Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Stop Rape- Say Yes!
I'm not sure I really agree with part of MacKinnon's argument regarding rape. She claims that rape happens because women are not allowed to have the same sexual freedom as men. Rape is an act of power- and women are not the only ones who get raped; thousands of men and boys are raped each year as well. If I am freer with my sexuality and engage in whatever sex acts I want, awesome. But if I'm at a party and a guy tries to have sex with me, that doesn't mean I'm going to want to have sex with him. Sexual freedom is about freedom. Therefore, I can have sex if I want to and with whomever I choose, or not. But that also means givings some R-E-S-P-E-C-T to everyone else. So, if I don't want to have sex with this guy I meet at this party, and he rapes me, does it really just come down to him being horny? I think not. Rape is an incredibly complicated, horrible thing all about control and power. And obviously less rape would occur if more women agreed to have sex with men and vice versa. So stope rape and say yes? Again, I think not. In my opinion, this particular part of her argument on rape is very weak where the rest of her argument is very strong.
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I have to agree I was a little shocked reading McKinnon's analysis of rape, but the way I came to understand it was McKinnon trying to show the irony of the way we understand sex and rape. Through her perception of pornography, she sees the power that the man has in the situation as a turn on. The idea of rape and the control the man has on a desperate fragile woman fulfills a sexual desire that comes from the porn they see on tv. If a woman consents to the sex, the sexual desire would not be fulfilled in the same way. She talks a little about the fine line of "consenting," but doesn't give a full explanation as to what would be considered as consent due to the difficulty of finding that correction definition which is even confused in our government today. I think her rape issue is more about the power that men derive from it rather than an issue dealing with finding the same sexual freedom as men.
ReplyDeleteI would like to add to this discussion a different but similar argument. I found it particularly intriguing to see that McKinnon's focus was on resistance, rather than solely on consent. We often criticize the female for not speaking out against a male's either aggressive or non-aggressive approach to having sex with her. But then again, she's likely going to receive at the least social embarrassment and verbal harassment if she says "no", and only wants to make out or "fool around". Why is it that all the pressure and decision-making is placed on the female? Why is not the norm for the male to ask, "Can I kiss you?" "Can I take off your clothes?" "Can I penetrate you?" Oh...because that would be to "awkward" or "unsexy". Well, in my opinion, receiving one's partner's verbal consent, however silly it might feel, is a hell of a lot better then finding out she actually felt she was raped, or that she thought saying "no" once was enough. We should shift our focus from resistance on the female's part to gaining verbal consent on the male's.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with you. She says that rape happens when a woman says no to the sexual advancement, but what if the person can't say no? Is that in effect saying yes? This is why some guys try to get girls drunk before they make the sexual advance, because the alcohol lowers the chances of getting rejected, thus, according to McKinnon, rape does not occur.
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