Rape Guidance - A Danger to Women

For most of us, the notional equality of women and men has been long established.

On reflection, I note that my political representatives, professional advisers, university lecturers have frequently been women, and their gender passed unnoticed. 

On further reflection, I note that no electrician, plumber, decorator or rubbish collector calling at my house has ever been a woman – and so far I’ve heard no protests about inequality on that front. Why not?

Nonetheless, at a time when society has moved on from the Victorian, patriarchal image of women as silly little creatures, dependent on the intelligence and wisdom of men, why would anyone wish to resurrect it in the context of sexual relationships?

Such attitudes not only undermine the role of women, they increase the danger that they may come to harm – and that those who harm them will escape punishment.

The central error is exactly that of years gone by - the assignment of different roles and responsibilities to different genders. The scenario of the weak and vulnerable female needing to be protected from the brutality of the dominant male may be a theme celebrated in historical  literature but it is distorting and unhelpful perspective for regulating our day to day lives in the modern era.

We now understand that relationships between the sexes are complicated and varied but that their chance of success is always enhanced by the sense of a shared responsibility.

The idea of gender equality is particularly important in the context of the issue of rape. In practical terms, one does far more to protect a woman by reminding her of her responsibility to herself – the need to avoid becoming drunk/drugged and incapable - rather than abandoning herself to the whim of others (men or women).

To those who object that a woman has a right to behave as she likes, the obvious reply is that she has indeed such a right, but rights are always to be exercised with commonsense. She has, for example, the right to keep a note of her pin number together with her credit card. This lack of care would not excuse the thief who used it to take money from her account, but her bank would refuse to reimburse her and the law would support its decision.

The same one-sided caricature of sexual relationships is also an obstacle to conviction rates in matters which come to court. Jurors familiar with the real world just do not accept the terms in which certain cases are presented to them. It is not a question of ‘dark alley myths’, merely that when a woman decides the following day that she had not consented to sex the previous night, jurors ask themselves how has she found herself in this position, and why is it the man who must be held solely responsible?

The claim in recent headlines that men must now prove consent to sex hardly holds water, as the duty on the prosecution to prove the accused guilty, and no ministerial diktat can change that. Nevertheless, such statements do not augur well for male/female relations and relationships. It can only be a matter of time before chemists start to supply written contracts with condoms so that men can be fully protected in sexual relations with women.

But, even then, would the woman’s signature be enough or would pressure groups demand that a responsible family member (male, of course) countersign to confirm her informed consent had been freely given? And perhaps have an obligatory 6 day cooling off period.