Misogyny 101

[ismnotwasm]

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)?

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.

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


Wow does this sound familiar...

[Deep13]

1. ugh.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

2. that was a great read, thanks.

The comments were excellent too. I like this Quiet Mike.

[Warpy]

3. It's also impossible to tell those guys what they are and what they're doing

Some people just have zero empathy and zero insight as well as zero knowledge of the system. You can't tell them about any of it because they think they know it all.

[cinnabonbon]

4. Super familiar :(

[Squinch]

5. It is stunning to me that there is a subset of men who are determined to blame women for problems

that obviously originate with men.

Someone is raped by a man? It's a woman's fault. A culture of vilification that drives rape victims to suicide (men, women, boys AND girls)? That no excuse not to report your rape.

A man feels emasculated because the number of his unearned advantages are becoming fewer and fewer? It's the fault of women, not the fault of the men who assumed those unearned advantages belonged to them in the first place. And not the fault of the men who judge each other's worth on the basis of how much power each has over other people.

An advertising industry (dominated by men) develops a system that portrays men as inept in order to make that group of women whose only intellectual outlet is being "CEO of the house" feel that being "CEO of the house" is a worthwhile pursuit? It's the fault of the women who have nothing to do with the creation of the advertising message aimed at them.

Feminists aren't working hard enough to improve the life expectancy of men? (And don't mention the fact that there are no male-originated organizations or efforts working on this problem.) That means feminists aren't doing feminism right.

All of this points one way to me. There was a serious problem among women, in how they treated themselves and other women, that needed addressing, and women created feminism to address that problem.

Now it is clear that there is a serious problem among men, in how they treat themselves and other men, that needs addressing. When in hell are men going to begin a movement to address these problems of the awful messages men give themselves and each other?

I often see comments about how feminists aren't for equality. They usually boil down to men expecting women to find the solutions for the behavior of men who behave badly, and belittling women when that doesn't happen. It's time that a men's movement arose to take responsibility for the bad messages that men give themselves and to each other.

[redqueen]

7. Men like Jackson Katz are trying. But they are facing incredible pushback.

Mostly from other men, naturally.

[cinnabonbon]

9. this honestly baffled me when I see it:

Someone is raped by a man? It's a woman's fault. A culture of vilification that drives rape victims to suicide (men, women, boys AND girls)? That no excuse not to report your rape.

And seeing it said earnestly is even worse.

And don't get me started on the men that goes "well, what has women done to, for example, stop male circumcision?!" Make campaigns to stop it yourself, you lazy ass! There's no one stopping you.

[redqueen]

10. And when I have tried to raise awareness of how damaging and unnecessary circumcision is?

It's mostly women backing me up. And both men and women laughing it off as if it was a big joke.

[cinnabonbon]

11. I know! I've noticed the very same thing.

Because circ is damaging, so I did some reading up on it. And what do you know, feminists got why it was a bad thing and other didn't. I'd love to see men take charge of this and be the voice against circ, but I haven't seen that much of it so far.

So when it's brought up in a conversation about feminism, I start to wonder if it's a derailing tactic instead of an honest question.

[redqueen]

12. I just assume it's a derailing tactic.

Unless the derailer can point to discussions they've started in the effort to raise awareness of how harmful and unnecessary it is... well, there's your answer.

It's really frustrating how many men seem to think feminists are being mean by not taking up arms in whatever issue they've picked to care about. As if fighting gender norms is being mean to men and not caring about boys and men. Women started working on domestic violence and instead of doing the same, many men whine that women haven't done enough for male victims. What's stopping them from getting involved themselves? Makes me wonder if they weren't raised in a patriarchal household in which any time they whined, mommy came and fixed it.

[Squinch]

13. ^That. That's what always comes to mind.

Mommy isn't fixing their problem, and therefore they are enraged that mommy isn't being impartial to her boy and girl children.

Where are junior's own responsibility and voice in these matters, other than to rail at mommy?

[redqueen]

14. For some reason this video came to mind.

http://vimeo.com/64941331

[Squinch]

15. Exactly!

[Tuesday Afternoon]

6. ugh.

Bob, you sound hideous. I hope your words echo into your brain for eternity.

[redqueen]

8. I don't like that she labels chauvinism as separate from misogyny.

Chauvinism is a manifestation of misogyny. She's making the mistake that many do when they only see people shouting racial epithets as racist, but want to find a kinder, gentler label for the ideas that promote racial stereotypes. It's all racism.

Overall a good piece. I hope she realizes that misogyny is far more widespread than she thinks.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

16. I was wondering about that, too. Thank you for explaining chauvinism/misoygny.

You could expand on it further. An OP = would be a good subject/topic.

Chauvinism is a manifestation of misogyny.

[ismnotwasm]

17. I agree

It seems as though her point was that the word is over used, but doesn't address clearly enough that have a systemic problem of misogyny that has nothing to do with how much you love your wife or how many women friends a male individual has.