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Comment by abrimo | Hacker News Reader

You're trying to blame the victim, which is troublingly common when someone has been raped or sexually harassed but it is never the right response. It is traumatising when these things happen, it is personally demeaning and it is never acceptable.

Justine is brave for coming forward and we should encourage everyone in a similar situation to do the same and support them when they do.

The deeper cultural problem here is that your comment has been voted to the top.

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I don't see how you can interpret my post as blaming the victim. I'm blaming society for the extreme damage the crime has done to her and I propose ways to mitigate some of the damage.

I'm not addressing the perpetrator at all, because he's obviously guilty of a crime. That doesn't change anything about the fact that we can mitigate the results of the crime.

It's absolutely still victim blaming, though thinly veiled under the guise of societal expectations being the reason for her supposedly blowing the whole thing out of proportion. Even if you pretend to be blaming society as the main culprit, your argument still essentially boils down to "it's not that bad, deal with it" and there is no denying this. I'm not saying there isn't any validity to your original argument, but don't back off and act like you're not saying that it's her failure to psychologically cope and deal with it that is causing all of this suffering. I've never had any person close to me experience sexual assault, but to argue that it's a societal problem and to imply that it's less psychologically traumatizing than it actually is is a dangerous argument to make without any kind of experience or knowledge of the actual psychological impact.

The solution isn't to make society believe that it's not a big deal, and that people are expected to make a timely recovery. I feel like this would lead to even more victim blaming and even more self hatred for those who don't meet the societal expectations of quick recovery. The proper message isn't "you should get over it quickly", but instead "you CAN get your life back"... and unless I'm mistaken, I believe this is what people helping those with rape try to teach the victims to believe.

Its easy to interpret it that way when do not read the comment.

I am unable to understand how a long post about how "societal expectations makes the suffering of the victims even worse than it might otherwise be" is anything except sympathetic towards the victim.

If you're seeing blaming in it, please do explain why since I'm as confused as the OP was.

We blame the victim all the time. Many alcoholic, drunk driver, bad-at-their-job people would rather not be like that but they're suffering some kind of severe emotional trouble and don't have the willpower to overcome it, much like this girl. They still get fired and charged with DUI regardless.

"Blaming the victim" means suggesting that the victim of a crime perpetrated by another was not the fault of the person who committed the crime, but rather their fault is somehow absolved by the actions of the victim. This is considered a terrible thing to do because it completely removes the victim's right to NOT be a victim.

If the victim actually, definitely and factually is partly to be blamed, why cannot the victim be blamed? Or do you disallow facts to be said? (This comment is general and doesn't make claims about this particular case).

Because then they are no longer the victim?

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