Concern is not ‘victim-blaming’

I regard myself as a liberal person, who believes consenting adults have the right to do whatever they want with other consenting adults.

Having said this, I have some sympathy for George Hook this week. While I can understand the reaction to some degree to what Hook said, I feel that there was a valid point lost, mostly due to Hook’s poor choice of words and the fact that he was talking about an actual case, with a real-life victim, who deserves nothing but our sympathy.

But I’d like to create a hypothetical scenario, which I think portrays what Hook was trying to get at.

Let’s pretend that I have an 18-yearold daughter, she goes on a night out in town, gets drunk, meets a guy she likes, gets more drunk, heads back to his house with himself and his friend. She passes out while there.

A few hours later, she wakes up, she hasn’t a clue where she is, doesn’t know who the lads in the house are, can’t remember meeting them. Can’t remember anything from the night before. She happens to be fully dressed, she hasn’t been touched or harmed in any way. It turns out the lads in the house are ordinary decent lads – they threw a blanket over her and let her sleep in peace. Like most lads would, and every lad should. There is no victim.

She arrives home and tells me the story. I’m furious with her, even though nothing actually happened. I give her a severe telling-off, tell her what she did was dangerous, that anything could have happened to her; that she left herself vulnerable and behaved irresponsibly. I tell her she needs to be more careful in future because next time things might not end so innocently.

I say all of this because I worry about my daughter, I care about her and because I want to make sure she protects herself as much as possible.

Had the story gone the other way and something dreadful happened, of course, I wouldn’t give out to her or get angry. I’d be distraught for my daughter, try my best to console her, do my utmost to help my her recover and ensure the perpetrators saw justice.

Her actions would have been the very same in both incidents, only the outcome would have changed my reaction.

Does this make me a misogynist? Am I a victim-blamer? I don’t think so. I think it would make me a concerned, decent parent, who is aware of the dangers in this world.

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