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The Forum > Article Comments > It is never the victim's fault > Comments

It is never the victim's fault : Comments

By Dannielle Miller, published 25/5/2009

Our blame-the-victim mentality is one of the main reasons many women do not report sexual assault.

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RObert,

That's a pretty good analysis of the situation.

"All of those who took part in this should think more carefully about who they choose to have sex with and the nature of the relationship with that person."

That is the unambiguous lesson from the incident.

"Johns and any others involved who cheated on partners had cause to answer to those partners."

Yes, which he has apparently done. It should also be said that when Johns had sex with Clare in a group context, or at least a potential group context at first, he was acting as a conduit for anyone else in the team to get involved. That's why he's copped the backlash he has in the media - for his agency to the "locker-room" culture.

"Women who find a power imbalance threatening need not seek out powerful men (nothing I've seen here suggest that applied in this case but the power imbalance has been mentioned often)."

Good advice.

-- -- -- -- --

A positive in the incident that hasn't been so widely discussed is that one player took Clare home afterwards and made sure she was OK. A sign that things can potentially improve in future?
Posted by RobP, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 11:12:45 AM
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YES - there is no more certain truth than this. It has been a foundation of our evolution beyond lower life forms that we experience and express love and devotion. Then we exhort our young women to abandon their beliefs in these higher pursuits. We have made so much progress in recent years toward holding men accountable for abuse, and now we face the potential undoing of it all. The man's new mantra is to follow the Great Instinct, so reasonably, convincingly and disingenuously preached by Mr. Crossfield as the flagship "policy" for his It Says Here sermons. Evidently we must all bow to the man’s divine mission of unabated promiscuity because evolution so dictates. Should we all simply regress to animalistic behavior because someone speaks so authoritatively? We might as well start killing our neighbors because they are encroaching on our food-gathering territory.
Posted by happymeg, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 12:28:39 PM
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Myth 1: Victims aren't actively and fallaciously labelled as such, by third party beneficiaries. There's always someone or something to blame, and in knowing who/what to blame the event can be understood better.
Myth 2: Ones position in what we understand as our reality is not shaped by ones management of random events, but by the event itself or an agent deemed responsible for said random event management skills. Said differently, denying responsibility for our feelings over the chance to blame and exact revenge is human and mature; no alternative exists.
Myth 3: The psychological distress manifested by humans labelled by others as "victims" is only reflecting the true nature of the horrors that were "done to them", and does not reflect the scurrilous abuse of their psycho-social status by Victim of Crime Advocates.
Myth 4: To wantonly and without invite label another human being as a "victim" of anything is not an act of psychological abuse against the so-called "victim" or any others who may identify with that "victim making" - albeit random - event.
Myth 5: Those exploited by 'victim makers' such as Noel McNamara [Crime Victims Support], PALS are always better off when informed justice will never be done, democracy favours criminals, sentences are always lenient and jail is a holiday camp. Without "the victim" doing and saying what the Victim Makers want, others will suffer. This does not place further guilt, stress, burdens on the unfortunate. Clearly, this is a positive viewpoint in coping with tragedy or - as is often the case - assumed tragedy.
Myth 6: VOC Advocates have no hidden personal agenda that if mirrored in business, medicine, law or other arenas would amount to a conflict of interest and justify disqualification and/or criminal proceedings.
Myth 7: Emotionally, psychologically crushed family, friends... etc, who parrot the predictable "We get a life sentence, and they get off scott free" have not been targetted by and coached to serve, VOC Advocacy.
Myth 8: A lifetime victim is a happier, more productive and confident person than one who accepts the random nature of existence.
Posted by Firesnake, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 2:13:14 PM
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Myth 11: A supreme being, for reasons humans can never fully grasp, planned for the "victims" random suffering at the dawn of time and this is part of some plan that we also cannot grasp. Hence, it is logical we oversee more suffering of all involved, and deny that "retribution" is religious in origin. Said simply, forcing people to be "good" as per their cultures idiosyncrasies is not related to holy scripture or religious indoctrination.
Myth 12: Those labelled victims have the least control over the dynamics pertaining to their victimhood; eg- justice systems, law enforcers, compensation bodies and Victim makers. It is imperative the victim is treated... as a victim. Forgiveness is unthinkable, albeit being a fast track to the "victims" recovery.
Myth 9: Being attacked by another human is 'less random' than being hit by lightening. Again, the "victim" has no control over how they feel, cope, recover.
Myth 10: Life must be Fair as opposed to Real. All attempts to deny reality and suppress progressive legal policies are humane. This also has nothing to do with religious/Christian residue overlaying a veneer of anthropomorphic logic to suit demonstrably false scripture. Satan assisted to harm the "victim".
Myth 11: It is impossible for any victim to contribute to their own murder, assault, robbery, theft, scam/con, etc. This rule becomes iron clad once official Victimhood is awarded the Victim.
Myth 12: Magistrates who fail to find evidence respected by the victim or the Victim Makers have failed the community, who always want vigilantism and violent retribution. This rule also increases in absolutism when the magistrate reminds the court the "victim" was, for want of a better word, an arrogant, risk taking SOB who brought about the circumstances in which they were harmed. Said differently, mitigation should be removed from legal defence strategies.
Myth 13: Sport = purity. Christians raping and abusing vulnerable children is as nothing. As a nation Australia is quite right to become obsessed with what others are doing, whilst supporting unabated abuse by Christians.
Myth 14: "Victims" need to pray.
Posted by Firesnake, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 2:55:34 PM
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SJF, maybe Cannold is a humanist, rather than a feminist. Anyway a little bit of word play.

An ethical ethicist, or an ethicist who is finally ethical, for once I agree wholeheartedly with what she has written, regardless of her political alliances.

The thing that stands out for me is that she promotes the idea of individual responsibility and explores the difference between consent and regret.
Posted by JamesH, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 4:11:38 PM
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Dannielle Miller-Thank-you for your article. I have posted this on the thread above. There is no need to write another response. One size fits all!:

Presently on OLO?......

If you have perused other threads on this subject, then you would be fully aware of the trend on OLO currently.

Most male posters on this site have gone to extraordinary lengths to justify the Christchurch incident, including rationalising the male need for group sex/the victim being to blame/the players being victims!

Any of the minority female members of OLO (yes, they are in the minority in current active m/ship of OLO), have been attacked as feminists-as if that were some kind of dirty word. It was irrelevant what approach they took.

IF they considered the women in the incident in any way, shape or form-a victim, then they too;..were fair game. Just as she was.

The few real men,- (putting in the 'real' IS deliberate and calculated),- who were not part of the condemnation of the woman,-but sought to make the point that the men should have behaved with some modicum of responsibility... were roundly condemned and ridiculed.

It has been nigh on impossible-even for the more 'reasoning' of female members, to make any kind of dent in the wall of the male mantra-line that occurred here.

Posting this is tantamount to OLO Boy's Club heresy.

This is the second time I have been stunned by reaction on this site-and I don't stun easily!

OLO is not-IS NOT:- currently a forum that is female friendly. I made a comment about female members 'circling the wagons', which has already been thrown back at me,-but I meant exactly what I said.

If we defended from the female prospective we were roundly condemned!
Does that sound familiar?

1 women-11 men; that's OK? 'She asked for it'.

Sad isn't it?

I truly wonder why you felt the need to put up a thread on OLO, which all current evidence suggests that you will get more of the same.

The widely entrenched here?:-'stop whining on about what you asked for, and then blaming men for it'.
Posted by Ginx, Tuesday, 26 May 2009 4:29:54 PM
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