Yesterday, Harpyness reader Christopher F. wrote me about the firestorm of controversy surrounding a recent student column in the Daily Princetonian. In “The Real ‘Sex on a Saturday Night‘”, freshman Iulia Neagu explains that women who are raped while inebriated have only themselves to blame:
She knew what would happen if she started drinking. We all know that the more people drink, the less likely they are to make wise decisions. It is common sense.
Therefore, the girl willingly got herself into a state in which she could not act rationally. This, in my opinion, is equivalent to agreeing to anything that might happen to her while in this state.
It’s okay if your head exploded on reading that. Chris knew that mine would, and wanted to know if it would be shooting fish in a barrel for me to write a screed about Neagu’s op-ed.
Well, yes. But plenty of other women beat me to the punch, including a hell of a lot of Daily Princetonian commenters–rock on, y’all!—student activists at Princeton, Anna North at Jezebel and many, many others. So I’m not going to bother to take apart this poorly-written, small-minded turd of rape apology, although I will note that I have read much more eloquent and insidiously persuasive rape apologia in my time; Iulia Neagu is clearly still a rank amateur at writing, reasoning and victim-blaming.
As I discussed Neagu’s column in various comment threads, some responses–particularly from fellow Jez commenters–caught my attention, including this one:
Confession time: When I was the same age as Neagu I used to partake in the victim blaming. I used to think that women weren’t saying no loud enough or that they shouldn’t have put themselves in dangerous situations. I used to pride myself on my ability to suss out danger and stay away from people who could cause me harm. I thought that instincts, even when drunk, could protect someone. Looking back at my cocky 20 year old self, I want to kick myself, since I now know that instincts and saying no really loud are not enough to protect everybody all the time. And there is someone I truly owe an apology too from that time, since I’m sure I hurt her with my vicitm blaming ways.
Trust me, Neagu will figure it out soon enough and will feel like an ass for this article she wrote. It doesn’t excuse her behaviour, but one day, she’ll see it. I can assure you of that.
I suspect that even if the current blowback isn’t convincing, Neagu will be regretting it hardcore when some future HR recruiter does a Google search on her. But I did feel a pang of recognition–when I was 18, I held a lot of views that I look back on and cringe (although I was never a rape apologist). I also had that same jackass courage of my convictions. Fortunately for me, my youthful arrogance is not enshrined for posterity on the internet.
Still, Iulia Neagu chose to write this preachy, odious column, so she opened herself up for the furious response she’s getting. She’s technically an adult, she’s intelligent, she chose her choice–now she’s going to have to handle the consequences like a grown-up.
Another Jez commenter, though, had a (very) little empathy for Neagu, and I do think her point is worth considering.
I strongly disagree with this young woman. I strongly agree with the people who are calling bullshit on her victim blaming. But I’m a little worried about the way college writers are now being held up for scrutiny in the national media. This young woman is a freshman from Romania. That means she’s probably about 18 years old, and an international student. I’m worried that she, like many students, didn’t quite realize what she was getting herself into. I know, I know–the internet has made college news into a whole new phenomenon. College students are adults and responsible for their actions, but it’s one thing to be schooled by your fellow students, another to end up on Jezebel. I guess I’m imagining her as one of my own students, and thinking about the fact that not many of them could handle this kind of attention. I’m hoping her university has really good psychological services, both for her and her friend who had to read such a hateful statement about her experience.
Yes, I bet peer relations are preeeeetty unpleasant for Neagu right now, and I’m guessing the friend who confided in her will–rightly–never speak to her again. But now thanks to the internet, Iulia Neagu is also being shamed and maligned in public by thousands of people around the world.
That’s a lot for an 18 year old to handle, and it’s entirely possible that the fallout will continue to affect Neagu for years to come. So I ask you, gentle readers–does the punishment fit the crime?
@Sparkl: I didn’t realize that it’s feminism’s responsibility to tackle irresponsible drinking on college campuses.
It’s not. Feminism is only about ensuring that women have freedom of choice. It doesn’t guarantee that we will make the right choices, and when we don’t, that ain’t feminism’s fault.
“I’m a little puzzled as to why people keep trying this since it’s so useless.”
Because the alternative would be to talk to men about controlling themselves, and the implication that men have a role in rape is deeply offensive to many of them?
Joe: Hiring decisions are made by people who will take into account everything available to them and use their subjective opinions deciding who to hire. Most professionals that I have had contact with admit to googling applicants
Once facebooked, are you always facebooked, or can you go back and scrub?
It was an incredibly shitty article. It was a bad idea and ill-thought out to write it, and I agree with you that she’s a grown up and deserves the shitstorm heading her way, because she’s an adult and she’s got to learn to own the things she’s said.
However. I was an arsehole when I was 18. I was unexamined priviledge-heavy high-intelligence low-wisdom jackass #24,355, and I thought I knew best about everything, and I said some horrible things. Later I apologised to the people I’d hurt, when I knew better, and some of them are friends with me now and some said thank you for apologising and never spoke to me again, and both those reactions are completely fine.
It’s going to be much more difficult for Neagu to apologise, because she’s hurt so many people so badly with her ill-advised words. I think she should be allowed the platform she had to make the column to apologise for it, when she’s learnt her lesson, and that that apology should be spread about as far as the original column, and some people will forgive and some people will go “thanks for apologising but I still can’t trust you, ever” and some people will say that no apology makes up for how shitty she mae them feel, and all those responses will be right.
I worry that her platform to make an ass of herself will be removed for any attempt she makes not to salvage her own dignity and reputation, but to genuinely apologise to those people she’s hurt. If she’s got herself into this mess, she should be allowed the space to get herself out of it, because we’ve all been young and stupid and said shitty things and regretted it later. I’d hate to see her punished for her shitty things more than anyone else by virtue of having a big platform for her terrible diatribe and no platform at all for a real apology.
@Joe: No, you can delete things from your Facebook profile or take it down altogether. Actually, the best thing to do is just to set the privacy settings so that no one can look at it who’s not friended with you. Other things, though, like pics someone else has posted, or stupid articles you’ve written for your school newspaper, are not so easy to remove from the internet.
@ Baraqiel, Spark, and BeckySharper: I don’t view feminism as being simply about making sure women have freedom to make choices. I think advocating for women to be healthy and safe and to teach about ways to empower yourself to do that is very feminist. I can’t force women to make good choices, but I can hope and wish that they will.
I don’t think that talking to women about the risks of excess drinking is all that should be done. Men need to hear about the risks of excess drinking. Men need to hear “don’t rape.” Increasing our statements to men doesn’t mean we have to decrease our statements to women.
And as far as the argument that it doesn’t work to talk to teens about risks of drinking– it works sometimes, and sometimes it works unpredictably. Even if it’s not working as much as we would like, does that mean we should say nothing to teens about risks? Doing nothing really won’t work.
It’s frustrating to me when it seems like feminists are saying: we mostly agree that X is true (not just here and not just in this discussion), but we shouldn’t say it because it could be used against us. Some truths are difficult and make the discussion more complicated. Some truths make women look not as good as I would like. But I don’t think the answer is to not talk about them.
“I think advocating for women to be healthy and safe and to teach about ways to empower yourself to do that is very feminist.”
I’m sort of on board here, but this goes back to what I was saying before. The people I know who make unhealthy choices about alcohol, make unhealthy choices generally. It’s not like they’re totally responsible people in every other part of their lives except with booze (I’m sure these people exist, but as far as I can tell they’re rare). In my experience, people who don’t know their limits with alcohol, don’t know their limits *generally*; people who can’t resist peer pressure about alcohol, can’t resist peer pressure *generally*; and so on. A program focusing on how to use alcohol responsibly isn’t going to help these people very much since they aren’t good at making responsible choices in the first place. That’s not to say they won’t get good at it — I also know some people in their 30s who drank a lot in college, irresponsibly, and are really none the worse for it but wouldn’t do the same now. But simply making it about alcohol, I don’t think would work, especially given that:
“And as far as the argument that it doesn’t work to talk to teens about risks of drinking– it works sometimes, and sometimes it works unpredictably.”
In my experience, this, again, isn’t true. I know a fair number of people who don’t drink, myself included, and none of us abstain because of “the dangers of alcohol”. We all have other reasons, many of which are simply neuroses (control issues, etc.) that extend into other parts of our lives. If the alcohol education programs you’re talking about actually reach some teenagers as intended, the number of those teenagers is minuscule. Part of the reason for that is that the message seems to be that getting drunk once every couple of months with friends is exactly as dangerous as binging at a frat party every weekend. Teenagers are smart enough to tell the difference between those two situations and the fact that the alcohol education programming argues that there isn’t one discredits it totally. Again, I think this is part of the general problem that teaching people not to abuse alcohol doesn’t work, compared to teaching people how to make safe and responsible choices generally in their lives. Again, if feminism is going to say anything about this, I think it would be much better served by saying something about how to be a responsible person generally, to know your limits and be able to enforce them (especially since teen girls are taught so strongly not to police boundaries!), than it would just being another one of the voices that’s alarmist about alcohol use.
@pedimd: I would be with you if women weren’t already constantly getting the message that drinking puts them at risk. In these conversations, someone inevitably someone says, “but why aren’t we telling young woman that drinking can be dangerous?” Thus proving that we’re always telling women drinking is dangerous.
Your personal experience is relevant, but anecdotal. Your point about people not knowing their limits generally is important, but ignores that over and over that gets expressed through excessive alcohol. As far as I know, there isn’t an “epidemic” of excessive gambling among college students because they don’t know their limits (but correct me if I’m wrong). It’s important to talk to teens about how to set your own limits, but also important to talk about alcohol specifically because it’s easily available, commonly abused in this age group, and has specific effects. I don’t view pointing out the facts as alarmist, and I’m well aware that overdoing the drama is a sure way to turn teens off.
Not all education is good education. Bad education is ineffective. I just found the link below. I didn’t read all of it, but scroll down to page 3 “Young People.” It’s a nice summary of a lot of the points you make, along with a discussion of educational approaches that are more effective.
http://www.icap.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=%2bc7WqP1UP6Y%3d&tabid=75
@pedimd – “Your personal experience is relevant, but anecdotal.”
That’s true but I have no reason to believe it’s not representative (but I suppose it’s worth noting here that I’m only talking about the US — many other cultures are healthier about alcohol, in my experience). I went to a pretty normal high school and kept up with my friends who went to a range of different types of colleges — altogether I haven’t seen any data that contradicts my experience. In fact, the data on teen/college drinking would seem to support my assertion that alcohol education as it currently stands does basically nothing to deter teens from drinking. Your link is interesting and I think it does support what I’m saying.
“over and over that gets expressed through excessive alcohol”
…and procrastination, and sex, and violence, and other drugs, and spending money they don’t have, and voluntary sleep deprivation…not gambling that I know of, but I’m sure it’s out there. And bad education isn’t just ineffective, it’s counterproductive.
This puzzles me, honestly, because I feel like we’re really clear on how this works as far as sex ed goes. Telling teenagers that sex is a dangerous part of life that they’re not yet prepared for is a miserable failure; telling teenagers that sex can be risky but that there’s a healthy way to have sex and that it’s important to respect yourself and your limits works very well. Drinking (and, if we ever come to our senses and legalize weed) drug education should be the same.
To all the posters focusing on the dangers of drinking: Drinking can be dangerous, and the dangers should be discussed. Even in the feminist world. (Oh hai, very recent post on this blog! http://www.harpyness.com/2010/02/09/sober-child-in-the-city-by-commenter-mkp-hearts-nyc/)
But when “you shouldn’t drink!” is brought up in reaction to a drunk woman being raped, you are not discussing the dangers of drinking. You are putting the blame for rape on the victim. You are focusing on the victim’s actions in the aftermath of a crime. By its very nature, this action takes the focus off the perpetrator.
One of these things is not like the other.
“I think advocating for women to be healthy and safe and to teach about ways to empower yourself to do that is very feminist.”
I agree with this, but I (and others) take issue with the fact that “stop drinking so much” is a diversion from the topic, which is a college student who wrote an article placing blame on rape victims for their assaults. I wish kids would stop getting obliterated, too. And I don’t think anyone’s advocating for irresponsible behavior. People are saying women’s irresponsible behavior does not give men carte blanche to use their bodies as they wish.
@yvane and SarahMC – Oh, I know, I just think this is an interesting conversation (albeit a total threadjack). I can abandon it if requested.
That’s the nature of anecdotal data, you don’t really know if it’s representative. Did the alcohol education not work because of something about you and your friends? or your high school? or was it a bad educational approach? something else? You don’t actually know. If you keep reading in that link, after it talks about the stuff you are saying, it talks about a number of educational approaches that have been effective.
Also, I guess I wasn’t clear that I’m not advocating the “don’t ever drink” approach. When I talk to my patients about this stuff, I like the “harm reduction” approach. In my anecdotal experience, teens like to pretend they’re too cool to listen to me, but they do listen. If they go on to drink themselves into a blackout 8 times instead of 10 times, then I consider that I had some success.
And, hey! I never said men ever have carte blanche to use women’s bodies. I’m just saying that in terms of risk reduction, each individual woman can control only their own behavior. So if I’m talking to my teen patients, for example, and I emphasize how they can reduce the risks to themselves, I spin it differently for boys vs. girls because the risks are different.
As far as Neagu is concerned — I think she was deliberately provocative because she wanted the attention for her writing. Someone I went to college with did that in college and has made quite the career out of it.
“If you keep reading in that link, after it talks about the stuff you are saying, it talks about a number of educational approaches that have been effective.”
Actually, that was the part I thought supported my point — it seemed to me that your link is saying that education based on life skills and social norms is more effective than education based on risk, but we could be interpreting the text differently, the language seems ambiguous (“x technique may show promise” isn’t exactly a strong statement).
It just seems to me that talking about alcohol to teens only with regards to its risks is ultimately harmful. “Alcohol will get you drunk and that’s dangerous” is a much less effective message than “Alcohol can get you drunk, but it can also get you just buzzed and some of it tastes good” in the same way that “sex feels good and should be fun for everyone involved” is a more effective message than “STDS AND BABIES!!!”. Now, given, I don’t think that talking about the good parts of alcohol is necessarily your personal responsibility as a doctor, but I do think that as far as alcohol education in the US goes, talking about alcohol as if the only thing it can possibly do is get you plastered teaches teens that getting plastered is the only reason and only way to drink alcohol, if that makes sense. This may seem counterintuitive, but I know a lot of people who had to learn how to drink without getting smashed even though they’d been drinking for years. Why make it the goal that a teen only blackout 8 times rather than making it the goal that they spend their money on a six pack of Blue Moon every month instead of a case of PBR every week?
I have no sympathy for the rape apologist.
1. She’s the right age to have grown up on the internet and therefore know how aggregator blogs like Jezebel work.
2. Focussing on very young, drunk female rape victims is like focussing on ‘stranger in a dark alley’ rapists – a distraction from the majority of women’s experience.
Stop blaming booze and return to blaming the patriarchy, please.
Come on — It’s not my goal to get people down to 8 blackouts. That’s my goal for the person who would otherwise have 10 blackouts. I know no matter what we do, some people are going to be irresponsible, so I have to work with the person I have in front of me. I am in support of whatever educational approach works.
I think you’re missing my point. 8 blackouts is clearly (in my opinion) a compromise between 10 blackouts and no drinking at all. No drinking at all isn’t a realistic or, to my mind, desirable goal. I think a lot of teenagers and college students drink irresponsibly because no one taught them how to drink responsibly or even included that concept in their alcohol education whatsoever.
I’ve only ever left one other comment on this site before (although a regular lurker!) and I’m also jumping rather late into the fray over here *and* changing the subject of recent comments, so I’m going to try not to be snarky – however I am going to state right out that I found a number of the initial comments in this thread nothing less than offensive, especially in view of the recent discussion on American self-centricity.
I am unsure how the fact that Iulia is from Romania relevant here. Avoiding victim-blaming is not a quintessential part of American culture. It is not something that separates the US from the rest of the world. I’m not from the US myself, but my (plentiful) exposure to American media suggests that victim-blaming and slut-shaming is plenty compatible with American mores – as it true unfortunately of most of the rest of the world. Stating that Iulia didn’t know any better because she’s not from the US is – arrogant? Self-satisfied? Uninformed?
Iulia is from Romania. Yes, that is an Eastern European country, but you’ll note that the communist block fell more than 20 years ago now. Moreover Romania is part of the European Union, so pretty western for what that’s worth. Is victim-blaming likely to be prevalent in Romanian culture? Yes. But that is not because those backward folk cannot keep up with the sophistication of more evolved countries, but rather because misogyny is an issue *everywhere*.
I’m Greek and (despite this horrible disadvantage!) somehow even at the age of 18 I did manage to realise that blaming women for the violence visited against them is not ok. And I was not some sort of freakish anomaly among my peers either. However, if Iulia were Greek, I can easily imagine reading discussions on this site wondering whether it was fair to blame her for her ignorance since those plebs just don’t know any better, right? And in Southern Europe women are held responsible for their honour. And she just hasn’t adjusted yet to “our” norms. And [insert presumptuous condescending nonsense of your choice here]. And I could tell you then as I can tell you now: I don’t care where she is from. Decent people shake their head at this sort of stuff everywhere. Iulia is an 18-year old with the brains and the means to make it into one of the world’s most prestigious universities. That is all I need to know. She *should* have known better. She should not have written that piece.
(Plus, she’s from friggin’ Romania for crying out loud! Focus people! I know you won’t believe me, but you can do a lot worse than that.)
(Becky) Other things, though, like pics someone else has posted, or stupid articles you’ve written for your school newspaper, are not so easy to remove from the internet.
It does give one an insane desire (well me) to google every name from my past i can think of