Midget--not weird, tragic. To the man, to the woman. False accusations are evil. But ignoring a true violation even in date rape is also an evil. I hate to think of falsely accusing men of such a crime. It's so terrible. I do agree with you that when it comes to sex (not issues of beauty,dress, or blame), propriety is best. The problem with false accusations is that everyone is reduced. Truth is lost. Everyone suffers. I hate that. As for "regrettable sex," no, that is not rape at all. Not even close.

I'm sorry, Midget. I didn't really want to go here with this conversation. And I'm thinking about deleting what I wrote. Too personal. But I felt compelled to respond to you and to do so in public since so much has been written.

I think we all knew it was just a matter of time before we'd find out that Fox reporters were targeted as well. As for Carney's statement, it's been proven that he's a liar, and he's lying again. Obama is not a defender of the First Amendment because he is not a defender of the Constitution. It's something that stands in the way of his agenda to transform America into a statist regime. 

Or maybe we should just go full out and really make sure no man lusts after a woman and ensure that she won't be raped. According to your logic, we would all be safer if we dressed like this:

But, darn it, that doesn't work either because women are raped in countries where burqas are required. On a rape scale of 1 to 5, Saudi Arabia ranks 4. Hmmm.... But how can that be? Their women are all covered. They're considered one of the most "conservative" nations in the world as far as women "keeping in their place." Wow. It boggles the mind.

Or maybe women should dress like this? Will this keep them safe? 

You know, probably not, because guess what? Women were raped in the 1500s, the 1600s, and the 1700s, and before that.

This is ridiculous. No wonder young women are running from the conservative plank. We don't live in 1962. Hippie dress is not looked upon by young men these days as "loose." How should they dress? Like this?

 Well, guess what? Women were raped in the 1950s. What? How could that be? They weren't dressed like hippies. What could have been the cause???

That is a logical conclusion to what has been stated thus far about beautiful women being at higher risk for rape if she doesn't cover her beauty or dress more modestly than ugly women (whatever that means).

Let me take a different angle that you might understand. First of all, in my discussion with you I'm not disagreeing that women should not hop into bed with men or dress like sluts. We were talking about beauty, the workplace, and women having normal, social contact with men. I repeat, rape is caused by evil in the heart of man, and the cause is not the woman. My final argument in this--if your position were true that beautiful women are such a terrible temptation for men to rape, or even immodest beautiful women (however you define that), then please explain why historically there has been rape, and likely more rape, throughout history when women were covered and certainly didn't work alongside men??? Women were raped throughout ancient times, the middles ages, and mainly in patriarchal societies and in cultures with slaves (who weren't exactly dressing provocatively, working with men professionally, or acting with more "confidence" than "they should.") Women are raped because men want to exercise power over them and feed their lusts. That's why there was more rape in premodern societies than there are in modern, nonpatriarchal ones.

This is straight from Islamic teaching --"And those who allow the woman to show her hand and face -the Malikiyah and Hanafiyah- do so with the provision that make up will not be used, but if the woman's face is naturally beautiful, then she must cover her face for fear of being a temptation to men." You people do sound like you're straight from the Taliban. But as least Islam is honest about what's really going on when people talk this way about covering up beautiful women for the purposes of "chastity and modesty." It's not really about the woman at all. It's about protecting the man, keeping him from sinning: "Allah, the most high, decreed that the woman should be veiled. He did so in protecting the chastity of the men who might see her, and not in protection of the chastity of the woman from the eyes of those who look at her." Again, I will not be bound by the shame and sin of another or have my freedom diminished out of projected fears. I find it beyond offensive. I'm sure you will disagree, but we will have to agree to disagree.

Midget--I disagree with the premise about beauty and risk and that out of fear a beautiful woman should lessen her beauty when in the presence of men. If she should "mitigate the risk" of luring some man by her beauty to rape her, please tell me how short should a beautiful woman's dress be compared to the ugly woman? How much makeup should a beautiful woman wear compared to the ugly woman? Which job in the military or anywhere else should a beautiful woman not take and instead allow the ugly woman to take it? Should only the ugly woman wear high heels? Should beautiful women bind up their hair so its loveliness won't attract a male and tempt him to rape her? How long should a beautiful woman talk to a man before it is just too overwhelming for him that he might want to rape her? Or should she only let the ugly women do the talking? At what point does a beautiful woman cease to be modest compared to the ugly woman? Finally, and this is the original point of my post, even if a woman is acting immodestly, she is not responsible for getting raped.

That's not prudent risk analysis. That's fear. Fear generated by another's sin.

How about this. If men have such an **expletive** difficult time not lusting after a beautiful woman, maybe they should all have blindfolds on. They're the ones with the problem. Not the woman! She has done nothing wrong. She is simply beautiful. The man, according to you, is the one with the lack of self-control, therefore, he should be the one restrained. So, instead of having beautiful women "hide" or cover or lessen their beauty (I don't even know what you're suggesting practically speaking as far as her not being so beautiful as to be a temptation to men), then men should cover their leering eyes. I, for one, will not bear shame that belongs to another.