@quillfire

Paul - 

I have been meaning to come and read this since Gina waved its tantalising title at me.  Alas, it's taken 7 days as I was preoccupied with a wedding fair over the weekend, complicated by the joys of loadshedding which has meant that for the last 7 days we have had at least 4, often more hours, without electricity.  I am now sorry I didn't get here sooner and I fear that my comment will not add to the rewards pool for this post.  Also, the comment belongs here, not somewhere else....

While your satire is not lost on me, and nor is your wholly appropriate incredulity at the some of the product of gender studies, I do need to weigh in on the issue of the high percentage of rape and sexual harrassment.  South Africa is a "rape capital" and the violence often perpetrated in the commission of rape makes it even more reprehensible.    I will not even go into the issue of "corrective" rape of lesbians.  Or the fact that such incidents have lead to the demise - in a township public and communal toilet (https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/khayelitsha-lgbti-community-on-edge-after-lesbian-taken-from-shack-shot-20161205) and a bit more here about the general situation (https://rapecrisis.org.za/about-rape/) and which is hardly general at all.

I am fortunate in that I have only a couple of times been on the receiving end of inappropriate sexual advances.  Once, as a young professional when, with a male colleage, we were in negotiation with a major bank for a sponsorship for a youth cricket competition.  The corporate representative came on to me by reaching under the table and rubbing my leg while all the time engaging with my colleague.  I cannot remember whether I told my colleage what had gone down  (ha!) I do know that because I did not respond "appropriately", we did not get the sponsorship.

There have been others, but one that sticks in my head was when I was still at university and it was not with a peer.  I was working as a housekeeper/receptionist/concierge - such as that could be in a small university town more than 30 years ago -  at one of the residences (dorms) during what has now become South Africa's National Festival of the Arts.  Our brief was to show visitors to their rooms, answer questions, deal with issues relating to their accommodation and to just generally be nice.  This "gentleman" representing one of the major sponsors (a major wine brand), one morning, after breakfast, followed me to my room and as I was about to go in, tried to force himself on me.  Fortunately I had not unlocked the door and he was much taller than I and I was able to duck under his arm and flee.  My male peers and some of the other guests literally closed ranks and that was that. I was rattled.  Still am as I write, but comforted and protected by a bunch of men apalled at that kind of conduct.

There is a third instance which, it took me years to work out:  my first sexual relationship - there were undertones of violence and had it not come to an end, when it did, I don't know where I'd be right now.  And that with a peer from the same uni.  Which, incidentally, has a student body that has lead the crusade against campus rape over the last 5 or so years.  It is most certainly an epidemic here.  And not in the pseudo fart rape way that diminishes the real issue.

I say again:  I am fortunate.  And I am talking 30+ years ago.

My sister-in-law was raped in her own home about five years ago.  She was, at the time, in her early 60s.  She was a virgin.  She is a devout Christian spinster.  The perpetrator, a serial rapist it was subsequently discovered, had cased her house, entered through the bathroom window and was waiting for her when she got home.  I will not go into the gory details except to say that the secondary trauma for those who support victims, especially their male relatives is can be likened to rape.  

Oh, and returning to my alma mater:  proportionately, it produces the highest number of Rhodes scholars of any South African university, so it is "up" there with the best.

So, having been a grinch, I am certain that with the sensibility she has from having a dad like you, Katie will more than hold her own.   After all, I am sure she has good instincts to which she should listen, and she knows how to coach a beau before "that" meeting.  More to the point, she is a young adult in a society where the males are more afraid of rape and sexual harrassment, or being accused of either, than their female counterparts are of rape.  Which you so elequently - as always - articulate.

Fiona

PS I did, also in my 20's happily play Isabelle to a Paul....and if not happily married, would probably do so again!