Date: Sat, 1 Oct 1994 16:59:55 -0400 (EDT)
From: PNEWS 

[PNEWS.D]
From: Deb Zaccone "Wild-womyn" 
[Originally from: ug241@freenet.Victoria.BC.CA (Karen Gordon)]
(from: I Never Called it Rape - by Robin Warshaw):

The socialized 'deafness' of men toward women, and the 
likelihood that a man will interpret a situation to have 
stronger sexual overtones than a woman will - leads to the 
belief among many men (and some women) in 'justifiable rape', 
somewhat along the lines of 'justifiable homicide'.

In 'justifiable rape', the victim's behavior is seen as being 
responsible for triggering the man's action.  Although there is 
no legal concept as there is in 'justifiable homicide', the idea 
of 'justifiable rape' influences the opinions of everyone from 
the rape victim's own family to the jury who may sit in judgment 
of her attacker.

Recent studies show that men believe date rape is more 
justifiable if one of these circumstances occurs:

 : the woman invites the man out on the date
 : the man pays for the date
 : she dresses 'suggestively'
 : they go to his place rather than to a movie
 : she drinks alcohol or does drugs

Men with traditional attitudes toward women rate these 
situations as justifying rape significantly more often than do 
men who hold nontraditional attitudes.

The research also shows that many times men will feel 'led on' 
while women will not have the slightest clue that their actions 
are being interpreted as sexual.

IN A 1967 study by Purdue's Eugene Kanin, sexually aggressive 
college men said they believed their aggression was justified if 
the woman was 'a tease'.  A 1979 survey of California high 
school boys showed 54% thought rape was justifiable if the girl 
'leads a boy on'.

In a study exploring correlations between people who rated rape 
as justifiable under certain circumstances and people who 
actually were involved in sexually aggressive incidents, Texas 
A&M's Muehlenhard found that men were much more likely than 
women to say that the woman had hinted before- hand that she 
wanted the man to ask her out.

When she looked at just those subjects whose dates involved 
sexual aggression, Muehlenhard saw this difference in high 
relief:

 60% of men reported that the woman had hinted she was interested
 in dating him;
 only 16% of the women said they had so hinted.

Those men clearly felt 'led on' by the women who refused them 
sex, a feeling which many of them may have regarded as 
justification for committing rape.