Pretenders frontwoman Chrissy Hynde has caused outrage with recent remarks blaming rape victims for being attacked if they are provocatively dressed or intoxicated.
“If I’m walking around in my underwear and I’m drunk … Who else’s fault can it be?… If I’m being very lairy and putting it about and being provocative, then you are enticing someone who’s already unhinged … that’s just common sense,” Hynde told the UK’s Sunday Times magazine.
To add a little context, the remarks come as Hynde, 63 has recently released her autobiography Reckless in which she details being sexually assaulted in Ohio in the US. Kidnapped by a motorcycle gang member who had promised to take her to a party, she was held in an abandoned house where she claims she was forced to perform sex acts on the biker and others, being threatened with physical violence if she didn’t do as she was told.
Rather than blame her attacker however, she takes “full responsibility” for the assault.
“Technically speaking, however you want to look at it, this was all my doing and I take full responsibility. You can’t f*** about with people, especially people who wear ‘I Heart Rape’ and ‘On Your Knees’ badges … those motorcycle gangs, that’s what they do… You can’t paint yourself into a corner and then say whose brush is this? You have to take responsibility. I mean, I was naive,” Hynde said.
Hynde went on in this manner, continually focusing blame for her assault on herself, and making more remarks implying women who dress or behave provocatively are responsible for being assaulted.
“You know if you don’t want to entice a rapist, don’t wear high heels so you can’t run from him,” she elaborated further and added, “if you’re wearing something that says ‘Come and f… me’, you’d better be good on your feet … I don’t think I’m saying anything controversial am I?”
But rape victims weren’t the only ones ripe to be painted in blame by Hynde, as she was quick to label any pop stars calling themselves feminists but who used their sex appeal to sell albums, as prostitutes. “Women who sell what their product is by using sex – that’s prostitution,” she was quoted as saying.
“A pop star who’s walking around, parading themselves as a porn star and saying they’re feminists. They’re prostitutes. I’m not making a value judgment on prostitutes, but just say what you are.”
When asked whether or not she thought the biker gang that assaulted her took advantage of her vulnerability, she responded with: “If you play with fire you get burnt. It’s not any secret, is it?”
Causing outrage among victim support charities, as well as online, with Twitter awash with commentary, Hynde has yet to make any statements regarding the furore.
https://twitter.com/jesshopp/status/638078806654386177
https://twitter.com/Anomaly100/status/637975745592184832?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/amazing_haynes/status/637954373985898496
Yikes, I love you Chrissy Hynde, but your comments are #rapeculture
— Nicole Connolly (@nicoleconnolly4) August 30, 2015
https://twitter.com/kaylasananjou/status/638133239530438656
https://twitter.com/bloodlust6669/status/638130303127715840
