Have some links about rape/rape culture.

(Trigger warning.)

ginmar has some very powerful commentary on rape and rape culture:

We're so completely incapable of respecting women that we don't realize the heroic odds against which women labor to lead full lives. And, God, I'm so damned sick of idiots who whine, "But don't you believe women should take basic precautions?! All it is is locking a door....or wearing pants....or not drinking....or not having a life......:" There's a sadism to the ever-increasing list of restrictions under which women must labor, and you can just bet if a woman dared to have some fun, and a man raped her, she'd get blamed---not the predator who's the boy next door, or the guy next cubicle, or the neighbor across the street.

And what simple precautions are those? The Army likes to cite a figure of----OMG! 52% of all rapes involve alcohol! But...what about the 48% that don't? Those are sober men raping sober women, but once that 52% shows up, nobody wants to hear about anything else. Women shouldn't have any fun at all, and if they do, they'll get punished. And everybody will gloat, because let's face it, that's what it is.

Here's the precautions that people think women should take: don't wear mini skirts, high heels, walk at night, keep your keys poked out between your fingers, don't park in ramps, don't wear overalls, long hair, ponytails, drink with guys, go to parties, and in short, don't have fun. Live in fear, ladies, is the message, and then people will gloat because, hey, somebody's got to suffer, and isn't that women are supposed to do? If you avoid getting raped, your life will be so miserable that you might as well be in purdah. But we're so much better than the Taliban, mind you!

And it's true. Whenever I travel anywhere, I'm paranoid I'll be approached by a stranger, nevermind I know that statistically I'm three times more likely to be raped by someone I know. However, even my mother and other female relatives will often remark that they worry when I travel to Atlanta, or when I go to one of the "big cities" alone. Never once have I heard my male friends warned to look over their shoulder, to walk with their keys ready to fend off an attacker, to keep an eye on a drink at a party lest someone slip something into it, etc. Nor do I hear them being told "Hey, by the way, don't rape women/let your friends rape women," but of course the consensus is that's just a silly notion because every man I know would never rape...except when they have. One of the "incidents" (I still won't call it rape) in my life happened because even though two people could see I was really unsure about what was going on, and that I was too shy and scared to tell the man no, they left me alone with him because they were getting uncomfortable. That's part of what is meant by turning the attention off what women can do to prevent rape and placing it on men and their friends.

Continuing with this theme, lupabitch linked to one post in a series of posts about rape by Fugitivus:

Women who are taught not to speak up too loudly or too forcefully or too adamantly or too demandingly are not going to shout “NO” at the top of their goddamn lungs just because some guy is getting uncomfortably close.

Women who are taught not to keep arguing are not going to keep saying “NO.”

Women who are taught that their needs and desires are not to be trusted, are fickle and wrong and are not to be interpreted by the woman herself, are not going to know how to argue with “but you liked kissing, I just thought…”

Women who are taught that physical confrontations make them look crazy will not start hitting, kicking, and screaming until it’s too late, if they do at all.

Women who are taught that a display of their emotional state will have them labeled hysterical and crazy (which is how their perception of events will be discounted) will not be willing to run from a room disheveled and screaming and crying.

And she goes on, and explains rape culture with very clear examples of precisely why it is women can never end rape by ourselves, and why there's more to ending rape than just telling us to say no or take self-defense classes. It requires social change, ones I'm saddened to say probably will never happen in my lifetime.

Just some food for thought.