#rape laws

[ablackwomansurvivingrape]

Don't ask why survivors wait so long to speak up. As what systems were in place to keep them quiet.

[mrmuffinman4211]

For your 411.....

Me, 15 minutes ago: just awoke in sweats from freakish nightmare.....

Me, right now: There are actually some states where marital rape is legal...(after doing some research)

You, reading this blog: What does the hell does that mean?

Me, in response: If you're a person living in America, there are still spousal exemptions to rape in 20 jurisdictions

You: WTF OMG! Ooh please do tell me so I know where not to live.....

Me: Virginia, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Michigan, South Carolina, Missouri, Mississippi etc...

Me, just saying: Do your own research!!!

Me, again: Thoroughly though, okay!!!!!

[oldshrewsburyian]

Hi! I have a question regarding the depiction of gender roles in ASOIAF and how they compare to that of the real medieval Europe, specifically high-to late medieval. I'm aware that the violence against women and misogyny depicted in the books are often justified by fans on the basis of "historical realism".

How does the depiction of traditional gender roles in Westeros such as limitations based on gender-what women can and can't do-and violence against women differ from the real middle ages?

Another question: Cersei is meant to be a deconstruction of the "evil queen archetype", and part of her character is learning at an early age that she has no agency because she's female and that her only value is her ability to bear children, and the only way she's able to get anything done in the books is by influencing men with sex or using underhanded magical means because she's barred from traditional routes of power.

However, does this reflect real medieval queen consorts and noble-women? I've read that the things Cersei does were the sort of nasty stereotypes that existed about women during the period seeking illegitimate power.

Okay, here goes, but I am going to immodestly observe that answering questions like this is usually part of the work I'm paid to do. And there's so much going on here.

To your final question first: no, it does not reflect reality. And also, uh, no. There are a lot of assumptions embedded in that phrase "seeking illegitimate power" (illegitimate how/why?) but anyway. The image of Cersei as sexually voracious and insatiable (and incestuous) may borrow from the charges against Anne Boleyn, but that case is 1) exceptional for a lot of reasons 2) not medieval. Evil Woman Wielding Power Via Sex + Magic is a medieval idea if you count Thomas Malory's Morgan le Fay, I guess? Which is not nothing! But a work of entertainment literature from 1485 ≠ generalized medieval stereotype.

The fact that real medieval queens, and queens-consort, and queens-regent, and noblewomen -- including those known as lords because that's what they were -- wielded power with no one freaking out about it is, in scholarly terms, old news. Joan Kelly's brilliant 1977 article, "Did Women Have A Renaissance?" (brilliantly summarized/contextualized here by Natalie Zemon Davis, thank you @jstor) points out some of the ways this was so. From at least the 1990s on, the work of other scholars, e.g. Bonnie Wheeler, Amy Livingstone, Fredric Cheyette, Miriam Shadis, has expanded our vision of this. And I'm going into this detail in order to illustrate how long this accurate work has been around, and thus available to work into undergraduate coursework, which is where I'm presuming most people have the closest access to up-to-date scholarship.

Three books in, I'm going to say that if Cersei is intended to be a deconstruction of the "evil queen archetype," uh. GRRM could have done better. I do think she's a fascinating character. But she's also, I think, very clearly a woman who would not be evil™ if women could get MBA degrees. Okay, well, she might be a bit evil™, but in a Narcissist With An MBA way. Anyway. In Westeros, she would be a lot less evil/angry if women could just wield power the way they did in the Actual Middle Ages!! FFS!

Taking your first question last: this is one of the things that frustrates me about ASOIAF because it is so far from historical reality that there is no simple answer to this. This question cannot be answered with a checklist, with items. Medieval misogyny existed. It was also very different from modern misogyny. I don't know why GRRM treats sadistic and often sexual/sexualized violence and abuse of women as normative. Women's legal recourse against marital abuse would require Fantasy Canon Law™, which as we have seen, he does not have. And the idea that most medieval people (canon law notwithstanding) were just a lot less uptight about sex than, say, the Victorians does not seem to have entered his head. Also ~traditional gender roles~ my left foot.

I'll close with one story about medieval misogyny. It comes from a miracle collection. A non-elite woman (artisan or peasant, we don't know) was raped by a stranger; "some man of high rank," according to the text. She was deeply traumatized. She was also, and this breaks my heart, "fearful lest her husband have hate for her because of this thing." But here's where it gets better: we know this in part because she told her neighbors! They functioned as a support system, and recommended that she seek healing at a saint's shrine (mental/emotional/physical health being seen as inseparable.) She stayed in that place for nine days, resting, and visiting the shrine, and talking with the friars who managed it. Gradually, her symptoms of trauma improved. She returned home. I don't know the rest of her story; I hope she was okay, and that her husband behaved decently. But the fact that she was treated with compassion both by her community of origin and the community to which she went for specialized help shows a reality very different from that of ASOIAF.

[wingsy-keeper-of-songs]

Sometimes I think people need a few more lessons in media literacy before they engage with something that deals with sexual trauma/abuse. I see takes like "wait, did Cazador actually sexually abuse Astarion and the other spawn? Omg it's just so ambiguous idk!"

My guy. My dude. My brother in Lathander. What the fuck do you think the line "he said my screams sounded sweetest" meant?

[a-room-of-my-own]

Living embodiment of this meme

[benoitblanc]

making an emily-arc gifset and screaming internally. why the fuck did they do that to scully

[porterdavis]

Make it make sense

[coochiequeens]

Another demonstration against Femicide and barely any media attention

Activists denounce 900 femicides under Macron presidency in Paris protest

Mared Gwyn Jones Fri, February 9, 2024

French feminist group #NousToutes took to the streets of Paris on Thursday evening to honour the 900 women murdered in France since Emmanuel Macron came to power.

Holding signs saying "guilty state, justice accomplice," they denounced Macron for failing to protect women and girls from violence.

Some 900 candles representing every woman killed were lit near the city's iconic Eiffel tour, and a 15-metre-long banner with the names and ages of the women was displayed.

It included the names of the 20 women, aged between 16 and 75, the group say have been killed since the beginning of this year.

#NousToutes say the frighteningly high numbers highlight an "absence of real political will" from the French government to tackle gender-based violence.

"Since President Emmanuel Macron took office, more than 900 femicides have been recorded and more than 1,000 children have been orphaned," they said in a statement.

They also say that the "great cause" of Macron's five-year term is conspicuous in its absence.

In November 2017, months after taking office at the Élysée Palace, Macron declared that equality between men and women would become the "grand cause" of his term, vowing to prioritise the crackdown on violence against women.

But Macron sparked fierce condemnation in 2020, when he appointed Gérald Darmanin to the post of Minister of the Interior.

Darmanin at the time faced allegations of rape.

Macron came under further fire earlier this year when he defended French actor Gérard Depardieu's right to be presumed innocent after he was accused of sexual assault.

In a further blow to his "grand cause", Macron has been blasted for blocking the inclusion of rape as an EU-wide crime in new EU laws to fight violence against women.

"Nothing has changed since 2016 and the start of our count, we have been at the same rate for eight years, with a woman killed every three days by her partner or ex-partner," Julia, not her real name, told the AFP news agency on Thursday.

The group say their femicide count helps raise public awareness of the gravity of the problem and put pressure on Macron's government to take action.

Macron became France's President in May 2017 and is currently serving his second term.

[myfandomrealitea]

Fictional content is not a victimless crime purely because, with some very minute exceptions it is simply not a crime.

It is, simply put, not actually illegal, as in not actually in violation of a written, valid law, to write about a fictional character raping another fictional character. Or murdering them. Or taking their child as a slave.

And, yes, by reality's standards those things are horrifying and illegal, but those people do not exist. Those actions do not exist. Those laws have not been violated because other than as words on a page or pixels on a screen, they do not exist.

Much in the way that fictional characters cannot harm you, or rob you, or marry you or touch you or even speak to you, they cannot commit crimes or be victims of crimes. They are not real people. They are not entities. You cannot harm them any more than they can step out of a screen or off a page and violate laws that exist in real life.

They do not need protecting because they do not exist. They are not allusions to real people or proxies for real people. Nothing that you do to or make a fictional character do has any impact on real people. Actions against fictional characters do not equate to the capability for or desire to do the same to real people.

"But its disgusting to do that to [character]!"

No it isn't, because they're not real. They don't exist. They don't know what's being 'done' to them because they're fictional. They do not need your protection and your championship.

Real victims do. Real people do. They do not need you to start arguments on Tumblr about fanfiction. They need you to force change in the justice system and help increase funding for support outreach and efforts. Fictional characters do not.

[creature-wizard]

Law of Assumption has this weird concept called “Revision” which basically states that you can manifest your past to be changed or revised. This stems from what your previous anons were talking about, the whole “Everything is you pushed out” thing. The logic behind it is that if you are the creator of your reality or reality in general, you should be able to go back in time, change the past, etc. It sounds crazy, it is crazy, but for people who have gone through traumatic shit in the past, this shit is a dream come true. All you need to do is manifest for whatever happened, to have never happened.

If you’re disabled, affirm that you’re… able bodied. If you were raped, affirm it never happened. If you’ve got abusive parents, affirm that your parents are loving. Shit like that. That’s what led me to LOA in the first place. Just wanted to not be stuck in a house with a p*do anymore. Thought I could manifest that it never happened.

But when you look into the concept of it… it’s really fucked up.

Because if everybody is you pushed out… then you are your rapist. You are your abuser. You are the reason you’re disabled, etc. But it’s okay, because you can manifest that it never happened!

But if you fail to manifest it away, then it’s your fault that it even happened to you because you’re the “creator of your reality” and you’re choosing to have limiting beliefs. You chose to be abused. You chose to be assaulted. You chose to have your family die. You chose to be in this predicament.

LOA is literally just “spiritual” victim blaming. If hell exists, Neville Goddard is rotting in its pits.

This. Fucking all of this. The Law of Assumption movement preys on the desperate and traumatized with false promises of personal empowerment, and when these impossible promises fail to manifest, blames the victim. It's so fucking ghoulish and people have got to stop pushing this type of bullshit.

[not-poignant]

Hi Pia!

I was rereading the first Ice Plague story the other say and got to the bit where Eran pimps out Mosk (oof) and has that horrible encounter with that one fae that forces him to watch.

Was that fae one of the ones that fed on sexual violence/rape? He seemed to get a lot out of violating Eran at the same time as Mosk.

Also in the fae realm I take it that there's less safety net / social or cultural morality around sexually exploiting someone for money? Most of the fae that came across Eren and Mosk seemed to realise that Mosk wasn't a willing participant but they didn't seem to care or mind much. And this was in public establishments.

And yeah I know this sort of stuff happens in the human realm too but it seems more acceptable in the fae realm?

Like... most human hotels have policies in place that require staff to call the authorities if they witness anything untoward because raoe and sexual exploitation in the human realm is mostly illegal. But that doesn't seem to be the case in the fae realm? Like there's no police force or social safety net or a fae equivalent to human rights organisations or shelters.

I suppose Ash would consider the human realm superior to the fae realm in that regard right? I think I remember him stating that the human realm was better morally because abusing kids was illegal in most places and also that education in the human realm was better because is was more accessible and less based on class ect. Unless I'm misremembering .

Sorry for the wall of text lol. I'm just really curious and have a lot of questions. Thanks for taking the time to read/answer

Was that fae one of the ones that fed on sexual violence/rape? He seemed to get a lot out of violating Eran at the same time as Mosk.

He was!

Also in the fae realm I take it that there's less safety net / social or cultural morality around sexually exploiting someone for money?

Generally speaking, it just depends. Among most fae, there's less legal protections. Like, there's no one Eran could go to, in order to report what happened. There's no one Mosk could go to either. But if they were in a city of common fae, there might be police-style force of people they could go to.

But you couldn't, say, go to the Unseelie King and be like 'I was raped by this fae' because the response is going to be 'that fae needs to rape to survive, but if they're doing it for any other reason, let me know.'

It's a world that simultaneously understands these things really suck to experience, but in many cases (with the exception of child sexual assault) treats them like many other things that suck to experience. It doesn't make them easier to deal with, but it does give many a different perspective.

Most of the fae that came across Eren and Mosk seemed to realise that Mosk wasn't a willing participant but they didn't seem to care or mind much. And this was in public establishments.

And yeah I know this sort of stuff happens in the human realm too but it seems more acceptable in the fae realm?

It is, especially in certain cities, or in desperate times (it was definitely desperate times during The Ice Plague). It mostly depends on who runs the bar/pub/establishment, honestly. Some will allow that stuff, some won't. Some will kill you for it without blinking.

I suppose Ash would consider the human realm superior to the fae realm in that regard right?

He maybe thought that way once, but I don't think he does anymore. Like, we can see in The Nascent Diplomat that almost all fae (including Augus and the Raven Prince) have extremely strong and visceral reactions to child sexual abuse. It's clearly very frowned upon and if anything, more decisive action is taken in the fae realm than in the human realm (where most child rapists never get sentenced or see any consequences for their actions - Oxcillian was killed without a trial lol).

Something being illegal doesn't actually mean the people committing the act are seeing consequences for that act in any consistent or meaningful way.

Stertes attempted to rape Eran, and Mosk murdered him. It really just depends on the fae that are around at the time.

I would say the system is uglier in some ways, and cleaner in others. It highlights the power differential and class structures in a more stark way, but our human world has those too, and they're often more hidden, insidious, and sometimes even more damaging.

I find that really interesting to think about. I don't think Ash thinks the human realm is better anymore.

[siryouarebeingmocked]

TVtropes editor; Law And Order SVU had an episode with a male stripper, raped by woman. And most people didn't believe him, because of sexist beliefs about male rape.

TVtropes editor: Clearly, this plotline was symbolizing what female rape victims go through.

Me:

Imagine being so sexist you don't even think a story about male rape victims is actually about male rape victims.

Look at the trope entry right below this one, BTW:

A trope about sexist double standards in rape.

I think it’sremotely  possible the writers were actually trying to allude to what women go through. Which would be incredibly stupid, when dudes like this actually do get sexually harassed and assaulted.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Scotland/comments/116ejah/why_the_hell_is_it_so_normalised_for_people_to/

[djeterg19]

Thank God because Thailand has a thing about blackout drunk sex and was really scared they were going there here.

Also glad that they are acknowledging that it would be rape and a crime

[c1nto]

finding it hard to care about the investigation plotline because i'm on the side of the rapist killers

[porterdavis]

When I first started writing this blog around 15 years ago one of my main topics was the astonishing yet massively under-reported frequency of Black men being killed by the police. At the time there was no real awareness of it outside of Black families and communities. There was no central reporting apparatus of any kind that I was aware of.

More than once I was accused of lying. It didn't bother me, I had no real agenda other than being incredulous that a:) it was happening and b:) nobody seemed to care. The drums began beating with the murders of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, and of course...George Floyd.

As horrible as those killings were, they obscured another reality -- police were killing Black women on an even larger scale. The sexual abuse and disappearance of this vulnerable demographic went almost completely unreported. (The only worse situation I can think of is the disappearance of Indigenous women in the North).

This story above is a long, well-researched indictment of...all of us.

[moghedien]

WAIT so you're telling me that Greta actually got Andrew Tate arrested because he was too fragile not to try to dunk on a random 19 y/o