""But by your own admission, if a man was driven to rape by your innocent provocative display you would be partially to blame. No?"

I don't behave provocatively, full stop, Mary. I do not dress provocatively, nor move provocatively"


The point is, one person's innocent dancing might be another's provocation. The point is, should you be held responsible for someone else misinterpreting your behaviour? Because, when a girl dresses in skimpy clothes just like all her mates do, maybe she's not setting out to be sexually provocative, either. You seem to be saying that, if a man decides she issexually available, it's her own fault and she deserves what she gets.

Lots of people do things that some people could interpret as taking really stupid, foolish risks. I knew a woman who met several men on the internet. Because one of the men lived very far away, she invited him to stay - incredibly, she actually had her children in the house when he came. Her friends told her what a stupid thing this was to do, but she insisted that it was okay because they "absolutely knew each other" as a result of their long correspondence. The man turned out to be some sort of predatory nutter, and a very bad situation involving her daughter was only narrowly avoided. Now, many people would think she had behaved incredibly stupidly. But surely no one would say she had provoked, or worse deserved, the outcome.

Would they?