Rape Culture

Today's class discussion on rape culture was extremely riveting and also a bit horrifying.  Rape is just one of those concepts that is so difficult and uncomfortable to talk about, but at the same time, discussing rape is so necessary if society has any desire of limiting the frequency of the atrocities.
Although most of the discussion revolved around the safety of women, it was interesting to consider the  other side of the gender spectrum.  It would have been nice to have a higher male percentage represented in the class, but it was also comforting(in some demented way or another) to see that women were taking the upper hand in the discussion. In terms of the male representation, though, it was interesting to see how different the perceptions of rape culture, and relatively innocent actions varied between genders. For example, the majority of the class considered walking alone to be dangerous and risky, especially when you walk past someone at night.  Whereas the males were less frightened of being alone, and were not even aware of the implications of their behavior. The parallels that the class was able to draw concerning the gender binary was just so bizarre considering how frequently these things happen.
The gender binary also leads into the next point, which as that society spends so much time trying to teach women how to not get raped, instead of educating society to simply not partake in rape.  Almost everyone's parents warn young women about the dangers of date rape drugs, and don't walk alone at night, yet rarely do you hear about a parent lecturing someone to understand that if someone says 'no', it means 'no', and the importance of consent when it comes to sexual relations.
Along with that, it is interesting to see how often society tries to justify a vast majority of sexual assault by saying that a girl dressed in a certain way, or they were drunk, when in reality society as a whole simply needs to address the fact that rape is rape.  Society needs to develop a sense of compassion for victims instead of siding with the assailant.