Schroedinger's (Female) Rapist

Over on one of Crommunist’s posts that has nothing to do with the topic, some of the usual suspects are whining once again that Schroedinger’s Rapist is sexist against men. This time, they have the help of Reddit MRAs who were attracted by the actual content of the post.

The tactic has shifted ever so slightly now. There is less “You’re looking at all men and thinking, ‘Rapist!'” Now, courtesy of John D, we have the argument that women should be looked at the same way. He bases this on the fact that by NISVS definitions of rape (including being made to penetrate another), men and women faced nearly identical victimization rates in 2010.* Additionally, while women accounted for almost none of the rapists of women, they accounted for a large majority of the rapists of men. Given those numbers, women would account for about 40% of 2010 rapists under the NISVS definitions of rape.

That is something approaching parity. Does it mean that the Shroedinger’s Rapist post, and its use by other women in explaining their viewpoints, are sexist against men?

Finger wag from TV series Bones.
An homage to Crommunist, who’s dealt with way too much of this shit.

No.

Let me repeat that: No.

The explanation of Schroedinger’s Rapist is specifically one person’s viewpoint, even though it has echoed strongly with many people since then. The person who wrote that post is a woman, Phaedra Starling. As a woman, she has almost nothing to fear from another woman. If she is raped, it will almost certainly be by a man. The NISVS numbers cited bear that out.

Additionally, it will almost certainly be by a man whose behavior matches the behavior she is warning other men away from in that post. People do remember what that post was for, right? They remember that it was a primer in differentiating one’s self from a rapist when approaching someone you might be interested in for strictly consensual fun times. The women who might approach her are already likely to be cautious and act less entitled, simply because they deal with a lot of crap if they don’t.

So, no, it was not sexist for Starling to offer a personal perspective that was directed at men. This is even more true when you consider that men actually ask for this advice. Maybe John D doesn’t–I don’t know–but plenty of men do. “How do I approach women without seeming creepy?” Not an unusual question.

What John D is doing by bringing up these figures is pointing out a disparity. Women will tell men how to avoid acting like sexual predators. Men don’t say the same to women. Therefore, the women are being sexist and should stop.

Morrisey shaking his head.
Even emo dude here gets this.

No.

Let me repeat that: No.

Exactly the opposite should happen. Men should start speaking up if they find women acting like sexual predators and expecting that behavior to lead to those aforementioned fun times.

It does happen. I can’t tell you exactly what behavior led to responses from men leading to those counts in the NISVS. I can tell you, however, that I’ve talked to plenty of guys who have been approached by women in ways that did not indicate that these guys might have their own ideas about what they wanted to do with their bodies. I’ve talked to guys who have been stalked, guys who have been abused or derided for saying, “No.” It does happen.

Guys, you have my permission to say this is not acceptable.

Your body is your own every bit as much as mine belongs to me. You have every right to direct what happens to it, just as I have to direct mine. You have every right to name nonconsensual sex, whether forced or coerced, as rape. You have every right to avoid people who act as though they don’t respect your decisions and your bodily integrity. And you have every right to stand up and say that this is why you are avoiding these people.

You have every right to write a Schroedinger’s Rapist of your own, from your own perspective, using the genders relevant to you. Or to point to the original and say, “That. You know, with the genders reversed.” Either way.

What you don’t have, what you have never had and will never have, is a right to tell us we can’t speak up for ourselves just because we’re not talking about your perspective at the same time.

———————-

*This is not true for lifetime rates, which is a bit of an oddity in the survey, but not one that can’t be reasonably explained by changing awareness over time. Despite John D’s continual referral to force in his comments, these definitions include rape by coercion, including by the use of lies, which probably accounts for the higher numbers of male victims both in the short term versus long term in this survey and as compared to other victimization surveys. This also has implications for understanding a metaphor describing fear, but those are not discussed here.

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Schroedinger's (Female) Rapist
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62 thoughts on “Schroedinger's (Female) Rapist

  1. 1

    I think they prefer Schroedinger’s False Rape Accuser, for maximum silly. But yeah, dudes creeped out should say so. God knows me and my girlfriend talk about women creeping us out whenever they are.

  2. 2

    These definitions include rape by coercion, including by the use of lies, which probably accounts for the higher numbers of male victims both in the short term versus long term in this survey and as compared to other victimization surveys.

    I thought that the study explicitly did not include rape by coercion in their numbers on rape. It was listed as “coercion” under “Other sexual violence”. I wish they had been explicit about which questions got marked into which category.

  3. 3

    The thing that makes me so angry is that the same privileged white men who are so infuriated by the “Shroedinger’s Rapist” idea are the sort of people who are “race realist” racists who assume that any black man is a threat because “statistics say” that black people are more likely to rob white people in bad neighborhoods blah blah blah blah.

    Again, I bring up “defensive driving”… we acknowledge that other drives can be bad drivers without assuming a personal attack on individuals, and that some bad drivers might kill us. Why is it so different in this instance? You don’t know at a glance that I’m not a bad driver or a rapist. I could become a bad driver or a rapist in an instance before you can react to it. Why do people accept defensive driving without being offended, and get so stupidly offended in a very similar situation when it comes to sexual assault?

  4. 5

    Um, the Full Report in that link says 18.3% of women and 1.4% of men have been raped (page 18). It also says 98.1% of women raped reported the rapist was a man, and 93.3% of men raped reported the rapist was… a man (page 24).

    So according to those numbers:
    – If you’re a woman it’s a lot more probable that someone will rape you than if you are a man;
    – Regardless of what you are, it’s very, very probable that if you are raped, your rapist will be a man.

    I don’t see the parity.

  5. 6

    At its heart, Schroedinger’s Rapist is nothing more than a cost-benefit analysis. We do those all the time: Should I drive defensively, or normally? Should I jaywalk, or wait until I get to a controlled intersection? In either case, I’m making no value judgment against other drivers, I’m simply trying to protect myself from potential harm.

    That this concept is difficult for some people to grasp suggests they’re either suffering from a high level of cognitive dissonance, or entitlement.

    <shameless plug>

    As proof it’s nothing more than a cost-benefit analysis, here’s a spreadsheet version of Schroedinger’s Rapist. Download it, play with the numbers, and conclude the blindingly obvious. For bonus points, use it to show airport profiling doesn’t work, by only changing the labels and probabilities!

    </shameless plug>

  6. 7

    First off, basing further models on Schroedinger’s cat is moronic. Schroedinger’s cat was an intentionally burlesque metaphor intended to criticize the Copenhagen interpretation of the deformation of the wave function in quantum mechanics. It was a parody, not a serious proposition. However, what it really boils down to is uncertainty regarding strangers, which applies to everyone, because every demographic can be linked to crimes. It’s as moronic as considering all humans ‘Schroedinger’s murderers’ because some minute, statistically anonymous percentage of humans commit murder. Humanity is a social species, so humans tend to behave socially overall. If you believe in Schroedinger’s rapists, please, for your own sake, grow up.

  7. 9

    I think they prefer Schroedinger’s False Rape Accuser, for maximum silly.

    How would men wary of Schroedinger’s False Rape Accuser act like, I wonder? Declining to have sex or even just be alone with women they don’t know well enough? Declining to have sex with women who seem to send mixed signals about how interested they are? Going out of their way to establish consent with absolute certainty whenever they fuck? Maybe I’m not thinking this through, but: SOUNDS GOOD TO ME.

  8. 10

    George of America, Schroedinger’s Rapist makes colloquial use of Schroedinger’s Cat to make a point about social interactions. It’s not meant to reflect the actual state of quantum science or even the original meaning of Schroedinger’s Cat. However, throwing a fit over the scientific inaccuracy of the analogy is treated by some as a tactic to derail this discussion wherever it happens.

    It’s as moronic as considering all humans ‘Schroedinger’s murderers’ because some minute, statistically anonymous percentage of humans commit murder.

    What percentage of humans commit or try to commit rape?
    What percentage of humans are affected by attempted or actual rape?
    Who defines “minute, statistically anomalous”, and would that person get their head out of their ass for a moment, please?
    Do you believe the only thing relevant to risk-related calculations is probability of incident? Does the potential gravity of incident (i.e. the cost of being wrong) enter your bizarro calculation at some point, or is it more conveniently ignored?

  9. 11

    How would men wary of Schroedinger’s False Rape Accuser act like, I wonder?

    Ensuring that they’re never alone in the company of women. It sounds great, but I know I’ve read at least one low level manager who drank the ZOMG FALSE RAPE ACCUSATION kool-aid deep and was bragging on reddit about how he protected himself by not hiring women (who were of course entirely incompetent anyway what with being women)

    Going out of their way to establish consent with absolute certainty whenever they fuck?

    Allegedly, by making sex tapes without consent.

    What, you thought MRAs would accidentally stumble into something good? How naive 😀

    Seriously though, it’s a good thing they’re weak as hell.

  10. 12

    Forbidden Snowflake, I’ve seen the light. I’m willing to set blatant misapplication and misunderstanding of basic science aside, and admit that I’m Schroedinger’s Rapist. My only condition is that you first admit that we’re both Schroedinger’s murderers by the same rationale. Sure, it’s unlikely that you’ll murder me but as you said, probability isn’t everything.

    “Do you believe the only thing relevant to risk-related calculations is probability of incident? Does the potential gravity of incident … enter your (sic) bizarro calculation at some point…?”

    If you murdered me, the gravity of the incident is that I’d be dead. I can’t think of any incident more grave to me than my own death, so to hell with probability, right?

  11. 13

    so George let me guess, with that attitude towards risk, you don’t buy homeowner’s or auto insurance, don’t use passwords on your online accounts, and don’t believe in vaccines either, huh?

  12. 14

    How gracious of you to overlook the fact that a text that makes no claim whatsoever to be discussing science uses sorta-science-related terms colloquially.
    It’s cute how you think you have some big GOTCHA!, George. No, I don’t believe that I’m entitled to the trust of strangers. I would never, for example, walk around in public holding a knife or a brick, even if that was convenient for some reason, because I realize I would be thoughtlessly inflicting fear on people surrounding me. ESPECIALLY when dealing with members of demographic groups who are murdered at higher incidence than average by people from my demographic group.
    I also stand back when waiting in line for an ATM, even though I would never steal someone’s banking information even given the opportunity. I’m fine with the fact that I’m Schroedinger’s Robber to them. And it’s an understanding shared by all people without huge entitlement issues, really.

  13. 15

    Forbidden Snowflake: “I would never, for example, walk around in public holding a knife or a brick, even if that was convenient for some reason, because I realize I would be thoughtlessly inflicting fear on people surrounding me.”

    But then there are those guys into “open carry” of guns.

    Hmm, they’re usually guys aren’t they?

    Wait a minute!
    … there couldn’t possibly be any significant overlap between the “open carry” types and …

    Maybe I shouldn’t go there, it might be sexist to do so.

  14. 16

    Forbidden snowflake:

    So, you aren’t “Schroedinger’s murderer”, because you…
    “…would never, for example, walk around in public holding a knife or a brick, even if that was convenient for some reason, because I realize I would be thoughtlessly inflicting fear on people surrounding me.”

    Alright, by that logic, I’m not Schroedinger’s rapist, because I don’t carry my exposed genitalia around in public. Quid pro quo, my dear.

    My point is that we’re both probably decent people, so let’s not go around accusing each-other of pre-crime, shall we?

    Pteryxx:

    “so George let me guess, with that attitude towards risk, you don’t buy homeowner’s or auto insurance, don’t use passwords on your online accounts, and don’t believe in vaccines either, huh?”

    No. I just don’t assume that everyone I meet is anywhere near as likely to compliment me as rape/murder me. I don’t associate 50 percent of the population with violent criminals, because I don’t live in Mad Max’s universe.”

  15. 18

    My point is that we’re both probably decent people, so let’s not go around accusing each-other of pre-crime, shall we?

    At this point, you are literally trying to tell me how I’m allowed to think about you. You don’t get to do that. If you think that women worry too much about the 1/6 lifetime risk of being raped, cited in this very thread, tough. Scolding them to be more trusting of strangers won’t help.
    “Probably decent” won’t be good enough if you follow me into an underground parking lot and ask if I’d like to come over and see your fish tank.
    OF COURSE most people are probably decent. That is why living in society is generally worth the risks created by the non-decent minority. However, we use behavioral clues to distinguish decent people from people who may turn out to be not-decent if given the opportunity. Do you really believe that to be unreasonable?

  16. 19

    “At this point, you are literally trying to tell me how I’m allowed to think about you.”

    No. I was asking you to accuse me of pre-crime. I’m still not clear on weather you refuse or not.

    Regardless, to address you points, there’s an obvious difference between calling me a potential rapist because I’m male and calling me it if I were to “…follow (you) into an underground parking lot and ask (you) if (you)’d like to come over and see (my) fish tank.” One scenario is an accurate assessment of risks because someone is exhibiting unusual, alarming behavior, and the other is presumptuous, fallacious casuistry of the worst order.

  17. 21

    No. I was asking you to accuse me of pre-crime. I’m still not clear on weather you refuse or not.

    In your mind, is “accusing of crime” the same thing as “not assuming you’re incapable of crime”?

    Regardless, to address you points, there’s an obvious difference between calling me a potential rapist because I’m male and calling me it if I were to “…follow (you) into an underground parking lot and ask (you) if (you)’d like to come over and see (my) fish tank.” One scenario is an accurate assessment of risks because someone is exhibiting unusual, alarming behavior, and the other is presumptuous, fallacious casuistry of the worst order.

    That’s the fucking point of Schroedinger’s Rapist. “Don’t engage in alarming behavior, because it makes people wary of you and makes it harder to single out actually dangerous individuals”.
    Regarding your “calling me a potential rapist” remark, I think it obscures the difference between “any man is morally capable of rape” and “an unknown man may turn out to be one of the men who are morally capable of rape, who are a limited subset in the population of men”. The latter is what is actually being said.

    Do you accept the claim that rape is not a statistically negligible threat and that it is not irrational to be wary of it?

  18. 22

    Great post, the only thing I wanted to add was you cant state that men should stand up and say no to sexual abuse or un-wanted sexual attention without stating the obvious double standard a large majority of society holds. Like, women still have a hard time being taken seriously in these regards which is insane, but holy crap, could you imagine a guy being taken seriously

  19. 23

    My only condition is that you first admit that we’re both Schroedinger’s murderers by the same rationale. Sure, it’s unlikely that you’ll murder me but as you said, probability isn’t everything.

    Oh, but I am.
    I’m also Schrödinger’s arsonist.
    I’m Schrödinger’s pedophile.
    I’m Schrödinger’s reckless driver.
    I’m Schrödinger’s ATM fraud.
    The whole thing about Schrödinger’s anything is that you can’t know in advance. You can’t read minds. And you make your risk-analysis according to that.
    The possibility that I might be murdered by just anybody I meet in the street is very, very small unless somebody runs amok.
    The possibility that somebody lights the house I live in is very, very small, that’s why I’m not overly concerned at people entering and leaving the house.
    Now, the possibility of somebody being an idiot on the road is relatively high that’s why I pay a fucking lot of attention to what other drivers are doing and have a big safety distance. And guess what, it has saved my ass a few times.
    The possibility of being a victim of ATM fraud, people stealing my data is pretty real, too. That’s why the police tell me to be cautious, and don’t use the ATM if either the machine itself looks strange or people in my vicinity act strangely. So I monitor them.
    And then there’s Schrödinger’s rapist. It means I monitor the behaviour of guys when I’m in a vulnerable position, like walking to my car in a pretty dark car park. Oh, and guess what, it saved my ass, too, because when I made a dash for my car he made a dash for me. Guess what, if he hadn’t been a rapist when I was considering him a potential threat his fee-fees might get hurt. If he had some working brain-cells he might then have thought “oh shit, yeah, I followed this woman all the way from the lighted street into a dark car park, dude, I must have looked creepy to her, no wonder she was afraid, I was being an idiot”.
    If I had just ignored the guy and acted like he was not a potential rapist because that would be sexist I would be lucky if I could call myself a survior now. If I had been unlucky you’d never know about me…

    Oh, back to Schrödinger’s female rapist: Guys, how big are your chances that something like that happens to you when you walk to your car?

  20. 24

    Exactly. The whole thing was directed, explicitly, at men who DO NOT RAPE and wonder why women don’t automatically assume that.

    To take a piece that is explicitly self-labeled as an explanation for non-raping men and call it sexist because it is calling all men rapists takes a special, deliberate kind of stupidity. The sexist kind of stupidity.

  21. 26

    @jose

    I dunno, the numbers look all funny to me. When that report says “rape” they’re only talking about penetrative rape with force/threat of force or unconsciousness. It doesn’t include nonphysical coercion or forced envelopment. The numbers would wobble around a bit if it included everything, mostly with respect to what sex rapists of men are.

  22. 27

    Exactly. The whole thing was directed, explicitly, at men who DO NOT RAPE and wonder why women don’t automatically assume that.

    Yeah, and as a matter of fact, all decent people understand the other Schrödingers automatically and behave accordingly.
    You don’t tailgate other drivers, you approach crossroads carefully so the other driver knows you respect their right of way. You don’t leer over people’s shoulder at the ATM but keep your distance and you don’t give strange people’s kids candy in the park.
    Because you can empathically put yourself in somebody else’s place in those situations. And it’s a perspective that men are lacking with regards to women. And you try to explain it to them and then some of them howl as if you kicked a puppy.

  23. 28

    Nepenthe,
    Yes, because the study uses the commonly accepted definition (the FBI one, equivalent to how rape is specified in my country’s criminal code -I looked-). I know there is some redefining going on in the other thread in order to make bold claims, but I subscribe to the commonly accepted definition, and I think it’s how the Schrodinger’s rapist idea understands it, too.

    By the way, it’s interesting that the “a voice for men” people are advocating widening the definition to include more things, given how upset they were when the FBI did it. They labeled the news under the “false rape culture” tag, but now they support widening it even further… but making it apply exclusively to the last 12 months for some reason? How convenient. Sorry, too much juggling with the data. It’s not going to hold up.

  24. 29

    @Nepenthe, there are a few problems with that CDC report, both in how they define rape as opposed to made to penetrate, as well as the differences between rape and sexual coercion. I applaud them for expanding the survey to try to capture the reality of male rape, but I think they need to spend some time refining their definitions and how they slice their data.

  25. 30

    there’s an obvious difference between calling me a potential rapist because I’m male and calling me it if I were to “…follow (you) into an underground parking lot and ask (you) if (you)’d like to come over and see (my) fish tank.”

    The point of the original article was to identify behaviors that put a guy FURTHER into the category of “potential rapist”, so that if they are not such, they can avoid it.

    Sure, you’re Shrodingers rapist to start with, with, let’s say, a max value of a 6% chance you’re a rapist, if you go with low estimates of the number of men who are rapists in the population.

    But for every behavior you exhibit that indicates you do not care about a woman’s personal boundaries, the possibility that you are a potential rapist increases. The “Shrodingerness” of it, if you will, goes down as the hard evidence that you’re a creep accumulates.

    Seriously. Figure out what you’re trying to criticize before you mouth off about it.

    But what you need to realize is that the possibility that you are a rapist STARTS at about 6%, much higher than the murderer example you tried to use as an analogy. That’s high enough to have a certain level of caution to begin with. As you behave badly, the caution increases.

  26. 31

    What I find both so frustrating and so fascinating over the uproar caused by ‘Schroedinger’s Rapist’, is the rank hypocrisy of many people who oppose the term. (Note I said many, not all.)

    For as long as I can remember, women young and old have been presented with lists of risk-minimization behaviors we should engage in to reduce the chances we have of being raped or sexually assaulted. All of which focus on restricting our self-expression or basic freedoms like how we dress and when/where we can walk alone. Some of them are common sense – like, don’t leave your drink unattended. Most of them, however, don’t work to reduce the incidents of rape. And even if they did, it still remains a huge problem that the victims are the ones being expected to prevent the crime. And in many cases, are blamed for the crime no matter what they do. If they are believed to begin with.

    And it’s in that toxic environment that women have described for men how they evaluate men they come in contact with. What behavior they monitor for and what makes them uncomfortable. Because, quite simply, we have to. When the onus is on us to prevent the crime, but the crime prevention ‘tips’ we’re given suck and don’t work anyway… we just have to resort to watching for behaviors that are red flags. And when we give this a label, to try and describe how we don’t know if a dude is a rapist or not until we’ve had a chance to observe their behavior… we get shit for it.

    So let me make sure I understand this: We get blamed for rape even if we follow the ‘here’s how to not get raped’ lists (when we don’t follow the lists we’re sluts that deserved it anyway, on top of being to blame), and we get blamed and cried at if we observe behavior before deciding if a guy is capable of raping us and making our decisions based on that.

    How about… fuck you, assholes. I don’t care if your feelings are hurt anymore. I’d rather judge a guy harshly and be proven wrong, then be a victim again. And oddly enough, this hasn’t stopped me from being able to have male friends, or find someone I love and get married. Surprise!

  27. 32

    But what you need to realize is that the possibility that you are a rapist STARTS at about 6%

    That’s an interesting perspective. It occurs to me that my odds of winning any given hand in a game of poker are significantly less than 6%, yet I continue to play and do well in tournaments.

  28. 33

    Excellent post.

    Giliell:

    Because you can empathically put yourself in somebody else’s place in those situations. And it’s a perspective that men are lacking with regards to women.

    But there is not, in fact, a good reason for that to be so in contrast to the other “Schrodingers” you mentioned. I think the reason why some men do show a lack of empathy is due to patriarchal conditioning telling them that “real men” don’t get sexually assaulted. The reality is far otherwise. While to be sure the majority of victims are female the existence of male victims cannot be dismissed as insignificant http://www.cmhc.utexas.edu/booklets/maleassault/menassault.html. The risk may not be as great for me, a man, as for a woman but it is still there and therefore it is perfectly possible to empathetically put myself in her place.

  29. 34

    Marismae – word. Our entire lives we’ve been getting the completely worthless “advice” on how not to get raped. Schroedinger’s Rapist is essentially the real world version of that advice – that is, it’s a risk assessment women perform because *drum roll* OUR ENTIRE LIVES WE’VE BEEN TOLD ITS UP TO US TO NOT “GET” RAPED.

    So, the George Porgies of the world first lecture the silly girls on how not to “get” raped, and when we take that ‘advice’ and make it useful, they go apeshit. So, we’re supposed to not “get” raped by doing nothing at all. Because, after they’ve told us our entire lives that its’ our fault if we “get” raped and that we should have known better than to date that guy, or be alone with that guy, or talk to that guy, we’re supposed to magically and psychically know which guys are that guy and which are good guys. Because facing the reality that MEN do most of the raping and women are not, in fact, born with psychic abilities, makes Georgie Porgie sad. Which is way more important than bitches trying to protect themselves.

    Until, of course, we are raped, then George Porgies of the world can go online to rehash everything we did wrong that “got” us raped and can continue to pretend that they’re totally good guys.

  30. 35

    I’d like to elucidate my point, but first here’s a note to Illuminata:

    “So, the (sic)George Porgies of the world first lecture the silly girls on how not to “get” raped, and when we take that ‘advice’ and make it useful, they go apeshit… Until, of course, we are raped, then George Porgies of the world can go online to rehash everything we did wrong that “got” us raped and can continue to pretend that they’re totally good guys.”

    I have done no such thing.

    Unless you can point out when I blamed rape victims, I’m not interested in being associated with your stawmen.

    Moving on,

    The essence of my objection to Schroedinger’s rapist is presented below, via a metaphorical comparison.

    [Fuckheaded comparison to racism deleted for being about two years behind the times. –SZ]

  31. 36

    After being asked to clarify my point, the entire point has been deleted.

    VenomFang-esque censorship tactics from “freethought” bloggers.

    I understand, and expected little more.

    After all, You wouldn’t want to clutter your comment sections with people who commit the atrocity of disagreeing with you.

    Once again, AthiPlus dogmatists have demonstrated the caliber intellects.

  32. 38

    Oh, George…poor George…you don’t realize that regurgitating your years-debunked argument is the dogmatic act? You should get out more. Maybe pay attention to wide variety of things people write on the internet. I hear it’s popular.

  33. 39

    Poor, George. Thought he was clever and is all sad that his brilliant ignoring, once again, of the point of Schroedinger’s Rapist can be summed up by “What the last several hundred idiots said.” Poor, poor, dishonest, gone, George.

  34. 41

    Wow, George really did go the racist route. Funnily enough, the analogy doesn’t go the way he thinks it does, as Crommunist himself explains:

    Now there are two ways I could react to these encounters. I could rail against people for being racist and sexist and size-ist (if that’s a thing) – I’m so gentle and warm and loving! How dare they act as though I’m not? That’s one way – and it’s the stupid way. The other way is to recognize that while I strongly dislike the fact that people see me as dangerous because of how I look, it is up to me to decide what to do with that information. If I don’t care about spooking my neighbours, I don’t have to shuffle my feet – let them deal with their fright. But if I do care, then I have to find some way of mitigating that fear so we can coexist harmoniously.

  35. 42

    Come on, George. Your “it’s just like being afraid of blacks” argument reminds me of how creationists keep coming up with the flagellum and the eye even to this day (and plenty of creationists have their comments deleted when they show up in threads explaining how the eye refutes evolution). There really is no excuse for that anymore.

  36. 43

    OK, we’ve heard enough about the bad analogy of “it’s just like being afraid of blacks”. Can we discuss the right one for a change? If I meet a random stranger, the likelihood of me being physically assaulted in a manner severe enough to cause serious physical damage does correlate with the size of the person. It’s not a perfect correlation of R = 1.0. But it’s there. The risk increases even more if the person is a martial arts expert. Therefore, I am more on my guard against bigger people and those with training in physical combat. Is this sizeist? Reverse ableist? Am I singling them out as “Schrodinger’s Assaulter”? Am I bigoted against big people? After all, a midget could walk up to me and stick a knife in my thigh. No, in reality we men make this kind of risk assessment all the time and act on it without being accused of sizeism and reverse ableism. And we do appreciate it when they go out of their way to make us feel more safe and comfortable.

  37. 44

    “Guys, you have my permission?”

    Get the fuck out of here. Not only are you flat-out wrong on female rape, but you’re committing the most basic of violations of agency? “You have my permission?”

    And you feminists wonder why you had to resort to rich lobbyists to get your ridiculous shit institutionalized. You wonder why the common person, including the common woman, laughs at and despises you.

  38. 45

    Seriously, do you actually believe that your admitted rape committed by women against men is given anywhere near the same regard as male-perp’d rape of a woman? How disconnected from reality can you be?

    You people are pathetic. I thought tumblr was a cesspool until I tried rediscovering this nightmare of a “free thought” website. In this very comment thread some needledicked moderator edited the content of a guy’s post because they didn’t like the analogy he used, an analogy you all refuse to provide a refutation for. If it’s so swiftly debunked and easily demolished, why don’t you go ahead and do it?

    A racist looks at incarceration stats and (REPORTED) violent crime stats and says “OH, well, GOLLY GEE, I guess them blacks just commit moar crimez!”

    A feminist does the same thing for (REPORTED) violent crime and rape stats and concludes from this that Schroedinger’s Rapist is totally valid when applied to men, despite the fact that no one choose their gender-assigned-at-birth any more than they choose their racial background or ethnicity. Please, do enlighten me on how this is an invalid comparison if you could be so fucking kind. Preferably outside the bounds of your religion.

  39. 46

    Hi Karen. According to the CDC study, 17.9% of women will be raped by men. For the “black” analogy to be valid, something similar to 17.9% of white people should be assaulted by black people, but this is not the case. That’s why the analogy doesn’t work.

  40. 47

    Karen @45

    Please, do enlighten me on how this is an invalid comparison if you could be so fucking kind.

    Apparently you didn’t read the thread. Here, let me quote Crommunist again:

    Now there are two ways I could react to these encounters. I could rail against people for being racist and sexist and size-ist (if that’s a thing) – I’m so gentle and warm and loving! How dare they act as though I’m not? That’s one way – and it’s the stupid way. The other way is to recognize that while I strongly dislike the fact that people see me as dangerous because of how I look, it is up to me to decide what to do with that information. If I don’t care about spooking my neighbours, I don’t have to shuffle my feet – let them deal with their fright. But if I do care, then I have to find some way of mitigating that fear so we can coexist harmoniously.

    Let me know if he used too many big words.

  41. 48

    Karen,

    Seriously, do you actually believe that your admitted rape committed by women against men is given anywhere near the same regard as male-perp’d rape of a woman? How disconnected from reality can you be?

    Can you please point to the part of the OP in which Stephanie appears, in your mind, to be making the claim you are attributing to her, or any claim that appears to be resting on that assumption?
    It would be nice if you could demonstrate that you are arguing with the actual OP and not an imaginary straw-version of it, before you accuse people of being disconnected from reality.

  42. 50

    From that post:

    I am averse to that notion in the first place for the same reason; men who have no intention of doing harm have no real reason to alter their behavior, and any woman who is interested in observing reality will take note of moments where she found herself uncomfortable and nothing went wrong.

    Drivers who want to observe reality should also take note of all the times somebody tailgated them and nothing happened. They will learn that their fear of being rear-ended by a tailgating driver is completely irrational, especially given the statistics that most rear-ending doesn’t happen on the motorway but at crossroads.
    Tailgaters who have no intention of rear-ending the car in front of themhave no reason to change their behaviour. After all they haven’t rear-ended anybody so far.

  43. 51

    Seriously, do you actually believe that your admitted rape committed by women against men is given anywhere near the same regard as male-perp’d rape of a woman? How disconnected from reality can you be?

    The same regard? As in, none? No, I’d say you’re just seriously overinflating what regard rape is given in general.

    A racist looks at incarceration stats and (REPORTED) violent crime stats and says “OH, well, GOLLY GEE, I guess them blacks just commit moar crimez!”

    Yeah, to be blunt: Take this shit to any crime other than rape, your narrative falls entirely apart. The evidence strongly suggests that, indeed, there actually are considerably more male perps. It’s the exact opposite of non-white people; black people, at the very least, generally commit crimes *BENEATH* the general incidence rate, specifically because they’re better aware of the legal consequences. Unequal enforcement takes care of the rest. I’d be legitimately shocked if the pattern didn’t hold for hispanics, the other crazy over-represented minority in the US Penal system.

    And you feminists wonder why you had to resort to rich lobbyists to get your ridiculous shit institutionalized. You wonder why the common person, including the common woman, laughs at and despises you.

    What parallel earth are you from, exactly?

  44. 52

    If a person was to make the post about any other demographic, it would be considered hate speech. Since people get sensitive about a race analogy, how about I use a gender analogy?

    I am more likely to be violently raped by a gay man than I am a straight man. So I guess it would not be at all inappropriate for me to make a blog detailing how homosexual men should approach straight men.

    Of course it’s the view of a particular person that’s shared by a number of other people. So is every other form of bigotry. She discusses men approaching her on trains and the like. Very little chance of being raped there. She discussed using the man’s appearance, such as dress, tattoo’s, etc. to make a judgement about the man. Yet if I were to state a judgement about a woman based on her appearance, I would be condemned for it, would I not?

    Finally, the odds of you (woman or man) being raped in a dark alley (or some comparable location) is comparable to that of you being murdered and notably smaller than you being assaulted, robbed, etc. Every single person, whether they are a woman or a man, has to take precautions for their safety.

    @Pteryxx:
    Actually, Crommunist even stated in the article that it was sexist. He simply has more of a “make the best of it” attitude.

  45. 54

    It is a bit confusing and somewhat ironic that critics of Schrodinger’s rapist are now advocating that this caution advised by the argument is not comprehensive enough because it only refers to strangers; since most rapists knew their victims, the slight wariness should be expanded to include more men, not only strangers!

    In other words, we should get rid of Schrodinger’s rapist as an argument altogether because… is doesn’t cover enough ground? Reminds me of that Woody Allen joke about the food in this restaurant being awful and on top of that, look how small the servings are!

  46. 55

    Jose, actually, you are correct. You should include every man, including your brothers, father, husband, boyfriend, boss, etc. You should also include every woman as you are more likely to be a victim of another crime from a woman than you are to be the victim of a rape from a man. Etc. Every man should behave the same since a man is more likely to be a victim of a crime than a woamn.

    It’s paranoid. For instance, she discusses approaching women on a train. There’s next to no chance of being raped on a train. There’s no reason for her to be afraid by a guy trying to talk to her on a train. In fact, I doubt she was afraid of being raped on a train (if she was, she is unarguably paranoid) but was simply annoyed by ugly guys trying to pick her up. Hence her focus on their physical appearance when she discussed whether or not they could approach her.

  47. 57

    Every man should behave the same since a man is more likely to be a victim of a crime than a woamn (sic).

    Everyone does behave that way, including men. Many examples were given in this very thread (did you read it?). But it only becomes a contentious issue when it’s about women, men and one particular type of crime.

  48. 60

    I agree with @57. The “paranoid” bit is not a very accurate description of how the argument is put in practice in everyday life. Sorry for beating a dead horse, but you aren’t being paranoid when you look to both sides before crossing a road, the train company isn’t being paranoid when they install ticket barriers (how insulting! They’re assuming the good people of this town would just sneak onto the train! Abscheulich!), etc. and those events are far less likely than a man raping a woman.

  49. 61

    Eldin Alvere @ 52:

    If a person was to make the post about any other demographic, it would be considered hate speech.

    Hate speech is a negative assertion made without evidence. “All men are rapists” is hate speech; “be careful around men because some are rapists” is not.

    I am more likely to be violently raped by a gay man than I am a straight man.

    Whoa whoa whoa. Depending on where you get your stats from, roughly 1-10% of men are gay. In order for your assertion to be true, then, either:

    A) gay men are 10-100 times more likely to be rapists then hetro men.
    B) gay men are 10-100 times more likely to rape than hetro men.
    C) some combination of the above

    I see no evidence for any of the above, no reason to suspect any of the above, and some evidence that none of the above is true (“Rape of Males,” S. Donaldson, 1990).

    In short, you decried this post for hate speech, then wrote some hate speech yourself. This strongly suggests you are either clueless or trolling.

    Eldin Alvere @ 58:

    Why was my last post removed?

    I subscribed to this post, and haven’t seen any missing comments. Anyone else?

  50. 62

    People are entitled to trust or not trust anyone they like.

    Personally for me as a father, any man OR woman I don’t know extremely well is “Schrodinger’s Abuser,” and I will watch the hell out of them when they’re with my kids.

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