Reply #26: Respectfully,

[Hello_Kitty]

I submit that I understand you mean well with the suggested strategies but they really aren't anything that most women over the age of 12 already know. Sorry but the overall effect of including them in your post is the perpetuation of blaming victims for the acts of their attackers.

1. What gives a fellow I invite into my home the idea that I'm agreeing to have sex with him?

2. What gives him the idea that I am willing to have sex with him because I have porn?

3. I agree with throwing a guy out at the first sign of rudeness. But far too many women are incapable of putting this into practice, given the way we are socialized from birth to be "nice", accomodating, and deferential to males. Perpetrators know this and take advantage of it.

4. So what if he's got a hard-on from a backrub? Guys can get hard-ons in the absence of any physical stimulation.

5. Okay, self defense strategies are good for anyone to learn but maybe she wouldn't have gotten to the phone to dial 9-11 after using them on him. Then what? We weren't there, she was. Maybe she sensed that it would be safer to not struggle against him physically.

I'm not flaming here, I just want to point out that placing the responsibility for avoiding rape on the shoulders of it's potential victims is unproductive. If all women were to follow your suggestions perfectly, rapists would simply change their tactics. Rape occurs because the rapists can do it and because the shitty legal system lets most of them get away with it, not because women need better dating strategies.