Degrees of Misogyny

[Tiassa]

I think the issue is how we define harassment.

Now you're starting to get it, but―

Does a compliment, especially when offered to a women, qualify as harassment?

―for all women are trying to tell us the problem, that you should ask that particular question means you haven't been paying attention.

You, Schmelzer, Ophiolite, mtf, DaveC. You've all taken part in a disgusting behavior intending to silence women in a discussion about their lives.

Unacceptable. Repulsive. Dangerous.

 

[billvon]

I think the issue is how we define harassment. Does a compliment, especially when offered to a women, qualify as harassment?

Depends on the environment. There have been several cases where nothing but compliments (as defined by the person offering them) have been declared sexual harassment by the courts.

It is, of course, possible to compliment someone else without it being harassment, and indeed 99% of compliments fall into that category. That does NOT mean that any compliment is OK.

 

[mtf]

Wait, I think I get it: _Anyone_ who dares to do anything but vehemently agree with anything Tiassa, Bells, and some others say, is, in the view of Tiassa, Bells etc. a misogynist, rape advocate, victim blamer etc.

You, Schmelzer, Ophiolite, mtf, DaveC. You've all taken part in a disgusting behavior intending to silence women in a discussion about their lives.

Unacceptable. Repulsive. Dangerous.

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is how you twist around what people say.

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is that you aren't reading what is written.

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is how you imagine and see things that aren't there.

You are the bully here.

 

[billvon]

Wait, I think I get it: _Anyone_ who dares to do anything but vehemently agree with anything Tiassa, Bells, and some others say, is, in the view of Tiassa, Bells etc. a misogynist, rape advocate, victim blamer etc.

Basically yes. Which means 90% of the people out there (including women) are misogynists. At least according to them.

I see this phenomenon on a lot of forums. There's a tendency to normalize to the opinions of the moderators or frequent posters; anyone to either side of them is an extremist. Support nuclear power and renewable energy? On boards with right wing posters/moderators you are a loonie liberal who wants to drive power prices up and kill the children of poor people; on more left-wing boards you're a corporate shill who wants to kill the same kids by putting piles of nuclear waste in their back yards.

 

[Daecon]

DaveC. You've all taken part in a disgusting behavior intending to silence women in a discussion about their lives.

I'm sorry but I find that hard to believe. I understand your feelings regarding human rights, human equality and bigoted intolerance - and I respect and feel much the same way.

However, reading back through the last few pages of his thread, I can't help but feel that there's a chance you could have misunderstood DaveC's "middle ground" opinion as an attack on values that we should all strive to hold dear, instead of what I see as trying to... shall we say, "extend the scope of the context" specifically from rape survivors and other women, to the general public - of which vulnerable women are definitely a part of, but not the whole.

I don't see that as trying to disregard women, but as including them in with everyone else. If you feel that such an approach may be seen as trying to drown out the voices of those women, that's a valid concern, but I don't think it was DaveC's intention.

 

[DaveC426913]

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is how you twist around what people say.

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is that you aren't reading what is written.

What is unacceptable, repulsive, and dangerous is how you imagine and see things that aren't there.

You are the bully here.

Well said.

Tiassa is building a great big straw man. We are talking about perfunctory, lawful, public interaction. Tiassa is attempting to extend that to something entirely different.

She pretends to speak for a stranger on the street as if she can know what they are thinking and what they want - because - what? - all women think the same way as she does? Many people welcome interaction with others. Some are lonely. The world is a rainbow of people. To pidgeon hole them based on their gender is the definition of sexism. They are people first. Individuals.

To suggest that normal, social, public societal behavior is an attempt to "silence" (a demographic of 3.5 billion) is as straw as one can get.


If someone is out in public, then - by definiton - they can expect to interact with the public - in a generally accepted and acceptable way. Speaking is acceptable.

It only becomes unacceptable once the person communicates their desire not to engage and that is not heeded.

Sorry, Tiassa, there is no societal rule to not speak to strangers. On the contrary, it is part of what it means to be a society.

 

[Randwolf]

Tiassa is ...

She pretends to speak ... she can know what they are thinking and what they want - because - what? - all women think the same way as she does? ... To pidgeon hole them based on their gender is the definition of sexism.

Ummm... She's a he - the word irony comes to mind here...

 

[DaveC426913]

Ummm... She's a he - the word irony comes to mind here...

It doesn't matter to my contribution. Put any pronoun in there and it reads exactly the same.

That's the beauty of addressing what someone says, rather than who someone is.

 

[Tiassa]

I'm sorry but I find that hard to believe. I understand your feelings regarding human rights, human equality and bigoted intolerance - and I respect and feel much the same way.

However, reading back through the last few pages of his thread, I can't help but feel that there's a chance you could have misunderstood DaveC's "middle ground" opinion as an attack on values that we should all strive to hold dear, instead of what I see as trying to... shall we say, "extend the scope of the context" specifically from rape survivors and other women, to the general public - of which vulnerable women are definitely a part of, but not the whole.

No, Daecon, this time I must disagree with your attempt to pretend some reasonable, pragmatic middle.

When the question is catcalling, the answer is that a woman doesn't have the right to leave the house and expect to be left alone. He's been on that tack for months.

The women are telling us what the problem is, Daecon, and the response is to simply invalidate them. When they speak of disruption, the response is that they ought to be grateful for the compliment. When they speak of catcalling, the response is to complain about banning "conversations". When asked what gives him the right, we are told she must make herself clear; our neighbor Schmelzer has gone farther by deigning to instruct women on how they must reject men; what is absent from any of this is, say, what the women are telling us, and apparently the verbal abuse, physical abuse, and even murder in the wake of these rejections just aren't anything Dave or his buddies need to consider. After all, her feelings aren't worth considering on the front side, and when she tells us what the problem is, her feelings aren't worth considering, full stop.

I even offered an explicit example; I even reiterated it. Can't get an actual specific answer. All anyone gets in return is generalization, an expanded valence. This counterpoint results in two possibilities:

(1) That the generalizations are intended to invalidate and exclude the actual examples by simply ignoring them.

(2) That the generalizations do, in fact, include the specific examples, and this is our answer, anyway.​

Thus, if I decide to tell you that you have pretty lips? How 'bout if I follow up by telling you how much prettier they would look wrapped around my cock? What, I'm just paying you a compliment, right? It's just a "conversation". You don't have the right to leave the house and expect to be left alone.

This proposition does, in fact, disagree with the effective reality I remember. Even today there are places in my society where talking to a man like that will get me killed. And for three quarters of my life, the presumption was automatic: If I didn't want to get killed, I shouldn't have hit on him.

Here's another question: What if you've been there before? What if it's already been your turn, so the moment I lean close and put on that smile, before I even purr those encouraging words about how much prettier you would be if you would just make those pretty lips smile, you're right back in the moment? Parish priest? Drunk uncle? Psycho bully up the street when you were eight? I got it, how about your high school basketball team?

Yeah, you're welcome. And all because I wanted to (ahem!) give you a compliment. Seriously, is it fair that I might do that to someone else?

What if that someone else is a woman? What then?

See, according to our brothers, over there, that's not our concern. That's her tough shit, and it's still her job to make the point of rejecting us, but only in a way that meets our standards. Some days, we kill over this shit. That's how determined we are to secure our right to sexually harass and terrorize women.

They tell us about the catcalling. They tell us about the disruption. They tell us about the harassment. Should we really pretend this is our right?

No one who steps into a public place has the right to say "I never want to be seen as approachable." They do have the right to say "I do not wish to be approached now. Go away." or "You should know that this is a place where it is not appropriate (perhaps, the workplace)."

(DaveC, #90↑)​

That's DaveC's response to the proposition that women do not exist for his benefit; he was, at that point, promoting chivalry. He's been on this tack for months. She is there for men to approach; I ask what gives him the right, I am told he doesn't need a right, and this is a consideration of catcalling and harassment. The women are telling us what the problem is. Does our neighbor (1) invalidate what they say, or is he (2) advocating that women do not have the right to be free of harassment?

Neither answer describes a sufficient attitude.

This retreat to generalization is very problematic. It is a desperate attempt to stand a worthless line, and requires invalidation of either woman's experience or existential condition.

Even in its most forgiving description―the soft hatred of dehumanizing indifference―it is still hatred.

 

[Bells]

I'm sorry but I find that hard to believe. I understand your feelings regarding human rights, human equality and bigoted intolerance - and I respect and feel much the same way.

However, reading back through the last few pages of his thread, I can't help but feel that there's a chance you could have misunderstood DaveC's "middle ground" opinion as an attack on values that we should all strive to hold dear, instead of what I see as trying to... shall we say, "extend the scope of the context" specifically from rape survivors and other women, to the general public - of which vulnerable women are definitely a part of, but not the whole.

I don't see that as trying to disregard women, but as including them in with everyone else. If you feel that such an approach may be seen as trying to drown out the voices of those women, that's a valid concern, but I don't think it was DaveC's intention.

He wasn't just talking about vulnerable women.

To put it bluntly, Daecon, there is no "middle ground" when it comes to sexual harassment. When it is dismissed as being simply being spoken to in a public area, it is diminished to something inconsequential, banal, not something threatening.. The reality of street harassment is that it is threatening, it is frightening.

And it isn't just for vulnerable women but for all women and girls. I dare any of the men who have spent pages dismissing sexual harassment as merely being spoken to, would feel comfortable if their teenage daughter had a man sidle up to her in the street and 'speak to her in public' like that..

A group of 15 and 16-year-old girls who have been victims of street harassment reveal how being catcalled makes them feel in a short documentary that aims to empower young women and raise awareness to the rarely discussed issue.

The anti-street harassment documentary created by imMEDIAte Justice, a community outreach program that helps girls make films dedicated to sex education, shows how constant street harassment makes teen girls feel 'unsafe' and 'angry'.

'I've been harassed just about everywhere,' 16-year-old Mary Beth says in the video. 'I've been harassed here at school, on the street, out with my friends, and even in amusement parks and stuff, where it's supposed to be kid-friendly.'

[...]

According to a survey conducted by anti-harassment group Hollaback!, 84 per cent of women have been harassed on the street before age of 17, with 13 per cent reporting that they were 10 or younger when they had faced unsolicited comments and unwanted attention.
​

This is what is being dismissed as being public interaction and people like Dave and co are telling us that we do not have the right to not be spoken to in public, when we demand that we not be harassed on the street.

Street harassment is the most common and prevalent form of sexual harassment young people face. And when we say that people have the right to not be harassed in public, the response we get from some men is that we do not have the right to not be spoken to in public?

Instead of saying street harassment is wrong, the response we get is:

He doesn't need a right in a free country.
It is not assault to speak to a stranger in public.
If she makes it plain that she's not interested, and he persists, that's a different story.
But being out in public means, by definition, that one will interact (to at least some degree) with people.

Let me put it this way.. Street harassment is not simply speaking to a stranger in public.

Here is an example of what is being dismissed as being a mere public interaction:

The first time I remember being followed I was 12 years old and a car full of men slowed down to drive next to me as I walked. While one shouted “compliments,” the others barked and howled.

The most recent time was last year, while walking with my teenage daughters in what would be considered a “safe” part of Washington. Three men on a sidewalk whistled as we passed them, then they started walking behind us. Aware of a possible problem, I positioned myself between the men and the girls, whom I then stopped, so that the men would have to pass us. After they’d gone by, I felt more comfortable walking to our destination, a stoop to a front door. But when I turned to let the girls in ahead of me, there on the stair behind them was one of the men who said, “I’ll come in with you.” I held up my phone, dialed 911 and told him to leave. He smirked and sauntered away, pausing at the gate to wave.

According to a newly released global study conducted by the anti-street harassment organization Hollaback and Cornell University, more than three-quarters of surveyed US women (77 percent) under 40 report being followed during the past year. That number is 71 percent globally. More than 50 percent of women report being groped, fondled or assaulted by passing men.

These are commonly employed practices in a larger arsenal of street harassment tactics that includes verbal and non-verbal harassment, exposure and also sexualized surveillance. For example, only months after the man followed us up the stairs, a truck full of men snapped pictures as we walked together, one of them yelling, “Now we have you forever.” Every time something like this happens, I talk to my children and their friends about harassment as a regulatory force in culture.​

She was 12 years old. I can only hope that some of the men dismissing this as being inconsequential as being spoken to in public, public interaction, freedom of speech, being complimentary to the girl/woman, and all the other excuses I've witnessed over the last few days, do not have daughters. Because I cannot imagine anything worse than telling a trusted parent about something as awful as this and having it dismissed as being normal interaction in public..

And that's the problem. When this is simply dismissed as being a normal part of life, a part of public interaction, just means that it is also normalised for boys who then grow up to become men who believe that this is normal and acceptable interaction in public and the vicious cycle continues.

While stories of stranger-perpetrated violence against women are constant fodder, the role of street harassment as the initial component of violence is often ignored. Contrary to popular belief, episodes that tilt from hostile verbal interactions to violence occur regularly, and similar assaults reported in isolation from one another and rarely referencing street harassment, can be found in every U.S. city. Last year, for example, a 14-year old girl in Florida was pulled into a man’s car, assaulted and then thrown out and run over. Headlines describing the assault used words like, “Girl kidnapped,” but first, she refused the man’s harassing request for sex as he drove by. Multiple murders of transwomen of color have started this way. The common refrain is that those targeted with harassment should call police for help. Even that can be problematic for many women, myself included, when police officers have themselves been the harassers.

[...]

Consciously or not, girls and women fold this information into their lives in an infinite number of ways, two of which are anxiety and hyper vigilance, both of which also take a toll on women’s well being. Recently, researchers at the University of Mary Washington’s measured accrued effects on women of two key factors: “body surveillance” and “unwanted sexual advances,” such as those that come up daily in street harassment. They specifically looked at the relationship between harassment, objectification, depression, body evaluation and shame. Their conclusion was that a huge number of women experience “insidious trauma” over time, leading to negative health outcomes.​

So yeah, how about Dave not dismiss and diminish street harassment as being mere public interaction..

Mtf asked me earlier how it can be fixed.. Stop normalising it, stop dismissing it and start recognising this is a problem and educate our children about how and why this is wrong.

 

[DaveC426913]

Let me put it this way.. Street harassment is not simply speaking to a stranger in public.

Were we not talking about someone saying "I think you're beautiful"? In each of my posts, I made it abundantly clear that I was referring to simply speaking to someone in public. No more. And I pointed out that it cannot go beyond that, or it certainly does cross over the line of harrassent.

That is not street harrassment. If we are talking about any of the things you mention in your diatribe, then absolutely, I do not condone that, or indulge in it.

So yeah, how about Dave not dismiss and diminish street harassment as being mere public interaction..

Since I was not referring to that, you can direct that strawman elsewhere.

You have gotten it backwards.

I am not lumping street harrassment under public interaction - you are lumping public interaction under street harrasment.

 

[DaveC426913]

Mtf asked me earlier how it can be fixed.. Stop normalising it, stop dismissing it and start recognising this is a problem and educate our children about how and why this is wrong.

This is true.

But we must separate the wheat from the chaff. These emotionally-baiting, deliberately-shaming comments continually being put forth are eroding any credibility. Being angry at the world will not get one the results they hope for.

 

[Bells]

Were we not talking about someone saying "I think you're beautiful"?

Actually, we were. When you responded to Tiassa's comment about what gives men the right, he was responding to Bowser questioning why should not be allowed to comment on a woman's appearance if she "takes their fancy".

Bells, why do men catcall? In your opinion. I've never seen it in a vulgar sense. Once while working downtown as a youth, an attractive woman passed me and a friend while we were working. My friend shouted out, "I think I'm in love!" To which she smiled. Does that smack of sexual harassment in your opinion?

I think there are different ways of expressing attraction. I'm leaning in the direction that some men are more willing to show their feelings verbally. I can understand how aggressive behavior would be a source of concern, but simply showing an appreciation of a woman's beauty? It's not something I have ever done, but, yeah, I do notice attractive women in public spaces.

Why do men catcall? Because they like doing it. Because they think it is correct to foist their opinions on passing females as to how women should dress, look, walk, run, smile..

Hmm... That might be part of it. I think it's just a natural reaction for men to recognize beautiful women. Most do it silently, for sure.

Okay.. So why can't they do it silently all the time?

Why do you think it is acceptable for men to accost women, complete strangers, often on the street, to give their opinion on how that woman looks? Without invitation..

Why should if they see a woman who takes their fancy?

What ... gives ... him ... the ... right?

To which you responded with:

He doesn't need a right in a free country.
It is not assault to speak to a stranger in public.
If she makes it plain that she's not interested, and he persists, that's a different story.
But being out in public means, by definition, that one will interact (to at least some degree) with people.

To answer your question, Dave, we were talking about someone saying "I think you're beautiful". And that was your response to that conversation.

In each of my posts, I made it abundantly clear that I was referring to simply speaking to someone in public. No more. And I pointed out that it cannot go beyond that, or it certainly does cross over the line of harrassent.

That is not street harrassment. If we are talking about any of the things you mention in your diatribe, then absolutely, I do not condone that, or indulge in it.

Except that in each of your responses, you were responding like that to a discussion about street harassment and sexual harassment in public.

And thank you, you just proved my point. I comment about sexual harassment and explain its dangers and you refer to it as a "diatribe". The irony, really, is spectacular.

Since I was not referring to that, you can direct that strawman elsewhere.

You have gotten it backwards.

I am not lumping street harrassment under public interaction - you are lumping public interaction under street harrasment.

Except that we were openly and actively discussing street harassment. So the question to you now is, why did you try to change the subject and literally dismiss and diminish what we were actually discussing?

This is true.

But we must separate the wheat from the chaff. These emotionally-baiting, deliberately-shaming comments continually being put forth are eroding any credibility. Being angry at the world will not get one the results they hope for.

And trying to change the subject, thereby dismissing sexual harassment and street harassment as you did, by scoffing about public interaction, will and does only result in the continued normalisation of the issue.

You wish to be taken seriously in the context of this discussion? I'll give you a hint. Stop with the shrugging dismissal of street harassment by changing the subject and then acting as though you are offended when said change of subject and open dismissal of what is being discussed is pointed out to you.

You think that street harassment is a problem? Great. How about next time, you don't change the subject and dismiss the subject outright in a form of argument that can only be described as the 'what about the men' defense to rape culture. No, really, that is literally what you ended up doing. Despite several of us trying to point this out to you, you doubled down and now you try to plead ignorance and try to pretend to be aggrieved at the injustice done to you?

 

[DaveC426913]

All right. I'll accept that.

I did not read enough preceding posts to see that there were divergent conversational threads. I conflated two.

It is not my intent to belittle the rights and freedoms of women or to brook any kind of harrassment.

 

[Bells]

Thank you Dave. I really appreciate that. I am glad we managed to get to the bottom of it.

 

[iceaura]

What matters is the extension of the power of the state.

That's not at issue. The issue is the ability of women to call upon the existing power of the State, if and when necessary, to protect themselves from you on the public street.

There is no option of "sound and principled governance", except in propaganda fantasies for the sheeple.

Childish nonsense.

And politically kind of dumb: you intend to force women to make a choice between a police state or continual harassment and threats from you? Smooth move. You just got half the population to back police state oppression of you, because that's the only option you allow them other than continual abuse and harassment. Plus their parents, relatives, etc.

You think naming some claim "obviously" is an argument?

It was an observation. Good laws exist, despite vague boundaries surrounding all areas of human behavior.

Again: Of course, it is possible to govern public behavior. But if this governing includes governing of speech, it cannot be, by construction, precise enough to meet the elementary criteria of a state of law.

It's routine, done all the time. Terroristic threats, false warnings of danger, slander and lies, talking really loudly and disturbing the peace, harassing phone calls, all illegal, no problem.

Accosting someone on the street is public behavior. It can be governed.

And if the only way to stop crime is to imprison everybody - - -

An equally stupid claim, but unlike yours nobody is making it.

The quote is certainly not an advocacy of rape and murder threats against children.

Uh, yes, it is - at least, it's an advocacy of allowing others to make such threats. Just strangers enjoying their free speech, after all.

instead of what I see as trying to... shall we say, "extend the scope of the context" specifically from rape survivors and other women, to the general public - of which vulnerable women are definitely a part of, but not the whole.

What women do you imagine to be not vulnerable to abuse and harassment on the street?

 

[mtf]

Mtf asked me earlier how it can be fixed.. Stop normalising it, stop dismissing it and start recognising this is a problem and educate our children about how and why this is wrong.

It's not clear that the way some women's rights activists are going about this is actually reducing the number of rapes and rape threats.

It's not clear whether slogans like this
http://madibengtimes.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/STOP-RAPE-NOW-280_1449290a.jpg
http://dmanewsdesk.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/stop-rape-delhi.jpg
actually lead to a decrease in violence against women.

Trauma like that can and often causes severe depression which yes, does sometimes lead to suicide. Her life was ruined because she was raped. She opted to kill herself to not suffer the pain that goes with being raped. A lot of rape victims suffer and a lot commit suicide as a result. What could she have done? I don't know. I can't give you the answer to that question because I haven't found it yet. Some opt to go a day at a time and for others, they cannot cope with it. Hence the tragedy.

You should have an answer to that question.

You don't have the moral highground if you can't actually solve the world's problems.

 

[mtf]

I don't question your goals, but I question the efficacy of the methods with which you propose to attain those goals.

As long as people believe that happiness or satisfaction in life is to be sought in various material pursuits and as long as we live in a universe with limited resources, this long will there also eventually be theft, lying, robbery, assault, rape, murder.
IOW, the problem underlying rape is much bigger than just "men hating women."

 

[iceaura]

You don't have the moral highground if you can't actually solve the world's problems.

Nonsense. For starters, it's not the world's problems in this situation - it's your neighbor's problems, your town's problems, your problems. In the second place, no one can solve the world's problems - that doesn't mean everyone occupies the same moral turf. Some people, some times, have the moral high ground. The people who justify and protect the harassing of women on the street are not among them, in this matter.

the problem underlying rape is much bigger than just "men hating women."

The problem of men hating women is not small. There is no "just" to append to it.

I don't question your goals, but I question the efficacy of the methods with which you propose to attain those goals.

Your suggestions, for better methods of attaining the shared goals, can be provided here.

 

[mtf]

Nonsense. For starters, it's not the world's problems in this situation -

it's your neighbor's problems, your town's problems, your problems.

... also known as the "world's problems," ie. the problems one encounters living in this world.

Some people, some times, have the moral high ground.

If they cannot offer a viable and actionable solution to a problem, then they do not have the moral highground.

The problem of men hating women is not small. There is no "just" to append to it.

Why don't you read what I said?
As long as people believe that happiness or satisfaction in life is to be sought in various material pursuits and as long as we live in a universe with limited resources, this long will there also eventually be theft, lying, robbery, assault, rape, murder.
IOW, the problem underlying rape is much bigger than just "men hating women."