Contemplating short dresses and cleavage on teens

[rousseau]

The biggest hurdle in fixing anything is to get most feminists to admit there are fundamental and inherent gender differences in behaviour. Until we get to that point this debate will stay stupid. For example, educating boys on how to behave towards women won't solve the problem of violence toward women. Because men who assault women aren't wired in the head like the rest of us. Most men never do anything bad toward women and make considerable efforts in protecting women around them. That is normal human male behaviour. Men don't need education to protect women. It comes naturally to us. I think its instinct. We protect our in group and keep a watchful eye on the out group.

The implication that sexual assault perps have different wiring is difficult to reconcile with incidents of sexual assault.

Take the Steubenville high school rape case, for instance. A whole group of boys took part in the assault either as perpetrators or spectators. What are the odds that they all shared the same mental deficiency that made them capable/tolerant of such cruelty?

I think that such cases are not far removed from the men described in Christopher Browning's Ordinary Men:

While this book discusses a specific Reserve Unit during WWII, the general argument Browning makes is that most people succumb to the pressures of a group setting and commit actions they would never do of their own volition.

I am confident that if you go through life with your eyes open, you'll find men everywhere going along with shitty behaviour rather than stopping someone doing what they know to be deeply wrong. To use your own phrase against you, it "is normal human male behaviour".

On some level this is how the relationship between men and women are built:

- the sexually successful man is the one who manages to produce a baby, either by diplomacy or by force. This implies some level of aggression, regardless of how subtle it is.
- the sexually successful woman is the one who raises a child to adulthood, meaning she's found a committed partner. This implies caution and care.

So in practice what happens is that in communities where women's rights are respected, and sexual violence is dealt with by the law, we breed out men who use force, and breed in men who use diplomacy and social skills. But even then, no matter which way you slice it, a significant chunk of the men who pro-create will have found their partners by sheer persistence and aggression, but will have achieved consent rather than resorting to sexual violence. Somewhere in the middle of all of this is a subset of men who are sexually aggressive.

If you take this heuristic to somewhere like a war-zone in Africa, rape is not only widespread, but it's an act of war, so communities move in the opposite direction: more sexually violent than diplomatic men are being bred.

But the story doesn't just end there. Another part of it is the financial inequities between men and women. Many women also need to pair up with terrible dudes because it's quite literally their only way to survive.

And so I think you could build an argument that our very best weapon against sexual violence would be to increasingly protect women's legal, bodily, and financial rights. Sexual violence won't go away, and it's unlikely that it will ever be eliminated, but it would be lessened.

 

[TSwizzle]

The biggest hurdle in fixing anything is to get most feminists to admit there are fundamental and inherent gender differences in behaviour.

Just on this. Is that really the biggest hurdle? Do we really need to wait for those feminists? There's not all that many of them and, let's say they remain unconvinced. We could still get on and do...anything, unilaterally. I mean, mostly it's not feminists telling us they're harassed and suchlike.

Well it's the biggest hurdle that comes to mind, maybe there are bigger hurdles, I don't know. But this one is a big one in my opinion.

 

[ruby sparks]

Those feminists completely dominate the dichotomy. How else could the phrases "toxic masculinity" and "patriarchal oppression" catch on and be used so freely?

If one gender, on average, is more aggressive than the other and resources are scarce logic dictates that members of the more aggressive gender will seize power. That's not oppression. Nor patriarchal oppression. Since most of the patriarchy are also oppressed. That's "by design". Gender equality is absolutely connected to the economy and how abundant it's resources are. Which is why the less developed an economy is the more patriarchal it is. There's a reason the goat herder economy of the African Dinka is the world's most patriarchal society. Its economy has looked the same the last 15 000 years. Give or take a few.

How doesn't patriarchal oppression imply some sort of conspiracy? Why would most men participate in a conspiracy they're at the losing end of?

To a large extent, I agree with you that Feminism is......well, arguably, at the very least, an implicitly divisive phenomenon. By the same token, that is neither unexpected nor unwarranted, imo. You may not agree, because you may think the issues it was born out of were really nothing worth starting a reactionary movement against. I personally don't buy that. Furthermore I don't buy that there aren't still valid issues for...a movement, of some sort....to try to change, albeit there has been a LOT of progress. And Feminism did not invent the dichotomy in question. That was already there before Feminism. It was called patriarchy. Of course if you don't see patriarchy as any big problem, then you won't agree with that. What's the alternative, women making a big fuss all about not much? Typical, eh?

And yes, at times (and not infrequently) the Feminist paradigm has even implied conspiracy, and even, at other times involved outright misandry.

But still, here's the thing. Most of the things F is actually asking us men to do are things that anyone could ask, and does (non-feminist women ask, men ask) and a lot of them are things we arguably should be doing anyway and things that would be good for us.

And how many actual Feminists with a capital F are there, really? Something like 7% of UK women self-identify as such, apparently. And how many of those are really radical in the way we might find objectionable?

In any case, maybe we don't have to find out who's to blame. We don't have to win that argument. We could (and I find this as tricky as the next guy) just get on with trying to make things better.

Maybe it would help if Feminists wore false beards and spoke in deep voices when talking to us?

 

[ruby sparks]

The biggest hurdle in fixing anything is to get most feminists to admit there are fundamental and inherent gender differences in behaviour.

Just on this. Is that really the biggest hurdle? Do we really need to wait for those feminists? There's not all that many of them and, let's say they remain unconvinced. We could still get on and do...anything, unilaterally. I mean, mostly it's not feminists telling us they're harassed and suchlike.

Well it's the biggest hurdle that comes to mind, maybe there are bigger hurdles, I don't know. But this one is a big one in my opinion.

I can see where you're coming from. Trust me, I'm not uncritical of Feminism. Sometimes it annoys me severely in fact.

But, for instance, if (if) we (the royal we, men) are going to......try to be less toxic, or try to not just stand by if it happens around us.....let's just do that. How much does it really matter, at the end of the day, whether we get agreement from a bunch of noisy gender studies graduates about the causes of the thing that needs to be fixed? Let's just fix it.

Hey. Fuck it. Let's just do it for us. Screw those effin' eFFers. We don't need them to try to tell us what to do, the bossy cows. Cut out the middlewoman, that's what I say. That'll give them something to ponder. What are they gonna do all day when there's nothing to complain about that is men's fault?

And anyway, given a few millennia, I'm fairly sure we would have eventually gotten around to doing at least some of it anyway. We can work stuff out for ourselves, right? And even if we didn't, the least they could do is let us believe it was our idea.

And then there's the awful thing. The possibility that Feminists might actually be right about a lot of stuff.

 

[TSwizzle]

But, for instance, if (if) we (the royal we, men) are going to......try to be less toxic, or try to not just stand by if it happens around us.....let's just do that. How much does it really matter whether there is agreement about the causes of the thing that needs to be improved, at the end of the day?

"less toxic" is meaningless corporate claptrap. Nobody talks like that in real life. It's bullshit, I have no time for it.

 

[ruby sparks]

"less toxic" is meaningless corporate claptrap. Nobody talks like that in real life. It's bullshit, I have no time for it.

What would you call it then, instead of toxic masculinity?

 

[TSwizzle]

"less toxic" is meaningless corporate claptrap. Nobody talks like that in real life. It's bullshit, I have no time for it.

What would you call it then, instead of toxic masculinity?

If someone is being a knob, call them a knob.

 

[ruby sparks]

If someone is being a knob, call them a knob.

Gotcha. Like when someone is being a skanky ho.

Sorry, that was a cheeky cheap shot. I just don't buy this 'there's no such wider phenomenon to describe' crap.

But it's a cool approach. Yours. If we transferred it to other issues, we could, say, just call someone a racist, if we caught them being racist. Bye bye analysis of the wider phenomenon. This is what we might call, 'there's really not much of a general problem to fix in the first place' starting position. Sometimes followed by the 'not much can be done about it through education' segue. And of course our old friend, 'it's the feminists who are the big problem' quickstep. What's remarkable about DrZ's hat-trick is not so much how fast the goals went in, but how many different places the goalposts were in.

 

[ruby sparks]

What I think one of the biggest hurdles is, is men not getting over themselves and opting for butthurt and objecting and being dismissive and negative, and being tribal about their perceived ingroup, instead of taking stuff on board. How about, instead, saying, 'if women are saying there's a big problem, hey, maybe there is actually a big problem'?

Plus, it's the hurdle you can get yourself over, as opposed to spending your time trying to get others to get over their hurdles. Get over your own hurdles first, in other words.

Plus, the Gillette ad. Did anyone notice how often boys as victims featured? Quite a lot.

Yes, you could say that boys as victims of girls was not adequately covered, but it was an ad asking men to be better. We could also ask girls and women to be better, sure. We could ask people to be better. I'm all for that. But if, in a particular case, people (men and women, even if mostly the latter, for valid reasons) are asking men to be better, let's just go along with that.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Well that was annoying. I wrote a long reply that just disappeared into cyberspace. Here we go gain. This time shorter.

To a large extent, I agree with you that Feminism is......well, arguably, at the very least, an implicitly divisive phenomenon. By the same token, that is neither unexpected nor unwarranted, imo. You may not agree, because you may think the issues it was born out of were really nothing worth starting a reactionary movement against. I personally don't buy that. Furthermore I don't buy that there aren't still valid issues for...a movement, of some sort....to try to change, albeit there has been a LOT of progress. And Feminism did not invent the dichotomy in question. That was already there before Feminism. It was called patriarchy. Of course if you don't see patriarchy as any big problem, then you won't agree with that. What's the alternative, women making a big fuss all about not much? Typical, eh?

Please don't put words in my mouth. I'm not a Trumpian conservative. I'm a liberal progressive. I'm on the feminist side. I just think that third wave feminists aren't helping the feminist cause. I think they're directly damaging to women and the feminist cause. I think they're only an added obstacle to gender equality.

I think third wave feminism is a reactionary movement against the 1930'ies type KKK, fascism and Nazism. Where nationalism and chauvinism and masculinity was upheld as ideals. The master race/powerful groups oppressed and exploited the weaker groups. Third wave feminists kept the groups but reversed the dynamic. So instead of the master race exploiting the weak, they are lifting them up. So we get intersectionalism and identity politics. Sounds great, but isn't.

The master race loves it because they still get to feel superior. Nothing feels better than knowing that one is privileged and treated like it. They are rewarded for passivity. We're all lazy at heart. Who doesn't like getting a reward for doing nothing? The oppressed peoples lose their identity if they stop being victims. So they have to make sure the oppression is perpetuated to eternity. So they "problematise" and see problems ie instances of "structural oppression" you can only see if you squint really hard. Not to mention that this is a white middle class phenomena. I somehow doubt a working class woman in a poor neighbourhood gives a shit whether her abusive husband uses non-oppressive language while he beats her. I suspect she's got other things to worry about.

Third wave feminism perpetuates the conservative nationalist world view of the 1930'ies. I don't think they should be called feminists at all. They're conservatives in disguise. They're certainly working towards the same goal. Albeit using "non-oppressive" language.

Here's a typical example of third wave feminism shooting itself in the foot. The violence pyramid. Today upheld as an absolute truth and aggressively pushed on all levels of society.

http://ccasayourworld.com/get_the_facts/violence_pyramid/

There's zero evidence to support any of these claims. There's nothing connecting the various layers in the model. It might feel like it, but there's no causal relationships. They could have written any words anywhere and it would make as much, or little sense.

And it isn't harmless. It diverts time and energy away from things that could actually help women in need.

And yes, at times (and not infrequently) the Feminist paradigm has even implied conspiracy, and even, at other times involved outright misandry.

If this is a conspiracy it's the most incompetent conspiracy in the history of the world.

And how many actual Feminists with a capital F are there, really? Something like 7% of UK women self-identify as such, apparently. And how many of those are really radical in the way we might find objectionable?

It's just ignorance and a lack of history. 20% today barely know what the holocaust was about. The reason so many are uncomfortable calling themselves feminists is because third wave feminism is so completely dominant today. They've gotten to define the terminology. It's a bit like Neil deGrasse Tyson being uncomfortable with calling himself an atheist because he doesn't want to be associated with "angry" atheists like Richard Dawkins. He's still an atheist. Nearly everybody today is a feminists. All it means is that men and women should be able to live the life they want, free from social pressures and norms trying to force them into being something they're not. It's usually veiled in more vague language, but that's essentially it. Only an idiot would argue with that. The various versions of feminism takes the basic premise and then just ad bits on it. With whatever ideological framework attached to it.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Here's an interesting article of the waning popularity of feminism

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-47006912

 

[rousseau]

I think you can pretty much insert any group identity in the place of feminism, and you'll find people making ill-thought out or researched arguments. Anyone who identifies with a certain brand of politics is usually more interested in the group they're attaching themselves to than the theory.

To say things like 'I am liberal' means 'I believe liberal ideology'.. same with conservatism, feminism, christianity etc. Group identity is inherently self-limiting, and maybe there is a purpose for this limit, because the feminist with 100 feminist friends has a lot more people to help them out, than the guy who's yelling 'you're all full of shit'.

 

[ruby sparks]

SEXY DRESSING REVISITED: DOES TARGET DRESS PLAY A PART IN SEXUAL HARASSMENT CASES?
https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1109&context=djglp

Focuses more on perceptions about the issue than the issue itself (of whether victim dress plays a part in harassment), and it's about legal issues (cases which go to court) rather than 'everyday' or unreported stuff.

Conclusions:

When I began research for this article, I expected to find many cases
involving allegations that the plaintiff “welcomed” the sexual harassment by her
workplace attire. I was surprised to find that this was a rare case. Defendants
were not using the woman’s dress to weasel out of claims, but instead, the
woman’s dress most commonly was present in allegations by plaintiffs.

Plaintiffs frequently raised comments about their dress as part of their sexual
harassment allegations. This would seem to open the door to defendants, who
might use evidence of target dress to argue that the plaintiff welcomed the
harassment. Yet, that was not the case.

I have tried to account for the lack of case law and, in the process, have gone back to the root cause of sexual harassment:
power. Sexual harassment is about power; therefore, a target who is dressed
provocatively is not the ideal target for the would-be harasser, who appears
motivated at least in part by his ability to dominate his victim.

Provocative dress does not necessarily signify submissiveness but instead may be an indication of
confidence and assertiveness. It is clear, however, that comments about dress
directed at plaintiffs are a component of sexual harassment allegations.
Comments about dress are used to undermine working women’s authority and
should be considered seriously by courts assessing sexual harassment claims.

 

[ruby sparks]

I think you can pretty much insert any group identity in the place of feminism, and you'll find people making ill-thought out or researched arguments. Anyone who identifies with a certain brand of politics is usually more interested in the group they're attaching themselves to than the theory.

To say things like 'I am liberal' means 'I believe liberal ideology'.. same with conservatism, feminism, christianity etc. Group identity is inherently self-limiting, and maybe there is a purpose for this limit, because the feminist with 100 feminist friends has a lot more people to help them out, than the guy who's yelling 'you're all full of shit'.

Hi Rousseau,

Any thoughts on this possible 'paradox':

And second, what does 'not correlated' mean, if the data were broken down? It may mean that attire (for example) is not necessarily or overall related to risk, or it could, I think, mean that it sometimes is and sometimes isn't, which would of course leave instances where it was. Hypothetically, certain types of of inappropriate behaviour, in certain situations, perpetrated by certain types of (horny, confident) men (who may lack self-control or have other attitudes associated with toxic masculinity) might be correlated to sexy attire.

I think it's an interesting question, though I don't know the answer. An answer would hopefully resolve the arguably puzzling apparent disjoint between the fact that sexy appearance in a woman does arouse straight men, often leads them to wrongly assume the woman wants sex or is at least signalling something along those lines (and also at another level that men and women tend to generally think, rightly or wrongly, that such things are likely to provoke certain responses) and so on and so on, but that it (the attire etc) does not, apparently, actually lead to inappropriate behaviour.

One answer might be...........men are generally incredibly good at maintaining self-control?

 

[Shake]

I think you can pretty much insert any group identity in the place of feminism, and you'll find people making ill-thought out or researched arguments. Anyone who identifies with a certain brand of politics is usually more interested in the group they're attaching themselves to than the theory.

To say things like 'I am liberal' means 'I believe liberal ideology'.. same with conservatism, feminism, christianity etc. Group identity is inherently self-limiting, and maybe there is a purpose for this limit, because the feminist with 100 feminist friends has a lot more people to help them out, than the guy who's yelling 'you're all full of shit'.

The problem I have with anyone attacking "feminists" or "conservatives" or "liberals" or "Christians" or whatever, is that each of those labels is too big. Grab a sample of people of any of those groups and ask them how they define the term and what it means to them and you'll come up with many different answers. It also depends on how much stock they put into their labels. The "Christian" group could contain people who were merely raised that way and take the label because it's what their parents are, or they could be hard-core YEC fundamentalists. For feminists, you have 2nd and 3rd wave, or others who just think women should be treated equally and they don't hate men. It's important to be clear about your terms because your ideas of what a certain label mean may or may not find agreement with certain members who self-identify that way.

Moving on: I've not read through the whole thread and admit I'm late to the show here, so I may have missed this point being made already: I'm pretty sure (almost) no one goes out of their way looking to be sexually assaulted or raped, and how one dresses (or doesn't dress) is not an excuse for such behavior. Ever. You may or may not have seen the images of half-naked women walking around at protests with the words, "still not asking for it," written on their bodies. It's about respect for your fellow humans, people.

 

[rousseau]

I think you can pretty much insert any group identity in the place of feminism, and you'll find people making ill-thought out or researched arguments. Anyone who identifies with a certain brand of politics is usually more interested in the group they're attaching themselves to than the theory.

To say things like 'I am liberal' means 'I believe liberal ideology'.. same with conservatism, feminism, christianity etc. Group identity is inherently self-limiting, and maybe there is a purpose for this limit, because the feminist with 100 feminist friends has a lot more people to help them out, than the guy who's yelling 'you're all full of shit'.

Hi Rousseau,

Any thoughts on this possible 'paradox':

And second, what does 'not correlated' mean, if the data were broken down? It may mean that attire (for example) is not necessarily or overall related to risk, or it could, I think, mean that it sometimes is and sometimes isn't, which would of course leave instances where it was. Hypothetically, certain types of of inappropriate behaviour, in certain situations, perpetrated by certain types of (horny, confident) men (who may lack self-control or have other attitudes associated with toxic masculinity) might be correlated to sexy attire.

I think it's an interesting question, though I don't know the answer. An answer would hopefully resolve the arguably puzzling apparent disjoint between the fact that sexy appearance in a woman does arouse straight men, often leads them to wrongly assume the woman wants sex or is at least signalling something along those lines (and also at another level that men and women tend to generally think, rightly or wrongly, that such things are likely to provoke certain responses) and so on and so on, but that it (the attire etc) does not, apparently, actually lead to inappropriate behaviour.

One answer might be...........men are generally incredibly good at maintaining self-control?

Doesn't really seem like much of a paradox. Men being aroused by women doesn't mean they can just assault them whenever they like, other conditions have to be true: privacy, usually some semblance of rapport, and the like. When you live in a community that has repercussions for sexual harassment and assault it's not open season.

But in theory there should be a link between women being attractive overall, and men trying to maneuver into situations where sex is possible. As I mentioned in the beginning of the thread, the clothing is a part of the lure whether the women wearing it know it or not, aka whether they're wearing it because they just want to 'look good' aka fit stereotypical norms of an attractive woman, or whether they want to explicitly attract men. Either way the result is the same: they get sexual attention.

 

[rousseau]

I think you can pretty much insert any group identity in the place of feminism, and you'll find people making ill-thought out or researched arguments. Anyone who identifies with a certain brand of politics is usually more interested in the group they're attaching themselves to than the theory.

To say things like 'I am liberal' means 'I believe liberal ideology'.. same with conservatism, feminism, christianity etc. Group identity is inherently self-limiting, and maybe there is a purpose for this limit, because the feminist with 100 feminist friends has a lot more people to help them out, than the guy who's yelling 'you're all full of shit'.

The problem I have with anyone attacking "feminists" or "conservatives" or "liberals" or "Christians" or whatever, is that each of those labels is too big. Grab a sample of people of any of those groups and ask them how they define the term and what it means to them and you'll come up with many different answers. It also depends on how much stock they put into their labels. The "Christian" group could contain people who were merely raised that way and take the label because it's what their parents are, or they could be hard-core YEC fundamentalists. For feminists, you have 2nd and 3rd wave, or others who just think women should be treated equally and they don't hate men. It's important to be clear about your terms because your ideas of what a certain label mean may or may not find agreement with certain members who self-identify that way.

Moving on: I've not read through the whole thread and admit I'm late to the show here, so I may have missed this point being made already: I'm pretty sure (almost) no one goes out of their way looking to be sexually assaulted or raped, and how one dresses (or doesn't dress) is not an excuse for such behavior. Ever. You may or may not have seen the images of half-naked women walking around at protests with the words, "still not asking for it," written on their bodies. It's about respect for your fellow humans, people.

I don't disagree, although I more commonly see group labels applied as a heuristic to determine what people believe, rather than actual thoughtfulness and analysis. Apply the label, gather the beliefs, and never change is pretty much the norm. Beliefs will vary, but the core identity usually becomes more important than anything else.

 

[ruby sparks]

Doesn't really seem like much of a paradox. Men being aroused by women doesn't mean they can just assault them whenever they like, other conditions have to be true: privacy, usually some semblance of rapport, and the like. When you live in a community that has repercussions for sexual harassment and assault it's not open season.

This seems to imply that men generally won't misbehave or cross a line they shouldn't. I'm not sure if that's the real world. In fact, I know it's not. Bear in mind I'm not just talking about serious sexual assault, but about about harassment, which could include inappropriate staring, comments, unwanted approaches and touching. Also bear in mind that a lot of the time, the men aren't initially consciously, intending to harass, albeit they are often mistaken in their judgement.

I take your point about other factors.

I'm still seeing a disjoint, and possibly a paradox.

1. Revealing dress and certain types of make up, etc, cause sexual arousal in men's brains. Straight men, I mean, when it's a woman they encounter.
2. Revealing dress and certain types of make up, etc, cause men (wrongly a lot of the time) to think that the woman either wants sex or wants something along those lines, and is more open to being approached.
3. Men make passes more readily at women who wear revealing clothes than women who don't.
4. Alcohol (involved in a lot of social situations where men see women in revealing clothes and make up) weakens or deactivates the mechanisms in the man's brain which function as behaviour restraints.
5. Alcohol (involved in a lot of social situations where men see women in revealing clothes and make up) reduces the man's ability to read signals and intents correctly.
6. Women, as well as men, believe that revealing dress and certain kinds of make up increase the likelihood of unwanted attention and harassment.
7. Anecdotally (including in legal harassment cases) women report such things, for example sexual harassment at work if they wear revealing clothes.

Add all those up.

But

8. Wearing revealing clothes and certain kinds of make up, etc, are not correlated to risk of unwanted attention and harassment?

Note that being a risk factor for something does not say anything about whether the inappropriate behaviour, harassment or what have you is justified or right. It isn't. Leaving your car unlocked or your wallet or phone lying on the table does not make the thief any less of a thief. Consuming alcohol is a risk factor for being a victim of a sexual wrongdoing, but there is nothing wrong with getting drunk, and you don't have to be at all drunk to become a victim, just as you don't have to be dressed in any revealing way to be a victim. If something wrong is done, by a man, it's on the man. 'Just don't be an arse'. No means no. Etc. This is all separate to what is or isn't a risk factor. It may involve considerations of managing personal risk and such things as preventative measures and taking advice, and even on that limited front, there are risk factors for men to be careful about also (alcohol again). Not to mention the risk factors of men possessing the sort of attitudes and beliefs which are associated with inappropriate or toxic behaviour, or worse.

But in theory there should be a link between women being attractive overall, and men trying to manoeuver into situations where sex is possible. As I mentioned in the beginning of the thread, the clothing is a part of the lure whether the women wearing it know it or not, aka whether they're wearing it because they just want to 'look good' aka fit stereotypical norms of an attractive woman, or whether they want to explicitly attract men. Either way the result is the same: they get sexual attention.

Yes, they get sexual attention. And men may try to manoeuvre into situations where sex is possible. And already they may have harassed. And if they've manoeuvred into that situation where sex is possible, and they're drunk, and aroused, not reading signals, under the illusion that the woman wants sex....

Regarding why women, or girls, wear revealing clothing and certain types of make up (and high heels and so on) I think it's fairly clear that they do not often, in fact mostly don't, wear them for the reasons that men think they do.

 

[ruby sparks]

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lljf3C0KzH0[/YOUTUBE]

 

[rousseau]

Doesn't really seem like much of a paradox. Men being aroused by women doesn't mean they can just assault them whenever they like, other conditions have to be true: privacy, usually some semblance of rapport, and the like. When you live in a community that has repercussions for sexual harassment and assault it's not open season.

This seems to imply that men generally won't misbehave or cross a line they shouldn't. I'm not sure if that's the real world. In fact, I know it's not. Bear in mind I'm not just talking about serious sexual assault, but about about harassment, which could include inappropriate staring, comments, unwanted approaches and touching. Also bear in mind that a lot of the time, the men aren't initially consciously, intending to harass, albeit they are often mistaken in their judgement.

I take your point about other factors.

I'm still seeing a disjoint, and possibly a paradox.

Oh.. THAT paradox, the one I'm not touching with a ten-foot pole