Since when do MEN get to tell us how we should feel about rape?

[politicat]

Yes, I'm pissed, and yes, I just went off.

The post that started it is here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2166180&mesg_id=2166402

The Poster basically said that we don't have the right to feel violated, horrified or hurt if we are raped because it's a crime of violence and should be treated like any other crime of violence. The psychological aspects of the crime should be ignored, quoth HE. Like he's likely to ever be raped, or for that matter felt up on a crowded train, pressured into an inappropriate relationship to keep a job, forced to make the decision between having sex with someone or being homeless with two kids in tow... I know these things happen to men, but they're so rare in comparison, and so disconnected from the way most men live their lives that they don't know what our lives are like.

The response I just posted and don't feel like taking down is here...http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2166180&mesg_id=2166539

Yes, rape has a violent component, but the more I think about it, the more I think that it is primarily a form of psychological torture, the pain of the physical violence and harm being secondary to the dehumanization that accompanies rape. I beleive it is primarily a tool used by men against women to "keep us in our places" by doing their best to make us feel wrong, corrupted and depersonalized.

But I don't think men should be allowed to tell us how to feel about it. That's like having the master tell the slave how the slave should feel about being enslaved.

[lukasahero]

1. You did an excellent job rebutting his comment

I was even more horrified at his suggestion that it's really only our "puritanical" ideas about sex that make it such a terrible crime. (Does that ring of "shut up, you know you really like it" to anyone else but me?)

I am not entering the fray - I can't - it's way to personal. That said, I alerted on his post.

[politicat]

2. don't do anything that would hurt you.

Thanks for alerting.

That's how it struck me, too - if we weren't so Victorian about sex, we wouldn't feel it was so bad to be raped. Obviously someone who has never been there.

(Now I need to go get copies of those replies, because I think I'm feeling a research paper coming on.)

[ismnotwasm]

3. Why would any man even want to think like that?

He didn't make sense. Maybe intoxicated? Bringing the topic of rape in the same sentence on "Victorian prudishness" is weird.

I posted a sentence on one of the now very tiresome porn threads about victorian porn.
I didn't say what it entailed. It of course was in the form of banned books, but I read a history and synopsis or so of it and the pornography was very sadistic, with the male overcoming the female with rape, torture and bondage. VERY popular in the Victorian age. The female would ultimetly enjoy this treament, as evidenced by orgasms.

So not only was the response odd, it's historically inaccurate. Rape was not unknown in the "Victorian" age. Nor was Porn, prostitution, degragation of women. And the concept of women-as-property was alive and well.

I think this convienent ignoring of the history of rape is very strange, and I don't understand it. The information and history is available. The studies are available. The statistics are available. The stories are available. Many men have a loved one who has been raped.

The rapist is unrealized/realized sadist, he is an insecure male, he is an inadequate human being, he is a socio-path, he is a mysogynist. He "wins" at life by overpowering his victim, the physically weaker,or in fear for her life because of a weapon, woman. The evidence of the "win" is in the rape. (He is also a disgusting thief because he violently steals what should be considered, and given as, a gift--to paraphrase Stephan Donaldson)
There is a little evidence of latent homosexuallity in rapists. (Very little but the premise is that the rapist acts out of unacceptable yearnings, a form of projection)
Another book I had but gave away to my regret, "Why men Rape- A case study" Where I got some of this information.

Look at the thread on this board on the Handl case. How the victim was treated. How the defense tried to make the rapist the victim. And that is classic rape defense. The Norm.
You did good, and thank you

[smirkymonkey]

10. Or maybe he's just another f-ing sexist idiot.

Occam's Razor and all, you know.

[ismnotwasm]

11. Yeah

I don't know why I expect more.
It's bad when I'm at the point where I'm making excuses for severe thinking impairments or just plain ol' all too commom sexism. Maybe it was the topic.

[Warpy]

4. I remember having this very discussion in real life

back in the 1960s with a very nice but very blockheaded young man. By the end of the discussion, he not only wished he'd never opened his mouth, he was thoroughly ashamed of himself.

I wish I could remember what I said to him. I do know it was both pithy and pungent.

Men go around thinking they know who we are, how we live, and how we feel about things. They will never, ever experience any of it and most of them will never ask us about any of it, they just "know." Shattering this wall of arrogance and false knowledge is one of the biggest tasks we ever have in dealing with them.

Women, on the other hand, really do know quite a lot about the lives men lead, since we spend so much time as the invisible person in a room observing them.

Kudos to Politicat and the others who tried to educate this clod. Rape is the ultimate hate crime, and that's the component we understand all too well and they always fail to grasp.

[MountainLaurel]

17. What a great statement

Women, on the other hand, really do know quite a lot about the lives men lead, since we spend so much time as the invisible person in a room observing them.

I had never considered the issue this way, but you are so right, in multiple contexts. My best friend in undergrad (where I was a journalism major) once said something, in teasing, to the effect of "You damn journalists, just sitting there taking everything in, and not saying anything." I picked up the habit as a kid, growing up in a family where "seen and not heard" was the mantra. But I learned more about my mom and other family members sitting in the kitchen watching and listening when I was a child than I ever did in actual conversation. And, when the men were there, the women tended to be much more subdued, particularly the kids.

[bloom]

5. I was just reading

"The Conversations of Consent: Sexual Intimacy Without Sexual Assault"

http://www.teachingsexualethics.org/writing/conversations.htm


That Katherine had posted... That poster needs some serious re-education. He should start by reading that.


And I think this business - that seems to be gaining popularity on DU that woman are sexist because of our "visceral response to rape" and other ridiculous reasons just goes to show you how ridiculous DU is getting. The misogynists seem to be getting more empowered for some reason.

[Warpy]

6. All those antichoice candidates the DLC is scraping up

might be one of the reasons. Men always find it all too easy to sell our rights out, and will do so even when there isn't any sort of quid pro quo to sweeten the deal.

They really think we'll vote for antichoice candidates on the strength of how good they look on men's issues. This arrogance is being echoed by clueless males on DU more and more.

It's amazing how they think the party can win without working people and without women.

[femrap]

8. Do you think it's just the DLC or all of the Dems?

I remember Dean saying something that sounded fairly anti-choice a while back....

I know there was a pro-choice women running for Senate and was booted out in Pennsylvania...damn...why can't I ever remember her name? I was pissed about that....but did it get any coverage at all? It was something similar to what happened to Hackett and all his macho buddies were howling for weeks...hell, they still might be. (As an aside, I never trusted Hackett's pro-choice stance...I have seen him treat women condescendingly and insultingly....and hey Sherrod is rated 100% by NARAL).

Who else is the DLC proposing that is anti-choice?

I had a sort of ephinany last summer when Johnny Bob Taliban was going thru his nomination process for the Supreme Court....Most of the Dems don't care one jot if Roe vs. Wade is overturned. They really don't. I haven't given a cent to the Dem Party since....and I don't think I ever will until they put the ERA back on their platform. I'll just money directly to pro-choice candidates and groups that support women.

I do have to commend Skinner though...last summer he posted on the front page that if NARAL and PP say Johnny Bob is bad, that should be enough for all Democrats to fight him. He was pissed at the majority of posters who were saying the Roberts was a done deal.

But men don't get pregnant and they don't face unwanted pregnancies as we do....but that doesn't mean they can't be educated. Hell, if I can train my cat, we can educate and enlighten a DU male poster....right?

Hey, has anyone checked out 'Women's Voices, Women Vote?' www.wvwv.com or it might be org. I printed out their 85 page report on unmarried voters...women are a huge voting bloc...and when they vote, they vote Democratic...but the Dems seem to be more interested in running after the 'angry white male.'

[Katherine Brengle]

7. Rape is a violent crime that uses sex AS a weapon--

this is what those asshats don't seem to understand.

[femrap]

9. The thread is now locked....

right in the middle of your post, I think.

You certainly educated the DUers!

[politicat]

13. Was it the entire thread, or just the subthread?

I had a blood donation appointment and a meeting this afternoon and evening, so I haven't been constantly at my computer.

Ah, well. Glad I copied and pasted it into a text file.

[Hello_Kitty]

12. His argument is bogus.

He says that rape is so traumatizing for women due to paternalistic, Victorian attitudes toward sexuality and women's purity. OK, but rape is every bit as traumatizing and degrading when it happens to men, as it so often does in prison or other isolated and deprived settings. Yet men are permitted far more sexual freedom in most cultures, and the idea of a man being 'ruined' in the same sense as that is perceived in women is unthinkable.

I agree with your response, politicat. Even in the most enlightened society, there is no way that forced sexual acts on another human being would ever be anything less than physical and psychological torture.

[bliss_eternal]

14. It's been deleted--what did the idiot say?

I just clicked on your first link, and it's no longer there. The thread has been locked, too--so I'm not sure how long they will allow this thread to exist...

:hug: From one that knows how frustrating battling in the GD trenches can be. :hi:

[politicat]

15. In essence....

to the best of my knowledge - and this is not verbatim - the argument was this: he
basically said that women should view rape as a crime of violence, rather than a sexual crime, and if we would just do
so, we wouldn't feel shame or horror at being raped. He also said something to the effect that the only reason we felt
shame or horror at being raped is because of the Victorian prudery of our sexual mores.

I think the concept he was trying to get across was that, if we women would just be more openminded and accepting of sex,
we would feel less badly about rape.

Sorry I don't have the originals. I should have copied the whole thread, but I was mad and didn't think.

[bliss_eternal]

18. Wow--what a bunch of horseshit...

Where do some of these guys get this crap? It boggles my mind. :crazy:

Sorry that I missed it, politicat. I would have supported you had I seen it. Thank you for filling me in on what I missed. I appreciate it. I'm very sorry that you had to endure such idiocy. As one that's fought it out in GD I know you reach a point you can't even think straight...

:hug:

[NMMNG]

16. I see

So if I were to tie him up, strip him naked, slap him around, repeatedly shove a broom handle up his anus, fondle his genitals, and force him to tell me how much he enjoyed it....

That would be no different than if I were to steal his wallet at gunpoint (while thumping him upside the head with the gun for good measure)?


I get the picture. :sarcasm:

[Moderator]

19. Lockign per DU rules

Do not use the DU Groups to "rally the troops" to go participate in discussion threads elsewhere on our website, or to likewise encourage members to vote in polls or recommend threads or alert on posts.