Joanna Lumley has sparked widespread outrage by suggesting that women who wear short skirts and get drunk put themselves at risk of being raped.
The Absolutely Fabulous actress — who played the constantly drunk Patsy Stone in the TV sitcom — lashed out at “trashy” girls, reigniting the old “uncovered meat” debate about whether women who are raped are somehow responsible for their fate.
“Don’t look like trash, don’t get drunk, don’t be sick down your front, don’t break your heels and stagger about in the wrong clothes at midnight,” Lumley told the UK’s Daily Telegraph. “This is bad.”
“It’s not me being a snob about it. It’s not me being an old woman talking to young women, it’s just standard practice for how our species should behave. Don’t behave badly.
“Don’t be sick in the gutter at midnight in a silly dress with no money to get a taxi home, because somebody will take advantage of you, either they’ll rape you, or they’ll knock you on the head or they’ll rob you.”
The controversial comments sparked a Twitter storm, with thousands of young women using the social networking site to rage against Lumley’s words and their implications.
“Joanna Lumley seems to think alcohol rapes people. No, rapists rape people,” one person wrote.
“Rape is an act of violence, not sex. To suggest women could avoid rape by drinking less or wearing different clothes is ignorant and insulting,” another added.
Karen Willis, Executive Officer of the NSW Rape Crisis Centre, says comments like Lumley’s perpetuate the “myth” that women are to blame if they get raped.
In reality, Willis says, how women are dressed or how drunk they are means nothing to rapists.
“We know from talking to convicted sex offenders, that how women are dressed, how drunk they are, what kind of makeup they’ve got on, actually isn’t on their radar,” Willis told The Weekly.
“They’re looking for access, and the ability to manipulate that person into a location where they won’t be interrupted or witnessed. Neither of those things have anything to do with sobriety or the length of their skirt.
“They will use those excuses if they get caught, but it doesn’t figure into their thinking. Our acceptance of this myth that somehow women are to blame, that they are somehow at fault, feeds into that idea that it excuses the offender’s immoral behaviour.”
Willis says nobody deserves to be sexually assaulted, and no victim should ever be made to think that they played a part in what happened to them.
“Nobody gets dressed for a night out thinking, ‘Oh, if I wear this I might get raped, wouldn’t that be fun?’ Rape is about power and control,” she said.
“It is done to hurt, humiliate and dominate the victim and sex is used as a tool. Nobody asks for that. Nobody deserves that.
“Getting drunk to the point that you are vomiting is a public health issue, male or female, but it has nothing to do with sexual assault.”
Willis also makes the point that the “uncovered meat” defence doesn’t account for the men who fall victim to sexual assault.
Statistically, one in five Australian women will experience sexual assault in their lifetime, but one in 20 men will too.
Most of the assaults on men occur before the male’s 18th birthday, but seven percent of all adult sexual assaults in Australia are perpetrated against men.
“We don’t say to men, if you put on a tight singlet and a pair of shorts and go to the pub and get drunk then you’re asking for sexual assault and it will be your fault,” Willis said.
“It’s a gender issue too. There are so many double standards around this issue.”
