A conversation about conversations about bigotry

[Sifright]

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

*snip*
At least how I see it, statistics that are clear cut, non-negotiable and correct are far more powerful to me than spooky statistics made to make the problem look as big as humanly possible.*snip*

It doesn't matter how valid the statistics are people will always look to minimize them, there are a whole variety of biases that play into it. That you sought to question the statistics is an example of the biases in play.I very much doubt you would go to those lengths if the stats said the opposite to be the case. Your response is a perfect example of confirmation bias the disproportionate amount of effort people put into attempting to debunk things they disagree with vs agreeing with.

I'm not going to talk as to the actual validity of that infograph because i can't the idea that it's actually representative of the usa population sickens me though, because there is a good chance the same stats would hold true in the uk.

[Relm Zephyrous]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

I don't see why it matters in the slightest whether it's true of all males, some males, males located in the state of Florida, males located on a particular college campus, or males located in any place where they'd happen to have the opportunity to interact with females in any way, shape or form.

Let me draw a fictional corollary to explain why it matters.

There has been an outbreak of prostate cancer in males, by straight up tenfold. This is a massive health concern. Still, I don't see why it matters in the slightest whether it's true of all males, some males, males located in the state of Florida, males located on a particular college campus, or males located in any place where they'd happen to have the opportunity to interact with females in any way, shape or form. I just don't see how that would be relevant to solving the problem.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

Something like 90,000 *REPORTED* rapes occur in the United States every year. The real statistics of actual rapes that occur every year are almost certainly far higher, because not every occurrence is reported.
How the fuck do you think it's not remotely misogynistic of you to pretend that these statistics are making a problem like 'rape' "look as big as humanly possible."

EDIT: Actually it's even worse than what I just typed above. There are 90,000 'recorded' rapes each year in the U.S., which does not include rapes that are not reported, and also does not include cases that are reported by victims but not recorded, because society is seriously such a gigantic misogynistic asshole that some cases of reported rape aren't sufficiently believable to be 'recorded.' /end edit

Did I quote those statistics and say they were inflated spooky statistics? Because I'm pretty sure I wasn't actually mentioning the real national averages at any point in time when I was talking about spooky statistics.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

And in doing so, you're forgetting an important thing: The statistics referenced above aren't about you, and what you may personally believe, and whether you're personally a decent person who'd never consider coercing a woman into sexual activity. They're about society. And they speak to a far broader issue than your own personal feelings on the subject and how you may want to disassociate you or your great guy friends from such generalizations.

...

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

I agree that even best case scenario this is a problem, however I'm not only pointing out that fact but also that this implicitly makes the claim that this is representative of all males. To state more clearly, my point isn't just that it might be 50% that believe that truly, it is also that 50% believe it truly only when segregated to a sexist area. If so, this is kind of like doing a poll down in one of those towns that lynch gays on their opinions of gays, and then making it sound like this is representative of the actual USA population opinion.

Yep, this is totally only about me. No way am I making the specific argument that this is not actually representative of society. No siree.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

It's directed at a group of people, that happens to include you and your earlier post.

Ah, alright. Mainly because if it just referred to me I would have had to ask where these posts were because at that point I had made only one post in the thread.

Originally Posted by Sifright

It doesn't matter how valid the statistics are people will always look to minimize them, there are a whole variety of biases that play into it. That you sought to question the statistics is an example of the biases in play.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

But the fact that your default response is to merely downplay these statistics-

My default response is always to downplay statistics to the bare bones truth, especially when I don't know enough about them, because I simply know too much about statistics not to. Also how valid the evidence is matters in how well the evidence can be defended.


Also something I thought up in a chat window that probably should be mentioned as a good reason always to strive for the truth of statistics.

Originally Posted by Relm

If a society makes the statistics seem much bigger than they actually are, and then convinces itself the inflated amount is true, they lose sight of the actual issue. And this can lead to multiple problems. One of which being that somebody thereafter states the true opinions and numbers and then everybody might convince themselves that there was an actual decrease when there was not. Which among other things can get people to think that whatever happened in that short timespan actually solved a huge deal, but did not. Which in turn leads to solutions being proposed to the problem that doesn't have any real evidence for working.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

There has been an outbreak of prostate cancer in males, by straight up tenfold. This is a massive health concern. Still, I don't see why it matters in the slightest whether it's true of all males, some males, males located in the state of Florida, males located on a particular college campus, or males located in any place where they'd happen to have the opportunity to interact with females in any way, shape or form. I just don't see how that would be relevant to solving the problem.

I'm genuinely struggling to understand the reasoning behind this comparison.

But I think the crucial difference here is that prostate cancer is an outbreak that lacks a direct human cause, whereas rape simply can't happen unless a person acts with the intent to commit the act. That's a critical distinction. When analyzing a health outbreak it's genuinely important to attempt to statistically dissect it because the cause of said outbreak is in doubt. And from that perspective it is vitally important to make distinctions based on the location of the outbreak, the age of those affected, etc.

With rape, there's a known cause: The perpetrator, who is a human being. And it really doesn't matter how old the perpetrator is, where the perpetrator is located, who the victim is, where the victim is from. To draw distinctions at that level is an attempt to narrow the blame of a cultural, society-wide phenomenon, that impacts victims of all races and religions and ethnic identities and ages, to a specific subset: "Oh, it's really just college boys that are the problem." No, the problem is much larger than that, because regardless of distinctions as to the identities of the specific perpetrators, our global culture as a whole enables the phenomenon, by doing exactly what you're doing: downplaying its severity lest we get the wrong impression of the complicity of men.

Did I quote those statistics and say they were inflated spooky statistics? Because I'm pretty sure I wasn't actually mentioning the real national averages at any point in time when I was talking about spooky statistics.

No, but the national statistics that suggest that rape is a prevalent and entirely-too-common phenomenon does subsequently lead to the conclusion that there must be pervasive societal, sociopolitical, cultural reasons why rape occurs so often, that demand to be understood and addressed.

From that perspective, the mere fact that any significant percentage of men, anywhere, would suggest that a woman dressing provocatively "is asking to be raped" is an incredible source of concern.

Rape doesn't occur in a vacuum. If there wasn't a culture that persisted in enabling it, it wouldn't be occurring with the freakishly frightening regularity that it does. And from that perspective, whether 83.5% of men, 50% of men, or even 20% of men believe that a woman 'deserves' to be raped when wearing certain clothing is irrelevant. The mere fact that any amount of men believe it is enough to merit the wholesale condemnation without demanding further statistical analysis.

Yep, this is totally only about me. No way am I making the specific argument that this is not actually representative of society. No siree.

Perhaps the more pertinent question is: Why was your initial reaction to doubt the authenticity of said statistics when you read them? Why did you initially disbelieve them as 'not actually representative of society?'

Because I think the answer to that question speaks more to the subconscious bias in which you're approaching the issue, namely you simply can't fathom that so many guys would believe women 'deserved to be rape,' because some societal misperceptions about how rarely rape occurs leads you to give men the benefit of the doubt.

If a society makes the statistics seem much bigger than they actually are, and then convinces itself the inflated amount is true, they lose sight of the actual issue.

Again: I think the bigger issue here is that society has been conditioned to be so skeptical of claims that rape has occurred that the default assumption upon hearing a disquieting statistic regarding its prevalence is: "Well, that can't be true, there has to be something wrong with it" as opposed to saying, "Shit, that's awful."

[rpgdemon]

Why does it matter if it's only 83.5% of males in the slums who think women were asking for it, or 83.5% nationally? That's still terrible, unless you believe that by living in the slums, women are asking to get raped, which is also terrible.

[Relm Zephyrous]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

I'm genuinely struggling to understand the reasoning behind this comparison.

But I think the crucial difference here is that prostate cancer is an outbreak that lacks a direct human cause, whereas rape simply can't happen unless a person acts with the intent to commit the act. That's a critical distinction. When analyzing a health outbreak it's genuinely important to attempt to statistically dissect it because the cause of said outbreak is in doubt. And from that perspective it is vitally important to make distinctions based on the location of the outbreak, the age of those affected, etc.

With rape, there's a known cause: The perpetrator, who is a human being. And it really doesn't matter how old the perpetrator is, where the perpetrator is located, who the victim is, where the victim is from. To draw distinctions at that level is an attempt to narrow the blame of a cultural, society-wide phenomenon, that impacts victims of all races and religions and ethnic identities and ages, to a specific subset: "Oh, it's really just college boys that are the problem." No, the problem is much larger than that, because regardless of distinctions as to the identities of the specific perpetrators, our global culture as a whole enables the phenomenon, by doing exactly what you're doing: downplaying its severity lest we get the wrong impression of the complicity of men.

Because while there is intent, the intent also has causes in culture. And culture isn't simply a gigantic blob of only one thing, nor is it the same everywhere. If for example we have an area with a very high amount of sexism, and low sexism in other areas, as can analyze what the differences in the culture are. Just because there are similarities between most cultures right now at the global level, does not mean they are the same.

And no, I'm not suggesting that only college boys are the problem. I don't even see where you could have gotten that from.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

No, but the national statistics that suggest that rape is a prevalent and entirely-too-common phenomenon does subsequently lead to the conclusion that there must be pervasive societal, sociopolitical, cultural reasons why rape occurs so often, that demand to be understood and addressed.

And this is exactly what I am talking about. If we can identify where sexism occurs more, we can look at what cultural and sociopolitical reasons are highly prevalent in those areas. And thus, solve the problem.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

From that perspective, the mere fact that any significant percentage of men, anywhere, would suggest that a woman dressing provocatively "is asking to be raped" is an incredible source of concern.

...

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

-the study no matter the context certainly suggests something bad,-

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

I agree that even best case scenario this is a problem,-

So how many times do I have to agree that this is a problem before you indeed acknowledge that I know this is, in fact, a big problem?


Rape doesn't occur in a vacuum. If there wasn't a culture that persisted in enabling it, it wouldn't be occurring with the freakishly frightening regularity that it does. And from that perspective, whether 83.5% of men, 50% of men, or even 20% of men believe that a woman 'deserves' to be raped when wearing certain clothing is irrelevant. The mere fact that any amount of men believe it is enough to merit the wholesale condemnation without demanding further statistical analysis.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

Perhaps the more pertinent question is: Why was your initial reaction to doubt the authenticity of said statistics when you read them? Why did you initially disbelieve them as 'not actually representative of society?'

Because the statistics raised so many obvious questions. And because if something is as vague as to give an expected range of within 3% to 87% on a given question, I need more information to close up what that range means because at that wide a range the 'data' basically means "This happens with some frequency." which we already knew.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

Again: I think the bigger issue here is that society has been conditioned to be so skeptical of claims that rape has occurred that the default assumption upon hearing a disquieting statistic regarding its prevalence is: "Well, that can't be true, there has to be something wrong with it" as opposed to saying, "Shit, that's awful."

I am aware that there is a problem, and this is partly why we need to have accurate numbers. So people can't think in their heads "Well, that can't be true." and just go on their way. If we are rigorous with the numbers as can dispel any doubt, because if the evidence 'is' faulty and vague then we give a legitimate argument for those that would argue that sexism isn't a problem at all. And if they have a legitimate argument, then all the rest crumbles because give the opposition one legitimate argument against you and you will never convince them of anything.


We can be 'aware' of a problem like this through bloating up the problem.
We can 'solve' the problem through being precise and figuring out the exact 'whys' of it.

[Marc v4.0]

Originally Posted by Relm Zephyrous

I am aware that there is a problem, and this is partly why we need to have accurate numbers. So people can't think in their heads "Well, that can't be true." and just go on their way.

Not touching the rest of this, but it is clear you give the public at large WAY more credit than they are due. No matter how accurate the data is, how strong the evidence is, our society has been ingrained to doubt and under-estimate these incidents thanks to the prevalence of rape culture.

We can argue on making sure we are as accurate as possible in order to make the proper surgical strikes once we are done convincing people to take action and care in the first place.

[IHateMakingNames]

You guys keep saying "asking to be raped." The statistic is actually for "argue that they may be asking to be raped." Completely different things because the latter is so easily manipulated.

Relm is right in that specific image, by itself, is some shitty ass data.

And remember, everyone (here) agrees that rape is bad.

[Solid Snake]

Well, if this is so important to you.

I believe based on flipping through a truncated version of Margo Maine's book online that the numbers come from the 1988 version of "I Never Called it Rape," republished in 1994. The authors of that title surveyed 6,000 students from 32 colleges throughout the United States.

Some of their findings, and some other findings, are summarized here: No, I am not going to waste my time looking up each statistic to determine whether this summary is wholly accurate.

The graphics appear to be from RAINN, and you can see footnotes that include documentation for their statistics here:

http://www.rainn.org/get-information...eporting-rates
http://www.rainn.org/get-information...ault-offenders
http://www.rainn.org/get-information...ssault-victims

Now can we stop pretending it makes any meaningful difference whatsoever whether 83.5%, 60% or 40% of men argue that a woman in a provocative outfit may be "asking to be raped?"

[Relm Zephyrous]

@Marc: Funny thing is, we don't need everybody on board to change things. If we understand the principles behind it, we can implement the social activity to solve it. (Even putting aside the issue that 'aware' isn't all that measurable, and that I'm not sure how we would know we are 'aware' enough to begin implementing solutions.)

@Snake: I was just asking for basic information on the study in order to understand what it is talking about precisely. Although IHMN stated my point about it precisely, because I'm not just saying the numbers might be off, I'm saying that this isn't actually giving a accurate description of whether people would argue this at all.

But alright, since we've reached the point where the contention is that I believe the amount of people that believe a given thing matters, and you do not believe the amount of people that believe a given thing matters as long as it is above 0, we've reached the point upon wherein we can't progress the discussion further.

So what would you prefer to talk about?

[Ecks]

I wanted to apologize for my sarcasm earlier but I walked into this discussion going on. I'd participate but I have practically nothing to contribute beyond agreeing that there is a serious problem with rape and rape culture, in so far as I fear for my girlfriend's safety frequently and I hate that the reason for this is "some guy could rape her."
I'm not even sure if it's wrong to feel that way. I certainly dont think rape is an uncommon occurrence, nor do I feel that she dresses in a way that screams "Rape me!" So whatever the statistics, whatever the arguments, its a thing that needs to stop. Because I don't want her to be one of those statistics. And I don't want the guy thinking he'll get away with it anywhere near her. I can't afford to go to jail for manslaughter, and we can't afford to get sued for medical bills when she castrates him for trying.