About the hostility toward threads about rape and violence against women

[BainsBane]

This whole business of a few members of this site taking posts about rape and domestic violence as personal attacks against themselves has got me thinking. A "brand new" member signed up just to tell me how offensive my posts about rape are since they amount of "post after post attacking men . . . day after day." He insisted they serve no purpose because I'm preaching to the choir, and they only antagonize people (meaning men who think like him).

There is much that is strange about that position, but two points come to mind. One, it assumes that all posts are created for men like him and reveals an inability to comprehend that women might want to talk to each other and our allies. What really strikes me, however, is why these individuals decide that posts about rape are directed at them and not posts about murder, robbery, and other crimes. Why do they not take the posts about congress or bankers as attacking men, when most of them are also male? They seem to see themselves reflected in OPs about rape, harassment, and domestic violence in ways they don't in threads about white collar crime, theft, ordinary assault, or murder. I wonder why that is?

[Squinch]

1. I have always been puzzled by this. The idea that they can't comprehend that women might want to

talk to each other about these things never occurred to me, but I think you have something there.

In some minds, it can't be us discussing things that occur to women with sickening frequency, it must have something to do with them, and therefore be aimed at them and insulting them.

I am choosing not to think that it is because they see too much of themselves in it. I don't want to go there. If that is naïve, I will remain willfully naïve.

But I can see the possibility of an infantile self-centeredness that doesn't consider any possibility other than that the posts must have to do with them, because everything must have to do with them, when of course the posts have nothing to do with them.

The other possibility is that, because something around 25% of women are assaulted in their lifetimes, and who knows how many men, we all must admit that there are quite a lot of men doing the assaulting. The complainers simply find themselves helpless in the face of that number, and don't want to be reminded of it. But that, again, puts us back into an infantile self-centeredness that places their discomfort over the legitimacy of others discussing a common and traumatic occurrence.

[BainsBane]

2. I have noticed some have a tendency to see all posts about them

I commented on reactions to the Indian PSA, and two members responded that I wasn't being fair, that they hadn't responded that way. No where did I say everyone or all men responded that way. I said a handful of men. Yet somehow they couldn't imagine that I wasn't talking about them.

Then the assertion that the threads "serve no purpose" but to "antagonize." There is just this weird conception that all that matters is them. Their reaction determines the worth of a thread, not the OPs and other women. I suppose it comes from imagining everything in life is for and about them. I've never felt that way about the world, and it has never been my experience. I simply don't view threads that way unless someone is calling me out or making some other sort of reference that reveals they are talking about me specifically.

[Squinch]

5. Another permutation of "entitlement."

[boston bean]

9. They still don't want us to post about feminist issues! They know already, god damnit!

That is why they are telling feminists what they can/cannot, should/should not discuss!

[A-Schwarzenegger]

3. Yeah, that one got their first hide.

Correction: going, going, gone.

[BainsBane]

4. Must have been the response to me I didn't read

I'd had enough of him. I'm pretty sure he was Blanket Statements.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

6. Except BS couldn't put two sentences together.

Here's an excerpt from his last post:

"Some women claim that a drunk woman can't give consent.... The lack of a no implies consent."

[BainsBane]

7. Obviously that is rape

The law makes that clear. That comment proves his previous posts to be false.

[boston bean]

11. He really didn't know a thing about rape and certainly needs some education! LOL

You can't make this crap up! It's astounding!

[KitSileya]

13. That's horribly similar to the poster I was horrified didn't get a hide.

"Giving females alcohol is often statutory rape but if females are aware of the debilitating possible effects of alcohol on their willpower and desire those consequences which in some cases they may, it is again hard to call it rape in a courtroom. Neither pressuring, nor guilting, nor causing a female to be inebriated constitutes violent sex and certainly not rape."

I wasn't so much horrified at what the poster said, as that it didn't get a hide. The poster isn't tombstoned either.

[boston bean]

14. can you pm me a link! my jaw is on the floor.

[Squinch]

15. That is nauseating.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

20. who said that? PM me, please. Thanks. n/t

[boston bean]

8. Did you read that dudes last response,

about consent and that if one doesn't say no, it is consent?

He was a troll of the highest magnitude, but a returning one who obviously was on DU for quite some time to know the history he relayed throughout his posts.

[BainsBane]

10. No, I didn't

but from what A-Schwartnegger said, his earlier point about already knowing what rape was and being the choir was bullshit. I think other parts of the posts I read were made up as well.

[JustAnotherGen]

28. And pretended to be a black man too

With a reference to Nubian something or another. Thank God BB schooled him or all hell would have broken loose in the AA group today. That type always has their targets well laid out and go after the exact same groups.

[ismnotwasm]

12. I'm sick of the pervry bastids

Especially the ones married to "strong wonderful women" or "I have daughters" like that means a motherfucking thing, other than it's a lie.

Riiight.

[ScreamingMeemie]

16. I think that recent one was the return of fitman from a month or so ago.

Sounded just like him

[BainsBane]

17. Except fitman is obsessed with Seabeyond

And he has the annoying habit of commenting on whether he would want particular members as his wife.

[CTyankee]

22. I have ahard time believing that those remarks are true. My guess is that the men saying that are

probably lonely guys and they're alone for good reason...

[redqueen]

18. We need more discussion of these issues, that much is obvious.

Based on some recent exchanges it's clear some people are just not getting it. Someone recently compared being teased by school kids to sexual harassment. I was teased in school. I was also sexually harassed in school. They are two very different things.

There have also been way too many posts implying that sexual harassment is complimentary. If an individual likes strangers commenting on their anatomy, that's their business. It doesn't make it actually complimentary (it's not) and it doesn't mean it's acceptable behavior.

[Squinch]

19. And the position being taken - "YES! We totally agree, already! Now stop flame-baiting and

insulting us by stating these things that we totally agree with!" - isn't really that convincing.

[xulamaude]

21. Sure are a lot of views on this post...

All I have to say is that if I were a member of the class of people who are responsible for the vast majority of rape (arguably well above 90%...) I probably wouldn't want to hear about it either.

[ismnotwasm]

23. They're not right in the head

Not stupid, in many cases, but psychologically disturbed. I know they like to run around and accuse feminists of the same thing; but feminism, as we've pointed out many times before is a valid and powerful political and philosophical voice for positive change. The nut job fringe yaps like my little dog-- very annoying, but at least my dog has redeeming qualities.

[whopis01]

24. What class of people are you referring to there?

Because as a man, I have to say that hearing about this doesn't upset me in the least. Or more correctly I should say that I don't feel targeted, unjustly accused, or personally attacked by such posts. In my view, they are targeted at those who rape, who would rape in the right circumstances, who condone rape, who feel determination of consent is up to someone other than the woman, etc. I know that I am not one of those - so I don't feel that such posts are accusing or targeting me of anything.

[xulamaude]

25. By "class", of course

I mean men/males.

I am indeed glad that you do not feel upset by posts about rape/rape culture/rape awareness.

And I agree with you that it is most likely those "who rape, who would rape in the right circumstances, who condone rape, who feel determination of consent is up to someone other than the woman, etc." who are upset and who would rather not hear about it.

Sometimes it's just better when another man says it straight up like you did, as opposed to a woman like me.

Seriously.

[whopis01]

29. More men should speak up about it

I believe that it is a fairly small percentage of us who actively cause the problem but far too many that stand idly by.

[Squinch]

26. Yes, but YOU are responding the way a sane, adult person would respond...

... I'll say no more...

[JustAnotherGen]

27. I logged off because

I had people coming today and had to cook. So just seeing this now. I saw that newbie - and responded once - and he was booted by my second post.

All fair points in this thread BB. All fair points and good questions.

Just adding that the point of view is awfully self centered and self absorbed isn't it? I can't imagine being stuck(married) to that. Yuck!

[intaglio]

30. I sometimes have the feeling that sometimes the hostility is justification

Some men are concerned they have acted without explicit consent on one or two occasions and have to feel that it was OK so they say "...but not saying no means yes"

[BainsBane]

31. In the case of the banned troll mentioned above

that would appear to be true. Based on what others have said about his hidden post (that I myself never saw), he essentially claimed that drunk women who don't say anything (or can't say anything), consent. If they can't say no, they consent, in the mind of that troll. Clearly that is rape.

[nomorenomore08]

33. Or there's the "you hate sex"/"you think all sex is rape" strawman, which seems to be partly based

on the fact that, IRL, the line between consent/non-consent is sometimes blurrier than it should be. Which is why I'm of the "when in doubt, ask her" school of thought. Although in most cases that's not even necessary, because it's fairly obvious when a woman does or doesn't want sex. Yet some people, for reasons of their own, insist upon blurring the lines.

[ismnotwasm]

32. There is also the unreasoning denial of rape culture

Once you understand what it is and what it means, any man is going to understand that we have a societal problem, that enables sick rapists to act within what's basically considered 'a norm'

In other words, people get raped, 'it's just the way things are'. So protect yourself Carry mace. Walk in groups. Don't get drunk..blah blah blah. None of this is bad advice, it simply sidesteps the issue and encourages victim blaming.

Use similar arguments on a different topic--war for instance, and you'll completely different responses.

[nomorenomore08]

35. "If they don't want to get bombed, then they should move to a different country!"

Or, a la Sam Kinison: "If they don't want to starve to death they should move where the food is!"

As I'm sure the MRA/"reverse racism" types would be quick to remind us, an accident of birth should not be conflated with a moral failing. But I guess that only applies to well-off white males - whereas blaming an inner-city gunshot victim for being born black and poor, or blaming a rape victim for being born female, is evidently just fine.

[nomorenomore08]

34. As always, I ask myself *why* they insist upon taking things so personally.

It may be simple self-centeredness, or there may be a guilty-conscience aspect somewhere in there.

[KitSileya]

36. I just want to know where they take this "all men are potential rapists" crap from.

Oh, I know where - they're deliberately twisting the words of Schrødinger's rapist, where women correctly say that they don't know which of the men that approach them are rapists, so many keep that fact in the back of their minds when they do meet men that any of them can be a potential rapist. However, so many of them, even reasonable people otherwise, drag out the canard and make it mean that every man has the potential in him to be a rapist, and then they use it to claim that some (read pretty much all) feminists hate men.

And let me tarnish my reputation on this site even further, and give them more ammo (sorry, fellow feminists) - all men and women have the potential in them to be rapists the way all humans have the potential in them to kill someone. Heck, even toddlers have killed people - before the gun ban in GD we'd see news reports of kids and toddlers shooting and killing others accidentally all the time. Sometimes all it takes to be a rapist is lack of communication - you think your partner is a-ok with having sex, but they are unable to consent, or unwilling to refuse consent because they are scared, or feel guilted into it, or pressured - and you assume, and don't ask. Doesn't mean that every time you didn't ask, you raped someone, but how would you know? You didn't ask and they didn't say. A lot of what they do use as ammo against us comes from us trying to explain these nuances, and them twisting it completely into anti-men, anti-womenwhodon'tagreewithus propaganda.