Devolution
Member
The majority of rapists are men, why shouldn't we be talking directly to them? I don't even get this thread.
I would disagree with feminism being just a political movement. And when I think of an anti-feminist, I would think of what the Oxford English Dictionary defines as......and all the literature/ideology involved with wanting to keep things the way they are. I don't want to argue semantics or definitions though, so I'll just leave it at that.
The majority of rapists are men why shouldn't we be talking directly to them? I don't even get this thread.
I've already shared the definition that I and many others are referring to when we use the term "feminism". As I said, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. In the end, it doesn't really matter.What is feminism then? The actual study of the issues generally falls under Women's Studies as far as I know. Also, using a prescriptive definition of a term that almost nobody uses is kind of dumb.
The majority of rapists are men, why shouldn't we be talking directly to them? I don't even get this thread.
I've already shared the definition that I and many others are referring to when we use the term "feminism". As I said, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. In the end, it doesn't really matter.
The part that lobbied for laws like this. An act that in its original form, didn't cover victims of domestic violence of both genders.
Since I'm lazy, I'll just use what's on Wikipedia. A feminist to me is someone who is "an advocate or supporter of the rights and equality of women". That's it. They could be part of the feminism movement. They could be misandrists. But I see it as a desire for equal rights between genders.I'm sorry, I tried looking through your other posts and I didn't see a definition. Do you mind reposting?
So, how is this a zero-sum game of rights again? Which rights were these feminists taking away?
Seriously?
I think you're confusing this with the ideal of removal of existing rights. Giving additional new rights to women is the same thing.
VAWA original form legislated the false idea that only men are perpetrators and only women are victims. My over arching point was there are *some* feminists who genuinely believe this it true. I find it hard to come to terms with the refusal to see this.
The defence in this thread that 'feminism' just means moderate, equality for all modern feminism, and the less saviour, and certainly not egalitarians views are just straw man inventions or slurs.
Seriously?
I think you're confusing this with the ideal of removal of existing rights. Giving additional new rights to women is the same thing.
VAWA original form legislated the false idea that only men are perpetrators and only women are victims. My over arching point was there are *some* feminists who genuinely believe this it true. I find it hard to come to terms with the refusal to see this.
The defence in this thread that 'feminism' just means moderate, equality for all modern feminism, and the less saviour, and certainly not egalitarians views are just straw man inventions or slurs.
Seriously?
I think you're confusing this with the ideal of removal of existing rights. Giving additional new rights to women is the same thing.
VAWA original form legislated the false idea that only men are perpetrators and only women are victims. My over arching point was there are *some* feminists who genuinely believe this it true. I find it hard to come to terms with the refusal to see this.
The defence in this thread that 'feminism' just means moderate, equality for all modern feminism, and the less saviour, and certainly not egalitarian, views of some feminists are just straw man inventions or slurs.
You should not have phrased it as a "zero sum" game then. That would mean giving rights to one group and removing rights from another group.
I don't think I stated it explicitly outside of a roundabout way in one post. I would still count it as falling under equality if it gave women rights that they should have had but didn't previously. But nothing is perfect, I suppose. I want men to be equally protected when it comes to rape and sexual assault. There will always be oversights, though, and people will fight for that which matters the most to them. It seems most of us more or less want the same things in this thread when it comes to the ambiguous concept that is "equality", though.So you're defining it for the first time in this thread? That's not a terrible definition. I don't think it's perfect, and I'd probably at least get rid of the 'equality' bit since feminism doesn't tend to slavishly commit their political capital to "equality' rather than gaining rights for women, but it's not a terrible definition.
When Shouta stated that I'm fairly certain he meant it without you having to phrase it in a condescending manner, which again reinforces his point.
Do you actually believe this type of 'dialogue' enhances discussion or is part of the reason why people will continually reject siding with your positions?
Nothing. That you assume that it is a problem. Your tone is part of the problem, it is really accusatory.
But the problem is that this is not necessarily the agenda.
What I mean those parts I like such as those found in what I quote can be a part of that agenda but parts I don't like such as the one I mentioned in my previous post can also be part of your agenda and you might interpret those parts as being parts of the same package, when I don't agree.
But yeah I approve feminists making no means no campaigns. Do it, it would benefit society and you are right about that.
It's exactly zero sum game. One party gains, the other party loses.
Party A (women) gain a right under law, Party B (men) explicitly get that right denied in law.
It's exactly zero sum game. One party gains, the other party loses.
Party A (women) gain a right under law, Party B (men) explicitly get that right denied in law.
It's exactly zero sum game. One party gains, the other party loses.
Party A (women) gain a right under law, Party B (men) explicitly get that right denied in law.
Are we talking about the right to rape?Oh dear. One party can gain without the other party losing. When women gained the right to vote, what did men lose?
The exact right that men lose in an enthusiastic consent world.
Are we talking about the right to rape?
What?
No, we certainly aren't.
What?
When minorities get more protection under the law what do you feel the majority loses?
Equal protection.
Equal protection.
Equal protection.
You can probably make some kind of argument about how funding is zero sum, but I'm not seeing the point you're trying to make.
Clearly, federal grants plan into this. Grants that would only go to women domestic violence groups.
If you mean your post in #245 where you talk about wanting to increase the sentence for a false accusation of rape to one to two decades, as I understand it filing a false police report for a felony crime such as rape could result in 2 to 10 years for that alone, and I assume that perjury could be added on top of that, which could easily get you to around those numbers you were advocating. If it can be demonstrated that someone knowingly filed a false police report, then I agree that this should be prosecuted.
I wouldn't advocate that for every case; if a fifteen year old girl lied about rape because she was afraid of what her parents would do if they found out she had sex, I think it would be cruel to then send her to prison for 20 years. And I do worry about the potential deletrious effects on reporting if women believe that there is a danger that legitimate rape victims will be prosecuted as having filed a false rape report. But I'm not opposed in principle to the idea of harsh punishments for filing a false rape report, and the potential for these already exists on the books.
I honestly do not see how my tone was accusatory; he suggested I ask them what scares them about it. I was not sure what "it" was in this case, so I asked what scared people about my position (which I explained) and asked, if what I was saying was not the issue, then what was it that scared them.
I don't really see why people are reading condescension or accusations in to the question, but I can only say that I did intend to communicate either of those thin when I posed the question. It actually was posed in all sincerity.
http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/pdf/NISVS_Report2010-a.pdf
Go to pages 19 and 20. Rape doesn't include female perpetrated rape, for that you want to look at "made to penetrate". 12 month totals are nearly identical across genders.
Approximately 1 in 21 men (4.8%) reported that they were made to penetrate someone else during their lifetime; most men who were made to penetrate someone else reported that the perpetrator was either an intimate partner (44.8%) or an acquaintance (44.7%).
Quote from the PDF:
Now I would say this could be defined as rape (the report separated it under sexual violence) but I think you should look at some of the previous posters in this topic and ask them if they think drunk sex with your girlfriend could be rape. You could also ask if willingly going home with your work colleague after a party could lead to rape.
Oh dear. One party can gain without the other party losing. When women gained the right to vote, what did men lose?
Being the sole voting block and deciders of legislation. I'm really not quite sure how you can not see that. ALL changes in power structures are zero sum, that isn't a value judgement and you should stop taking it as such.
Being the sole voting block and deciders of legislation. I'm really not quite sure how you can not see that. ALL changes in power structures are zero sum, that isn't a value judgement and you should stop taking it as such.
Also how about all those threads where male posters have no problem with teachers doing it to students.
Quote from the PDF:
Now I would say this could be defined as rape (the report separated it under sexual violence) but I think you should look at some of the previous posters in this topic and ask them if they think drunk sex with your girlfriend could be rape. You could also ask if willingly going home with your work colleague after a party could lead to rape.
Ok, cool, I remember a more strong disagreement in the past but I might had misremembered.
However an argument that starts with the assumption of guys my agenda is perfect why would you be scared with it is making one feel accused because they feel that they are about to be caught in a gotcha. Another problem is that they might do disagree with you on something, but describing something as great and asking why someone would disagree does not allow much discussion from which people can see the opposite point of view. You prove your agenda by explaining it basically and not claiming that it does X and X and ask people why they are scared. People who are already suspicious are not so easily convinced by claims.
It's like some people lack any, or enough, education in these matters, like they are illiterate some may say.
Seriously?
I think you're confusing this with the ideal of removal of existing rights. Giving additional new rights to women is the same thing.
VAWA original form legislated the false idea that only men are perpetrators and only women are victims. My over arching point was there are *some* feminists who genuinely believe this it true. I find it hard to come to terms with the refusal to see this.
The defence in this thread that 'feminism' just means moderate, equality for all modern feminism, and the less saviour, and certainly not egalitarian, views of some feminists are just straw man inventions or slurs.
No. And neither is the feminism that was initially discussed in this thread.Is Gay Marriage a zero sum game?
It's exactly zero sum game. One party gains, the other party loses.
I think you're right that the media reaction is generally negative, but you also have to consider that those politicians making those "gaffes" are not, in their minds, making gaffes when they are saying them. In other words, I think that they don't expect that what they are saying is going to be problematic nor do they expect that their (often worse) explanations will be problematic either. So I don't think "They get blowback" is evidence that we don't have a problem with misogyny; I think it is evidence that we also have opposition to misogyny - and good for us! - in addition misogyny.
But I don't think that those politicians are speaking only for themselves; I think that they believe that for a significant proportion of their core constituencies what they are saying about rape is at the very least not anathema - an even representative of the views of a wide swath of Americans.
Can you link me to a feminist that thinks gender-specific domestic violence laws are a good thing?
Can you link me to a feminist that thinks gender-specific domestic violence laws are a good thing?
People aren't losing rights from gender equality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_Bindel
Specifically, she campaign for, and was almost successful in getting it legislated, mitigating factors as a defences in murder cases to be denied to men, but enshrined to women. The goal was to allow a heat-of-the-moment self defence for women trapped in domestic violence, while also explicit deny the same right for men. It would have meant being a female victim of domestic abuse would be a legal reason to kill a male abuser, effectively granting the death penalty. She also has written extensively in the Guardian and elsewhere on why male-to-female transgenders are not real women and should be treated (legally and socially) as men (and also written on why she hates all men).
There is a Daily Mail story (sorry, horrific paper) written by Erin Pizzey, a campaigner for domestic abuse victims, that goes into great detail why the Bindel / Harriet Harman proposal and is awful.
http://www.*****************/news/a...estic-abuse-away-murder-affront-morality.html
Trying to pretend like bigots like this woman don't exist and actively lobby for legislation is at best naive. At no point have I said that these view are in any way mainstream or representative of all Feminism. I have stated the opposite. But these views still exist under the broad umbrella of feminism, which goes back to my original point that you're all jumping down my throat and playing at semantics.
Love Letter said:It is a truism in the anti-rape movement that rape is not motivated by sexual desire; it is motivated by a desire for power and control, working to uphold systems of oppression. To say that sex and rape are unrelated, however, is to both ignore the deep scars across the sexual selves of masses of people and avoid dismantling the symbiotic relationship between a sex-negative culture and a culture that supports sex in the absence of consent.
Let's be clear. By "rape," I mean a sexual encounter without consent. Consent is saying yes. Yes, YES! This is the definition, in my experience, employed by today's rape crisis services. Their models for prevention education, however, fail to teach young people how to really articulate or receive consent. They instead focus on how to say and listen to "no." "No" is useful, undoubtedly, but it is at best incomplete. How can we hope to provide the tools for ending rape without simultaneously providing the tools for positive sexuality?
The ways in which interpersonal sexual violence is a barrier to positive sexuality are intricate and specific. It is not only folks who can point to precise sites of violation in their personal histories, though, who are burdened by complicated and often painful relationships to their sexual selves. For me, the effects of living and growing up in a sex-negative culture have been illuminated by an exploration of my past, spurred by the vicarious trauma I felt while doing rape crisis work, as well as the conversations I now have daily around sexual relationships and pleasure.
By "sex-negative culture," I mean a culture that values the lives, bodies, and pleasure of men (and in particular white, middle- or upper-class, heterosexual men without disabilities) above those of women and transgendered people, and promotes shame about sexual desire, particularly female or queer desire. Sex-negative culture teaches us that pleasure is sinful and provides us with narrow scripts for appropriate sexual encounters. Conversely, a sex positive culture would use the presence of consent as the only requirement for acceptable sexual encounters and encourage the interrogation of or playing with power and control. Sex-negativity teaches us that sex is not to be spoken of. This directly shapes the aftermath of sexual assault, in which survivors are shamed and discouraged from talking openly about their experience. Rape is not taboo because it is violence; it is taboo because sex is the weapon of violence.
The abstinence-only education camp that holds political and economic power in this country is at the forefront of maintaining a sex-negative culture, but this force is by no means the only place that sex-negativity manifests. It can be found in nonprofit rape crisis organizations' one-dimensional or absent analyses of issues such as pornography, the sex trade, and child sexuality. It is exemplified within some so-called sex-positive queer and "radical" spaces that set up a narrative of orgasm as ultimate enlightenment and create a hierarchy of sexual practice. Our own feminist communities must be examined critically for ways in which our work does or does not address the diversity and breadth of experiences in relation to sex, as well as sexual violence.
Nice Guys said:Having said that, being transsexual - having had the experience of navigating my way through the world as male prior to my transition as female - has given me a somewhat different take on rape culture than the view that is often taken for granted among many cisgender (e.g. non-transgender) women. From my perspective, much of the existing rhetoric used to describe and theorize sexual harassment, abuse, and rape is, unfortunately, mired in the concept of "unilateral sexism" - that is, the belief that men are the oppressors and women are the oppressed, end of story.
Some of those who buy into unilateral sexism believe that men are inherently oppressive, dominating, and violent. Others believe that the problem is rooted in patriarchy and male socialization conspiring to condition men to become sexual predators. While there is certainly some truth to the idea that men are socialized to be sexually aggressive, even predatory, this is not the only force at work in their lives. Male children and teenagers are also regularly and explicitly reminded that they should be respectful of girls and women, and are often punished severely for picking on, or "playing rough" with, their female peers. Further, the men-are-just-socialized-that-way argument fails to explain the countless men who never sexually abuse or harass women in their lifetime.
The truth is that rape culture is a mindset that affects each and every one of us, shaping how we view and respond to the world, and creating double binds for both women and men. I call this phenomenon the predatory/prey mindset, and within it, men can only ever be viewed as sexual aggressors and women as sexual objects.
The predatory/prey mindset creates many of the double standards that exist in how we view female versus male sexuality. For example, on numerous occasions I've heard heterosexual female friends of mine ogle some man and make comments about how he has a nice ass. While one could certainly make the case that such discussions are "objectifying" or "sexualizing," what strikes me is that they don't feel that way. But if I were to overhear a group of men make the exact same comments about a woman, they would feel very differently. They would feel sexualizing.
Similarly, if a male high school teacher were to have sex with one of his female teenage students, we would all be appalled. The incident would feel like statutory rape to us. However, when the roles are reversed - when the adult teacher is female and the teenage student is male - it generally feels like a completely different thing to us. While it still fits the definition of statutory rape, we often have problems mustering up the feeling that the boy has been violated or abused. In fact, after one recent high profile case, comedian Bill Maher joked that such teenage boys are "lucky," and the audience broke into laughter.
What these anecdotes reveal is that the predatory/prey mindset essentially ensures that men cannot be viewed as legitimate sexual objects, nor can women be viewed as legitimate sexual aggressors. This has the effect of rendering invisible instances of man-on-man and woman-on-woman sexual harassment and abuse, and it makes the idea of woman-on-man rape utterly inconceivable. It's also why women cannot simply "turn the tables" and begin sexualizing men. After all, if a woman were to shout catcalls at a man, or were to pinch a guy's ass as he walked by, her actions wouldn't mean the same thing as they would if the roles were reversed. Her actions would likely be seen as suggestive and slutty, rather than intimidating and predatory.
Because of the predator/prey mindset, when a woman does act in a sexually active or aggressive way, she is generally not viewed as a sexual aggressor, but rather as opening herself up to being sexually objectified by others. This is why rape trials have historically dwelled on whether the woman in question was dressed in a revealing or provocative fashion, or whether she met with the man privately, and so on. If she did any of these things, others are likely to view her as inviting her own sexualization, as "asking for it." The underlying assumption is that women should simply know better - they should recognize that they are prey and men are predators, and they should act "appropriately."
As I've stated a bunch of times, I all strongly in favour of equality for all, regardless of gender, race, sexuality etc. My original point are there are those within single issue political movements that don't want or campaign for equality for all, but just for the demographic they are part of.
This argument gets trotted out all the time in debates about social issues and it's always nonsense. Every system of oppression for one group results in corresponding privilege for another. Campaigning for the equal rights of the privileged is redundant as they have both equal treatment, and an unearned advantage. On the other hand, advocating for equal rights for the oppressed automatically pushes us towards equal rights for all because the rights of the privileged were never in jeopardy in the first place.