What is more repulsive to sane people? Rape, or unloading dead babies with a pitchfork? The actual aspect of murdering unborn babies, in reality is worse than unloading babies with a pitchfork.

But, I committed the mortal sin of reminding the politically correct murderers, of their so obvious crimes.

if you restricted the comparison to child-murder (predominantly female-perpetrated)

Where on earth are you getting that claim? Murderers who are related to child victims are divided almost evenly between genders. Men greatly predominate among strangers who murder children. Ergo, the murder of children is predominantly male perpetrated, even when taking neonaticide into account.

As for the warm fuzzies about men changing… well, um… I’d say we might actually have a chance if it weren’t for the impending economic catastrophes. Maybe after the human race recovers (IF we do), those of us still standing will have the chance to build a new society which worships the number “3″.

““I don’t think “we should really infantilize women, particularly rape survivors, because people are protective of kids, so if they think of women as children, it’ll totally stop rape!” is a great take-home message.”

Well, you’re right. But so are they - you need to convince people of the power disparity between attacker and victim.”

and

“As I see it, almost all of society’s acceptance of rape is built on the “maybe she was asking for it” assumption.

I think that’s getting at the heart of it. It’s not that society “accepts” rape, but they’re confused about what it is. With neonaticide, there is never any doubt after the fact whether a crime has occurred. If every rapist were a knife-wielding psychopath prowling the streets for victims they had never met, then rape would have the same low acceptability as neonaticide. But as we all are aware, there’s many more garden varieties, often trying to disguise themselves as something else.”

For the first comment, I disagree with the need to convince people of the power disparity between attacker and victim. I think that’s absolutely the wrong way to go. That is the route towards putting the onus on stopping the crime on the victim–we don’t take that approach with mugging, for instance, at all.

For the second comment, I believe that you just described the “2″ status of rape. It isn’t really a crime, not culturally. The kind of “rape” you say that people accept as a crime is actually “battery” that just happens to have sex thrown in, and people do accept that threatening someone else with a knife is a crime, both de jure and de facto.

We really appear to be stuck in the “2″ status of rape.

Also, to those who spoke of the lack of male empathy with a rape victim, I agree. Men have a vested interest and cognitive complex that strongly discourages them from empathizing specifically with a rape victim.

I don’t believe there’s anything women as a group can do to change that last. I believe that’s something that more men than not have to make both an internal and a cultural commitment to change about themselves.

Somebody give me the warm fuzzies that that’s ever going to happen?

I think that’s getting at the heart of it. It’s not that society “accepts” rape, but they’re confused about what it is. With neonaticide, there is never any doubt after the fact whether a crime has occurred. If every rapist were a knife-wielding psychopath prowling the streets for victims they had never met, then rape would have the same low acceptability as neonaticide. But as we all are aware, there’s many more garden varieties, often trying to disguise themselves as something else.

More education can only help, especially to high school and college age boys. (I think The Biting Beaver’s rapist checklist should be required reading material in every high school health class. I don’t agree with all of it, but I like the point it’s making, and I think it’s a great starting point for discussion.) If everybody in society starts to “knows the rules” about which behaviors are acceptable, or even just became just a teensy bit more aware about the issues at play, then maybe the actual perpetrators of social rape might start being blamed a little bit more (rather than the victims, I mean). I now count my blessings that I went to high school at a time when “sex education” was something other than encouraging abstinence. The classes often seemed silly and lame to us at the time, but in retrospect I bet it did some real good to at least a few of us.

That’s actually shocking to me, because rape strikes me, viscerally, as so much worse. It’s a crime against someone who clearly has a formed sense of personality, agency, and autonomy.

I’m kind of surprised at your surprise. I thought it went without saying that because of learned sexism, men don’t see women’s personality, agency, and autonomy, and thus it is easier for them to feel sympathy for a baby than a rape victim.

I take some disagreement with you on how much of that is learned from culture, but it is as you say: men identify more with the rapist than the victim. I don’t think it’s JUST a matter of identification, though.

I don’t think “we should really infantilize women, particularly rape survivors, because people are protective of kids, so if they think of women as children, it’ll totally stop rape!” is a great take-home message.

I don’t think it is either, but that’s not really what I said. It’s a message I see allllll the time, in every admonishment not to victim-blame. “Women can’t stop rapists by wearing different clothes/not wearing makeup,” and other things along those lines are what I’m talking about. Those messages all have the take-home: the rape victim was not in control of whether she is raped. The control of the crime lies entirely with the rapist.

As I see it, almost all of society’s acceptance of rape is built on the “maybe she was asking for it” assumption. If you take that away, the entire web of justifications and excuses comes apart.

I may have a followup but I need to get to the gym before it closes!

Well, you’re right. But so are they - you need to convince people of the power disparity between attacker and victim. I don’t think that going back to protecting women and chivalry and all that will work, but I think there may be something to be said for a psychological look into a hypothetical victim’s head DURING the act itself. Fear can be quite paralyzing, and helplessness isn’t the only thing that can make a person powerless in a given situation.

I doubt rape will ever garner the horrified reactions of newborn-murder. One reason is that it’s a lot easier to convince yourself that a rape victim had some say in the matter,

That’s actually shocking to me, because rape strikes me, viscerally, as so much worse. It’s a crime against someone who clearly has a formed sense of personality, agency, and autonomy. The rapist violates those aspects of another person. Rape is always abominable; a rapist is always performing an unforgivable act.

Neonaticide is horrible, but we can imagine situations where it doesn’t seem that the perpetrator has another viable choice—if either you can eat, or the baby can eat, what do you do? It’s a shite situation, absolutely, but because it’s a shite situation, it seems very difficult to say, “you absolutely cannot choose yourself in that situation, ever,” especially as choosing to feed the infant is poetic, but futile. In contemporary western cases, perpetrators of neonaticide often have severe mental illnesses, and / or are acting out of the same survival urge that has made it an accepted practice at various points. There’s a reason why foundling wheels—still used in Italy!—are actually effective at reducing neonaticide.

So to move rape to a #3 level of acceptability, convince people of the victim’s powerlessness to stop it.

I don’t think “we should really infantilize women, particularly rape survivors, because people are protective of kids, so if they think of women as children, it’ll totally stop rape!” is a great take-home message.

For one thing, children are frequently sexually assaulted. Known, convicted perpetrators receive some degree of stigmatization, but they are just as often protected by patriarchal institutions.

I think the reason rape is common in our culture is that men are taught to identify with rapists and to not identify with women. That’s it—simple, vicious, and self-perpetuating. This is why so many men react defensively; that’s why patriarchal organizations minimize rape; that’s why it is still represented as a lesser crime, just the sort of thing that boys will do, y’know, as they learn the ropes. Wink. Nudge.

I think the biggest problem with the analogy is that the gender-of-the-perpetrator is of much less prominence in people’s minds than the (perceived) ability/agency/powerlessness of the victim. I think if you restricted the comparison to child-murder (predominantly female-perpetrated) vs. child-rape (I assume this is still predominantly male-perpetrated), that defensiveness would disappear; as far as I can tell, men generally DON’T get “offended, uncomfortable, or defensive” when the rape victim is a child.

Bringing a child into the discussion short-circuits consideration of the perp’s gender, so it’s not fair to attribute the discrepancy of reactions to these particular gendered crimes on the audience’s gender.

I guess what I am saying is that the reason infant-murder is inexcusable while rape is excused, has less to do with the gender-predictability of the criminal, and more to do with the perception of how much the victim could have done about it. So to move rape to a #3 level of acceptability, convince people of the victim’s powerlessness to stop it.