Why are women so vocal about rape and not other things which have a far greater chance of happening to them?

Question

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap_percap-crime-rapes-per-capita

United States: 0.301318 rapes per 1,000 people.

That's around a 1 in 3,300 chance of being raped next year.

Next year you also have:

A 1 in 77 chance of being killed in any sort of transportation accident.

A 1 in 69 chance of being killed in any sort of non-transportation accident.

A 1 in 1,820 chance of dying of any sort of injury.

A 1 in 2,232 chance of fatally slipping in the bath or shower.

For women over 30, who seem to be the most vocal of all women about how they are worried about being raped, they make up 10% of that figure, so they have a 1 in 30,000 chance of being raped. That means they have a better chance of:

Being murdered (1 in 18,000) and Finding a four leafed clover on the first try (1 in 10,000).

Why are they not as vocal and concerned about this sort of thing, which will result in death and are far more probable, than they are about rape?

By the way I'm at level 3. I'd like to thank my friends at Yahoo.

Mellie: Your last sentence is an argument against your first sentence.

I see you deleted the sentence in question Mellie. Good for you and your denial.

Answer 1

Good point...

Answer 2

Accidents are things that happen that can't be prevented. Rape is a deliberate act of sexual violence against a man or a woman. I'm almost 30 and heck yeah I'm vocal about rape prevention...but I'm also vocal about other important issues.

Minimizing rape is just being plain ignorant. It's one of the most underreported crimes...by both men and women.

I am a rape survivor...and while I don't think about it all the time...it will always be a painful part of my past. And you can bet I will always be vocal about rape prevention. If telling my story or passing out literature or counseling another rape victim helps just one person...it won't erase the memory...but maybe it can prevent someone else from having one of their own.
No one deserves or wants to be raped. It happens. And it's serious. I hope you are never in this situation. Judging by your question you have not been. You probably have never met anyone that has been a victim of rape.
What would you tell someone that told you that they were raped? Hey...at least you didn't fall and break your neck in the shower!!

The statistics you give...hello!!! Regardless of what the numbers are...which of course are underreported...aren't those numbers enough to be angry about? Considering that there are 300+ million Americans.

Answer 3

I think it is not that they are not concerned with the other things but rather that rape is fought in a more public way.
to prevent a transportation accident, for example, they check the brakes on the car and drive as cautiously as they can and that is about all they can do, other than those who drink and drive and they are idiots anyhow and women are as vocal about that as they are against rape -MADD for example.
to prevent the non transportation things, they have check ups with a doctor, make sure there is a rubber mat in the bath tub and so on.
Those are impersonal things that can happen but rape on the other hand is a very personal assault, an invasion of ones body and so is fought in a personal way rather than just dealing with it as one might the other possible dangers.
when it comes to murder, there is not a lot that can be said about murder by a stranger and not a lot that can be done to prevent that other than standard means of staying safe, but when it comes to murder by a spouse we again have the outcry and the support centers by relatives of the killed woman - for example, Denise Brown regarding her sister Nicole.
As far as statistics regarding this though, I would question how accurate they are because of the number of unreported rapes - a girl who is at a party who thinks it is her fault for having had too much to drink and may have lead some guy on, a sister who doesn't want to report her brother or father raped her, and so on.
we deal with out problems in the best way we can and the best way to deal with rape is to be loud and clear that some guy forced him self upon another person because only then can you prevent someone else from having the same thing happen to them, so you do check the brakes on a car to prevent accidents from hurting others and you make a loud noise in the case of rape for the same reason, to protect others and to put the invader somewhere that he can not do it again.

Answer 4

A lot of women do not report rape because they feel powerless and embarrassed by what has happened. Rape is more about power than sex anyway. Its purpose is to put the woman in her place and if (understandably) she can't find the strength to overcome that damage, she's not going to tell anyone.

A lot of the other things you are citing here are freak occurrences or accidents. But rape is preventable and those who rape are morally responsible for doing what they do. Men CAN control themselves, but choose not to do so because anti-feminists make apologies for them.

Rape is an insulting, hurtful violation of women's personal rights. It shouldn't happen at all. Neither should murder, but that's an issue for both sexes to tackle.

Answer 5

Your source is crime statistics - by definition that means a rape that has been reported and the perpetrator convicted.
Even your level 3 account has been here long enough to know that there are a large number of rapes that go unreported, as well as the number of questionable sexual assaults that may qualify as some form of rape.
So the actual risk numbers are higher than what you stated above. And your statistics fail to adjust for demographics. Women age 16-25 are at highest risk of rape. The same demographic is very UNLIKELY to have a fatal incident in the shower.

The reason the 30+ women are so vocal about it is to make younger women aware of the risk, in an effort to prevent them from being sexually assaulted.

It's a pity you don't get paid to manipulate statistics and put a spin on issues - you'd have made quite a nice nest egg from your Q& A activity.

Answer 6

All of those are accidents. No one can predict when they will happen or how, hence the term, accident. And should you live through those accidents, mostly you are left with physical damage you can recover from.
The physical damage of rape is recoverable. The psychological damage too often is not. It's on that list of things that could never happen. Accidents are on the list of things that could. We are as prepared as possible for accidents. There is no preparation for rape. No one ever expects to be raped ever. Rape is not an accident, it is a deliberate action by another person to control and dominate.
You can't compare the two, accident vs non-accident? Not a chance.
And hops...what planet are you on? Rape is something to be hysterical about. Some of us would rather be murdered than raped, so as not to have to live with the memory of being violated in a humilating and painful way.
But you're a man and will never know what this feels like.

Answer 7

So, you suggest that we sisters all band together to speak out against slippery bathtubs or shaky ladders?

If you watch TV or read the paper or magazines I think you'll find that women are speaking up to warn us about breast cancer, heart disease, and drunk drivers, not to mention school safety, autism, animal cruetly, child abuse and other issues that we can actually do something about.

Oh, an when you talk about numbers of rapes, you're talking about rapes that have been identified as rape by the Court, meaning that there was a trial and a conviction. Most rapes are not reported. Most that are reported are never brought to court because it's too hard to prove and the DA won't waste the Court's time. We want men to stop rape and so we want more women to report rape so that laws are changed in order to bring convictions against the attackers.

Answer 8

Tracey, thanks for the PR spot for sharks. We need better representation in the media than we're getting.

EACH year there are 14 times as many people killed in car accidents than were killed on 9/11, but nobody seems to be interested in fighting a "War on Car Accidents" and the US Army still hasn't invaded Detroit.

In the US alone, we experience a 9/11 death equivalency from food poisoning approximately every 8 months, yet we have not decided to wage a "War on Botulism."

I'd have to conclude that it is not a uniquely female trait to rail on about hot button issues. It is an issue which women feel particularly vulnerable and they understandably speak out about that.

But, just like the Bush Administration, which is quick to label just about anybody a terrorist, women are sometimes too hasty in their concept of what constitutes rape.

By the way, congratulations on reaching level 3. If you keep this up, you might replace the real Rio as the best answerer.

Answer 9

Hmmmm...Any poll can be skewed to say anything that the person using the poll WANTS it to say. It doesn't mean it is true or not. Point blank you comment that it is more probable to be killed than raped. THAT right there is warped thinking and using polls to degrade people.

Furthermore, rape and molestation leaves long lasting DEEP scars that can't be healed overnight. All it takes is ONE time for something like that to happen and the womans life is forever changed, and that change was done on purpose. UNLIKE the accidents which affect everyone equally.

Answer 10

It's the nightmare of not being in control of your own body. There is nothing more personally assaulting than rape to a woman. Until they have kids. Then the real nightmare is harm to your children.

It gets the most attention because it is the biggest fear. I would rather slip and fall, or die in a plane crash, or get struck by lightening than be raped. As a matter of fact, I would rather be tortured, hung, drawn and quartered than be raped. The only thing I wouldn't do to not be raped is allow my kids to be hurt.

Answer 11

I think that the fear about rape and other forms of violent crime is way out of proportion to your chances of experiencing those things. It certainly doesn't help to count all cases of morning after regret as "rape", and then telling young women that 1 out of 4 of them will be "raped" - total BS. Women should rightly be cautious, and learn some self-defense techniques, but most men are not rapists - period.