liberty and just enough order, and only make change when absolutely necessary. Ideally!"

I assumed you were referring to this:
"Actually AM, I want the right to have a sexual life and for the police not to conflate that into a mitigating factor in crime against me. "

I don't consider it a Utopian ideal myself. I consider it a necessity and a right.

A. MacAulay

That's one of the problems with assumptions, Rachel. It is undoubtedly your right to do what you want, when and with whom you want so long as it doesn't impinge on the rights of others. The, "she was asking for it" defence is nonsense along with debates about whether rape is motivated sexually or through power needs. Rape is a crime! Rapists don't have much of a lobby and most people, I believe, would be pleased to see convicted rapists punished much more severely, as in, lock-em-up and throw away the key! Lastly, I'm not sure (I assume) the Canadian Officer didn't say, "If you dress like a slut you deserve to get raped." I mean, he was daft but not mad.

However the world is imperfect. Go before a court and you will get a judgement; justice is something else. Whether you/we have a behaviouristic or biological view of society, legislating for an ideological "utopia" will, through manipulation or sanction cause more injustice than it prevents. But that's the way I think.

Lastly, the view that we live in a sort of Animus Farm, with the male piggies conniving and profiting from keeping women down is just feministic b*llocks, if one can allow oneself the expression.