Interesting, Roo. But what bothers me about this kind of thing - and not getting at you here at all, but at the study itself - is that as usual with half the advice out there the onus is on the woman to live her entire life to account for the fact that she might/maybe/could be a victim some day. No thought given to perhaps tackling the problem at its source. With the culprit, not the victim.
It strikes me as faintly ridiculous to suggest that a woman should make sure she always has her hair cut short, rather than a style of her own choosing, should always make sure she has a chaparone with her when she sets foot outside, etc etc. Just on the offchance that perhaps one day some man will decide she's a target.
It's like the police advice routinely trotted out when a serial rapist hits the news. All women should stay indoors. Gee, ever thought of making sure all men stay indoors till the culprit is caught? Just once? That would solve the problem, wouldn't it? Why should women have their lives restricted because some men can't behave themselves? I know, I know, it's only practical. But it still ticks me off, the way it's women in a community who are expected to rearrange their entire lives and make themselves prisoners in their own homes to solve such a problem.
Last year, in Glasgow, we had a spate of attacks of male rape on young men in the city's clubs and bars. Did the police suggest on the news that all young men should stay indoors until the culprit was caught? That they should stay away from clubs and bars? That they should never walk the city streets at night alone? They did not! They began extra patrols of the city and paid special attention to clubs and bars.
Anyway...rant over. <g> This is just one that strikes a nerve and is a bit of a bugbear with me. As you might have been able to tell. <G>
Which isn't to say at all, that all such advice isn't valuable. Some of it is mainly commonsense and unfortunately so long as society continues to leave the victim to do the hard work, a sad necessity. It just makes sense not to go traipsing around a city car park that has no lighting, much as one might wish to have the freedom to walk where one chooses, whenever one chooses. I'm ranting more from a philosophical angle here than a practical one. <g> Practically, women just have to shrug their shoulders, sigh, accept that society expects them to manage their lives to take account of becoming a victim of deviants in a way that men aren't and get on with it. It's bloody unfair. But then what else is new there? So is much of life.
LabRat
