Today’s post is a guest post for our awesome colleague Lisa!

“It’s a no-brainer you wouldn’t sit by and watch if you saw someone being kidnapped. But what if you saw a woman being led away, a woman who can barely stand up because she had too much to drink?”

May 7, ABC’s prime-time show, What Would You Do?, aired an episode asking this question. It explored people’s reactions to a man attempting to leave a bar with an intoxicated woman who was out alone celebrating her 21st birthday. Watching the promos for the episode, my immediate (and cynical) thought was that bystanders would do nothing. In actuality, the results of the show were a pleasant surprise. However, I would argue that the scenario cultivated by the show was one in which it was substantially easier to identify something was amiss and to intervene. Furthermore, the show neglected to name the threat as “alcohol-facilitated sexual assault,” preventing its message from having much real meaning. (See George Mason U‘s site for a breakdown of what I mean by this term).

The scenario is set up in a bar on the Jersey Shore (though in a noticeably classier one than those featured in the reality show of its namesake). The bar is well lit and it appears to be daylight outside. It is not busy; in fact, all bar patrons have their own stool and thus it is relatively quiet and easy to hear other conversations. In this setting, it is easy for the other patrons to hear the young actress tell the man that she does not know him. This line is repeated quite often, prompting people to tell the man to leave her alone and prevent the young woman from leaving with him. I will give credit where credit is due and celebrate the patrons for stepping up and assertively preventing the man from taking the woman out of the bar. However, I don’t know about everyone else, but when I’m at a bar, it is often dark, crowded, and so noisy I may even have to shout to be heard by my friends.  To notice an interaction like this, one would need to be paying attention. It also may take a little more courage to intervene or perhaps require a higher standard of proof that something is awry.

This notion brings me to my next point, that it may not always so clear that the interaction poses a risk to the person in question. I would argue that it is unlikely that in a real-world situation the woman would have protested that she did not know the man. There is evidence that one way perpetrators are able to use alcohol and other substances to facilitate sexual assault is that the use of alcohol makes it difficult for people to detect ambiguous risk cues. For example, actions such as drinking or being led to an isolated place can be ambiguous because they can also be part of normal social behavior and flirting. Therefore, an intoxicated person may be less likely to perceive risk. This lack of perception of risk may make a person more likely to willingly leave the bar with someone (unlike the protests featured in WWYD). This reality calls for careful attention from bystanders and to recalibrate what is deemed as a warning sign (i.e slightly more subtle than the person shouting “I don’t know you.”).

Unfortunately we live in a society where alcohol consumption is gendered. People tend to perceive women who are drinking as sexually available and men who are drinking as aggressive. These expectancies set up a dynamic that not only enables alcohol-facilitated assault but wrongly places blame on the victim. As expertly stated in Jeanette Norris’s paper on alcohol consumption and sexual victimization, “Just as no one who is about to go out in public is expected to prepare to be mugged at gunpoint, neither do women preparing for an evening of socializing think about which man might sexually assault them.”

WWYD plays into these expectations in some respects. (You’ll have to catch the episode on TV to see this clip because it is strangely missing from the web video.) Their resident “relationship expert” offers a frightening nugget of wisdom excusing the appalling behavior of two young, married men (one an off-duty police officer) who joke with the young man about the potential of the young woman’s surprised reaction in the morning when she “wakes up with her pants around her ankles.” The expert explains these men likely feel they are missing out on their “days of freedom” and are living vicariously through the young man. Oh really, they are reminiscing about the good old days when they were single and could entice young women onto the beach and rape them? I found it gravely concerning that the show never addressed head-on the true issue at hand: alcohol-facilitated sexual assault. In fact, the word “rape” is uttered only once. Please, WWYD, call a spade a spade.

By now you might be thinking I’ve painted a hopeless picture. The show itself even concludes by stating that despite its results one cannot count on someone stepping in. To this point, I challenge everyone to change that norm. In spite of its many, many flaws, WWYD does offer a glimmer of hope in people’s humanity. Think about what made the people more likely to intervene in WWYD when the environment was small, quiet, and clearly dangerous and adapt those abilities to be effective in real-life situations. My favorite piece of WWYD’s naturalistic observation was that “once women got involved, it inspired others to get involved.” Sarcasm aside, there is power in numbers and if you speak up, others will be more likely to follow. I challenge everyone to question gendered expectations for drinking behavior and learn to recognize warning signs*, to step beyond the typical “don’t get involved” attitude, and to intervene when they feel it is safe to do so.

* Some things to be aware of include the greater likelihood that in sexual assaults involving alcohol parties do not know each other well (i.e. they are strangers, acquaintances, or casual dates) and both people may be consuming heavy amounts of alcohol.

A lot of different ideas are swirling around in my head right now and I’m going to try to link them together in one giant mess of a post.

I’ve been thinking about privilege and its relationship with violence.  I am hilariously bad at domestic tasks.  I can only barely figure out how to do laundry, most of my socks need to be retired, and it’s a damn good thing I have a dishwasher in my apartment because I am unkind to dishware when I wash it. This weekend I was up in Burlington, Vermont to see my cousin graduate from UVM (congrats, man!), and I was rocking my usual casual gear for the commencement itself (which was about six hours long), but for our family dinner I brought nice, reasonable-person clothes: slacks and a button-down shirt and decent leather shoes.  I’m not a fan of dressing up, but I do clean up nice and this was a quasi-formal occasion.

Problem was, I got to Vermont via the B line, commuter rail, and two different cars.  My overnight bag was an environment hostile to nice clothes.  When we finally got back to the hotel after the commencement ceremony, I had about an hour to make myself look presentable, but my pants and shirt were wrinkled like the Crypt Keeper.  They needed an application of IRON.  This was going to be a problem.  I think I spent 50 minutes of my hour trying to get these stupid wrinkles out.  I didn’t know what I was doing.  I almost burned a hole in my sleeve because the iron didn’t have fabrics listed on its heat dial, so I completely guessed at random and I chose…poorly.  Thankfully, I did eventually get (most) of the wrinkles out, and my clothing survived more or less OK.  I don’t think anyone in my family recognized the ineptitude, although my uncle did compliment me on my choice of shirt color.

One of the small ways I started to understand privilege was through my domestic failures - things like ironing.  I have to wear a button-down shirt to work every day, but my employer is lucky if I’ve taken an iron to any of my shirts in the last six months.  Part of it is laziness on my part - I hate ironing, I don’t own an ironing board, and I barely wake up with enough time to make it to the bus every morning as it is.  I won’t iron unless I have to, and I’m very creative in finding ways to not have to iron.  This only works, though, because I can get away with it.  I can look kind of dumpy at work, and every now and again someone will make a joke at my expense and ask if I had a late night or something along those lines, but I’ve never been told I didn’t look professional, or that I really needed to be more attentive to my shirt-wrinkles or there would be disciplinary action.  This is male privilege - this is what society lets me get away with for visibly complying with what men are supposed to be.  I have it good.  Cuppy has a much better post about this in general over at her place, on account of she is, in fact, female.

Privilege extends a lot farther than not having to spend money and time on my appearance, though.  It’s a privilege to not get hit-on when I ride the T in the morning.  It’s a privilege not to get harassed on the street at night when I’m walking home.  It’s a privilege that, generally, people don’t bother me, threaten me with violence, harass me, make fun of me, or make sexual comments about me.  When something like that does happen, it’s strange enough that I don’t consider it a part of my every day life, and I don’t have to modify my behavior to plan for that harassment’s inevitability.  Not having to think about violence is one of the biggest privileges I get as a man.  Holly takes this one on perfectly at her place.

The big unifying idea with privilege is that it isn’t something I have to actively use.  It’s just there.  The rest of the world in which I exist makes exercising my privilege difficult to separate from just the way I live my life.  This makes it different from, say, a right, because we exercise our rights - we make conscious choices to apply them.  I don’t have to do that with my privilege, I just have to be a lazy bastard and the privilege keeps me from getting in trouble for it.

Amanda over at Pandagon has a really good piece on privilege, and defines these things really well:

I thought about it really hard and decided there’s three categories of privilege that I perceive:

1. Advantages that one person has over another that they don’t deserve and will lose in a just society.
2. Basic human rights that everyone deserves, but only some people have, making those both a right and a privilege.
3. Advantages that can’t be distributed fairly in a practical sense, and can’t be taken from the person who holds them without violating human rights.

This is in my head because of the new bill that Massachusetts passed, 258E, that allows for survivors of harassment and sexual assault to get restraining orders against with whom they do not have a prior relationship.  While the restraining order is not gendered (which is a very good thing), I would hazard a guess that the majority of the survivors who end up getting one will end up being female-identified.  Women and non-gender conforming people are the recipients of the vast majority of street harassment, and still (as far as we know), the majority of survivors of rape and sexual assault.  Walking on the street, riding the train - existing in the world as a human - without being harassed should be one of those second category privileges and rights.  It should be something everyone gets to do without having to think about it. 

I’m as…excited, I guess you could say, about the new bill as I can be for bills that help make people safer, but I’m also depressed.  Restraining orders are a stop-gap measure.  They don’t change our culture alone.  They can help keep individual people safe, and this new bill shows that our leaders in Massachusetts recognize that violence occurs in many contexts, often outside of relationships, but the bill itself isn’t going to keep violence and abuse from happening in the first place.  If we’re lucky, and the bill works and we actually get to see it in action, then we might be in for a small cultural shift here in Massachusetts where potential perpetrators of violence are at least aware that they can get into serious trouble.  But we need more.  We need to fight, in this case, for something that shouldn’t have to be a right - it should be a privilege. 

Good morning! Dave’s out of town, so I am taking his day. Which works out fine, as I’ll be a bit frantic on Wednesday in my rush to get everything packed and organized for my trip to Wisconsin on Thursday. Why Wisconsin, you may ask? Because I’m attending WisCon, the leading feminist science fiction convention! I’ll be discussing rape in genre fiction Sunday evening, so if you’re at Wiscon, you should come to that. We can get dinner after. It’ll be awesome.

But since I wasn’t expecting to blog today, I don’t really have a topic of my own! Alas! This strikes me as an opportunity to highlight some other people’s fantastic posts.

We talk about rape culture here a lot.We try to give some background in what that means, but we haven’t gotten into serious nuts-and-bolts detail - in part because Melissa McEwen of Shakesville has already written the ultimate, untoppable Rape Culture 101 post. That post is brilliant and comprehensive, and even if you already have an idea of what rape culture is and what it means, I highly recommend that you go read it. Take time to click on the links and read them, too. Set aside some time for this.

This is what we’re fighting.

Another fantastic rape-culture blogger is Harriet of Fugitivus. All of her posts are fantastic, but I’m going to highlight this one:

If women are raised being told by parents, teachers, media, peers, and all surrounding social strata that:

And then, all of a sudden, when women are raped, all these natural and invisible social interactions become evidence that the woman wasnt truly raped. Because she didn’t fight back, or yell loudly, or run, or kick, or punch.

That is but a sliver of the post; like many of Harriet’s, it’s long. But really, go read that whole thing. It’s illuminating.

And now I must go do paperwork on all of the fantastic volunteers we just accepted for our June training. Did you mean to apply and not get around to it in time? Then you should apply for our August training!

Today we have an amazing guest post from a good friend of mine, Catt Kingsgrave-Ernstein of Rensselaer County SACVAP. I met Catt and her husband at a panel on gender politics in fandom at a local science fiction convention in early 2009; we hit it off instantly. I was thrilled and unsurprised when, seeing how much I love BARCC, they signed up to become advocates with SACVAP. :) We reprised the gender politics panel at this year’s convention and also did one on rape and sexual assault in genre fiction; both of them went wonderfully, and I look forward to doing even more awesome social justice stuff with them. Like me, Catt is a writer, so she has a particular gift in communicating with people and helping them understand rape culture. When I saw this post on her personal blog, I was bouncing - “Yes yes yes! That! Brilliant!” - and she graciously gave me permission to reprint it here. Consider this part of the “how to talk about rape culture” series. And without further ado, here’s Catt:

———-

“Forgive me,” he said, with genuine respect in his voice and bearing, “I don’t mean to be insulting about it, but wouldn’t you say that there’s a big difference between the jogger at the park, and these girls who go to bars and dress provocatively?”

And I said, “Only in degree, really. Many serial rapists actually prey in bars because their odds of getting away with it are better if their victim is impaired.” And he brightened, as if I had proved his point. So, sorry I had to disappoint him, I went on. “There are situations and places which carry more personal risk than others, but the question is, why should they BE risky, really? Is it dangerous for a man to dress in tight jeans, a flimsy tee shirt, and go out to a bar? Is he likely to be drugged, dragged off, and sexually compromised just because he was present, and wearing cologne? And if he is, is he likely to be called a slut and a whore in the press because of it?”

He looked confused, but after a moment, he nodded his understanding unhappily. “But still, the way some of these women dress…” He was Muslim, you see, and quite earnest in his faith, though clearly not wishing to give offense to me.

I cut him off. “I liken it to driving a car, actually.”

And he looked up, shocked enough to actually laugh. “Seriously?”

“Absolutely,” I grinned in reply, as much to defang what I was about to lay on him, as to show that I didn’t take his cluelessness personally. “Hundreds of thousands of people die in cars every year. Even more are maimed for life in them, but do you really, seriously think about those odds every time you make the choice to get into one?” He made a thoughtful face, and nodded again. I went on. “Now, there are steps you can take to help pare down the basic risks of driving, of course; you can wear your seatbelt, you can keep your car in good order, you can use all your mirrors and turn indicators, you can avoid speeding, tailgaiting, and driving after you’ve taken cold medicine…” He looked up, sensing, I think, what was coming next. “But you can still get broadsided by a bus, even when you have taken each and every one of these precautions.”

This time, his nod was thoughtful. It really was sinking in. “And then there’s the fact that sometimes you can get into someone else’s car, and their choices can put you into danger that you cannot escape, and for which you cannot be responsible, as well,” I told him. “Friends haul each other out to parties, urge each other to do things that aren’t exactly smart, and cheer each other on to greater heights of daring in the name of fun and acceptance, and many predators know just how to find a girl in that kind of a flock, and cut her out like a cheetah with a gazelle. The rest of the flock might notice she’s not with them, but they often won’t know she’s in real trouble until it’s all over.”

His expression turned a little sour, and I could sense a gender disrespect issue arising, so I moved to head it off before he could bring it to words. “And also, I want to point something important out about those provocatively dressed girls who are getting drunk in the bars.” And here, he looked up, cautiously. “For every one man who made the decision to rape that girl we’re talking about, there are twenty or thirty more who were there, who saw her, heard her, and maybe even bought her a drink, but who made the decision not to rape her.”

And I watched that sink into his brain like a boulder in mud—too big a truth to just swallow and chatter on, or to wave away like a stinging fly, and he was conscious and conscientious enough that he didn’t care to delude himself on account of his manhood alone. This was the cornerstone of rape culture that I’d just chucked at him with very little warning, and while I watched his face, he managed to get it down.

There was a lot more I could have shown him, down the rabbit hole of understanding, into which he’d just begun to peek, but unfortunately we hadn’t any more time. While I had been talking with the earnest young man in the crochet cap and camo BDU’s, the SUNY health fair had been shutting down around us. Ken had packed up the SACVAP display table, and was waiting for me to shift a bit, so he could get the last of the flyers into the case. It was time to go, and really, he’d had about as much as he was ready to retain from one encounter, I felt.

I offered to shake his hand. He graciously declined, explaining that his faith forbid it, and then he thanked me for taking the time to educate him on the matter. And I thanked him for staying to hear what I had to say about it.

And then he was gone. But he left behind the persistent sensation of hope inside my jaded, cynical breast; that men realy CAN learn to get it; they really can understand, and reject rape culture without resorting to a kneejerk fear reaction, or defensiveness. They can actually hear that their suppositions are flawed, and deeply so, and can carry that away to repair in their own time. That the dismantling of rape culture isn’t necessarily going to rest entirely on the shoulders of feminist men and women—that non-feminists too can just reject the underlying sleaze that holds up the code of conspiratorial silence, apologism, and victim-blame.

Step by step, the longest march
Can be won, can be won.
Many stones can form an arch
Singly, none. Singly none.
And together, what we will
Can be accomplished still;
Many drops can turn a mill
Singly none. Singly none.

Yes, you! I was going to post about our volunteer program today; we just did the information and interview sessions for prospective volunteers for our June training, so I’m particularly excited about the volunteer program right now. :) But there happens to be something time-sensitive that we need your help on. The below text is from Senator Cynthia Stone Creem and our legal advocate, Stephanie Decandia.

The Boston Area Rape Crisis Center, Jane Doe, Aids Action Committee, and staff of Greater Boston Legal Services are asking for your support and telephone calls to your State Senator advocating on behalf of survivors of rape, sexual assault, stalking and domestic abuse.  Senator Cynthia Stone Creem is the Lead Sponsor of S. 2274, and the bill is now in the Senate where it is up for discussion on Thursday, 5/21/10. Please contact your Senator today to voice your support of this bill!

Domestic violence, rape, sexual assault, and stalking are endemic in Massachusetts, increasing housing instability and threats to public safety. Effective and appropriate public safety responses to these criminal offenses often produce housing instability for victims and their children. Some victims face retaliatory evictions and discrimination in finding alternative housing as a direct consequence of taking steps to protect themselves and their children. Victims who stay in dangerous situations for fear of the financial consequences of breaking their leases are at risk of further victimization. There are few safe housing options available for victims. Waiting lists for subsidized housing are years long, and emergency homeless shelters are overwhelmed. In many cases, victims of such violence remain with their childre in unsafe situations due to their very real fears of becoming homeless.

Federal law recognizes the need to protect victims from discrimination. The federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) passed in late 2005 provides protections against discrimination in housing admissions, prohibits eviction based on abuse, and permits victims to break their leases and flee for safety. However, VAWA does not apply to all multifamily subsidized housing, private housing, or state-assisted housing. Many states have passed legislation similar to VAWA to protect state or private tenants. Massachusetts has no such law. This bill would provide these needed protections.

What S. 2274 will do if passed:

• permit victims to raise sexual and domestic violence as a defense to eviction;
• permit victims to opt out of leases without penalty upon proof of sexual or domestic violence;
• require landlords to approve lock changes and make lock changes to protect the victim;
prevent owners from denying admission based on negative references directly related to the violence;
• prohibit inquiries into the tenant or prospective tenant’s status as a victim;
• prohibit a landlord from failing to renew or refusing to rent to a tenant or occupant for having broken a lease or requesting refund of prepaid rent.

S. 2274 will cover all rental housing in Massachusetts and expands protections already in place under VAWA in federal public housing and Section 8 protections.

Your support is critical. Please call your senator today!