@petehague's piece on This Week's Pod Delusion
Saturday, July 9th, 2011 10:09 am![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miss_s_b
This week's episode contains an interesting piece by Pete Hague. In it, among many other things, he claims that the idea of Schroedinger's Rapist is inherently irrational. I have made a little (deliberately non-gendered and non-sexual) consequences graphic with which to illustrate the point that I think he is wrong:
As you can see from the graphic, the consequences of treating an unknown stranger with caution (the stranger might get a bit miffed) are far less disastrous than the possible, even though far less likely, consequences of NOT treating an unknown stranger with caution. It doesn't matter that the stranger being an attacker is markedly less likely than them not being an attacker; the consequences of non-caution are overwhelmingly worse. It's like the climate change thing: if the science is wrong about climate change and we still modify our behaviour, all we have lost is a little inconvenience and we've probably saved a bit of money through using less resources. But if the deniers are wrong and we don't modify our behaviour, the consequences are far, far worse.
Obviously the graphic can be tempered by various specific circumstances.
If you're in a crowded public space, in daylight, with plenty of escape routes and plenty of people to help if something should happen, a physically weak person is less likely to feel threatened. In a confined space, with uncertain escape routes, at 4am, when you have already announced that you are going to bed because you feel tired? I think it's perfectly rational to be a little creeped out, and to treat an unknown person with caution.
To do so is not an attack on the sovereign right of all men to be trusted unless they have proved that they are evil by attacking you; it is simple, rational, modification of one's behaviour to minimise risk. Treating all people who appear physically stronger than you with caution is not irrational at all; to claim that it is is to say that a stronger person's right to avoid being miffed is more important than a weaker person's right to protect themselves from attack. Now, if Pete can tell us that he has never (for example) changed his route to avoid being caught up in a EDL march or felt physically threatened in some other way and thus modified his behaviour then I will buy that he genuinely doesn't understand that sometimes it can be rational to change one's behaviour towards another person dependent on the possible consequences of that behaviour.
Otherwise, I'm afraid I am going to have to continue to think of him as willfully misunderstanding in order to attack feminists, which he pronounces to rhyme with scum at several points during his piece.
As to the rest of Pete's flimsy arguments and straw men... Well, I fully intended to do a line by line rebuttal of his piece today, for which purpose he kindly sent me a transcript, but I'm not going to have time before work. Somebody else has made a pretty good start for me, here, though. And Pete might pay attention to that person, since he's a man.
As you can see from the graphic, the consequences of treating an unknown stranger with caution (the stranger might get a bit miffed) are far less disastrous than the possible, even though far less likely, consequences of NOT treating an unknown stranger with caution. It doesn't matter that the stranger being an attacker is markedly less likely than them not being an attacker; the consequences of non-caution are overwhelmingly worse. It's like the climate change thing: if the science is wrong about climate change and we still modify our behaviour, all we have lost is a little inconvenience and we've probably saved a bit of money through using less resources. But if the deniers are wrong and we don't modify our behaviour, the consequences are far, far worse.
Obviously the graphic can be tempered by various specific circumstances.
If you're in a crowded public space, in daylight, with plenty of escape routes and plenty of people to help if something should happen, a physically weak person is less likely to feel threatened. In a confined space, with uncertain escape routes, at 4am, when you have already announced that you are going to bed because you feel tired? I think it's perfectly rational to be a little creeped out, and to treat an unknown person with caution.
To do so is not an attack on the sovereign right of all men to be trusted unless they have proved that they are evil by attacking you; it is simple, rational, modification of one's behaviour to minimise risk. Treating all people who appear physically stronger than you with caution is not irrational at all; to claim that it is is to say that a stronger person's right to avoid being miffed is more important than a weaker person's right to protect themselves from attack. Now, if Pete can tell us that he has never (for example) changed his route to avoid being caught up in a EDL march or felt physically threatened in some other way and thus modified his behaviour then I will buy that he genuinely doesn't understand that sometimes it can be rational to change one's behaviour towards another person dependent on the possible consequences of that behaviour.
Otherwise, I'm afraid I am going to have to continue to think of him as willfully misunderstanding in order to attack feminists, which he pronounces to rhyme with scum at several points during his piece.
As to the rest of Pete's flimsy arguments and straw men... Well, I fully intended to do a line by line rebuttal of his piece today, for which purpose he kindly sent me a transcript, but I'm not going to have time before work. Somebody else has made a pretty good start for me, here, though. And Pete might pay attention to that person, since he's a man.
no subject
Date: Sunday, July 10th, 2011 01:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, July 10th, 2011 01:22 pm (UTC)If someone doesn't believe I have the right to be wary of strangers approaching me in public and who expects me to protect their feelings before protecting my own safety (going back to the diagram at the top of the page), I am more likely to be suspicious of them because they are already demonstrating that their desires are more important than my boundaries.
And to be clear, this is wariness, not immediate assumption of guilt. If someone backs off when I show I'm not interested then we can both go on with our day quite happily.