Misogyny 101

[sheshe2]

Posted by Erin Nanasi on Friday, January 17, 2014

If you want to know what a misogynist is, listen to what Bob has to say

Misogyny, according to Merriam-Webster, is “a hatred of women.” That’s it. Nothing subtle, just a hatred of women. Unfortunately, the word is often applied in situations where it’s not really warranted. People may confuse chauvinism (“an attitude of superiority toward members of the opposite sex”) with misogyny, or simply not understand it means a person who hates, not just a person who thinks they’re better than someone else.

Learning the difference was important to me as a survivor of rape and domestic violence, because of how misogyny typically presents itself. The most frequent topic for misogynists is victim blaming, especially victims of sexual and/or domestic violence. We’ve seen examples of misogyny from conservative men and women, but I had never met anyone who claimed to be a liberal exhibit pure, unadulterated misogyny. Until this past week.

On Wednesday, my friend Christopher Warren posted an astonishing question to his Facebook page. He asked his friends who among us had ever been raped, and if we had reported it or not. What you have to understand is Chris does this a lot; he is a student of the world around him, and he often pushes his friends to think and react in a way they may not have before. Many friends responded truthfully, sometimes posting very short answers (like mine), others posting heartbreaking and powerful comments. It was an incredibly frightening thread, and yet, Chris made sure everyone participating felt safe.

My guess is, some time between the end of Wednesday’s conversation and Thursday morning, Chris realized the Facebook post may have triggered some unpleasant memories for the people who participated. Thursday, he shared another status, and began putting links to resources on his page. It was a very empathetic reaction to what might have been traumatic for someone on Wednesday. And it was on this post, the post thanking the people who answered so honestly, and pointing out that blaming or judging is never the right thing to do, that Bob appeared.

Bob’s first comment was “As insensitive as I know I sound, people that do not report an alleged sexual assault but whine and feel guilt about it 20 years later are very much part of the problem.” This rang warning bells not only in my head, but in the heads of other women on the thread. This sounded like misogyny. Was it? Or would Bob’s future comments clarify his language and choice of words (whine, alleged)?

more

http://quietmike.org/2014/01/17/misogyny-101/

[DURHAM D]

1. Yes

[Cha]

2. K^R for now.. thanks she..

[Triana]

3. "Misogyny is not just a casual belief, it is the support of violence against women."

Well said. Great article.

[bettyellen]

6. and knee jerk victim blaming is support of violence.

those people had a lot of guts to post about their experience. it is a shame someone had to shit all over it like that.

[bettyellen]

5. did you miss the part where he blamed the rape victims for being "part of the problem", shaming them

for speaking out? Or, do you think that is not misogynistic? Most people agree victim blaming is beyond the pale, but… you? What do you think of it?

[bettyellen]

10. "I still think that it is a stretch to go from "blaming and shaming rape victims" to "hatred of

women".

Blaming and shaming rape victims is hateful behavior, repulse to see it defended here.

Horrified.

And no, just because you complain about being paid too little, it doesn't give you rape victim status, even though it appears you'd like to believe that. Wow, that is a weird leap.

Horrified to read this crap here. Ick.

[bettyellen]

25. telling rape victims they are part of the problem is HATEFUL toward women. full stop.

no exceptions.

and making this about poor you and your crappy job? that's just bizarre and truly callous.

[sheshe2]

12. "And their "part of the problem" was perhaps the fact that "they didn't report it"."

Really?

Have you ever been raped, abused physically or verbally? Have you?

You have no clue what you are talking about. The shame and blame of the victim is overwhelming. They are the ones that are on trial, when they come forward. The perp, not so much. He was such a good boy!

The bells turned to tornado sirens as the conversation continued. Bob proceeded to blame the mother of the Steubenville rape victim for not wanting to subject her daughter to everything she knew would happen if they went public. He wrote “pfft” in regards to asking men to change; in other words, men rape, deal with it. Bob also blamed rape culture on “radical feminism in America.” And there it was. Feminism is toxic to a misogynist; women are horrible, and deserve to be treated as badly as possible.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

16. You are way out of line

[bettyellen]

20. he is on the side of victim blamers, has said it straight out.

incredible.

[sheshe2]

7. No contradiction.

Again, from Bob.

No one deserves to have their home broken into but we can help the situation by at least locking the door. There needs to be a respectable balance found between “victim blaming” and “just being a man” blaming.

It’s our fault, ladies, because we didn’t lock our vaginas. Welcome to Misogyny 101.

Stop blaming the victim.

[sheshe2]

22. so once again...

"15 year old girls should not go to parties and get drunk with 14 year old boys under no adult supervision".


you blame the girl. why is that?

[hfojvt]

24. maybe because

if my 15 year old daughter said to me "I'm going to a party at some boys house to get drunk and their parents are not home."

I'd say "the hell you are."

Doesn't mean I am cool with the boys. I'd like to beat the crap out of them. I don't really understand what is wrong with them. Are they really normal kids, or psychopaths?

[KitSileya]

28. I had a reply all typed out when the post was deleted

So if you don't mind, I'll apprehend it to yours, with modifications, of course.

"It’s our fault, ladies, because we didn’t lock our vaginas. Welcome to Misogyny 101."

Like his analogy was supposed to be taken literally. Instead of meaning something fairly sensible that most people would not disagree with like "15 year old girls should not go to parties and get drunk with 14 year old boys under no adult supervision".

Is that a bad thing to think? Is it anti-women?

What this is saying is that women should not get drunk in the presence of men, right? They talk about adult supervision, but in the Steubenville case, they did have adult supervision, only the coaches took the side of the boys, so adult supervision is no guarantee that a woman won't be raped if she gets drunk. And the age of the woman is really immaterial when we know that women from the ages of infant to 98 years old get raped. Women of pretty much any age can get drunk, and they do it in the presence of men of any age. Whenever you drink, you don't know with 100% certainty how the alcohol will affect you - if you're tired, if you haven eaten, if you don't drink often - so there's no guarantee that you won't get drunk from even one drink (and that's not getting into the chance that the drink will be doctored) so better not to drink at all. And parties aren't the only places where you drink, of course, and women are raped everywhere, but most often by men they know, so not going to parties will hardly keep those vaginas locked.

In other words: Women of any age should not go anywhere with men, nor ingest any liquids in the presence of men of any age, lest the men cannot help themselves and rape them - in which case it is the women's own fault for not keeping their vaginas locked."

What you are saying, hfojvt, is that guys, ooops, got to say some guys, cannot help themselves from raping women - and I challenge you then - isn't it more productive to instead focus on the gender who makes up the majority of rapists, rather than the victims. After all, we don't expect a potential robbery victim to give away all their belonging to make them secure. How about instead of limiting the movements and actions of women, we instead limit the movements and actions of the possible perpetrators? After all, according to RAINN, 50% of all rapes happened within a mile from the victim's home, and 1/3 of rapists had drunk alcohol - let's stop men from going to parties, and let's ban their alcohol consumption. It is only fair, don't you think?

[sheshe2]

30. Well said.

"isn't it more productive to instead focus on the gender who makes up the majority of rapists, rather than the victims."

It is indeed fair, and I thank KitSileya.

[KitSileya]

31. It's always revealing when they are willing to restrict the victims,

but not the perpetrators. Rich people aren't made to give away their riches to avoid being robbed. They're told not to "flaunt their wallets" and that is used as an analogy for rape, but when only 1 out of 12 rapes are 'jump out of the bushes' rapes, and only 1/3 are stranger rapes, women are never safe. They have to not "flaunt their wallets" everywhere - at home, with friends, at cafes, with their male friends, relatives, at work... Why should the onus be on the victims? Why not just cut straight through and say, that as long as 98% of all rapists are men, men have to bear that burden? Isn't that fairer. After all, the restrictions would hit more guilty people if put on men, than if they are put on women.

[Spider Jerusalem]

9. The author of this piece is wrong, sorry

misogyny - n. dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/misogyny

[bettyellen]

11. hate is shorthand for dislike and contempt, and she is right about the jerk flinging rape apologies

his behavior is contemptuous of women. even if he loves his mom, he appears to be a full blown misogynist.

[Spider Jerusalem]

13. She's wrong about the definition, not this person's misogyny.

[bettyellen]

19. Meh, perhaps only by degree…. they appear to be synonyms to me.

and it appears a few here do not recognize misogyny when it bites them on the ass.

[sheshe2]

14. Oh there is a hell of a lot of contempt

that Bob spewed.

And that is indeed ingrained prejudice against women.

[Major Nikon]

26. The author was quoting Merriam-Webster

mi·sog·y·ny
noun \mə-ˈsä-jə-nē\
Definition of MISOGYNY
: a hatred of women

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/misogyny

[redqueen]

27. +1

[Pretzel_Warrior]

15. Very good find. Expanding what is covered under "misogyny"

Does a disservice to accurate discussion about legitimate feelings of hatred and bitterness toward women.

[Bonobo]

17. Words do actually mean things. I like that.

It makes writing and speaking more effective.

[sheshe2]

18. Thanks for the support, Pretzel!

So good to see you back.

I love Quiet Mike, indeed there are some great articles there.This one was spectacular!

[redqueen]

29. She's wrong to try to minimize misogyny using dictionary definitions as if they were gospel.

Chauvinism is a manifestation of misogyny.

http://www.afr.com/p/national/macquarie_dictionary_has_last_word_NzrQFdWcPJG6G8qLRRiZtK