[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by EatingPie

Indeed, your long discourse is valid opinion, but mine is not. I get that... com. plete. ly. Way to engage in discourse!

I fear you get very little if that's the response you give.

Why yes, I gave a long discourse. The intent was to illustrate that it's a complex matter, not simply resolved. You may disagree, but if you do, you're expected to say so, and state why. Instead, you assume I claim my opinion is valid and yours is not, and avoid actually responding to what I said.

So let's try this from a different angle. RAH was among other things a huge proponent of personal responsibility, operating under an assumption that we are responsible for our lives, make choices that affect our lives, and must bear responsibility for the consequences of those choices.

So one of the underlying issues here is culpability.

I live in a major metropolitan area. In fact, it's one of the major metropolitan areas in the world. Like all such areas, it has good neighborhoods and bad neighborhoods. There are areas in my city where if I choose to walk around in them after dark, I can reasonably expect to be at least beaten and robbed, and possibly killed, if for no other reason than the fact that I will be seen as trespassing on a gang's turf. As a long time resident of my city, I am expected to know that.

So what happens if I do go wandering around in one of those bad neighborhoods and get beaten and robbed? My lack of common sense and poor judgement certainly doesn't excuse those who beat and robbed me, and all will hope they will be arrested, tried, convicted and punished. But I can't expect much real sympathy for my plight, as most others will assume I should have know better than to go there in the first place, and I was paying the price often exacted for stupidity. (And my likely reason for being in an area like that would be buying drugs, which would be another point against me.)

Am I a poor blameless victim, absolved of all fault for my plight, or am I in part responsible for my own difficulties? RAH would say I was, and I would agree with him. I should have known better, and got myself into trouble. I made a bad decision, and must bear the consequences.

Now apply the same reasoning to rape. It's heinous crime, and I have fairly draconian notions about the appropriate way to treat repeat rapists, along the lines of making it impossible for them to do it again by removing the equipment they use to commit it. But does a woman who is raped never bear any responsibility for what happened to her? Like me, she's expected to have some idea of where she is, what circumstances she's in, and how she ought to behave. There will be places she's expected to know better than to go to, and ways she's expected to know better than to act, because if she goes there and acts like that, there will be predators who see a convenient victim, and she will be preyed upon. What happens if she knows those things, and goes there and does that anyway? Is she in part responsible for her predicament? If your answer is "no", I'd love to know why.

Our society does not do a good job of dealing with problems like this. There are still too many cases where getting raped is perceived to be the woman's fault regardless of circumstances, and it's an easy accusation to make if you've never had the misfortune to be in that situation, often through no fault of your own.

But just as that assumption is demonstrably untrue, the reverse assumption - that the woman is never responsible for what happens to her, is equally untrue. The truth lies somewhere in the middle.

If you want to claim that Heinlein's female character overstated her case, and that there were many more circumstances than she might admit to where her view wouldn't apply, I'd agree. If you simply reject the entire statement out of hand, I don't.

I am happy to discuss Heinlein's work, as proof by this thread I obviously have the dissenting opinion. But, really, this whole "opinion" thing is silly. It's merely an attempt to elevate your opinion above someone elses, and it's the poorest form of debate. Let your argument stand on its merits, don't attack the idea that we are expressing opinion.

I'm not quite sure I understand how you expect a discussion like this to proceed. I think the result you might like is for me and others to be swayed by your eloquence, convinced by your argument, and change our own opinions and admit to your superior moral stance and enlightened viewpoint.

Unfortunately, that hasn't happened. Speaking personally, I don't see your moral stance as superior, or your view as more enlightened than mine. I have been attempting by example to illustrate how I see the issues. I hardly expect you to agree with me, and indeed, the best I really hope for is to clarify what our respective positions are.

But meanwhile, if you disagree with my argument, refute it. Respond, point by point, to what I said, and state where you believe me to be wrong.

In discussions like this if you don't do so, the usual assumption is that you haven't done so because you can't. And in that case, you're considered to have lost the argument by forfeit.
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Dennis