I Get More Letters

[Trigger warning for rape culture.]

Hey, remember this guy, my charming correspondent who had been banned or engaging in rape apologia and acknowledged having read in the commenting policy that people banned for violating that very policy are not welcome to bring their grievances about being banned to my inbox...? And remember how I pointedly explained that ignoring someone's clearly delineated boundaries is not just rude, but hostile to the notion of consent, and thus finds itself on a continuum at the other end of which is sexual violence...?

Well, I don't guess I need to tell you what colossal dipfuck has just sent me yet another email, the subject header of which is—I shit you not—"Sorry for invading your boundaries," that is, in fact, not (surprise!) an apology for disrespecting my boundaries, but is, instead, (spoiler warning!) a massive textwall manspalining to me how he TOTES IS NOT a rape apologist, even though he doesn't think it's victim-blaming to tell women not to drink so much if they don't want to get be raped, insisting that "rape apologist" is a slur (lulz), telling me that I'm being "hurtful," asking me to forward to him a copy of his original email (because he didn't bother to keep one, so now I'm his personal secretary), auditing my boundaries by telling me he can't figure out what my "publicly published Contact link [is] supposed to function as," if not a resource to whinge at me, and then concludes with this gem:

Apologies if you believe this e-mail also crosses any boundaries. If you do not wish to receive any more correspondence, please tell me (although I would appreciate my original e-mail if that is alright with you).

No. None of this is all right with me. That's why part of my published comment policy, in big bold letters, is: Being banned from Shakesville is not an invitation to take your issues to the email inbox of Liss and/or any of the other contributors or mods. And fauxpologizing for disrespecting clearly-delineated boundaries is worth a squirtload of good to the person whose boundaries you must disrespect to deliver it.

Of course, my correspondent has audited my boundaries and determined them to be bullshit, which is why he is still emailing me to try to convince me how much not an apologist for a rape culture the cornerstone of which is a disrespect of boundaries he is.

Lest there be any confusion: I am not writing about this because I am scared or hurt or offended. (As the masthead says, I'm just contemptuous.) I am writing about this because, when I write about things like this ongoing exchange, there are men (and women), more interested in living a life truly respectful of consent than my correspondent, who email me to say they have learned something about how better to respect other people's boundaries in everyday ways, and there are women (and men) who email me to say they have learned something about defining and defending their own boundaries, and their right to do so.

I also write about it because sometimes people think the moderators here take too hard a line on rape apologia, that we don't give enough leeway. Well. This is where leeway lees to.

And I write about it because I write about the rape culture, and the rape culture starts with every person who says, "I know you said not to, but I'm going to do it anyway."

You can't claim to be anti-rape, unless you're pro-consent.