I haven't personally had any assault experiences, but I generally avoid publicly spreading around the names of the people who I have been told have committed sexual assaults, mostly because I've felt like it would bring more unwanted attention upon their victims.
On the other hand, I have had private conversations of the sort, "You seem to be spending a lot of time with X. X was involved in a situation a while ago where they may have sexually assaulted someone they were dating, although I don't think they understood what they were doing at the time. I don't mean to tell you that X is a horrible person, but please be careful."
I know that publicly outing assaulters could warn a lot more potential victims than privately saying something when I happen to notice a potential bad situation, but it also seems like it would cause a lot of larger social strife. I feel like there's a degree of social ostracism that can make someone realize that they really committed a sexual assault and they were wrong, but there's also a degree which can make them too defensive to think about their situation. I don't really know where the happy medium lies.
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regna
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-18 01:29 pm (UTC)On the other hand, I have had private conversations of the sort, "You seem to be spending a lot of time with X. X was involved in a situation a while ago where they may have sexually assaulted someone they were dating, although I don't think they understood what they were doing at the time. I don't mean to tell you that X is a horrible person, but please be careful."
I know that publicly outing assaulters could warn a lot more potential victims than privately saying something when I happen to notice a potential bad situation, but it also seems like it would cause a lot of larger social strife. I feel like there's a degree of social ostracism that can make someone realize that they really committed a sexual assault and they were wrong, but there's also a degree which can make them too defensive to think about their situation. I don't really know where the happy medium lies.