"Men are not unmindful of the rape problem. To the contrary, their paternalistic laws reserve the harshest penalties for a violation of their property (women). They approach rape as an illegal enroachment by an unlicensed intruder, a stranger come into their midst, the advice they gave (and still try to give) was all of one piece: a set of rules and regulations designed to keep their property penned in, much as a sheepherder might try to keep his flock protected from an outlaw rustler by taking precautions against their straying too far from the fold. By seeing the rapist always as a stranger, never as one of their own, and by viewing the female as a careless creature with an unfortunate tendency to stray, they exhorted, admonished and warned the female to hide herself from male eyes as much as possible.

In short, they told her not to claim the privileges they reserved for themselves. Such advice - well intentioned, solicitous and genuinely concerned - succeeded only in further aggravating the problem, for the message they gave was to live a life of fear, and to it they appended the dire warning that the woman who did not follow the rules must be held responsible for her own violation.

What the rules tell us implicitly and explicitly is:

1) A woman alone probably won't be able to defend herself. Another woman who might possibly come to her aid will of no use whatsoever.

2) Despite the fact that it is men who are the rapists, a woman's ultimate security lies in being accompanied by men at all times.

3) A woman who claims to value her sexual integrity cannot expect the same amount of freedom and independence that men routinely enjoy. Even a small pleasure like taking a spin in an automobile with the windows open is dangerous, reckless behavior.

4) In the exercise of rational caution, a woman should engage in an amazing amount of pretense. She should function on a sustained level of suspicion that approaches a clinical definition of paranoia.

A woman who follows this sort of special cautionary advice and thinks she is acting in society's interest - or even in her own personal interest - is deluding herself rather sadly. This does not diminish the number of potential rapists on the loose, and the ultimate effect of rape upon the woman's mental and emotional health has been accomplished even without the act.

To accept a special burden of self-protection is to reinforce the concept that women must live and move about in fear and can never expect to achieve the personal freedom, independence, and self-assurance of men.

That's what rape is all about, isn't it? A possible deep-down reason why even the best of our concerned, well-meaning men run to stereotypic warnings when they seek to grapple with the problem of rape deterrence is that they prefer to see rape as woman's problem, rather than as a societal problem resulting from a distorted masculine philosophy of aggression."

-Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape