I thought this might be a useful article for a few con-goers

[matchgirl42.livejournal.com]

I could go on and on with an explanation, but I'll just link the column with the caveat: this is not me saying *anything* about your average con-goer. Please read the article through before reacting. Ktnx.

Guest blogger Starling: Schrodinger's rapist, or a guy's guide to approaching strange women without being maced.

Comments

A note (1 of 2)

[kylekatern.livejournal.com]

I have taken some time to get real life issues and problems dealt with, and have been avoiding this thread. The following are my OPINIONS. You can hate me, you can hope I burn in hell, you can hope you never see me face to face, or you can wish me well and want to buy me a beer. In this statement, you and they are both used in the generic, as a term for society in general, not any one person, here or elsewhere.

I believe, and feel, that individuals are ultimately responsible ONLY for their own thoughts and actions. However, I also believe that one can plan for the worst, and still hope for the best. My younger sisters are just now age 20. Twins. They both have cell phones, with myself and their other brothers on speed dial. They both have pistols, and have had time and practice and training in their use. They both have pepper spray, neither has a taser as those don't work worth a damn. I have done my best to teach them about situational awareness. However, should they CHOOSE to put themselves in a situation that is unsafe, I cannot stop them, even though I want to do so. I can only hope that all I have taught them and done for them keeps them safe.

Yes, I read books that involve dark fantasy's. I also read books that involve FANTASY'S about rape, as well as ones that deal with KINK, BDSM, and 'Consensual Non-Consent'. Fantasy's are legal. They break no law. I can go to a party, and have girls who will ask, politely, if they can be tied up or otherwise restrained and tickled, slapped, or otherwise treated in ways that are outside the 'norm' of public behavior. I even run a side business making furniture just for that use. Industrial steel, with overhead lifting rings and chain falls to suspend objects or humans from the ceiling. However, outside that party, with those people, all of age, all fully aware of what they are getting into, I am just another guy, going about my day to day life. Even in the context of a negotiated, written down scene, there are still limits, there are still words that mean stop, be it no, or red, or whatever is chosen. There are still those who monitor the 'play' at an event to ensure that nobody gets talked into anything that is a little beyond what they would normally do/try. So yes, I LIKE dark fantasy, I ACT OUT dark fantasy, but do so with those who revel in every moment of it, and go home safe and sound at the end of the night.

When I am in public, I use my eyes. I look for cameras, for those who are watching me or watching the crowd. I look for dark corners, I look for unlocked exit doors. I look for parking near the door, and for where the street lights or parking lot lights are. I often take seats in a corner with a wall not a window in places I go to eat. In fact, I am somebody who legally carries a gun or guns with me everyplace I can do so under the law. Be that a gun on my hip, or 1 - 2 in my pockets or otherwise tucked away. I am someone who believes that going to get the mail means I need my keys, boots, fully dressed, pocket knife, flashlight, and wallet, and more often than not a gun. I always try to expect and plan for the worst. I hope I just walk to get the mail, walk back. But what if? Its all about the what if. That dark alley that you cut down as its the only way to get to your car is the one I flash a sun like tactical flashlight down before using. I walk around my truck and check the tell tales on the tires for pressure, and check the bed and under it before I get in. Its habits that, while 99.99% of the time are just a time eater, have a few times helped me, and might someday be of more help.

A note (2 of 2)

[kylekatern.livejournal.com]

I also believe that there ARE bad people out there. That they are the ones who CHOOSE, or for some reason, drugs, mental illness, etc, cannot NOT choose, to do evil. I believe that any time I CAN prevent them from doing something I should do so. Call it being a boy scout, call it a White Knight complex, call it what you will. As many attribute to Burke: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing". We cannot, and should not, hobble the many to defend against the few, or to avoid offending the minority. Rape, assault, and abuse are horrific things. But far to often, those who commit them are never reported, and those who have NEVER done any of these things bear the brunt of the attempt to 'make it all safe' for those who have been victimized. I know more than one person who is a 'serial victim' Once somebody has been victimized, in any way, they tend, unless they recover VERY well, to have some certain quality about them that makes them seem vulnerable, and seems to attract the bad types. Like somebody who gets out of one abusive relationship into another, or the person abused as a child who ends up being assaulted or raped at a college party. The person who was victimized is NOT at fault for the initial offense.

I can be a nice guy all my life. Never commit any crime beyond speeding. Help women cross the street, open doors, offers my spare bedroom to folks who need to get away from a bad relationship, and be there for anyone who needs help, be it a truck to get furniture at 3 am, or a trip tot he gun range to qualify before trying to get issued a concealed handgun permit. However, I, and others who are GOOD people who ACTIVELY try to stop BAD people in our day to day lives CANNOT be everywhere. Its not hard to dial 911 when you heard a 'domestic' fight. Or to offer a safe ride home to a friend who has had 2-3 too many, so that she does not make a new friend while drunk. However, too many are so full of righteous zeal and fury that they attack the hand that is offered to the drowning person. This discussion is not the first, or the last time I will be attacked. Nor is it the first or last time I will be told that I do not understand, or CANNOT understand. That I will NEVER be trustworthy or a good guy, no matter what my actions, because I am male, and therefor one of 'them'. Rape is not a male - female issue or war. Neither is assault. Homosexual, trans gender, and gender fluid individuals, of both sexes, physically and mentally identified, are on both sides of the rape issue. By turning it into a 'guys are evil' or a 'men cannot be trusted' issue they cut out some of those that can help, they slander many who have never harmed a soul, and they managed to re-enforce the stereotypes that CAUSE some of the frictions that KEEP things from being discussed in an open light.

All opinions aside, the following are facts.

I have never been charged, or investigated, or questioned, or even accused, of any crime of domestic violence.

The worst thing I have done to an individual I have been in a relationship with is refuse to let them drive home form a party while they were drunk and angry, even those this got me bruises, a screwed up hand, and them attempting to run me over with a car as myself and others sat down so they could not drive away.

I have never done anything to cause damage to the opposite sex that was not done with permission and enthusiasm on both sides of the incident.

I have, one more than once occasion, been the good guy and told individuals, male and female, that they were not in a state of mind to ask for what they said they wanted, and taken time to see them home safe.

I pay for and carry an extra cell phone, with a Google voice number mapped to it, JUST for people who may need my help, be it a voice or a ride.