Process, Ethics, and Justice: An Inauspicious Note Regarding the Politics of Rape Culture

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Tiassa, Dec 17, 2017.

  1. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

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    Well I have changed my behavior, I gave list of recommendations on how men can avoid causing sexual harrasment, so what is the problem?

    Done and done, covered in rule #1 on my list. Next.

    So Kitta' is a rapist now? When did "I don't want to be raped" translate into "Do not question me ever" it almost seems like a emotional weapon, like you are taking the issue of rape and using it as a power play.

    Oh boy watch me interspect: I have a desire to be loved and to love, but these desire makes me helpless to the whims of others, co-dependent, used and abused, therefor this desire must be suppressed, redirected or ameliorated via artificial means that I can produce self-sufficiently. Free of that desire I can live independent and content, with my furry dick-girl hentai.
     
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  3. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Does nothing to stop simple browser scripts.

    It is exactly what I'm talking about - it is a failure from day one. Do you really think people are so far removed from what they are taught growing up? If someone is taught to view women as an object, how do you think they will act as an adult?

    Good grief... yeah, this is why I don't bother with you.
    Then what is the solution, Bells? So far, all you have put forth is "stop doing it". That isn't a solution. That isn't going to stop the ones that are going to do it.

    Ah, so now I'm a rapist - quite the bold claim, Bells. I would call bullshit but, well, I already know you don't care to dwell on facts.


    Indeed, because as much as you dislike it, it's the simple, ugly truth - telling someone "don't rape people" isn't going to fix this issue.

    Simple - you can't even make a rebuttal without resorting to fallacy and ad hominem attack, Bells.

    So you are saying I have no responsibility to stop others? Cool - then by virtue of the fact that I don't rape people I have not embraced rape culture.

    C'mon Bells - certainly you get the foolishness of that statement.

    By teaching young men (and women) that other human beings have value? That their wants and desires are important? That affirmative consent is important?

    I'm the one hurling insults:

    I am addressing it - I'm addressing the very foundation of it. You are just telling people to stop doing it. The day your "solution" works, let me know, kay?

    Oh, hey, lookit that - more slanderous bullshit from Bells. Shocker. Yeah, I don't see any reason to engage someone as insincere in discussion, because there can be no discussion when one side is intent on slander and bald faced deception. Quit twisting words and maybe you will find people aren't as hostile towards you Bells.

    As I said - if someone wants to actually work towards a solution, then lets do so.
     
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  5. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    So you posit that Rape would not happen if "Men saw women as equal to themselves"...

    So, then, since you seem determined to harp on this false premise -

    What is the cause of rape when a woman rapes a man? I presume you must intend for there to be a different cause than "society seeing women as worth less than a man"?
     
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  7. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Lets take it a step further:

    https://www.theodysseyonline.com/actually-you-can-teach-boys-not-to-rape?utm_expid=.oW2L-b3SQF-m5a-dPEU77g.0&utm_referrer=https://www.google.com/

    So, again, we have this idea that this must be taught early, and it must be taught correctly. Teach that other people have value (and not just other men, ffs) and that their wants and needs are just as important as your own.

    Should be self explanatory.

    Ah, this ties into the Affluenza case again - if, from a young age, someone is taught that they are "above" having to take responsibility for their actions, then guess what - they will grow up to think they are above the law! This ties in with the next one:

    Again, we have generations of people that were taught that higher social status means a reduction in penalties. That needs to not be true, and that starts by teaching them that their actions have consequences!

    The highlighted part is important - let us teach young men that they can be powerful in healthy and productive ways. Lets show them and teach them a new definition of masculinity, that isn't the "shove her to the bed and take what you want" style from the sixties era movies ala James Bond.

    Entitlement is a helluva drug, and we've had numerous cases in the last few years where someone felt entitled to something from another, and so went and just took it... and then they got off with very little, if any, consequences. That needs to stop.

    So, to get back to my post that set Bells off so -

    Lets stop teaching kids to bottle everything up until it explodes. Lets stop teaching kids that it is okay to just take what they want because they are stronger. Lets stop teaching kids that either gender is "stronger" or "weaker", or that one must be subservient to the other.

    Instead, let us start teaching them, from a young age, proper outlets and proper etiquette.

    Lets kill rape culture in the most permanent way possible - by raising future generations to turn away from such decisions.

    In the interim, well, we will need laws and punishments, equitably met out, to discourage those that, for whatever reason, may otherwise be tempted. Much like we need laws against murder and drunk driving and other things that, really, should be common sense.

    EDIT So, again - if you want to discuss and work towards solutions, lets do so. If you want to muckrake and point accusations and generally whinge about things... well, you have two other threads to do that in, go do so there.
     
  8. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    The big challenge within this is the address of privilege in general; whether it is a pro football player stealing donuts because he's stoned and hungry, or an international financier chasing chambermaids. Because it's not just the spectacular. Culture of privilege is generally pervasive; there are days it seems everybody wants a piece. There is a level of office management, for instance, where certainly this person isn't bourgeoisie proper but they're going to try to act like it. Sometimes it is pressure from above; sometimes it just is.

    Here's another challenge, one that actually might even be larger, but is even more difficult to classify: People behaving according to culture of privilege and entitlement generally view what they are doing as some manner of necessity or other natural outcome that has nothing to do with privilege or entitlement. Go back and read Russell Simmons' statement↱, for instance, and wonder as sarcastically as you might or not why (ahem!) the innocent so frequently behave just like the guilty. I mean, Simmons issued a terrible statement; and when they lead like that, watch for the hook: In the first paragraph he denies the allegations and asserts all his relations are consensual. The second paragraph asserts his innocence and attacks others. The third paragraph acknowledges his exposure while shining himself up as some sort of sacrificial hero. It's an awful statement, and, damn it, his attorneys, at least, can be reasonably expected to know how terrible it is.

    Imagine for a moment, please, someone who is not Mr. Simmons. Imagine a star staging a sham marriage to a fifteen year-old; it was "consensual". Or denigrating sexual relations with an underage girl including the manufacture of child pornography; that, too, was "consensual". And now there is a story circulating that he keeps a small harem, but even the alleged victims are pushing back, so that, too, is "consensual". Society will need a lot more to move on that last, but even if we can prove he is guilty, as we already know with the other issues, process did not achieve justice. And in this case, there are some strange results; I encountered the other day a subsequent artist borrowing from the star, and for the sake of our own senses of irony, doing so in an explicitly "romantic" context. Now, I get it, though: It's "okay", as such, to keep working with and paying tribute to the star because we had process and he was not convicted. But that's the thing; we all know he's guilty. Process is as process does.

    This is part of why, in the face of the crisis, some will fall back to "process" instead of "justice". Process is important; it is part of justice. You weren't specifically wrong to ask↗ about the context of whether "legal procedures are or should lead to justice"; it's just that the answer is a known affirmative value insofar as that is supposed to be the point of due process, and, the question of whether process is justice is one of those fundamental building blocks.

    So part of what is happening is that it is not supposed to be okay. Stars are already called out for working with Woody Allen; soon enough they will be called out about R. Kelly, or will they?

    The normalization of predatory behavior manifests itself in many forms. It’s not yet clear how the black community will respond to the news that icons like Russell Simmons and Tavis Smiley are among those men who have been accused of sexual misconduct. (Both deny the accusations.) Unlike when the accusations were made against Harvey Weinstein, however, we have yet to see a flood of prominent figures publicly stand with the victims. What is clear is that too many of us still perform mental gymnastics, of the sort deployed during Woody Allen movies, to justify attending R. Kelly concerts, despite years of reports about him victimizing young girls. For some of us, the basis for this cognitive dissonance was established at a very young age.

    (Hubbard↱)

    In other questions, I sometimes point to an old article about Islam and tyranny, but the underlying device seems hard for people to grasp; the author, Yvonne Y. Haddad↱, begins by exploring the idea that, "the time has come to try Islam"; for our purposes, what she meant in 1982 was that various political archetypes were trying on Islamic trappings in hopes of achieving this or that. And, indeed, rape culture, like any such dynamically nebulous idea as authority and especially tyranny, can express itself in particular forms according to circumstance; the shape of such perpetual transition and flux includes reflection of its constraints. So if we run through government tyranny, like Stalinism, Nazism, two-bit strongmanning, and so on: Why not Islam? Well, now we know what it looks like when Stalinism dresses up in Islamic robes, and, these years later Iraq is now mired in post-counterrevolutionary Islamism, which is its own fascinating question that is hard to define; I recall Riesebrodt's comparative examination of fundamentalism among American Christians and Iranian Muslims; I might wonder if in twenty years I might read an article comparing whatever Daa'ish becomes to tales of the Official IRA falling into gluttonous mobster habits manipulating construction, sanitation, and transportation contracts, versus the Provisional IRA seemingly continuing to fight, and I have no idea what to make of what I call the "spacemonkey" element.

    And if I had a better library on rape culture, I could probably write a similar paragraph about variations on the theme. But it's true; rape culture has common ingredients about its iterations, but reflects its circumstance. Shanita Hubbard's↱ tale defies me; I cannot conceive of living this way, yet I already know it happens in my society.

    I came to believe—wrongly—that a person can be a victim only if those committing the offenses against her had great power. By any definition, the corner guys had very little power—and they themselves were victims of those who did. They were victims of a type of power that drove through that same intersection, snatched people away from their families and out of the community for decades. This type of power could stop and frisk them, and return to its patrol cars and proceed with its day. On a good day, if these guys were alone and remained silent without resisting, the consequences wouldn’t be as severe. A few cops would pull up, pat them down, curse at them, beat them up and scream for them to get off the corner. On other days, especially if the corner guys were in a large group, things could escalate quickly. Sometimes a corner dude wouldn’t make it home that night.

    This state-sanctioned abuse at the hands of police evoked, and continues to evoke, a community response that literally and figuratively calls for the protection of these young men, and rightfully so. A community is right to fight against over-policing and brutality. It should encourage victims of police violence to speak up and put pressure on local politicians to take a stand.

    But when your community fights for those same people who terrorize you, it sends a very complicated and mixed message. Even worse, sometimes the community members fighting back consist of young women who were once the little girls walking home from school doing their best to be invisible in hopes of avoiding what nobody ever called sexual assault. This sends the message that your pain is not a priority. It tells you that perhaps you are not a victim, because those who are harming you are also being harmed and we need to focus our energy on protecting them. After all, their lives are at stake.

    Sometimes my job is to pay attention and learn.

    And there are times when it is clear: What I have learned is to not begin to speculate about "rape culture in the [_____] community", because functional valences of intersectional truth reveal and reiterate with kliegs and neon and inherent radioactive spectra, that it all starts with empowerment. That is the one element of Hubbard's tale I can grasp in a familiar context. And I already know the corner guys aren't just black. In another community they're Hispanic. That legendary white working class has a corner here and there, too; the underlying question transcends those identifiers; in many cases the identifiers might be helpful because they point us to the historical base for a given iteration, but the actual phenomenon we're chasing is more fundamental and seemingly universal.

    Some days, then, we remember what we have learned because it is important to learning something new.

    So we start by making our stand, here and now. It's the first "only" thing we can do. Understanding what is going on is extraordinarily difficult, which becomes all the more reason that here and now is the where and when. But if you can imagine some day in which rape culture is an isolated and understood minority attitude, that civilized society has somehow largely transcended and figured out the real definition of having better things to do, or whatever vague phrase we might use, then it ought to be somewhat apparent that when we get there, the solutions will be a bit easier to conceive, or, at the least, recognize particular shapes of. We need to get there, first.
     
  9. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    Notes on #25↑ Above

    Haddad, Yvonne Y. "The Islamic Alternative". The Link, v. 15, n. 4. September/October, 1982. AMEU.org. 18 December 2017. http://bit.ly/1KB97vq

    Hubbard, Shanita. "Russell Simmons, R. Kelly, and Why Black Women Can’t Say #MeToo". The New York Times. 15 December 2017. NYTimes.com. 18 Deceember 2017. http://nyti.ms/2CXp8jK

    Simmons, Russell. "Russell Simmons's Statement on Rape Allegations". The New York Times. 13 December 2017. NYTimes.com. 18 December 2017. http://nyti.ms/2zke8Nl
     
  10. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

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    Oh please everyone knows that can't happen.

    The fundamental problems is people want to fuck, but for some reason they just can tell each other that, say "no thanks" or "yes, thank you" like an offer of sex was a glass of water. Instead we have courtship rituals, but modern technology and society have changed things. The standard "women flirts and man propositions" or "a man chases and a women leads him on" is going out the window, good riddance I say, it was a disgusting system of innuendo and much misinterpretation, before a women would say no and the man had to re-propose until she said yes, now she calls HR and he never has a good job again. Imagine if Michell Obama did that to Barrack when he played that game and she finally relented to his propositions?

    Now with women able to destroy a man at a whim, with a tweet, men simply have to stop proposing. But what if she wants him, well she can just ask, he can accept or reject and then she better not ask again. Or she can go to a dating site or app and swipe right. Men can use those sites too, no more propositioning women even for a cup of coffee sometime, no more pickup lines, no more hassle, for both sides. Thanks to technology the old game is obsolete and frankly was morally questionable anyways.
     
  11. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    #rapeculture | #persecutor

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    Click for alien intelligence.

    Getting so wrapped up in your personal disputes as to require fallacy in order to complain about false premise doesn't really help anyone.

    What she said translates more directly in your reformulation as men would not rape women because men would see women as human beings.

    This is why—

    —you need to stop trying to tell people what they think.

    It's not that I don't get the rhetorical maneuver; nor would I say it is, as an abstract concept, utterly without utility of merit; however, when you're erecting sosobra to burn—inventing a point of dispute—instead of identifying any substantial vector of genuine dispute according to what is there, it just doesn't work.

    In this case, you extended that men would not rape women into "rape would not happen"; that one didn't work.

    Not entirely a digression: I might be a bit confounded by your focus on the superficial politics; maybe it stands out to me because I recently failed to recognize currents taking place beneath the superficial politics; in any case, it seems problematic to me because you're opting for disputes of immediate context that only make things worse when you lose and generally only tread water at best if you win. And here I can remind that the history of political struggle is a history of class struggle, and remind that intersectionality reminds that men and women have common cause in this such that wasting time on superficial status quo politicking only further empowers the "them" we all supposedly tremble and scrape and suffer for. But, actually, I would simply point to the difference between that and personalized fallacy. Consider, please, that your and my discourse over drinks and a nice table with maps and charts spread out to show how smart we are, forty-two stories up in our shared tower of privilege, is for every woman you know an existential discussion, a perpetual storm. Our glib bullshitting represents our regard for their human condition. And the thing is that you virtually cannot be unaware of how quickly some men will absolutely bawl about disrespect for their existential condition because, you know, men are the real victims here, the dirty feminist whatnot and whozat, and all that.

    And again maybe there is easily accessible sympathy about what they say, but like many general frameworks we might wonder at the value of letting those unreliable arguments set the definitions.

    "What is the cause of rape when a woman rapes a man?" Well, how specific do we wish to get? At some point you'd have to ask a woman who raped a man. The general devices of empowerment expressed through sexual conduct actually translate fairly consistently, though I also understand there is a really complicated discourse to be very delicately derived from obscure data having to do with the differences about the relationships between men and women to empowerment according to the environment in which their conduct is forged. That is to say, I think it's pretty much the same except to some degree we can't figure the difference 'twixt women learning to express themselves as such from men compared to what happens in a white-room context and how the behavior works. More directly, it is really hard to find a sample range of heterosexual, female-dominant rape behavior arising in a context of dominant feminine societal empowerment. But, yeah, within the framework we have, it's largely specialized exploitation; it sometimes looks strange because of the application of terms—(e.g., "reproductive coercion")—but that is part of the point about learning to unwind the mind and rethread the head.

    No, really: The difference 'twixt penetration and being penetrated seems significant to me, but I also come from a time and societal outlook justifying the Guardians of Female Chastity according to a basic difference 'twixt men and women that much of the masculinist counterargument seems to ... I don't know, it's difficult to explain their not-quite disregard for it, except they might be jealous, which, y'know, c'mon, that can't really be, can it, because wouldn't something like that pretty much make the point in and of itself? But I also come from a time with the stud/whore double standard, and it is similarly invested. No, really, it comes down to superstition and ignorance, and the aesthetics of being able to wash our cocks in the sink versus what filth did whoever put in her. And it all will come up along the way, because it's part of the story. And it even fucks up men's regard for what counts as being raped by a woman. But if we're going to figure those parts out, this needs to be about rape culture itself, not the superficial politics that bear testament to its power, nor the petty politics of personality and pride. Meanwhile, it is clear we men have never really settled those old superstitions about women's bodies; I don't expect we can simply drop such ballast, walk away, and forget.

    But that's also the thing. When a woman rapes a man? There seem to be many aspects that are pretty much the same, but the power dynamic has a mysterious valence about it we have a hard time figuring in large part for sampling difficulty, and there will be particular differences when we look at the nature of particular rape behavior.

    If, however, you're only asking in order to get a hook out of a fallacy, then it's not really a helpful question, is it?
     
  12. Bells Staff Member

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    Which is again not what you were talking about in that post. You discussed everything but rape culture in that post, hence why I asked what did it have to do with rape culture.

    You seem to be jumping from one thing to the other to try to justify your position. You seem to be confusing wealth and privilege tied to wealth, with rape culture, despite the fact that rape culture has nothing to do with the distribution of wealth. I gave you a basic definition of rape culture, the bare minimum, if you will. And that exists in all levels of society, regardless of the distribution of wealth. It's on its own, it exists within its own sphere within society, while affecting everything else. It is invasive and entrenched. Understand now?

    And this latest response does deal with rape culture. But that is not what you were attempting to discuss originally. Hence why I questioned what it had to do with rape culture.

    When you partake in said culture, for example, look at your responses in the Franken thread and the justifications you were making for the sake of politics, then the solution does start with you. You are the one doing it, you are the one protecting said culture when you do it. Fixing it starts small and it starts with each individual. You seem to think that laws can be passed, etc, to stop it. That's not how it works. It will take a societal shift, where each member of society has to change, has to shift their embracing it. It starts with not making excuses for it, not protecting it, not ensuring it be allowed to continue, such as with your argument of throwing women up shit creek for the sake of politics. Understand now?

    I'll give you an example that applies to male victims. Rape culture is embraced in the criminal justice system. How many times have you heard jokes about not dropping the soap in prison? How many times have you heard comments about how a paedophile or rapist is going to get their own in prison (ie, be raped into oblivion in prison) for their crimes? It is a tacit approval of rape as a weapon against those we deem less worthy. Now, when applied to women, how many times have you heard comments about how a woman should not walk alone at night, that she's just asking for it, for example? How many stories have there been about police or lawyers questioning a woman about what she was doing there at that time of the night, after she had been raped, in the sense that she was putting herself out there and somehow or other, shares some of the blame. The same applies, because it is a tacit approval of rape as a tool to teach these women a lesson. Tiassa linked a post in the Al Franken thread, when I asked about "due process for who?".. He linked to the story of Jill Meagher, a young woman who was raped and murdered when she was walking down a busy street in Melbourne at 1am, coming home from a night out with work colleagues. When that happened, the question was not about why her rapist and murderer did it (he had prior convictions), but what was she doing there walking home alone at that time of the night, her going out drinking with her friends was 'brought to light'. The focus was turned to her. That is rape culture. And it is pervasive and exists everywhere. It exists for male victims as it does for female victims. It exists when society is willing to overlook sexually groping women for the sake of politics. It exists when you questioned about how to flick that switch.

    Where did I call you a rapist?

    I see you still fail at basic reading and comprehension and you do so to try to change the subject. In other words, you invented an offense so you could change the subject and show your pathetic moral outrage. You have a habit of doing this. Perhaps it's time for you to stop.

    Once again, the solution is to teach men that women are human beings, equal to those men. And yeah, at the end of the day 'don't rape' is what it comes down to. 'Don't sexually assault' is what it comes down to. 'Respect women' is what it comes down to, and so on and so forth.

    At the end of the day, only a rapist can be the solution by not raping. It isn't on "us" (ie, women) to fix. It starts with attitudes, it starts with not excusing behaviour for the sake of politics, for example.

    I made a rebuttal. I pointed out just how you have embraced rape culture, by being willing to excuse and defend it, for the sake of politics. I have pointed out how you are more intent on changing the subject than actually discussing it. You are more intent on minimising what women experience (ie, that flick switching, the many outweigh the needs of the few, when the few in your example means women, who are currently half the population), for the sake of politics. When you go out of your way to protect an abuser, for the sake of politics, then you have embraced rape culture. You exist within it comfortably enough to sell out women to protect your politics.

    That's not a fallacy. That is evident in what you posted. Over and over again.

    How can you stop others from embracing rape culture, when you can't even do so yourself?

    It starts with you, Kitta. If you want to effect change, then you need to accept that you need to change first and foremost.

    And that wasn't what you initially said. Understand now?

    And it's not just affirmative consent. It's about how you exist in society itself. It's about not flicking that switch or making such arguments, for the sake of politics.

    Do you want me to go through the litany of insults you have lobbed in this and other threads, Kitta? I call you a troll because you are a troll. When you encouraged my being accused of murdering children, what were you doing then? You were trolling. And that's just one example. There are many many more.

    So no, you don't get to complain about being called a troll.
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2017
  13. Bells Staff Member

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    You don't even understand or know what the very foundation of it is. You are pricking holes, trying to figure out what you are looking for.

    It starts with respecting our voices, Kitta. The very foundation is respect and recognising us as human beings, equal to you.

    And you are willing to shut a woman down (just as you tried to shut Birch down), who is trying to educate you about rape culture, a culture we are victims of, because you refuse to acknowledge that you exist in said culture and embrace it, the latest example being your adhering to it for the sake of politics. And accusing me of twisting your words, when you invent things to be offended by, really, this is not even comical. It's pathetic.

    The more you refuse to acknowledge your part in rape culture, the more you try to lecture women, the victims who live it every day to tell us how to fix it, the more you show just how much you don't get it. Put simply, you are demanding we change the narrative, to suit your continued embrace of rape culture.

    Then start by looking at yourself. It starts with you as an individual.

    It starts by not excusing the behaviour for the sake of politics. It starts by not attempting to silence women who speak out, for the sake of politics and your own personal male pride.
    *Sigh*

    Read what I wrote and then think about it. Attempting to reinvent what I wrote to match your personal narrative is part of the problem, and is not a solution.

    I you posting this for my benefit, or your own?

    You are attempting to address it by placing yourself outside of it, without looking at your own behaviour, words and actions. Put simply, do you think I don't know any of this?

    From your link:

    One thing that I loathe more than almost anything else is when someone mentions something about rape culture or how we need to start teaching boys not to rape, instead of teaching girls how not be raped and someone else replies with, “You can’t tell a rapist not to rape any more than you can teach a murderer not to murder someone.” Let me explain why that’s not true. Rape and murder are a lot alike in the severity of the crimes. When you murder someone, you may take their life, but when you rape someone you still kill them, only now they have to live with that trauma forever. However, rapists and murderers aren’t exactly alike.


    Physician, heal thyself.

    It starts with every individual. Do you understand that to rid society of rape culture, it starts with introspection, it starts with addressing how we view women as human beings. So teaching boys to respect women and girls, when in the previous breath you were willing to sell out women to protect an abuser for the sake of politics... Do you still not understand that it starts with you? When you were willing to join in in accusing me of murdering babies in an attempt to shut me up for attempting to discuss rape culture, and in the next breath you try to lecture me about how to "stop rape culture", do you actually not understand that it starts with you?
     
  14. Bells Staff Member

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    It's not about proper outlet and proper etiquette, Kitta.

    It is about teaching boys and men that women are equal human beings. Proper outlets and proper etiquette reeks of allowing rape culture to exist, just so long as it is in the proper place.

    If you want to stop rape culture, it is about respecting women as human beings, with equal rights. Yes, it actually is that simple.

    I have two boys. I don't teach them that there are proper outlets and proper etiquette when it comes to rape culture, say jokes about girls, for example. I teach them that women, girls, the girls at their school, the girls who are their friends, their female teachers, are equal to themselves and that they should respect them for that very reason. I teach them to listen. To think about the girl or woman as a person first and foremost. Not as a "girl" or "woman", but as a human being of equal value to themselves. I teach them that it is about respect. I teach them that no matter what they might want from someone, it is about respecting their voice first and foremost, because that other person is a human being, with equal rights.

    And that starts with you as an individual. For example, your willingness to sell out women and protect rape culture for the sake of politics. Ya, it really is that simple.

    Yep. Then perhaps you can explain why you were willing to embrace and partake in rape culture to protect abusers for the sake of your politics. It can start with your demanding 'due process' for the abuser, while being willing to sell out women by flicking that switch, to protect what you deemed to be 'the many' at the expense of the few, when the few amounted to women being victims to rape culture, for the sake of your politics and ignoring their due process.

    I have presented you with the solution, the very start of it. Your response is to mansplain rape culture to me, invent offenses to be offended about, etc. As I said, your behaviour is the embodiment of rape culture, because you are more interested in protecting your own privilege than actually addressing the women who are trying to address it with you.
     
  15. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

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    Indeed, we need to get there; hence the idea that it starts with our youth and children. It starts by enacting in them a sense of empathy and responsibility and, dare I say, kinship. After all, it is easy to attack someone who is worthless or otherwise marginalized to you; we've done it time and time again through history. Native Americans, Blacks, Women, Japanese Americans, Hispanics... American History is replete with marginalization. Maybe if we attack the problem at the source and change the mindset from the get-go, well, maybe then we'll have a solution once and for all?
     
  16. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,938
    What fallacy? She literally said "Rape occurs because rape culture exists. If rape culture did not exist. If it was not a problem, men would not rape women. Do you know why? Because they would see women as human beings, equal to themselves. Because they would recognise women's humanity."

    I took what she said literally (since, obviously, men cannot presume to know what women think) - and now even that is wrong.

    What a hi-lariously fucked up standard.

    Hm, okay, question:

    She said, verbatim - "If rape culture did not exist. If it was not a problem, men would not rape women."

    She set the premise that "men rape women" because "rape culture exists".

    She also said, verbatim - "Do you know why? Because they would see women as human beings, equal to themselves."

    She set the premise that "men do not see women as equal".

    Now, I find it interesting that she needs a second party to change what she said to keep her argument propped up. Am I supposed to presume she needs a translator, Tiassa, and is incapable of articulating her own thoughts?

    Again - all the more reason to simply not engage her at all.

    Curious - if the law does not prevent the problem in question, then why have the law? Why not change the law so as to accomplish the supposed goal of said law? And if the law is, in theory, sufficient, and merely not being enforced... well, wouldn't the solution be to ensure equitable application of said law?

    Also curious - so when a man rapes a woman, it's about power and control... but when a woman rapes a man, it is suddenly a "mysterious" thing that we have a hard time figuring out?

    Again... I have to ask - why a double standard? If it is as simplistic a problem as our colleague would have us believe (that all that needs to happen is for "men to stop raping women") then, well... seems it's an open and shut case, problem solved, let's all go home for tea and biscuits and have a jolly gay time.

    If we want to actually solve the problem, once and for all, I would say we need to actually solve the cause of the problem, rather than treating the symptom of the problem.

    But, well, that seems to be an unpopular position *shrug*

    All the same, I've said my peace and, having it, yet again, turned pretzel into something it never was, see little reason to continue herein.
     
  17. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    37,893
    What fallacy?

    How about this? What's the fucking point?

    I literally tell you what the fallacy is↑, yet you go make that shit up?

    I call bullshit. You made up a straw man to respond to.

    And it's not funny.

    The idea that you think your behavior is somehow acceptable is a fucked up standard.

    So, to review:

    • What she said translates more directly in your reformulation as men would not rape women because men would see women as human beings.

    • In this case, you extended that men would not rape women into "rape would not happen"; that one didn't work.

    So, seriously:

    As I said, you extended that men would not rape women into "rape would not happen".

    You built a straw man↑

    • So you posit that Rape would not happen if "Men saw women as equal to themselves"...

    —in order to pretend false dichotomy—

    • What is the cause of rape when a woman rapes a man? I presume you must intend for there to be a different cause than "society seeing women as worth less than a man"?

    —while finding time along the way to complain:

    • So, then, since you seem determined to harp on this false premise -

    Justify your reformulation of Bells' statement. I find it interesting that you can't, or won't, or whatever the hell.

    Your reformulation; your extrapolation; your problem.
     
  18. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,938
    Simply put, I disagree with your assessment. I responded to, quite literally, the very thing she said.

    So it is a straw man now to expect equal treatment across gender lines?

    Actually, it is - because you and Bells are normalizing it by perpetuating it.

    Oh? So, expecting things to be equitably enforced is a "fucked up standard"? Taking what someone says at face value, rather than trying to divine hidden meaning, is a fucked up standard?

    Glad we sorted that out, Tiassa - from now on, I'll peer into my tea leaves to figure out what you and Bells are actually trying to say.
    Wait, no I won't - I'll just shrug and move on because, honestly, not worth my time.

    She said "rape happens because" and provided a reason. Ergo, if said reason did not exist, rape would not happen.


    There is no "reformulation" here - she wrote it. I think I see what it is that has you bent out of shape. I rather figured the "human being" part was self evident (last I checked, I don't look at a woman and see an automobile or an AH-64 Longbow Apache), so the important bit would seem to be the "equal to themselves" and the "recognition of their humanity"; ergo, a presumption that men look at women as "inferior".

    Again, her own statement leads one to the conclusion that, in her understanding, rape culture exists because men do not see women as being of equal worth to themselves, and thus we have rape (Rape occurs because rape culture exists; ergo, if rape culture did not exist, rape would not occur.)

    Now, I find her premise flawed, and stated why - extended to its logical conclusion, it doesn't hold water as to why a woman would rape a man (or a man another man, or a woman another woman, so on and so on).

    There is no straw man. There is no false dichotomy, and the complaint is the simple fact that claiming this as a solution to the problem is foolish and will not work - if it would have worked, this problem would long be solved and we'd be moving onto other things. Obviously, the problem is not solved, and I say it is because we are teaching kids (through numerous outlets, including stupid shit like letting people proven guilty in a court of law off easy because it "might impact them in a significant way") that they should expect to be beyond repercussion and reproach, and that they should just take what they want. We have long glorified that idea in media and in law - the rich and powerful can just take what they want and nobody will stop them. The solution, then, would seem to be to, to borrow from George Carlin, stop raising overly entitled assholes.

    Obviously this is a long-term solution, so in the interim a review of judicial process and the laws surrounding all of this would seem to be in order. Let's plug the loopholes and stupidity that allow people like Brock Turner, Ethan Couch, Tonya Harding, Adam Jones... lets face it, the list goes on and on and on and on. Is it time to put a stop to this yet, or are we just going to sit around and bemoan it forever?

    *shrug* Choice is yours to make obviously. All I can do is hold myself and those around me accountable since, apparently, I'm not even supposed to be part of the discussion.
     
  19. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    But you did not take it literally. You turned it into something else to set up something for you to complain about.
    The law is not the problem.

    The culture is the problem. The law is punitive. So you do the crime, you do the time. That threat of 'time' is supposed to be the prevention. But that isn't the problem.

    The problem arises when society fails to note the humanity of the woman. The problem arises when men are unable to recognise women as human beings, with human rights, equal to their own.

    And it doesn't have to be a huge thing, but the day to day things. The jokes, the objectification of women, the attempts to silence and shame women, the attempts to dictate how women should behave or should have behaved, the attempts to diminish women and the treatment they face on a day to day basis. That is what feeds rape culture. By the time the rapist gets to court, he is faced with a criminal justice system that has a history of questioning victims of violence about her actions, a judge who takes her actions into account in determining guilt or innocence or the sentence, a jury who is bombarded from the moment they enter society, to question women, to hear jokes and laugh about women and sexual assault, for example.
    Well no actually. You didn't. You changed the narrative of what I said to something else entirely.

    Let me explain it to you this way. If men saw women as human beings, with equal rights to their own, they wouldn't rape them. Can you possibly understand why? Men rape women because they view the women as being less than them, they view them as people they can dominate and control, overpower, diminish. If they saw women as they see themselves, if they considered that women have the same rights as they have themselves, they would not rape those women. They would not sexually harass or assault those women. I'll put it another way. There are countless of videos of street harassment, and how some women are disguised and made to walk past their sons who then catcall them, not recognising them as their mothers, and having their mothers turn on them, identify themselves and the men are shamed for what they did. Do you understand why people conduct these experiments? Think along the lines of 'that's my mother, dude!'. They see their mothers as human beings, women they need to respect and for whom they demand respect. But that respect does not extend past the women in their immediate families. Other women are sluts, whores, objects for their amusement.

    I remember this case, a long time ago, with a rapist who when we interviewed him and took his testimony, one officer in the room turned around and asked him 'what if she was your mother?'. And the guy flipped, freaked out, demanded we not speak that way about his mother. She was a human being. But the poor woman he raped, was not.

    Do you understand what I meant now? And why your changing it to something else entirely alters the narrative completely? Rape culture tries to change the narrative, and diminishes the very essence of recognising women as human beings. And the reason you did it was to bring up 'what about the women who rape men'.

    Consider the metaphor of thumbs and fingers. All thumbs are fingers but not all fingers are thumbs. Similarly, all rape is part of rape culture but rape culture is not limited to actual rape. In other words, rape culture encompasses a much broader range of behaviours, beliefs and norms than actual rape.

    So when you try to change the narrative to set up the 'women rape men too' argument, you are also diminishing the role that rape culture plays in that too. Yes, men are victims of rape, and men are victims of rape by other men and by other women. Rape culture protects that narrative by belittling the men who are raped, or they argue about how lucky the guy was that he was raped by a woman. Prison rape, where male on male rape is prevalent, is joked about, encouraged, it's used as a threat or taunt. It is normalised. Rape culture is not just about "rape". But rape occurs and is accepted by society in various ways, because rape culture is so prevalent.

    Yet another change of narrative.

    You normalised it by defending it for the sake of politics. You normalised it when you diminished the recognition of women as human beings with equal rights, by declaring the needs of your politics outweighed the needs of women to not be sexually harassed by politicians. You aren't just normalising it, you are so firmly entrenched in rape culture rhetoric, that you have consistently tried to change the narrative, change the subject, diminished its seriousness and damage it does to women and society as a whole. Women and victims attempt to discuss rape and rape culture and sexual harassment, you change the subject to something else entirely and then abuse us for pointing out that what you are going on about, has nothing to do with what we are actually discussing. You have reacted this way each time we have tried to discuss it and currently, you did it for the sake of politics. That is perpetuating rape culture. That is normalising it.

    So when you set up a false narrative to set up your 'gotcha' moment, you are doing so to maintain your position, you are essentially defending it. When you try to lecture us about rape culture without fully understanding the subject itself, when you do so to diminish it and to suit your own narrative, you are essentially defending it. I mean, you even went so far to throw in the bit about urges and how boys need to be told out outlets. I mean, what the fuck? It's like you are trying to argue that men have these urges and they just need to channel it better to not rape, while ignoring that doing so, still does not address how men view women.

    If you had taken what I said at face value, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You changed the narrative to set up a strawman so you could feel righteously offended.

    Or you could read what we actually say. Case in point:
    You seem to invent things just to feel offended. You did it in the other threads as well. Repeatedly.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  20. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,523
    Alternate theory: There are percentage of psychopaths that abuse and rape regardless of how much culture tries to prevent it.

    You completely ignore the fact that our culture (developed western world) has a rate of abuse and rape far lower then other cultures or historically. That rates of sexual harassment have been falling yearly. The very fact you are allowed to complain about a ever shrinking problem is a sign that you are fantastically free and empowered.

    Honestly what percentage of men do you think don't recognize women as human beings, with human rights, equal to their own?: https://www.voanews.com/a/women-inferior-men-survey-finds/3754803.html (that is all people, men and women world wide)

    I would say the solution to psychopaths is to identify them early, and treat them as a medical condition to be cured by jabbing electrodes in their brain until they have a conscious.

    Lets take a look at people that do not in fact believe in the equality of women and men: https://nypost.com/2017/12/18/womens-march-organizer-accused-of-covering-up-sex-abuse/
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2017
  21. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    What culture is trying to prevent rape?

    I am "allowed to complain"? Well, how mightily gracious of you.

    One in six women will experience rape and/or sexual assault in their lifetime in the US alone.

    And that is for the rapes that we know about. The greater majority of rape, attempted rape and sexual assault, goes unreported.

    Now, are you going to try and diminish it some more?

    Are you going to try and tell me what I am allowed to say now too?

    One in five. Ooohhh women should consider ourselves so lucky that the number is so low. I mean, I cannot imagine why we women are complaining.. *rolls eyes*

    And you think it's just about men thinking women are inferior? That's really cute.
     
  22. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,938
    Which is kind of the point I've been making (and Bells has been so adamantly ignoring) - a single-pronged approach will not solve this. Period.

    Kids need to be raised to not be assholes. That will reduce the incidence of a lot of problems. For the rest, well, we've have several fine examples of the high and mighty being given a slap on the wrist for violent and heinous crimes because of who they are. If that little tidbit were changed and all people were held to the same standard, regardless of gender, race, creed, background, wealth, status, athletic ability, et al... well, I think we'd start seeing a change from that as well.

    Do both at the same time? Shit, I think that'll net a pretty damn significant reduction in violent crime.

    The next piece of the puzzle would then be to take care of the mental health aspect of things (for example, preventing the small fraction of sexual assault / rape perpetrated by those who are intellectually disabled) - after all, the ultimate goal is to try and end it altogether... but lets go after the low hanging fruit first, especially given the massive impact it can have.

    So, to simplify to the point of absurdity:

    1) Stop raising assholes
    2) Stop letting wealthy assholes off easy
    3) Address remaining concerns
     
  23. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    37,893
    You literally ignored what I told you, and literally disregarded her words, in order to do that.

    Consider how you highlighted:

    Rape occurs because rape culture exists. If rape culture did not exist. If it was not a problem, men would not rape women. Do you know why? Because they would see women as human beings, equal to themselves. Because they would recognise women's humanity.

    That you must actually ignore words, effectively silence her, in order to speak for her, is not insignificant. See that sentence you keep skipping over? "If it was not a problem, men would not rape women".

    Let us look at that:

    Bells: "If it was not a problem, men would not rape women".

    Kittamaru: "So you posit that Rape would not happen if 'Men saw women as equal to themselves'..."

    Tiassa: "What she said translates more directly in your reformulation as men would not rape women because men would see women as human beings ... you extended that men would not rape women into 'rape would not happen'."

    Kittamaru: "She said 'rape happens because' and provided a reason. Ergo, if said reason did not exist, rape would not happen".

    Okay: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we get it, Kittamaru, but she also said other things, and your calculated refusal to acknowledge and attend those words not only fails to be insignificant, it is pretty defining.

    And in order to make your argument about generality, you must ignore specificity.

    It would be incredible, but, frankly, it is dishearteningly typical: You literally got caught out pulling a ritual gaslight; the only puzzling thing is that for the effort required to do that, you're actually being really, really lazy, and for putting in the effort there ought to be some ... I don't know, at least functional result. But antisocial behavior is attracted or impelled toward dysfunction; in recent times a pop culture adoration seems to bave emerged or grown or strengthened.

    †​

    I would also ask, again, that you consider your priorities. Look at one of your responses:

    Two things go here: The first is just another reminder about priorities. The second is to look at what you're agreeing and the hit you're applying.

    The idea that Bells "completely ignore[s] the fact that our culture (developed western world) has a rate of abuse and rape far lower then other cultures or historically" is problematic. And there is all sorts of stuff we could distract ourselves with about whether or not who should have seen what in which post ostensibly directed to another person in a thread when ostensible direction to anyone observably does not preclude other commentary on those discussions, and so on, but that's not quite the point. It is, however, true, though, that I did in fact remind, several days ago in another thread↗:

    It's like when the right wing tries to tell women to think of Saudi Arabia, or reminds queers about Iran: Okay, and? These are the United States of America, the fact of a violation at hand not being as bad as another violation somewhere out there does not mean the violation at hand is not a violation.

    Part of my point is that nobody really knows what to cover for the benefit rank of opposition because there is no such thing as a psychic, so we can't all read each other's minds, so Bells cannot anticipate which part of what she already knows about the world that, really, seems a pretty straightforward and common-knowledge point, you or anyone else who subordinates their discussion of such issues to secondary priorities might demand next.

    It's also a really weird take on psychopathy, sociopathy, or other antisocial disorder; yes, nature will provide, and ought not that be enough? Look around: Some would fashion arguments to preserve safe harbor for impropriety according to individual perception of political aesthetic; some are so anxious to silence women as to erect straw man surrogates; some rush to fight over #WhatAboutTheMen. Certes, we see antisocial behavior, but at what point is it a disorder?

    Think about what you threw in with: A focused and deliberate diminution of rape behavior in society; a fallacious appeal to worse conditions somewhere else; an appeal to self-reporting in a context easily subsumed by ego-defense behavior; an example alleging a woman participates in rape culture.

    And you managed to lead with what?

    Your priorities are showing.
     

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