If you honestly believe that, even counting unreported cases, men are domestically abused anywhere near as much as women, you’re delusional. NO this isn’t me saying we should ignore cases where men are domestically abused.
See also: actual rape (committed mostly against women) vs. false rape accusations (a much smaller problem, and again, no, I’m not saying it’s not a problem); the many places around the world where being born a woman really fucking sucks; fiction where women exist mostly as a plot device for male characters, etc.
Some people need to stop getting their facts from the Amazing Atheist. That guy’s an idiot.
Not sure why I’m still trying considering the hardcore strawman-ing that has occurred and will occur.
The abuse rates are roughly 1 in 4 for women and 1 in 5 men are domestically abused at one point in their lives last I checked, which isn’t as much of a difference as you’re implying with that post. The key difference between the two of them is that fact that there are thousands of women’s refuge groups around while there are an absolutely abysmal number of male ones, further perpetuating that women are always the victims and that men seldom can be victimized. As for women on serving to be plot devices, that’s fucking stupid, as most characters aside from the main protagonist, main antagonist and maybe a few sides kicks RARELY get enough development to be considered anything but plot pieces or devices. Following technicalities leads to EVERYBODY being a plot device to get across a message or invoke a feeling, so don’t try and hit it with that tumblr logic of one rule for men, one case of abuse for women.
If you want to drag in countries like Cuba or some places in the Middle East, sure, that would definitely skew the statistics but it’s an asinine thing to do when we live in and are discussing a Western sociological and legal philosophy. Their culture differs from ours greatly and using that as a case against men in America is ridiculous and you know it. Those are also generally places where being ANYTHING but the colour accepted there can land you the same amount if not worse abuse than being a woman, so it’s hardly like it’s strictly hate against girls.
Amazing Atheist is a mongoloid, but that doesn’t change the fact that people need to be critical of this victimizing horseshit that goes on unabashed and the uninformed white knighting that accompanies it.
Niggas writing books in this thread and for what? Too prove to themselves something that they already know? Bend over backwards just for trying to reason with the unreasonable. All you need to say is You right bitch like my boy Face and be done with it. And if shit get to rowdy, just break out the baby powder and let a ho know that dick is in charge, pussy.
EEEK!! I LET A MOSQUITO INSIDE MY PLACE!!! Gotta call my girl before I hyperventilate.
My dudes Unbrock and Drama came in the world, don’t put them on the same level as this whiny closet dike.
Whoa, let me just stop you right there. Let’s keep this shit within the realm of reality.
I can almost guarantee you there isn’t a male here who can’t tell you a story about either himself, or someone he knows personally, being assaulted by a woman in a manner that, were the roles reversed, they’d be in front of a judge. You can dismiss this any way you’d like, and many people do, but it doesn’t make it less real.
Women are given a social privilege allowing them to assault men with little to no safe recourse whatsoever. This fact isn’t lost on women. Not in the fucking least. (False rape accusations fall along these lines as well, but I’m not sure any of us want to go down that road.)
If you report the incident, the police treat it as a joke, complete with glib comments about your sexuality and masculinity. The only person going to jail is you if you don’t drop it and apologize for wasting the nice officer’s time. Mind you, they’re going to check her out before they leave. Not you, her. It’s my understanding that many law enforcement agencies require this from officers responding to domestic violence reports, regardless of who is attempting to report it. Better hope they don’t find so much as a bump on her. If they even so much as see a red mark on her where you blocked an incoming swing… well… you know how this plays out. It gets much worse depending on how vindictive/angry she is at the time. She can tell them whatever she wants…
Expect to be on the receiving end of a jail sentence. You, and only you, are going to be one facing domestic violence charges. You’re going to have a great time in jail. “Woman beaters” tend to be only a few rungs on the ladder above rapists and pedophiles. When you get out, expect to be without a job. Don’t expect to get another one any time soon. Also, you can kiss any firearms license you had goodbye. In my state at least, a domestic violence charge revokes it permanently. Scratch that, I just looked it up. It’s Federal law. Applies in all 50 states, and also hits people under restraining orders as well. Yep, enjoy having a constitutional right permanently revoked in addition to everything else. Cue up the Yakov Smirnoff soundbite folks, “what a country!” Speaking of countries, have fun trying to get a visa to visit/move/work in another country with a domestic violence conviction.
If you manage to escape some jail time (i.e. you walked with a suspended sentence), you’re still going to be court ordered into some type of domestic violence and/or anger management counseling group. You’ll be there in group sessions with actual criminals, and other suckers much like yourself who made the foolish mistake of defending themselves. If you don’t go, don’t worry. They’ll have an arrest warrant for you so you can serve that suspended sentence in the clink.
I really hope the two of you don’t have any kids together. All I’m going to say about that.
And in any case, enjoy having your name placed on the National Domestic Violence Registry, often for the remainder of your life. Good luck with any future relationships. You’re going to need it.
There are reasons why there aren’t any statistics shedding light on this very real and very common problem. There are reasons why you get to erroneously wave your hand and dismiss it all as rare. I’ve just outlined the major ones above. There is absolutely nothing to be gained by reporting a violent incident, and a dire amount to be lost by doing so. As I’ve mentioned, the losses becomes much worse should you defend yourself. This is why we have no real statistics, but everyone knows a guy who’s been assaulted by a woman, girlfriend, wife, etc.
(inb4 check your privilege, accusations of MRA, etc.)
Is there a hit-head-against-a-brick-wall smiley yet? … Nope.
Use your imagination.
Anywho, I think you need to check again.
A few things:
Don’t use the terms “main protagonist” and “main antagonist” please. Those are really, really dumb terms, and wildly overused. PROTIP: it’s the word “main.”
No, not everyone other than the protagonist/antagonist exists merely to push those two characters’ stories, unless it’s a shitty story. And besides that, there’s a depressing lack of quality female characters in fiction, especially in the protagonist and antagonist roles. Far too many times the “chick” is there as purely a combination of eye candy and a plot device for male characters. Do some research, both into how Hollywood and the gaming industry looks at female characters.
Don’t use the word “uninformed” if you’re unwilling to inform yourself.
You should have seen the stuff Dab00g and alot of other people said to me missy. Guys like angelpalm helped me and quite frankly they don’t say anything hurtful to you. It might be mildly annoying or even trollish but trust me you haven’t seen anything. Nessa, Qrazy, Momo and you are treated pretty tamely more or less. That goes for any other woman or girl on this thread. But don’t make any mistake if you say annoying crap you are gonna get flamed for it if you don’t like it you don’t have to be here on SRK. But I would rather not see you leave cause you feel like you’re getting bullied because personally I like you. BUt then again if you can’t handle what niggas on this forum say then maybe you are better off going.
This thread is blowing up I see too. Some are BS, and some have valid points. Honestly I haven’t seen this many people on GD in a while.
For one, way to completely not touch on the fact that it’s, at most, a 20% deficit between gender abuse rates. Secondly, there can be multiple protagonists much like there can be multiple ANtagonists, if you read some actual books you’d know about that. To further cement what I mean:
And besides that, there’s a depressing lack of quality female characters in fiction, especially in the protagonist and antagonist roles.
'The fuck you talking about? Do you honestly believe that shit or are you just trolling at this point? I don’t think anybody can be that legitimately deluded, especially since you said a lack of them in broad fiction. A Song of Ice and Fire itself has numerous well written, interesting female characters in both roles, as well as many in between. And even if there WEREN’T literally hundreds of well written female characters, who the fuck are we to tell people what to write? Is that indicative of our society at all? Especially with all of those female authors, of which some are the highest paid.
Stop taking what you see on tumblr as fact and get out there in a real situation and look at that horrible misogyny at work. Educate yourself, look at all the prolific women in multiple roles and ask yourself that if this was a true patriarchy, if those women would be serving any use besides a cumdumpster and cooking lackey. Better yet, go play a video game with a female friend and look at all the rampant misogyny that will be brought down on her if she doesn’t trumpet her arrival with HEYYYY GUYS, BEFORE U ASK YES IM A GIRL x3. Seriously, this entire fucking inequality spiel in the industry is so retarded but I can’t even be angry at it anymore. Lord knows that as long as there are sheltered, socially stunted neckbeards willing to support these entitled girls, there will never be a real solution put in place to appease the tear-filled feminists and their bootlickers.
“Reality” that you can’t support with statistics or studies or any boring crap like that.
The good news is that you have suggestions of (bullshit) anecdotes that you insist are probably coming real soon (if we ask, which I won’t). That’s some serious science. Men MUST be abused as often as women, because you say they might be, and you’re a fucking expert.
Of course I can’t. Did you even read my post? As I explained, our society is geared toward keeping incidents of female on male violence out of the public eye as much as it can. That said, there are studies and statistics out there from credible sources. I explained my position as to why they’re inaccurate (i.e. statistically lower than instances of violence against women, and much lower then the actual amount of incidents). Somehow I don’t think linking any of them would change your position, though. I get that impression from you. Not that you couldn’t look them up yourself, in any case.
I have no intention of offering anecdotes, bullshit or otherwise, even upon request. I’m not even sure why you’d feel I would.
At no point in time did I claim that men were abused as much as women. I didn’t even imply it. Nor did I imply being an expert on the subject. Where are you getting this shit from?
My point was that instances of domestic violence or assault against men are a much larger problem than people are willing to admit, for a myriad of reasons. My point was that ours is a society where they don’t have to admit to the problem. There is no social pressure to do so, quite unlike “traditional” domestic violence. That is, violence involving a female victim. My point was that if you are a male victim of domestic abuse, you’re in a lose/lose situation.
This is a real issue. The issues that keep it hidden away are quite real as well. Your post, funnily enough, is proof of that in some small regard.
Edit: See the post right below this one. The first link alone is a pretty good read. Basically everything I said in the post you replied to, complete with credible citations.
Really bring the police in on being hit by your girlfriend? Let’s see, on average men are much stronger POUND for POUND…in addition to being taller and heavier. Yeah the police aren’t going to take it seriously and think you’re a wuss, but can you blame them? If a woman is attacking you, you can easily restrain her.
Doc Robot…so no statistics, but we know its true. Sure.
spoken like someone that’s never had to restrain anyone, ever.
a woman that’s trying to fight you cannot be easily restrained without either hurting or leaving visible marks, both of which would land you in jail if they were brought to the attention of the police.
so yeah, have fun getting shit thrown at your face and then going to jail when she (or the neighbors) calls the cops and says you attacked her using the red marks on her wrists as evidence. i’ll be locking myself in the bedroom and calling the cops to escort her crazy ass out.
If you draw your definition from a lot of feminist literature, I assume you’re familiar with ways that it has been used, but the definition I invoked is at least a game attempt to boil privilege down to the basics–perhaps not universally agreed upon, but probably as close as it can get without copying and pasting a Wikipedia/Cliff’s Notes/Whatever summary. Certainly not a gender bigot’s abuse of the term, and what use would anyone who wasn’t a gender bigot have for such a jaundiced definition anyway?
Here’s a complaint that’s been made many a time. When a man and a woman show up to a store to buy a computer together and the salesperson addresses the man rather than both of them together (or, hell, the woman), perhaps it’s that the salesperson chose at random–but more likely the choice was influenced by social norms that paint the man as more likely to be knowledgable and that the woman is more likely to defer to his decision-making. And perhaps the salesperson bases this on past observation, but that still boils down to a prejudgment based on lines of sex and gender, just as much as it would boil down had he chosen based on any other prejudged basis. How does a man earn preferential treatment from a person he’s never met in his life? This is an example based in self-report to be sure, but my goal here is to illustrate the sort of assumptions that color the ways that people treat one another and even accept treatment from one another without realizing it. It’s a subtler sort of discrimination that can’t be legislated against because it occurs in circumstances that don’t lend themselves to legislation, that are difficult to measure except by the testimony of those involved. Because it is so difficult to address in any other way, it is best addressed if people go from not thinking about it to thinking about it–if people think about the assumptions they’re making about the qualifications and life experiences of others, and if they question why they make their choices in how to treat one person versus how to treat another.
This treatment does happen and it is B.S. that it does. Of course it needs to stop, and ironically it’s something that feminism applies to. Most feminists can at the very least agree that a reappraisal is in order for the gender roles that we’re expected to fill.
For example, the implicit assumption that children are better off in the company of a woman is the vestige of a June-and-Ward-Cleaver social model in which the man is necessarily the breadwinner and the woman is necessarily the child rearer. For the most part, this social model begat the sort of domestic repression that feminism has historically sought to address. If the lingering effects of “ideal” housebound motherhood are done away with once and for all, then so will the implicit assumption that women are necessarily better for children than men.
I’m sure that there are fair-weather, self-styled “feminists” who would hit the ceiling if this happened, but that’s one of those monkey’s paw outcomes where the thing you wish for is exactly what you get.
As someone who is sympathetic to a reasoned and rational approach to feminism, I would wholeheartedly welcome a society that accepts single fatherhood. It would mean that women are “out of the kitchen” so to speak… or that men and women are assumed to spend the same amount of time in the kitchen. Feminist goal accomplished.
It is very much true that the assault of men is relatively rare and that the public harassment of women is a common occurrence. We address the assault, so why not address the harassment? Just because it’s a matter of hearts and minds rather than the law doesn’t mean that there’s nothing to do about it. When somebody catcalls, or makes similarly undesirable remarks, the problem isn’t so much that the recipient finds it offensive or threatening per se, but that the person making the remarks is doing so without caring whether or not the recipient finds it offensive or threatening. It is downright brazen to take advantage of the fact that people are in a position where they have to hear such remarks directed at them without any recourse.
In simple terms, it’s called being a douchebag–in this case, a sexist douchebag, which is even worse, because the douchebag’s douchebaggery is predicated on the idea that slightly over half the human race deserves to be a target of douchebaggery based solely on the fact that it is one kind of person and not another. It’s ludicrous.
Of course, people have the right to say whatever they want, but that only means that in the absence of the government exercising discretion over what we say, it is up to us to consider the consequences of our use of language, and to be empathetic to those who have no choice but to hear it. It is a protection against tyranny, and it is thereofre disturbing that some people use it as a pretext to say every nasty little thing that pops into their heads to every hapless person within earshot. The reason free speech is so crucial is that speech is a powerful thing–it can bring us up or cast us down. It deserves respect.
I actually don’t buy the equivocation between people making remarks in public spaces and similar talk that happens over the gaming headset. That isn’t to say that the ossified, malignant attitudes that produce those remarks aren’t the same, but as others have pointed out before me, being in a virtual gaming space gives the recipient some agency–the agency to turn off the feed, of anonymity, and of physical distance. People in public spaces don’t have that.
The homeless population is overwhelmingly male, but the male population (as well as the population in general) is overwhelmingly not homeless. For that reason, male homelessness–which is a problem that I don’t intend to marginalize by any means–is not a great metric for male disenfranchisement as a whole.
As for the prison population, that may very well be the effects of a different sort of privilege altogether. Get them in a room together. What do they have in common besides being men?
I think we’re at cross purposes here, and it’s my bad. Poor wording. I didn’t mean to imply that there is a cause-and-effect relationship between online harassment and subsequent real world violence. I was suggesting, or attempting to suggest, that while men and women alike experience a certain level of harassment in online spaces, women are more likely to be exposed to such a thing in real world public spaces and have less recourse against it, which is why it’s difficult to compare the two situations. (Yes, I’m aware of the irony that this comparison was the impetus for this thread in the first place, so don’t bother pointing that out.) Again, shit wording on my part in the previous comment.
I don’t have much to say to this except that I think that the ratio you’re suggesting is backwards when you compare successful men to lottery winners and homeless men to the lottery losers, which would suggest that they represent an overwhelming majority of people. Though perhaps your call for a more holistic approach can result in some insight. One allegation commonly made by feminists isn’t necessarily that men are given success, but that they have more opportunities for success–and therefore more opportunities for failure. The goal, therefore, is not to produce more success for women, but to produce more access to opportunities. Perhaps if this happened, we’d see more successful women and more failing women. The necessary two sides of the coin.
Freedom to win is freedom to fail. I’d say both are pretty important.
I’d love to say that I’ll be waiting for that discussion to occur, but there’s some Hello Kitty in one of the other threads and I keep expecting it to leak into here. Never mind that while I find this subject legitimately interesting and commend you for sticking it out where so many others would have lost their attention span days ago, I have to admit that typing all this shit is pretty taxing. I’ve got a stack of comics to read and cartoons to watch just like everyone else, though–again–discussions like this one, on this site, are a rarity.
The Girl Scouts, to the best of my knowledge, are not nearly the same level of organization that the Boy Scouts is. That said, if they refuse to admit boys, well, shame on them. I’m sure there’s some kind of argument to be made to keep the genders rigidly segregated, why the activities of one group couldn’t be just as beneficial to the other… I just don’t know what it is. I’ve heard plenty of arguments that insist on tradition, which is a fairly empty argument unless the traditions in question have some better merit than just tradition in itself.
I know I’m about to make everybody wince all over again, but I’ll borrow a catchphrase from another movement and say that the dueling Scouts is a case in which separate is not equal. At least, it hasn’t been demonstrated as equal, as far as I can see. Why not allow a girl to participate with the boys, or vice versa? Aside from unquestioning adherence to tradition, that is.
That’s a tricky matter of definition, because while it has been suggested that the level of female-on-male abuse is underestimated and underreported, the injury rate resulting from domestic abuse is much, much higher in male-on-female cases. The consequences are graver, and it’s not hard to understand why. Poodles and dalmations tend to be a lot meaner than rottweilers and pitbulls, but I know which breeds I’d rather take my chances with in a scuffle. Nevertheless, you raise a point. People should have access to a place they can go for protection if they feel they need it, regardless of who they are.
But I will differ once again on the level of seriousness with which we should treat an adult’s wariness of being around a potentially abusive teenager. Being below the age of majority doesn’t mean that someone doesn’t have a capacity for violence, the wherewithal to carry it out, or the strength to do so effectively. I mean, I was a puny teenager, but I knew a lot of kids my age who weren’t. I was also a relatively level-headed, non-violent teenager, but I still knew a lot of kids who weren’t. For that reason, I do think there’s some merit in taking that into account even when dealing with underage kids.
Logically, if the goal of feminism is to raise female agency in our society by debunking assumptions about what women are capable of and how they should be treated, then we have to consider the potential for hypocrisy–the presence of people who act in the service of that goal only selectively. To draw an analogy, it’s fairly well-known that one of PETA’s highest-placed officials is an insulin-dependent diabetic who uses some fairly self-serving rationalizations to justify injecting herself with dead animal products in order to prolong her own life. That doesn’t mean that animal rights is a bunk issue, and it doesn’t mean that the ideas she professes to adhere to are bad ones. It means that she’s a shithead who doesn’t practice what she preaches.
While I’m a big proponent of feminism as an idea, I have a fundamental distrust of big top-down organizations that style themselves upon feminism, because positions of authority are going to attract people who aren’t necessarily interested in upholding the stated mission of the organization. Incidentally, I could very well substitute “feminism” in that sentence with “animal rights”.
I realize that sounds precariously close to a “No true Scotsman” argument… but fuck it. It still applies.
I also realize that some of this might come across as hedging, which is not my intention. I just think it’s important to be clear that while I support ideas and goals that are fundamental in feminism, I don’t support every feminist or every feminist organization. Mainly in cases where their tactics don’t stand up to a critique based on their own damned philosophy.
I would bet that both are true–nerds insulted, nerds vying for protection of their niche. Both involve a need to maintain a sense of identity, I think.
Whoa whoa whoa, let’s not say anything we can’t take back. While I might be sticking up for feminism, I haven’t thrown in my lot with this Anita person by a long shot. It may very well be possible that we hew to some of the same ideas, but I find her tactics silly and I think this whole business of raising money to make a glorified YouTube video, with no better commentary than many other people have already generated in lengthy discussion for free, is basically a scam wrapped in the flag of activism.
Also, I have an unimpeachable history of staunch heterosexuality. I will therefore deny your allegation of homosexuality and rejoinder by suggesting that you, yourself, are a homosexual.
