America Is A "Rape Culture"

Con has made some brilliant points, which I am now going to tear down. I will also consider their addendum in the comments section, and I ask the voters to do the same. There's a principle called "Hanlon's Razor", which states: "Never assume malice until you've ruled out incompetence." Most arguments in favour of "Rape Culture" rest on the assumption that RC is a malicious system, designed to oppress women and bolster men. Con has made a convincing case for why this is not so, but has failed (just like most RC activists) to consider incompetence as a cause. Incompetence and indifference can cause just as much harm as malice. Look at the Holocaust: most Germans weren't evil people, but their inaction allowed the Nazi party to commit atrocities. My counter-argument to Con's points is that RC exists, not because people want it to, but because they don't do enough to stamp it out. 1. Blaming the victim. People take offence when it's obvious, but they often don't pick up on subtle victim blaming. For example, a few months ago in Australia (I know this debate is about the US, but I'm less familiar with US news, and this example is just to illustrate what I mean), a teenage girl was raped by three guys on her way home from school. The mayor of the city said something to the effect of, "See? This is what I'm talking about. Teenage girls shouldn't walk home alone." While his comment was no doubt well-meaning, and teenage girls should absolutely take all precautions possible, think about it from the victim's point of view. She hears that, and she probably feels like sh*t. Maybe she's even blaming herself for the assault, thinking, "If only I'd not walked home alone." This is outrageous, since the rape was not her fault. Victim-blaming isn't just about what you say, but also how and when you say it, and how it could misinterpreted. 2. Trivializing sexual assault. This may be frowned upon by society as a whole, but there are large, mostly online, groups within society that engage in this behaviour all too frequently. Again, the problem is not that society condones it, but that society doesn't stamp it out. 3. Sexually explicit jokes. Con is right. There is no proof that rape jokes lead to rape. However, like all racist/sexist humour, they should be used with extreme caution. 4. Tolerance of sexual harassment. Again, people tend to react to the obvious and ignore the subtle. Bill Cosby is demonized now, but he got away with his actions for decades. 5. Inflating false rape report statistics. The notion that "[all] women lie about being raped" is often used to reinforce misogynistic viewpoints. While misogyny doesn't always lead to rape, it can be a contributing factor. 6. Publicly scrutinizing a victim"s dress, mental state, motives, and history. It's increasingly less accepted, but it still happens far too often. 7. Gratuitous gendered violence in movies and television. Con is right, this one is stupid. 8. Refusing to take rape accusations seriously. While this probably does happen on a small scale, it'd be impossible for me to prove/disprove with the tools at my disposal. 9. Assuming only promiscuous women get raped. "If [promiscuous women] get raped, then it's okay to rape [promiscuous women]." OR "Don't dress like a [promiscuous women], or you'll get raped." Both are horrible and fallacious lines of reasoning, but they persist nevertheless. It's not socially acceptable to say it, but a lot of people still think it. 10. Assuming that men don"t get raped or that only "weak" men get raped. Men are less likely to be raped than women, because men are bigger than women, men are less likely to say "no" to a woman, and most male rapists are straight. 11. Teaching women to avoid getting raped instead of teaching men not to rape. Feminists present this in a fallacious way, but ideally we'd teach both. To reiterate my previous point: rape culture doesn't have to be deliberately encouraged or accepted in order to be "pervasive and normalized", it just has to be ignored and misrepresented. RC activists are probably just as guilty of misrepresentation as anybody else. While I don't believe the picture of Rape Culture that feminists paint, and I really hate the philosophy because it's just inflammatory, there is no denying that rape is a serious problem and could be addressed better. We now return to Con.