Batman
Not all those who wander are lost...
My two cents on all of this.
I think an important distinction here that needs to be made is that of “blame” and what we mean by it, which I think would get rid of a lot of the ambiguous semantics and possibly the disagreements in this thread as a result.
Let’s make this into a syllogism so we can think about it in a more organized way, and I’m going to do so in the way I think both sides are intending “blame”.
P: Men should not assault women regardless if women take certain precautions to minimize their potential for being assaulted or not.
C: Therefore, women are not acting unwisely by not taking those precautions.
I think this sums up what’s at stake here when we pull apart what’s meant by “blame”. On one side, blame is being used in the sense of placing responsibility for fault, insinuating that women have a responsibility to protect themselves from potential male aggression, and if they don’t, they help to create their own victimization and therefore their status as a victim is less sympathetic. In other words, they are somehow partially morally responsible for the harm that came to them, since they refused to act in ways that would protect themselves from an immoral act, causally. On the other side, “blame” is being used in a different, more casual sense of knowing the risks and disregarding them, and therefore being partially responsible (because they know better) for what happened to them causally due to unwise choices they were cognizant of that put them in a dangerous situation.
So I think both sides mean something different by “blame” as blame can have more than one connotation, thus creating the confusion: one that I hope I’ve cleared up with the syllogism. Going back to the syllogism, the conclusion (C) obviously doesn’t follow from the premise (P). To drive this point home, let’s use the same syllogism, but change the variables:
P: ISIS extremists should not assault Christians in the Levant regardless if those Christians take certain precautions to minimize their potential for being assaulted or not.
C: Therefore, Christians are not acting unwisely by not taking those precautions in the presence of ISIS.
Obviously the conclusion doesn’t derive from its premise when we distinguish “blame” in the “morally responsible” sense from the “knowingly making an unwise choice” sense in both cases. I think both sides in this thread completely agree with the validity of (P), but what’s causing the argument is what conclusions are being reached.
I think everyone can agree that a victim can certainly be considered unwise for not taking certain steps they are aware of in order to minimize the risk of a situation where their safety is in jeopardy. They can in some sense be held responsible for putting themselves in a risky situation knowingly without proper precautions, but I also think everyone can agree that they shouldn’t be blamed for the consequences, morally, considering what’s truly going on here is the illegitimate actions of others oppressing them against their will. The only person at moral fault here is the agent who wills a series of actions that infringe on the woman through assault. The woman may be unwise in her choices if her goal is to be safe, but she’s certainly not “to blame” in the broad sense, and damn sure not to be blamed for wanting to be free and taking the risk. Which brings me to my final point:
What needs to be said immediately after is that we absolutely shouldn’t have to live in a society where taking these precautions are necessary (or wise) in the first place. That’s the crux behind the anti-victim-blaming position and it’s why people get so mad when others try to come up with ways to in some sense put fault on the victim of any kind, because some people consider that fault to be legit in a really ****ed up way, to save face for their nonsense ideas about society, which of course is morally disgusting. So it’s our moral responsibility to fight against this reality that women need to take precautions just to walk and dress at the time they want. We can “blame” a woman who is raped in a back alley for not taking proper precautions that would have reduced the likelihood of her rape in only the most contrived sense that tends to downplay the infringement done by the agent who does the actual raping, the person all the focus should be on. If you don’t get really close to a cliff edge, you are less likely to fall off a cliff. Great. If you don’t wear provocative clothing and walk alone at night in a dark part of town, you’re less likely to be raped. Great. No ****. But this attitude (not saying people in this thread have this attitude, but many idiots elsewhere do) just ignores the issue entirely and states the obvious like that’s a solution. It’s not a solution.
So in my personal opinion, more than stating the obvious and getting upset that women don’t take proper precautions which they ideally should if they value their safety, we should get more upset that women have to take these precautions in the first place. Women literally live in a world where they are not allowed to freely be themselves. Their freedom to dress how they want and walk where they want at whatever time they wish is compromised in our modern world, with their mental health and even their very lives are at stake for trying to be free. It is absolutely unacceptable, and the same is true for all cases of people, intersectionally all oppressed groups of people and just people in general, who have their freedom taken away, consistently or occasionally, by the realities of our ****ed up society.
It’s our job to do everything we can as a civilization to stop this. It’s imperative that we immediately identify the causes of violence against women (and all social ills), the roots of this behavior, and do everything in our power to eradicate it as soon as possible. That way the conditions that breed violence against women are no longer there to produce the consequences. As to how this is to be done, that’s another topic entirely, and one I have a lot of strong opinions about. But actively eradicating these poisons to humanity should be a top priority for everyone who wishes for a better future.
I think an important distinction here that needs to be made is that of “blame” and what we mean by it, which I think would get rid of a lot of the ambiguous semantics and possibly the disagreements in this thread as a result.
Let’s make this into a syllogism so we can think about it in a more organized way, and I’m going to do so in the way I think both sides are intending “blame”.
P: Men should not assault women regardless if women take certain precautions to minimize their potential for being assaulted or not.
C: Therefore, women are not acting unwisely by not taking those precautions.
I think this sums up what’s at stake here when we pull apart what’s meant by “blame”. On one side, blame is being used in the sense of placing responsibility for fault, insinuating that women have a responsibility to protect themselves from potential male aggression, and if they don’t, they help to create their own victimization and therefore their status as a victim is less sympathetic. In other words, they are somehow partially morally responsible for the harm that came to them, since they refused to act in ways that would protect themselves from an immoral act, causally. On the other side, “blame” is being used in a different, more casual sense of knowing the risks and disregarding them, and therefore being partially responsible (because they know better) for what happened to them causally due to unwise choices they were cognizant of that put them in a dangerous situation.
So I think both sides mean something different by “blame” as blame can have more than one connotation, thus creating the confusion: one that I hope I’ve cleared up with the syllogism. Going back to the syllogism, the conclusion (C) obviously doesn’t follow from the premise (P). To drive this point home, let’s use the same syllogism, but change the variables:
P: ISIS extremists should not assault Christians in the Levant regardless if those Christians take certain precautions to minimize their potential for being assaulted or not.
C: Therefore, Christians are not acting unwisely by not taking those precautions in the presence of ISIS.
Obviously the conclusion doesn’t derive from its premise when we distinguish “blame” in the “morally responsible” sense from the “knowingly making an unwise choice” sense in both cases. I think both sides in this thread completely agree with the validity of (P), but what’s causing the argument is what conclusions are being reached.
I think everyone can agree that a victim can certainly be considered unwise for not taking certain steps they are aware of in order to minimize the risk of a situation where their safety is in jeopardy. They can in some sense be held responsible for putting themselves in a risky situation knowingly without proper precautions, but I also think everyone can agree that they shouldn’t be blamed for the consequences, morally, considering what’s truly going on here is the illegitimate actions of others oppressing them against their will. The only person at moral fault here is the agent who wills a series of actions that infringe on the woman through assault. The woman may be unwise in her choices if her goal is to be safe, but she’s certainly not “to blame” in the broad sense, and damn sure not to be blamed for wanting to be free and taking the risk. Which brings me to my final point:
What needs to be said immediately after is that we absolutely shouldn’t have to live in a society where taking these precautions are necessary (or wise) in the first place. That’s the crux behind the anti-victim-blaming position and it’s why people get so mad when others try to come up with ways to in some sense put fault on the victim of any kind, because some people consider that fault to be legit in a really ****ed up way, to save face for their nonsense ideas about society, which of course is morally disgusting. So it’s our moral responsibility to fight against this reality that women need to take precautions just to walk and dress at the time they want. We can “blame” a woman who is raped in a back alley for not taking proper precautions that would have reduced the likelihood of her rape in only the most contrived sense that tends to downplay the infringement done by the agent who does the actual raping, the person all the focus should be on. If you don’t get really close to a cliff edge, you are less likely to fall off a cliff. Great. If you don’t wear provocative clothing and walk alone at night in a dark part of town, you’re less likely to be raped. Great. No ****. But this attitude (not saying people in this thread have this attitude, but many idiots elsewhere do) just ignores the issue entirely and states the obvious like that’s a solution. It’s not a solution.
So in my personal opinion, more than stating the obvious and getting upset that women don’t take proper precautions which they ideally should if they value their safety, we should get more upset that women have to take these precautions in the first place. Women literally live in a world where they are not allowed to freely be themselves. Their freedom to dress how they want and walk where they want at whatever time they wish is compromised in our modern world, with their mental health and even their very lives are at stake for trying to be free. It is absolutely unacceptable, and the same is true for all cases of people, intersectionally all oppressed groups of people and just people in general, who have their freedom taken away, consistently or occasionally, by the realities of our ****ed up society.
It’s our job to do everything we can as a civilization to stop this. It’s imperative that we immediately identify the causes of violence against women (and all social ills), the roots of this behavior, and do everything in our power to eradicate it as soon as possible. That way the conditions that breed violence against women are no longer there to produce the consequences. As to how this is to be done, that’s another topic entirely, and one I have a lot of strong opinions about. But actively eradicating these poisons to humanity should be a top priority for everyone who wishes for a better future.