Don’t mean to go tit for tat but here Warning…very disturbing.
The thing is you (a man) being touched by a woman when you didn’t want to be touched is really not a straight comparison to what a woman experiences when she’s touched by a man that she doesn’t want touching her. On average men do have more muscle strength than women. A more appropriate comparision to gauge the woman’s reaction would be to consider how you would feel if another man one who was physically capable of overpowering and restraining you, were to touch you in a manner indicating he wanted to have sex with you. Chances are your reaction at least emotionally would not just be I told them “no”, and that was it.
(my reaction would be the same)
I hadn’t seen that one, and it is rather disturbing.
I’ve got a couple others (not for insurance, though) that I think portray men very poorly, but that would be a bit of a hijack. My point was just that anybody can probably find something in the media to be insulted by. I don’t think the issue is simple, or one-sided.
I found that the best way to deal with feminists is to agree with them: the vast majority because they’re right and the crazy minority because you don’t argue with the Crazy.
There are different levels of Feminism. And frankly, some levels are a little extreme in my opinion. You can google for the the PIV type websites. These Feminists believe that any and every time a man inserts his penis into a woman’s vagina (ergo, PIV), the woman is being raped.
While personally, I’m generally in the “You really can’t tell how the shoe pinches someone else’s foot” school, I think this PIV stuff is really going overboard.
Feminism is fragmented. Yes, it means something. Generally it means people for the advancement of women’s rights. This does not always mean equal rights. Some self-described feminists legitimately hate men and want some Matriarchy, but you’ll find absolute whackos in any movement. The vast majority just want equal rights.
Rape Culture itself is a bit of a wishy-washy concept. You’ll fairly easily find definitions under the headline “this is what rape culture is”, but you’ll note that they range from the sensible (“victim blaming”, “prison rape jokes”, “people convincing women not to report their rapist”) to totally insane (“any portrayal of heterosexual couples is rape culture”), and everywhere in between.
“Feminist” isn’t meaningless, but unfortunately I can understand the people who don’t want to be called a feminist. I went through that phase at one point because of all the inane bickering. Everyone is a catastrophe for feminism, if you’re not sex-positive/negative you secretly hate women. Buffy is the most sexist claptrap ever written unless it’s the most feminist work ever and if you disagree with me you are PART OF THE PROBLEM ASSHOLE. Meghan McCarthy gives a pretty awesome, and somewhat funny takedown of the loud, inflammatory “Twitter Feminism” that’s giving Feminism a bad name here.
I really hate to keep posting this, but RAINN disagrees with you:
https://rainn.org/images/03-2014/WH-Task-Force-RAINN-Recommendations.pdf
The thing to point out is that they don’t think it’s as effective in isolation, but in that article they do claim that evidence says that risk-reduction messaging is effective, but must be done with care to avoid victim blaming.
However, this is from the mouths of trained professionals; random friends, neighbors, lawyers, cops, bloggers, and message board posters probably aren’t the best people to be giving “risk-reduction” messaging because they’ll likely completely fuck it up if not descend into victim blaming.
In fact 100% of their messaging focuses on non-rapists. Their messaging focuses on
- Educating people how to respond to a rape, should one happen
- Clarifying the laws and procedures, making it easy to respond to rape, should one happen.
- Educating good men and women on how to be vigilant and prevent other people from being raped.
They find that it’s hard to get rapists not to rape, but it’s easy to get non-rapist non-victim bystanders to prevent the rapists from committing rapes.
Based on all of what they say, it sounds pretty reasonable. Maybe I’m wrong on that point, though I see that they agree with me on how to make such a message.
By the way, what’s with the “keep posting this”? This is your first post in this thread.
I’m glad I made a thread on this. I have to say that what learned about Rape Culture, before I started this thread, was really mean and drastic. The word “Rape” is scary to me, as I have had a bad experience once with an ex girlfriend. We were getting high and it was her first time, she got super paranoid, and thought I was trying to take advantage of her by getting her inebriated, (I was not thinking about sex at all that night and she now knows that).
I think the word “rape” can scare a lot of men. Even good men.
But anyway, I agree with what It’s about from everything I’ve heard. It’s not easy for men, even with other men, to not feel like there’s a suspicion about your intentions. At least for me and a few other guys I’ve talked to about it. How you’re dressed and the color of your skin I’m sure there’s a factor.
I hate the feeling.
I do admit that “sexist” jokes are funny, on either side of the spectrum. We are generally different, and it’s fun to laugh at, even if it’s a generalized difference.
Of course, it has to be really funny too.
This thread is offensive. Wait until my tumblr readers hear about this.
Modern internet feminism is a multi-faceted environment with wide ranging opinions. Intra-feminist trainwreck arguments make Pit threads look like snuggle parties. Man, womenfolk and their hysterical emotions, am I right guys? High five!
As for anti-feminists, they definitely exist. Feminists are often accused of lacking a sense of humor, which is pretty accurate…but if there’s anyone with even less joviality it’s the MRA types. They are wound up* tight*. A lot of people think they have good points about child custody cases, although it seemingly goes against each side’s ideology half the time. Should mothers generally raise the kids even if they kinda suck at it or not? Figure out your gender essentialism and evolutionary psychology just so stories, people.
Regarding rape culture, everyone knows that rape is wrong. But there are also these ideas that are common in our culture:
[ul]
[li]That all men constantly want sex[/li][li]That something is actually wrong with a man if he doesn’t constantly want sex[/li][li]That women don’t want to have sex as much as men do (or at the very least good women don’t want sex as much as men do)[/li][li]Therefore a man might need to persuade or pressure a women into having sex[/li][li]No means no, but as long as she’s not actively saying no it’s okay[/li][li]Women like to play hard to get, so just keep pestering her and you might turn a no into a yes[/li][/ul]
It seems that right now that young women, teen girls especially, are bombarded with messages about what to do and not to do, and the whole world is a minefield and dangerous for you so it’s your fault if you venture out there. What I’d like is for men and women to be taught that it’s okay to want sex, or to not want sex, and how to navigate consent.
Women are constantly monitored about how they dress, teenage girls especially. The message for teenage girls isn’t usually the explicit “dress modestly or you will get raped.” But fairly often it is stated something like “dress modestly so that you don’t distract the teenage boys, or tempt them into having impure thoughts.” So the thought behind that is that boys can’t control their thoughts, so it’s up to women to not tempt them into lust. So it follows if it’s the girl’s fault for tempting the boy into bad thoughts, isn’t it also a little bit her fault for tempting him into bad actions?
Hmm. I think men’s voices should be heard. For numerous reasons. But I think the goal should be the same, and totally not conflict with most types of feminists. To say a group off people who might be a little nutty, doesn’t mean men don’t have obstacle’s, (not just legal, but social), to face.
Don’t men also generally get much harsher penalty in cases? Just asking if that’s true.
I was told by a feminist friend of mine to check out books by; R.W. Connell, Michael Kimmel, William Pollack, Jackson Katz, or Terrence Real.
She said there’s a documentary out there call “Tough Guise” that I might like, and a new movie coming called “MissRepresentation”.
I understand women’s needs take priority, but I think we should understand men, of all types, how society absorbs them, and recognizing that men have separate issues to face. They will probably be better people for it.
That’s not really what the MRAs are all about. They’re basically a bunch of sexist jackasses who don’t like the fact that men no longer have special priviledges anymore.
As far as I’m concerned, Feminism also covers being opposed to the shitty way that men are treated by society. It’s not as bad as how women are treated, overall, but it’s definitely not awesome.
There are people who disagree with me about this - they argue that feminism is about women, and that they only care about addressing the problems of women. I thought for a while about letting those people have the term ‘feminist’, and calling myself something else. After all, I’m a man - should I really get to define feminism? After a lot of careful thought, I’ve decided that, yes, I’m ok with saying that those people are wrong, that feminism is about fighting all the crappy ways that society treats people as a result of their gender, and that they’re still wrong even if they come from a less privileged background than I do.
It’s my opinion that men do have issues, but most of them stem from traditional gender roles. Men get custody less, and are less trusted around children, and traditional gender roles say women should be the primary caretaker for children. Male rape and domestic abuse victims have a hard time getting taken seriously, and traditional gender roles say women are weaker than men and aren’t aggressive. Emotional men are looked down on, and traditional gender roles say emotions are feminine.
The problem with the MRM is that it it hyper-focused on the last 10% and some non-issues that it can blame on feminism. There isn’t an epidemic of fake rape accusations or women impregnating themselves out of used condoms for child support money.
Being a sensitive dude myself, I don’t think certain “traditional ‘man’ traits” should be discouraged, either. I don’t possess many of these traits, but I’m sure they have value. If someone, (women included), identified with that type of personality… Just as long as they respect everyone.
I’ve posted it 3 or 4 times on this board, I think once may have even been in response to you. Not a big deal, just didn’t want to sound like a broken record for bringing up that paper so much to anyone who may have noticed that I’ve done it before.
Feminists also have a lot of different focuses. And what matters to one woman who calls herself a feminist, might not even be on the radar of another woman. And they may even disagree (reproductive rights is one where not all feminists agree). One might be really passionate about rape - another about the plight of women in the Middle East. Another on making sure daycare is available and affordable. One may think that any woman who dresses attractively is betraying the sisterhood and catering to men, another might make adult film as a form of expression of her sexuality and power.
Feminists include a wide range of people - and anytime you have a wide range of people, you won’t find many things ALL of them have in common. In the case of feminists, about the only thing you’ll find in common is the belief that women deserve to be treated with respect and dignity - and not less on account of their gender. What that means - even defining what a woman is - may be open for debate.
The MRM isn’t about respecting everyone. The keep claiming that feminism oppresses men.
(Granted, the cite is somewhat biased. It does, however, outline their claims accurately)