Would You Intervene To Help A Woman Getting Abused By A Lover?

OneSTDV has an interesting post up about an ABC TV show which conducted a social experiment to determine if strangers would help an obviously beaten woman in a public restaurant when her violent boyfriend shows up. Actors played the roles of the abused girlfriend and the abusive boyfriend. A bunch of clackety clacking hens over at Feministing clucked up a storm when two of the pairings demonstrated a contrast in how the public responded to the bruised actress in distress. In the first mock scenario, the woman was dressed conservatively. A white knight rushed to her defense. In the second mock scenario, the bruised woman was dressed sluttily, showing lots of cleavage. No one stepped up to help her, men or women. The fembots harrumphed that this proves that people perceive slutty women as “asking for it”.

OneSTDV’s explanation was this:

I disagree. I’d wager the different reactions stem from a lack of respect commensurate with the girlfriend’s sexual openness. The other patrons’ responses reflect the existence of a number of indicators of status and class. Provocative dress implies a sexual luridness most middle aged persons find deplorable.

OneSTDV is closer to the truth here than are the fembots, although their competing explanations are not that different and could be mostly semantical. A woman perceived as low class because of slutty dress evokes a general feeling among onlookers that she is “asking for it”. The perception of low class leading to a belief that she is complicit in her suffering is not a broken path of reasoning. People of each sex do judge sluts more harshly because there is a human tendency to withhold empathy from losers who can’t even respect themselves. Naturally, a fembot would screech “why is dressing like a slut synonymous with being a loser?”. Not every slut is the female equivalent of the emotional tampon beta male loser, but the parallels are striking. Both must barter their most precious resource to get any attention from people of the opposite sex they most desire.

To answer the title of this post, I would not intervene to help an abused woman. My thinking on this is crystal clear: she chose to be with the abuser. I know that any help I may offer would be for naught as the next day she would run back to her thug lover for more of the same flirty flurry of blows.

There’s a lesson here. You can’t get something for nothing. If women want the assistance of white knights, they need to behave in a manner that is indicative of women who deserve the help of white knights. Which means not choosing and sticking around with Joe Uppercut as the welts accumulate so a pussy itch can be satisfied. And it definitely means not having a kid with him.

Rihanna balked.