I’ve read somewhere that most rape is committed by a familiar and very few by total strangers. I’ve never heard a real date-rape account told by anybody I know, but I have heard some female friends over the years tell me about near-rape traps they tripped into. Now, I’m wondering how overwhelming or underwhelming the incidence of date rape is.
Too many young girls I have spoken to are easily star-struck and appear to lose their head and heart around famous people. I can think of precious few A-List stars in Ghana: a few musicians (Kojo, Lumba, Amakye Dede), a few sportsmen (Pele, Essien, Appiah maybe), a few diplomats with obvious names, more than a few business persons, etc etc. So why do you bloody let a nothing small-time straggler (dabbling as an actor or musician) get into your head and date-rape you? But it’s not the girl's fault.
People are free to feel giddy about other people, mice, sports, depraved North African presidents or English football. THERE IS NO EXCUSE TO RAPE A GIRL, EVEN IF SHE THREW HERSELF AT YOU!
Does anybody know about any date rape in Ghana?
Does anybody know about any date rape in Ghana?
p.s.: Anti-Rhythm achieved its 40,000th visit yesterday. Thank you everybody for coming around.
Hmmm! Date Rape... no excuse for rape. Sometimes I wonder if they don't see these traps.
ReplyDeleteHey congrats... you're doing great
Date rape? I have to ask the gals about it since the topic has not come up between us. hmmmmm
ReplyDeleteCongratulations!!! Here is to the next 40, 000
They don't see the traps because they are not rapists so they just happen to not think like rapists. Silly girls, right?
ReplyDeleteAre you kidding me with that statement? Not like we're talking about strangers here. Most victims know their attackers! A little more sensitivity would you pls?
Enough of a trend in some places that there is a "Date-Rape Drugs" categorization.
Good going with the blog! More grease...
I get your disclaimers (+capitalizations)... but I think your second paragraph is objectionable, for reasons you already appreciate, hence your disclaimers.
ReplyDeleteps. That said, great work on the blog!
People walk into those traps with their eyes wide open. No sympathy from me. There is "study-mate" rape as well. No sympathy for that as well. Congrats NY!
ReplyDeleteare you for real???
ReplyDeleteMassa Mensa-Bonsu, guys don't have "rapist" tattooed on their foreheads so how do you know you are walking into a trap in the first place? I watched Tyler Perry's "For Colored Girls" and in it a lady invites a guy to come for dinner at her house and the guy took it as an opportunity to rape her. I didn't see that one coming and I'm sure she didn't either. Up till then, the guy had been a model friend. So what now? Do you stop interacting with guys altogether for fear that every guy is a rapist? That is no way to live. Granted there are guys that you should know even with your eyes closed that they are up to sth sinister thru their actions. Bottom line - you can't tell every guy's intention and what girl would walk into a trap to be raped? I think just like Nana said if you think you are being tempted, just walk away. Real men don't rape.
ReplyDeleteAnd Nana Yaw, congrats on your new milestone.
ReplyDelete@Kwame - You can be sure I won't be walking into any of 'your' traps. Beware ladies, you've been forewarned in this case.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous...I married my first girl and has not looked at any girl since. I am that type of person. But from what I have heard and seen in my almost four decades of existence, there are always signs. The conversation topics with you the girl/lady in question and other ladies, whether the person touches you inappropriately...however few and far in between....,etc, etc. There are so many signs that girls just ignore. Moreover why should you be in a situation which is bound to arouse even the most gentle of men? I have never set a trap and never will, as you angrily suggest, but I always let my lady friends know the purpose of our relationship and I leave no grey areas. Ladies should know this and not invite men/go with men into empty rooms....for stuff like candlelit dinners.Very suggestive actions! It is idiocy at best. Sorry!
ReplyDeleteI see the ladies have taken a different stand here from the males. Well that should tell you ladies to stand back learn and be careful.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWhoa!
ReplyDeleteI somewhat agree with both @anonymous (mostly) but also Kwame. As a victim of rape myself I can say I never saw it coming and I was a very decent girl without any idea about sex. So don't be telling "ladies to stand back learn and be careful" sometime's there is no avoiding it when the man is a violent rapist. I also take offence that you think you know anything because as a man you really don't, men are not exposed to the same things women are. Why should women always have to change and do all the work, and not men? The attitudes of Nana is what I wish would be the attitude of all men, that it's unacceptable NO MATTER WHAT. That's the only way we can reduce the incidence of rape. ALL that being said, I have been seeing things that have shocked me - girls just behaving crazy. I think they should get their ish together and be careful. Nothing ever gives a man the excuse to rape, NOTHING, but since it's not going to stop, women need to learn how to be careful too. But it's a sad truth that I am always going to have to be afraid that any man I meet might turn around and change the moment I'm alone with him inside 4 walls, cuz Kwame, you do have people like that. People who never give any signs ahead who just FLIP on you and rape you when you least expect it. Yes, there can be signs, and women should be aware of them and watch out, but there are exceptions. I don't think all the responsibility for preventing rape should be put on women only when it is men that commit the crime.
Nana, congratulations. You will soon reach 80 000. And what you said about girls throwing themselves at different 'famous' people - I think its ridicilous and I wish women would clean up their own mess when it comes to that...
It's hard not to get infuriated by such an insensitive and chauvinistic outlook. But I shall try to let calm heads prevail for the sake of civil discourse.
ReplyDeleteIn the first place:
"I see the males have taken a different stand here from the ladies. Well that should tell you males to stand back learn and be careful."
Secondly, your logic is inherently flawed because you assume that girls do or should be aware of a rapits's perverse intentions despite not being male themselves. Also you neglect to take into account that most criminals being criminals do not advertise their intentions prior commiting a crime. If anything, they more reasonably will take great pains to make sure they are not found out, before or afterwards.
I find it hard to accept that anyone would justify rape under any circumstances. I find it even more devastating that such opinions would be in any sense pervasive, in which case it indicates less progress made by us as a nation than I'd previously assumed.
On the flipside, let noone assume that by engaging in the conversation women in anyway condone this backward line of thought. Were we to have a more effective way of defending ourselves in this besides tedious, constant communication/education, our swift retributive action to such male exploitation would leave the matter resolved.
Liking what you just said Anonymous. THANK YOU :-)
ReplyDelete@ yeh:
ReplyDeleteI disagree with you that there is anything objectionable about my second paragraph.
I see this annoys you ladies. But honestly it shouldn't. In a perfect world, there should not be rape. I think rapists should be castrated, they are very abominable. But all I have been saying is....and this isn't logic, flawed or otherwise, but facts:1) Do not ignore any sign, however small and 2) Don't get yourself into compromising situations with even Angel Gabriel. You may get angry, etc, but ladies those are the facts of this imperfect world. It's something I'll my daughter, if I ever have one.
ReplyDeleteThis is disappointing, and not just the comments here - i guess it's more universal. To digress a little, there's a recent case of an 11yr old girl in texas who was raped by 18 boys/men 14-27 years of age. When the news was initially reported, there was a mixed bag of comments about - how the girl dressed, and visited with some male friends, and questions like "where was her mother?" Now, this is not too far removed from a comment about young girls getting giddy and careless around rock-stars. How about where was his mother? I don't understand why the discussion on rape always centers around the social responsibility of women? what about the men running around scruples?
ReplyDelete*This is disappointing, and not just the comments here - i guess it's more universal. To digress a little, there's a recent case of an 11yr old girl in texas who was raped by 18 boys/men 14-27 years of age. When the news was initially reported, there was a mixed bag of comments about - how the girl dressed, and visited with some male friends, and questions like "where was her mother?" Now, this is not too far removed from a comment about young girls getting giddy and careless around rock-stars. How about where was his mother? I don't understand why the discussion on rape always centers around the social responsibility of women? what about the men running around without scruples?
ReplyDeleteKwame Mensa-Bonsu,
ReplyDeleteI am sure that if someone forcible assailed you, tore off your clothes and sodomized you against you will (closest analogy I could come up with for the male equivalent, do forgive the vulgarity of the image readers), you would also be at least 'annoyed' if someone came along and told you:
1) Do not ignore any sign, however small and 2) Don't get yourself into compromising situations with even Angel Gabriel.
You insult us/our intelligence with your - and I reinterate - COMPLETELY FLAWED ideas and/or logic. From your point of view I suppose all females are ignorant twits flitting about, ignoring all the goings on in their external surroundings until they encounter an unsavory situation. Please spare me such patronization!
We are no less aware than you are, on the contrary I would hazard that from a lifetime of having to protect themselves from unwanted male advances most women can for the most part spot such traps far more readily than a man.
If you are aiming to learn anyone a lesson here, perhaps pay more attention to your own education. Maybe then you'll have something to say worth attending to.
With any luck you don't pass on to your daughters the superior, chauvinistic attitudes you display towards women on web forums. And instead raise strong, self-assured women who are confident in themselves and their opinions. Ghana could sure use a few more of these.
I must state quite strongly that i really respect women and have no patronising feelings towards them. I look up to women, actually...the stronger the better. But i am quite bemused by your strong reaction...actually it the first time i have been called chauvinistic in my life! But i still say: be careful. I'll say that's good advice in this imperfect world. Take care!
ReplyDeleteBemused...well good for you that you found something to laugh about on the subject of rape. That tells a lot I daresay...wish I could say the same.
ReplyDeleteIf it's such good advice, then 'my' advice is that you'd better take a bucket full of it yourself, sir.
To clarify, I find your 'attitude' towards the subject matter chauvinistic and not your person. Perhaps you are the decent person that you paint yourself as here. In which case, I still think your 'ideas' on this issue require much redress.
...and thus I betray the strong rule emotions have on the female psyche...that fervor be so awoken that one interprets bemusement as amusement...
ReplyDeleteThe former sentiment obviously being more appropriate, wallow in that state a few moments more if you can.
Then maybe transitioning out of it would lead to a peek from the other side of the glass, even for a brief second maybe you could sneak a glimpse from the eyes of the oppressed/powerless and gain some sort of insight.
Am I passionate about this topic? You bet I am! Must I maintain a level of fairness and basic comprehension? I shall try to...
Bemused: puzzled, confused, or bewildered--Oxford English Dictionary.
ReplyDeleteI am not from Ghana, but I visited the country this past year. I was there for about a month and became friends with quite a few of the people there.
ReplyDeleteMaybe things are different because I am American, and I have always had friends who are male so I did not think anything of what those supposed "signs" that other people have commented on here might be.
Nevertheless, I was date raped. I thought I would be okay hanging out alone with one of my "friends" that I had made, but he forced himself on me. I said no, but he didn't listen. By the United States definition of date rape, that is what happened.
So maybe according to Ghanaian culture what happened to me isn't date rape. I consider it to be and thereforth, would say that date rape does exist in Ghana.