Rape Culture Fucking Sucks

So the battle’s over.  We won.  We won big because we’re awesome.  We’re big manly men flying invincible internet spaceships and we won against carefully stacked odds that look in their favor but really aren’t.  We raped ’em.

No.  Wait.  We Didn’t.

You know why?  Because internet spaceships are awesome.  AND RAPE ISN’T!  It’s a simple concept but let’s face it some of us in the TL;DR crowd need pictures.  So I got Rixx to make me some.

This poster is also awesome.

By trivializing rape we act permissive towards it.  We pretend that it is not only not a crime, but is, in fact, something to be desired.  No we probably don’t all think that way, but it’s the image we put out and it encourages those who are of a mindset to do this horrible crime, and it’s a deterrent for the survivors of this crime to speak out, to get help.  We tell them it’s trivial.  It’s not a big deal.  You should harden the fuck up and deal with it.

This is wrong.  Rape is a horrible crime, it frequently exacts a lifetime toll on the victims and the victim blaming and shaming can cause even more pain.  And yes saying “We Raped Them” is victim shaming.  It says to rape victims that you are noobs.  That you are bad.  That you should have fought harder.  That you had control of your fate and could and SHOULD have done something.

We need to knock it off.  We are better than this.  We are capable of extolling our victories and coping with our defeats without hurting each other.  We may not always agree with each other but we are one community, the best community in gaming, and we can be better.  We owe it to the survivors in our midst.  We owe it to the survivors among our friends.  We should make ourselves clear to those animals among us that we do NOT tolerate, do NOT condone, and do NOT embrace anything that would comfort and console THEM.

Take it upon yourselves.  Stop using this language.  Stop using Rape as a descriptive term for success.

Gonna use this for a while

Because Fuck Misogyny

FC: Ok folks the Rape Train is pulling out of the station!

I heard this in fleet comms in my new alliance and my head fell back so that when my eyes rolled I didn’t sprain something.  Not one day in and already someone makes “the joke.”

Ok, look.  I know that shock humor is “in” and that somehow includes Rape humor.  Because Rape is hilarious.  Because the 1 in 3 women and around 1 in 20 men don’t mind you making light of the experiences they’ve gone through, and never suffer from extreme psychological issues because of what happened to them.  Because your ability to make a lame, unfunny joke is more important than them.

Rape isn’t funny.  It’s so not funny that many third world countries use it as torture for political prisoners, or as part of ethnic warfare.  Africa, South America, Asia, Europe, all across the world this horrible crime is used by men to oppress the female population.¹  When you joke about it, your joke has the same effect on the survivors of this crime.  It is an oppressive act that is potentially IMMENSELY harmful to the survivors.  Over at Afternoon Snooze Button they had a great post, for those of you in the Short Attention Span Theater crowd, I’ll post a nice summary she leaves at the bottom:

• Rape is a type of torture, and rape victims experience severe psychological trauma that goes well beyond the physical damage.
• The prevalence of sexual assault makes it much more likely that either a rapist or a rape victim will hear a given joke about rape.
• Rape jokes perpetuate our society’s fucked up belief that rape isn’t serious.
• Rape jokes empower would-be rapists.
• Rape jokes further harm the victims of rape.

Rape isn’t murder, where the odds of actually encountering it in the circle of people you know are vanishingly small.  Rape occurs everywhere, especially in the US.  1 in 3 women is a survivor of rape.  Odds are pretty good that this includes someone you know, even you making the terrible joke.  That person may not mind it but I bet someone else does.  I want more people playing EvE, and I want more women to feel free to join this community.

So let’s take a look at Rape Train.  I think this definition is mostly what people are looking for when they use it in gaming:

This act usually happens during games, either in Sports or in a video game. The rape train refers to one completely destroying/conquering their adversaries, you cant just fuck up one person it has to be a majority. It is a rare act but when it happens everyone around is left in awe, speechless if you will. The person who initiated the rape train event deserves a firm pat on the ass or a much less gay high five with a verbal acknowledgement. The “Rape Trainer” must respond with sounds related to old steam driven trains from the 1800’s.

Despite being “frothing at the mouth” mad about the issue in general, having been on the right side of a night of total domination and ruination of my foes, I know that the desire to put into words just how harshly and totally one has crushed ones’ enemies demands to be met.  Fine.  Let’s not put the word “Rape” in there though.  It doesn’t serve a purpose to enhance anything but the suffering of people to whom the only connection it has is to something horrible and hurtful.  Let’s find a better train to ride.

Same challenge as last time.  Whoever comes up with the best alternative to “Rape Train” to express the complete and utter domination of their enemies gets a shiny new plex in Jita 4-4.

¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_the_Bosnian_War#Major_Conclusions among others

I’m using it every time I can