Why Does Facebook think Mary Poppins is Hate Speech?

Well, there is a question I never thought I would ask myself. Good old wholesome Disney family movie to everyone else, but to Facebook, its hate speech. It's laughable, and who would believe it, but here we are.

It was a quote directly from the movie, showing pictures of that scene. Was it a little sexist? Yes, admittedly so...but it was a fun little dig after a week's worth of men all over facebook rejoicing at the nomination of Brett Kavanagh and fearing for their sons. I didn't consider it hate speech, just another sexist joke, which felt kind of true at the moment. Facebook apparently considers it hate speech though. 

What does Facebook officially define as hate speech? 

"Our current definition of hate speech is anything that directly attacks people based on what are known as their “protected characteristics” — race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, sex, gender, gender identity, or serious disability or disease."

However, I have seen countless posts about how women are gold digging bitches and have reported them, as well as ablest slurs and racist bile, but those comments are never against Facebook's Community Standards when I report them. Facebook didn't even think there was an issue with the man I reported for telling a woman that if she continued talking the way she was, she would end up in a ditch soon.

I don't really feel the need to go into it more deeply because you can try it out yourself; there is no shortage of disgusting vile hate speech on Facebook to report. Or try posting that quote from Mary Poppins on your own page and see what happens. Or post “Men are Trash”. That gets you banned for sure. I have a friend who has been banned several times for commenting it on articles about men acting like complete garbage. I could hardly believe it when he told me about it so I researched it, and here are some articles if you wish to read more on the subject:

Mic.com

Twitter

The Next Web

So even though I was surprised, I also wasn't really that surprised. What DID really surprised me though, was that Facebook would not allow me to send a report contesting the validity of my ban. There was a link urging me to do so, but the link made sure to inform me that no one would personally read it, and then it wouldn't even let me submit it. For my entire ban, I was unable to submit the report informing them it was a harmless Mary Poppins quote. 

On the same day, over 800 Independent media pages such as the Free Thought Project, Filming Cops, The Anti-Media, and Policing the Police were expunged from the platform. The pages were deleted just like the Bernie Sanders groups were before the election. I know when the Sanders groups came back after that, they were never the same. Suddenly they were filled with Bots and Trolls and Trump supporters.

I started thinking about who Facebook really is as a company. They mine our data, they creep me out with their ads proving they are listening to me through the microphone on my phone...I was so Lasse Faire about it because I assumed all companies do that, but they don't.

During my time off from Facebook I researched Facebook alternatives. Instagram and What’s App are owned by Facebook and though I might create an Instagram account, I would never post anything original on it.

 There are some really interesting choices out there for messaging and social networking, but of course, the main problem is that everyone is on Facebook. Ello and Mastadon look great, but no one I know is there. Telegram might be nice; they encrypt your messages and have chat bots just like Facebook messenger. I am sure they will have replacements for my word of the day messages. Discord is great, my gaming group uses that, but they are my only friends who use it. The alternative I decided on was Tumblr, supplementing it with things to cover the other features I will miss.

The events feature is so difficult to replace. There are local alternatives to keep me up to date with major events going on, but I know I am going to miss a lot of invites from my musician friends who do all their networking on Facebook.

I love being connected to the people I love and there are some amazing groups I am going to miss like crazy, but I can’t stay comfortable being a farm animal for Facebook to use without caring.

Rape: the Four Letter Word is already on Tumblr if you would like to follow me there, I am in the process of transferring things there now from our Facebook page.  Unsurprisingly, the ‘download entire album’ feature is not working at this time.

Safe Spaces, Free Speech, and the Infaltization of our Young Adults

My last post was regarding Stephen Fry's comments on the "infantile" culture of trigger warnings and safe spaces and their effect on freedom of speech. I covered trigger warnings, and this post will cover safe spaces.

 A specific safe space doesn't curb free speech unless people are forced into the safe space against their will and then you are curbing more rights than just speech. There are some valid concerns about safe space culture curbing people's freedom of expression and I would like address those.

In an interview mentioned in the New York Times, Adam Shapiro, a junior at Columbia at the time said, “If the point of a safe space is therapy for people who feel victimized by traumatization, that sounds like a great mission.” But a safe-space mentality has begun infiltrating classrooms, he pointed out, making both professors and students loath to say anything that might hurt someone’s feelings. “I don’t see how you can have a therapeutic space that’s also an intellectual space,”.

 I agree completely. There is no reason for a college classroom to be a "safe space". College is all about learning new things and...

If you always think what you have always thought,

Then you will always feel what you have always felt.

 

If you always feel what you have always felt,

Then you will always do what you have always done.

 

If you always do what you have always done,

Then you will always get what you have always gotten.

 

If you always get what you have always gotten,

Then you will always think what you have always thought.

 Socrates

In an article by The Atlantic they make an excellent point:

Silencing these voices is not a good thing for anyone, especially the advocates of marginalized groups who hope to sway public opinion. Take for example the idea that God opposes homosexuality, a belief that some students still hold. On an ideal campus, these students would feel free to voice their belief. They would then be confronted by opposing arguments, spoken, perhaps, by the very people whose sexual orientation they have asserted is sinful. At least in this kind of environment, these students would have an opportunity to see the weaknesses in their position and potentially change their minds. But if students do not feel free to voice their opinions, they will remain silent, retreating from the classroom to discuss their position on homosexuality with family, friends, and other like-minded individuals. They will believe, correctly in some cases, that advocates of gay rights see them as hateful, intolerant bigots who deserve to be silenced, and which may persuade them to cling with even greater intensity to their convictions.

So, I agree that Safe Spaces should be separate. However, I'm not sure why people feel the need to criticize therapeutic safe spaces that are separate as infantile. Here is an example of a safe space on a college campus as published in the previously mentioned NY Times.

"KATHERINE BYRON, a senior at Brown University and a member of its Sexual Assault Task Force, considers it her duty to make Brown a safe place for rape victims. So when she heard last fall that a student group had organized a debate about campus sexual assault between Jessica Valenti, the founder of feministing.com, and Wendy McElroy, a libertarian, and that Ms. McElroy was likely to criticize the term “rape culture,” Ms. Byron was alarmed. “Bringing in a speaker like that could serve to invalidate people’s experiences,” she told me. It could be “damaging.” …So she decided to create a safe space. The safe space, Ms. Byron explained, was intended to give people who might find comments “troubling” or “triggering,” a place to recuperate. The room was equipped with cookies, coloring books, bubbles, Play-Doh, calming music, pillows, blankets and a video of frolicking puppies, as well as students and staff members trained to deal with trauma."

A safe space such as this, separate and therapeutic, is criticized for infantilizing adults and I think that is completely unfair. It may seem silly, but psychologists agree, play therapy techniques, such as bubbles, or playing with Play-Doh, can be as useful to 20-year-olds as it is to 2-year-olds. Vibrantly painted moldable pieces of dough combine three stress relieving therapies: aromatherapy, tactile-play therapy and color therapy. Unfortunately, lots of people, think therapy means you are weak. They make comments such as this:

"What ever happened to removing yourself from a situation that you weren’t comfortable with? By no means am I trying to trivialize the effects of a sexual assault. It is, by far, one of the worst things a person can experience. However, there was nothing in this debate (for example) that required anyone to attend. If a person wasn’t comfortable with the topic, then they didn’t need to go. I just don’t see the need for a “safe room” — especially for one that sounds as if it virtually ignored the plight of men who are sexually assaulted. Now they’re talking about putting “trigger warnings” on books, television programs, and movies. I’m almost afraid that I’m raising kids who will be considered “insensitive”. A few months back, my son had to write a thing for school that included sayings and motto’s from their parents. I finally managed to talk him out of one that I picked up in the Army: “Grow a pair”, though he did keep “Suck it up and move on”."

I would counter that by pointing out that having places like this, could perhaps allow people to attend, who wanted to, but were nervous about the effect it would have on them. PTSD is real and going into a triggered state is horrible. I know they were not required to attend, but they might want to attend. Since universities should be encouraging thoughtful debate/discussion, having a safe place to retreat to, might actually get people to participate/listen that might otherwise stay closed off. Telling a rape victim to "Suck it up and move on" is trivializing the effects of sexual assault. Trauma requires therapy, safe spaces are therapeutic. What is so wrong with that?
Music therapy is widely used to benefit children, adolescents, adults, and the elderly with mental health needs, developmental and learning disabilities, Alzheimer’s disease and other aging related conditions, substance abuse problems, brain injuries, physical disabilities, and acute and chronic pain, including mothers in labor.

In Medical Daily, Dr. Stan Rodski, a neuropsychologist, says that coloring elicits a relaxing mindset, similar to what you would achieve through meditation. Like mediation, coloring allows us to switch off our brains from other thoughts and focus on the moment. Tasks with predictable results, such as coloring or knitting, can often be calming — Rodski was even able to see the physical effects they had on our bodies by using advanced technology. “The most amazing things occurred — we started seeing changes in heart rate, changes in brainwaves,” he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, adding that part of this neurological response in “colorists” comes from the repetition and attention to patterns and detail associated with coloring.

As for the puppies, studies have shown that pets can alleviate depression, reduce anxiety, and decrease levels of the stress hormone, cortisol, and provide some real benefits. Yet people still make degrading comments against these spaces.

Here is one such comment:

So I propose that every employer include these questions for every college graduate seeking employment at their firm.  As far as I know, since these could apply to any particular people group or sub-culture, no group could say they were unfairly targeted.

1.  Have you ever felt the need to go to a “safe space” during your college experience?  If yes, answer the following questions.
2. What was the cause of your need to go to said safe space?
3. Did you go?
4. Did you find that you were able to recover after your visit to the safe space?
5. Did you need to revisit the safe space any subsequent time?  How many safe space visits did you make during your collegiate time?
6. Do you believe that having a safe space at your place of employment is a necessary condition for you to accept a position with us?
7. If you hear ideas that previously drove you to seek a safe space, what are your plans to address that issue if you are one of our employees?
8. Do you believe you are now mature enough to tolerate ideas that you may not agree with without the need of a safe space?

Of course the employer should stop after question one if the answer is affirmative, then tell the applicant that for their safety, it is best that they pursue employment at a less-threatening institution.  Once the word gets around that safe spaces lead to no work places, I think we’ll see something different on our campuses.

I really wish Stephen Fry had just stuck with this and that everyone else would follow this example:

Getting help when you need it is not immature or childish. It is responsible! It is bravely admitting that you have a problem and then facing that problem head on. 

I've got a lot more to say on this subject so stay tuned!

Stephen Fry's rape comment:

I said in my previous post about rape jokes that I was going to do a series on comedians and other famous people so I thought I would start with Stephen Fry's rape comment.

He said: “Life is complicated and nobody wants to believe it. I suppose you might call it the infantilism of society. There is deep infantilism in the culture, in terms of the way they think, they can’t bear complexity.” He continued: “That you have to think, there are gradations, nobody wants that, they want to be told and to say: ‘This is good, this is bad’. “On student campuses… There are many great plays which contain rapes, and the word rape now is even considered a rape. “Or you can’t watch Macbeth because it’s got children being killed in it, it might trigger something when you were young that upset you once, because your uncle touched you in a nasty place, well I’m sorry.”

Fry continued: “It’s a great shame and we’re all very sorry that your uncle touched you in that nasty place – you get some of my sympathy – but your self pity gets none of my sympathy. “Self pity is the ugliest emotion in humanity. “Get rid of it, because no one’s going to like you if you feel sorry for yourself. “The irony is we’ll feel sorry for you, if you stop feeling sorry for yourself. Just grow up."

Obviously, outrage ensued, so he apologized:

  “It distresses me greatly to think that I have upset anyone in the course of the TV interview I had with David Rubin the other week. I of course apologize unreservedly for hurting feelings the way I did . That was never my purpose. There are few experiences more terrible, traumatic and horrifying than rape and abuse and if I gave the impression that I belittled those crimes and the effects they have on their victims then I am so so sorry. It seems I must have utterly failed to get across what I was actually trying to say and instead offended and upset people who didn’t deserve to be offended or upset.”

I have always liked Stephen Fry and I have a great deal of respect for him, but what he said about abuse victims disgusts me. First of all, a sarcastic "I'm sorry" that your uncle touched you in a nasty place is infuriating. Second of all, there is a difference between struggling with trauma and self pity. As the president of a mental health charity it is seriously concerning that he doesn't know the difference.

I understand his intent was to talk about curbing free speech, but I never considered trigger warnings or safe spaces could prevent freedom of speech. Adding a trigger warning allows for people who might be triggered by what you are saying to either prepare mentally or to retreat from what they are about to hear or read, but it doesn't stop you from saying anything. That's like saying a description on a book jacket prevents an author from writing a book or a spoiler alert on a post about a TV show prevents you from writing about the show. Giving people a heads up on your topic of speech doesn't affect your speech, it just affects the demographic of people who might be listening.

Safe spaces are a little bit more complicated. I'll be posting about them next.

To be continued...

The administrators for the facebook group "Bernie Believers" are ok with sexual assault and I am horrified.

I was banned from a group on Facebook today. I've been banned and blocked before, but I never thought it would happen in a Bernie Group. The whole thing kind of blew my mind. I posted this image on my Facebook page Rape: The Four Letter Word

I like to share my posts on other pages and groups as a way to attract people to my page. I thought to myself, "There is no better place to share my righteous indignation than on a Bernie Sanders page. These people share my values and are seekers of justice! They are my kin!" Apparently not the people who admin on the page Bernie Believers. Those people are using my hero's name to downplay sexual assault.

I was immediately attacked for being a "Hillbot" and told that I was posting Hillary propaganda and Trump didn't rape anyone.

First of all, I love Jill Stein and I am not a supporter of Hillary Clinton (See my previous post Triggers) and I am a real person with independent thoughts who isn't getting paid to express any opinions. Second of all, I love Bernie more and have done so longer than most of them. I have been following him obsessively for ten years while most of them didn't know he existed until this election cycle.

I assured them I was not a Hillary supporter and reminded them that speaking out against Trump should be every bit as important as speaking out against HRC if they were really supporting Jill Stein the way they said they were. Most importantly though, I explained to them that sexual assault doesn't always mean rape and sexual assault is always bad, even if it isn't rape. That prompted them to lecture me with the explanation that "letting" someone grab you is the definition of consent and saying that I am too stupid to understand three letter words like "let".

"Letting" someone do something isn't the same as giving consent. People who believe that are the reason we need consent classes in schools. When I explained that, they blocked me. This brings me to the conclusion that the admins in the Bernie Believers group on Facebook are OK with sexual assault and don't understand what consent is. I invite them all over to my page to learn something.

An update on my cousin who is definitely not like a girl and so much worse…

My cousin who was once told he was like a girl, but better is absolutely a misogynistic man. I thought he liked to listen, but it turns out that is only is he thinks he might get in your pants. I thought he stood up to bullies, but he really just wanted an excuse to threaten others and get away with it. I thought he was all ‘woman power’ because he loves River from Firefly, but really he just thinks Summer Glau is hot. I thought he appreciated meaningful dialog because he liked “chick flicks”, but he really was just going for the attractive actresses. He always said that was the reason, but I thought it was a cover to protect his fragile masculinity. I know guys sometimes over compensate, so I thought his talk was bravado. I was wrong. He really did watch Mean Girls just for glimpses up their skirts.

I recently worked up the courage to ask my facebook friends to either unfriend me or Zac. This is hugely important for me for two reasons.

1.)   It will protect me from surprise triggers of seeing him tagged in the same posts as me and have to read his comments. For some reason, even though I had him blocked, I still saw things when we were both tagged in them sometimes. The worst were the memory pictures. I was especially close to my grandmother. The older cousins called her mom (probably because that is what they heard their mom call her), but when I was born, my mother asked her what she would like to be called and she chose Grannie. I’m not sure how the spelling came about, but Grannie always spelled it with an IE and never a Y. I liked it because it made it more like a name than a title. I lived with her for 11 years of my life (until I was ten and then one more when I first started college). It was torture getting tagged in photos of her after her death and having to read Zac talking about how much he loved his "granny". I’m not saying he shouldn’t be allowed to express his love for her, but I am saying it was very hard on me to get smacked in the face with it unexpectedly. 

2.)    It is a clear and public declaration of which side people are on. You cannot support both a rapist and his victim. It can’t be done. I have no idea why so many people believe it can, but you absolutely cannot be what the victim needs if you are also trying to be what the person who tortured her for 13 years and stole her childhood needs. They have conflicting needs. They both need to feel validated and the victim cannot feel validated if you are validating her abuser…and if you validate the victim, the abuser isn’t going to feel validated because the only way to validate her is by telling the abuser he was wrong. 

It was one of my least angry posts and borderline polite: 

I tagged everyone in it, both so they would get a notification and therefore see the post, but also to spread the word of what Zac did and make sure as many people as possible who might know him, know what he really is.

I did catch a little flak from people for including deceased relatives in the list, but those relatives’ pages were the most likely to hold family memorial pictures that both of us might get tagged in. When the daughter and niece of those two relatives let me know that she couldn’t alter their pages since they were memorial pages I thanked her, took them off the list, and simply unfriended them to be sure I wouldn’t have to remain connected to Zac through them. I wanted to give people every opportunity before just unfriending them because these people were my family.

My misogynistic cousin told me that he didn't "do ultimatums or demands" and commented about my "utter disregard" for the deceased family member's daughter’s feelings while offering her no support himself. He was unaware of when or how the tragic deaths occurred and didn’t care. He was just using her pain to be a dick to me and hide from the responsibility of owning his choice to support a rapist. The daughter assured me she hadn’t been offended in the slightest and expressed heartfelt regret that my cousin was behaving so inappropriately. She and I have our differences of opinion now and again, but she always handles everything with such poise that it is impossible not to have the utmost respect for her.

I unfriended the misogynist and wished him luck in his choice, while expressing my continued concern of him allowing his daughter to be endangered by his relationship with a pedophile rapist. I also messaged him privately, to explain to him the issues concerning the memorial pages and assure him that I meant no harm to anyone in regards to my post. Then I carefully explained to him the reasons I would no longer be speaking to him and keeping my son as far away from him as possible. His response was to own his choices with pride and declare that he never said he was a good person to begin with, that nothing I said had any effect on him, and I was really quite sad and had evidently not been “fixed” by getting married and having a child the way he had. It was honestly one of the most deluded things I have ever read.

I hadn’t expected him to reply at all, as my note was a goodbye message and didn’t require any sort of follow up, but he made sure to let me know not to respond to him in any way. I understand that immature and controlling people need to have the last word. I myself have trouble ending arguments, but that is because I find a point I feel the need to counter in their replies, not because I need to be the one to end things. He didn’t counter any of my points, he merely congratulated himself in his terrible choices while trying to convince me that nothing I said mattered to him. That’s really believable…

I have no need to message him again, I already said my goodbye, but I do truly fear for his daughter. Zac isn’t the only terrible man he is exposing her to. His other best friend is a man who routinely uses women. This man steals their rent money and credit card information while mooching off of them for months and sleeping around. He verbally abuses them and degrades them every time they are alone. These men that he is bringing around his daughter are going to distort her view of how men and women should interact. I sincerely fear for her physical and emotional well-being and I hope my cousin realizes that before it is too late.

What I learned from marrying an abusive asshole and having an amazing little boy, is that you need to be selective about who you allow into your child’s life. Children really are little sponges and they will soak up all the information you give them and they are shaped by the choices you make. He might be proud of not being a good person now, but he will surely regret it when he sees the pain it is going to cause his daughter.

My cousin who is like a girl…but better

My cousin had a girl tell him that once and he decided to take it as a compliment. Some people would have been offended, but it was a compliment and a very fitting one for him. He is one of those guys who can just hang out and talk for hours. He’s always been an excellent listener and seemed to be righteous (sans religious connotation). He was known for standing up to bullies and saving other kids from getting their lunch money stolen.

He and I were very close. I shared everything with him. I told him about Zac when I was 18. He was the second family member I told. My cousin who is like a girl but better, was fairly supportive and mostly just listened. He agreed that Zac was a terrible person, but that was it. He didn’t say anything to Zac or anyone else. I had asked him to let me tell our family in my own time in my own way when and if I was comfortable enough to do so, so I can understand his silence. What I never understood was his desire to continue hanging out with Zac after he knew. If he had told me that someone in our family molested and raped him, I would want nothing to do with that person. I would stay as far from them as I could and if they asked why I would have told them.

After I told the rest of the family, I told my cousin who is like a girl but better, that he was free to tell anyone and everyone, since silence only benefits the abuser. He agreed that made sense and again mentioned what a slime Zac was. He then proceeded to tell me that Zac had shown him kiddie porn and described what he liked and which age group was his favorite. We talked about how disgusting that was...but then I heard he was still hanging out with him. I decided to ignore it. For years I have waited for people to decide on their own that Zac wasn't worth their time. For years I waited in vain.

When Zac tried to molest me after my aunt died, it was this cousin who put his body between me and Zac and told him that if he ever touched me he would kill him. (Pedestals are Dangerous, People Tend to Fall Off of Them)

Eventually, this cousin developed a crush on one of Zac's girlfriends and when he found out that Zac was cheating on her he told her. He also threatened to go to the FBI about the kiddie porn. He then ended his friendship with Zac. Over a girl he had a crush on. That stung a little, but at least he was done with Zac and that was good for everyone. There was one instance, a year later, when he and his brother were living together and Zac came to their party, but my cousin said that was because Zac was friends with his brother and assured me he still hated that creep.

Fast forward a few years.

I moved back to the city from the country and am invited to my cousin's wedding. I couldn't be happier for him. When I get to the church I suddenly start to wonder if Zac would be there. My cousin hated him, but Zac was family and this was a wedding so I wasn't sure. I had brought a friend as my plus one and she promised to stay by my side if Zac appeared. He did appear....in the very front of the church. He was the best man.

How did this happen? My cousin chose this pedophile rapist over his own brother to be his best man? What happened to the hate? Apparently, when he got over his crush he also decided to forgive Zac and pretend to me that he still hated him. That's seriously messed up in my opinion. It lead me to believe that my cousin cared more about getting his dick wet than having actual principles...which sounded a lot like Zac to me, so maybe they should be besties.

Their friendship had been going on the whole time I was away in the country, but I knew nothing of it because I had blocked Zac on facebook and so I didn't see the comments or the pictures.

I didn't say anything to my cousin then. I didn't want to ruin his special day...and after...I wasn't really sure what to say. There was no explanation that he could give that would have made that ok to me. Then my cousin had a baby shower...thinking a baby shower was the last way Zac would want to spend his time, I didn't think he would be there until we were at the park and one of my aunts warned me that he was in fact coming. Why didn't my cousin warn me? Why didn't he care about my feelings? Why didn't he care that he was putting me in danger and at the very least triggering me? Why didn't he consider that I might not want my son around this monster who molested me as a child? Why didn't he warn me so that I could decide before hand how to handle it? I hate being invited to events that Zac is also invited to, but at least EVERYONE else tells me. It is heartbreaking that this cousin, with whom I was so close and actually saved me one night, didn't care enough to warn me. My feelings didn't enter his head at all, or if they did, he dismissed them as so unimportant that he couldn't even give me a simple heads up.

Then my cousin's daughter had a birthday party. I excitedly RSVPed yes immediately, and then got a text from my boyfriend. "I saw you RSVPed to your cousin's daughter's birthday party....is Zac going to be there?" I switched it from "going" to "interested" and decided to check back later. I would have to temporarily unblock Zac to see, so I waited until two weeks or so before the party and checked. He was going. This was the last straw for me and I posted on the event page, explaining why I couldn't come. This is standard practice and you see comments all the time about how people can't make it due to being out of town or whatever, so I decided to let everyone know why I couldn't make it. I warned my cousin first, I told him I was going to post something that would potentially upset him and that it was about Zac. He told me to "do whatcha gotta do". So I did.

As I mentioned in my post: Everyone Has a Story...Too Many Are Like Mine, all that came of it was an argument with his wife about how I ruined their daughter's birthday (by posting my RSVP on a Facebook event page the child couldn't read weeks before the party) and that I should have talked to her privately (which I would have done if I had known my cousin hadn't already warned her about how dangerous Zac was - that is something I feel a husband should do, especially if his wife was also a rape victim and he was bringing a rapist around her and their daughter...a rapist who was also a pedophile).

I wanted to announce the reason I wasn't coming publicly for two reasons: Keeping rape private supports the rapist. I wanted everyone at that party to know who he was and what he did to me. I wanted them to know both because I am sick of him getting to live his life like he didn't molest and rape me for 13 years and also because it was a child's birthday party for Christ's sake. It is dangerous to invite a pedophile to a child's birthday and not warn the other parents.

Then my cousin's wife followed it up with that status update (you can read it in the other post mentioned above) about how she wasn't being ignorant or wrong and just trying to survive because she had also been raped in her past. That makes no sense to me. I believe that if you have been raped you wouldn't tell another rape victim to keep it private and you wouldn't choose to keep associating with her rapist. Unfortunately, a lot of rape victims aren't quite as self aware or as mature as I am, so she chose to support my rapist and he supported her by liking her post about how she wasn't a bad person for wanting him around. I still don't understand how it is "survival" for a rape victim to want to be around another rapist and keep his actions a secret...sounds like the opposite of survival to me unless he was threatening to kill her otherwise.

I've tried to talk to my cousin since then, both privately and publicly, and he refuses to say anything on the matter except that I am pissing him off. I am pissing HIM off. I don't know whether to laugh or cry. He likes to get on my facebook page and argue with me about politics as a way to poke at me passive-aggressively, but refuses to speak to me about his choice to support my rapist....but like I said before....there is really nothing he can say to make me understand. There are two options as I see it. Either he has such low self-esteem that he will be friends with anyone who gives him the time of day...or he just really truly doesn't give a shit about anything except for what makes him happy in that moment...Both of which explain why he is not only friends with my rapist, but also another abuser who hurt someone else he claimed to love.

When is rape funny?

Rape is never funny, but sometimes people joke about it anyway. Sometimes it is laughing to keep from crying, or trying to bring attention to the issue, but it can also be triggering and even end up validating rapists. It can be a pretty taboo subject for comedy, because unless you are one evil SOB, rape isn't funny.

I am going to do a series of posts on what different comedians have said about rape and abuse and why some jokes are acceptable, while others aren't. The first thing I want to mention is the weird way comedians feel threatened by the rape isn't funny movement. The big tagline is: "comedians need freedom. That's how comedy gets made. If you don't want to be offended, then stay out of comedy clubs." That's right, comedians go out on stage and say whatever they want and the then audience reacts and they learn from the feedback which jokes work. However, for some reason, comedians refuse to listen to the feedback they get on their rape jokes. Some rape jokes are great, but comedians need to craft them responsibly.

Survivors deserve the right to be able to heal. No joke, no matter how funny or clever you think it is, should override that right. This has nothing to do with being sensitive. PTSD triggers our real physiological responses that cause real suffering. I don’t think it’s possible for people who don’t have PTSD, to understand, but try to imagine the most awful, horrible thing that’s ever happened to you, and then imagine your friends joking and laughing about it. It’s not cool.

 Every time you tell a rape joke, there’s a good chance that you’re triggering someone’s PTSD. According to the Rape Abuse and Incest National Network, one in six women have been raped, and one in 33 men. Even those numbers are probably low because, unfortunately, rape is a crime that goes unreported a lot of the time.  If you tell a rape joke to a group of any size, you’re more likely than not, to cause someone severe emotional distress. Rape can cause very traumatic flash backs and panic attacks, as a result of PTSD, and making jokes like that only makes survivors feel more alone and isolated.

 While I can agree that nothing should be out of bounds for humor because comedy functions best (most of the time) when it is pushing limits, I also understand that the vast majority of rape jokes are jokes which further victimize people who have been raped -- and that's not pushing anything except the already widespread cultural belief that rape is a joke. The best comics use their art to call bullshit on those terrible parts of life and make them better, not worse.

There's a very clear difference in a rape joke that makes fun rapists and one that makes fun of victims. When a joke takes a shot at a rape survivor, who’s that helping? You’re just attacking this person who’s gone through this horrible thing, and for what? To prove that you’re edgy and cool, and not tied down by political correctness? That’s crap. There’s nothing edgy or cool about making fun of rape survivor. 

Making fun of victims is never funny, but pointing out the faulty logic in a rapists fucked up mind is completely different...

Louis C.K. is making a great rape joke here. He is making fun of how ridiculous it is to have any excuse for raping another person. I love it! Cyanide and Happiness does the same thing:

Very funny stuff. 

This however, is not funny at all:

I don't condone anyone raping anyone and I don't think picturing anyone being raped is or should be funny, even if they are cartoon characters. George goes on to explain himself a little better, but I'll cover that in a later post. 

Also not funny:

This is one of those jokes that makes fun of the victim, not the aggressor. This is seriously messed up and isn't funny. Rape jokes like this are actively harmful. When rapists see rape being joked about, and taken lightly, they think that their behavior is okay. A lot of rapists don’t know that they’re rapists, because they don’t feel like they’ve done anything wrong, this feeds into that.

So is rape funny? No, absolutely not, never. 

Can rape jokes be funny? 

Sometimes, as long as you tell them responsibly.