Ferthaloveagod. I note you rather selectively snipped out the part where nyctea went on to say who she felt deserved to get their ass beat. I believe rapists were mentioned. Bolding mine, because you seem to think this translates as “Good thing she kicked the shit out of him.” It doesn’t. It translates as: “people who have been emotionally abused will sometimes snap and do something out of the norm, possibly dangerous when they feel backed into a corner, as torie did.” Which is absolutely true.
Says you. Do you know him personally? She says he is. Can you PROVE he isn’t? Just because she hasn’t offered up enough to back up that assertion does not make it less true. One year of being belittled and emotionally abused, over and over, every single day, would fill up a lot of diaries. Not to mention that emotional abuse goes further than just a comment here and there. It’s very subtle, and a lot of things play into it. Body language, tone of voice, facial expression; all kinds of things that do not come accross well in a written post. And because it’s hard to
prove, it’s often dismissed unless it’s blatant. But usually, by the time it’s blatant, it’s moved on to physical abuse as well.
Before I leave, here is the response you all felt Sol deserved. In spite of the accusation, this is not an attempt for a last word.
If your definition of “spew all the hateful shit you want. . . “ is this, and it is the ENTIRE post, instead of the C&P job that has been posted here:
Written by me -
*“Switch the gender of the OP and her ex.
How many doper women would be lining up to flirt?
There are so many pathetic things in this thread, it hurts my head to even begin to start pointing them out.”*
Then we are going to have to disagree. I didn’t “spew all the hateful shit I wanted” in that thread at all. Why do you think I stared a Pit thread?
Go read the things you wrote in this thread? What makes me different from you? I am seriously asking you for your answer.
Again with the “cronies” comment. Can I not post my own personal opinion and have others agree with me without being accused of having a posse or cronies? I mean, WTF? Do you really think I gathered them up like the Calvary?
I don’t think I missed the tone of the original thread at all. It may be different from the tone you got, but what I got out of it, is the fact that a person committed an abuse, asked for flirts, and a few men busted hump to give it to her. I personally find that disturbing and disgusting. You don’t feel the same? :::shrug::: opinions and all. . . .
Here is where you obviously aren’t getting the difference I see.
I am not confusing the words “support” and “nice” with the word “flirt”, like some of you. I have NEVER stated that she does not deserve support, nor have I ever said that people shouldn’t be nice to her. The only thing that I find appalling is that she did something despicable (even she agrees) then came looking on the SDMB for flirts AND the fact that a few people offered them to her. You see it as harmless support, I see it as endorsing violent behavior. It bothered me even more to see people offering up justification for her behavior – he deserved it. She is “just a girl” so it didn’t hurt.
THAT is the shit that pissed me off from the get-go.
The claim that I was against giving this girl any kindness or support is a creation of nyctea and a few others. Now do you see the frustration I feel when I am forced to defend something I did not say or do?
You want to flame me for my thoughts on the flirting? Fine, I will defend them. You want to flame me with accusations that I said she shouldn’t be supported and doesn’t deserve our kindness? Then we have a problem bud, because I have NEVER said that.
It’s getting to be Goddamn frustrating.
No, but when you coddle someone who has just admitted violence and honor their request for flirting with giggles and smilie face hearts and other “harmless stuff”, you are indirectly endorsing their behavior. Why not offer your support and wish her well on her therapy? Violence is a serious matter that IMNSHO is lessened by some of the flirty, giggly responses in that thread.
When someone presses the submit button, they have opened themselves up to compliments and criticism. If they don’t want to accept each and every response that comes their way, they should consider what they are willing to put out there.
First of all, let’s get something out here right now. I work in the mental health field and have for MANY years. I am very good at what I do, so don’t presume anything about my “empathy” or how I interpret something. I saw a person who came onto a message board, spilled her guts about her horrible situation, then followed it up with “flirt with me”. That in itself was disturbing but would not have gotten my response in that thread nor a Pit Thread. What pushed me over was the responses by the men in that thread who, in spite of everything they just read) took the opportunity to jump on the chance to flirt. My Pit thread was actually geared more to those men than to Torie.
As I have said a half million times, switch gender roles, would a man have gotten the same flirty responses? Why or why not? Is this okay to you?
You know, this would be an easier pill to swallow had you not posted that vile shit yourself. It makes you look like a hypocrite. Are you allowed to post hateful shit when you are pissed but I am the dregs of humanity when I do? Where is the difference? I was pissed and disgusted with the topic of my OP, you were pissed and disgusted with the things I said. Why are you allowed to write hateful things but I am not? Please explain.
YET AGAIN – There truly is a difference between “support” and “kindness” compared to “flirting”. This is the major barrier you don’t seem to be getting over in your anger towards me. I totally agree that she needs her friends and the support they offer, this however, has NOTHING to do with the reason behind my OP. Can you not see that?
No, I’ll tell YOU what. I have run across a few male abuse victims in my own line of work. Let me give you their abusers phone number so you can call and flirt.
If you want to debate the concept of domestic violence and how we should treat the abusers, here I am. You want to toss in untrue accusations of things I supposedly said (unworthy of support/nice, etc.) then I don’t have the time or the desire to keep correcting your mistakes and misinterpretations.
First, let me say that I know nothing about Torie, her situation, or her (former) relationship. What I am about to say is a general statement and has nothing to do specifically with her.
There is a tendency in contemporary American society to equate someone’s causing you pain or even a loss of self-confidence with mental or emotional abuse. Similarly, there is a tendency to equate feeling bad with being a victim, probably of malice and/or negligence.
This tendency is so strong that we actually have Maureen demanding that it be proven that Torie’s ex-boyfriend is not an abuser; the presumption is that Torie feels bad, therefore she must have been abused.
I have not the faintest idea whether or not Torie was abused, and it’s not relevant to my point, anyway. My point is, anyone on this board (and probably most other boards, although this is the only one I’m familiar with) who asks for sympathy is going to get a huge outpouring, not only of sympathy, but of repeated staements of how wonderful they are. I would, however, like to point out that the fact that someone is in pain does not make them either a saint or a victim. Again, this is not saying anything one way or another about Torie; I am making a general point.
Personally, I would find such “sympathy”, “support”, and “love” to be utterly worthless; it is offered utterly uncritically and automatically, and therefore would have pretty much no comfort value whatsoever for me, as it would have little or nothing to do with me as an individual. However, obviously YMMV.
But some of you guys are jumping down Diane et al’s throat for, among other things pointing out that being unhappy does not necessarily equal victimhood, and that victimhood does not necessarily equal virtue. Some of you have torn her a new asshole for “Not Being Supportive.” Well, I call bullshit on that. An output of glurge on demand is not real support, and may in fact mask important points that could actually be of use to the person in pain, instead of encouraging that person to feel like a victim and/or feel an illusory sense of virtue. Not offering automatic “You’re a wonderful person and s/he is an asshole and you deserve better” is not not being supportive, and is hardly being Mean and Cruel (which several of you accused Diane of being.)
Diane, you on the other hand, missed the point of the flirtation in the original thread. Those people weren’t coming on to Torie; they were being what our society has now deemed to be “nice.” We have reached a point where anything short of lavish praise is considered to be un-nice.
Now everybody get a grip. Nobody here is trying to victimize anyone. Diane thought indiscriminate lust was driving people to ignore brutality. It wasn’t - they were being nice and supportive. Diane’s critics think she’s being vicious and attacking Torie. She isn’t - she just doesn’t buy into contemporary notion of supportive behavor.
<nitpick> No. I am saying this: torie said her SO was emotionally abusive to her every day that they were together. To me, that constitutes pattern of abuse. We do not have his side to make a balanced decision on. However, A Monkey With A Gun is flat out saying “he is NOT an emotional abuser.” I don’t feel we have enough to go on to make that kind of blanket statement. And, unless that poster can come up with torie’s ex-SO’s perspective on this, then there’s no evidence to the contrary. <end nitpick>
Otherwise, yes, I agree. There is a huge tendency for people to point and say “abuse!”
I get what you are trying to say but Diane was still on the attack from the start. Why else do you start a Pit thread if not to hit out at someone? She accused me and every other “supporter” of torie of being disgusting, pathetic creeps, and through that she made torie out to be a woman who would beats her BF into a bloody pulp and gets off on it.
She may have had no intention of giving us that impression but that is her reasoning behind this pitting, that impressions are everything and one should except a flaming from it. She should be exempt from the same treatment.
You don’t deserve to take the high road, Diane. I’m willing to admit now that you may have not wanted to give the impression of torie as a vile abuser and us as her sick perverted followers but you did, just as other “supporters” have admit faults in their defence. You still have not shown any support towards the things that have happened to her. You have acknowledged them but not one, “I’m sorry to hear that” has come out of your mouth. It’s becuase of that we have had to step in and defend torie because your side of the story has never reflected well on her behalf.
You don’t know this. You don’t know all the details. You can only go on what torie has said. You apparently think he was a saint. From what I have heard, I think he was an ass. We’re both entitled to our opinions.
All I know is what torie said. She said he made her feel worthless every day. And he kicked her out of their apartment. They were living together, right? That was her place of residence. I don’t care if her name was on the lease. They lived together and he kicked her out with no notice. To me that = asshole. You disagree; that’s fine with me. Oh, and if I am slandering him, then he is more than welcome to sue me!
Ahem, THEIR apartment. If you read one of her previous threads, she was the one working more hours; all he had was a paper route working a couple hours a day. He was in school. So I am sure she was contributing to expenses. Let’s ask her…Torie? Did you contribute to expenses?
No I don’t really see where you’re going. 1) I misunderstood the job thing. I admitted it. What do I need to do, get down on my knees and beg for forgiveness? 2) He kicked her out and that = homeless. Just because she was able to take shelter at her mother’s house (who is mentally ill and destitute, the electricity and water were both turned off for nonpayment), that doesn’t mean she wasn’t ejected from her place of residence… Someone who loses their home and stays with friends or relatives or at a shelter, they are all still homeless. Homeless does just mean out on the streets, sleeping in a cardboard box.
Yeah he’s still an asshole to me. Was torie Miss Perfect? Probably not. But that doesn’t excuse what he did. It’s my opinion, and I am not going to change my mind, so get over it. You wanna nominate him for Mr. Perfect, be my guest.
The point is, your assertion that he was not an emotional abuser is just as valid as my assertion that he was. I can live with that, can you?
I think the problem stems here from the fact that we have no real evidence, other than what Torie has said, to judge emotional abuse. The on example provided seemed to consist of him wanting to go out with the guys (to a strip, club, admittedly), and suggesting that she pick up her own laundry from the laundrymat. (BTW, I was under the impression that leaving one’s things at a laundrymat invites theft? I thought they were supposed to be attended?)
Now, the strip club-that’s probably a debatable issue. Wanting to go out with the guys, for once, is not.
Now, this is all we seem to have to judge the situation. And again, the rule on the SDMB is, instead of proving that something didn’t happen, the person has to prove it DID. Or offer evidence.
Now, it very well could be that this guy IS an abuser. BUT…admittedly, Torie is going through a difficult time and ADMITS that she herself is not blameless, and needs help. So, we have to take that into account.
So for all of those saying, “Oh, he’s an abusive jerk!” I think it’s jumping the gun a bit. We don’t know whether he is, or isn’t, based on the scant info we have.
I don’t think we ever quite examined this issue sufficiently…
I fully agree that if the genders were switched, NO women would be flirting. I think all or most of us would agree there is a double standard.
Now the question is, why?
Some people have touched on possible reasons for this in this thread. Could it be because men are usually stronger than women? Is it because men are more often the abuser, and women are more often the more peaceful sex? Is it because women have higher standards and would never lower themselves to flirting with an abuser? Is it because some men wouldn’t regard what torie did to be such a big deal? Is it because society has generally viewed a woman slapping a man in anger to be OK (in films and pop culture through the years) but a man hitting a woman to be totally different?
These are all possibilities, but I don’t know. I’m not saying I agree with any of the above statements, I am just trying to put the issue out there, since that is one of Diane’s original points that was never really examined.
Maybe this is just an old-fashioned antiquated way of thinking, and while people are moving away from that mindset, some elements still remain in the minds of some people?
It can’t be the “women would not flirt with an abuser” for sure because many women have written “love” letters to famous murderers.
Maybe men are the flirters and women are more naturally the flirtees.
?
Thank you for bringing this thread back to the intended purpose.
I don’t know why genders would react differently, but I know that they do, probably for any or all of the reasons you mentioned. However, regardless of the reason, I still think it (as shown in the original thread) is disturbing and disgusting.
It minimizes the situation and attempts to make violence acceptable. Look what happened here. How many (yourself included) came in here and started justifying why Torie beat the guy? Going so far to creating a story that showed him to be a monster (although most of that was untrue). How many others came in and said it was okay for her to hit him because she is “just a fragile girl” and that she didn’t leave a bruise?
People were not only flirting and minimizing the situation, they were creating a story that made it acceptable for her to abuse another person. Torie herself admitted that she did something very wrong and is seeking help (which, JFTR is great), so why is there the need for others to come in and make excuses for her?
What she did was wrong, but what some of you are doing by trying to justify that behavior is beyond understanding.
I know I’m coming in late to this party, but I’m sick of some of this bullshit so I wanted to respond to this old post:
Why don’t we rollll back a little here and why don’t you find some posts I wrote where I even hinted that this was the case? Huh? Why don’t we do that. Why don’t we COPY AND PASTE any quote where I said anything like that. Please COPY AND PASTE where I intimated that it was “okay.” COPY AND PASTE.
Sheesh.
How many frickin’ times do I have to repeat: We don’t know. He very well may have stung, or not. He probably was upset (I repeated this several FRICKIN’ TIMES already) but we don’t know. He could have been aroused for all we know.
It’s the rest of you who want to assume that this guy felt this, or that, or whatever, but the fact is, YOU DON’T KNOW. NEITHER DO I.
I’d like to ask a question, and please, keep the answer simple, will you?
Let’s say I have two sisters (well, I do have two sisters). Both get pissed at me. Both hit me around the stomach and chest.
Sister #1 gives me no bruises, and I feel zero discomfort or pain. Her hits are ineffectual. She hit me, and she was pissed.
Sister #2 hits me around the stomach and chest. I get big bruises. A black eye. A fat lip. She hit me, and she was pissed.
Do you treat both these sisters exactly the same, based on what they did? Both hit me. Both were pissed. So it’s the same, right? Exactly the same, right? You rip both of them exactly the same asshole, right? You give them exactly the same lecture, right? Because hitting is bad, and they both hit. Is that how it is, or are there shades of grey with this sort of thing?
Now, do you think that I’m saying that because Sister #1 didn’t cause me any physical discomfort (and Sister #2 did), that Sister #1 is a great person, a wonderful sweet person for what she did? That what she did “didn’t matter”? Do you really think I’m saying that? Do you really think I’m saying that Sister #1 did nothing wrong and therefore deserves no censure? If you think that’s what I’ve been saying all through this frickin’ thread, please copy and paste where I actually said it. Copy and paste. COPY AND PASTE. That’s all I’m asking for.
All I’m saying for the last few frickin’ pages is that we don’t know what he felt, but based on torie’s account, he did not suffer grave physical harm. Perhaps some temporary physical discomfort (but WE DON’T KNOW) and likely some emotional upset (but WE DON’T KNOW). But, if we are to believe torie, he’s not limping and black and blue.
So, torie did something that was way out of line. She immediately sought counseling, because is was way over the line and she ought to never, ever do it again. But if we were to try to analyze what she actually did, it appears (though WE DON’T KNOW) that her behavior is a little closer to Sister #1 than to Sister #2 above.
If you had interpreted the thread that prompted this one as Diane did, that people were coming on to Torie because they wanted to get some, and didn’t care about anything else, wouldn’t you have found it pretty sick and perverted? THat Diane interpreted it that way is sad, but given that interpretation, I’d say her outrage was pretty understandable, wouldn’t you?
All that Diane knows about the situation is that Torie’s boyfriend dumped her, she went back and hit him several times, came to the SDMB asking for sympathy and flirtation, and got not only flirtation but at least one person saying that the guy had it coming. Oh, and that Torie says that he was emotionally abusive because “he made her feel bad every day,” which given the way the term “emotionally abusive” is thrown around these days, is worth about the paper it’s written on (and please note that it’s not written on any). There are a whole lot of different ways of “making” someone feel bad, and many of them are blameless on the part of the “maker.”
If someone criticizes me because I’m stupid, I’m only going to feel bad if I’ve actually been stupid. Otherwise, it’s going to roll off my back, because I know I’m not stupid in general. Alternatively, if someone criticizes me for being blonde, I’m not going to feel bad because, while that someone may not like it, I’m blonde and there’s nothing wrong with it (and nothing I can do about it - even if I dyed my hair, I’d still BE a blonde naturally). I can only be hurt by valid criticism, and then it’s not the fault of the criticizer - it’s my own. I’m not saying that it’s impossible for someone to be nasty; of course it is. But generally, when we feel bad, it’s because we’ve been forced to acknowledge something about ourselves that we don’t like but were managing to avoid thinking about. So cruelty or nastiness boils down to the intent of the person saying it. If they were saying something with the deliberate intent of not helping you, but of making you feel bad about something over which you have no control, they’re being nasty. But it’s entirely possible for someone to “make” someone else feel bad without any ill intent at all - I know people whose very existence is a reproach to me because of their virtues and my inexcusable lack of the same. Is it their fault? Hell no! But sometimes I feel bad none the less.
We have no idea how or whyTorie’s ex “made” her feel bad. But I don’t see that Diane was morally obligated to sympathisize or make Torie look good. Getting dumped sucks, but the fact is, more relationships end than survive. Generally speaking one person does the dumping and the other gets dumped. It doesn’t make the person who chose to end it a villain, and it doesn’t make the person who was dumped a saint.
Again, none of this really has anything to do with Torie per se. I don’t know anything about her, her situation, or her relationship. But I don’t think Diane deserves the venom that has been spewed at her here.
I wanted so badly to stay away from this thread. All day I’ve stayed out of it because I’d said what I had to say but this
I had to respond to.
YES. I’d treat both sisters the same way. Because whether or not your skin has a tendency to break or bruise, the intent of the person hitting you was to cause you harm physically instead of being a fucking grown up and a) walking away or b) using words.
Also, I was wondering if there’s any other choices between Abusive Boyfriend and Mr. Perfect. I see that those of us on the ‘bad side’ of this arguement are being accused by nyctea of thinking he’s ‘a saint’ and ‘mr. perfect’. I was under the impression that someone could be an asshole AND be physically injured without being a criminal.
Once again, Diane, in case you didn’t see it on the previous page in big red letters, I quote nocturnal_tick:
Like I have said 10 times already, I think the guy is an asshole for kicking her out with no notice. The only thing that was “untrue” as you put it is my mistake about her job, but other than that, everything I have read about him makes me think he is a jerk. My opinion…get over it.
Oh and Diane, now that we’re back on topic, let’s try to stay there. I noticed you were getting back into trashing others…instead of discussing the whole “double standard” issue, which you brought up in the first place
There is one more issue that is tangential to this thread that hasn’t been discussed… That is, whether it was right or even legal for him to kick her out of their apartment with no notice. I have to go now, but I will be back in a few hours to talk about it.
AvhHines, if you’d read the first page, you’d see more posts like this:
Then this exchange between Diane and Jarbabyj:
jarbabyj
Quote:
Originally Posted by tim314
And maybe she just said that “unlovable” bit so saps like me would feel sorry for her and line up to stroke her ego. In which case, I guess she fooled me. Although not really cause I didn’t bother to post in her topic anyway.
Bingo my friend. “Say it’s ok that I beat up a human being and tell me I’m cute” would have been a more concise OP
Yesterday, 09:56 AM #37
Diane
Charter Member Join Date: Mar 1999
Posts: 4,765
Location:
You poor stupid fucker. Who in the KEEEEEERIST do you think started this Pit thread?
Diane
Charter Member Join Date: Mar 1999
Posts: 4,765
Location:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Diane
You poor stupid fucker. Who in the KEEEEEERIST do you think started this Pit thread?
In case it isn’t obvious to old brainiac, this post was addressed to Shaolinrabbit
jarbabyj
Charter Member Join Date: Dec 2000
Posts: 7,144
Location: Slam City
oh good, because I was about to throw down, fucka
Diane
Quote:
Originally Posted by jarbabyj
oh good, because I was about to throw down, fucka
Gawd, you are so fucking sexy when you threaten violence like that!
jarbabyj
Charter Member Join Date: Dec 2000
Posts: 7,144
Location: Slam City
I just ran over some squirrels with my truck…tell me I’m lovable!
And the rest of page one, plus a bit of page two. Diane basically strutted around acting self righteous and holier than thou, and a few others egged her on. That’s not debate. If it had actually been presented the way the past page or so has been going, she would have probably garnered a lot more support, and people would have been willing to discuss it rationally, which they are now. As it was, the above left people (well, me) thinking “OMG, is this what ex-cheerleaders do after they graduate high school?”