Ben Hughes wonders if there ought to be an App for “Misogynists Around Me.”
I have a knee-jerk defensive response to the term rape culture. It feels accusatory. It feels like the intent is to say that “all men are rapists”. I think I’ve had it all wrong.
Even living under my news rock it was hard to miss the controversy about Girls Around Me:
“It’s not, really, that we’re all horrified by what this app does, is it? […] It’s that we’re all horrified by how exposed these girls are, and how exposed services like Facebook and Foursquare let them be without their knowledge.” – Cult of Mac
Actually, that’s not what horrifies me. Some people are misogynistic creeps, and some of those creeps are app developers who will use data in unintended ways. That doesn’t make me happy, but it doesn’t particularly worry me. What horrifies me is that the focus on “women being exposed” perpetuates the predator/victim dynamic between men and women. It is victim blaming (don’t want to be hunted by sexual predators? Better not share your location!) and it takes as given that men are inherently dangerous.
Instead of the privacy of women’s location data, we should be talking about why that data being shared is “dangerous”. In our attempt to “protect” women I think we are unintentionally normalising and spreading the myth (please God, let it be a myth) that men are sex-obsessed beasts ruled by their cocks, who don’t much care who they fuck. That we are obsessed with impressing and obtaining women while simultaneously hating them. And of course that women and helpless victims who need saving (except when they’re treacherously plotting to steal our manhood).
I’m a guy trying to raise 3 boys into decent, humane men. I want them to grow up being conscious of how they treat other people, especially sexually, but without carrying the baggage of being “potential rapists”. I don’t want them to think of women as “potential victims” in any sense.
We teach boys that they are dangerous. We joke about men being ruled by their dicks. We normalise and excuse attitudes that are eerily similar to those held by rapists. We unquestionably accept that Girls Around Me will be used by leacherous men to hunt women.
This is rape culture. While I still despise the term, I don’t think I can dismiss the concept any more. And honestly, that makes me pretty sad.
Of course, all of this is from the perspective of a 30-something white guy. For a different (but I think complementary) perspective, check out Rosie Ryan’s post.
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Originally posted on Ben Hughe’s blog with the title ‘Misogynists Around Me‘
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photo: Cult of Mac via The Blaze
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“We unquestionably accept that Girls Around Me will be used by leacherous men to hunt women.” Duh? So who is using the app then? Doesn’t such an app, that allows you to search for girls in your area, reduce women to the state of being a commodity that can be looked up and is freely available? This is like implying an app that searches for McDonalds around you is not used by people who like to eat burgers. Don’t get me wrong, I also dislike that men are often portrayed as sexual predators who cannot control themselves but on the… Read more »
Does it have to mean they are a commodity though? Do dating sites turn people into commodities? I have serious issues with people labeling stuff so negatively like that, the app is questionable but why do you see it as turning women into a commodity? Did you ever consider it could just be to find and meet women, a lame attempt at dating in the 21st century? Seeing everything so negatively simply adds to the culture that portrays men as sexual predators because their actions are so often seen as such. Take this app for example, some folk see it… Read more »
“Did you ever consider it could just be to find and meet women, a lame attempt at dating in the 21st century?” No, not at all. That is probably the result that women are constantly portrayed as commodities, cause half naked, lucious, available women will sell any product. When I see this app, I do feel reduced to a commodity. One that, just like a restaurant, can be looked up and approached. That I feel that way is the result of how I see myself (or women) being portrayed in the media. If the app equally shows men and women,… Read more »
Pretty sure this app searched for men as well, the women part was just a “catching title”. Wouldn’t be hard to search by gender from the data I’m sure. But I can see your point on the other stuff, probably why the app makes me wonder wtf they were thinking, something seems iffy about it.
So another social networking site, Badoo, launched in America last month (its been a big hit in Europe for a while now).
I don’t know the specifics on it yet (I went to the Badoo’s site and you pretty much can’t do or see anything without signing up or at least letting them look through your contact lists to see who among your contacts is already on it) but I just wonder if this will cause a similar stir.
“Instead of the privacy of women’s location data, we should be talking about why that data being shared is “dangerous”.” Yes, but this question is going in the wrong direction. To my mind, there is an even bigger question. Why are so many people of ALL genders so cavalier about giving location information to the entire world? How could anyone NOT think of the security problems involved with giving social networks your location and a photo of yourself? Good grief. There doesn’t need to be any paranoia about insatiable male rapists. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. It doesn’t… Read more »
Why would they ? Because most people are too lazy to read what they sign. A few years ago there was a huge campaign about risks of posting sensitive information (like hey, I am rich and live here, we are going on a looong trip, our children are attending that elementary school and since they have only a 10 min walk back home nobody picks them up) and people still do things like this, no, it’s even worse ! I don’t know if number of burglaries or kidnappings for ransom increased, but giving away info about EVERYTHING, from your address… Read more »
What I’m disturbed by is this quotes thing. No. I cannot tell the difference between the mag’s and rapist’s quotes. I know not all lad mags are like this (I wouldn’t say Playboy is), but to think there is a lad mag out there like this selling well enough to still remain on the shelves is harrowing.
Ignorance sure is bliss. I think every poster in the thread should spend a week in a courthouse and see how society (with its laws) treats rape and sexual assault and how it treats victims of other crimes such as common assault. I think you would be shocked. Get away from activist websites who claim “women are never believed” or “women are victimized again” , or the absolutely laughable one “women are blamed”. This isn’t reality folks, does it happen every once in a while , sure it does BUT the vast majority of rape and sexual assault cases are… Read more »
You’re correct. In the real-world justice system, the presumption is overwhelmingly in favor of the accuser when it comes to rape crimes–or, as they are more often called, ‘the victim.’ Because anyone who files rape charges is a capital-V Victim and automatically deserves to be believed. And the accused is automatically a monster unless he (and in cases, it more often is a he) can prove otherwise. Who cares that this runs counter to the core principle of our justice system, i.e., “innocent until proven guilty”? What matters is that alleged sex offenders be punished, and plaintiff-victims always be believed,… Read more »
I thought that the purpose of providing your location was for your friends to find you in case they were in the area you’d have a chance to meet up.
Friends already now where I live. I have no interest in having surprise visits with people I haven’t spoken to in years and who barely know me…
Here is a paper on the legal objectives behind rape culture activism. http://www.ncfm.org/libraryfiles/Children/rape/greer.pdf
Oh dear, look at the source: ncfm.org?! If you want to be credible, find something that is less ideological and biased and even more important, find a source where the writers get their facts right. Those guys from ncfm.org seem to be so far out of touch with reality, it’s as if they live on different planet. There are some true gems on the site “Between the pill and abortion, women have complete control over the reproductive process.” Sure. Pills, abortion. all freely available to anyone, everywhere at anytime. Wow. Talk about distorting facts. or this “the rights and freedoms… Read more »
Unfortunately there is so precise definition of “rape culture”. But I think a big part of it is blurring the lines between consensual sex and non-consensual. Talking about what you and your lover want out of love-making prior to the actual lovemaking is not seen as very romantic. Men are supposed to dominate the women they want. Sometimes women will expect men to “just know” what they want. On girlsaskguys.com people discussed asking before you kiss, almost everyone was against asking. Some men believe that asking about sex will scare women off, even I get that feeling. I know consciously… Read more »
“Unfortunately there is so precise definition of “rape culture.” Correct. It is whatever the person who believes in it says it is, no different than burglery or car jacking culture. That it exists in one person’s mind doesn’t mean it actually does exist. However, I understand why it exists in the mind of many. Properly, they care about women, what happens to them matters. That’s the right way to feel, IMO. So they focus on it mentally and anything that reminds them of it is part of what they consider to be the culture. I get that. I am surrounded… Read more »
I’m hoping that someone can look at how male victims of female sexual abuse aren’t believed or ostracized by society (that includes by men AND women by the way) and how this is also “Rape Culture” at work as well.
amazing. this entire article rightfully acknowledges the problem with male behavior and rape culture (in which the VAST MAJORITY of victims are female) and the only response you can think of is to cry about male victims of female abusers (who are the extreme minority). when women think of an app called “boys around me” and start abusing males by the millions, then you might have a point. but that will never happen. we aren’t like that. (edited) This is a perfect example of what the author is talking about. thanks for proving him correct. (edited) (edited) Moderator’s Note-do not… Read more »
Jackiesmith
This
“(in which the VAST MAJORITY of victims are female) and the only response you can think of is to cry about male victims of female abusers (who are the extreme minority).”
is total nonsense and a great example of how radical feminism is the real rape culture.
https://goodmenproject.com/ethics-values/gender-and-sexual-violence-manufacturing-victimhood-marginalizing-victims/
amazing. this entire article rightfully acknowledges the problem with male behavior and rape culture (in which the VAST MAJORITY of victims are female) and the only response you can think of is to cry about male victims of female abusers (who are the extreme minority). when women think of an app called “boys around me” and start abusing males by the millions, then you might have a point. but that will never happen. we aren’t like that. And you just proved Eoghan’s point. Supposedly rape culture is about how ALL rape victims and how the way out culture seems to… Read more »
Jackiesmith890, I would love to rebute your opinion in a civilized, polite manner but these two paragraphs here: “amazing. this entire article rightfully acknowledges the problem with male behavior and rape culture (in which the VAST MAJORITY of victims are female) and the only response you can think of is to cry about male victims of female abusers (who are the extreme minority).” “when women think of an app called “boys around me” and start abusing males by the millions, then you might have a point. but that will never happen. we aren’t like that. ” Just proves you don’t… Read more »
“we aren’t like that.”
Zip up, your sexism is showing. You’ve just grouped all men into the “sexual predator” box and all women into the “pure as driven snow” box.
People who try to establish the moral superiority of womanhood are directly attacking a core assumption of feminism: that gender doesn’t determine a persons character and biology isn’t destiny. Your comment belongs right beside all those people you’ve ever heard claim that men are naturally more suited to the workplace.
Not to mention that you’re wrong, some of you are like that, just as some men are.
Thanks, Ben, for such a great summary on one aspect of “rape culture,” and how it impacts men negatively as well. Rather than viewing “all men as potential rapists” and all “women as victims,” it is more empowering to recognize that there are a great deal of cultural factors that support violence and mistreatment of people to to learn ways to speak out against it. No, not all men are potential perpetrators, AND, how can all men be empowered to say something to a friend who uses such an app or who says things that are objectifying. To collude in… Read more »
Any man that wants to live in a society where he has the basic presumption of innocence should not be talking up the radical feminist rape culture ideology.
The legal end of it, involves changing the legal system and removing protections against false accusations
When a man is accused of rape, there is the presumption of guilt by the media. There should be a rape accused shield law for men, so they are not named unless convicted, as well as prosecution of false accusers with their names published.
Good gravy.
I rest my case.
This is how feminists see men, rape culture and stuff like this :
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2010/11/29/why-men-rape/
See the title ? Read the comments, they are delicious.
Actually the comments are horrifying, but I assume you are employing sarcasm. Rape is a horrible thing no matter who it happens to, and it happens to every gender by every gender it appears. We shouldn’t support violence back against violence and I feel much more accurate in saying, those comments are horrifying.
Glad to see the art of recognizing sarcasm isn’t dead and yes, I agree. Crime is crime, rape is rape and punishment is punishment.
Why anyone would post their photo and location on the Internet ? I don’t understand purpose of applications like this or Facebook… really, people who are posting on FB are giving out more info than UB or SB (our former “security”, like KGB) was interested in.
You don’t post your info for the same reason you ain’t posting a photo of yourself and two kids in front of an expensive car in front of your nice, big house. You don’t want to make a thief’s job any easier, do you ?
“You don’t want to make a thief’s job any easier, do you ?” Add to that the folks who advertise they are not home by announcing a month long vacation – posting holiday snaps online as they take them …. and still have the Pictures which show their now Empty Home – their Car parked and waiting ….. Their House Number and Home in full view to be scoped out via Street View! It’s called Data Leakage! Better still they have their real names on-line and it’s so easy to use free on-line services to find out the address, pay… Read more »
Take note Ben, the radical feminist version of rape culture, which is what we are talking about here, excludes and does not want to talk about female sex criminals so, by its on definitions of what a rape culture is, its a rape culture.
I think all this app proves is that we need to educate young people (both men and women) about the negative consequences of making all kinds of their personal data publicly available on Facebook and other media, so they make an informed decision. There are always a few bad people out there. They are the minority but you have to take them into account. You have to learn to walk a line between being appropriately cautious and being paranoid. Once someone is past the young and naive stage, they should know better. Broadcasting your location AND photo to strangers is… Read more »
This, a thousand times. The internet is the street, even when you are sitting in your own bedroom. When you throw your privacy away, you have only yourself to blame.
Exactly.
Sarah Literacy in personal security and I.T. related areas is not age related. I can give you chapter and verse on failures from the cradle to the grave – children, parents, grand parents – pensioners. It is not just an issue for the young. I’ve even seen I.T. security managers lecture employees in some very large companies all about the issues – and yet prove the old adage of “Do As I Say, Not As I Do!”. In the same vein it is not just an issue related to sex, gender, race, socio-economic status, disability and many other ways of… Read more »
You are correct, people of all ages and genders are careless with their online privacy. I’m willing to cut teens/young adults some slack if they don’t fully understand the consequences. That is, I won’t call them dumb, I’ll just say naive. But once you have some life experience, you SHOULD know better. Many, many people don’t know better, of course.
I have a preference for the the term rape tolerance it’s individualistic. Collectivized guilt is a trap.
In our attempt to “protect” women I think we are unintentionally normalising and spreading the myth (please God, let it be a myth) that men are sex-obsessed beasts ruled by their cocks, who don’t much care who they fuck. Agreed. And speaking of normalising and spreading myths I think it says something that the first thing people thought of when hearing about this app was “OMG men are going to use it to hurt women!”. Not making possible connections with other people, but hurting women. No I don’t think rape culture is about holding up the relatively small portion of… Read more »
I find the back to front thinking in this piece and the comments bizzare. So here is some Light being shed – Yet Again – on “Rape Culture™”. The term “Rape Culture” is YET Again being bandied about, without an actual “Operational Definition” of the term being in place. That Logical Fallacy has been repeated so many times – and it just keeps on going. It’s called making reality fit the premise – and we see Yet more attempts at “Reification”. So there is now an App – and it is being made to fit the definition – the idea… Read more »
I’ll be honest, I didn’t get past the fifth paragraph. However, in my original post (http://blog.benrhughes.com/misogynists-around-me) I did include a link to the definition I was using (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_culture). As I mentioned earlier, somehow all of the links were stripped when the post was republished here.
The links are there now, Ben. Sorry for the technology glitch. Feel free to email me any time if something like that happens again — it’s the best way to get stuff done quickly. lisa at goodmenproject dot com
“I’ll be honest, I didn’t get past the fifth paragraph.”? Ben – Ironic is not the word! P^) If you are linking to Wikipedia as a source, it may be advisable to also read the “talk” section where both the Neutrality of content is in question – as are a number of entries made, and others deliberately omitted, in what is identified as “Advocacy Editing”, Systemic Bias and even Racism! Oddly – Wikipedia does require “Valid” citation of sources, and yet there is now an entry under “Prominent incidents and allegations of rape culture – United Kingdom” ( added which… Read more »
Where do people get the idea that we as a society fail to address sexual assault. You can’t go a day without seeing a story in the news about sexual assault. Go to any major news websites, and there are stories about sexual assault all over the world. We address it constantly, all the time. It reminds me when the Sandusky story broke, there were many people to claimed “see, now that boys are being sexually assaulted we are taking notice”. Those people failed to acknowledge that there are 1000s of stories about girls. Sandusky was but one large story,… Read more »
As a lawyer, I can tell you for certain that those that believe that society doesn’t take rape as serious are 100% wrong. In fact, rape (and sexual assault) are the most prosecuted crimes in North America. All too often there is very little evidence to justify the charges that come from an accusation, but the DA will press forward anyway. There is a concept in the law called MENS REI, which in short means ‘a guilty mind’. This concept is all but gone in the area of sexual assault. There are those that think we (as a society) fail… Read more »
Interesting Carl. In a way that makes sense, at least within my understanding of rape culture. Isn’t it simply an extension and reinforcement of the idea that men are more than likely rapists? I think that’s the subtlty that’s often missed: when we normalize the idea of rape we harm women (by potentially increasing the number of rapists) *and* men (by treating them, under the law or otherwise, as if they are rapists). When I said earlier that we need to address the sexual violence that does occur, I wasn’t necessarily talking about law enforcement. I was thinking more about… Read more »
@Carl Mode, I have wondered many times why sexual assault is treated so differently to assault. I don’t deny sexual assault / rape is a crime but why is it worse than being crippled from a beating?
Whilst the app has some scary implications for stalking I have to wonder why it’s automatically assumed someone would use this to rape someone? Why is it straight to the negative?
WRT rape culture, isn’t it really a violence culture, theft culture, cheating culture and a whole list of other bad experiences that go on and get victim blaming, etc?
“We teach boys that they are dangerous. We joke about men being ruled by their dicks. We normalise and excuse attitudes that are eerily similar to those held by rapists. We unquestionably accept that Girls Around Me will be used by leacherous men to hunt women. This is rape culture.” No, this is feminism. As I said on Genderratic a while back: “Feminists are right – there is a rape culture. They are immersed in it. It defines all interaction between the sexes in terms of rape. It normalises rape, and trivialises it. It uses rape, like Brownmiller says, to… Read more »
As I said in the post, I think the campaign to protect women has a large part to play in rape culture. In a similar way to how the desire to protect children has created helicopter parents and the assumption that every man is a child molester. And certainly, large aspects of feminism are concerned with women’s safety, and (I’d hope) smaller aspects like to paint all men as potential rapists. However, there’s a lot more to it than that. Sexual violence is a reality, not just a construct of feminism. Feminists may have exacerbated rape culture, but as a… Read more »
For some reason the links that I’d originally included got stripped when the post was re-published here. FYI:
Cult of Mac article: http://www.cultofmac.com/157641/this-creepy-app-isnt-just-stalking-women-without-their-knowledge-its-a-wake-up-call-about-facebook-privacy/
Rosy Ryan’s article: http://rosieryan.com/articles/47/on-the-internet-everyone-knows-you-re-a-woman
Cracked post on hating women: http://www.cracked.com/article_19785_5-ways-modern-men-are-trained-to-hate-women.html
Rapist vs Men’s mag: http://jezebel.com/5866602/can-you-tell-the-difference-between-a-mens-magazine-and-a-rapist