The Man in the Elevator at 4 AM

So there is this whole big controversy going on in the nonbeliever circles about Richard Dawkins and his comments. You can read it here.  Dawkins made comments that were dismissive and, quite frankly, shitty.  A lot of men though, are all up in arms about the situation and how women are overreacting. Given that, I'd like to take this time to be quite inclusive to the men and extend my hand.

Hello, gentlemen. Welcome to the Rape Culture.

Welcome to a culture where women have been drilled into their heads every day, every single day, that they have to be on their guard against rapists at all times.

If they are not in guard and they get raped, it's their fault for being stupid.

If they show any signs of being nice or vulnerable and they get raped, it's their fault for being encouraging.

It is not feminists who have taught us this.  You assume the feminists taught us and told us to hate and fear men, but it wasn't.  We have been told this by friends, family, churches, lawyers, schools, and everyone else.

There maybe was that one or two times when we let our guard down because we thought the Special Safety Rules for Women were stupid.  The shitty thing is, for a lot of us, that one time we let our guards down, we actually did get assaulted.

So we take self defense classes, we travel in groups, we keep pepper spray on our person, and, for many of us, we structure our lives in a way to stay as far away from men as possible.

And no, it's not that we hate you.  It is merely that we have been told, over and over again, that it is our responsibility to stay safe and not put ourselves in those million situations where we can get raped.

What does this mean for you, as men?

It means that, like in the situation presented in the article, no woman will ever go have coffee with you at 4 AM in your hotel room.

It means that fewer women will come to your parties.

It means that fewer and fewer women will show up at the vacation spots where there is a known higher level of rapes.

It means that women won't just start talking to you in the book store or the coffee shop or the grocery store, because a lot of bad things have come from that as well.

It means that trust will become harder, perhaps impossible.

It means you will be viewed as a potential rapist.

And if you are someone who went into any of these situations with innocent intentions, this is going to suck. It will probably make you angry.

The interesting thing is, you will have two choices at this point. You can either be angry at all the women for not trusting men and avoiding them and being upset when you approached them . . . or you can get angry at the real cause here.

You can be angry at the rapists who purposefully go to Spring Break places to drug and rape as many women as possible.

You can be angry at the rapists who decide to violate the ancient rules of being good hosts and rape the women who come to their parties.

You can be angry at the rapists who practice, actually practice, at ways to draw women out and make them trust them, who hunt in book stores and coffee shops, all with the intention of doing violence to another person's body.

You can be angry at the rape culture for letting all of this seem fine.

You can realize that rape culture is fundamentally damaging to all people and all relationships.

And finally, like the others of us, you can work for ways to change it.