Shut up and read, octopus, and you might learn something

As a response to Trump’s comments that were released Friday, ThelmaLou started the thread Women: share your stories of having your crotch grabbed (when you didn’t want it). And the first thing you, a man, post in a thread where women are describing times they’ve been sexually assaulted is a joke. Sure, you followed that up with “these stories are dismal reminders of how abuse of power and abuse of trust are far too common,” but even that showed you didn’t pay much attention to those stories. The majority of the stories in that thread were about encounters with complete strangers, not with people in positions of power or trust.

So you’re not actually paying attention to those stories? Of course you’re not - you’ve been posting up in the Elections trying to explain away Trump’s comments (oh, and making a couple of jokes about your wife’s pussy - classy). You clearly don’t take Trump’s words seriously, and your joke in ThelmaLou’s thread just drove that home.

There’s more to it, though. There’s a persistent vein of misogyny that runs through the SDMB, and it’s driven off more than a few posters that I like and respect. That sucks, and people have made it clear that it’s not just the posts that bothers them, but it’s the fact that it’s seen as not that big a deal. Your posts - especially the joke - are exactly the kind of thing that drives people away from this board. So if you wonder why I’m “trying to be a white knight for some women on the internet who you’ll never meet,” it’s because I don’t want more people to leave. You say you didn’t intend any offense, and I believe that, but I’d be genuinely surprised if nobody was offended.

So that’s the thing that has MY panties all twisted - oh hey, I’m less of a man because I’m wearing women’s underwear! Haha, that’s pretty funny. :rolleyes:

I’m sick of hearing that it’s “just locker room talk” and “all guys do it”.

No we don’t. A discrete subset of males who should be shunned/arrested do.
Fuck you.

ETA: even if these pigs do not have daughters, surely they have mothers, right?

This is a perfectly fine rant, and I don’t like a lot of what octopus has posted on this board.

However, the joke he posted in response to my comments was not, as far as I’m concerned, a good example of misogyny - it was harmless with respect to the “victim” in question (me), directly in response to the youtube video I posted, and was followed by a comment that acknowledged the seriousness of the abusive acts I described.

So please - carry on and identify/criticize his overall posting history all you want, just don’t think that his joke in response to my post is a big deal. It wasn’t.

Your criticisms are well-justified and I fully endorse them. What I do not see though is why people would be driven away from the board by misogynistic comments rather than taking issue with them. The majority of male Dopers are in no way misogynists and they really should not allow a small minority to spoil their enjoyment of the board.

I fear this represents an attitude becoming common in the country, represented by the opinion of many students that universities should be ‘safe places’ where they never hear any opinion that might offend them or any viewpoints with which they disagree. The truth is you should be exposed in university to many different opinions, even if they make you angry or upset. The same goes for this board. I shudder to think how boring the place would be were we all of the same opinion.

Whenever I’m in a locker room I’m trying to get out as quick as possible so I don’t have to watch old men drying their balls. Where are these locker rooms filled with in depth conversations?

For what little it may be worth, I’ve never heard this kind of talk in a locker room either. In my experience, most guys don’t tend to talk much at all in locker rooms, and when they do, it’s usually about mundane stuff like work, different kinds of exercises, going out at the weekend, stuff like that. Me personally, when I’m in a locker room all I care about is getting out as soon as possible.

I’ve seen Trump. If he’s ever waddled into a locker room, it’s been by accident.

I am in a men’s locker room 6-10 times per week and have been for a number of years (15’ish years and then less frequently the previous 15 years). In all that time, I’ve never heard anything like this. Maybe way back in high school did I hear some dumbshit (I think he had an octopus tattoo) in the locker room but since becoming an adult, no.

“Locker room” is shorthand for “anywhere two or more men interact with each other without the presence of women that would otherwise restrain their language or subject matter.” That’s what Trump means when he says he had locker room banter on that bus talking to Billy Bush. It’s a straight up admission that the unfiltered Donald tends to exert privilege and boorishness as male virtues. So when he claims “everybody knows that’s not who I am,” the reality is exactly opposite. This sort of unrestrained discussion shows us exactly who someone is.

That’s an absolutely fair outlook on your part CairoCarol and it’s clear you don’t need anyone to be offended on your behalf. May I describe how I’m offended, as an adult male trying my best to better myself along with the various male-dominated subcultures I inhabit?

First, although superficially supportive, octopus’ comment about ‘abuse of authority and abuse of trust’ applied to only one of the incidents you described in your post, and to only a portion of the other stories shared in that thread. This may seem minor, but it’s the precise sort of casual elision of detail which allows a misdiagnosis of ingrained and systemic social ills as simply individual behavior issues that should be handled reactively and procedurally. It’s an approach privileged groups take when they have to acknowledge that something happened but they’re resistant to the idea that there’s anything wrong with the system that has so far benefited their majority group.

Second, that approach sets up the ‘bad apples’ defense, which is the really offensive fuckery going on here. It’s the same thing in all of the BLM threads and in the “Controversial encounters…” thread; any and all abuse is the result of “bad” actors, and all the [sub]cultural norms that enable or abet the bad actions are hand waved away as non-influences, or necessary exigencies, or irrelevancies in any particular incident the defenders of status quo pretend is the true subject of discussion. Or sometimes those norms are just flat out denied.

You may not see any of this in octopus’ post, and it may all just be reflexive mistrust on my part. But that flippant misdirection looks and smells really familiar to me, and I wouldn’t step in it if I were you.

The tendency to overreact to imaginary slights and offenses in the long term is counterproductive.

Because there comes a point when it’s just not worth fighting. This place should be enjoyable. Having to fight the same battle over and over gets exhausting.

Maybe. I just think the tendency to underreact to sexual assault is a lot worse.

Good, I’m glad that didn’t bother you.

Ah. I guess it’s one of those transatlantic, “separated by a common language” type things. In England a locker room is…well, a locker room :slight_smile:

It’s one of those contextual distinctions. Sometimes a locker room is just a locker room. :wink:

Well, if he had said “drunken fratboy talk” he would have had a bunch of fraternity brothers all riled up against him; if he had said “barracks talk” he’d have pissed off military people; he needed a phrase.

Not just any phrase, the best phrase!

It’s a great phrase. Many people are saying, many many people.

There’s locker rooms and there’s locker rooms.

People here are talking about the locker room of their gym, where they have little connection to anyone else in the room and are mostly going about their business. That’s not what Trump is referring to. He’s referring to something more like the locker room of a sports team, where guys hang around a lot with other guys that they’ve bonded with over a long period of time and shared endeavors, and where - apparently - there’s a lot more trash talking and macho boasting than is the norm in other venues.

That said, I’ve never been in the latter sort of locker room, and what I wrote above is based on second-hand reports in the media and elsewhere. But my point here is that people extrapolating from their own experiences in public gym locker rooms are missing the point.

He never called it misogynist. He called it inappropriate. You may not think it was, but you aren’t the only person involved.

Enginerd was uncomfortable with his post, and thought it was inappropriate. He said that he was uncomfortable and was polite about it. octopus pulled the same dismissive response that he’s pulled here, so Engineerd called him out on it. Then octopus went on a rant and assumed it was about you, arguing against the very idea of defending other people.

Plus, the context is important. octopus posted in that thread making a joke, while at the same time constantly defending Trump for bragging about sexual assault using those same words. Even now, I think the only reason he even said anything was that your video gave him an opening for a joke. Any response about how rape is bad from a guy defending those comments seems insincere.

Even now octopus is incapable of understanding the situation. He can only be dismissive in a way that would result in a divorce if it was his wife.