Poll: Biased Gender Politics and Violence

[Colour Scientist]

The feminist movement in it's infancy was by and large much more rational than the one we have come to know and love today. It's the other way around really; if anything we are seeing MORE irrational splinter groups today than we did a few years ago.

That's because as a movement it's larger than it was then. Any rapidly growing movement is going to have it's fair share of crazies who graft their own ideals onto the basic beliefs of the movement. Unfortunately, these ones tend to be more vocal and get the most press coverage.

It's like the realively new Men's Rights movement, I suppose. Some of their ideas are perfectly reasonable but it's largely tarnished by its particularly vocal and paranoid members. That and a good deal of it seems to be more of a backlash against feminism rather than a genuine attempt to improve the standing of men with issues such as child custody.

 

[Thaluikhain]

So, I identify as a feminist and I want gender equality but by your broad interpretation of what feminism is I'm obviously lying to myself.

Well, here is the definition of feminism I have found.

"The advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men."

What do you do in the case when women have it better than men? Feminism by definition does not seem to care about those matters which would imply that it doesn't care about true equality.

They aren't of the most pressing concern to feminist, no, but you can't make women equal to men whilst being superior to them.

(in regards to true equality, though, well, there's a discussion in Religion and Politics about gay people's bigotry to bisexuals. Change "gay" to "feminist" and "bisexuals" to more or less another other minoruty group and most of it will fit far too many feminists)

 

[Colour Scientist]

Well, here is the definition of feminism I have found.

"The advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men."

What do you do in the case when women have it better than men? Feminism by definition does not seem to care about those matters which would imply that it doesn't care about true equality.

Ooh, a definition, better abandon my whole belief system.

If you look at my earlier post, I pointed out that a lot of modern feminists push for society to reject traditional gender roles, which includes pushing for men to have more rights when it comes to child custody cases to name one example.

Then again, you can just completely ignore what I'm saying and believe a 16 word definition instead.

 

[Clearing the Eye]

I think violence against women can be quite erotic in certain context. Also against men in similar context, but to a lesser degree. So I guess I'm sexist

 

[occamsnailfile]

What feminists? Name one.

Throw a dart at any random bimbo on TV complaining that men are evil.

Post a clip. Pics or GTFO. This is not actually a thing.

If anyone on this site ever actually talks to a real feminist they'll understand that they do push for gender eqaulity

There's two groups of women pushing for women's rights: Women who are fighting for gender equality, which I have nothing against and support 100%, and feminists. Feminists are just bitches that think men are the cause of all problems. They don't belong to the former group and take those ideals so far to the extreme they're a detriment to society.


Was this always the case? Nope! You can thank the radicals for changing the meaning of feminist in such a way that the only thing that comes to mind when the word is heard is controlling, domineering ***** who hates Y chromosones and the bearers thereof.

Wow, what a complete and total misunderstanding of "feminism" or what the word actually means to people who use it. It's true that a lot of feminist discourse discusses issues of power through the term "patriarchy" but that's because men do still hold a great deal more power, money, and influence in society than women, and the reasons for this are not based on merit but on gender constructions that cause problems for everybody.

Modern feminism also tries to address the limitations of masculinity, to allow men to step down from having to feel in control or be considered un-masculine, to encourage men to step up and become equal partners in marriages in terms of actual interaction within family life (this includes housework, fellas) and to help craft a definition of masculinity that is positive and doesn't just stop at 'not abusing one's partner'.

It also tries to examine the intersections of gender and class, race, etc since nothing is ever only one thing. But hey, it's a lot easier to just dismiss womens' concerns as 'angry feminism' than to try and address all that, that stuff is hard.

I recall reading a news article about domestic violence which reckoned that men were just as likely to be the victims of domestic violence as women, but were less likely to report it and less likely to be taken seriously if they did. Apparently in any verbal confrontation women are 70% more likely to strike the first physical blow.

But back to the OP.

The first part of this is false. DOJ Intimate Partner Violence Survey [http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/ipvus.pdf] scroll down to "reporting" and you'll see that male reports have risen steadily until they have surpassed female reporting rates about seven years ago. Yet men are victimized at far lower rates, also as shown. There is a lot of misuse of certain data sets that find women are not solely passive victims in intimate partner violence but these same studies also find that women are seriously injured or otherwise victimized at seven times the rates of men. Those studies also define any "touch" as the first blow, so you can show someone's arm away and that's counted the same way as shoving someone down the stairs.

Yes, as many others have stated, men can be victimized. It's just much less common, are much less likely to be injured. People also don't automatically assume they're some conniving ***** making up stories to hurt their partner.

 

[mrhappy1489]

This is one of those topics that is not black and white, it's greyer than the inhabitants of the neutral planet. The problem in most situations, is that men are generally significantly or at least moderately more inclined to be larger than women. This means that in most situations of domestic abuse, the culprit fits the bill of a large burley man with an anger problem and the woman as a small helpless victim. Considering this also, women generally then have to employ alternative means with regards to abuse, such as mind games, therefore they may not technically be illegal in the legal sense. This means that while abuse might be dual sided, the significant percentage of cases with regards to physical domestic abuse will be overwhelmingly male. To the topic at hand, the whole men not hitting women has been culturally embedded in western society (not from asia, africa or the middle east, I have no idea about their customs) since the days of the chivalric knight and distressed rescue victim and is something that will be with us for a long time (especially considering feminists cling to it with disturbing vigour). As a result, women will always be the victim in the eye of the public and what they do to us can never be reciprocated.

If I had my way, no one would be treated any differently no matter the gender, with a case to case basis being used with regards to abuse (like whether she was abused continuously until she snapped and stabbed him). This won't happen for a long time and men are just going to have to accept that, we treated women/gays/blacks/anyone with such vigorous hate and oppression that we will just have to ride it out until the world is truly equal. That day will never come, but it is nice to hold onto hope for change.

 

[Thaluikhain]

It's true that a lot of feminist discourse discusses issues of power through the term "patriarchy" but that's because men do still hold a great deal more power, money, and influence in society than women, and the reasons for this are not based on merit but on gender constructions that cause problems for everybody.

And on the flip side if you look at the bottommost rungs of society you'll find that men dominate that section of society too.

Men do tend to dominate every rung of society, yes, though I doubt that's what you meant.

 

[Navvan]

So, I identify as a feminist and I want gender equality but by your broad interpretation of what feminism is I'm obviously lying to myself.

Well, here is the definition of feminism I have found.

"The advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men."

What do you do in the case when women have it better than men? Feminism by definition does not seem to care about those matters which would imply that it doesn't care about true equality.

"Equal to men" is the key point there. It does not say equal or better, which implicitly means that it includes (or should in an ideal sense) the rights of men should be equal to women. To put it in a more blunt way, 1 is not equal to 2 in the same way 1 is not equal to 0. I'm not saying there aren't some people out there who hijack the feminist title who are actually misandrists but that is not what the movement is about. That said I don't see why its such a issue to call oneself an equalist instead, but it is a synonym to feminist.

OT: Violence is an inexcusable action (unless in self defense) for anybody to commit. Those acts of violence against you should have been punished, and you should (and legally are) able to defend yourself from such acts. So long as you do not use excessive force (e.g. break their face for drawing blood with a pencil). Retaliatory violence should be your last course of action, but it is an option.

 

[occamsnailfile]

It's true that a lot of feminist discourse discusses issues of power through the term "patriarchy" but that's because men do still hold a great deal more power, money, and influence in society than women, and the reasons for this are not based on merit but on gender constructions that cause problems for everybody.

And on the flip side if you look at the bottommost rungs of society you'll find that men dominate that section of society too.

Men do tend to dominate every rung of society, yes, though I doubt that's what you meant.

The fact that underclass men continue to hold the majority of the scraps even at that level is in fact considered part of the problem. It means that women at the lowest rungs of society have even less support or ability to escape an abusive relationship.

Wow, what a complete and total misunderstanding of "feminism" or what the word actually means to people who use it. It's true that a lot of feminist discourse discusses issues of power through the term "patriarchy" but that's because men do still hold a great deal more power, money, and influence in society than women, and the reasons for this are not based on merit but on gender constructions that cause problems for everybody.

So, why do they hold a great deal more power, money and influence? This should be fun.

Educate yourself, don't ask a woman to do your work.

 

[Eamar]

No, that's not what I meant.

What I meant is that feminists are clawing to get to the top but they don't seem to want to fix what is going on in the bottom.

In the UK men account for 97.4% of workplace deaths.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workplace_safety

This source says men comprise almost 2/3 of all homeless people.

http://www.humanneeds.vcu.edu/Page.aspx?nav=29&scope=0&source=13

True, but those things aren't caused by feminism.

The workplace deaths thing is caused by societal expectations which dictate that these more dangerous jobs are "male." The same expectations that feminists oppose and seek to remove, so I don't really see what point you're trying to make? According to feminist ideals, women would be just as acceptable as, say, construction workers, as men. No feminist is trying to keep women away from these jobs, quite the opposite in fact.

The homeless statistic is more relevant however. I'm obviously not an expert, but I'd imagine the lack of male shelters is a factor, so yes that's something that should be addressed.

Of course, the real priorities in these cases should be to reduce workplace deaths and homelessness, regardless of gender.

 

[ninjaRiv]

Good lord... How about "real life violence is bad, end of story?"

A woman beating a man is the same as a man beating a woman. If you're about to tell me how wrong I am, give me a minute.

It's the same in the vaguest sense; it's violence. Each case should, of course, be judged on it's own. There are reports of women doing horrible things to men. And yeah, statistics show that more men are violent and I believe that. All the same, though, violence is bad! It's bad! No, violence! BAD VIOLENCE! Violence, of any form, should be left to fiction (in an ideal world).

But this is NOT and ideal world so if a woman tries to stab you, you do what you'd do if a man tried to stab you; get out of the fucking way and hit them until they stop moving. Or run away. I don't know, something to save yourself.

 

[Dastardly]

The fact that underclass men continue to hold the majority of the scraps even at that level is in fact considered part of the problem. It means that women at the lowest rungs of society have even less support or ability to escape an abusive relationship.

Wow. Did you just say because more men are at the bottom rungs of society, they need more help and that is a problem for women?

That's not what I read.

What I see here is "Because even at the bottom rungs of society, men tend to have more of the money and power. Women at the same rung have even fewer resources than women of "higher" stations, so it's that much harder for them to escape abusive relationships."

Nothing was said against men. Seems to me it's simply stating that in lower socioeconomic groups, the power differential between men and women tends to be more dramatic.

(If I have a million dollars, and you have ten million dollars, it's numerically a huge difference... but in terms of status, it's not big at all. I have all the money I need to do what I want, regardless of the fact that you have ten times as much money.

If I have five hundred dollars, and you have a thousand, though. Sure, it's only twice as much, and even then only in the amount of $500 difference... but the difference is far greater in terms of who has the power. I could afford rent, and that's it (if even). You could afford rent and a car payment.

That's the principle I believe Occam is talking about)

 

[Thaluikhain]

No, that's not what I meant.

What I meant is that feminists are clawing to get to the top but they don't seem to want to fix what is going on in the bottom.

In the UK men account for 97.4% of workplace deaths.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workplace_safety

This source says men comprise almost 2/3 of all homeless people.

http://www.humanneeds.vcu.edu/Page.aspx?nav=29&scope=0&source=13

Not usually directly, no.

The citations given for workplace safety didn't work so I can't really say where they got their stats from. But feminists have been quite active in ending the discrimination against women working in more dangerous professions (mining and the military come to mind) and also dealing with the sort of mindset that says men should be willing to put themselves in danger. With mixed success, though.

As to homelessness in the US, I can't really say. I had thought there were more veterans in there though.