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It would certainly be good if its use became unnecessary. I don’t see it happening until more colleges take strong actions similar to what Georgia Tech did. Yale took action against DKE, but it wasn’t really enough.</p>
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<p>Luring other people into sexual situations where (due to drunkenness) ability to consent is questionable at best and post-event recollection is impaired is not exactly a desirable thing to do. To the extent that many such situations result in non-consensual sex (i.e. “rape” in colloquial definitions, regardless of the exact legal definition in the given jurisdiction), it is not surprising that some people describe places where there is a high risk of such events to be “rapey”.</p>
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<p>Part of the problem I have is with the idea that women are “lured” into these situations. Is the woman always the victim and the man the predator? </p>
<p>Much of peoples’ opinions on this issue is colored by their views of gender bias or empowerment, imo.</p>
<p>Yes, it is pretty offensive that schools allow places with rapey members to lure young women, but the more the girls know, the better off they are. I’m encouraged that older women are letting the younger women know in advance. Rapey houses are the dark alleys of college campuses. Girls are best advised to avoid both. B-) </p>
<p>Bay, did you read those links? Fraternities practice organized methods of luring women into these situations. While I do think women need to take responsibility for their own actions, there’s no question in my mind that at “rapey” frats, the members plan to exploit women–which is why they target first-semester freshmen, who may not have been warned yet.</p>
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<p>No one is claiming that all men are predators or all women are victims.</p>
<p>But, given that first semester frosh are more commonly rape victims, it is not much of a stretch to conclude that the actual predators (only a small minority of men) take advantage of the naivete of such first semester frosh.</p>
<p>That is not so different from other crimes (e.g. robbery and other theft), where people visiting or new to the area may not realize what places or situations are high risk ones where they are most vulnerable to local criminals.</p>
<p>Not really, @bay. If it weren’t so clear that the victims of these groups are first semester freshman, I might agree with you. But, they are so clearly targeting naive, unimformed young students that it’s simply not credible to say anything other than, “yeah, let’s warn these girls. Maybe it will keep some of them safe.” Anyway, it must be helping. The statistics are going down not up.</p>
<p>@cobrat Did you actually read the quote you quoted before you quoted it?</p>
<p>I specifically mentioned types of speech being OUTLAWED. When a government agency (Public colleges are government agencies) prohibit the free exercise of speech, they are violating the Constitution. One need not be incarcerated to have one’s Constitutional rights violated. </p>
<p>You are correct, private schools have more leeway, but then you get into some more tricky legal nuances as many of them receive considerable funds from the federal and/or state government and it could be held that they are required to respect the free speech rights of students on that basis (though I don’t believe there is case law on that particular topic as of yet). There is case law on extending federal protections/requirements based on federal spending in other areas, so it is not especially far-fetched. </p>
<p>My point was exactly that the individuals in the school should be taking it upon themselves to chastise the boorish behavior by shunning, protesting or other legal means. The school taking steps to squelch speech is in some cases directly illegal and is at least tantamount to illegal censorship in the case of private schools.</p>
<p>Warning young women about potentially dangerous situations of course is good practice. No one would argue against that. My issue is with labeling young men as “rapey” without any evidence that anyone has been raped by them. That is wrong in my mind, but apparently not to others. </p>
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It’s very unlikely that any court would find that a private college couldn’t punish speech of the kind we’re talking about here–indeed, they’d probably allow public colleges to do so as well. (I wouldn’t agree with such a decision; I’m just saying how I think it would probably come out. They would say that threatening speech isn’t protected, or something of that nature–I’m thinking in particular of the DKE case.)</p>
<p>It’s not easy to get the reputation of “rapey.” I’m sure the girls have plenty of “evidence.” Girls like boys and they like parties. By the time they are ready to avoid a club, alley, house or team? They have evidence. </p>
<p>At D1’s school, the hockey team was considered to be rapey but the lacrosse team was not. By the time she left, the hockey team was considered to be a lot less rapey than they had been when she started there. Reputations change. Girls do not like to avoid groups of boys. But rapey is rapey. </p>
<p>I guess I can’t get too upset about people being labeled “rapey” when all they really are is offensively sexually aggressive and willing to use alcohol to try to get sex from naïve freshmen girls. Fraternities that don’t do things like that don’t get labeled as “rapey.”</p>
<p>So is slutty, slutty too? </p>
<p>Bay, why are you so eager to label young women as slutty? Even if they are, they aren’t preying on vulnerable people like these young men are, so I give them more of a pass.</p>
<p>I never label women as slutty. I have never used the term outside of discussing usage of the term. </p>
<p>Who cares about slutty? Slutty is a willingness to participate sexually with a willing partner. Rapey is predatory. If you tell a girl a house is rapey and she avoids it? She is clearly not in the mood to deal with that kind of attention. If you tell a guy a house is slutty and he avoids it? He is clearly not in the mood to deal with that kind of attention. Who cares?</p>
<p>I really don’t think girls care about slutty, anymore. Nobody takes that word seriously. It’s a personal choice.</p>
<p>HAH! I know of quite a few young ‘ladies’ who preyed upon naive young men and used their sexuality to get what they wanted. </p>
<p>This is just a tired old double-standard. Victims are victims regardless of gender. </p>
<p>Note: I have never heard an individual person described as “rapey.” I have only heard it used to describe organizations or locations. I have, however, heard individuals labeled as “slutty.”</p>
<p>Yes. I agree with that. I’ve worked with both male and female rape victims. The perpetrator has always been male, but a colleague I consult with has had two young men who were raped in adolescence by female pedophiles. </p>
<p>Poetgrl,
This thread was started because a man claimed to quit his fraternity because his female friend was hurt by being called slutty. He called himself a “feminist” for doing so. </p>