I know it is important not to blame the victim but it seems like when people encourage women to adopt reasonable safeguards (like having a buddy system at large drinking parties), they are often drowned out by others insisting that that is just a way of blaming the victim. Look, I don’t think that a woman who gets falling down drunk at a party with strangers “deserves” to get raped——-but women who don’t want to get raped can make it a lot less likely by drinking in moderation. We teach our kids how to look both ways when they cross the road.
We don’t think that kids who are careless “deserve” to get struck by a car and no one says that teaching kids road safety is really just a way to blame pedestrian victims for being hit.

That said, we DO need to work as a society to teach men that rape is a simply horrific thing to do to someone. The way some guys smugly laugh about it——-like that Steubenville (?) football player is absolutely disgusting.

Change takes time however, and women should take steps to keep themselves safe in the meanwhile since there are so many awful people out there.