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mstakenidentityI've been trying to avoid this topic in the news since it makes me feel so helplessly angry, but it's built up to the point that it is impossible.
For the non-Victorians on my list, after the 2010 AFL Grand Final party for the Collingwood Football Club (The premiers) a woman has come forward alleging she was sexually assaulted.
This has produced the predictable media circus with all the usual suspects mouthing off. As previously stated, I've been trying to avoid it, but one particular comment by ex-footballer "Spida" Everett really got to me: "Girls!! When will you learn! At 3am when you are blind drunk & you decide to go home with a guy ITS NOT FOR A CUP OF MILO!"
OK, this upsets me on many levels. The non-obvious level that really gets to me is this; Where is the scope for friendship between men and women? I know that I personally in my early 20s have been blind drunk at 3am and have taken a guy back to my place (usually it was my place because I was the one who lived in the inner suburbs)and guess what? IT WAS FOR A CUP OF MILO! Or possibly another beer while we sat on my bedroom floor and discussed vast philosophical topics such as Life, Love and whether that spot on my bedroom wall looked more like a flower or a cloud. We watched television, we sat outside and looked at the stars, we decided to load up my music player with songs from the early 90s and sung embarrassingly until my housemate(s) told us to shut up or joined in. And after all that guess what? When I went to bed, they either stretched out on the floor of my bedroom or if still able to they stumbled onto the couch in the lounge. Very occasionally they would make a move, and when rebuffed would take it with good grace, if a little embarrassed, and would trundle off to said floor or couch. If they didn't accept the rebuff with good grace I never invited them back again or dropped the acquaintance entirely, depending on the circumstances.
What shits me is, if ever I made a huge mistake in judgment and one of these encounters had gone very very wrong according to the media beat up it would be my fault for having them in my house. The fact I'd done the same dozens of times with other guys with nothing happening would not prove that this one guy out of many was a dickhead, instead it would prove that I'd let myself in for danger time and time again, and I was just lucky it had only happened this once. Cue side rant about rape protection always being the onus of women and women getting grief for both assuming every man will rape her and for not assuming every man will rape her.
And to all you guys who ever came back to my place for the equivalent of "a cup of milo" thanks for being awesome and being a massive part of my early 20s, and for not making me consider it any more dangerous to invite you back than one of our female friends.
For the non-Victorians on my list, after the 2010 AFL Grand Final party for the Collingwood Football Club (The premiers) a woman has come forward alleging she was sexually assaulted.
This has produced the predictable media circus with all the usual suspects mouthing off. As previously stated, I've been trying to avoid it, but one particular comment by ex-footballer "Spida" Everett really got to me: "Girls!! When will you learn! At 3am when you are blind drunk & you decide to go home with a guy ITS NOT FOR A CUP OF MILO!"
OK, this upsets me on many levels. The non-obvious level that really gets to me is this; Where is the scope for friendship between men and women? I know that I personally in my early 20s have been blind drunk at 3am and have taken a guy back to my place (usually it was my place because I was the one who lived in the inner suburbs)and guess what? IT WAS FOR A CUP OF MILO! Or possibly another beer while we sat on my bedroom floor and discussed vast philosophical topics such as Life, Love and whether that spot on my bedroom wall looked more like a flower or a cloud. We watched television, we sat outside and looked at the stars, we decided to load up my music player with songs from the early 90s and sung embarrassingly until my housemate(s) told us to shut up or joined in. And after all that guess what? When I went to bed, they either stretched out on the floor of my bedroom or if still able to they stumbled onto the couch in the lounge. Very occasionally they would make a move, and when rebuffed would take it with good grace, if a little embarrassed, and would trundle off to said floor or couch. If they didn't accept the rebuff with good grace I never invited them back again or dropped the acquaintance entirely, depending on the circumstances.
What shits me is, if ever I made a huge mistake in judgment and one of these encounters had gone very very wrong according to the media beat up it would be my fault for having them in my house. The fact I'd done the same dozens of times with other guys with nothing happening would not prove that this one guy out of many was a dickhead, instead it would prove that I'd let myself in for danger time and time again, and I was just lucky it had only happened this once. Cue side rant about rape protection always being the onus of women and women getting grief for both assuming every man will rape her and for not assuming every man will rape her.
And to all you guys who ever came back to my place for the equivalent of "a cup of milo" thanks for being awesome and being a massive part of my early 20s, and for not making me consider it any more dangerous to invite you back than one of our female friends.
