Schrodinger's Rapist: When is uncritical thought ok?

[HansMustermann]

Why don't you address the argument that I presented rather than call the side of the argument that I am on strange? I never argued to keep talking to someone for ever when they clearly dont want to talk, I argued that there are no absolutes and that some people will warm up and enjoy the interaction. Do you disagree?

What harm is caused by asking someone with earplugs reading the bible what there favorite passage is? They were annoyed for a few seconds? For 1 min? Oh the horror, such behavior is the bane of society.

This strikes me as a horribly antisocial attitude, if you genuinely think it's ok to annoy others for your own boredom or entertainment. Not to mention that placing someone else's annoyance that clearly as unimportant compared to your getting less bored, is pretty much the definition of disrespect.

And, yes, such antisocial attitudes kinda are the bane of civilized society. If we all started having some entitlement delusion that it's ok to annoy someone every time we feel bored, I don't think it would make for a more pleasant life for everyone. Because then a bunch of people around would also think it's ok to annoy _you_ for some quick entertainment, and it will be in ways _you_ don't like.

And at any rate, for my own 2c, I'm a guy and I too would say that if I'm reading a book and have the earbuds on... guess what? I really don't want to talk to you.

ETA: also, what he argued was that exactly the bolded part is actually false, if you listen to women relating their side to exactly that kind of story. They were actually annoyed and worried, and only faked some interest, so the guy doing it won't get aggressive. So, yes, it's not even just whether he or I disagree, but the women telling their side of that kind of story actually very much disagree.

ETA2: also, maybe it's just me, but that whole story and bolded part actually tells me you think those women actually don't know what they want. They may have explicitly put up all the signs that say "do not disturb", and they may say that they find it worrying when a guy deliberately ignores her essentially having a big "no" sign, but you know better that they don't really want what they think they want. Once a Real Man shows them what they've been missing, man, they probably thank the stars they didn't actually get that quiet ride they were asking for. Heh.

[Elizabeth I]

In this hypothetical scenario I risk annoying 9 women for a few minutes each, so that 1 woman can meet someone they like. It's not about only about me..it's also about that 1 girl. So that math is that 9 lose and 2 gain. Is the gain of the two worth the loss of the 9? I just made up the 9/10, but if 9/10 is too high, when does it become okay? 5/10, 1/10, 1/100? Never?
No, you should absolutely approach all women everywhere under any circumstances no matter what they may be doing because obviously getting to know you will be such a positive life-changing experience that eventually they will all thank you, and in fact if every woman in the world could just know your manly awesomeness choirs would be formed to sing your praises.:rolleyes:

[SatanicSheep]

No, you should absolutely approach all women everywhere under any circumstances no matter what they may be doing because obviously getting to know you will be such a positive life-changing experience that eventually they will all thank you, and in fact if every woman in the world could just know your manly awesomeness choirs would be formed to sing your praises.:rolleyes:

Good advice, because he's Schrodinger's Prince Charming.

That's where I see the conflict in the philosophy. Yes I am Schrodinger's rapist, as well as Schrodinger's shape shifting reptoid. Much like granny in her 85 towncar is Schrodinger's cop killer in the same way that the vato in a low rider is (psst cops profile people all the time). Saying "I never really know" and then using statistics to say "except when I sorta, kinda know." doesn't add up to me.

That's why I don't understand the point of the article. It's telling non rapists how not to give the impression that you're rapist, but that's never actually possible because nobody knows who is a rapist until they're commiting a rape. WTF is a normal person supposed to garner from this?

[Furcifer]

Except I'm not saying 1 in 6 men are rapists, and she doesn't say 1 in 6 men are rapists. That's your own strawman.

And, again, just repeating the same ridiculous strawman just one more time won't magically make it true. We're not in The Hunting Of The Snark.

I could even assume that you misread it the first time or something, but persisting in saying the same falsehood even after it's been pointed out repeatedly, has a name: lying. You know, since you were accusing others of lying.


It's amusing how everyone refuses to acknowledge what she multiplied by 10 to get her number.

"If you had ten times as many IQ points you'd have 100!"

"I don't have 10 IQ points" :(

"I never said you did, where'd I say that? You can't say I said that. You don't know math"

:D

Have fun explaining how 1 person doing 10 rapes makes you any safer than 10 people doing 1 rape.

[Sun Countess]

This may be a little off-course at the moment, but as a math teacher, I've been completely frustrated at 3bodyproblem's inability to figure out the author's use of statistics. She's absolutely correct (though possibly wrong in her assumption that each rapist commits an average of 10 rapes, but let's grant that for now as being in the ballpark.) I've devised a little word problem, which I would love for 3bodyproblem to answer:

Scenario: 600 men and 600 women are living together in a community. At the end of an abbreviated "lifetime" together, it is discovered that 100 of the women have been raped. However, each woman doesn't have a unique rapist; in fact, it is discovered that only 10 men have committed all 100 rapes. Whether a man has committed one rape or dozens, he is now classified as a rapist.

Q1: 100 of the 600 women has been raped. This ratio can be reduced to _____________.

Q2: Ten men have committed a total of 100 rapes. On average, each man has committed ____ rapes.

Q3: 10 men in a population of 600 are rapists. This ratio can be reduced to __________.


(Answers: 1 in 6, 10 rapes, 1 in 60) I hope 3bodyproblem understands the math - given the above scenario - and if he has any issue with the numbers, I'll gladly give up my degree. I can't make it any simpler. I know that most people here understand the numbers, and know that if you change the average number of rapes per rapist to 5, that it would increase the ratio of rapists in a community to 1 in 30.


Also to ThunderChunky, I understand that you like getting to know new people, and maybe see earphones and cold body language as an interesting challenge, but where is it written that any of us is obligated to entertain a stranger? I don't like meeting new people, and I will be rude if you bother me when I clearly don't want to be disturbed, and it's not because I'm a bitch or because I want to make you work at warming me up; it's because I don't like meeting new people. Your desire to be entertained doesn't trump my desire to remain undisturbed. (Note: If you're legitimately asking for directions, I will help you and then get back to reading. If you ask for directions on a ruse, I'll be even more pissed.)

[Furcifer]

So, if you don't get your panties in a bunch over being Schrodinger's Cop Killer, why are you so upset about being Schrodinger's Rapist? The odds of each are low, and your chances of doing either are (I assume) the same, so why the outcry over one but not the other?

Nobody has their panties in a knot, it's funny how people think discussing things on the internet is some sort of "live or die" arena battle. It's a matter "I don't think this article is that great and here's why"

In this case I don't think being a woman on the bus is a high risk occupation like being a police officer on the hunt for a serial killer. The Dating Game never seems to end like an episode of Cops or America's Most Wanted.

If the police on foot patrol started walking around with their guns drawn on every person they pass on the street because everyone is a potential "murderer" or "rapist" people would begin to question their rationale.

Of course being cautious is warranted and the police in Canada carry sidearms. I don't see anything wrong with it, but it's my understanding the police in some European countries still don't carry firearms at all. So even among police there are varying levels of risk assessment.

This author doesn't seem to be saying to walk around with your guns drawn, but I bet she's packing heat :D

[Professor Yaffle]

I find that if you are not sure if a person reading or wearing earphone minds being disturbed, a good non intrusive method is to offer them one of your biscuits. If they shake their head and carry on reading they don't want to talk. If they accept with a "Ooh, thanks, I love these ones" and put the book down etc, you are probably OK striking up a conversation.

[HansMustermann]

Have fun explaining how 1 person doing 10 rapes makes you any safer than 10 people doing 1 rape.

So now we have to add moving goal posts to your long list of fallacies? You were saying she accuses 1 man in 6 of being a rapist, and even claimed it's somehow necessary for her maths. You were repeatedly asked to provide a quotation to support that. Now instead of that, you're shifting goalposts to "yeah, but you're not safer than that." Yeah, and?

She's still not much safer than 1 in 6 lifetime chance to be raped anyway, so if you just wanted to get to "you're not safer than" you could have just left it at that, as a known number. So the whole detour into making a fuss over exactly how many rapes per rapist she estimates and why that's wrong... was... what? Just a red herring?

Plus, I never said it makes me or her any safer. Her lifetime chance is still 1 in 6. Asking me to support a position I never claimed, is exactly a textbook case of a strawman.

[HansMustermann]

Good advice, because he's Schrodinger's Prince Charming.

That's where I see the conflict in the philosophy. Yes I am Schrodinger's rapist, as well as Schrodinger's shape shifting reptoid. Much like granny in her 85 towncar is Schrodinger's cop killer in the same way that the vato in a low rider is (psst cops profile people all the time). Saying "I never really know" and then using statistics to say "except when I sorta, kinda know." doesn't add up to me.

That's why I don't understand the point of the article. It's telling non rapists how not to give the impression that you're rapist, but that's never actually possible because nobody knows who is a rapist until they're commiting a rape. WTF is a normal person supposed to garner from this?

I dunno, it seemed actually pretty clear to me, when you read what she actually says.

She's saying that since she doesn't know it, if you want to pick her up and maybe end up in an intimate relationship, you should not start by showing disrespect for her or her choices. E.g., she's saying basically that if you start by giving her the impression that you take her "no" as a "yes" when it comes to conversation or anything else, then WTH, it's only correct to learn that sometimes you ignore her "no". Etc.

Seems clear enough to me. Did you try actually reading it?

[Furcifer]

Scenario: 600 men and 600 women are living together in a community. At the end of an abbreviated "lifetime" together, it is discovered that 100 of the women have been raped. However, each woman doesn't have a unique rapist; in fact, it is discovered that only 10 men have committed all 100 rapes. Whether a man has committed one rape or dozens, he is now classified as a rapist.


I'm a little concerned a math teacher is having trouble with this, but I think it's just being stubborn as opposed to being completely ignorant.

In order for the author to jump from 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted to 1 in 60 men are rapists she has to assume a direct correlation between the number of assaults to the number of rapists. First she assumes 1 in 6 men are rapists. She then hypothesizes that they may be responsible for 10 rapes, thus reducing her initial assumption to 1 in 60.

What I find completely absurd is how people seem to think this makes any difference statistically. I will demonstrate with an example.

Barb lives in a neighborhood, where there are 40 women and 60 men. There is a rapist in the neighborhood. This neighbour will commit 10 rapes.

Fran lives in a neighborhood where there are 40 women and 60 men. 10 men in the neighborhood will commit a single rape each.

Is Barb safer than Fran? Does a serial rapist committing 10 rapes in Barb's neighborhood change her chances of being raped?

Let's see: In Barb's neighborhood there are 40 women and 10 rapes, that's 1 in 4 women will be raped.

In Fran's neighborhood there are 40 women and 10 rapes, that's 1 in 4 women :eye-poppi

But how is that possible? The "rapist concentration" is different, in Barb's neighborhood it's 1 in 60 rapists and in Fran's neighborhood it's 1 in 6?

Quite the conundrum isn't it? :cool:


ETA: If you don't understand how this applies to "Schrodinger's Rapist" and this authors probability calculation I would politely suggest you do a refresher course on stats.

[Furcifer]

So now we have to add moving goal posts to your long list of fallacies? You were saying she accuses 1 man in 6 of being a rapist, and even claimed it's somehow necessary for her maths. You were repeatedly asked to provide a quotation to support that. Now instead of that, you're shifting goalposts to "yeah, but you're not safer than that." Yeah, and?

She's still not much safer than 1 in 6 lifetime chance to be raped anyway, so if you just wanted to get to "you're not safer than" you could have just left it at that, as a known number. So the whole detour into making a fuss over exactly how many rapes per rapist she estimates and why that's wrong... was... what? Just a red herring?

Plus, I never said it makes me or her any safer. Her lifetime chance is still 1 in 6. Asking me to support a position I never claimed, is exactly a textbook case of a strawman.

Wow, pot meet kettle, kettle pot.

This is Professor Yaffle's red herring "Where did she say 1 in 6 men are rapists, she never said that, she said 1 in 60"

Then you all jumped on board with the red herring.

Whether she said it or not is irrelevant to discussing the probability of her being raped and her risk assessment. (It's the title of the article that gives it away)

So you trump out this red herring, have it dismantled before your eyes, and then claim it's my red herring?

Unbelievable. This debate style discussion isn't for you bro. You obviously discovered the "list of fallacies" and decided to engage in every one of them.

I'll repeat, this is your red herring, I never brought it up, you did. You've been schooled (like a fish ;) )

[Sun Countess]

I'm a little concerned a math teacher is having trouble with this, but I think it's just being stubborn as opposed to being completely ignorant. No. I'm trying to get you to see where she gets her numbers. She made an assumption that each rapist commits an average of ten rapes; otherwise, one in six women getting assaulted by one unique rapist would mean that one in six men were rapists. She made a point of saying that's obviously not the case. Therefore, each rapist is on average committing more than one rape. She made a ballpark guess that each was on average responsible for ten rapes, to bring the number of rapists in the general population down to 1 in 60. If each rapist were in fact responsible for fewer rapes on average, then the proportion of rapists would have to rise, because the fact is that 1 in 6 women is still being raped by somebody.

Why didn't you answer the three questions I gave you? Do you have any problem with those numbers?

In order for the author to jump from 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted to 1 in 60 men are rapists she has to assume a direct correlation between the number of assaults to the number of rapists. No she doesn't. She notes that there's not a direct one-to-one correlation between rapists and victims. She makes a point of that.

First she assumes 1 in 6 men are rapists. No she doesn't! She starts with the fact that 1 in 6 women are rape victims, but clearly states that not all are victims of unique men. We all know there are serial rapists out there, so it's very obvious that at least some proprtion of rapists commit more than one rape. They're not all committing one rape, and they're not all committing 50 rapes, but there will be an average number of rapes committed per rapist.

She then hypothesizes that they may be responsible for 10 rapes, thus reducing her initial assumption to 1 in 60. This part is correct.

Barb lives in a neighborhood, where there are 40 women and 60 men. There is a rapist in the neighborhood. This neighbour will commit 10 rapes.

Fran lives in a neighborhood where there are 40 women and 60 men. 10 men in the neighborhood will commit a single rape each.

Is Barb safer than Fran? Does a serial rapist committing 10 rapes in Barb's neighborhood change her chances of being raped?

Let's see: In Barb's neighborhood there are 40 women and 10 rapes, that's 1 in 4 women will be raped.

In Fran's neighborhood there are 40 women and 10 rapes, that's 1 in 4 women :eye-poppi

But how is that possible? The "rapist concentration" is different, in Barb's neighborhood it's 1 in 60 rapists and in Fran's neighborhood it's 1 in 6?

Quite the conundrum isn't it? :cool: How is this a conundrum? The risks are the same, but in Fran's neighborhood, the proportion of rapists is higher, so a woman living there probably shouldn't leave her house because 1 in 6 men is a rapist.

All the author has said is that we probably live in Barb's neighborhood, where the average number of rapes being committed by each rapist is higher, but where only 1 in 60 men is a rapist. She didn't say every rapist commits exactly 10. She did recognize that we don't live in Fran's neighborhood.

[Cavemonster]

I'm a little concerned a math teacher is having trouble with this, but I think it's just being stubborn as opposed to being completely ignorant.

In order for the author to jump from 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted to 1 in 60 men are rapists she has to assume a direct correlation between the number of assaults to the number of rapists. First she assumes 1 in 6 men are rapists.

No, once again, she doesn't.

Think about this for a second. Everyone, including a math teacher is telling you that you don't understand the math. Either absolutely everyone else is wrong, or you are. You may want to take a step back and think about this.

[SatanicSheep]

E.g., she's saying basically that if you start by giving her the impression that you take her "no" as a "yes" when it comes to conversation or anything else, then WTH, it's only correct to learn that sometimes you ignore her "no". Etc.


Is that really how people gauge social interactions, by spurious associations?

A: "Wanna see a movie?"

B: "No"

A:"Oh come on there's a good one playing."

B: "Please don't rape me."

A: ?

[Furcifer]

No she doesn't. She notes that there's not a direct one-to-one correlation between rapists and victims. She makes a point of that.


SHE HAS TOO, there is no other way. She has nothing to multiply by 10 to get her next figure.

What kind of math teacher doesn't follow the work and just jumps to the answer? Unreal, you can't be teaching math above grade 4 level because there is simply no way you can overlook the intermediary steps here. (I mean that in the sense you aren't checking their work, you're just looking at the answer, not as a dig at your skill level, but I am beginning to wonder)

FSM, she has to multiply something by 10 to get the figure she gets. Her baseline assumption still reduces to 1 in 6 rapists.

This is a red herring, this doesn't change the probability anyways. In terms of risk assessment it's exactly the same, it just looks different.

[HansMustermann]

Dude, seriously, she's right, you're wrong.

[Furcifer]

No, once again, she doesn't.

Think about this for a second. Everyone, including a math teacher is telling you that you don't understand the math. Either absolutely everyone else is wrong, or you are. You may want to take a step back and think about this.

Ah no, I bet I'm the one with the most recent experience in math at a post secondary level. Not that it matters, it's simple arithmetic.

Just because you refuse to acknowledge something doesn't make you right.

[Furcifer]

Dude, seriously, she's right, you're wrong.

Ahh, now that you've been proven wrong and shown your chasing some red herring you're ready to just move one right ;)

[HansMustermann]

Wow, pot meet kettle, kettle pot.

This is Professor Yaffle's red herring "Where did she say 1 in 6 men are rapists, she never said that, she said 1 in 60"

Then you all jumped on board with the red herring.

Whether she said it or not is irrelevant to discussing the probability of her being raped and her risk assessment. (It's the title of the article that gives it away)

So you trump out this red herring, have it dismantled before your eyes, and then claim it's my red herring?

Unbelievable. This debate style discussion isn't for you bro. You obviously discovered the "list of fallacies" and decided to engage in every one of them.

I'll repeat, this is your red herring, I never brought it up, you did. You've been schooled (like a fish ;) )

Dude, delusional BS like that everyone else has been schooled and it's some action against you if everyone points it out, still is just more fallacies. I mean above you still haven't supported anything, you just added one more ad-hominem circumstantial fallacy to that list of fallacies you use. Are you going to support your points with actual logic any time soon?

Ah, right, you also just proved you don't know the difference between red herring and strawman. I shouldn't hold my breath, eh?

And yes, maybe I just found the list of fallacies and maybe not. That's irrelevant. But you're the one doing them. If you want that people stop calling them out, here's a simple recipe: stop doing them. Try using actual valid logic for a change. It's really that simple.

[Professor Yaffle]

Jeez! This is really simple. She never makes the assumption that one rapist=one rape. She is saying that IF each rapist committed only one rape, then the rapist rate would be 1 in 6. Then she says its unlikely that each rapist only ever rapes one woman and makes a guesstimate of them committing on average 10 rapes each. She is then saying that is this guesstimate is the case then one man in 60 is a rapist. If you think rapists commit less than 10 rapes each on average, the figure will be somewhere between 1 in 6 and 1 in 60. She errs on the side of a lower rate estimate and says that even this rate is scary.

ETA - I have done some teaching of statistics at undergraduate level.

Also, although the 1 in 60 or 1 in 6 makes no difference to the overall level of rape in these circumstances, it DOES make a difference in appraising the risk of each individual you meet which is what she is trying to do, but still erring on the generous side.

[HansMustermann]

Ahh, now that you've been proven wrong and shown your chasing some red herring you're ready to just move one right ;)

Dude, once again, doing the troll trope of claiming victory still is just a troll trope and not doing much. No, you haven't proven me or her wrong. Yes, it was your red herring and strawman all along. No, you still haven't supported it.

And WTH, it's in a thread where everything is written down. Claiming more lies about who wrote what is silly.

Then again for someone arguing that you need to assume 1 in 6 of X have property Y, to get 1 in 60 of X have property Y and still doesn't see the impossibility...

[HansMustermann]

I mean, geesh, let's put that problem in the form of a simple primary school maths problem. I'm sure most fourth graders can solve it.

Farmer Hans has 60 female fowl. 1 in 6 of them is a hen.

Farmer Hans also has 60 male fowl. For each 10 hen there is a rooster.

How many roosters does farmer Hans have? One in how many male fowl is a rooster?

ETA: now also please explain how would you call someone who thinks you need to assume 10 roosters (1 in 6) to get 1 rooster (1 in 60), and not even notice they're mutually exclusive.

[Furcifer]

Jeez! This is really simple. She never makes the assumption that one rapist=one rape. She is saying that IF each rapist committed only one rape, then the rapist rate would be 1 in 6.

Exactly, she's using 1 in 6 as her baseline. "If" they commit 10 or 50 it's still the same probability.

Although a higher number would suggest she is slightly less likely to get raped assuming she only meets or encounters men in fractional amounts of the number she chooses. It depends a bit on the interval. 6 or 60 is essentially the same over a lifetime, but 6 or 240 might make a difference.

[HansMustermann]

But the only time she uses a 1 in 6 baseline is for _women_ raped, not for how many males are rapists.

[Sun Countess]

SHE HAS TOO, there is no other way. She has nothing to multiply by 10 to get her next figure. No. She makes a point of saying that one in six men is NOT a rapist; therefore each rapist is ON AVERAGE committing more than one rape. She makes the immediate assumption of saying that one in six men is clearly NOT a rapist. You may call it a baseline - because that's the number of female victims - but she jumps well away from it specifically because that number is not based in reality.

What kind of math teacher doesn't follow the work and just jumps to the answer? Unreal, you can't be teaching math above grade 4 level because there is simply no way you can overlook the intermediary steps here. (I mean that in the sense you aren't checking their work, you're just looking at the answer, not as a dig at your skill level, but I am beginning to wonder) Honestly, I don't care too much about what somebody with absolutely no understanding of math thinks about my ability. I teach high school math, and I have no problem with the numbers presented. Yes, she makes an assumption of a 10 per rapist average, and it's probably in the ballpark. As much as I don't like to think that rapists commit such a large number of rapes on average, I'd much rather think that than that more than 1 in 60 men was actually out perpetrating these crimes on women. Because 1 in 6 is still a victim.

FSM, she has to multiply something by 10 to get the figure she gets. Her baseline assumption still reduces to 1 in 6 rapists. She's multiplying by something because evidence shows that most rapists have more than one victim.

Everybody else here seems to understand what's going on mathematically, and how she very very clearly states that one in six is an assumption she takes explicit care to NOT make.

This is a red herring, this doesn't change the probability anyways. In terms of risk assessment it's exactly the same, it just looks different. It's not the same in terms of risk assessment at all! I would much rather live in a neighborhood where 1 in 60 were a rapist than where 1 in 6 were a rapist. I wouldn't leave my house if I thought 1 in 6 men were capable of that crime.

[Furcifer]

Also, although the 1 in 60 or 1 in 6 makes no difference to the overall level of rape in these circumstances, it DOES make a difference in appraising the risk of each individual you meet which is what she is trying to do, but still erring on the generous side.

Like I said, irrelevant with such a small interval over a lifetime, which is where she gets her 1 in 6. Even on a normal day she encounters more than 60 men according to her own words.

And it isn't erring on the generous side. If you try to get a number from the study Hans cited with college males it was around 4% of the population committing multiple rapes. Knowing also college women are 4 times more likely to be raped, there's simply no way rapists are committing 10 rapes each. College women would have to about 10 times more likely to get raped.

A generous estimate is about 2.5.

[Furcifer]

No. She makes a point of saying that one in six men is NOT a rapist; therefore each rapist is ON AVERAGE committing more than one rape..

Listen it doesn't matter what she says, it matters what she does. She still assumes 1 in 6 are rapists.

She has too. Any multiples of 1 in 6 don't change the odds except where they (rapes per rapist) get very high and the number of men she meets is very low.

:boggled:

[Furcifer]

It's not the same in terms of risk assessment at all! I would much rather live in a neighborhood where 1 in 60 were a rapist than where 1 in 6 were a rapist. I wouldn't leave my house if I thought 1 in 6 men were capable of that crime.

So you'd rather be a shut in? Because in case you didn't understand the only way to avoid rape (lower you odds of being raped) in the 1 in 60 neighborhood is to not meet the 60 men in your lifetime.

I think you're lying however, because I bet if there was a serial rapist committing hundreds of rapes you'd be even more scared than if it were multiple men committing a few rapes.


ETA: you can't avoid it all together, just lower the odds

[TraneWreck]

Your odds of being assaulted in the 1 in 6 neighborhood are exactly the same as the 1 in 60 with an average of 10/assailant.

The odds that any given man you're talking to is an assailant are 10x lower in the 1 in 60 neighborhood.

And, once again, it's irrelevant because the non-guess based numbers are much worse:

...conservative estimates suggest that at least 25 percent of American women have been sexually assaulted in adolescence or adulthood and that 18 percent have been raped. Furthermore, at least 20 percent of American men report having perpetrated sexual assault and 5 percent report having committed rape (Crowell and Burgess 1996; Spitzberg 1999; Tjaden and Thoennes 2000).

Granted violent crime of all types has been on the decline since the mid-90's, but 1 in 5 men ADMIT to perpetrating sexual assault and 1 in 20 ADMIT to raping.

The author in the OP was being insanely generous to show that the odds of any given man being a sex criminal were depressingly high. The actual numbers are worse.

Why should I care about this tomfoolery with made up statistics when the more reliable numbers strengthen the author's position?

[HansMustermann]

@3bodyproblem: No, she doesn't assume that 1 in 6 is a rapist. Geesh, how much more basic can something be explained? Try the roosters problem, really. I'm sure you can't screw that up even if you wanted to.

Well, ok, now I probably jinxed it :p

And I'm glad you agree that that level of risk would be enough to warrant shutting yourself in, because, well, now you know what women face and they have to function in a society where most don't have the option to live their whole lives shut in. They still have to go to work or shopping or whatever, whether they like those odds or not.

But nobody says that all that works is to not meet them at all. All that works is to not give them a chance to get in a position where they could start the attack. E.g., as she proposes, if a guy comes across as the kind who overrides her saying "no", then basically don't start dating him or anything. E.g., if someone seems to not mind cornering you in situations that make you feel vulnerable, basically don't follow him home and let him corner you there. That was the scope of her article, really.

Really, all it actually says is that you want to pick up a girl for a relationship, don't start by giving her the signals that say such a relationship could be a bad idea.

Now I'm sure there are more immediate measures she and other women take every day, but the actual article doesn't actually go into those. All that it does deal with is, really: so you want to pick up a girl, here's how you can maximize your chances by not tripping her alarms.

If anything, given the usual complaint that women should come with a manual, well, that's what she does there. Consider that part of that manual. Kudos to her for writing it. And sadly the reactions also prove why more don't.

[HansMustermann]

Jeez! This is really simple. She never makes the assumption that one rapist=one rape. She is saying that IF each rapist committed only one rape, then the rapist rate would be 1 in 6.

Yaffle, with all due respect, please don't feed the troll by proving that if he repeats the same lie over and over again someone eventually will believe it.

The article doesn't say 1 in 6 men are rapists, even with an "if" or anything. It's just not in there. At all. He's even been challenged to support that accusation, and the best he can do is handwave about how her maths _must_ have gone, but the actual article makes no such 1 in 6 are rapists claim at all, even in passing, even as an ad absurdum, or really at all.

The actual quote where she introduces the 1 in 60 number reads, copy-and-paste: "One in every six American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur. These rapes are not all committed by Phillip Garrido, Brian David Mitchell, or other members of the Brotherhood of Scary Hair and Homemade Religion. While you may assume that none of the men you know are rapists, I can assure you that at least one is. Consider: if every rapist commits an average of ten rapes (a horrifying number, isn’t it?) then the concentration of rapists in the population is still a little over one in sixty."

There is no "if one in six men are rapists" in there at all. That's purely and completely 3bodyproblem's own strawman.

Look, I'm not picking on you and generally I agree with most of what you wrote. But it's depressing to see that a lying troll can actually get intelligent people to believe his strawman if he only repeats it two dozen times.

[Professor Yaffle]

I was just breaking down the logic of how she got to her figure. She makes (implicitly) a conditional statement, not an assumption. Its the logic end that 3bodyproblem has the problem, not the sums end.

[Furcifer]

I was just breaking down the logic of how she got to her figure. She makes (implicitly) a conditional statement, not an assumption. Its the logic end that 3bodyproblem has the problem, not the sums end.

That's fine, then you admit her statement is nonsense. It's conditional on each rapist committing 10 rapes and that hasn't been proven.

I have proven that it only takes 1 rape to make someone a rapist, and based on my conditional statement hers means 1 in 6 are rapists.

Either way you look at it her statement is dependent on a direct correlation between 1 in 6 sexual assaults to 1 in 6 rapists.

Short of any proof one way or the other I am in the right to say the conditions of her statement leads to the conclusion that 1 in 6 men are rapists.

"If" it's one, which we know for sure then it's 1 in 6, "if" it's 10 which we don't know then it's 1 in 60. I'll stick with what I know until proven otherwise thank you very much ;)

[Furcifer]

Your odds of being assaulted in the 1 in 6 neighborhood are exactly the same as the 1 in 60 with an average of 10/assailant.
The odds that any given man you're talking to is an assailant are 10x lower in the 1 in 60 neighborhood.

Really? I'm going to let the stats teacher field this one.



Why should I care about this tomfoolery with made up statistics when the more reliable numbers strengthen the author's position?

Because she's talking about strangers and not people she knows. You know why that is right? You realize she is at significantly more risk from people she's already screened, not the stranger on the bus or some guy at the gym?

At least from a "rapist", not from some jerk "street harassing" her. That's why it's been reiterated about a hundred times "Schrodinger's Rapist" is a bit of a misnomer.

[bookitty]

Is that really how people gauge social interactions, by spurious associations?

A: "Wanna see a movie?"

B: "No"

A:"Oh come on there's a good one playing."

B: "Please don't rape me."

A: ?

Is there any human interaction that is as simple as that? We all judge a situation by past experience, non-verbal clues, subtle power-plays and presentation.

If a person is pressing the issue in a conversation, there will quiet chimes of warning. The longer it continues or the more persistent it becomes, the louder that warning gets. It happens regardless of the gender. With women being approached by a strange man, there are sexual undertones to conversation and the warning.

[TraneWreck]

Really? I'm going to let the stats teacher field this one.

God, why are you having so much trouble with this?

Town X has a female population of 600,000 and a male population of 600,000. 100,000 of the women have been raped at some point.

Option A: If 100,000 men committed the 100,000 rapes, there is a 1 in 6 chance that any man you talk to would be one of the rapists.

Option B: If 10,000 men committed the 100,000 rapes, there is a 1 in 60 chance that any man you talk to would be one of the rapists.

Thus, from the perspective of a woman, your chances of being assaulted are 1 in 6 under either option. However, the odds that a random man is one of the rapists is 1 in 6 under option A and 1 in 60 under option B. You are 10x more likely to be talking to a rapist when you meet a strange man under Option A.



Because she's talking about strangers and not people she knows. You know why that is right? You realize she is at significantly more risk from people she's already screened, not the stranger on the bus or some guy at the gym?

At least from a "rapist", not from some jerk "street harassing" her. That's why it's been reiterated about a hundred times "Schrodinger's Rapist" is a bit of a misnomer.

Now you're flying between two different issues again.

Whether or not the numbers need to be refined in a given situation is irrelevant to your consternation over the 1/6, 1/60 issue. If you read the article, as was just quoted, she is talking about known men. Some number of them are rapists. Turns out many more than she guessed.

Not to mention that "knowing" your assailant could mean:

"Who raped you?"
"He was this guy that rode my bus. He was always trying to talk to me, so I finally gave him my e-mail address. He would always follow me home."

[TraneWreck]

That's fine, then you admit her statement is nonsense. It's conditional on each rapist committing 10 rapes and that hasn't been proven.

I have proven that it only takes 1 rape to make someone a rapist, and based on my conditional statement hers means 1 in 6 are rapists.

Your fixation on this is so bizarre. Who has ever even remotely hinted that the threshold for being considered a rapist is commiting 10 rapes?

OJ is a murderer, he killed two people. Ted Bundy is a murderer, he killed around 50. The two of them average 26 murders, that doesn't mean you aren't a murderer until you've killed 26 people.


Either way you look at it her statement is dependent on a direct correlation between 1 in 6 sexual assaults to 1 in 6 rapists.

Short of any proof one way or the other I am in the right to say the conditions of her statement leads to the conclusion that 1 in 6 men are rapists.

Nope, not even cose.

[bookitty]

Is it at all possible that she used the word "rapist" because she is aware that her reaction to a stranger might be out of proportion to the actual threat? The article isn't talking about how to avoid rape. It is talking about how to avoid making a woman feel threatened by you.

[Furcifer]

And I'm glad you agree that that level of risk would be enough to warrant shutting yourself in, because, well, now you know what women face and they have to function in a society where most don't have the option to live their whole lives shut in. They still have to go to work or shopping or whatever, whether they like those odds or not.

Um yah, FYI we knew this already. This discussion is about how many men approaching women are rapists, and if the term "rapist" is really applicable based on the probability or if it's inflammatory.


But nobody says that all that works is to not meet them at all. All that works is to not give them a chance to get in a position where they could start the attack.

Actually no, if we look at the stats it's about the people you know, not the people you don't. There is no magic filter that prevents a woman from being raped by a stranger. You're either going to be social and take the risks (which might be a good case for never getting to know anyone) or you're going to be anti-social and never get to know anyone and reduce your risks.


E.g., as she proposes, if a guy comes across as the kind who overrides her saying "no", then basically don't start dating him or anything. E.g., if someone seems to not mind cornering you in situations that make you feel vulnerable, basically don't follow him home and let him corner you there. That was the scope of her article, really.

Again the stats don't seem to support this in terms of being "raped". Harassed certainly, but not a "rapist". There's nothing wrong with preventing harassment, so don't confuse saying they aren't a rapist with it's OK to allow yourself to be harassed.


Really, all it actually says is that you want to pick up a girl for a relationship, don't start by giving her the signals that say such a relationship could be a bad idea.

There was never any question of this, why do you feel the need to bring it up?


Now I'm sure there are more immediate measures she and other women take every day, but the actual article doesn't actually go into those. All that it does deal with is, really: so you want to pick up a girl, here's how you can maximize your chances by not tripping her alarms.

Sadly this is probably what the rapists want to know, not Joe blow looking for someone to take out to a movie.


If anything, given the usual complaint that women should come with a manual, well, that's what she does there. Consider that part of that manual. Kudos to her for writing it. And sadly the reactions also prove why more don't.

The manual is still in Womanese :D

I've never been a pushy guy, in fact the last girl I dated I got tired of calling and talking to all the time. She wanted to be pursued and I just can't be bothered. I stopped calling and that was that. I don't think we even "broke up", last time I saw her she was just as friendly and said "call me". meh.

But I do know a few guys that are pushy and I don't for the life of me know why. The only thing I can guess is it works. There are a sufficient supply of women that enjoy being pursued in what I would term "aggressively". Otherwise the behavior wouldn't be as prevalent as it is. I mean I scratch my head at some of these behaviours, hitting on waitresses half their age to the point of harassment, and yet their bringing them home at the end of the night. :boggled:

And mind you none of them are rapists. So that's why when you see an article like this you kinda shake your head. It seems rational (aside from the nit picking I've done) and yet to seems contrary to what I've seen others do successfully. (mind you they hit a lot of infield singles, I hit home runs)

[Furcifer]

God, why are you having so much trouble with this?


lol, because you don't realize what happens when 1 man is 10 times more likely to commit a rape and how that affects your sample population. If she was going to meet 1 man in her lifetime things would be different.


If you read the article, as was just quoted, she is talking about known men.
Not to mention that "knowing" your assailant could mean:
"Who raped you?"
"He was this guy that rode my bus. He was always trying to talk to me, so I finally gave him my e-mail address. He would always follow me home."

Redefining "known acquaintances" to include a person you saw on the bus or at the gym is nonsense. (people in school perhaps)

[Furcifer]

Is it at all possible that she used the word "rapist" because she is aware that her reaction to a stranger might be out of proportion to the actual threat? The article isn't talking about how to avoid rape. It is talking about how to avoid making a woman feel threatened by you.

Yah, if you ignore the title "SCHRODINGER'S RAPIST"

Oh and her few paragraphs on "rapist concentration".

And her question: "Will this man rape me?"


:rolleyes:

(this has come full circle hasn't it? Someone else made this claim earlier silly as it is)

[Furcifer]

Your fixation on this is so bizarre. Who has ever even remotely hinted that the threshold for being considered a rapist is commiting 10 rapes?

Just you, just now.

(although somebody brought it up before and it was laughed off as ridiculous)

[Furcifer]

Nope, not even cose.

Yah your opinion on this is worthless, you've already failed the test miserably.

Just because it's a conditional statement doesn't mean the statement itself doesn't exist.

As it is the statement is "1 in 6 men are rapsists" IF they each commit 10 rapes THEN 1 in 60 men are rapists.

There's no other way to form the logic statement. Sorry :D

[bookitty]

Yah, if you ignore the title "SCHRODINGER'S RAPIST"

Oh and her few paragraphs on "rapist concentration".

And her question: "Will this man rape me?"


:rolleyes:

(this has come full circle hasn't it? Someone else made this claim earlier silly as it is)

You think the article is advice to women on how to avoid rape?

[TraneWreck]

Yah your opinion on this is worthless, you've already failed the test miserably.

Just because it's a conditional statement doesn't mean the statement itself doesn't exist.

As it is the statement is "1 in 6 men are rapsists" IF they each commit 10 rapes THEN 1 in 60 men are rapists.

There's no other way to form the logic statement. Sorry :D

Nope. If they AVERAGE 10 rapes, then it's 1 in 60.

That could mean 5 guys that rape one woman and one guy who rapes 55.

All it would take is one rape to be a rapist and the 6 would average 10 rapes a piece.

This is basic, basic stuff.

[TraneWreck]

lol, because you don't realize what happens when 1 man is 10 times more likely to commit a rape and how that affects your sample population. If she was going to meet 1 man in her lifetime things would be different.

You are just wrong. I don't know how to explain it on a more basic level.


Redefining "known acquaintances" to include a person you saw on the bus or at the gym is nonsense. (people in school perhaps)

Look at the way it's defined here, just a random example:

By some estimates, over 70% of rape victims know their attackers. The rapist may be a relative, friend, co-worker, date or other acquaintance.
http://www.d.umn.edu/cla/faculty/jhamlin/3925/myths.html

My example was not just some random person, but someone who began as a stranger and was a known acquaintance.

For all your bellyaching about statistics, you should probably look up the definitions of the terms you're using.

[Lyrandar]

Yah your opinion on this is worthless, you've already failed the test miserably.

Just because it's a conditional statement doesn't mean the statement itself doesn't exist.

As it is the statement is "1 in 6 men are rapsists" IF they each commit 10 rapes THEN 1 in 60 men are rapists.

There's no other way to form the logic statement. Sorry :D

That seems poorly worded to me. If the original assumption was that one in six men are rapists, then the only way to get to the conclusion that one in sixty men are rapists will involve fallacious logic, since 1 in 6 and 1 in 60 cannot both be true (if we assume that the remaining 5 or 59 are not rapists).

I would say something more like "x number of rapes have been committed" (in this case, enough for 1 in 6 women to have been raped once) and then use the average number of rapes per man to determine what proportion of men are rapists. This could be 1 in 6, or it could be 1 in 60, depending on the average rate.

[Ivor the Engineer]

I'm amazed no one has complained about her characterisation of a tattooed man being considered more likely to be a rapist.

For example, I've been led to believe the quality of the cockroaches tattooed on his face is an important factor to get a handle on before jumping to such rash conclusions.

:)

[bookitty]

I'm amazed no one has complained about her characterisation of a tattooed man being considered more likely to be a rapist.

For example, I've been led to believe the quality of the cockroaches tattooed on his face is an important factor to get a handle on before jumping to such rash conclusions.

:)

And I am amazed, shocked I tell you, at the amount of minutia that people seem to focus on. It's almost as if there isn't a message there at all. :)

[Furcifer]

You are just wrong. I don't know how to explain it on a more basic level.

Here I'll explain it to you: This is over a life time, not just a single encounter. "1 in 6 women will be assaulted by the man they meet today"

No, that's wrong. "1 in 6 women will be assaulted in there life time"

You keep saying it's a 1 time event, it isn't PEOPLE MEET PEOPLE EVERY DAY THEIR ENTIRE LIFE.



Look at the way it's defined here, just a random example:
http://www.d.umn.edu/cla/faculty/jhamlin/3925/myths.html
My example was not just some random person, but someone who began as a stranger and was a known acquaintance.
For all your bellyaching about statistics, you should probably look up the definitions of the terms you're using.

Wrong.

"In fact, you would really like to have a mutually respectful and loving sexual relationship with a woman. Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."


She's talking about strangers. The fact she's ambiguous in the way she writes is one of the faults that was listed earlier.

Now please stop, this is just silly.

[TraneWreck]

Here I'll explain it to you: This is over a life time, not just a single encounter. "1 in 6 women will be assaulted by the man they meet today"

No, that's wrong. "1 in 6 women will be assaulted in there life time"

You keep saying it's a 1 time event, it isn't PEOPLE MEET PEOPLE EVERY DAY THEIR ENTIRE LIFE.

If I flip a coin, what are the odds that it will turn up heads?

If I flip 1,000,000 what are the odds on each flip that it will turn up heads.

The answer is the same for both.

And as for the lifetime thing, I just cited a study where 1 in 20 men admitted to being a rapist. You cannot respond to this so you hope your meandering confusion will rub off on others. We aren't all that hopelessly baffled by simple concepts.


Wrong.

"In fact, you would really like to have a mutually respectful and loving sexual relationship with a woman. Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."

She's talking about strangers. The fact she's ambiguous in the way she writes is one of the faults that was listed earlier.

Now please stop, this is just silly.

She's talking about meeting strangers, then evaluating their behavior as you get to know them more and more. She's talking about stalkers and creepy internet jerks and people who disrespected her on dates. She's not only talking about chance encounters on a bus that directly lead to rape.

It's possible to deal with multiple issues at the same time, but that's neither here nor there.

The fundamental point, that you dodge, is that you have no idea what is meant by "known" when the statistics say, "70% of assailants were known to their victim."

[Furcifer]

I would say something more like "x number of rapes have been committed" (in this case, enough for 1 in 6 women to have been raped once) and then use the average number of rapes per man to determine what proportion of men are rapists. This could be 1 in 6, or it could be 1 in 60, depending on the average rate.

We did, 1 in 174, "if" 1 man commits 1 rape in the given year (and 60% go unreported)

If 1 man commits 10 rapes, then it's 1 in 1740.

The stats suggest a majority of "rapists" are about the same age as the women they rape and highschool or college age. Then there's your adult "rapists" who force themselves on on young girls. Then there's the husbands or boyfriends of adult females, then finally there's the complete stranger that rapes women randomly.

Of course there is overlap in some of these groups.

The author doesn't distinguish from guys that may have been overly aggressive in high school and sexually assaulted his girlfriend. In this sense, he may have raped someone, he may be a rapist, but he doesn't have any intention of raping you. Thus in the authors mind your prior behavior may be held against you and every man.

In any event it's a very poor way of determining if a man is a "Schrodinger's Rapist".

[TraneWreck]

In any event it's a very poor way of determining if a man is a "Schrodinger's Rapist".

So just a second ago you were (wrongly) up in arms claiming that I forgot to consider that the 1 in 6 number was understood over a lifetime, so now you've gone and repeated your fatally flawed analysis of the statistics forgetting that we're dealing with the rates over a lifetime.

Amazing.

But most amusing is that last line. It may be a poor way of determining if someone is an actual rapist, but every man is a "Schrodinger's rapist' because the very reference is to an unknown entity. Calling someone "Schrodinger's rapist" is not accusing them of rape.

You're so lost on so many issues is honestly getting a little sad.

[Furcifer]

If I flip a coin, what are the odds that it will turn up heads?

If I flip 1,000,000 what are the odds on each flip that it will turn up heads.

The answer is the same for both.

And as for the lifetime thing, I just cited a study where 1 in 20 men admitted to being a rapist. You cannot respond to this so you hope your meandering confusion will rub off on others. We aren't all that hopelessly baffled by simple concepts.

Oi vey, 1 in 60 of your coins is 10 TIMES MORE LIKELY TO COME UP HEADS.



The fundamental point, that you dodge, is that you have no idea what is meant by "known" when the statistics say, "70% of assailants were known to their victim."

"Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."

Yah, but she means you know them. :rolleyes:

This is exactly why the wording in the article was questioned.

[TraneWreck]

Oi vey, 1 in 60 of your coins is 10 TIMES MORE LIKELY TO COME UP HEADS.

You're just never going to understand this, are you.

It's an average, not a statement that each instance carries 10 events.

I know you refuse to answer any question posed to you, for obvious reasons, but this one is really easy:

If the average income for a person in the United States is $50,000, does that mean everyone in the United States has an income of $50,000?


"Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."

Yah, but she means you know them. :rolleyes:

This is exactly why the wording in the article was questioned.

More awesome wrongness. Seriously, how can you miss the point so totally every time you try? At some point you're bound to get something right by chance.

Among the issues discussed in the article is how men go about meeting women and how women respond to those come ons. As I said before, "known" in the rape statistics doesn't mean, "know somebody really well."

A person whom a woman encounters on a bus, riding at the same time for several months, and becomes a casual acquaintance will "know" her assailant for the purpose of the statistics.

Thus, the group of people that the OP article is directed at are not complete strangers who grab and rape out of the total unknown. This happens very rarely, which is why you're obsessed with it. You think it will somehow magically make the odds of a man being a rapist drop, but the article has very little to say about that sort of thing.

I await your next hilarious mistake.

[Furcifer]

So just a second ago you were (wrongly) up in arms claiming that I forgot to consider that the 1 in 6 number was understood over a lifetime, so now you've gone and repeated your fatally flawed analysis of the statistics forgetting that we're dealing with the rates over a lifetime.

Oh will you please try and make sense? This doesn't make any sense.


But most amusing is that last line. It may be a poor way of determining if someone is an actual rapist, but every man is a "Schrodinger's rapist' because the very reference is to an unknown entity. Calling someone "Schrodinger's rapist" is not accusing them of rape.

You're so lost on so many issues is honestly getting a little sad.

Dude read the article, her question is quite clear:

"So when you, a stranger, approach me, I have to ask myself: Will this man rape me?"

But how does she determine if they will, piss poor statistics.

"I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur"

Yes, let's. Approximately 300 000 rapes last year, 150 000 000 men, or 0.2% of men last year were rapists. If 60% go unreported, approximately 0.45% men last year were rapists.

But no let's try to work out how many rapists there are based on 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

And you don't see the problem? :boggled:

[SOdhner]

"Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."

Yah, but she means you know them.

I think you misunderstood his point:

My example was not just some random person, but someone who began as a stranger and was a known acquaintance.

The person on the bus is, currently, a stranger. The risk assessment that is going on is to help determine if he should be allowed to upgrade to 'acquaintance' and then maybe to something else.

Even if the stranger is a rapist they are not likely to rape her right there on the bus, and in fact there's a chance they won't rape her at all, ever, even if they hang out. If, however, they later rape her once they count as an acquaintance... they still started off as that guy on the bus.

So if the guy on the bus is throwing up red flags, why not choose to keep him at 'stranger' status instead? There are plenty of people who DON'T show those signs of increased risk.

[Furcifer]

It's an average, not a statement that each instance carries 10 events.


WTF? You can't average a probability over 1 event. This is the dumbest thing you've written yet. This discussion is indeed a train wreck, thanks for the laugh.

[Professor Yaffle]

But I do know a few guys that are pushy and I don't for the life of me know why. The only thing I can guess is it works. There are a sufficient supply of women that enjoy being pursued in what I would term "aggressively". Otherwise the behavior wouldn't be as prevalent as it is. I mean I scratch my head at some of these behaviours, hitting on waitresses half their age to the point of harassment, and yet their bringing them home at the end of the night. :boggled:

And mind you none of them are rapists. So that's why when you see an article like this you kinda shake your head. It seems rational (aside from the nit picking I've done) and yet to seems contrary to what I've seen others do successfully. (mind you they hit a lot of infield singles, I hit home runs)

How on earth would you know whether any of them are rapists or not? Do you think all rapists tell their mates about it?

Sexually aggressive men are slower to stop the tape on a date rape scenario than non sexually aggressive men especially when alcohol is involved in the scenario.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2372/is_4_35/ai_53390351/pg_2/?tag=content;col1

[Furcifer]

So if the guy on the bus is throwing up red flags, why not choose to keep him at 'stranger' status instead? There are plenty of people who DON'T show those signs of increased risk.

The main issue is she engages in the fallacy that some stranger that looks less than ideal to her is in any way more of a threat. At least in regards to rape, not just annoying her. But she says she's weighing that against your likelihood of "raping her"

This is exactly why it's perfectly OK with saying "Hey I just don't want to talk to you", but it's slightly more questionable when she say "Are you a potential rapist? Let me evaluate you"

Poor use of stats- check

Engage in fallacy- check

Try to speak for all women- check

Hmmm, might not be the best article I've ever seen on how "women" think. If this is how "women" think there may be a slight problem :)

[bookitty]

\

Hmmm, might not be the best article I've ever seen on how "women" think. If this is how "women" think there may be a slight problem :)

Yep, slight problems. You know, like the fact that one in 6 women get raped.

And while we are on the subject, you never answered my question. Do you think the article is advice to women on how to avoid rape?

[Furcifer]

How on earth would you know whether any of them are rapists or not? Do you think all rapists tell their mates about it?

Sexually aggressive men are slower to stop the tape on a date rape scenario than non sexually aggressive men especially when alcohol is involved in the scenario.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2372/is_4_35/ai_53390351/pg_2/?tag=content;col1

All no, but men talk. If they're spilling the beans to surveys like Tranewreck cited I'm fairly confident they spill the beans over beers with a friend.

Why do you think men hide it like women do?

[Furcifer]

Yep, slight problems. You know, like the fact that one in 6 women get raped.

And while we are on the subject, you never answered my question. Do you think the article is advice to women on how to avoid rape?

No it's estimated 1 in 6 women get sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

[bookitty]

Why do you think men hide it like women do?

A few days ago, I would have said that men hide the fact that they are rapists because it is illegal and because it goes against the societal norm.

[bookitty]

No it's estimated 1 in 6 women get sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

Ah, I see. That's why you think it is a slight problem.

You still didn't answer the question.

[Professor Yaffle]

All no, but men talk. If they're spilling the beans to surveys like Tranewreck cited I'm fairly confident they spill the beans over beers with a friend.

Why do you think men hide it like women do?

What do you mean "like women do"? I'm confused.

If its true that rapists give away their crimes when chatting with their mates, then there must be at least a few men on this forum who will know that someone they know is a rapist. After all, a lot of women here know someone who has been raped or seriously sexually asaulted. What do you think? Think there is any man here who has heard their friend "talking" about raping a woman? Surely they must have if "men talk".

[Professor Yaffle]

A few days ago, I would have said that men hide the fact that they are rapists because it is illegal and because it goes against the societal norm.

And some of them may not even consider what they have done to be rape - just their usual sexually aggressive behaviour.

[Soapy Sam]

Actually, as I was saying, we do have some statistics, and a link has been posted at least twice. Here's a third time, maybe this time we'll actually read it: http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/sexist/2009/11/12/rapists-who-dont-think-theyre-rapists/

120 in 1882 men self-identified as rapists in that survey. Do you understand? One in 1882/120, or 1 in 15.7 men is a self-assessed rapist.



Hans, maybe I'm misunderstanding you here, but from my reading, none of the college students in that survey "self identified as rapists", because the word rape was deliberately and specifically avoided in the survey.


Indeed that seems to be the point of the article. These people did not consider themselves to be rapists.

That 120 of 1882 college students self identified as guys I'd like to kick in the head is, I agree, deeply disturbing.

Frankly, I'm astonished that even one answered "yes" to any of these questions, as doing so would be self incrimination- and could have led to criminal proceedings. That leads me to suspect they were guaranteed anonymity, which in turn makes me wonder how many of the responses were pure BS. Why would college students voluntarily take part in such a survey? Were they paid? Did they have an attitude towards the people carrying out the survey?
This just doesn't seem to me to make much sense.


ETA- Prof. I'm 55. I work in a virtually all male industry. Yes, men talk about women. A lot. Mostly they talk about what women say and do that they (men) find funny or incomprehensible.
I have never, not even once, known a man to admit to sexual assault, or even to hint at it. Never. I can't , therefore, say what the reaction would be if one did, but I suspect it would be bloody.

The survey Hans links to above therefore strikes me as simply unbelievable. Maybe college students are different from my day, but if anyone in my university class had admitted to (far less boasted of) assaulting a woman, I doubt he would have walked for some time afterward. While it's clear that some men are indeed a danger to women, what the article in the OP completely fails to mention is that the majority of men are not and would be both horrified and deeply insulted to be considered as such.

[TraneWreck]

Oh will you please try and make sense? This doesn't make any sense.

If the goal is to write things that make sense to you, no one is ever going to accomplish that.

Dude read the article, her question is quite clear:

"So when you, a stranger, approach me, I have to ask myself: Will this man rape me?"

Sigh. You have proven time and time again that focusing on one sentence and ignoring the point being made is a terrible way to evaluate an article.

I'm not going to keep saying this, it's a waste of time.


But how does she determine if they will, piss poor statistics.

"I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur"

Yes, let's. Approximately 300 000 rapes last year, 150 000 000 men, or 0.2% of men last year were rapists. If 60% go unreported, approximately 0.45% men last year were rapists.

But no let's try to work out how many rapists there are based on 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted in their lifetime.

And you don't see the problem? :boggled:

Forget this dumb game. I gave you a citation to a solid study that had 1 in 20 men self-identifying as rapists. Once again, the article in the OP was granting an absurdly conservative position. When the actual stats are examined, she would have more to worry about.

Your continued focus on a rough estimate when better numbers are available is just infantile.

[TraneWreck]

WTF? You can't average a probability over 1 event. This is the dumbest thing you've written yet. This discussion is indeed a train wreck, thanks for the laugh.

What the hell are you talking about?

The numbers aren't taken from meeting random people on a bus, they're applied to that event.

To the extent that I can even make sense out of the tangled web of insanity that is your thinking, you are 180 degrees off.

[SatanicSheep]

Is there any human interaction that is as simple as that? We all judge a situation by past experience, non-verbal clues, subtle power-plays and presentation.

If a person is pressing the issue in a conversation, there will quiet chimes of warning. The longer it continues or the more persistent it becomes, the louder that warning gets. It happens regardless of the gender. With women being approached by a strange man, there are sexual undertones to conversation and the warning.

No. That's why I don't think "disrespecting choices" can be applied to anything outside the specific situation. If there's always "sexual undertones" to any male/female interaction I'm not sure what modification can honestly be asked of men.

[Furcifer]

What do you mean "like women do"? I'm confused.

60-80% (depending on your source, I've seen both now) go unreported. While it doesn't say if it's on males or females, I assume that the same proportion of unreported cased is the same as reported so about 99% of the unreported cases are from (or not from) women.

For whatever reasons these incidents aren't reported and remain "hidden" from the authorities.


If its true that rapists give away their crimes when chatting with their mates, then there must be at least a few men on this forum who will know that someone they know is a rapist. After all, a lot of women here know someone who has been raped or seriously sexually asaulted. What do you think? Think there is any man here who has heard their friend "talking" about raping a woman? Surely they must have if "men talk".

I don't know a single male that been investigated, charged with or convicted of sexual assault. I think a lot of it happens in high school and college where it's a combination of immaturity, experimentation with drugs, hormones etc. so a lot of it goes unreported by the women because they just aren't sure what exactly happened and men perhaps just didn't know any better and didn't realize that "No means no".

I'm not sure about the rest of assaults. My old roommate, a female, used to joke about an "Upstairs sneaky uncle". (sweet girl, different sense of humour). A majority of people had to have it explained to them, but a surprising number of women (and a few men) understood right away.

So I think there are a lot of predators, older men that prey on young girls and boys, and I think the stats prove this. These men would not disclose what they are doing to just anyone, for obvious reasons.

That's what brings me right back to my original observation about this article. I honestly don't think women 25-35, the ones the author seems to be talking about, are in that high a risk category for rape. A guy coming up to you at the gym, or on a bus, or in a park don't have that much potential of becoming a rapist.

But nobody seems like they want to talk about the actual probability of meeting a rapist on the bus, or in a gym or at work. Obviously, a private investigator from NY says it's 1 in 60, well then it must be. :rolleyes:

[bookitty]

But nobody seems like they want to talk about the actual probability of meeting a rapist on the bus, or in a gym or at work. Obviously, a private investigator from NY says it's 1 in 60, well then it must be. :rolleyes:

And again I ask, do you think the article is advice to women on how to avoid rape?

And while we're on the subject of questions you don't answer, when can I let my guard down? When am I, as a woman, 100% sure that I am safe from rape?

[Professor Yaffle]

60-80% (depending on your source, I've seen both now) go unreported. While it doesn't say if it's on males or females, I assume that the same proportion of unreported cased is the same as reported so about 99% of the unreported cases are from (or not from) women.

For whatever reasons these incidents aren't reported and remain "hidden" from the authorities.

But that is unreported to the police - we were talking about mentioning it to friends. A lot more women do that. I know because friends have told me about sexual assaults that they haven't reported.


I don't know a single male that been investigated, charged with or convicted of sexual assault. I think a lot of it happens in high school and college where it's a combination of immaturity, experimentation with drugs, hormones etc. so a lot of it goes unreported by the women because they just aren't sure what exactly happened and men perhaps just didn't know any better and didn't realize that "No means no".

Thats just not true. Whilst the highest age category for rape in adults is the 16-19 year old group, there are still significant numbers in the other age groups. And the change in numbers is probably at least partially due to the changes in numbers of women who are single, which changes the opportunities for date rape. So if you are still single in your twenties or early thirties you are still very much at risk.

[Uncayimmy]

If an adult woman wants to take the NVAWS data to perform risk analysis, here's some data to consider:

Over half the women were raped before age 18. Those raped as minors were twice as likely to be raped as adults. So, of the women over the age of 18 and having never been raped before, about 8.5% will be raped (1 in ~12).

Of all the adult victims, the perpetrator was:
Intimate Partner: 62%
Relative Other Than Spouse: 9%
Acquaintance: 21%
Stranger: 19%
(totals over 100% because of multiple perpetrators)

Unfortunately, the study didn't break down intimate partner into spouse, live-in partner, and date/boyfriend (current/former) for the adult category. They broke it down for all victims (includes minors), and for minors, 87% were raped by a relative other than spouse.

So, if we do some math we find the following odds for an adult woman who was not raped as a minor:

Intimate Partner: 1 in 19
Acquaintance: 1 in 56
Spouse: 1 in 58 (I assumed that the number of minors with spouses was small enough to ignore, and spouses are included in the Intimate Partner number)
Stranger: 1 in 62
Relative other than spouse: 1 in 130

This next part is where it gets tricky because we don't really have any data for the number of intimate partners, relatives, acquaintances and strangers a person will have/meet. I would say it's reasonable to consider intimate partners to be the smallest group. The number acquaintances one has I would say dwarfs intimate partners and the number of strangers one encounters dwarfs the number of acquaintances.

My point about the number of people encountered is this: Suppose a woman in her lifetime goes on dates with 25 different men (I pulled this number out of my ass, but it seems to be reasonable (http://www.thefrisky.com/post/246-the-average-woman-dates-24-men-before-settling-down/)). These 25 men by far pose the greatest risk to her, yet it seems to me this is the group of men that women are the least concerned about. By contrast a woman encounters countless strangers in her lifetime, and they represent the least amount of risk outside of relatives. This, it seems, is the group women are most concerned about.

Stated another way, she's much more likely to be raped by one of the 25 men she dates than the thousands of stranger whom she encounters in her lifetime. Of course, an intimate partner starts out as a stranger and most likely passes through the acquaintance stage.

Of all the adult rapes, about 67% of the perpetrators were using drugs/alcohol at the time. About 20% of the victims were using drugs/alcohol at the time. There is no data indicating when both were using drugs/alcohol at the time. Interestingly, the study Hans referenced about self-described male rapists indicated that 70% of the men who admitted rape did so on intoxicated women. It's apples and oranges to a degree since this was a study of college men, but I offer it for the purposes of risk assessment.

About 32% reported being threatened with harm to themselves or someone close to them. About 43% reported feeling threatened with harm to themselves or someone close to them. Stated another way about 57% of the rapes didn't involve any threat of additional physical harm. About 32% reported physical injury, which means 68% did not. Of those who did get injured, about 35% were serious injuries and 75% were minor cuts, scratches, bruises (totals over 100% because of multiple injuries).

We can only sort of put this all together because the data is not granular enough, but in general it seems that women who are raped are most likely to be raped by the small group of men with whom they have relationships and those rapes don't match the "traditional stereotype" some perceive of a violent physical confrontation. Maybe we can coin a new term and call them stealth rapes.

About 82% of rape victims did not report it to police. Of those, 18% considered it a "minor incident; not a crime or police matter," which works out to be 1 in 100 women being raped in their adult lifetime and judging it that way. Another 13% said they didn't report it, "Police could not do anything," which is somewhat vague. Not included in those percentages are the 22% who refused to answer or said, "I don't know." Can't do much beyond speculating with those numbers. About 22% did not report it because they feared the rapist.

Finally, for those who were raped by intimate partners, about 88% of the rapes happened during the relationship. About 6% happened only after the relationship. About 25% happened both during and after the relationship.

To me this seems to indicate that women should be most concerned about those with whom they date or otherwise have relationships. A woman is about as likely be raped by her spouse as she is a stranger.

[Uncayimmy]

Thats just not true. Whilst the highest age category for rape in adults is the 16-19 year old group, there are still significant numbers in the other age groups. And the change in numbers is probably at least partially due to the changes in numbers of women who are single, which changes the opportunities for date rape. So if you are still single in your twenties or early thirties you are still very much at risk.

I don't know where you're pulling your data from, but the NVAWS breaks it down. The 12 to 17 age group is by far the most at risk:

Ages 0-11: 3.6%
Ages 12-17: 6.3%
Ages 18 and over: 9.6%

It's hard to get a firm number on "date rape" in part because of the vague definition but mostly because the NVAWS did not break down adult rapes between spouses, dates, and live-in partners. However, they did break it down for all rapes including minors.

Spouse (current/former): 20%
Live-in Partner (current/former): 4%
Date (current/former): 22%
Relative other than Spouse: 22%
Acquaintance: 27%
Stranger: 17%

For children 11 and under:
Relative: 87%
Acquaintance: 25%
Stranger: 11%

For girls 12 to 17
Intimate Partner: 36%
Relative: 20%
Acquaintance: 33%
Stranger: 15%

For women 18 and older
Intimate Partner: 62%
Relative Other Than Spouse: 9%
Acquaintance: 21%
Stranger: 19%

[Professor Yaffle]

I was using figures that look only at over sixteens - eg adult rapes as opposed to child abuse. And yes I know it changes the figures somewhat, I think it works out at nearer one in 10 women in the US being raped as an adult (one in 20 in the UK survey).

And as to your previous post, it is precisely the acquaintances, friends, partners etc that the OP is concerned about. It's about not letting someone into your social circle who shows signs that they don't totally respect your boundaries.

[HansMustermann]

All no, but men talk. If they're spilling the beans to surveys like Tranewreck cited I'm fairly confident they spill the beans over beers with a friend.

Why do you think men hide it like women do?

I would assume that:

1. A survey has a guarantee of confidentiality -- though, yes, there is probably some underreporting anyway -- while spilling the beans to everyone you do know is essentially a confession.

2. The focus in most male's bragging is on, basically, the results and/or performance, rather than on how much force was needed. "I banged that blonde all night" is something to brag about, while "by threatening to punch her in the face" or "while she was passed out drunk, and I should probably have called an ambulance instead of banging her" doesn't exactly roll off the tongue in casual conversation.

In fact given how much of some people's self image revolves around their being so ridiculously manly and all, confessing such details would make it look less manly. There isn't very much of a conquest to brag about in admitting that someone wasn't even conscious enough to actually use any charm and wit on.

Basically, same as you don't hear many confess that they're having erectile dysfunctions or a small dick over a beer. Men, like women, don't tell everything to everyone, and some creative puffering is pretty much understood to be allowed.

3. As the survey points out, most rapists don't even think they're rapists. If you ask "did you rape a woman before", you'd get a lot less "yes". It's only when you ask about details like "did you have to use force or threat of force" or "did she really want it, or was she too drunk to defend herself" that it turns out it was legally rape all right.

But it's those questions no gentleman actually asks another gentleman over beer, do they? At least I never heard someone do it. It's one of those things that directly questions someone's being manly, and you do it only if you want to insult his junk.

4. Look around. Given how many people question that rape even happens -- except maybe, you know, somewhere else and in so small numbers that really nobody should give it a second thought, if you listen to the rationalizations -- how many do you think suddenly do want to know all about a possible rape when they're having a beer with someone?

[HansMustermann]

Hans, maybe I'm misunderstanding you here, but from my reading, none of the college students in that survey "self identified as rapists", because the word rape was deliberately and specifically avoided in the survey.


Indeed that seems to be the point of the article. These people did not consider themselves to be rapists.

That 120 of 1882 college students self identified as guys I'd like to kick in the head is, I agree, deeply disturbing.

While they did make that distinction all right, and you're correct, nevertheless what they admitted there was the very definition of being a rapist. So it's basically like the distinction between "I'm a driver" and "I drive a car". Both mean the same thing.

Frankly, I'm astonished that even one answered "yes" to any of these questions, as doing so would be self incrimination- and could have led to criminal proceedings. That leads me to suspect they were guaranteed anonymity, which in turn makes me wonder how many of the responses were pure BS. Why would college students voluntarily take part in such a survey? Were they paid? Did they have an attitude towards the people carrying out the survey?
This just doesn't seem to me to make much sense.


ETA- Prof. I'm 55. I work in a virtually all male industry. Yes, men talk about women. A lot. Mostly they talk about what women say and do that they (men) find funny or incomprehensible.
I have never, not even once, known a man to admit to sexual assault, or even to hint at it. Never. I can't , therefore, say what the reaction would be if one did, but I suspect it would be bloody.

The survey Hans links to above therefore strikes me as simply unbelievable. Maybe college students are different from my day, but if anyone in my university class had admitted to (far less boasted of) assaulting a woman, I doubt he would have walked for some time afterward. While it's clear that some men are indeed a danger to women, what the article in the OP completely fails to mention is that the majority of men are not and would be both horrified and deeply insulted to be considered as such.

As I was saying above, I don't think any of them were actually boasting. They only admitted it in an anonymous survey, and only when questioned explicitly about the details of how.

In a non-anonymous setting, it might well happen a lot less. Same as, you know, if I were to start stealing office supplies, I might admit that in an anonymous survey outside the company, but not boast to my coworkers.

And I've never heard anyone actually ask those details in an informal setting. When you hear someone boasting about how he finally got sex from his girlfriend over the weekend, you don't exactly ask "did you have to threaten her to finally put out?" At least not without becoming the kind of a-hole that doesn't get invited to the pub any more.

[Ivor the Engineer]

2%-16% of the male population should be convicted of a serious criminal act and put in prison for years at a time?

That sounds expensive.

[Professor Yaffle]

2%-16% of the male population should be convicted of a serious criminal act and put in prison for years at a time?

That sounds expensive.

Ee well maybe that makes it a good thing that most of the crimes don't get reported, eh Ivor? Can't be locking away people who commit serious crimes if, heaven forbid, it will cost money...

[Ivor the Engineer]

Ee well maybe that makes it a good thing that most of the crimes don't get reported, eh Ivor? Can't be locking away people who commit serious crimes if, heaven forbid, it wil cost money...

Actually I wouldn't mind paying to lock up so many dicks and womens' poor choices. It would skew the ratio of men-women so much I would have a much better bargaining position.:)

[Professor Yaffle]

Actually I wouldn't mind paying to lock up so many dicks and womens' poor choices. It would skew the ratio of men-women so much I would have a much better bargaining position.:)

I wouldn't bet on it. Maybe if you kept your mouth shut?

[Ivor the Engineer]

Any stats on correlations between SES and rape?

[stilicho]

Suspicious.

Well, I'm convinced. :rolleyes:

Here (http://www.ncadv.org/files/DomesticViolenceFactSheet(National).pdf) are broader statistics. The likelihood for college women is higher, and considering the greater amount of risky behavior college students engage in. So, what's the basis for your incredulity?

The statistics change:

1 in 8 college women is the victim of rape during her college years. 1 in 4 is the victim of attempted rape.
95% of these rape victims did not report the rape to officials.

Yet:

1 in 4 college women have either been raped or suffered attempted rape.

Those statistics are listed together yet they don't mean the same thing. One means that 37.5% are raped or the victim of attempted rape; the other means 25.0% are.

Considering that rapes per 100,000 in the US as a whole hovers around 32 (about 90,000 to 95,000 a year) we can do the arithmetic fairly easily. The female enrollment at US universities is around 9,500,000 so the source you use predicts well over 1.1 million rapes a year or about 12 times more than actually occur (or reported and distributed) throughout the entire population.

If universities are about as safe as elsewhere, that 1.1 million figure you've suggested would dwindle to about 3,000. 3,000 is a far more reasonable number than the one you've cited. It's still too high by any calculation but nowhere near the 1.1 million rapes expected.

[Ivor the Engineer]

I wouldn't bet on it. Maybe if you kept your mouth shut?

But then how would women learn to appreciate (and come to love) my unique points of view?

What are the reasons for so many men raping women? Is it just an expected result of a differential in sex drive, or is it more to do with environment and upbringing?

[HansMustermann]

2%-16% of the male population should be convicted of a serious criminal act and put in prison for years at a time?

That sounds expensive.

In addition to what the professor said, the underlying assumption there seems to be that more stringent applying the law would have no effect on the crime rate. That doesn't seem to be the case.

In fact, some would even argue that the probability of being caught is actually an even bigger factor than exactly how big the punishment is. And as an anecdotal example, see the middle ages and renaissance, where disproportionately higher punishments and a disproportionately higher probability to evade the law, well, meant a lot of crime. As we had an increasingly good police and justice system, it didn't end up meaning we put half the population in jail for theft and murder, but actually that the incidence and prevalence of those crimes dropped.

And even for rape, _something_ must be having an effect on incidence rates, since they dropped 65% since 1993 and 6 _times_ since 1980. (So, yes, if you took the same poll in 20 years, you'll probably get a lot less than 1 in 6 raped.) There is a compelling case for the existence of internet porn as a factor, as supposedly now a lot more people are doing that instead of thinking they must get real pussy at all cost, but at any rate the correlation between internet access and the drop in rape incidents reported is pretty hard to dismiss. But equally a case is being made by many for it basically being more reported these days, and society being less inclined to blame the victim (not I said "less" not "not at all"), so basically the potential perps feel less like they could get away with it.

So basically it seems to me like a more realistic expectation would be that _if_ we could somehow get better at it, the result wouldn't be putting 2-16% in jail, but rather maybe putting 1% in jail and 1-15% getting the idea to find something else to do. Of course, it's _hard_ to get better at it without erring on the other side, so I'm not particularly blaming the justice system or anything, but just saying.

[HansMustermann]

What are the reasons for so many men raping women? Is it just an expected result of a differential in sex drive, or is it more to do with environment and upbringing?

I don't think anyone will ever truly know.

I don't think anyone has such a high sex drive that it overrides their judgment entirely. Or in other words, I don't think men are really wired to think with their dick.

And again the rate has varied by 6 times since 1980, so it can't be IMHO something hard wired. Whatever makes a difference there, it wouldn't be that big if it had to go against some biological drive.

Plus, there are rapes around which clearly happen for reasons having nothing to do with some impulsive reaction based on sex drive. Or even with sex drive at all. E.g., the aberration known as "corrective rape" in which some lesbian is raped, supposedly to show her how much better it is with a Real Man and turn her hetero. (Well, ok, that's so stupid that maybe some _do_ think with their dick.) E.g., historically there have been a lot of women raped as a way to marry into money or get hanged for trying: because raping some wealthier guy's daughter made her harder to marry, and there _is_ some biblical encouragement to marry her to the rapist, it was essentially a way for the rapist to climb the social ladder. In both cases it's hard to argue some momentary lapse of reason, as a result of sex drive, as in that case the perp wouldn't have time to also determine on the spot if that's a lesbian or respectively her father's net worth. And since not all daughters of a moderately wealthier peasant would be supermodel, I'd assume in some cases there wouldn't even be much of a sexual attraction at all; think more like hard work to get her dowry, than sexual gratification.

[stilicho]

I don't know where you're pulling your data from, but the NVAWS breaks it down. The 12 to 17 age group is by far the most at risk:

Spouse (current/former): 20%
Live-in Partner (current/former): 4%
Date (current/former): 22%
Relative other than Spouse: 22%

Rape really is related to the family unit then. This isn't surprising. Men convicted of rape outside the family unit start at home and if it's unreported there then they become a menace to society as a whole.

Time to rethink the concept of "family"?

[SOdhner]

These 25 men by far pose the greatest risk to her, yet it seems to me this is the group of men that women are the least concerned about. By contrast a woman encounters countless strangers in her lifetime, and they represent the least amount of risk outside of relatives. This, it seems, is the group women are most concerned about.

That makes perfect sense, though. When you meet someone you are most on guard, and once they are past your defenses you are most vulnerable to them but since that situation exists BECAUSE you are now less suspicious of them...

Think of it like this: how do you think someone goes from stranger to acquaintance to intimate partner? It starts with saying hello to her on the bus, right? So if she sees some behavior that sends up a red flag... and then we're back to the point of the article.

[Furcifer]

Thats just not true. Whilst the highest age category for rape in adults is the 16-19 year old group, there are still significant numbers in the other age groups. And the change in numbers is probably at least partially due to the changes in numbers of women who are single, which changes the opportunities for date rape. So if you are still single in your twenties or early thirties you are still very much at risk.

It depends on how you define risk and "very much".

ETA: I see UY has posted some stats, probably better to work form those but too late. The numbers I use here are from the numerous reports cited in this thread and others. Back of the envelope.

If you break down the population statistics, the number of rapes, how they occur and who commits them, the scenarios described by the author ie; going out on a date with a guy or talking to them on the bus are extremely low.

There are approximately 300 000 rapes reported in the US. 450 000 unreported from the stats. 30% happen within the age group you mentioned or around 135 000. For sake of argument because the stats are hard to read, around 50% of those happen in a relationship or at a home (either way it suggests someone you "know" not just are acquainted with) that's around 67500. The population pyramid from the US survey is hard to read but about 11.4% of the female population or male are in the mentioned age group. That's 17.5 million women and men.

That's 0.38%,which is very close to the national average of 4000 in 100000. This works out to be around 1 in 265.

Now I'm not saying this is "better" or "acceptable", but it's not 1 in 60. You can't use this lifetime stat to formulate and accurate probability the guy you meet at the gym or on the bus is a "rapist".

When the author says "This is why women live in fear" and "Men don't worry about being violently assaulted or murdered because of this" and goes on to butcher a stat to prove it I don't see what the big problem is in pointing it out it's not exactly correct. Being correct shouldn't marginalize victims, it's still a problem for society whether it's 1 in 6 or 1 in 600.

[Furcifer]

Think of it like this: how do you think someone goes from stranger to acquaintance to intimate partner? It starts with saying hello to her on the bus, right? So if she sees some behavior that sends up a red flag... and then we're back to the point of the article.

So some hard working guy on the bus decides to approach you and because he's worked all day in the sun and sweats that's a red flag? Because he had garlic sauce on his submarine that's a red flag?

Obviously not, but the author seems to suggest it. "You know you stink but here's my number, call me for coffee, after you take a shower and have a tic-tac"

or "You are invading my personal space with your stank, your potential for being a rapist is increasing to the point of discomfort, I'm going to scream"

Is what the author claiming really about "Schrodinger's Rapist" or is it just about having some common sense and realizing a woman isn't interested in you?

[HansMustermann]

Except again even that's not what the article actually says. That is, if you'd actually read the article instead of making up stuff to get preaching about. The actual phrase she uses is "if you have truly unusual standards of personal cleanliness". So, really, I get it that you like making up strawmen that much, but how do you get from "truly unusual" to something common, and from "cleanliness" to "had some garlic in his sub"?

[Ivor the Engineer]

Applying a crude population statistic to an individual when there are probably more important factors to consider (e.g., age, socioeconomic status, drug and alcohol use, aggressiveness, etc.) is rather pointless. Basically all the woman who wrote the article has discovered is that (a minority of) men rape women. She has done no work to try to identify what other personal characteristics can be used to estimate the likelihood of a particular man being a (potential) rapist, other than reeling off a list of her biases against men's appearance.

[bookitty]

Applying a crude population statistic to an individual when there are probably more important factors to consider (e.g., age, socioeconomic status, drug and alcohol use, aggressiveness, etc.) is rather pointless. Basically all the woman who wrote the article has discovered is that (a minority of) men rape women. She has done no work to try to identify what other personal characteristics can be used to estimate the likelihood of a particular man being a (potential) rapist, other than reeling off a list of her biases against men's appearance.

Go read the article again.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Go read the article again.

Just done that. I still haven't seen her mention any personal characteristics in the article which would allow a women to more accurately estimate the likelihood of a particular man being a rapist. Perhaps you'd like to quote some of them and provide supporting evidence to justify their use?

I think the following section highlights the woman's level of neurosis:

Pay attention to the environment. Look around. Are you in a dark alley? Then probably you ought not approach a woman and try to strike up a conversation. The same applies if you are alone with a woman in most public places. If the public place is a closed area (a subway car, an elevator, a bus), even a crowded one, you may not realize that the woman’s ability to flee in case of threat is limited. Ask yourself, “If I were dangerous, would this woman be safe in this space with me?” If the answer is no, then it isn’t appropriate to approach her.

:boggled:

I think her work as a PI has made her rather cynical and somewhat paranoid.

This is the same kind of crap which makes men think twice before approaching young children for fear of being thought of as a pedophile.

[Furcifer]

:cool:

Except again even that's not what the article actually says. That is, if you'd actually read the article instead of making up stuff to get preaching about. The actual phrase she uses is "if you have truly unusual standards of personal cleanliness". So, really, I get it that you like making up strawmen that much, but how do you get from "truly unusual" to something common, and from "cleanliness" to "had some garlic in his sub"?

Are you kidding me?

You're just being obtuse. I suppose it's a strawman to say she doesn't want a guy with a dismembered Virgin Mary tattooed on his face to approach her because WHAT SHE ACTUALLY SAID IS: "tattoos of gang symbols or Technicolor cockroaches all over your face and neck"

Oh yah, and it's a strawman to say if you've got garlic breath and haven't brushed your teeth today that's OK because WHAT SHE ACTUALLY SAID IS: buffalo breath

We get it Hans, you read a list of fallacies and now it's your "word of the day". You lack of comprehension is appalling, please stop with your "If it isn't literal it's a strawman". :rolleyes:

[bookitty]

Just done that. I still haven't seen her mention any personal characteristics in the article which would allow a women to more accurately estimate the likelihood of a particular man being a rapist. Perhaps you'd like to quote some of them and provide supporting evidence to justify their use?



Please reread the entire fourth point:
If you fail to respect what women say, you label yourself a problem.

As for this:
"Ask yourself, “If I were dangerous, would this woman be safe in this space with me?” If the answer is no, then it isn’t appropriate to approach her."

I fail to see how that is paranoid. You're walking down an enclosed staircase, no one else is around. You pass a woman going up the stairs, you turn and follow her in order to talk to her. What do you think her reaction is going to be?

Her reaction is most likely to be concern. She is trapped in that moment, there is no outside help available and you have superior strength. Before you've said a word, you have created an uncomfortable situation. What can you possibly say that will be worth it to the woman? Nothing. So why bother.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Please reread the entire fourth point:

Oh, I did. While I may agree with her that email stalker guy is engaging in behaviour which identifies him as being at a higher risk of progressing to a more serious offence, she then takes it to an absurd extreme with this:

So if you speak to a woman who is otherwise occupied, you’re sending a subtle message. It is that your desire to interact trumps her right to be left alone. If you pursue a conversation when she’s tried to cut it off, you send a message. It is that your desire to speak trumps her right to be left alone. And each of those messages indicates that you believe your desires are a legitimate reason to override her rights.

I know a guy like this at work (I'm an engineer, so I've met my fair share of odd people). He will not shut up. Personally I think he's just not very good at picking up when people aren't interested in what he's saying rather than being a potential rapist.

As for this:


I fail to see how that is paranoid. You're walking down an enclosed staircase, no one else is around. You pass a woman going up the stairs, you turn and follow her in order to talk to her. What do you think her reaction is going to be?

Her reaction is most likely to be concern. She is trapped in that moment, there is no outside help available and you have superior strength. Before you've said a word, you have created an uncomfortable situation. What can you possibly say that will be worth it to the woman? Nothing. So why bother.

Is she struggling with some heavy bags or a child in a push chair? How about "Can I help you with those/that?"

[bookitty]

It blows my mind how many guys want to argue that fourth point. Especially this:

It is that your desire to speak trumps her right to be left alone. And each of those messages indicates that you believe your desires are a legitimate reason to override her rights.

"That doesn't mean you're a rapist! What if she and I are destined to date! It's not that bad! She's paranoid! She should just say jerk!"

So are you guys all butthurt about being called a potential rapist? Because it's either that or you find something fundamentally wrong with a woman who doesn't desire to speak with you.

[stilicho]

I fail to see how that is paranoid. You're walking down an enclosed staircase, no one else is around. You pass a woman going up the stairs, you turn and follow her in order to talk to her. What do you think her reaction is going to be?

Her reaction is most likely to be concern. She is trapped in that moment, there is no outside help available and you have superior strength. Before you've said a word, you have created an uncomfortable situation. What can you possibly say that will be worth it to the woman? Nothing. So why bother.

How many sexual assaults progress from a stranger passing a stranger to turning to follow to striking up a conversation? Given that the mass of sexual assaults and rapes occur in the family, I would guess the number is extremely low.

That said, unless it was something such as "here, you've dropped your wallet, lady", I can't think of a single reason to turn to follow a woman through a confined space just to say something meaningless. Or a man for that matter.

[stevea]

OK - I haven't read all 13 pages of posts - mea culpa.

How much of this stats interpretation is based on dubious definitions ?

Statutory rape seems to be included in the DOJ stats and age of consent varies from 16-18 in various jurisdictions. So for example when we see recent stats that 46% of high school females have had intercourse (ignoring that oral sex may be more common) and that California has an age of consent of 18 - then can we conclude that about half of all female California HS seniors has been raped ? Is that really what we mean by rape ? Volition isn't germane to statutory rape, but I'm not sure we want to lump a pair of 17yo humping in a closet or exchanging oral sex with involuntary penetration.

The definition of "sexual abuse" is even more foggy. One paper off the DOJ website includes unsolicited exposure to porn as "sexual abuse". If that's the definition then I've been sexually assaulted by google_images several times in the past 24 hours.

One of the papers that an early poster found convincing stated that 1 of 6 males has been victim to sexual abuse. That doesn't pass the sniff test unless the definition is quite expansive.

There are a lot of interesting stats - that a large fraction of female victim rape involves husbands, ex-husbands (and an even larger fraction of violent sexual abuse), that there are socio-economic variations, the stats for alcohol involvement (perp and victim) and variation with race are interesting too. Why is Canada's per capita rate of rape about 2X the US ? Cultural or a reporting difference ?

I think we'd want to see a clearer definition of terms and a clearer explanation of the basis for the DoJ extrapolations before making any decisions. But that is exactly what is needed. The paper on self-reported college students is shocking, but can't be taken at face value nor extrapolated to the general population. Stilicho points to glaring errors in various reports.

==

I do not mean to diminish a very real problem. I can fully understand why females, especially in the higher risk categories should take the issue seriously, act very cautiously, and be prepared w/ self-defense, avoid situations as the stats (poorly) outline. The OPs link paper seems to me to be at the brink of media induced hysteria. That there is so much dissonance between the cited papers and common experience, and also the high variation in stats produced by various methods indicates that something is amiss.

To the original point -
I think this is bigotry, prejudicial and uncritical, but I'm not sure I have a problem with it...

It's not bigoted to think that some men are rapists or that some Muslims are terrorists. It is however gross prejudice to treat all males as potential rapists or all Muslims as potential bomb throwers.

It's no breach of rational thought to use solid statistical evidence, tho' imperfect, to assess the risks. Since the downside cost is so high it's rational to try to collect evidence and assess risks in any suspect case. Of course the social risk is that we may tentatively categorize a harmless socially inept person who won't stop emailing after a single date as a potential rapist, and we may tentatively categorize some Muslim from who studied at some madrassa or holds some political view as a potential terrorist.

In law there is a requirement of demonstrating "reasonable suspicion" to an independent judge before issuing a warrant to collect more evidence. The reasonable suspicion requirement generally means a lot less than proof beyond reasonable doubt, but more than generalized categorical suspicion. There must be some specific evidence and articulable reasoning to probabilify the suspicion.

I'm not suggesting that anyone must follow any particular reasoning when choosing personal relationships. If you want to live your personal life with a bunker mentality and presume that every male is a rapist looking for an opportunity, and every Muslim is ready to blow up a plane - then you are welcome to do so. We live in an era of extreme political polarization where equally broad-brushed evaluations are made by both sides - openly. Why not extend this lack of reason to personal relation ships too ?

Still I think a reasonable person wants some intermediate categories between "some males rape, and you are a male ...", to "has prior convictions for rape".

[Furcifer]

Schrodinger's ****

I know what your'e saying ladies "I'm not a ******" but let's face it 1 in 6 women have been sexually assaulted and they are carrying around baggage from that. I know it's not you, you're a nice lady, friendly and fun to be around but some women use it as a defense and who can blame them?

But let's face it, I don't know you. And even if I do how well do I really know you? When you combine that with the fact that 1 in 4 women have mental health issues, plus the fact that between periods and menopause your hormones are totally out of whack for a good portion of your life, odds are you're quite the bitch.

So when I'm talking to you I'm thinking "Sure, you're pleasant now, but in a split second you could turn into a raging bitch". So don't blame me if I'm not listening or get easily distracted. It's not you, it's the fact that at any minute you could turn into a raving loon, or a psycho bitch from hell and I'd rather imagine myself in pleasant situations. I have to wander off in my mind, it's in my best interest.

Here's a hint ladies, if you want to keep a man interested in you don't get fat. Some guys like chubbies, but most men would prefer you looked like Kate Moss on a meth bender. That doesn't mean we don't love you any less, just that we would love you even more if you were that hot. If you can't keep your body in shape it's a sure sign your mind is about to go as well. Exercise keeps more than just your body in shape, it keeps your mind in shape. Plus the time you spend exercising we can spend away from you and sometimes we need our alone time too.

Listen. Listen to us when we say "This isn't anything to get worked up about" "You're over reacting" . Mostly likely it's because your hormones are off or you forgot to take your Zoloft this morning. If it's "No Big Deal" it isn't, and we mean it. Acting like a complete **** over something that isn't a big deal isn't very endearing.

If we decide to not tell you, or perhaps lie, it's because we realize you are a potential ****. We're not certain what will or won't set you off. Ignorance can indeed be bliss. Remember that.

Please don't expect us to listen to you about your day. You work with 6 other women, chances are on any given day at least 2 of them are being total *****. Those 2 think it's another 2, and the other 2 think it's you and the girl that sits across from you, you know the one that shows up to work covered in bruises every other Monday. Between the 6 of you there is a constant cat fight over something, please don't make us decide which one of you is being the **** every day, you won't always like the answer.

Violate any one of these tenants and you set off the alarms, "Potential ****, Danger!". This goes for just about every woman, wife or girlfriend. I'm sorry but my own mental health is important to me and I really don't want a **** in my life.

:rolleyes:

[bookitty]

Schrodinger's ****

I know what your'e saying ladies "I'm not a ******" but let's face it 1 in 6 women have been sexually assaulted and they are carrying around baggage from that. I know it's not you, you're a nice lady, friendly and fun to be around but some women use it as a defense and who can blame them?

But let's face it, I don't know you. And even if I do how well do I really know you? When you combine that with the fact that 1 in 4 women have mental health issues, plus the fact that between periods and menopause your hormones are totally out of whack for a good portion of your life, odds are you're quite the bitch.

So when I'm talking to you I'm thinking "Sure, you're pleasant now, but in a split second you could turn into a raging bitch". So don't blame me if I'm not listening or get easily distracted. It's not you, it's the fact that at any minute you could turn into a raving loon, or a psycho bitch from hell and I'd rather imagine myself in pleasant situations. I have to wander off in my mind, it's in my best interest.

Here's a hint ladies, if you want to keep a man interested in you don't get fat. Some guys like chubbies, but most men would prefer you looked like Kate Moss on a meth bender. That doesn't mean we don't love you any less, just that we would love you even more if you were that hot. If you can't keep your body in shape it's a sure sign your mind is about to go as well. Exercise keeps more than just your body in shape, it keeps your mind in shape. Plus the time you spend exercising we can spend away from you and sometimes we need our alone time too.

Listen. Listen to us when we say "This isn't anything to get worked up about" "You're over reacting" . Mostly likely it's because your hormones are off or you forgot to take your Zoloft this morning. If it's "No Big Deal" it isn't, and we mean it. Acting like a complete **** over something that isn't a big deal isn't very endearing.

If we decide to not tell you, or perhaps lie, it's because we realize you are a potential ****. We're not certain what will or won't set you off. Ignorance can indeed be bliss. Remember that.

Please don't expect us to listen to you about your day. You work with 6 other women, chances are on any given day at least 2 of them are being total *****. Those 2 think it's another 2, and the other 2 think it's you and the girl that sits across from you, you know the one that shows up to work covered in bruises every other Monday. Between the 6 of you there is a constant cat fight over something, please don't make us decide which one of you is being the **** every day, you won't always like the answer.

Violate any one of these tenants and you set off the alarms, "Potential ****, Danger!". This goes for just about every woman, wife or girlfriend. I'm sorry but my own mental health is important to me and I really don't want a **** in my life.

:rolleyes:

So you believe that being a bitch is as damaging to a man as sexual assault is to a woman.

In that case I could give you some tips on how to avoid making a woman be bitchy towards you. Unfortunately, they all involve treating a woman with respect. So sorry, not much help there.

[Furcifer]

One of the papers that an early poster found convincing stated that 1 of 6 males has been victim to sexual abuse. That doesn't pass the sniff test unless the definition is quite expansive.


Just a note on this because I happened to think about it today. I'm not sure how many men have been "hazed" as part of a team or club here. I was lucky enough to to avoid most of the hazing as I was part of a newer Catholic high school and hazing was beginning to be discouraged.

However, the public high schools and hockey teams and baseball teams all had their own various forms of hazing.

Based on what I know happened, what I saw and what I heard, I can safely say just about every male that played organized sports at any serious level had been subject to involuntary actions of a sexual nature. Actions that if men were to force upon women would certainly meet the definition of "sexual assault".

I'd say just about every man at some point has been subject to or witnessed events that could easily be considered sexual assault by someone. It's just that we don't see it the same way and I doubt if it would be reported as such unless it was worded the right way.

Just a thought.

[Furcifer]

So you believe that being a bitch is as damaging to a man as sexual assault is to a woman.


No, you missed the point, allow me to explain.

I think calling a woman a "potential ****" is just as inflammatory as calling a man a "potential rapist".

You can be fairly sincere, have a point, and as you have demonstrate, have the reader totally miss the point because you are using the wrong words.

If a man walked around talking about how every woman was a "potential ****" we would call him a "woman hater" and say he was paranoid. Apparently a woman walking around calling every man a "potential rapist" we should call "insightful"

[Lyrandar]

No, you missed the point, allow me to explain.

I think calling a woman a "potential ****" is just as inflammatory as calling a man a "potential rapist".

You can be fairly sincere, have a point, and as you have demonstrate, have the reader totally miss the point because you are using the wrong words.

If a man walked around talking about how every woman was a "potential ****" we would call him a "woman hater" and say he was paranoid. Apparently a woman walking around calling every man a "potential rapist" we should call "insightful"

And if any of the advice offered in that first absolutely disgusting post was valid, you might even have a point.

As it is? That was simply wrong. Half of your "advice" there basically boiled down to "we know what's going on about yourselves better than you do, so shut up and go away". I could care less what terms you used; even if you used a less inflammatory term to describe women, it'd still be absolutely vile.

Your attempt at analogy (or parody) is completely unhelpful, since you change other things about your example besides the gender of the target then wonder why we're treating it differently.

[Furcifer]

And if any of the advice offered in that first absolutely disgusting post was valid, you might even have a point.

As it is? That was simply wrong. Half of your "advice" there basically boiled down to "we know what's going on about yourselves better than you do, so shut up and go away". I could care less what terms you used; even if you used a less inflammatory term to describe women, it'd still be absolutely vile.

Your attempt at analogy (or parody) is completely unhelpful, since you change other things about your example besides the gender of the target then wonder why we're treating it differently.

If a woman you don't know gets emotional easy and 1 in 4 women have mental health issues it's only right to assume they are crazy *****.

What's wrong with a man not allowing himself to be subject to mental abuse? :rolleyes:

[Elizabeth I]

plus the fact that between periods and menopause your hormones are totally out of whack for a good portion of your life
That may be the case, but you know what? Our body parts don't jump around completely out of our control five or six times a day. Talk about hormonal - geeze.

What's wrong with a man not allowing himself to be subject to mental abuse?
Well, first you'd have to prove you have something to be "mentally" abused.

And then, if you could demonstrate any mentality, perhaps you would explain how a woman's being a bitch is in any way analogous to a woman's getting raped.

Sorry that you fit the profile from the OP so well - I'm sure it was a shock to you.

[SatanicSheep]

3body didn't make a perfect analogy, but I still think I heard a penny drop.

Who would be receptive to a discussion that starts with "Just so you know you might be a [vile label]? You're probally not so don't get "butt hurt," just letting you know there's a chance." It's called tact. Men are supposed to have an abundance of it, according to the article, and yet she displays very little. Can anyone see why somebody would be a little hesitant to take advice about social interactions from someone who seems pretty inept at them?

[Lyrandar]

If a woman you don't know gets emotional easy and 1 in 4 women have mental health issues it's only right to assume they are crazy *****.

What's wrong with a man not allowing himself to be subject to mental abuse? :rolleyes:

The blog post initially up for debate stated that there was no way for the woman to know and offers advice for men that are not rapists to help them ensure the image they portray to women matches the reality (that they are not rapists). Presumably most men wish to ensure that they are not viewed as rapists and are capable of being polite.

Your... parody for lack of a better word... seems to assume every woman is a bitch and offers advice which a significant majority of them would have trouble following through no fault of their own. That "advice" solves problems which can just as easily be mitigated by the guy being a bit more honest, polite, and caring.

While I'm sure you're going to want to say that the women in the blog could fix any problems by being more trusting, this increases their risk of ending up in a very bad situation. And guys fixing the problems in your parody requires nothing more then being able to tolerate listening to someone in a bad mood every once in a while.

[SatanicSheep]

And then, if you could demonstrate any mentality, perhaps you would explain how a woman's being a bitch is in any way analogous to a woman's getting raped.


It's not. I also think being called a possible bitch isn't as bad as being called a possible violent sexual predator, but it still seems to have irritated people.

[TraneWreck]

You have every right to stay away from women displaying the behavior types you dislike. If they follow you around and force these characteristics on you, you're welcome to take out a restraining order.

Remember, the OP article is about men pursuing women in an unwanted fashion and ignoring their request to be alone.

My guess is that most of the people who think that ridiculous analogy is clever will have not trouble separating themselves from women.

(and now we get to hear the unrestrained boasting about how these douche-nozzles can take women whenever they want, so powerful is their allure).

[Furcifer]

Well, first you'd have to prove you have something to be "mentally" abused.


Scandalous.

"Well first you'd have to prove you have something to rape"

Is this really where you want to take the discussion :confused:

[SatanicSheep]

(and now we get to hear the unrestrained boasting about how these douche-nozzles can take women whenever they want, so powerful is their allure).

Nope. It hasn't happened since you predicted it the last time. I see you are still not reluctant to jump on the childish assumption that anybody who questions the article has problems interacting with women.

[Uncayimmy]

And as to your previous post, it is precisely the acquaintances, friends, partners etc that the OP is concerned about. It's about not letting someone into your social circle who shows signs that they don't totally respect your boundaries.

By the OP I assume you mean the linked article. I think the article was poorly written - it's all over the place. I don't find myself able to succinctly state what I was supposed to get out of it. Some of what she wrote comes across as wrong-headed.

She starts out writing it towards men. Specifically, men who have not met their partner through acquaintances and mutual friends and must look further afield. Thus, she's addressing men looking to meet strangers.

She specifically says that when she meets a stranger, she has to worry if he's going to rape her. She says, "This means that some men should never approach strange women in public." About 15% of rapes happen in public settings. The stranger group is the least likely outside of relatives to rape a woman. The number of strangers one encounters in a lifetime is large. Consider it to be 50 per year for 50 years of adulthood. That's 2,500, which is 100X the size of the group that is 3X more likely to rape her.

So, I have no qualms saying that I believe she has her priorities reversed. You can argue that she should have some concern about strangers and she should. But the fact is right after saying she has to worry about a stranger raping her she throws out the one in six number apparently not realizing that the overwhelming majority were rapes in that study were by intimate partners in private settings not involving a threat of violence or physical injury.

Her later arguments are built on unproven premises (men who ignore "no" in a non-sexual setting are more likely to do so in a sexual setting). Seems reasonable, but it's unsupported. From there she says that speaking to a woman that is "otherwise occupied" is not respecting boundaries. From this we go down the slippery slope of rape.

All in all, I found the article to be a piece of crap sitting on some fine china. Sure, there's some good stuff to see, but no way to do want to clean my plate to see it.

[Furcifer]

You have every right to stay away from women displaying the behavior types you dislike. If they follow you around and force these characteristics on you, you're welcome to take out a restraining order.

Remember, the OP article is about men pursuing women in an unwanted fashion and ignoring their request to be alone.


Right. And this is about women pursuing relationships with men in an unwanted fashion.

You're free to get a divorce or break up with a man or not even date him, just don't be a ****.

Kinda cuts when you say it, doesn't it?

[TraneWreck]

Nope. It hasn't happened since you predicted it the last time. I see you are still not reluctant to jump on the childish assumption that anybody who questions the article has problems interacting with women.

Wrong.

All women so far respond positively to my come-ons. :cool:

You can go back and read. He wasn't being sarcastic.

Also not that my warning was meant to stop the douche-crew from piping up with that nonsense. It didn't work the first time, let's see if the desire to prove me wrong is more powerful that the need to vent insecure masculinity on the internet.

[SatanicSheep]

Wrong. You can go back and read. He wasn't being sarcastic.

Also not that my warning was meant to stop the douche-crew from piping up with that nonsense. It didn't work the first time, let's see if the desire to prove me wrong is more powerful that the need to vent insecure masculinity on the internet.

Ok I was wrong. One guy did say it. I'm still right about the second part and you're still a troll of the highest order.

[Lyrandar]

Her later arguments are built on unproven premises (men who ignore "no" in a non-sexual setting are more likely to do so in a sexual setting). Seems reasonable, but it's unsupported. From there she says that speaking to a woman that is "otherwise occupied" is not respecting boundaries. From this we go down the slippery slope of rape.

... how else is this woman supposed to judge how any of these strangers she meets are likely to act in a sexual setting?

[TraneWreck]

Right. And this is about women pursuing relationships with men in an unwanted fashion.

You're free to get a divorce or break up with a man or not even date him, just don't be a ****.

Kinda cuts when you say it, doesn't it?

What?

Nothing you say "cuts" because it's always unintelligible.

[TraneWreck]

Ok I was wrong. One guy did say it. I'm still right about the second part and you're still a troll of the highest order.

I didn't say anyone, just those engaging in this infantile game of pretending that calling someone a "bitch" is the same as saying someone is a rapist.

One is a crime, the other is just a slur.

[Furcifer]

By the OP I assume you mean the linked article. I think the article was poorly written - it's all over the place. I don't find myself able to succinctly state what I was supposed to get out of it. Some of what she wrote comes across as wrong-headed.

She starts out writing it towards men. Specifically, men who have not met their partner through acquaintances and mutual friends and must look further afield. Thus, she's addressing men looking to meet strangers.

She specifically says that when she meets a stranger, she has to worry if he's going to rape her. She says, "This means that some men should never approach strange women in public." About 15% of rapes happen in public settings. The stranger group is the least likely outside of relatives to rape a woman. The number of strangers one encounters in a lifetime is large. Consider it to be 50 per year for 50 years of adulthood. That's 2,500, which is 100X the size of the group that is 3X more likely to rape her.

So, I have no qualms saying that I believe she has her priorities reversed. You can argue that she should have some concern about strangers and she should. But the fact is right after saying she has to worry about a stranger raping her she throws out the one in six number apparently not realizing that the overwhelming majority were rapes in that study were by intimate partners in private settings not involving a threat of violence or physical injury.

Her later arguments are built on unproven premises (men who ignore "no" in a non-sexual setting are more likely to do so in a sexual setting). Seems reasonable, but it's unsupported. From there she says that speaking to a woman that is "otherwise occupied" is not respecting boundaries. From this we go down the slippery slope of rape.

All in all, I found the article to be a piece of crap sitting on some fine china. Sure, there's some good stuff to see, but no way to do want to clean my plate to see it.

You, you...bastard..you're just not sensitive enough. This is woman hear her roar!

Oh wait, did I just make this about YOU and not what you wrote? My gosh, someone should make a rule against that. :cool:

[Furcifer]

What?
Nothing you say "cuts" because it's always unintelligible.

Aww, you hurted my feewlingz :(

And yet here you are, 3 days straight arguing my unintelligible gibberish.

I always wonder what motivates you to make such stupid statements? I bet in your mind you hear applause every time you troll a thread.

Admit it. ;)


Thanks for dragging me to AAH once again. :p

[Elizabeth I]

Scandalous.

"Well first you'd have to prove you have something to rape"

Is this really where you want to take the discussion :confused:

Oh, I didn't - that's where the discussion arrived when you posted your "parody." But that's fine. You go right ahead, secure in the belief that your irresistible masculinity trumps anything...ignorant...that you may say or write. I'm sure that sometime you will prove that ignoring what women say and what they think and what they feel is studlier than anything and women will be throwing themselves at your feet...





...in a pig's ear. You wouldn't even listen to a math teacher telling you, very politely, why your "statistics" were in error. That wouldn't have been because she was a woman, would it?

Oh, no, no, no. What was I thinking? I'm sure you're one of those people who doesn't have a prejudiced cell in his body.

[Furcifer]

I didn't say anyone, just those engaging in this infantile game of pretending that calling someone a "bitch" is the same as saying someone is a rapist.

One is a crime, the other is just a slur.

Let me explain something to you counselor.
If the man isn't a rapist, and you are calling him one, it is a slur. It's worse than a slur.

Funny how a little slur seems to generate a lot of sympathy, and yet the heinous crime of rape and calling men rapists, not so much. :rolleyes:

[TraneWreck]

Let me explain something to you counselor.
If the man isn't a rapist, and you are calling him one, it is a slur. It's worse than a slur.

Funny how a little slur seems to generate a lot of sympathy, and yet the heinous crime of rape and calling men rapists, not so much. :rolleyes:

Please, aren't you tired of this yet?

Why is the "Shrodinger" reference being made?

Not being a rapist, it bothers me very little that a random woman on public transit wouldn't want to chat with me because, not knowing me, I could potentially be a threat to her.

The fact that you care this much is telling.

[Furcifer]

Oh, I didn't - that's where the discussion arrived when you posted your "parody." But that's fine. You go right ahead, secure in the belief that your irresistible masculinity trumps anything...ignorant...that you may say or write. I'm sure that sometime you will prove that ignoring what women say and what they think and what they feel is studlier than anything and women will be throwing themselves at your feet...

Is it strawman or strawwoman? I get confused. Where did I say you should ignore women? Or that my "irresistible masculinity" trumps everything? You just think that don't you :blush:


...in a pig's ear. You wouldn't even listen to a math teacher telling you, very politely, why your "statistics" were in error. That wouldn't have been because she was a woman, would it?

Oh, no, no, no. What was I thinking? I'm sure you're one of those people who doesn't have a prejudiced cell in his body.

First, I didn't know PY was a woman. I thought "it" was a man, and from Canada. I was wrong.

Second, she was wrong. She admitted as such. The conditional statement still assumes a direct correlation. You can't make it any other way. Her statement of fact is "1 in 6 men are rapists" IF each rapist commits 10 rapes THEN 1 in 60 men are rapists.

Now try this: 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted, IF each rapist commits 10 rapes THEN....

Makes no sense. It doesn't follow logically. :)

[bookitty]

Let me explain something to you counselor.
If the man isn't a rapist, and you are calling him one, it is a slur. It's worse than a slur.

Funny how a little slur seems to generate a lot of sympathy, and yet the heinous crime of rape and calling men rapists, not so much. :rolleyes:

Did you happen to notice that she never called a man a rapist in the article. In fact she goes out of her way to say:

Let me start out by assuring you that I understand you are a good sort of person. You are kind to children and animals. You respect the elderly. You donate to charity. You tell jokes without laughing at your own punchlines. You respect women. You like women

and

Fortunately, you’re a good guy. We’ve already established that.

In cases where she says rapist, it is potential rapist which, for some odd reason, seems impossible for you to understand. You would prefer that women never think of any man as a potential rapist because you find it rude.

[Elizabeth I]

Where did I say you should ignore women?
You didn't have to. You have demonstrated your attitude clearly. In fact, it has been a long time since I have had the displeasure of communicating with someone so dismissive of women.

I had hoped that there was no one of your stamp still around under the age of 75. Seems I was wrong. Oh, well, life is full of disappointments.

[Furcifer]

Why is the "Shrodinger" reference being made?

Not being a rapist, it bothers me very little that a random woman on public transit wouldn't want to chat with me because, not knowing me, I could potentially be a threat to her.

The fact that you care this much is telling.

Because you can put "Schrodinger" in front of anything and you can call people whatever you want. "I don't know but I think it's possible you're a...." I'm not saying you are, I'm just saying I'm going to treat you like one.

Funny, I was just thinking a rapist on the internet would try to drill home the point he wasn't a rapist. Only a predator would feel the need to claim he wasn't a predator. The fact that you do is very telling. :cool:

[Furcifer]

Did you happen to notice that she never called a man a rapist in the article.

You[She] didn't have to. You[she] have demonstrated your[her] attitude clearly.

Editing mine :cool:

[TraneWreck]

Because you can put "Schrodinger" in front of anything and you can call people whatever you want. "I don't know but I think it's possible you're a...." I'm not saying you are, I'm just saying I'm going to treat you like one.

Funny, I was just thinking a rapist on the internet would try to drill home the point he wasn't a rapist. Only a predator would feel the need to claim he wasn't a predator. The fact that you do is very telling. :cool:

You really think she's calling you a rapist? What is wrong with you?

[bookitty]

Funny, I was just thinking a rapist on the internet would try to drill home the point he wasn't a rapist. Only a predator would feel the need to claim he wasn't a predator. The fact that you do is very telling. :cool:

There is the odd phenomena of men who go to sites that are geared toward women and haunt the comments sections of rape articles. They usually talk about how a woman deserved it, how all women are prostitutes because you have to buy them dinner, how sex is a commodity that women withhold for power so of course men have to rape because the world runs on power-plays, etc, etc. For this very reason, some of these sites have heavily moderated comments.

Anonymity brings out some ugly stuff in people.

[Furcifer]

You would prefer that women never think of any man as a potential rapist because you find it rude.

See, you miss the point. How many times do I have to tell you, it isn't about being called a rapist or not, it's a matter of it being warranted.

Her examples clearly don't demonstrate a need to consider men "rapists".

If her example was something like

"You see a girl at a frat party. She's been drinking a bit and one of her friends has disappeared upstairs with the Lacrosse team. You decide to approach her maybe call her a cab, see if she's alright. You have to understand what's going through her mind, she has to consider if you are a potential rapist. Don't be alarmed, the rate of sexual assault and rape for college age women is 4 time higher than any other age group. She's in a strange house and almost 50% of rapes occur within a home. Maybe you noticed her from Biology class and even had a coffee with her at the Strabucks on campus, in 76% of rapes the victim know the perpetrator."

You know that sort of thing. Talking to the target groups, the ones at high risk.

Not some guy on a bus with tattoos you don't like or doesn't realize you've got your headphones on full blast listening to Metallica.

She missed the mark. I'm sorry you feel the need to get the message out even if it's distorted and contains numerous fallacies. Or the fact you have to libel everyone that thinks this article is garbage. Self check time?

[Furcifer]

You really think she's calling you a rapist? What is wrong with you?

Just you, the 5 of us are just fine ;)

[bookitty]

You know that sort of thing. Talking to the target groups, the ones at high risk.


Ya know, you never did answer that question. Do you think the article is advice to women on how to avoid rape?

[Furcifer]

There is the odd phenomena of men who go to sites that are geared toward women and haunt the comments sections of rape articles. They usually talk about how a woman deserved it, how all women are prostitutes because you have to buy them dinner, how sex is a commodity that women withhold for power so of course men have to rape because the world runs on power-plays, etc, etc. For this very reason, some of these sites have heavily moderated comments.

Anonymity brings out some ugly stuff in people.

Finally you admit your bias. Well done. Now can you get over your preconceived notions about men on the internet and discuss this article?

I mean try, seriously. It's crap, and there a several reasons why. Would you like to hear them, or do you want to continue your derail?

[Furcifer]

Edited for civility.

[TraneWreck]

Deleted.

[dirtywick]

Hmmm..so the guy who prides himself on his aggressiveness finds little worthwhile content in an article about boundaries. Interesting although not wholly unexpected.

Still, it is what it is: shallow dating advice with an inflammatory hook.

[Furcifer]

There is the odd phenomena of men who go to sites that are geared toward women and haunt the comments sections of rape articles. They usually talk about how a woman deserved it, how all women are prostitutes because you have to buy them dinner, how sex is a commodity that women withhold for power so of course men have to rape because the world runs on power-plays, etc, etc. For this very reason, some of these sites have heavily moderated comments.

Anonymity brings out some ugly stuff in people.

You know, I was thinking about this. This is a skeptical forum, you are allegedly a skeptic I assume so I'll ask you:

How do you know it's men? I mean how do you know it's not women? Is there some sort of verification system in place? Is there some sort of screening? Are there male only IP addresses?

How can you say unequivocally it's men that create this phenomenon? I guess the internet isn't very anonymous is it? I mean you can apparently tell sex simply by reading what someone types.

How does it work? Is it like hand writing analysis? Do men use capitals where women use lower case letter? Do they paragraph or phrase differently?

Just curious ;)

[mediocrity511]

The "don't rape" thing actually has a history among feminists. It because nearly all anti-rape campaigns focus on making potential victims modify their behaviour and thus imply partially blaming the women who have been raped if they were out after dark or wore a short skirt or have a few drinks. Whereas the most effective way of reducing rapes would be to get rapists to stop raping women. I don't see why it's offensive, we have plenty of adverts telling us "don't drink and drive", "don't commit benefit fraud" ,and various other criminal acts, why does it only become unpalatable when used in regards to rape?

[Ivor the Engineer]

The article provided useful information to rapists on how to fool women into thinking that they are not rapists.

Not that they need any - the vast majority of rapists obviously don't behave in the ways the women in the article described or they would not have been so successful.

[Dipayan]

The word 'rape' seems to be extremely polarizing. Just the existence of that word in the article seems to have blinded a lot of people to the fact that it is badly thought out and poorly written.

Like UncaYimmy, 3BodyProblem and SatanicSheep, I too understand where the authoress is coming from, but the execution is definitely poor.

[Uncayimmy]

... how else is this woman supposed to judge how any of these strangers she meets are likely to act in a sexual setting?

My inability (or hers) to answer that question doesn't mean that what she's suggesting is a valid technique. It also presumes that there is a way to tell. Do you have any evidence for markers that indicate the likelihood of a man being a rapist? If so, please present them.

Most men don't go from stranger to intimate partner without some sort of interaction in-between. I find the notion that a man willing to interrupt a woman "otherwise occupied" having a higher rapist potential to be absurd, but I'm willing to hear evidence to the contrary.

Since by far the riskiest group for a woman is the intimate partner group, presumably the markers are difficult to identify or they are simply being ignored. Remember, about 20% of adult rapes were committed by spouses.

Part of the issue in my opinion revolves around what types of events we think of when we think of rape. In the NVAWS data we see that the majority of rapes do not involve a threat of harm, perceived threat of harm or actual physical harm beyond the act itself. A small minority involve weapons and/or serious physical harm (more than bruises, welts, etc). What the study did not tell us is the association between threats and actual violence and the relationship of the perpetrator. It seems reasonable to assume that the stranger rapes would be the most likely candidates since it seems a woman is less likely to be in an intimate situation with a stranger that then gets "out of hand" for lack of a better term. Likewise, it seems that an intimate partner is less likely to use a weapon for sex. I have no data to back this up.

The vast majority of intimate partner rapes occur during the relationship. We don't know at what point (first sexual encounter, 10th, 100th) it happens or even if there's a pattern. We do know that a significant number are by spouses, so presumably there's an existing comfort level with the person.

Rape is obviously a continuum. It goes from violent attacks by strangers to some undefined point involving intimate partners where no physical violence or threat of physical violence is involved. It would seem to me that the different situations would require different methods of risk assessment and techniques for avoidance.

At the violent stranger end of the continuum the NVAWS doesn't provide any real data for how those events go down. Obviously some will involve break-ins. Some will involve abductions, and those can range from being grabbed without ever seeing the person first to the Ted Bundy style where a polite, clean-cut gentleman approaches an obviously unoccupied woman. From what I've read those men tend to be serial offenders.

At the other end of the spectrum we have spouse rapes that don't involve violence or threats of violence, and some of the rapes reported to NVAWS were considered a "minor incident, not a crime." What does that tell us? Obviously the man has made it past many levels of screening. What we don't know is much about how these situations go down. Is every man a potential rapist in the bedroom? It's possible. Perhaps there's something about the relationship and/or the situation itself that leads up to that one event.

I don't think this theory is unsound. We recognize that otherwise non-violent people can sometimes snap under pressure or because of a combination of circumstances. The majority of the rapes involve drugs and/or alcohol on the part of the man, and I'm pretty sure physical violence is similar. This doesn't justify it, and I'm making no attempt to do so. What I'm pointing out is the difficulty in identifying those people in advance because they are all around us. They could be us.

Of course, there are countless other situations along the continuum. There are people who put on a good show for a while before revealing their nastier side. Some start with small episodes of relatively minor violence, which I believe the evidence shows is a good indicator of future major violence.

Truth is, I don't know what reliable indicators there are. I can speculate in a more sound way than this woman. For example, for some people the elements of control in a sexual encounter are more prominent. Some men like being physically aggressive and some women enjoy it (same with roles reversed). Some don't. I would say that those couples who are into that are more likely to have an event that gets out of hand. This is not excusing the man or blaming the woman. It's about risk assessment.

As I pointed out earlier, most of the rapes involve drugs/alcohol on the part of the perpetrator. It's well known that alcohol impairs judgment. The study Hans referenced indicated that the vast majority of college men admitting to rape described situations involving an intoxicated women and presumably at least some were intoxicated as well. Studies have also shown that when a man is aroused, he will make different judgments about what's appropriate. Men evaluating date rape stories while aroused are more likely to view certain conduct as acceptable compared to men who are not aroused.

Putting it altogether when it comes to rapes in the intimate partner category, I would offer that those men who enjoy the physical control are more likely exert physical control in a sexual encounter than those who don't. If the couple in the past has engaged in physically aggressive behavior in the bedroom, the more likely it is that at least an attempt will be made again. The more they've done it, the more likely the element will be seen again. I think that's a reasonable conclusion.

Of course, physically aggressive sexual behavior itself is a continuum. Decorum prevents me from getting into details, but magazines like Cosmo (http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/tips-moves/10-sex-cravings-3) discuss things like this as perfectly normal. There's nothing wrong with that so long as both parties are into it, and once again, this is about risk assessment, not blame.

Assuming these elements are present at some level, it's not unreasonable to consider them going to another level. That's not to say they cannot be introduced out of the blue - it's just risk assessment. If the man is intoxicated, he's less likely to make sound judgments. If he's aroused already, he's even less likely to recognize what's acceptable. Add in stressors like money, job, and relationships, he's more likely to be violent as well.

It would seem to me, then, that the evaluation of one's intimate partner is an ongoing process. I would think that each sexual encounter with him is an indicator of what may happen in a future sexual encounter, no matter what he says or does outside of the bedroom (remember the study about men evaluating date rape stories).

And while a woman may "trust" her man not to step over the line, I'm going to say that in any given sexual situation, if the man enjoys physical control, is intoxicated, has demonstrated in the past a lack of sound judgment while aroused, and is currently stressed out, the risk of rape is much higher than with a guy who is none of those things.

Again, none of what I describe is blaming the woman or excusing the man. You asked about risk assessment, and I am giving my theory and supporting it with evidence. And since the a woman is many times more at risk with the 25 men she dates than the thousands of strangers and acquaintances she meets, this type of risk assessment provides the most protection.

[HansMustermann]

Because you can put "Schrodinger" in front of anything and you can call people whatever you want. "I don't know but I think it's possible you're a...." I'm not saying you are, I'm just saying I'm going to treat you like one.

Jesus Haploid Christ, repeating the same strawman again won't magically make it true, you know? She's not saying she'll treat you like a rapist, she's saying she won't date you if you give the wrong signals.

Funny, I was just thinking a rapist on the internet would try to drill home the point he wasn't a rapist. Only a predator would feel the need to claim he wasn't a predator. The fact that you do is very telling. :cool:

Says the guy who's been arguing she shouldn't even call a rapist or rapist but something as vague and undefined as "jerk", or that if she even takes the precautions that actually work she's some kind of irrational fear monger, or trying to substitute lifetime for anual prevalence numbers because they're (obviously) smaller, etc. What would your argument above make _you_?

Actually, you may even have a point there. Let's see:

- you accused people of lying, yet it's you who repeatedly make up lies about the article, even if it's pointed out that the article doesn't say that

- you accuse people of not understanding maths, yet you repeatedly flunk a 4'th grade level arithmetic problem. And it's already generous to rate it even 4'th grade.

- you accuse people of being illogical, yet you don't even seem to comprehend how one can't simultaneously believe "1/6 of X are Y" and "1/60 of X are Y", much less one needing the other.

Seems like projecting lots to me. So

- now you accuse someone of being a rapist who tries to sound like nobody should fear him, when you're the one who's been arguing all along that one shouldn't even think of rape or rapists, but call it something as vague as "jerk."

Are you trying to tell us something? I mean, it's not even my argument that that would make one a probable rapist, you just made the argument yourself above in the quoted part.

[Uncayimmy]

The "don't rape" thing actually has a history among feminists. It because nearly all anti-rape campaigns focus on making potential victims modify their behaviour and thus imply partially blaming the women who have been raped if they were out after dark or wore a short skirt or have a few drinks. Whereas the most effective way of reducing rapes would be to get rapists to stop raping women. I don't see why it's offensive, we have plenty of adverts telling us "don't drink and drive", "don't commit benefit fraud" ,and various other criminal acts, why does it only become unpalatable when used in regards to rape?

Giving advice for reducing risk is not blaming the victim, and people would do well to reinforce that notion at every turn. We give all sorts of advice to people about how to reduce their chances of being victims of crime. Entire industries are built around it (alarms for example). Travel guides give all sorts of advice on how to avoid crime in areas people visit. This woman's article is implicit advice to woman on how to avoid being raped (stay away from stinky strangers with objectionable tattoos). Why does it only became "blaming the victim" when it comes to rape? Why wasn't this woman accused of blaming the victim?

The reason I find it unpalatable to be told, "Don't rape" is the very strong implication that I'm in need of being told not to do something because I am considering it. Lots of people consider walking down dark alleys, carrying their valuables in a visible and easily accessible manner, or getting a screaming deal on bodywork from somebody who shows up at the door. These things happen all the time, so it's not unreasonable to remind them of the risk. And, of course, they are not doing anything "wrong" by considering these things.

Most men don't consider rape. If we assume that every rape is committed by a unique individual, then that 1 in 6 number means that 1 man in 6 may do it just once in his entire life, so it's not like it's even a remotely common event for that 1 in 6.

Beyond that, what good does it do? Do you think those serial rapists and men who feel entitled to woman's body or figure "she wants it" are going to listen? I don't. They probably laugh. Meanwhile, many kind and gentle men are put off by the admonition. Minor girls are raped more than adult women. How would you feel about somebody saying to your father, "Don't diddle your daughter" or something equally repulsive?

[Ivor the Engineer]

Jesus Haploid Christ, repeating the same strawman again won't magically make it true, you know? She's not saying she'll treat you like a rapist, she's saying she won't date you if you give the wrong signals.

<snip>

And obviously most of the men who are rapists (i.e. those who are not jumping out of bushes) are *not* giving these signals, or they wouldn't have had the opportunity to rape. I.e. the signals are useless for detecting rapists from non-rapists, and merely represent the author's and other women's irrational biases and paranoia.

[HansMustermann]

My inability (or hers) to answer that question doesn't mean that what she's suggesting is a valid technique. It also presumes that there is a way to tell. Do you have any evidence for markers that indicate the likelihood of a man being a rapist? If so, please present them.

I would say that you can judge a person's personality by their behaviour all right. To quote Dave Barry, "A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person". Someone who is overriding a stranger's choices on the bus, it's actually a very good indication that it's the kind of person who'd keep overriding her choices. And rape is a kind of overriding the partner's choice.

It's not only logically sound, but basically you could even apply Bayes' Theorem to it if you were actually calculating probabilities. Watch:

A = "a guy is a rapist"
B = "a guy overrides the woman's personal choices"

P(A) = is the probability of a guy being a rapist in the general population, i.e., that 1 / 60 in her estimation, but actually higher in actual studies

P(B) is the percentage of guys in the total population who override a woman's personal choices. Obviously this is less than 1

P(B|A), i.e., the conditional probability of B given A is 1, since you can't possibly be a rapist without overriding a partner's personal choice at least once. You know, the choice to not have sex at that time.

And Bayes' Theorem says:

P(A|B) = P(A) x P(B|A) / P(B)

Given that P(B|A) is 1 and P(B) is less than 1, this means that P(A|B) > P(A).

In plain English: "The probability of a guy you observed overriding a woman's choices to be a rapist, is greater than the probability of being a rapist in the total population."

So, yes, her risk estimation is not only it's logically sound, it's provably _mathematically_ sound.

I'll skip the rest of your considerations as, basically, I feel no need to debate vague personal suppositions about something mathematically proven.

[HansMustermann]

And obviously most of the men who are rapists (i.e. those who are not jumping out of bushes) are *not* giving these signals, or they wouldn't have had the opportunity to rape. I.e. the signals are useless for detecting rapists from non-rapists, and merely represent the author's and other women's irrational biases and paranoia.

That's a (probably unintentional, as is almost always the case) Nirvana Fallacy. Just because something doesn't catch _all_ cases, doesn't make it useless. Trivial example: cops occasionally get shot even while having guns and wearing kevlar vests, but nobody would say they're useless, or that the SWAT should stop using guns and bulletproof vests.

As shown in my previous message, it's mathematically provable that her rules for estimating who's a higher risk and who isn't are mathematically sound. Obviously you'll never know exactly who is and who isn't, because we both know that probabilities outside 1 and 0 never give you certainty. But for minimizing your risks by avoiding the higher probability cases, it is as mathematically sound as it gets.

[Ivor the Engineer]

I would say that you can judge a person's personality by their behaviour all right. To quote Dave Barry, "A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person". Someone who is overriding a stranger's choices on the bus, it's actually a very good indication that it's the kind of person who'd keep overriding her choices. And rape is a kind of overriding the partner's choice.

It's not only logically sound, but basically you could even apply Bayes' Theorem to it if you were actually calculating probabilities. Watch:

A = "a guy is a rapist"
B = "a guy overrides the woman's personal choices"

P(A) = is the probability of a guy being a rapist in the general population, i.e., that 1 / 60 in her estimation, but actually higher in actual studies

P(B) is the percentage of guys in the total population who override a woman's personal choices. Obviously this is less than 1

P(B|A), i.e., the probability of B given A is 1, since you can't possibly be a rapist without overriding a partner's personal choice at least once. You know, the choice to not have sex at that time.

And Bayes' Theorem says:

P(A|B) = P(A) x P(B|A) / P(B)

Given that P(B|A) is 1 and P(B) is less than 1, this means that P(A|B) > P(A).

In plain English: "The probability of a guy you observed overriding a woman's choices to be a rapist, is greater than the probability of being a rapist in the total population."

So, yes, her risk estimation is not only it's logically sound, it's provably _mathematically_ sound.

I'll skip the rest of your considerations as, basically, I feel no need to debate vague personal suppositions about something mathematically proven.

The highlighted part is questionable. Have you never overrided a woman's personal choice? I would speculate that every human has at some point overrided another human's personal choice. If so, then P(B) = 1 and you're mathematical proof collapses.

[HansMustermann]

Well, if that's too debatably worded for your taste, let's try, B = "trying to make a woman do something against her will, when it's a personal choice for herself, about herself, and which generally she has every right to take, and you have no authority to override."

I doubt that you could make every guy ever fit _that_ bill. Heck, if nothing else, some are naturally submissive or meek.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Well, if that's too debatably worded for your taste, let's try, B = "trying to make a woman do something against her will, when it's a personal choice for herself, about herself, and which generally she has every right to take, and you have no authority to override."

I doubt that you could make every guy ever fit _that_ bill. Heck, if nothing else, some are naturally submissive or meek.

How does talking to a person when he or she may not want to talk to you fit that description?

Are the people on the forum who respond to the posts of those who are ignoring them more likely to be rapists?

[Uncayimmy]

I would say that you can judge a person's personality by their behaviour all right. To quote Dave Barry, "A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person". Someone who is overriding a stranger's choices on the bus, it's actually a very good indication that it's the kind of person who'd keep overriding her choices. And rape is a kind of overriding the partner's choice.

You merely repeated her assertion and are presenting some mathematics that one could use if it were true. But this presumes the statement to be true. It does not prove it to be true.

Essentially you are arguing that the presence of one event at one end of a continuum of events indicates a probability at the other end of the continuum. One way this fails Ivor has already pointed out - we all act in ways contrary to the wishes of others, therefore every person is on the continuum. The other way it fails is that you have not demonstrated any connection between the two events beyond some overly simplistic way of wording the continuum. Bayes depends on conditional probability.

You and she need to establish a connection between behavior on a bus and behavior in the bedroom. I can relate my own personal experiences to demonstrate how this connection is by no means automatic.

As Bookitty so kindly pointed out, I am an "aggressive" person. I prefer to describe myself as someone will not shy away from a confrontation and will intervene in confrontations if I believe one party is at a significant disadvantage and is being treated unfairly or is in danger. I am not afraid of being hit nor am I afraid of hitting someone else, but I do my best to avoid both. It has been many years since either.

That said, here are a couple of stories. I pick up my son from preschool on a street that has a school bus lane and the signs in the street telling people to slow down to 15mph. I pick him up with my car. There have been times where cars didn't slow down even though the children and buses were there, and I was strapping my son into his car seat. Several times I have literally stepped out into the street, stood my ground, and made a speeding car stop. I didn't care if the driver was male or female. By your logic and that of the woman, this makes me much more likely to be a rapist because I exerted physical control (one could argue physical threat based on my actions) to alter the behavior of another person, and that person may have just not been paying attention and was innocently following the normal speed limit of 35mph.

My second story I have shared before. My ex and I rarely argued strongly, but on several occasions where we did, I walked away, sometimes even leaving the house. This pissed her off and upset her greatly. We finally discussed why it made her so upset.

Turns out that her father would ignore her as punishment when she was a child, sometimes not talking to her for days. My actions brought up feelings of being punished. She asked me why I walked away. I explained that I was mad and didn't want to say something mean to her. "Like what?" she asked. "Like calling you a selfish bitch. That's just not something I want to say to my wife, so rather than let my anger get the best of me, I'd rather just cool off so we can talk calmly." She told me she'd rather I call her a selfish bitch than walk away.

Based on the second event, it would seem logical that I am much less likely to be a rapist because I demonstrated control of my emotions and showed respect for her that many men in similar situations would not. In fact, she would sometimes call me names in anger, and my worst response was to walk away.

The first event, based on your logic, would not predict the second event. Both events seem to predict entirely different risks of me being a rapist.

What you and the author have done is taken the incredibly complex nature of human beings and human interaction, both of which are affected by genetics, culture, and the dynamics of the individual situation, and made incredibly simplistic evaluations that produce nothing of any value.

So, yes, her risk estimation is not only it's logically sound, it's provably _mathematically_ sound.

I'll skip the rest of your considerations as, basically, I feel no need to debate vague personal suppositions about something mathematically proven.
Bayes is rolling over in his grave, and all the Ted Bundy wannabes appreciate just how much easier you have made it for them to rape women.

[HansMustermann]

She's talking about risk assessment, which is probabilities not certainties. So the objection that it's somehow valid because you can't predict with certainty is basically invalid.

And yes, actually bayesian heuristics are exactly about predicting the probability of an event, if you know a different event. That's why there's an event A and an event B in there in the first place. That's the whole idea. That if you have very different events or properties and a conditional probability link from B to A, _you_ can estimate probabilities from A to B too.

The argument that you can't is basically claiming that Bayes' Theorem is false. And I guess you have a mathematical proof for that? I still only see vague personal suppositions boiling down to an implied Nirvana Fallacy: because you can't achieve 100% accuracy, then it's ok to pretend that it's a pure mystery.

[HansMustermann]

How does talking to a person when he or she may not want to talk to you fit that description?

Are the people on the forum who respond to the posts of those who are ignoring them more likely to be rapists?

You're trying to make her take part in a conversation, after she indicated that she's not interested. Note that she's not even talking about starting a conversation with someone with headphones on and reading a book, but about trying to continue it.

[Ivor the Engineer]

You're trying to make her take part in a conversation, after she indicated that she's not interested. Note that she's not even talking about starting a conversation with someone with headphones on and reading a book, but about trying to continue it.

Now all you have to do is link that behaviour with physically forcing a woman to have sex. Any evidence to suggest there is a correlation between the two, or is it so obvious no evidence is required?

[Uncayimmy]

She's talking about risk assessment, which is probabilities not certainties. So the objection that it's somehow valid because you can't predict with certainty is basically invalid.

And yes, actually bayesian heuristics are exactly about predicting the probability of an event, if you know a different event. That's why there's an event A and an event B in there in the first place. That's the whole idea. That if you have very different events or properties and a conditional probability link from B to A, _you_ can estimate probabilities from A to B too.

The argument that you can't is basically claiming that Bayes' Theorem is false. And I guess you have a mathematical proof for that? I still only see vague personal suppositions boiling down to an implied Nirvana Fallacy: because you can't achieve 100% accuracy, then it's ok to pretend that it's a pure mystery.

I never said anything about not being able to reach 100% accuracy. That's your straw man. I am saying that you and she have not provided any evidence that rape and something like interrupting a woman on a bus are somehow related and therefore worthy of consideration.

Now, if you want to play your little game with Bayes, go right ahead. By your logic you can use Bayes to "prove" that it's "logical" to consider the risk of men wearing long sleeved red shirts on the third date raping women because not every man wears a long sleeved red shirt on the third date, and thus the probability is less than 1. As a practical matter such a correlation is completely worthless, and applicability of Bayes mathematics doesn't prove that there's any value to a woman breaking off the date and never seeing the guy again because he wore a long sleeved red shirt.

I don't know where you're trying to go with this, but it's silly on its face.

ETA: If we take the author's commentary about whom she dates and doesn't date based on things like interrupting conversations on a bus and assume that a significant portion of women in the USA use the same techniques, we actually have no idea if that works or not. The reality is that the majority of rapes are by intimate partners. If her technique is valid, then the only way to prove it is to look at women who do and women who don't follow her technique and compare their rates of being raped by intimate partners. If the vast majority of women already follow this technique, then presumably the rate of rapes would be higher than they are already. If they don't, then getting women to adopt those techniques should result in a lowering of the incidence of intimate partner rape over time.

However, by telling all men what the warning signals are, she is advising rapists how to increase their chances of becoming an intimate partner and committing a rape.

[mediocrity511]

Giving advice for reducing risk is not blaming the victim, and people would do well to reinforce that notion at every turn. We give all sorts of advice to people about how to reduce their chances of being victims of crime. Entire industries are built around it (alarms for example). Travel guides give all sorts of advice on how to avoid crime in areas people visit. This woman's article is implicit advice to woman on how to avoid being raped (stay away from stinky strangers with objectionable tattoos). Why does it only became "blaming the victim" when it comes to rape? Why wasn't this woman accused of blaming the victim?

The reason I find it unpalatable to be told, "Don't rape" is the very strong implication that I'm in need of being told not to do something because I am considering it. Lots of people consider walking down dark alleys, carrying their valuables in a visible and easily accessible manner, or getting a screaming deal on bodywork from somebody who shows up at the door. These things happen all the time, so it's not unreasonable to remind them of the risk. And, of course, they are not doing anything "wrong" by considering these things.

Most men don't consider rape. If we assume that every rape is committed by a unique individual, then that 1 in 6 number means that 1 man in 6 may do it just once in his entire life, so it's not like it's even a remotely common event for that 1 in 6.

Beyond that, what good does it do? Do you think those serial rapists and men who feel entitled to woman's body or figure "she wants it" are going to listen? I don't. They probably laugh. Meanwhile, many kind and gentle men are put off by the admonition. Minor girls are raped more than adult women. How would you feel about somebody saying to your father, "Don't diddle your daughter" or something equally repulsive?

74,000 people were caught drinking driving in the UK in 2006
In 2006 85,000 women were raped in the UK.
So clearly the amount of people who rape someone and those who drink and drive are roughly of the same order of magnitude. We have so many adverts telling people not to drink and drive, we also have campaigns which inform people exactly what is drink and driving.

Oh and about asking me how I'd feel if someone told my Dad not to abuse me, you are again failing to understand just how common rape and sexual abuse is. 1% of people under 16 are sexually abused by their parent and carer. So you had roughly a 1 in 100 chance of asking someone who was abused wether they wish someone had asked their father to not do it.

[HansMustermann]

Actually, that's flat out wrong, Unca. You need not only a P(B) for that estimate, but also a P(B|A). _If_ the percentage of rapists wearing a red shirt on the third date were were known to be higher than the percentage of guys wearing red shirts on the third date in the general population, (ETA: or just the percentage of rapists wearing red ever vs the percentage of guys wearing a red shirt ever, that works too,) then yes, Bayes' Theorem would say exactly that: that it's ok to start worrying if the guy you date shows up in a red shirt on a third date.

Just because you obviously don't understand it, doesn't mean it's useless. It just means you obviously don't understand it.

And the whole _idea_ is to predict the probability of an event B when you know event A has happened, even if they're not the same type of event or behaviour. E.g., "If 50% of a high school's students are female, and only 40% of girls wear pants, if you see someone wearing pants from a distance, what's the probability it's a girl?" Nobody (sane) would say that wearing pants is the same kind of behaviour as being a girl, or anything, but you can calculate the probability anyway.

The other objections in the thread boiling down to "yeah, but there are other factors" are invalid too. Yes, if you knew other factors, you should adjust the estimate based on them too. But that doesn't mean you can't calculate a probability until you know all the factors.

E.g., in the girls and pants example, sure, someone could sound all profound by going on about what if genetic preferences influence it too, and what if certain kind of pants are more girl-like, and what if someone deliberately wears pants to deceive you (the Bundy objection.) So what? If you know those you should of course adjust the estimates, but in the meantime you still _can_ calculate a probability based on what you do know.

What she describes there is just the normal and correct way to assess risk. If you know nothing, that person starts at the general P(A). Once you know an event B you can correlate with, you move it to P(A|B). Once you have a C, D and E too, you move it to a P(A|B&C&D&E). And so on.

There is nothing irrational in there. That's how risk assessment works. That's how your insurance can adjust your premium based on what types of incidents you've been in, or conversely how many years without one you had. You start at P(A), then are moved to a P(A|B), then to a P(A|B&C) and so on.

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

There is nothing irrational in there. That's how risk assessment works. That's how your insurance can adjust your premium based on what types of incidents you've been in, or conversely how many years without one you had. You start at P(A), then are moved to a P(A|B), then to a P(A|B&C) and so on.

And people are paid lots of money to sift out the red-herrings from the truly predictive factors. Insurance companies don't want to turn down or price out good risks because of irrelevant information.

So, where's the evidence to indicate a man talking at a woman when she doesn't want to talk is predictive of that man being more likely to be a rapist?

[HansMustermann]

The evidence is that piece of maths above.

Really, nowhere does Bayes say "but only if it doesn't bother you, or can find a good reason to believe the correlation." It doesn't matter if there is a logical "why would B lead to A". Technically it doesn't even have to lead to. It's just a probability of A to happen if B happened.

In the girls in pants example, nobody says that being a girl is a cause of wearing pants, nor that wearing pants makes one a girl. You can calculate a conditional probability anyway.

Ditto here. It doesn't matter if you have a known reason why one would lead to the other, and in fact there doesn't even have to be a causation at all. It's a conditional probability.

[Lyrandar]

You and she need to establish a connection between behavior on a bus and behavior in the bedroom. I can relate my own personal experiences to demonstrate how this connection is by no means automatic.

(stories)

The first event, based on your logic, would not predict the second event. Both events seem to predict entirely different risks of me being a rapist.

First off: I think your behavior in both stories is admirable.

That said, I don't agree with your example. I would specify the nature of the warning signs a bit more carefully - in particular, I'm worried about motive. Your motive in the first story is entirely acceptable - your safety, your son's safety, and the safety of everyone else around you. The motive of someone that refuses to leave some woman alone is almost certainly based on what they want - I can't say that with certainty, but I think exceptions to that would be easy to notice. I don't find that admirable.

Believe me, I don't have any problems with aggressive behavior. Aggressive behavior for the wrong reason, though, I think makes a perfectly good warning sign that this person may not have respect for others.

What you and the author have done is taken the incredibly complex nature of human beings and human interaction, both of which are affected by genetics, culture, and the dynamics of the individual situation, and made incredibly simplistic evaluations that produce nothing of any value.

I'm willing to believe the author oversimplified a little to make her point simpler. I don't blame her for that, though. I'm willing to read what she wrote and accept it as mostly true with some exceptions that she doesn't mention for brevity's sake. Even if the woman you're dealing with is less cautious than the author, it's not like following the advice given will cause major problems.

[Uncayimmy]

74,000 people were caught drinking driving in the UK in 2006
In 2006 85,000 women were raped in the UK.
So clearly the amount of people who rape someone and those who drink and drive are roughly of the same order of magnitude. We have so many adverts telling people not to drink and drive, we also have campaigns which inform people exactly what is drink and driving.
Sigh...First, it's common courtesy to provide links to the sources of your data. Second, assuming your numbers are correct, you are comparing arrests to what are by far mostly unreported rapes. If you want to make a comparison, find the numbers for unreported drinking and driving incidents. According to this article (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8472268.stm), 3.4% of those drivers tested in one month by the police were intoxicated. According to this article (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/7563297/Number-of-cars-declines-for-the-first-time-since-Second-World-War.html) there are 31,000,000 cars on the roads in the UK. The math shows that 3.4% of that number is over 1,000,000, which is not the most reliable calculation but it demonstrates my point.

Continuing along this line, according to this report (http://www.ias.org.uk/resources/factsheets/drinkinggb.pdf), 59% of women and 75% of men drank alcohol within the last week. The number of people (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_Kingdom#Age_structure) over age 14 is about 50,000,000. If only half of them after drinking have a decision about driving, that's about 17,000,000 every week who have to make a choice about driving while intoxicated.

Do think the number of men considering raping somebody even approaches that?

Third, people drink all the time and are faced with the choice of driving. Alcohol is well known to impair judgment. The reminders are welcome, and they also remove the stigma that used to associated with somebody not drinking and driving (when I was coming up only wussies gave their keys to somebody else). Fourth, lots of people believe they can drive safely while under the influence and don't think they are doing any wrong yet, speaking for myself, I can so no situation where I would even consider rape as acceptable.

Your argument fails.

Oh and about asking me how I'd feel if someone told my Dad not to abuse me, you are again failing to understand just how common rape and sexual abuse is. 1% of people under 16 are sexually abused by their parent and carer. So you had roughly a 1 in 100 chance of asking someone who was abused wether they wish someone had asked their father to not do it.
Please don't tell me what I am and am not aware. In the NVAWS report they indicate that majority of rapes happen to minors. About 21% are raped for the first time before they reach age 12. Of those, 87% are raped by relatives. In the 12 to 17 age group it's about 20%.

That said, you didn't answer the question, and you twisted it around. I didn't say anything about somebody wishing their father didn't do it. I asked you to consider how insulting it is for a father to be told not to diddle his daughter when the very thought of such a thing boils the blood of most fathers.

You can continue to tell me that I shouldn't be offended by being told not to rape someone. Intellectually, I can see why someone might say that. It still bothers me, though. And I don't believe it actually has any benefit and probably hurts the cause.

[Professor Yaffle]

All else being equal, people tend to exhibit similar personality characteristics over different situations. So in the absence of empirical data on the subject it is common sense to assume that people who override other people's wishes sexually (rapists) will be more common in the group of people who override other people's wishes in the conversation area than in the group of people who do not override other people's wishes in the conversation area. Since the rapist group is much smaller than the conversation boundary crossers, the result is still to filter out a lot of non-rapists too, but its still enough for a woman to decide to put up her guard. ESPECIALLY AS SHE DIDN'T WANT TO CONVERSE WITH HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE!

[Ivor the Engineer]

The evidence is that piece of maths above.

Really, nowhere does Bayes say "but only if it doesn't bother you, or can find a good reason to believe the correlation." It doesn't matter if there is a logical "why would B lead to A". Technically it doesn't even have to lead to. It's just a probability of A to happen if B happened.

In the girls in pants example, nobody says that being a girl is a cause of wearing pants, nor that wearing pants makes one a girl. You can calculate a conditional probability anyway.

Ditto here. It doesn't matter if you have a known reason why one would lead to the other, and in fact there doesn't even have to be a causation at all. It's a conditional probability.

P(A|B) = P(A).P(B|A) / (P(A).P(B|A) + P(~A).P(B|~A))

A = 'rapist'.
B = 'talks at women who don't want to be talked to'.

What are your data to estimate P(B|A)?
What are your data to estimate P(B|~A)?

[Ivor the Engineer]

All else being equal, people tend to exhibit similar personality characteristics over different situations. So in the absence of empirical data on the subject it is common sense to assume that people who override other people's wishes sexually (rapists) will be more common in the group of people who override other people's wishes in the conversation area than in the group of people who do not override other people's wishes in the conversation area. Since the rapist group is much smaller than the conversation boundary crossers, the result is still to filter out a lot of non-rapists too, but its still enough for a woman to decide to put up her guard. ESPECIALLY AS SHE DIDN'T WANT TO CONVERSE WITH HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE!

Should I be keeping an eye on parents who sometimes shout at their kids in the supermarket?

Is it 'common sense' military men are more likely to be rapists, or would that just be a gross generalisation?

In fact, is anyone who exercises any form of authority more likely to be a rapists because they override another person's will?

[Professor Yaffle]

Re my previous post - in terms of the Big Five factor model of personality, I would say that rapists would tend to fall among those who measure low on the agreeableness factor. Persisting in trying to converse with someone who had given out signals that they do not want to talk would also be a rough and ready measure of their level of agreeableness - although it would catch more people as well as the rapists.

Agreeableness is a tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others. The trait reflects individual differences in general concern for social harmony. Agreeable individuals value getting along with others. They are generally considerate, friendly, generous, helpful, and willing to compromise their interests with others. Agreeable people also have an optimistic view of human nature. They believe people are basically honest, decent, and trustworthy.

Disagreeable individuals place self-interest above getting along with others. They are generally unconcerned with others’ well-being, and are less likely to extend themselves for other people. Sometimes their skepticism about others’ motives causes them to be suspicious, unfriendly, and uncooperative.

[edit] Sample agreeableness items
I am interested in people.
I feel others' feelings.
I have a soft heart.
I make people feel at ease.
I sympathize with others’ feelings.
I take time out for others.
I am not interested in other people’s problems. (reversed)
I am not really interested in others. (reversed)
I feel little concern for others. (reversed)
I insult people. (reversed)[30]
I like being isolated. (reversed)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#Agreeableness

[mediocrity511]

That said, you didn't answer the question, and you twisted it around. I didn't say anything about somebody wishing their father didn't do it. I asked you to consider how insulting it is for a father to be told not to diddle his daughter when the very thought of such a thing boils the blood of most fathers.

You can continue to tell me that I shouldn't be offended by being told not to rape someone. Intellectually, I can see why someone might say that. It still bothers me, though. And I don't believe it actually has any benefit and probably hurts the cause.

You didn't ask me about a father, you asked me about my father. I deliberately didn't answer the question because I was abused by my father, therefore how I feel about someone saying it to my dad is likely to be different to about 99% of the population. That said personally I don't think offending people is a good reason for taking an action that may result in fewer people being harmed. For example I know many gay men are offended by the fact that they aren't allowed to donate blood, however I think the risks of someone contracting a bloode-bourne disease trumps offending a few people.

[Professor Yaffle]

A sample of 521 college men completed the Revised NEO Personality Inventory and an expanded version of the Sexual Experiences Survey to examine whether variation in the Big Five personality traits in a normal, college population provides any insight into the nature of sexual assault and rape perpetrators. Rape perpetrators reported lower levels of Agreeableness and Conscientiousness when compared to both sexual assault perpetrators and nonperpetrators, and lower levels of Extraversion when compared to nonperpetrators. Rape perpetrators also endorsed lower levels of tendermindedness, excitement-seeking, warmth, positive emotions, feelings, altruism, competence, and dutifulness, and higher levels of vulnerability. Contrary to expectation, overall personality profiles followed remarkably comparable patterns for sexual assault and nonperpetrators, suggesting that sexual assault perpetrators were more similar to nonperpetrators than to rape perpetrators. Findings suggest that individuals who perpetrate sexual offenses, particularly rape, differ from nonperpetrators on dimensions of normal personality. Clinical and research implications are discussed.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19443734

[HansMustermann]

Ivor, when I have a mathematically proven formula, namely Bayes' Theorem, give me one good reason why I should use yours instead? It's not as if there is any doubt about whether Bayes is right or wrong about that formula.

Also, note that nowhere does it say that you have to go that specific. I can calculate, say, which percentage of girls wear pants even without narrowing down to basically "but what is the data for her being brunette and the pants being Levi jeans." Same here.

But you tell me if you have more specific data. Then we'll plug it into the formula and get a more accurate estimate.

But the absence of such more specific data doesn't mean one can't calculate a conditional probability based on the less specific known data. E.g., in the girls in pants example, I _can_ calculate a conditional probability even without knowing the numbers specifically for short-haired brunettes in Levi jeans.

Same here. She can estimate a risk anyway. It won't be as accurate an estimate as one based on more specific numbers, but it's mathematically sound to calculate one based on the larger category anyway.

Unless, as I was telling Unca, you want to claim that Bayes' Theorem is false. Well, have fun proving that.

ETA: and what makes it even sillier a red herring is that P(A).P(B|A) + P(~A).P(B|~A) in your formula equals P(B). Which makes it just more blatantly irrelevant to try to slice "yeah, but you don't know P(B|~A)" when mathematically provably it makes no difference in the final result. It's not even just a logical red herring, it's a mathematically provable red herring.

[Dipayan]

B = "a guy overrides the woman's personal choices"

According to the article, for a girl on the subway, 'looking out of the window' is code for 'don't disturb me'. Note that Ms. Starling does not say that this is true only for her. She is making a pretty sweeping statement here. So if you happen to talk to a girl on a subway who is looking out of the window, apparently you are sending out a subtle sign that you could be a potential rapist.

A statement like 'a guy overrides a woman's personal choice' is a strong statement, and it can hardly be used for a situation such as this. Unless, it is your contention that every person who is looking out of the window in a subway is doing so to signal to others that they do not want to be disturbed. If you cannot show this to be true, this condition of yours is not met.

You might say that I am taking her too literally and thereby losing the essence of her article, but my issue is with the little things, not the big picture.

[Uncayimmy]

Actually, that's flat out wrong, Unca. You need not only a P(B) for that estimate, but also a P(B|A). _If_ the percentage of rapists wearing a red shirt on the third date were were known to be higher than the percentage of guys wearing red shirts on the third date in the general population, (ETA: or just the percentage of rapists wearing red ever vs the percentage of guys wearing a red shirt ever, that works too,) then yes, Bayes' Theorem would say exactly that: that it's ok to start worrying if the guy you date shows up in a red shirt on a third date.

We don't know P(B|A) when it comes to interrupting conversations or wearing red shirts and rape. Period. We can assign a value and do some calculations. There is no requirement whatsoever that P(B|A) needs to be greater than P(B|C) to use Bayes.

Just because you obviously don't understand it, doesn't mean it's useless. It just means you obviously don't understand it.
Again with the unsupported assertions.

And the whole _idea_ is to predict the probability of an event B when you know event A has happened, even if they're not the same type of event or behaviour. E.g., "If 50% of a high school's students are female, and only 40% of girls wear pants, if you see someone wearing pants from a distance, what's the probability it's a girl?" Nobody (sane) would say that wearing pants is the same kind of behaviour as being a girl, or anything, but you can calculate the probability anyway.
That is an accurate description. However, it says nothing about the value of whether considering pants is a good idea or not. It could say that it's a horrible idea. Let's keep our eye on the ball here. The author has offered that something like interrupting a conversation is an indicator of rape potential, which assumes that at least one man in this world has never interrupted a conversation. He's either a rapist or he's not. Therefore, we can use Bayes.

So what? Does this make her premise a valid one?

The other objections in the thread boiling down to "yeah, but there are other factors" are invalid too. Yes, if you knew other factors, you should adjust the estimate based on them too. But that doesn't mean you can't calculate a probability until you know all the factors.
Another straw man.

What she describes there is just the normal and correct way to assess risk.
Another unsupported assertion.

If you know nothing, that person starts at the general P(A). Once you know an event B you can correlate with, you move it to P(A|B). Once you have a C, D and E too, you move it to a P(A|B&C&D&E). And so on.
She doesn't know any of them!

Look, the first thing she has to do is demonstrate that there is a statistically significant difference between rude men (tired of typing interrupting conversations) and men who are not rude and rape. Everyone is rude at some point or another, so the probability of a rude person being a rapist is 100% and the probability of a rude person not being a rapist is 100%.

You can then try to get more granular with the definition of rude and looking at specific behaviors. If you can find a behavior that is different among rapists and non-rapists, then you're on to something. You can then invoke Bayes if you want. There's nothing profound about that declaration. Nobody has argued against it. I have argued that nobody has presented any evidence for a specific behavior.

If such a behavior or characteristic can be established, then we have to enter into a new discussion about the value of looking at that behavior.

[Dipayan]

The point being that, Hans, I would think you are correct in that a rapist is more likely to be a man who overrides a woman's personal choices. But my issue is that most of the examples given in the article are too insipid to be called 'overriding a woman's personal choices', unless we specify that we are only talking about a sample size of one - Phaedra Starling.

[Uncayimmy]

Re my previous post - in terms of the Big Five factor model of personality, I would say that rapists would tend to fall among those who measure low on the agreeableness factor. Persisting in trying to converse with someone who had given out signals that they do not want to talk would also be a rough and ready measure of their level of agreeableness - although it would catch more people as well as the rapists.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#Agreeableness

At least now we're getting somewhere. Too bad the Revised NEO Personality Inventory they used is copyrighted and thus not subject to enough peer-reviewed criticism. I hate seeing studies about what people answered to questions without actually seeing the questions. I also hate seeing abstracts that talk about lower or higher levels of something without using the words "statistically significant." Anybody familiar with my posting history knows that I apply these same skeptical standards to all studies.

I agree that it's possible that persisting in conversation might indicate a lack of agreeableness. At the same time I will note that perpetrators score lower in extravertism, which is "the act, state, or habit of being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from what is outside the self".[3] Extraverts tend to enjoy human interactions and to be enthusiastic, talkative, assertive, and gregarious."

In other words one could just easily use this data to say that the assertive, talkative guy on the bus is less likely to be a rapist.

[HansMustermann]

We don't know P(B|A) when it comes to interrupting conversations or wearing red shirts and rape. Period. We can assign a value and do some calculations.

Except again, there is nothing that says you can use Bayes only for categories as specific as your highness approves. If you don't have the specific data for the more specific behaviour C to calculate a P(A|C), you can still use the more generic super-category B to calculate a P(A|B).

See again the example of girls in jeans. If I don't have the more specific data of how many girls wear Levi jeans, I can instead calculate from the probability of girls using pants.

There is no requirement whatsoever that P(B|A) needs to be greater than P(B|C) to use Bayes.

Considering that i never said that, well, yeah. Any other irrelevant wisdom you feel like dispensing?

Again with the unsupported assertions.

I think you've supported that assertion of mine quite amply by now, actually.

That is an accurate description. However, it says nothing about the value of whether considering pants is a good idea or not. It could say that it's a horrible idea.

I never said that it did. It's just a conditional probability. So that would make this just another red herring. Yes, the example has nothing do with how good an idea it is to wear pants, nor with the radius of Pluto's orbit, nor with the height of the Great Pyramid, nor anything else. It's just an example of calculating a conditional probability.

Let's keep our eye on the ball here. The author has offered that something like interrupting a conversation is an indicator of rape potential, which assumes that at least one man in this world has never interrupted a conversation. He's either a rapist or he's not. Therefore, we can use Bayes.

Well, I'm glad we can at least agree that we can use Bayes. But again, it says nothing about how specific you need to get with the event you correlate. There is nothing in there which says you can only correlate with specifically "a guy insisting to have a conversation", and not with the super-category of "a guy overriding your personal choices."

You can correlate anything with anything, if the data supports it.

So what? Does this make her premise a valid one?

That's what I've been trying to say.

Another straw man.

It's on the same page, so hardly a strawman.

She doesn't know any of them!

Not with decimals or anything, but you only need to know that one number is 1 and another is less than 1 to know that the risk just increased.

Plus, the process described is valid anyway, even if necessarily inaccurate.

Look, the first thing she has to do is demonstrate that there is a statistically significant difference between rude men (tired of typing interrupting conversations) and men who are not rude and rape. Everyone is rude at some point or another, so the probability of a rude person being a rapist is 100% and the probability of a rude person not being a rapist is 100%.

Prof Yaffle already supported that, but basically no the author doesn't even have to do that. Again, there is no requirement that the events correlated must be as arbitrarily specific as you approve.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Ivor, when I have a mathematically proven formula, namely Bayes' Theorem, give me one good reason why I should use yours instead? It's not as if there is any doubt about whether Bayes is right or wrong about that formula.

Mine is Bayes'. I've just expanded the P(B) in the denominator. See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_inference).

Also, note that nowhere does it say that you have to go that specific. I can calculate, say, which percentage of girls wear pants even without narrowing down to basically "but what is the data for her being brunette and the pants being Levi jeans." Same here.

But you tell me if you have more specific data. Then we'll plug it into the formula and get a more accurate estimate.

But the absence of such more specific data doesn't mean one can't calculate a conditional probability based on the less specific known data. E.g., in the girls in pants example, I _can_ calculate a conditional probability even without knowing the numbers specifically for short-haired brunettes in Levi jeans.

Same here. She can estimate a risk anyway. It won't be as accurate an estimate as one based on more specific numbers, but it's mathematically sound to calculate one based on the larger category anyway.

Unless, as I was telling Unca, you want to claim that Bayes' Theorem is false. Well, have fun proving that.

I know how to apply Bayes' rule. In this case it requires one to have sources for estimates of P(A) (which we have), P(B|A) and P(B|~A) (which we don't). What are your estimates for the latter two probabilities and where did you get them from?

Are you just assuming rapists talk at people? Why would they do this if women will think men who do this are more likely to be rapists? Remember the article was written as advice to men on how not to appear like a rapist to women, so it seems obvious that successful rapists do *not* behave in ways which make them appear like rapists two women before raping them.

[Uncayimmy]

Hans:

I am not wasting anymore time this Bayes thing. I wrote, "My inability (or hers) to answer that question doesn't mean that what she's suggesting is a valid technique. It also presumes that there is a way to tell. Do you have any evidence for markers that indicate the likelihood of a man being a rapist? If so, please present them."

Perhaps you thought by "technique" I meant using conditional probabilities. I'm not sure why unless you stopped reading at the first sentence and assumed what I meant. Obviously the whole thing makes much more sense taken in the context of finding such a conditional probability in the first place. Following the thread backwards, you can see that by "technique" I was referring to where I wrote "her later arguments are built on unproven premises (men who ignore "no" in a non-sexual setting are more likely to do so in a sexual setting)."

When you responded to my request for evidence of markers that indicate the likelihood of a man committing rape, you launched into the whole Bayes thing as if that proved something.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Note sure how reliable they are, but I've been looking for sources for behaviours which can be used to identify rapists. Here are two such lists:

http://rapesurvivor.pbworks.com/Rapists

Warning signs for potential male rapists

It is very difficult to predict who may or may not be a potential rapist because rapists have many [personality type]s, and use many different methods. However, certain behavioral characteristics have been observed in some rapists. These should be used cautiously as "warning signs", since non-rapists and other innocent people may also exhibit similar behaviours:


Extreme emotional insensitivity and egotism;
Habitual degradation and verbal devaluation of others;
Tries to tell others what they are feeling and thinking, as though it is his or her decision and not theirs. "S/he said no, but s/he meant yes";
Consistently using intimidation in language, or threatening behavior to get his way. Uses words like "bitch" and "whore" to describe women;
Excessive, chronic, or brooding anger;
Becoming obsessed with the object of his or her romantic affections, long after his or her advances have been rejected;
Extreme mood swings;
Violent outbursts; lack of impulse control;
Aggressive and violent;
Cruel behavior, especially under the influence of alcohol or drugs.


Scientific research does not support the assumption that rape fantasies are warning signs of a potential rapist. While rapists were almost invariably found to have rape fantasies, they were a very small minority compared to a far larger number of psychologically healthy and normal men who had rape fantasies but did not commit rape.

http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/profile.html

Danger signs

1) Insensitivity for others/emphasis on self - Does this person put his wants above the needs, feelings or well being of others? Is getting his way more important to him than other people's welfare? Often this can go beyond mere selfishness and border nearly on an "assumed divine right." Often these people will justify a particularly vicious action with a flip comment like, "Hey, that's how the game is played." Such a person has no understanding that he must co-exist with others. Because he simply exists he thinks the world "owes" him whatever he wants. A common tactic of such a person it to make you feel bad for not doing what he wants.

2) Belittling behavior or attitudes towards others - Does this person habitually make nasty, belittling or degrading comments about others – especially under the guise of joking? Does this person think he is better than others? Does he look down on others? A nouveau riche aristocrat? Is he a racist? A person who thinks that race or social position makes him superior can also assume gender does too. When you think you are superior, an assumed right to ‘take’ what you want often follows.

3) Negating behavior or comments - Closely related to 1 and 2. Does he try to tell you what you are feeling or thinking? Or worse, tell you what you are not? Comments like "you don’t really mean that" are serious indicators of someone trying to negate you. A person who negates others is trying to take away the other person’s thoughts, feelings and needs and attempting to project his wants onto that person. The most obvious example of this is "Well even though she said ‘no’, she really meant ‘yes’".

4) Hostile and/or threatening language - What words does a person use? Choice of words convey subconscious assumptions about a particular topic. For example a man who generically refers to women as "bitches" does not have good assumptions about females (or much respect). It is all too easy to dismiss this behavior as just "blowing off steam." But if it is a constant behavior, it goes far beyond that. Someone who habitually uses violent or threatening language should be carefully watched for possible escalation. It’s on his mind already. It’s a uncomfortably short step from ‘thinking about’ to ‘doing’.

5) Bullying - This behavior is especially dangerous. Does this person use overt or subtle threats to get his way? A bully uses the threat of violence more than actual violence. Most often bullies are not willing to risk conflict with someone who can hurt them (an alpha male), and will instead chose to intimidate someone he considers weaker and safer. Someone who is bullying over other matters can easily turn to bullying you regarding sex.

6) Excessive anger - How easy does this person anger? Is he a "Short Fuse"? Does he boil over at the slightest problem? This is an indication of chronic anger. A person who explodes over a minor issue is like a full pot boiling over on the stove. It’s not that the issue is all that important, but that he has so much anger already, any more causes him to explode. Often people with chronic anger look for targets to vent their anger at. This could manifest as physical fights, abuse, or rape.

7) Brooding/ revenge - Does this person hang onto his anger long after the situation is over? Will he still be stewing over something while everyone else has moved onto other things? Will he become anti-social and glare at the source of his anger from across the room? Will he insist on taking revenge for real or imagined slights? Both indicate a petty and obsessive personality. A brooder fixates on something and then works himself into a frenzy over it. A person who seeks revenge "has to win" and is willing to take it to extremes. Refusing such a person’s sexual advances can turn this tendency towards you.

8) Obsession – This is a close cousin to number seven. It is a major factor with acquaintance rapes. This is the person who won’t leave you alone. He insists on ‘hitting on you’ long after you have told him no. He is always trying establish forced intimacy (see ‘bonding process’ below). Such obsessions easily turn into anger when his advances are rejected. One day he shows up in a fringe area, drunk and attacks.

9) Extreme mood swings - Beware someone who can go from wildly happy to deeply wounded at a moment's notice. This sort of personality can feel justified to commit an unlimited amount of violence and damage, because you "hurt his feelings." This is a common pattern among those with chronic anger about life.

10) Physical tantrums - How does this person get angry? Especially when denied "getting his way". Beware of a person who regularly physically assaults his environment i.e. hitting walls, kicking things etc. It is only a short step from striking a car to attacking you.

11) Jock or gorilla mentality - This mentality promotes both acceptance and encouragement for the use of violence. It is especially common among participants of contact sports. What is most insidious about this mentality is the "jock" receives, not only positive reinforcement, but out-and-out applause for being aggressive and violent. This can easily lead to a failure to differentiate between the playing field and real life. Mike Tyson’s comment is a prime example: "Nobody ever objected before."

12) A mean drunk - Nearly all rape and abuse cases involve alcohol. Watch what surfaces when someone is intoxicated. It shows what is always lurking underneath. Do not put yourself into a situation where you would deal with such a person while he is intoxicated. Most importantly, don't allow your facilities to be diminished by alcohol or drugs in this person's presence.

13) Alcohol or drug abuse - To begin with drug and alcohol addiction can in be traced back to selfishness and a refusal to change one’s world view. Alcohol and drugs are not the cause of bad behavior, rather they are used as an excuse! Often the attacker intentionally became intoxicated to ignore the social restrictions and inhibitions regarding violence.

While there are others, these behaviors are serious indicators of a potential rapist. This short list should acquaint you with the basics. Not all men are rapists, but a person like this has a higher probability than others. You not only find these traits among rapists and abusers, but also professional criminals. Philosophically there is little difference between such, they are all selfish. Most often it is just a matter of degrees, style and choice of victims.

[Furcifer]

Jesus Haploid Christ, repeating the same strawman again won't magically make it true, you know? She's not saying she'll treat you like a rapist, she's saying she won't date you if you give the wrong signals.

That's the first time I've ever mentioned the fact that putting "Schrodinger" in front of a word apparently allows someone to call you whatever they want, without actually calling you anything.

Second she said you're acting more like a rapist if you do x,y and z. It's the same thing.

Third, you really need to brush up on your fallacies. She uses "Schrodinger" in front of rapist and now you magically believe because she's calling men a "Schrodinger's rapist" she's not calling you a rapist or treating you like one. It isn't a strawman. She's advocating treating every stranger you meet as a rapist of varying degrees.


Says the guy who's been arguing she shouldn't even call a rapist or rapist but something as vague and undefined as "jerk", or that if she even takes the precautions that actually work she's some kind of irrational fear monger, or trying to substitute lifetime for anual prevalence numbers because they're (obviously) smaller, etc. What would your argument above make _you_?

:dl:

Since when is "jerk" vague and undefined? You're joking right?



Actually, you may even have a point there. Let's see:

- you accused people of lying, yet it's you who repeatedly make up lies about the article, even if it's pointed out that the article doesn't say that

- you accuse people of not understanding maths, yet you repeatedly flunk a 4'th grade level arithmetic problem. And it's already generous to rate it even 4'th grade.

I'm going to ask you a simple question that everyone has avoided, see if you can answer it: What did she multiply by 10 to get 1 in 60?

I bet you can't answer it, and it's a very simple question.

I'm going to use my super powers and guess you will lie and squirm like a worm on a hook trying to deny the obvious.

[Uncayimmy]

First off: I think your behavior in both stories is admirable.

Thank you, but a lot of people wouldn't, especially in the case of stepping out in front of cars. They would find it overly aggressive. After all, nobody was immediate harm, and I caused distress to the driver. My wife at the time certainly saw my behavior as far worse than calling her a name.

In both cases somebody could easily make the case that I am more likely to rape. It's classic confirmation bias. In the first case I demonstrated my willingness, nay, eagerness to control a situation that wasn't mine to control. Anybody who would do that wouldn't think twice about dominating a woman if he felt it was his right, and we all know many men see women as property or objects of conquest. In the second case I demonstrated an uncontrollable temper, which is why I had to leave. What happens when I don't leave? Do I snap? Or maybe I demonstrated manipulative behavior and by walking away I was in some way trying to get her to submit to my will by withholding my attention and presence.

My point is that this is all just a parlor game. We can look at all sorts of behaviors outside of a sexual situation and invent our own probabilities of what that would mean in the bedroom. Of course, I'm talking about intimate partner rape, not stranger attacks. Professor Yaffle cited some data, but depending on which part you read, the person on the bus pushing a conversation may be more or less likely to be a rapist.

It's not a comfortable situation to realize that you've got little in the way of predictive power, but that's no excuse for adopting unsound policies. It's certainly an avenue for further research. I wrote another post where I went into detail about behavior I thought was reasonably predictive, and I gave some reasonable scientific basis for it. Unfortunately, the best predictor of unwanted sexual behavior involves engaging in sexual behavior with that person.

What makes it worse is that once you're at that point, it becomes even harder to look at the situation objectively. It's easy to dismiss a stranger as a potential rapist because he hit on you too hard on the bus. It's quite hard to think that your lover who got a little rough and aggressive while drunk the other night is giving you a big clue that one night he goes over the edge and forces himself on you. But the statistics say that your boyfriend is far, far more likely to rape you than any of those pushy strangers on the bus.

[HansMustermann]

I'm going to ask you a simple question that everyone has avoided, see if you can answer it: What did she multiply by 10 to get 1 in 60?

I bet you can't answer it, and it's a very simple question.

Actually

1. she didn't multiply, she divided

2. the number divided was the percentage of women raped in the general population.

And not only nobody avoided it this far, it's been pointed out to you repeatedly.

I'm going to use my super powers and guess you will lie and squirm like a worm on a hook trying to deny the obvious.

Super-powers failed, obviously.

[HansMustermann]

Mine is Bayes'. I've just expanded the P(B) in the denominator. See here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_inference).



I know how to apply Bayes' rule. In this case it requires one to have sources for estimates of P(A) (which we have), P(B|A) and P(B|~A) (which we don't). What are your estimates for the latter two probabilities and where did you get them from?

And again: no it doesn't. Just because you can expand something into a sum, doesn't mean it's a valid objection that basically "you may know the sum, but not the individual terms." As long as all that's required by that division is the sum, that's all that matters.

[HansMustermann]

Note sure how reliable they are, but I've been looking for sources for behaviours which can be used to identify rapists. Here are two such lists:

http://rapesurvivor.pbworks.com/Rapists



http://www.nononsenseselfdefense.com/profile.html

Well, that's helpful. Thanks. Now let's look at those and see how far the author of the article was off the mark:

Danger signs

1) Insensitivity for others/emphasis on self - Does this person put his wants above the needs, feelings or well being of others? Is getting his way more important to him than other people's welfare? Often this can go beyond mere selfishness and border nearly on an "assumed divine right." Often these people will justify a particularly vicious action with a flip comment like, "Hey, that's how the game is played." Such a person has no understanding that he must co-exist with others. Because he simply exists he thinks the world "owes" him whatever he wants. A common tactic of such a person it to make you feel bad for not doing what he wants.

I'd think that -- although not deterministically conclusive -- someone who is basically a jerk to a stranger on the bus (to use 3body's "jerk" term) has already fit this criterion. So it would seem to me like she at least got one criterion right, after all.

2) Belittling behavior or attitudes towards others - Does this person habitually make nasty, belittling or degrading comments about others – especially under the guise of joking? Does this person think he is better than others? Does he look down on others? A nouveau riche aristocrat? Is he a racist? A person who thinks that race or social position makes him superior can also assume gender does too. When you think you are superior, an assumed right to ‘take’ what you want often follows.

Just look around in this thread. We've even had comments of the type of "ask a man to explain it to you" (though now it's been thankfully moved by a moderator.) It's not that hard to see that at least some people do think women are in some way inferior or incapable of taking their own choices or knowing what they really want.

But at any rate, someone who thinks he can override her choices or that it's ok to make her uncomfortable, even when it comes to little things, has to some extent proven that he puts himself and his needs above hers. To exactly what extent, remains to be proven, but we're talking something that nevertheless is recognized as a potential warning sign.

3) Negating behavior or comments - Closely related to 1 and 2. Does he try to tell you what you are feeling or thinking? Or worse, tell you what you are not? Comments like "you don’t really mean that" are serious indicators of someone trying to negate you. A person who negates others is trying to take away the other person’s thoughts, feelings and needs and attempting to project his wants onto that person. The most obvious example of this is "Well even though she said ‘no’, she really meant ‘yes’".

Here we basically have it refined to exactly what the author was talking about. Someone who thinks they can override someone's choices -- and note that here it's talking about behaviour too, not just telling her explicitly "you don't mean that" -- has just rung this warning bell.

And, at any rate, it's exactly reflected in one of the author's bolded criteria: "If you fail to respect what women say, you label yourself a problem."

4) Hostile and/or threatening language - What words does a person use? Choice of words convey subconscious assumptions about a particular topic. For example a man who generically refers to women as "bitches" does not have good assumptions about females (or much respect). It is all too easy to dismiss this behavior as just "blowing off steam." But if it is a constant behavior, it goes far beyond that. Someone who habitually uses violent or threatening language should be carefully watched for possible escalation. It’s on his mind already. It’s a uncomfortably short step from ‘thinking about’ to ‘doing’.

Is not explicitly addressed in the article, except maybe tangentially.

5) Bullying - This behavior is especially dangerous. Does this person use overt or subtle threats to get his way? A bully uses the threat of violence more than actual violence. Most often bullies are not willing to risk conflict with someone who can hurt them (an alpha male), and will instead chose to intimidate someone he considers weaker and safer. Someone who is bullying over other matters can easily turn to bullying you regarding sex.

While not explicitly mentioned as such, a lot of the behaviours she describes as negatives can be actually done intentionally as basically intimidation attempts. She doesn't know which is which, but I think she has a right to be cautious if someone's behaviour is strangely all that would take to make her feel extra vulnerable.

6) Excessive anger - How easy does this person anger? Is he a "Short Fuse"? Does he boil over at the slightest problem? This is an indication of chronic anger. A person who explodes over a minor issue is like a full pot boiling over on the stove. It’s not that the issue is all that important, but that he has so much anger already, any more causes him to explode. Often people with chronic anger look for targets to vent their anger at. This could manifest as physical fights, abuse, or rape.

IIRC not explicitly addressed in the article.

7) Brooding/ revenge - Does this person hang onto his anger long after the situation is over? Will he still be stewing over something while everyone else has moved onto other things? Will he become anti-social and glare at the source of his anger from across the room? Will he insist on taking revenge for real or imagined slights? Both indicate a petty and obsessive personality. A brooder fixates on something and then works himself into a frenzy over it. A person who seeks revenge "has to win" and is willing to take it to extremes. Refusing such a person’s sexual advances can turn this tendency towards you.

8) Obsession – This is a close cousin to number seven. It is a major factor with acquaintance rapes. This is the person who won’t leave you alone. He insists on ‘hitting on you’ long after you have told him no. He is always trying establish forced intimacy (see ‘bonding process’ below). Such obsessions easily turn into anger when his advances are rejected. One day he shows up in a fringe area, drunk and attacks.

Basically here 7 is a possible manifestation of 8, and 8 is basically illustrated in her obsessive emailer example.

9) Extreme mood swings - Beware someone who can go from wildly happy to deeply wounded at a moment's notice. This sort of personality can feel justified to commit an unlimited amount of violence and damage, because you "hurt his feelings." This is a common pattern among those with chronic anger about life.

10) Physical tantrums - How does this person get angry? Especially when denied "getting his way". Beware of a person who regularly physically assaults his environment i.e. hitting walls, kicking things etc. It is only a short step from striking a car to attacking you.

11) Jock or gorilla mentality - This mentality promotes both acceptance and encouragement for the use of violence. It is especially common among participants of contact sports. What is most insidious about this mentality is the "jock" receives, not only positive reinforcement, but out-and-out applause for being aggressive and violent. This can easily lead to a failure to differentiate between the playing field and real life. Mike Tyson’s comment is a prime example: "Nobody ever objected before."

12) A mean drunk - Nearly all rape and abuse cases involve alcohol. Watch what surfaces when someone is intoxicated. It shows what is always lurking underneath. Do not put yourself into a situation where you would deal with such a person while he is intoxicated. Most importantly, don't allow your facilities to be diminished by alcohol or drugs in this person's presence.

13) Alcohol or drug abuse - To begin with drug and alcohol addiction can in be traced back to selfishness and a refusal to change one’s world view. Alcohol and drugs are not the cause of bad behavior, rather they are used as an excuse! Often the attacker intentionally became intoxicated to ignore the social restrictions and inhibitions regarding violence.

While there are others, these behaviors are serious indicators of a potential rapist. This short list should acquaint you with the basics. Not all men are rapists, but a person like this has a higher probability than others. You not only find these traits among rapists and abusers, but also professional criminals. Philosophically there is little difference between such, they are all selfish. Most often it is just a matter of degrees, style and choice of victims.

9 to 13 are not explicitly addressed in the article.

So basically it seems to me strange that so many people would have it so hard to believe that there's any possible rationality in her criteria, when those in the article are a direct match to half the recognized list of danger signs you quoted. She even left out the cases when a guy is directly aggressive or whatnot.

[Augustine]

It's not only logically sound, but basically you could even apply Bayes' Theorem to it if you were actually calculating probabilities. Watch:

A = "a guy is a rapist"
B = "a guy overrides the woman's personal choices"

P(A) = is the probability of a guy being a rapist in the general population, i.e., that 1 / 60 in her estimation, but actually higher in actual studies

P(B) is the percentage of guys in the total population who override a woman's personal choices. Obviously this is less than 1

P(B|A), i.e., the conditional probability of B given A is 1, since you can't possibly be a rapist without overriding a partner's personal choice at least once. You know, the choice to not have sex at that time.

And Bayes' Theorem says:

P(A|B) = P(A) x P(B|A) / P(B)

Given that P(B|A) is 1 and P(B) is less than 1, this means that P(A|B) > P(A).

In plain English: "The probability of a guy you observed overriding a woman's choices to be a rapist, is greater than the probability of being a rapist in the total population."

So, yes, her risk estimation is not only it's logically sound, it's provably _mathematically_ sound.

So I assume she could also use
B = "a guy is a member of a certain race"
as well, correct? That would be mathematically sound as well, correct?

[Uncayimmy]

Note sure how reliable they are, but I've been looking for sources for behaviours which can be used to identify rapists. Here are two such lists:

The first link seems to be dealing more with attack-style rapists and not so much with the non-violent, intimate partner rapes that make up the majority. There seems to be some good stuff, but they do say:

It is very difficult to predict who may or may not be a potential rapist because rapists have many [personality type]s, and use many different methods. However, certain behavioral characteristics have been observed in some rapists. These should be used cautiously as "warning signs", since non-rapists and other innocent people may also exhibit similar behaviours:

The second link doesn't provide any indication that the information is science based or even based on expert opinion. The male author is allegedly an expert on hand-to-hand combat. It says, "his main skill, however, is to find the easiest and best way to handle violent situations." The female author worked as an editor. Neither has any training in the field.

Basically, the second article is little more than an elaboration of the bullet points of the first article. In fact, each bullet point appears in the same order in both articles except that the second article adds "Bullying" in the middle. Other than that they are essentially the same thing in the same order using very similar language. If I had to guess I would say the second article was based on the first.

Overall, what they describe sounds reasonable. Of course, it takes a lot more than just a brief encounter with a stranger to detect, and even then, as they say, it can be "very difficult" to predict. And as I have said several times, it needs to be an ongoing process of evaluation, and it can be very difficult to admit to the signs when there's an emotional attachment.

[Ivor the Engineer]

And again: no it doesn't. Just because you can expand something into a sum, doesn't mean it's a valid objection that basically "you may know the sum, but not the individual terms." As long as all that's required by that division is the sum, that's all that matters.

Actually we both made an error. Earlier I stated that P(B) becomes 1 when B is uncorrelated with A. This is both sloppy and incorrect. When B is independent of (and so uncorreleated with) A, P(B) = P(B|A), so that

P(A|B) = P(A).

I.e. Event B provides no information which can increase or decrease the probability of A being true.

Your error was assuming that because P(B) < 1, this makes P(A|B) > P(A).

ETA: Although I see you defined B such that P(B|A) = 1.

So, where is the evidence that rapists are more likely to start unwanted conversations with people than non-rapists?

[Furcifer]

Actually

1. she didn't multiply, she divided


Actually no she didn't, she multiplied two unrelated ratios. Nice squirm.


2. the number divided was the percentage of women raped in the general population.

A lie or you just don't have any clue about math. The percentage of women raped dived by 10 is {16.66%/ 10= 1.666%} or 1.66% of women raped. Not 1 in 60 men are rapists.



Super-powers failed, obviously.

Not quite, you lied and squirmed. (That's 2 in 2 or 100% FYI) You're very predictable, perhaps that's why you don't mind profiling :D

[Furcifer]

The first link seems to be dealing more with attack-style rapists and not so much with the non-violent, intimate partner rapes that make up the majority. There seems to be some good stuff, but they do say:



The second link doesn't provide any indication that the information is science based or even based on expert opinion. The male author is allegedly an expert on hand-to-hand combat. It says, "his main skill, however, is to find the easiest and best way to handle violent situations." The female author worked as an editor. Neither has any training in the field.

Basically, the second article is little more than an elaboration of the bullet points of the first article. In fact, each bullet point appears in the same order in both articles except that the second article adds "Bullying" in the middle. Other than that they are essentially the same thing in the same order using very similar language. If I had to guess I would say the second article was based on the first.

Overall, what they describe sounds reasonable. Of course, it takes a lot more than just a brief encounter with a stranger to detect, and even then, as they say, it can be "very difficult" to predict. And as I have said several times, it needs to be an ongoing process of evaluation, and it can be very difficult to admit to the signs when there's an emotional attachment.

^This

The predictors listed are probably very good over a period of time. That period of time is much longer than simple interaction on a bus or even a date.

It's pretty obvious what the target audience is, and given the stats it's the appropriate audience to speak to.

You'll also notice the deliberate attempt here to point out this shouldn't be used to accuse innocent people of rape or being rapists. The author in question suggests this, then goes on to do it anyways.

[Furcifer]

The word 'rape' seems to be extremely polarizing. Just the existence of that word in the article seems to have blinded a lot of people to the fact that it is badly thought out and poorly written.

Like UncaYimmy, 3BodyProblem and SatanicSheep, I too understand where the authoress is coming from, but the execution is definitely poor.

Yes, that's the basic gist of it. I'd go so far as to say the author has good intentions, but in writing her guide for men on approaching strange women she seems to have missed her target audience-men and instead used the inflammatory language to get the rally cries from women.

I can be as sincere as I want writing a "How to understand men; A woman's guide to dating" and if I start throwing around the word **** or bitch too willy nilly I'm going to lose my target audience. No matter how much I try and fail to rationalize it.

Welcome to the forum Dipayan.

[SOdhner]

So I assume she could also use
B = "a guy is a member of a certain race"
as well, correct? That would be mathematically sound as well, correct?

I don't know what I'm talking about and have no understanding of Beysian Whatevers, and I still think it is safe to say you have misunderstood.

For the original example, B was something that would apply to all of A. Because of this it was useful even without knowing the exact percentages of other factors. In your example, we would need to know the percentages involved.

Or I could be totally wrong.

ETA: But I don't see any reason that race couldn't be factored into this kind of formula under the proper conditions.

[TraneWreck]

Yes, if pursuasion was her intent she radically underestimated male sensitivity. I'm surprised at how easily feelings were hurt.

Of course the article was more of a venting of frustration than anything. The complaint about tone and civility strikes me as quite similar in construction to theist whining over the mean, nasty New Atheists. Sometimes it's necessary to just call ******** ********.

Which is why I took no offense. That article wasn't directed at me. It was directed at the endless dirtballs, scumbags, douche-knozzles, and, at worst, sexual assailants that women have to deal with on a dialy basis in a way that few, if any, hetero-sexual men ever encounter.

If you read that article and come away thinking you're being called a rapist, you're either insecure on an astonishing level or really bad at reading.

[Uncayimmy]

Let me see if I can settle this. What she wrote was:
[assuming one in six women has been raped]if every rapist commits an average of ten rapes (a horrifying number, isn’t it?) then the concentration of rapists in the population is still a little over one in sixty.

What I think she was saying was this:

Given Some Population of Women
10,000

Number of Women Raped
1,666 (one in six)

Maximum Number of Rapists
1,666

This is wrong because one woman can be raped by multiple people multiple times. We cannot deduce a maximum number of rapists based on the one in six number for rape victims. The only number we know is the minimum number of rapists, which is 1.

She seemed to assume (incorrectly) that each woman raped was raped only once by one person, and that each rapist only raped one person. That would give us 1,666 unique rapists to match the 1,666 unique rape victims. If we further assume that the population of women is the same as the population of men, then one in six men is a rapist.

Her statement then asks to consider 10 rapes per rapist. The implication is that each rapist rapes exactly 10 different women and that each woman is still raped only once (faulty assumptions). We'd still have 1,666 rapes, only now we'd have 166 rapists. Again, assuming the same population of men, then 1 in 60 men would be a rapist.

The math is sound, but the assumptions are not. You can't get to the number of rapists by looking the unique count of rape victims. Period.

[HansMustermann]

Actually no she didn't, she multiplied two unrelated ratios. Nice squirm.



A lie or you just don't have any clue about math. The percentage of women raped dived by 10 is {16.66%/ 10= 1.666%} or 1.66% of women raped. Not 1 in 60 men are rapists.




Not quite, you lied and squirmed. (That's 2 in 2 or 100% FYI) You're very predictable, perhaps that's why you don't mind profiling :D

Dude, seriously... your inability to understand elementary arithmetic even after several people explained it, doesn't make me a liar, it just makes you innumerate.

Try this:

X = 1/6 raped_women/total_women

a = 1/1 total_women/total_men
(This is actually true within the precision she uses, which is to say, rounding to the nearest. She's not using 17.1% rape attempts either, she rounds it to 1/6.)

b = 10 raped_women/rapist

If you multiply and pay attention to the units, a*X = 1/6 raped_women/total_men, but that still doesn't tell us how many rapists there are. Then we divide by B. Again, pay attention to the units. The raped_women variable is once above and once below the fraction line, and gets taken out. And you're only then left with rapists/total_men. With 1/60 rapists/total_men, to be precise.

And frankly, even without the maths part, again, even the notion that you need to believe 1/6 of X are Y to believe that 1/60 of X are Y is freaking absurd for any definition of X and Y. You can't simultaneously believe, say, that 1.6% of women are redheads _and_ that 16% of women are redheads, much less require the latter to believe the former. They're simply mutually exclusive, for crying out lout. Or you can't simultaneously believe that 1.6% of chicken in my farmer example are roosters _and_ simultaneously 16% are roosters, much less require the latter to believe the former. Ditto for rapists.

It's not even a matter of maths, it's a matter of it making no freaking sense to believe that for the exact same ratio two vastly different numbers would both be the result.

[HansMustermann]

Let me see if I can settle this. What she wrote was:
[assuming one in six women has been raped]if every rapist commits an average of ten rapes (a horrifying number, isn’t it?) then the concentration of rapists in the population is still a little over one in sixty.

What I think she was saying was this:

Given Some Population of Women
10,000

Number of Women Raped
1,666 (one in six)

Maximum Number of Rapists
1,666

This is wrong because one woman can be raped by multiple people multiple times. We cannot deduce a maximum number of rapists based on the one in six number for rape victims. The only number we know is the minimum number of rapists, which is 1.

She seemed to assume (incorrectly) that each woman raped was raped only once by one person, and that each rapist only raped one person. That would give us 1,666 unique rapists to match the 1,666 unique rape victims. If we further assume that the population of women is the same as the population of men, then one in six men is a rapist.

Her statement then asks to consider 10 rapes per rapist. The implication is that each rapist rapes exactly 10 different women and that each woman is still raped only once (faulty assumptions). We'd still have 1,666 rapes, only now we'd have 166 rapists. Again, assuming the same population of men, then 1 in 60 men would be a rapist.

The math is sound, but the assumptions are not. You can't get to the number of rapists by looking the unique count of rape victims. Period.

Well, mostly correct, but technically she never even mentions the possibility of it being 1 rape per rapist. I think the implied assumption is more like it's going to be 1666/X, whatever X may be. She never actually makes the case even in passing or as a conditional that X would or even could be 1.

[TraneWreck]

Let me see if I can settle this. What she wrote was:
[assuming one in six women has been raped]if every rapist commits an average of ten rapes (a horrifying number, isn’t it?) then the concentration of rapists in the population is still a little over one in sixty.

[...]

The math is sound, but the assumptions are not. You can't get to the number of rapists by looking the unique count of rape victims. Period.

It's a sloppy, quick number and very much wrong, but all assumptions are made in favor of the contrary position: that a smaller percentage of men are sexual assailants.

If more than one man rapes one woman, then the concentration of rapists would be higher in relation to the number of victims. And obviously a 10 rape average is ridiculously high. You are correct that it assumes multiple victims.

We do not know the minimum number of rapists because, theoretically, 1 rapist could commit all 1,666 rapes in your example. And, conversely, every man in that town could be a rapist, they just go after the same 1,666 women, meaning the ration of abused women would be 1 in 6 and the ration of male rapists would be 1 in 1.

If all assumptions are made against the notion that there are a bunch of rapists in society and we still arrive at the conclusion that there are a bunch of rapists in society, the point stands.

It's not a work of art, nor a particularly convincing bit of science. It does, however, more than establish the case she's making: that guys stop doing creepy stuff to scare women.

[Uncayimmy]

Well, mostly correct, but technically she never even mentions the possibility of it being 1 rape per rapist. I think the implied assumption is more like it's going to be 1666/X, whatever X may be. She never actually makes the case even in passing or as a conditional that X would or even could be 1.

I had to read that five times to figure out what you are trying to say. I never said she said it was 1 rape per man, so it makes no sense to tell me that she didn't say something I never said she said. Can you see how that might be confusing?

I said she seemed to be saying that given N rapes in Y population, the maximum number of rapists would be equal to N. That's the only way I can see her subsequent math making any sense. I gave my derivation about all the assumptions she made to get to the 1 in 60 number.

[SOdhner]

She seemed to assume (incorrectly) that each woman raped was raped only once by one person, and that each rapist only raped one person.

I didn't see either part of that in the article. Multiple rapes against the same woman don't change the ratio of one in six because that's not ever referred to as "number of rapes" but of "nuber of people who have been raped" unless I missed something. As for the second part, she never says that each rapist raped one person. She assumes that each rapist rapes multiple people, an assumption that is both logically sound and is in favor of men in general. She picks ten arbitrarily and doesn't claim otherwise.

[HansMustermann]

I had to read that five times to figure out what you are trying to say. I never said she said it was 1 rape per man, so it makes no sense to tell me that she didn't say something I never said she said. Can you see how that might be confusing?

I said she seemed to be saying that given N rapes in Y population, the maximum number of rapists would be equal to N. That's the only way I can see her subsequent math making any sense. I gave my derivation about all the assumptions she made to get to the 1 in 60 number.

I'm trying to say that she never names a maximum. Sure, it's clear to you or me what would happen if that coefficient were any other number than 10, a value of 1 included. But she doesn't say it. And that's IMHO an important distinction.

[HansMustermann]

I didn't see either part of that in the article. Multiple rapes against the same woman don't change the ratio of one in six because that's not ever referred to as "number of rapes" but of "nuber of people who have been raped" unless I missed something. As for the second part, she never says that each rapist raped one person. She assumes that each rapist rapes multiple people, an assumption that is both logically sound and is in favor of men in general. She picks ten arbitrarily and doesn't claim otherwise.

Actually, to be pedantic, for the first part, she does seem to confuse incidence with prevalence. Because she first uses the 1 in 6 number which is raped women, not rapes, but then applies a factor of 10 rapes per rapist. It only works out to 1 in 60 if she actually assumes 1 rape per raped woman.

Not that it would matter all that much, I would think, since it's still IMHO quite clear what she means anyway. And given that the real numbers are scarier than her generous estimate anyway, it doesn't work against her point anyway. I mean, sure, it's not exact numbers but the risk is just as real.

[AvalonXQ]

And given that the real numbers are scarier than her generous estimate anyway,

Except they're really not. The real numbers are much less scary than her estimate; it is much less likely than 1 in 60 that the stranger on the train who speaks to her will rape her. UY has explained some of the reasons why.

[bookitty]

Yes, if pursuasion was her intent she radically underestimated male sensitivity. I'm surprised at how easily feelings were hurt.

Of course the article was more of a venting of frustration than anything. The complaint about tone and civility strikes me as quite similar in construction to theist whining over the mean, nasty New Atheists. Sometimes it's necessary to just call ******** ********.

Which is why I took no offense. That article wasn't directed at me. It was directed at the endless dirtballs, scumbags, douche-knozzles, and, at worst, sexual assailants that women have to deal with on a dialy basis in a way that few, if any, hetero-sexual men ever encounter.

If you read that article and come away thinking you're being called a rapist, you're either insecure on an astonishing level or really bad at reading.

Thank you. This is exactly it.

To sum up the article - Most men are not going to sexually assault a women. But, because a large percentage of women have been sexually assaulted, women can be sensitive to certain behaviors/clues from strangers. Here are some of those clues/behaviors [list]. These behaviors make women uncomfortable. If you don't want to make women uncomfortable, please don't do this. And while we're at it, don't sexually assault women in any way.

There is nothing in the article that needs super-duper maths to prove. Even if her math is way off, enough women have been assaulted that it is a problem. People (male and female) tend to rationalize/excuse their own behavior when there is something they want. This includes men approaching an unknown woman because they are attracted to her.

[Furcifer]

Dude, seriously... your inability to understand elementary arithmetic even after several people explained it, doesn't make me a liar, it just makes you innumerate.
.

No, you're lying and you know it or you wouldn't keep bringing it up. The statement of fact she is making is 1 in 6 men are rapists. The conditional statement is IF they each do 10 rapes THEN it's 1 in 60. There's no other way to make the connection between the 2 stats. It's amusing that you want to return to your own failure and havewave. It's quite the dance :D

Don't think I didn't notice your lack of correcting everyone else that's said the same thing. It's quite shameless on your part, and very dishonest.

[SOdhner]

Actually, to be pedantic, for the first part, she does seem to confuse incidence with prevalence. Because she first uses the 1 in 6 number which is raped women, not rapes, but then applies a factor of 10 rapes per rapist. It only works out to 1 in 60 if she actually assumes 1 rape per raped woman.

So if I'm understanding your point, she could have said 10 unique woment per rapist and it would have been fine. That's how I *read* it, though I understand that technically that's not how it was worded.

[Furcifer]

Yes, if pursuasion was her intent she radically underestimated male sensitivity. I'm surprised at how easily feelings were hurt.


Now Hans are you paying attention? This is a strawman.

Nobody said their feelings are hurt. And yet Tranewreck is employing an argument from incredulity based on his own strawman.

You'll find his posts are chalk full of fallacies.

He's conflating the objection to the improper use of a term applied to a group of people, with emotion. It's an argument from ignorance because he chooses to ignore all of the evidence given thus far as to why the author is wrong to do so, and instead suppose it's all due to emotion.

Textbook case of fallacy in use.

[TraneWreck]

Now Hans are you paying attention? This is a strawman.

Nobody said their feelings are hurt. And yet Tranewreck is employing an argument from incredulity based on his own strawman.

You'll find his posts are chalk full of fallacies.

He's conflating the objection to the improper use of a term applied to a group of people, with emotion. It's an argument from ignorance because he chooses to ignore all of the evidence given thus far as to why the author is wrong to do so, and instead suppose it's all due to emotion.

Textbook case of fallacy in use.

Haha, I didn't realize people had to say their feelings were hurt in order to interpret such.

Again, the term isn't being improperly used. Calling someone a "potential rapist" will almost always be true. You're so confused on this, from the basic numbers to the use of allusions to general comprehension, that you cannot spit out even a barely cogent argument.

You also don't know what a "fallacy" is. You use it each time you want to say "bad argument," which would be wrong on the merits, but at least the appropriate phrase.

And what, praytell, is the evidence provided to show that she was wrong for calling someone a "potential rapist?"

The reason I am able to see how badly your feelings have been hurt on this is that you CANNOT get beyond your first emotional reaction to the word "rapist" despite your consistent misunderstanding of how it was used. The entire basis of your "criticism" is that the word is too inflamatory. What does that mean? It means it inflames emotions, ie, hurts people's feelings.

Anyone acting on rationality would be able to criticize the article without these random tantrums.

[Uncayimmy]

It's a sloppy, quick number and very much wrong, but all assumptions are made in favor of the contrary position: that a smaller percentage of men are sexual assailants.
I have no idea why the three of your were arguing over that number. I read some of those posts several times and still don't know what some of them were saying.

That aside, even if we could get a handle on the number of rapists, knowing that percentage of the male population isn't all that useful. The author seems keen on identifying rapists when the goal, and I know this sounds pedantic, is to avoid getting raped, not simply identifying rapists. Now, before anybody jumps my ass about this, hear me out.

About 78% of women are raped by one person in their lifetime, 14% two rapists, and 8% person three or more rapists (they don't break out multiple simultaneous rapists versus consecutive rapists). In NVAWS the women 18 and older were raped on average 2.9 times in the preceding 12 months.

So, the minimum number of rapes for the first two groups is as follows assuming the lifetime number of rapists holds true for the 12 month period:
78 + (2 * 14) = 106

We're told that the average victim is raped 2.9 times, so a group of 100 women will have 290 rapes; Subtract from that the minimum number of rapes by the first two groups:
290 - 106 = 184

This means our 8% (three or more) group would have to have been raped by 23 (184/8) rapists on average. Not likely, right? What's far more likely is that all three groups are suffering multiple rapes by the same person. They have the *********** rapist identified with 100% accuracy, yet they are still getting raped. And based on other stats, it's very likely that this person is their intimate partner.

This woman talks about the fear of strangers on the street like it's the major problem. It's like she's oblivious to the dangers of intimate partners. She writes:

When you approach me in public, you are Schrödinger’s Rapist. You may or may not be a man who would commit rape. I won’t know for sure unless you start sexually assaulting me. I can’t see inside your head, and I don’t know your intentions. If you expect me to trust you—to accept you at face value as a nice sort of guy—you are not only failing to respect my reasonable caution, you are being cavalier about my personal safety.

The reality is that her boyfriend or husband is far, far more dangerous to her statistically than Schrodinger's Rapist. Given no other factors, an intoxicated man is twice the risk of a sober one. A private setting is about 6X as dangerous as a public one. An intimate partner is 3.5X as likely as a stranger to commit the rape, and the pool of strangers is probably 100X bigger than the pool of intimate partners.

Talking to a sober stranger on a bus, even an obnoxious one, is far, far less dangerous than being at home with your drunk boyfriend.

[HansMustermann]

No, you're lying and you know it or you wouldn't keep bringing it up. The statement of fact she is making is 1 in 6 men are rapists. The conditional statement is IF they each do 10 rapes THEN it's 1 in 60. There's no other way to make the connection between the 2 stats. It's amusing that you want to return to your own failure and havewave. It's quite the dance :D

Dude, seriously, if 1/6 or 1/60 of group X have property Y, then that's that. Regardless of what they do. Try it with anything else. If it's one percentage or another, that's that. It can't be simultaneously two different percentages for the same property.

You can't believe simultaneously that both 1/6 are rapists _and_ 1/60 are rapists, much less that one is a condition for the other. It's that simple. If, by any given definition, X% of group Y have property Z, then that's that, it's X%.

Furthermore, even the way you multiply it is wrong. 1/6 of men doing 10 rapes each, would mean 10/6 rapes per male population, not 1/60. There's a reason I told you it's a division not a multiplication, but even that seems to have sailed right above your head.

Don't think I didn't notice your lack of correcting everyone else that's said the same thing. It's quite shameless on your part, and very dishonest.

Actually, nope, the thing is, I haven't seen anybody else actually came even close to saying that she needs to believe two different probabilities for the same property at the same time. All the others were conditional upon something else being different. Only yours is flat out that she needs to believe 1/6 men are rapist to believe that 1/60 men are rapists.

Honestly, if you weren't keeping at it, I wouldn't even imagine that it's possible for someone to be that illogical.

And if you're trying me you genuinely you read those messages and didn't even understand that... well, now _that's_ a record.

[HansMustermann]

Now Hans are you paying attention?

All ears, guv'nor.

This is a strawman.

Nobody said their feelings are hurt. And yet Tranewreck is employing an argument from incredulity based on his own strawman.

You'll find his posts are chalk full of fallacies.

He's conflating the objection to the improper use of a term applied to a group of people, with emotion. It's an argument from ignorance because he chooses to ignore all of the evidence given thus far as to why the author is wrong to do so, and instead suppose it's all due to emotion.

Textbook case of fallacy in use.

Nope, it's you not knowing logic. And projecting again :p

[Uncayimmy]

I'm trying to say that she never names a maximum. Sure, it's clear to you or me what would happen if that coefficient were any other number than 10, a value of 1 included. But she doesn't say it. And that's IMHO an important distinction.

What is your point? I never said she said what the maximum was just like I never said she said it was one per rapist. I quoted her exact words, Hans. It was right there in my post for you and everyone else to see. Her exact words. I then proceeded to say that she "seemed" to be saying something and gave a lengthy explanation. To be clear:

Seem to appear to be.

Seriously, how much more clear can I be beyond quoting her exact words and then using the word "seem" to describe what I thought she was saying? Why are you coming back telling me that she didn't say something that I never said she said? What is your point?

[HansMustermann]

The reality is that her boyfriend or husband is far, far more dangerous to her statistically than Schrodinger's Rapist. Given no other factors, an intoxicated man is twice the risk of a sober one. A private setting is about 6X as dangerous as a public one. An intimate partner is 3.5X as likely as a stranger to commit the rape, and the pool of strangers is probably 100X bigger than the pool of intimate partners.

Talking to a sober stranger on a bus, even an obnoxious one, is far, far less dangerous than being at home with your drunk boyfriend.

Actually, that is a very true and insightful observation, but we've dealt with it before. (Mind you, I can't blame anyone for missing something buried in 15 pages of bickering.)

That's actually the whole point and context of her risk estimations. In the very first paragraph of her article, it says, "In fact, you would really like to have a mutually respectful and loving sexual relationship with a woman. Unfortunately, you don’t yet know that woman—she isn’t working with you, nor have you been introduced through mutual friends or drawn to the same activities. So you must look further afield to encounter her."

The whole point and context is that she's not talking about being raped right there on the bus, but as advice for someone looking to pick her up and end up in a "loving sexual relationship" with her.

It seems to me that you would agree that if a rapist got promoted to that, it would be a much greater risk to her than if it remained at the stage of a stranger on a bus. Right?

Well, that's actually what she says. That someone giving the wrong signals on the bus, won't get promoted to that category which is a much higher risk to her.

[HansMustermann]

What is your point? I never said she said what the maximum was just like I never said she said it was one per rapist. I quoted her exact words, Hans. It was right there in my post for you and everyone else to see. Her exact words. I then proceeded to say that she "seemed" to be saying something and gave a lengthy explanation. To be clear:

Seem to appear to be.

Seriously, how much more clear can I be beyond quoting her exact words and then using the word "seem" to describe what I thought she was saying? Why are you coming back telling me that she didn't say something that I never said she said? What is your point?

Yes, I got the "seems" part, but I just don't know where you get that impression. Everyone seems to have no problem with directly dividing or multiplying by 10.

I mean, look at my example with the hens and the roosters. Nobody really needs to first estimate a maximum number of roosters before just dividing the number of hens by 10.

Hmm, well, ok, then again maybe not everyone. Since you seemed to be explaining that to 3body, maybe you do need to break it into easier bites after all :p

[HansMustermann]

So if I'm understanding your point, she could have said 10 unique woment per rapist and it would have been fine. That's how I *read* it, though I understand that technically that's not how it was worded.

Well, at least then it would have been free of one thing that people can nitpick. As I was saying, I understood what she's trying to say too.

[Professor Yaffle]

What is your point? I never said she said what the maximum was just like I never said she said it was one per rapist. I quoted her exact words, Hans. It was right there in my post for you and everyone else to see. Her exact words. I then proceeded to say that she "seemed" to be saying something and gave a lengthy explanation. To be clear:

Seem to appear to be.

Seriously, how much more clear can I be beyond quoting her exact words and then using the word "seem" to describe what I thought she was saying? Why are you coming back telling me that she didn't say something that I never said she said? What is your point?

He's just reiterating for 3bodyproblem who seems to be having enormous difficulty in understanding.

[Uncayimmy]

I didn't see either part of that in the article. Multiple rapes against the same woman don't change the ratio of one in six because that's not ever referred to as "number of rapes" but of "nuber of people who have been raped" unless I missed something. As for the second part, she never says that each rapist raped one person. She assumes that each rapist rapes multiple people, an assumption that is both logically sound and is in favor of men in general. She picks ten arbitrarily and doesn't claim otherwise.

Sigh.

I quoted exactly what she said in my post, so any comments about me claiming she said something else are, well, just silly. Why would I quote her and then in the same post claim she said something different? I'm not an idiot. I used the word "seems" which, last I looked, indicates one is making an interpretation. I also said that I "think" she "assumes" certain things.

One can only speculate what her thought process was because what she did was wrong. Period. There is absolutely no way in the world for her to go from number of women raped to number of rapists in the population. It's just not possible. The best we can do is speculate, and that's what I did: I speculated about a set of assumptions that if followed would logically lead to the number she presented.

If you want to present your own theory as to how she arrived at the number 1 in 60, go right ahead. I presented mine in order to get people to shut up about it. That part of her article was just wrong and demonstrated a lack of understanding some basic statistics. It was unnecessary. She could have jsut said, "If one in six women has been the victim of rape and 82% go unreported to the police, that means there are probably a lot of rapists out there."

[Uncayimmy]

Well, that's actually what she says. That someone giving the wrong signals on the bus, won't get promoted to that category which is a much higher risk to her.

The problem here is that we're trying to interpret a poorly written article. It's not self-consistent. Did you not see what I quoted? Here it is again:

When you approach me in public, you are Schrödinger’s Rapist. You may or may not be a man who would commit rape. I won’t know for sure unless you start sexually assaulting me. I can’t see inside your head, and I don’t know your intentions. If you expect me to trust you—to accept you at face value as a nice sort of guy—you are not only failing to respect my reasonable caution, you are being cavalier about my personal safety.

Sounds very much to me like she's talking about imminent danger. Notice that she's only talking about strangers and not all the other people she encounters. She's not talking about acquaintances or friends of friends. She's not talking about guys she approaches. The whole thing is centered around strangers approaching her, and her writing, which is poor, seems to imply imminent danger rather entering into long-term relationships. After all, she says very little about how to handle ongoing relationships except for the e-mail guy.

We're trying to pick half-digested corn out of a turd and arguing if it came straight off the cob or not.

[Furcifer]

The math is sound, but the assumptions are not. You can't get to the number of rapists by looking the unique count of rape victims. Period.

I've been saying this for 10 pages. The math is fine, it's simple multiplication, it's her logic that's faulty.

They really want to hold onto the fallacy because they don't want to admit the author is wrong in any way.

Due to the nature of the topic a self righteous few seem to think by casting aspersions onto your motivation for pointing out this error they can bully you into accepting it. It's a sad thing to see in what's supposed to be a skeptical forum. :(

[TraneWreck]

That aside, even if we could get a handle on the number of rapists, knowing that percentage of the male population isn't all that useful. The author seems keen on identifying rapists when the goal, and I know this sounds pedantic, is to avoid getting raped, not simply identifying rapists. Now, before anybody jumps my ass about this, hear me out.

Obviously if the article was about the odds of being raped by a stranger on the bus, she would be really wrong.


The reality is that her boyfriend or husband is far, far more dangerous to her statistically than Schrodinger's Rapist. Given no other factors, an intoxicated man is twice the risk of a sober one. A private setting is about 6X as dangerous as a public one. An intimate partner is 3.5X as likely as a stranger to commit the rape, and the pool of strangers is probably 100X bigger than the pool of intimate partners.

Talking to a sober stranger on a bus, even an obnoxious one, is far, far less dangerous than being at home with your drunk boyfriend.

No one has argued otherwise. A few points:

1) The odds of a random man on the bus raping a woman is very low, but she's not talking about all men. She's discussing a subset of men who first try to talk to women, then ignore women's wishes to be left alone, then follow them home or wait for them at bus stops.

What percentage of men who behave thusly will commit sexual crimes? I'm not aware of any stats that give us an indication, but surely you can see why a woman would be afraid of such a person.

The reluctance to engage strange men on the bus is part "they might be rapists," part, "they might follow me around and really scare me," and part, "I just don't want to tell this obnoxious ass to leave me alone over and over." The "Schrodinger's Rapist" allusion was meant to illustrate the worst case scenario. Because there are no reliable stats for that (riding the same bus for 6 months and following a woman home might be sufficient to say that the woman "knew" her assailant for the purposes of the stats) she just went for a broad number that is deeply flawed, but actually conservative. It's not conservative with respect to "strangers on a bus" but it is very much so with respect to men in general.

2) Even if the odds are very low, women should not be placed in a position of having to guess, "is this my worst fear coming true?" Much of the article explains what behavior terrifies them.

Not that many people get killed by bears, but if I'm hiking in the woods and see a grizzly 30ft away, my reaction won't be, "likely he won't devour me." I'll be scared until I'm safe.

If men can avoid causing that reaction in women, they should. She's explaining how to do so.

3) People are consistently failing to consider the severity of the prescribed action when guaging the reasonableness of the article.

By analogy: Person A lives on the 40th floor of a high-rise apartment building. She has a balcony. Her odds of falling to her death are very, very low. Nevertheless, she requested that guard rail be built and that maintenance people test its quality twice a year.

Is this an irrational stance? Her odds of death are very low.

Similarly, if the OP was demanding that women hire body guards or never leave home alone, it would be an irrational stance. She's merely asking that men respect her desire to be left alone, this is very reasonable and proportional to the threat involved.

[Furcifer]

You also don't know what a "fallacy" is. You use it each time you want to say "bad argument," which would be wrong on the merits, but at least the appropriate phrase.


No,you generally have bad arguments because your reasoning is flawed. That's what fallacy is, bad arguments from poor reasoning.

Here: "a fallacy is a misconception resulting from incorrect reasoning in argumentation"

Nice try though. :)

[TraneWreck]

No,you generally have bad arguments because your reasoning is flawed. That's what fallacy is, bad arguments from poor reasoning.

Here: "a fallacy is a misconception resulting from incorrect reasoning in argumentation"

Nice try though. :)

Quoting the dictionary is a far cry from proper application. I look forward to your next amusing misuse of the term.

[Furcifer]

You can't believe simultaneously that both 1/6 are rapists _and_ 1/60 are rapists, much less that one is a condition for the other.


It isn't simultaneous. If they commit 10 it's 1 in 60, if they commit 11 it's 1 in 66 if they commit 14 it's 1 in 84 if they commit 1 it's 1 in 6. It's a conditional statement.

This is sheer nonsense, time to give it up.

[Furcifer]

He's just reiterating for 3bodyproblem who seems to be having enormous difficulty in understanding.

There's no difficulty in understanding the author, it's quite clear she converted 1 in 6 sexual assaults in a life time to 1 in 6 men are rapists then said "but if they commit 10 rapes it's 1 in 60".:confused:

What I don't understand is the denial. Whether she said it or not it's quite clear what she's done in order to get the numbers she did. It's WRONG. You can't do this. It's not statistically valid in any way. You can't convert sexual assaults into rapists.

[Ivor the Engineer]

I'm trying to figure out from the article when is it acceptable for me to approach and talk to a woman without her wondering if I'm a rapist. After reading the article and the comments of women in this and other threads, I'm not sure I can. Any suggestions? While you're at it, have you any ideas how I can talk to and maybe even touch a young child without being thought of as a pedophile?

[TraneWreck]

There's no difficulty in understanding the author, it's quite clear she converted 1 in 6 sexual assaults in a life time to 1 in 6 men are rapists then said "but if they commit 10 rapes it's 1 in 60".:confused:

What I don't understand is the denial. Whether she said it or not it's quite clear what she's done in order to get the numbers she did. It's WRONG. You can't do this. It's not statistically valid in any way. You can't convert sexual assaults into rapists.

Look, I'll try this one more time, mostly because I'm bored at work. I have absolutely no hope that you'll understand it the 95th time around.

1) 1 in 6 women are sexually assaulted at some point in their life.
2) The male and female populations are roughly equivalent.
3) The minimum number of men needed to rape those women is 1.
4) The maximum number of men who could rape those women is every man in the country so long as they rape the same 1 out of every 6 women.
5) Neither 4 or 5 is true.
6) If we assume that multiple men rape the same women, then there will be more rapists in relation to the general male population.
7) If we assume each rape victim has a unique rapist, and vice versa, then roughly 1 in 6 men will be rapists.
8) If we assume rapists have more than one victim, there will be fewer rapists in relation to the general male population.
9) To be conservative, the author chose the approach that would yield the most generous number, ie, fewest rapists in relation to the general male population.
10) Thus, if the average rapist has 10 unique female victims, and those victims are not shared with other rapists, then 1 out of every 60 men will be a rapists.
11) That cannot be true, but the error is in favor of a position contrary to the one she is advancing.

Now, it's fair to say that she didn't refine the stat based on situations, but as I said earlier, there are no stats to reflect what percentage of people who harrass women on public transit become sexual assailants. Because a perfect stat wasn't necessary to her point, that men respect women, it's largely a spurious issue.

[Uncayimmy]

He's just reiterating for 3bodyproblem who seems to be having enormous difficulty in understanding.

I don't think 3Body has any problem at all understanding it. He's just arguing for a slightly different misuse of statistics than I am. Such are the perils of trying to make sense out of something that doesn't make sense. It is entirely plausible that she thinks 1 in 6 men are rapists and is using the 10 rapes per rapist number, which she says is a hypothetical, to say that 1 in 60 men rape. She's obviously doing something with the 10 rapes. I gave one theory, and 3B gave another.

Thing is, anybody who defended the 1 in 60 number as being related to the 10 rapes per rapist number was unequivocally wrong. Same goes for any relationship to 1 in 6 women are victims of rape. There is no way in the world the two numbers can be related without faulty assumptions. Hans was 100% wrong when he wrote, "Except she isn't using any faulty interpretation of statistics, she's using a real one for that 1 in 60 figure, and makes it very clear what she means."

Wrong. Period. End of discussion. She's welcome to pull the 1 in 60 number out of her ass, but it was pure conjecture. She's welcome to pull 10 rapes per rapist out of her ass - pure conjecture. But in no way, shape or form can she show a dependency between those numbers or claim to be doing some sort of calculation. Anybody defending her that way is wrong.

3B explained it right here, plain as day (emphasis added):

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=6324487#post6324487
You can't use the 1 in 6 women will be sexually assaulted to formulate any number on the "concentration of rapists". Her baseline assumption that there is a direct relation between the number of sexual assaults reported in a survey and the number of rapists is faulty. "If" they commit 10, which we don't know there still isn't a 1 in 60 concentration. "If" they commit 1, which we do know there still isn't a 1 in 6 concentration of rapists.

Your defense of the author's poor use of stats is hilarious. The author doesn't even clarify if these 10 rapes she made up were against different women. She seems to be implying every rapist is a serial rapist, but you can't go on her use of statistics to determine this. I don't know if she realizes it's much more likely that multiple rapes occur by the same person on the same person.


Sorry, PY, but 3B got it. Now, I'll agree that 3B seemed to be giving some sort of object lesson in some of his other posts and was taking certain liberties based on on the author's probable assumptions, but the point is, he got it long before anybody else. I had to go back 8 pages to find it. It then got sidetracked into people defending the indefensible. Of course, they presented things that were "logical" but couldn't see how the author wasn't being logical in the first place.

Can we be done with this now?

[TraneWreck]

I'm trying to figure out from the article when is it acceptable for me to approach and talk to a woman without her wondering if I'm a rapist. After reading the article and the comments of women in this and other threads, I'm not sure I can. Any suggestions? While you're at it, have you any ideas how I can talk to and maybe even touch a young child without being thought of as a pedophile?

It's so difficult, what to do, what to do?

As the article specifically discusses, feel free to approach them, but if you're turned down or it's clear she doesn't want to talk, respect that.

If she smiles at you, have at it.

[Lyrandar]

In both cases somebody could easily make the case that I am more likely to rape. It's classic confirmation bias. In the first case I demonstrated my willingness, nay, eagerness to control a situation that wasn't mine to control. Anybody who would do that wouldn't think twice about dominating a woman if he felt it was his right, and we all know many men see women as property or objects of conquest. In the second case I demonstrated an uncontrollable temper, which is why I had to leave. What happens when I don't leave? Do I snap? Or maybe I demonstrated manipulative behavior and by walking away I was in some way trying to get her to submit to my will by withholding my attention and presence.

... Any particular reason why you didn't address what I said about motive? I think a lot of the reason that some of the things the article mentions are considered risk factors is because of the motives behind them, as best as they can be determined by someone else. I don't call either of yours risk factors for rape because of the motives I've been able to determine, and I wonder whether the author of that blog post would call them risk factors either.

My point is that this is all just a parlor game. We can look at all sorts of behaviors outside of a sexual situation and invent our own probabilities of what that would mean in the bedroom. Of course, I'm talking about intimate partner rape, not stranger attacks. Professor Yaffle cited some data, but depending on which part you read, the person on the bus pushing a conversation may be more or less likely to be a rapist.

It wouldn't surprise me if those invented probabilities matched, or were at least reasonably close, across some groups of people. The article is probably wrong to present these as the views of all women, but it would not surprise me to learn that a significant subset of women would agree with some of these risk factors.

It's not a comfortable situation to realize that you've got little in the way of predictive power, but that's no excuse for adopting unsound policies. It's certainly an avenue for further research. I wrote another post where I went into detail about behavior I thought was reasonably predictive, and I gave some reasonable scientific basis for it. Unfortunately, the best predictor of unwanted sexual behavior involves engaging in sexual behavior with that person.

The only problem I have with this is that, given the limitations you admit to, the only sound policies I can think of involve exercising less caution. A decision has to be made about whether to treat these people with more or less caution, and the impression I'm getting is that you're calling a lot of the "more caution" options "unsound paranoia". I think that'd result in more unacceptable consequences for those people that used it.

[TraneWreck]

I don't think 3Body has any problem at all understanding it. He's just arguing for a slightly different misuse of statistics than I am. Such are the perils of trying to make sense out of something that doesn't make sense. It is entirely plausible that she thinks 1 in 6 men are rapists and is using the 10 rapes per rapist number, which she says is a hypothetical, to say that 1 in 60 men rape. She's obviously doing something with the 10 rapes. I gave one theory, and 3B gave another.

[...]

Can we be done with this now?

The writing is sloppy, but it only requires two assumptions to be read charitably:

1) That there are about as many women as men.

2) That multiple men aren't sexually assaulting the same women to hide their numbers.

The first one is basically true, and the error in the second one runs in favor of the argument that there are fewer rapists in relation to the general population.

That's the point: she made conservative assumptions. They were likely wrong, but each mistake weakens her case, and thus, they're not really that big of a deal.

[Furcifer]

By analogy: Person A lives on the 40th floor of a high-rise apartment building. She has a balcony. Her odds of falling to her death are very, very low. Nevertheless, she requested that guard rail be built and that maintenance people test its quality twice a year.

Is this an irrational stance? Her odds of death are very low.



Wow, you really don't get what's going on here do you?

We're saying this woman is essentially living on the 1st floor, not the 40th.

Nobody has argued against caution. It's about whether or not the caution is rational based on her given reasons for exercising caution.

If she says "I want a railing so my dog doesn't get out all the time" it's completely rational.

If she says "I want a railing because I'm worried about falling to my death, the building is 400 feet tall and there's 40 floors so each floor is 10 feet tall and my balcony is 10 feet off the ground" you've got to shake your head.

It's really simple.

[Ivor the Engineer]

It's so difficult, what to do, what to do?

As the article specifically discusses, feel free to approach them, but if you're turned down or it's clear she doesn't want to talk, respect that.

If she smiles at you, have at it.

But then why isn't she thinking I'm a potential rapist? See, from the stats it appears that I'm always a potential rapist simply by being male and interested in having interaction with other people, including women.

At what point in a relationship should a woman stop thinking a man is a potential rapist?

[TraneWreck]

We're saying this woman is essentially living on the 1st floor, not the 40th.

I realize that. It's one of the many things that makes you wrong. Are you arguing there's zero danger from people who follow women home from bus stops?

If you put a rail on any floor but the ground floor for the purpose of avoiding the small chance of falling, it's a reasonable action.

[TraneWreck]

But then why isn't she thinking I'm a potential rapist? See, from the stats it appears that I'm always a potential rapist simply by being male and interested in having interaction with other people, including women.

At what point in a relationship should a woman stop thinking a man is a potential rapist?


Given that most rapes occur in domestic settings, it seems the answer is, "never."

Additionally, the article implies that by respecting women and their decisions, you can easily move yourself out of the "potential rapist" stack. It directly says that approaching women in safe settings will eliminate that background fear.

Your consternation over these triffling matters is bizarre. I think you're trying as hard as you can to have a problem with a very reasonable stance.

[jiggeryqua]

Quoting the dictionary is a far cry from proper application. I look forward to your next amusing misuse of the term.

I have been very reluctant to ignore anyone on this forum, but you now join UncaYimmy and HansWossisname on my list. Curious that all three of your are in this thread, getting shown up. I ignore you, I concede, because it's so much easier than the lengthy post I am too tired to write - I work hard for a living, and your lazy sophistry (I think you may confuse it, like jazz, with 'sophistication') is not worth my remaining energy. Rupert Brooke, the poet, has works that might appeal to you - I combed his collected works, and even the poem called 'Hedges phreaked with snow' turns out to be about how in awe he is of women. Take your uncle tom supremacist quasi-religious thinking and shove it.

[Furcifer]

While you're at it, have you any ideas how I can talk to and maybe even touch a young child without being thought of as a pedophile?

I wouldn't take the authors suggestion and start by talking to children on the internet.

I've always wondered what would happen if Shel Silverstein showed up at a playground to meet some of his fans unannounced.

http://www.beanski.com/.a/6a00e54edf6ea58833012876a2d5b1970c-300wi

[UNLoVedRebel]

2) That multiple men aren't sexually assaulting the same women to hide their numbers.But she switches from "sexual assault" to "rape" and then pretends they are the same thing.

"One in every six American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur."

Rape assumes vaginal penetration with the penis by force. "Sexual assault" can mean whatever anyone wants it to mean. There is no metric for it. Hell, I've been "sexually assaulted" dozens of times. If there is no metric then the data are no good. Come on, this blog isn't trying to protect women from sexual assault, she wants to antagonize men and pander to her readers--women who are frustrated and bitter at men.

[TraneWreck]

I have been very reluctant to ignore anyone on this forum, but you now join UncaYimmy and HansWossisname on my list. Curious that all three of your are in this thread, getting shown up. I ignore you, I concede, because it's so much easier than the lengthy post I am too tired to write - I work hard for a living, and your lazy sophistry (I think you may confuse it, like jazz, with 'sophistication') is not worth my remaining energy. Rupert Brooke, the poet, has works that might appeal to you - I combed his collected works, and even the poem called 'Hedges phreaked with snow' turns out to be about how in awe he is of women. Take your uncle tom supremacist quasi-religious thinking and shove it.

Haha, ok. I'm sure that post would have been good.

[jiggeryqua]

any ideas how I can talk to and maybe even touch a young child without being thought of as a pedophile?

Try not to live in the UK. I might well go and google the source of this, but some time ago I encountered a study that showed the subjects the same photograph of a youngish man playing with a ball and a group of children of both genders and various races, happily, in a sunny field. Ah, the joy of humanity...which is what most europeans reported seeing in the image. But not the British: "Paedophile!".

[TraneWreck]

But she switches from "sexual assault" to "rape" and then pretends they are the same thing.

"One in every six American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur."

Rape assumes vaginal penetration with the penis by force. "Sexual assault" can mean whatever anyone wants it to mean. There is no metric for it. Hell, I've been "sexually assaulted dozens of times. The data are no good. Come on, this blog isn't trying to protect women from sexual assault, she wants to antagonize men and pander to her reader--women who are frustrated and bitter at men.

Yes, that's a big problem with the article. Even though the actual stats reflect her claim about rapes, the sliding back and forth between sexual assault and rape is confusing, in the least.

[Uncayimmy]

1) The odds of a random man on the bus raping a woman is very low, but she's not talking about all men. She's discussing a subset of men who first try to talk to women, then ignore women's wishes to be left alone, then follow them home or wait for them at bus stops.

Please show me where she mentions following her home or waiting at bus stops.

What she does say is, "Is preventing violent assault or murder part of your daily routine, rather than merely something you do when you venture into war zones? Because, for women, it is."

Shortly after that she says, "So when you, a stranger, approach me, I have to ask myself: Will this man rape me?" As further evidence she's talking about attacks, she says, "If the public place is a closed area (a subway car, an elevator, a bus), even a crowded one, you may not realize that the woman’s ability to flee in case of threat is limited."

This woman is telling me that she's worried about needing to flee from a stranger on a crowded bus. In case there's any doubt, she does say (with an odd shift to the third person - you both), "On the other hand, if you are both at church accompanied by your mothers, who are lifelong best friends, the woman is as close as it comes to safe. That is to say, still not 100% safe. But the odds are pretty good."

Look, I think the article was poorly written, not grounded in fact, and not particularly useful. You seem to be reading a different article than I am.

[Ivor the Engineer]

Given that most rapes occur in domestic settings, it seems the answer is, "never."

Additionally, the article implies that by respecting women and their decisions, you can easily move yourself out of the "potential rapist" stack. It directly says that approaching women in safe settings will eliminate that background fear.

Your consternation over these triffling matters is bizarre. I think you're trying as hard as you can to have a problem with a very reasonable stance.

Not really.

The stats indicate a woman is far more likely to be raped by an intimate partner than a new acquaintance.

So shouldn't the advice be for a woman to become more wary after she's started having sex with a man because of the greater probability he'll one day rape her?

[Augustine]

At what point in a relationship should a woman stop thinking a man is a potential rapist?


Probably around the time she would like her partner to stop thinking of her as a potential ***** bitch.

[UNLoVedRebel]

So shouldn't the advice be for a woman to become more wary after she's started having sex with a man because of the greater probability he'll one day rape her?No, that wouldn't be as fun. Gotta pick on the Travis's of the world. Kick 'em while they're down.

[AvalonXQ]

So shouldn't the advice be for a woman to become more wary after she's started having sex with a man because of the greater probability he'll one day rape her?

Well, yes, that would be reasonable. But this article isn't about what's reasonable; it's about how the author feels. It's also about the author trying to justify how she feels with statistics.

[TraneWreck]

Please show me where she mentions following her home or waiting at bus stops.

What she does say is, "Is preventing violent assault or murder part of your daily routine, rather than merely something you do when you venture into war zones? Because, for women, it is."

Yeah, it wasn't in the article. It was in one of the comments. They blurred together in my mind:

How I wish I could have handed this out to some of the guys on the bus back in the day. I had to change buses for a month to get away from this one guy who would get off at my stop and follow me. Hey, maybe he was just looking to cheat on his wife and I wasn’t giving him a fair shake and thus hurt a poor widdle adulterer’s feelings. Maybe he was the sugar daddy of my dreams and I ruined my one chance to live a life of luxury. Certainly he was creepier than all get out though, and I was tired of having to look over my shoulder for him! Thirty days of going home later than usual was better than living in fear.


These are common stories. What are the odds that guy was a rapist? I have no idea, but that woman was right to be scared of him.


Shortly after that she says, "So when you, a stranger, approach me, I have to ask myself: Will this man rape me?" As further evidence she's talking about attacks, she says, "If the public place is a closed area (a subway car, an elevator, a bus), even a crowded one, you may not realize that the woman’s ability to flee in case of threat is limited."

[...]

Look, I think the article was poorly written, not grounded in fact, and not particularly useful. You seem to be reading a different article than I am.

I'll agree it was poorly written and not grounded in fact. The factual criticisms, as I've said before, don't necessarily get to the heart of the matter. She's close enough to justify her mild request.

It's an article by a woman venting about all the creeps she deals with on a regular basis and a perhaps flawed conceit that expresses her worst fears about those people.

Strangers start out as an unknown quantity. Notice she's not concerned with strangers who sit on the bus and don't bother her. The article is directed at men who confront and pursue women aggressively, at awkward times, and ignore negative responses.

If you're not one of those men, the article isn't about you.

[Furcifer]

I realize that. It's one of the many things that makes you wrong. Are you arguing there's zero danger from people who follow women home from bus stops?

Nobody is arguing that, although I would say telling a guy on the bus you think he's a potential rapist and you don't want to talk to him is probably not as good as just saying "Thanks for complimenting my shoes, but as you can see I'm a little busy right now".


If you put a rail on any floor but the ground floor for the purpose of avoiding the small chance of falling, it's a reasonable action.

Yes, because notice you used the right words here "falling", not "dying".

That's the real issue, are you going to try and rationalize falling or dying? Is it rape or is it just being bothered my some jerk?

Nobody is faulting her for determining the risk in any given situation. We all do this every day. Some people have different levels of acceptable risk. But you can't deny the fact that someone who estimates the risk of dying every time they get in a car at 75% is being irrational.

I know a few people that won't go on the freeway because they fear the speed and seriously think they will die if they do. I'm sorry but that's irrational as well.

[TraneWreck]

Nobody is arguing that, although I would say telling a guy on the bus you think he's a potential rapist and you don't want to talk to him is probably not as good as just saying "Thanks for complimenting my shoes, but as you can see I'm a little busy right now".

[...]

I know a few people that won't go on the freeway because they fear the speed and seriously think they will die if they do. I'm sorry but that's irrational as well.

Sometimes it seems like you're determined to have no one take you seriously.

At what point did anyone suggest telling people on buses that they're rapists?

[Uncayimmy]

... Any particular reason why you didn't address what I said about motive? I think a lot of the reason that some of the things the article mentions are considered risk factors is because of the motives behind them, as best as they can be determined by someone else. I don't call either of yours risk factors for rape because of the motives I've been able to determine, and I wonder whether the author of that blog post would call them risk factors either.

I thought I did address motive. You seem to get what I was trying to do. Others don't. I've seen it on this board where I've shared very similar stories and been accused of chest beating and all manner of untoward things. To you I come across as a dad watching out for not only his kids but those around him. To others I was just spoiling for a fight and in sharing that story, I was really just bragging about my aggressive nature, further evidence of just how aggressive I am.

The only problem I have with this is that, given the limitations you admit to, the only sound policies I can think of involve exercising less caution. A decision has to be made about whether to treat these people with more or less caution, and the impression I'm getting is that you're calling a lot of the "more caution" options "unsound paranoia". I think that'd result in more unacceptable consequences for those people that used it.
You say "less caution" because you believe the factors you are looking at provide some value. I'm telling you that you don't know what, if any, value they offer.

Take the guy who tries several times to start up a conversation. Is he an extravert, someone who is gregarious and assertive? If so, he's less likely to be a rapist. Or is he trying to override your wishes? If so, he's more likely to be a rapist.

How about the guy who sits next to you but doesn't try to start up a conversation. Good guy who read the article? Maybe not. Rapists tend not to be all that talkative and find initiating conversations difficult. Statistically, he may be more likely to be a rapist.

If a guy gives you the heebie-jeebies, by all means follow your heeby-jeeby detector. If he doesn't, well, understand that it doesn't mean all that much. The evaluation process never stops. It's complicated and vague. The best thing is to avoid certain situations and be more on guard for clues the more intimate you become with someone. I would argue that the longer you go without seeing clues, the less likely it's going to come up out of the blue.

However, if the "rape clues" follow a similar time line as burping, farting, drinking from the milk carton, and leaving the toilet seat up, it's going to be a while before you see underneath.

[Uncayimmy]

But she switches from "sexual assault" to "rape" and then pretends they are the same thing.

"One in every six American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. I bet you don’t think you know any rapists, but consider the sheer number of rapes that must occur."

Rape assumes vaginal penetration with the penis by force. "Sexual assault" can mean whatever anyone wants it to mean. There is no metric for it. Hell, I've been "sexually assaulted" dozens of times. If there is no metric then the data are no good. Come on, this blog isn't trying to protect women from sexual assault, she wants to antagonize men and pander to her readers--women who are frustrated and bitter at men.

I hate to burst your bubble, but the National Violence Against Women Survey says that one in six women have have been raped. And by "says that" I mean, "One of every six women has been raped at some time."

NVAWS says, "...rape was defined as an event that occurred without the victim's consent that involved the use or threat of force in vaginal, anal, or oral intercourse." And by intercourse they include tongues, fingers and objects in the vagina and/or anus.

One big problem is that even though they surveyed 8,000 women and 8,000 men, the questions as asked excluded several events related to men. For example, a woman could not rape a man. Likewise, if someone performed oral sex on a woman by force, that was rape. If a someone performed oral sex on a boy/man, it was not. Same goes for stimulation by hand. Also, if a boy/man was forced to enter someone's anus with his penis, that was not counted. And by not counted I mean the screening questions not only didn't ask but gave definitions that did not include those acts. See page 10 (http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/210346.pdf).

Also the definition of force was not defined. And the questions shifted around a regarding force and threats:
* by using force or threatening to harm you or someone close to you?
* by using force or threat of force?
* by using force or threat of harm?
* against your will or by using force or threats?
* attempted to make you...?

So, it's tough to get a handle on what happened in the 60% or so rapes that didn't involve either a threat of harm or a perceived threat of harm.

[Lyrandar]

I thought I did address motive. You seem to get what I was trying to do. Others don't. I've seen it on this board where I've shared very similar stories and been accused of chest beating and all manner of untoward things. To you I come across as a dad watching out for not only his kids but those around him. To others I was just spoiling for a fight and in sharing that story, I was really just bragging about my aggressive nature, further evidence of just how aggressive I am.

... Yeah, that's a good point, and I do tend to see more good than bad in most people. I can see how some would take it differently (although I still would disagree with them).

You say "less caution" because you believe the factors you are looking at provide some value. I'm telling you that you don't know what, if any, value they offer.

Take the guy who tries several times to start up a conversation. Is he an extravert, someone who is gregarious and assertive? If so, he's less likely to be a rapist. Or is he trying to override your wishes? If so, he's more likely to be a rapist.

How about the guy who sits next to you but doesn't try to start up a conversation. Good guy who read the article? Maybe not. Rapists tend not to be all that talkative and find initiating conversations difficult. Statistically, he may be more likely to be a rapist.

If a guy gives you the heebie-jeebies, by all means follow your heeby-jeeby detector. If he doesn't, well, understand that it doesn't mean all that much. The evaluation process never stops. It's complicated and vague. The best thing is to avoid certain situations and be more on guard for clues the more intimate you become with someone. I would argue that the longer you go without seeing clues, the less likely it's going to come up out of the blue.

Well, I would define all of this as more caution, not less. You're right that it can be very hard for me to assign any particular meaning to any of these factors, but I see that as a good reason to be more cautious and suspicious. In fact, your last paragraph makes me think that you're saying much the same thing.

That's one of the reasons I don't have all that much problem with that blog post, because I think that it has that among its fundamental points - that many women are going to be more careful, not less, and that this is entirely reasonable. It is expressed in inflammatory language, and the author is probably above average in terms of her level of caution, but I'm willing to ignore that and focus on other points.

And knowing that your judgment isn't going to be perfect shouldn't stop anyone from making a preliminary judgment based on your best interpretation at the time. This is only a problem if that "best effort" is completely divorced from reality and/or if you refuse to admit that your judgment might be wrong.

However, if the "rape clues" follow a similar time line as burping, farting, drinking from the milk carton, and leaving the toilet seat up, it's going to be a while before you see underneath.

True. It is possible to be too cautious, and end up at the point where you can't properly judge others or easily interact with others. The author may be close, but I don't think she's over that line to the point where she's being irrational. Also, I'm pretty sure no one, the author included, went quite as far as you just did (although I didn't read the comments on the blog so I can't be sure).