Here’s a little one-question quiz to see how much you know about Reddit’s Atheism subreddit.
QUESTION ONE: A woman describes being raped by a “friend” while both were intoxicated (though she doesn’t call it rape). Do the r/atheism regulars:
a) Respond with sympathy and support
b) Attack her and furiously downvote her posts, with the assistance of one of the moderators of r/mensrights, then return to posting and upvoting rape jokes
BONUS QUESTION: True or False: Someone on r/menrights links to her comment as “an example of how and why many people believe that rape is everywhere… because their definition of rape includes every sexual misadventure.” The most heavily upvoted comment in the r/mensrights thread declares that the woman who was raped “sounds like a delusional sheltered teen.”
Yes, the correct answers here are the ones you assumed were correct.
Here’s the woman’s post describing what happened to her.
She gives more details on what happened in other, also-highly-downvoted comments.
One highly upvoted rape joke from elsewhere in the thread:
Hilarious!
Amazingly, despite all the jokes and the victim blaming/attacking going on, the thread also contains some highly upvoted comments lamenting the tendency of people to blame the victim in rape cases. Apparently, when a rape victim is drunk, it’s not rape, even when she repeatedly says “no” and gives in because she’s scared, so it’s fine to attack away, and even to accuse the victim of being a rapist too.
This enables Reddit Atheists not only to blame the victim of rape without feeling guilty, or admitting that this is what they’re doing, while simultaneously feeling self-righteous in their condemnation of religious people doing the exact same thing.
And because their rape jokes are also couched as jokes about religious people’s views on rape, they can feel self-righteous while making them too.
Sometimes the actions of Reddit Atheists cause me to begin to doubt just a teensy weensey bit that “atheists are a community that’s pre-selected for clear thinking and empiricism,” as one commenter in r/mensrights put it not that long ago.
EDITED TO ADD: Thanks again to ShitRedditSays for highlighting this awful thread.
EDITED TO ADD 2: More SRS discussion, courtesy of Holly.
CassandraSay: Sorry, I got your comment where you say I can’t with the current data describe a rising trend mixed up with Pecunia’s statement that the last 12 months prevalency number can’t be used to make any extrapolation about the next 12 months.
I am however still curious as to whether there exist any possible charts that can be generated from the lifetime numbers and the last 12 months (4.8 to be distributed over the whole graph with 1.1 of them in the last period)?
CassandraSay and Pecunia:
As a male victim I’ve experienced dismissal and the commonality in that dismissal is always the belief that rape is almost exclusively a male on female crime. When findings start to suggest that it is far from as exclusively a male on female crime as previously though I can’t find any discussion anywhere about how this should influence rape prevention work. In fact, the finding is either completely ignored or defined away (as CDC and Schwyzer did). I also believe fervently that rape prevention work is an important factor in reducing all rape. A change in rape prevalence should henceforth be reflected with a change in how one work to prevent rape.
A commenter called pillowinhell stated that she had seen numbers showing parity between male and female rapists. Darksidecat challenges pillowinhell on that and pillowinhell didn’t cite the study where s/he found it.
I cited the NISVS 2010 study which actually showed that while not a parity a quite large proportion of the rapists who committed rape in 2010 were female. I was then attacked by Darksidecat and accused of not being able to read a report. (I had only copied and pasted one finding and stating that I thought this finding would be surprisingly for many).
So, all the comments that you’re disagreeing with are from one specific commenter, and you’ve decided to generalise that to the entire commentariat?
I’d also love to hear your explanation for why you made the statement that I quoted upthread. When you make statements to the effect of “so what you’re all saying is…”, and that’s not in fact what most people had been saying, one is inclined to think that you may not be engaging in good faith.
Now, putting aside my sense that Tamen is not arguing in good faith, if one was in the position he describes, and had the concerns he describes, what would be the smartest and most effective way to approach that? I have to say, “post comments on a blog that mocks misogyny” doesn’t strike me as a particularly effective form of activism.
Tamen: I’m sorry you’ve been dismissed, but that doesn’t entitle you to assume that anyone who disagrees with your data disagrees with your premise.
It certainly doesn’t entitle you to take an exchange (which had one person presenting no real evidence), and the outcome thereto (i.e. no evidence in support of the claim) as somehow meaning everyone here finds the underlying issue (rape) to be as you have found it elsewhere.
It most assuredly doesn’t justify you telling people they believe things which, in the very comment you were responding to, they had said quite the opposite.
Again, what is it you want?
“From one year I can’t even pretend to extrapolate the likelihood of being raped in my lifetime. All I can do is say, “In this year, this happened”. But that’s, to all intents and purposes, a single datum point. It’s not a valid basis for the extrapolation you are making.”
“You are the one claiming that this study has proven gender parity in rape, and it has not done so in any way, shape or form.”
“Do I believe the numbers? It doesn’t matter, when what’s being discussed is your use of the figures. If you want to say this is a persistent truth, then you need data more than one year.”
“That such rapes are actually equal in number to rapes of women… insufficient data. Even if true for one year, it’s only one year. How about the lifetime chances for women to be raped vs. men to be raped?”
“Again, the past 12 months are just that. The past 12 months. If you are trying (as you seem to be) to assert a radical change it needs to have more than a single source.”
Really? Really? Wow. If you think that is data from the whole of last year is;
1 – Insufficient time to calculate a rate (“need data more than one year” “single datum point” “it’s only one year”
2 – Less relevant to current rates of rape than the rate further in the past (All of it about lifetimes rates – every time it’s mentioned pretty much)
then I’m really not sure what to say to you. The CDC study is some pretty darn good data (though I’d like to see some reviews of the paper in the peer reviewed literature).
Some questions:
1: Do you think that attitudes to rape today are the same as 50 years in the past?
2: Do you think that people are more aware of consent issues now than 50 years in the past?
3: Do you think that ideas about the vulnerability of men to rape have changed in the last 50 years?
4: Do you think that crime rates have changed in the last 50 years?
5: Do you think that there is a generational difference in attitudes to rape (in general, everyone is an individual of course)?
6: If you answered any of the above questions with a ‘yes’ then why do you think the lifetime rate is a better measure of current rates than the rate from last year?
JoanofArt:
How many people were shot in my neighborhood last year?
From that what is the persistent rate of homicide where I live?
From that how many people will be shot next year?
A year is a year. It is, in this context, a single quantum of information.
I’ve not said the data isn’t good data. I’ve said the uses to which Tamen seems to be putting them aren’t something the data support.
Question: Do you think the relative rates of rape for men and women are now, and will be in the future roughly equal?
If so why?
To expand: Tamen seems to be arguing that this compilation means that males being raped is at parity with females being raped, and that somehow the paradigm of rape prevention, into the future, needs to be changed because of it.
His study is not a trendline. The longitudinal data aren’t there. That’s why the longer period is more relevant.
Moreover, what he wants is what I already support, so the details in this study are completely irrelevant to his actual desires. He could have asked, ab initio, “what do you think ought to be done to decrease the number of rapes?” and gotten the information he said he wants.
If, however, what he wants is to have a shift in focus from preventing rape, in general, to one of preventing male rape, in specific, he’s got a problems, because that’s not something I’m going to support, and it’s not something a single year’s data will justify.
I think your questions help to emphaises my point – the rate of homicide in your area is, next year, more likely to be like last year than the year 1700. Do you agree? I similary think that the relative rate of rape of men and women is much more likely to be like last year than an average of the last 50 years, as the conditions now are more similar to last year than the average conditions over the last 50 years.
So when we’re discussing lifetime prevalance we need to include statistics from the year 1700? I was not aware that this conversation involved surveying vampires about whether or not they’d been raped.
Murdered actually – that was about homicide. :p
In that case the rate is 100%. Or would be, if it was possible to access stats from that era, or if any of this was remotely relevant to the conversation at hand.
The conversation at hand is is more recent data more indicative of future data than older data – its right on topic.
Actually the conversation is now about why you feel that absurd hyperbole improves your argument.
Sure! It exaggerates the issue to demonstrate the point – conditions next year are more likely to be like last year than an average of the last 50 or so years – it just makes that point more clear.
Nah, it mostly just makes you look kind of silly.
I don’t mind looking silly. 🙂
BTW I still want to know what Tamen wants out of this conversation, exactly. He’s been asked multiple times now, so it’s odd that he still hasn’t answered.
Ah… so that last year had an gang war is therefore indicative of what?
Because it did, and the number of murders within three blocks of my house was 1: higher than the year before (though the number of murders within 100 feet was fewer), and I expect the rate to be less this year than last.
The rate of homicide in the year before was lower than the year before that.
The three years before those were much the as the year above, and the year before that was higher than last year, but lower than the year prior.
And in none of those years could one, rationally (my expectation that the gang war is over, and the rate of homicide likely to return to rates of the recent past is guess. It’s possible that outside circumstance will keep the rate of homicide about what it was. It certainly seems the rate of gun violence is about the same, but it also seems to be driven by poverty, not interfactional feuding).
Which is why one year isn’t adequate to extrapolate that sort of thing. Esp. if the year seems to be anomalous. If the study showed that reported rapes had been in rough parity for the past five years, that would be more indicative (as was the trending to a newly stable lower rate of homicide in E. Palo Alto was), but even that’s not dispostive, merely indicative.
tamen wants us to treat it as both indicative, and dispositve; from an artificially small (as he admits, he chose the data from the past year, because it was the data that made his argument seem strongest).
And… none of that matters to what he said his overall aim was… to get people to agree with his ideas on how to deal with rape prevention, because we already do agree with his definition of rape, and we want to stop it.
JoanofArt: Sure! It exaggerates the issue to demonstrate the point – conditions next year are more likely to be like last year than an average of the last 50 or so years – it just makes that point more clear.
No, it doesn’t, because that’s a fallacy.
Conditions from year to year are likely to be consistent, for most things (but see above, re homicides in my neighborhood). But that’s not the issue. The issue is: “Is the data from one year enough to make a substantive change to policy.”.
Look at climate change. This year is likely to be much the same as last year. Next year as well. But small changes, from year to year, can add up. And if I take just one year, one in which the swing was to the lower end of the temperature range, and used that as by baseline… declared a trend from it, I’d be screwed.
That’s why one needs to have longitudinal studies. Just as the users of Vioxx.
So let me get this straight – are you proposing that a nationwide rape epidemic of men occurred last year? Or that there was just a huge and unprecedented reduction in the number of women raped? Or perhaps both? I find that somewhat unlikely, and your proposition that last year was anomalous – if just one month was anomalous or just one region of the USA was anomalous then the date would still average out – requires this, Do have a reason to believe last year was particularly anomalous? Notably you do for the homicides – a gang war. The fact that this is a nation wide survey rather than within 3 blocks of your house makes quite a significant difference.
I have no idea what tamen wants, I’m curious about why the statistics from last year are being so strongly contested as representative with no reason given for why people think last year was so anomalous.
And.. who said average? I didn’t. I said trendline. If the rate of X is increasing the “average” can be quite different from any given year’s numbers. If I work to deal with the “average” (a meaningless concept in trying to deal with attitudes toward rape, in any case), I can (almost certainly will) mis-allocate my resources, because an average is an artificial tool used to model.
No one, for example, has 2.14 children, even if that is the national average. If I take last years average, fail to account for a steady decrease in family size, then I will build too many schools, train to many pediatricians (and Ob/Gyns), have too many neo-natal beds, etc. and the find I have problems later.
When you are using the lifetime rates it is an average – it is not a trendline – both the lifetime rate and the last year rate from the CDC are single data points in that regard. As for climate change – they regularly use data from the last year to examine (close friends with climate scientists, some of whom have worked for the Climatic Research Unit, so I’ve talked a lot about this) and look at future years – they just continue to get data – years which are anomalous are explained – what the North Atlantic oscillation unusual that year? Climate scientists do not just claim a year is unrepresentative without a good reason.
JoanofArt: Because they are. Unless you have a batch of studies showing that men and women have been being raped at equivalent numbers, for a period of years.
The problem isn’t that we don’t believe the data, it’s what we are being asked to believe about the data.
It’s also the fact that, even if true, the data don’t change our attitudes toward rape (it’s wrong), the definition of rape (sex obtained without honest consent), or what we want to do about it (teach people to not fuck until they have honest consent).
So the question isn’t about us. It’s about why “accepting” this data is so important. First to Tamen, now to you.
Because you seem to have no logical reason to? I am a big fan of reason. What exactly have I asked you to believe beyond either believing it is representative or coming up with a evidenced explanation of why the year was anomalous?
I don’t know what to say (to quote you) to your saying I have no logical reason to. It sounds as if what you are actually saying is you can’t understand why I don’t accept your reasons. Which is true. I don’t, and I explained why.
You also used a string of questions designed to force an answer (“6: If you answered any of the above questions with a ‘yes’ then why do you think the lifetime rate is a better measure of current rates than the rate from last year?), when those questions were not all related to the issue at hand. Since one of those questions required a “yes” (do I think crime rates have changed in the past 50 years), I have to doubt either your reasoning, or your honesty in debate. To be kind I have gone with the former. It does, however, put you at a disadvantage.
Argument by analogy is difficult when the analogies include gross errors in logic, they aren’t going to be convincing. When one error compounded (when Cassandra mentioned this you defended it as a reasonable way to show your point: even though there is no way to measure one of the data points [homicides in the are of E. Palo Alto in 1700]. As to rate.. I suspect it was higher then, given the relatively smaller population in 1700, but I can’t know), the subsequent arguments suffer.
You are asking me to take one year (which you admit isn’t the method in other sciences), and use it as a baseline. I am supposed to ignore that it’s anomalous. That I don’t you seem to think unreasonable.
And yes, the lifetime rates are an average. I didn’t say that no average is ever useful. But when looking at setting policy (what tamen was asking), using a larger data set is useful. From the data in which the lifetime chance was computed one can extract the baselines. With some regressions one can get better granularity on locale, and cause.
None of that can be done with one year’s data set. And you seem to think, in this case, it ought to be.
What exactly have I asked you to believe beyond either believing it is representative or coming up with a evidenced explanation of why the year was anomalous?
What I am asking is that you defend your positive claim (that it is reasonable to assume this year isn’t anomalous). It’s a basic principle of logic. The person who makes the claim has to defend it. Tamen was making that claim, and now you are.