‘Women need to learn difference between sleaze and assault’: Greer

Germaine Greer says the current tactics for dealing with widespread sexual assault aren’t working and that women need to learn the difference between between sleaze and assault.

The Australian writer’s new book On Rape will be published later this year in response to the MeToo movement and the recent spate of public shaming against high-profile men accused of sexual assault.

In the book, Greer argues that centuries of writing and thinking about rape have “got us nowhere”.

“Again and again crime surveys tell us that one woman in five will experience sexual violence,” she writes.

“Despite all efforts to root sexual assault out of workplaces and colleges, predatory individuals still inflict lasting damage with apparent impunity. The only result of desperate attempts to apportion blame and enact chastisement has been an erosion of the civil rights of the accused.

“Sexual assault does not diminish; relations between the sexes do not improve; litigation balloons. There has to be a better way.”

Greer has been outspoken against the aspects of the MeToo movement, which she says is sometimes too quick to point the finger.

Last month she sparked outrage after calling some alleged victims of sexual assault “career rapees”.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4‘s Today programme, she said that while the MeToo and Time’s Up campaigns had highlighted some serious issues, we still need to “sort out our concept of what rape is”.

She went on to call some alleged victims of disgraced Hollywood executive Harvey Weinstein, who have accepted money for non-disclosure agreements, “career rapees”.

“Some of whom have been paid six figure sums in the form of non-disclosure agreements,” she said. “That’s a dishonourable thing to accept and it’s not something you should boast about.”

Calling for more to be done to stop sexual assault and ensure the correct punishments are delivered, Greer slammed the number of cases where there’s a “clear case of sexual assault, of rape” with no conviction at the end of a lengthy investigation.

She went on to address the recent Hollywood scandal in particular, and explained: “They’ve probably been sexualised before they were ever in the casting couch situation. Because that’s what we merchandise. We use it to sell everything that’s sold.

“A woman selling drinks in a half-lit bar in southern United States would tell me that she wore a bustier or fishnet tights because if she didn’t, she wouldn’t get any tips. This is capitalism, the objectification of human beings, this is our culture, our we going to change it?”

She added: “We are in such an odd situation at the moment. You cannot call people who have been subjected to sexual abuse victims, you have to call them survivors – as if it was the wreck of the Titanic, it’s a bit silly.”