This Open Thread has been brought to you by the fact that my school has a sign on the doors that only open one way that says “ceci n’est pas une exit”…
About ozyfrantz
Ozy Frantz is a student at a well-respected Hippie College in the United States. Zie bases most of zir life decisions on Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, and identifies more closely with Pinkie Pie than is probably necessary. Ozy can be contacted at [email protected] or on Twitter as @ozyfrantz. Writing is presently Ozy's primary means of support, so to tip the blogger, click here.
http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2012/May/12-ag-635.html Search this for “female”. … I mean seriously is the random sexism really needed? Also Lamech’s guide to stopping Prison Rape 1) Camera’s everywhere. They are cheap as hell now everything should be recorded. 2) If their is a complaint check the camera. 3) Press Charges against the guilty party. Not any of this administrative in house crap. Its a crime use the justice system. Oh and separate them from the rest of the prison population. This is trivial you have video evidence. 4) Make sure you have decent rape laws. Also prisoners can’t consent to sex with prison… Read more »
@L:
That’s a good idea, maybe it should even get its own sub-forum because it’s a broad subject with considerations different from other forms of dating.
@L: You should do that! At least get it started! Cmoooon, it’ll be fun!
@daelyte: Hey, that’s pretty damn neat. Be sure to get some discussion going about internet and long-distance dating as well, seeing as how that sort of thing is on the rise and apparently reliable sources of information about how to be in those kinds of relationships (or even start them) is far and few between.
@Monkey: Which is why I asked the question to begin with. Because I’ll be damned if there’s nothing in between “life-altering trauma” and “zen bliss” on the scale of How Things Affect People. IMO, pretending that there isn’t for the sake of discussion makes for a pretty useless discussion. And for the record, you’re the one that gendered “bruised egos” here, not me. The idea that women don’t have pride is something I find kind of mind-boggling, especially with the narrative that describes all women as competitive, back-stabbing, and superficial harpies. Unless “ego” is used exclusively in reference to men… Read more »
@dancinbojangles: I think the most important thing is just to start the conversation. There’s a lot we can learn by talking about our experiences, instead of assuming what’s in each others’ heads. For example, until I came to this site I never realized the importance of a woman inviting a man to her room for the first time, and the sudden change of tone she may expect in their relationship as a result. For a man it seems like no big deal, because we’re not raised to worry about our safety like that. I’m sure it can get even more… Read more »
@Daelyte: Rad, good luck! I’ll hop on, though I don’t really have any advice. Not like I”m an expert picker-upper or anything.
Off topic but, due to an earlier discussion on this site, I created a forum for gender-egalitarian, coed, universal… pickup, dating and relationship advice.
Coffee_queen asked about Strategies of Approach, especially about messaging guys on dating sites and whether it’s approaching guys at the gym is off limits.
Also, I just posted a very rough draft of a Mission Statement, and Forum Rules.
http://www.gamedruid.com/mutualseduction/viewforum.php?f=2
I was hoping for a bit more activity, and maybe a little help?
L, I didn’t mean that to be an argument or say “you’re wrong.” I’m just talking about the experience of someone I know.
My take is not to belittle sexual assault, but to say that violence can be traumatizing. And maybe this part *is* being argumentative, but I find that talking about “bruised egos” is often used to belittle men’s pain.
I was once punched in the nose in the middle of school, causing much bleeding. It may not have been as traumatizing as sexual assault, but it was not nothing.
@monkey: “With the usual caveats for subjects both directly and indirectly related to the above.”
Wow, guess I really do need to put that. Too bad there’s no post signature functionality for wordpress.
News from Quebec: Anonymous supports the students in their movement against the government’s move to raise schooling fees (for tertiary education), and especially its move to have a special law to prevent public manifestations and greatly restrict them. The student’s have been manifesting for over 3 months now. The government has made half-hearted attempts to negotiate on other points (not the rise of fees), and then called the students as having bad faith for not wanting to compromise (and accept worse than crap an offer from the government). A government who would (and has in the past) negotiate fast enough… Read more »
L: I know someone who was VERY traumatized after being mugged.
@ozy: Sorry, you’re quite right, and I’ll try to use the correct terminology in future.
When I was talking about “furries” earlier I should have been saying “otherkin”. That’s what I meant.
1. Since I was responding to the idea of the rapey card game (which I doubt depicted date or intimate partner rape), my focus was on stranger rape and how the representation occurs. 2. There are a LOT of kinds of violence. However, rape (and some but not all other sexual assault) and certain nonsexual violence I think have a particularly harmful effect on the mind due to their controlling and torturous aspects. I’d also be interested in distinctions in what happens to soldiers vs. what happens to other people who see/suffer a LOT of violence in both combatative and… Read more »
@AGBirch: Okay, but do we differentiate between a bruised ego and something that actually fucks you up for a while, let alone is traumatizing? I mean, I can only cite from experiences that I’ve had and those that people around me have had, and the delineations they’ve, perhaps unconsciously, made between the “categories” of personal vs. impersonal, humiliating vs. irksome, big deal vs. not a big deal, etc. Anyways, my original point still stands: rape isn’t the only thing that falls under the category of sexual violence; just like how being slapped and being stabbed are both “physical violence” all… Read more »
You never hear of someone being too humiliated to file a police report for a mugging or bar fight.
It’s pretty common actually, many people don’t report physical, non-sexual violence because of shame and embarrassment..
@L:
Nice.
It could also be just about ANY violence, from anyone at all (including police themselves) directed at a trans woman, visibly trans or not. It’s not that it’s necessarily humiliating, it’s that “you had it coming” from “living while trans”, and “going somewhere while trans” (wherever ‘somewhere’ actually is).
Men get slightly less victim blaming, unless it’s sexual violence, where they actually get more.
Oh right I guess I came back here to share this: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/21/business/increasingly-men-seek-success-in-jobs-dominated-by-women.html
@Dvar: (I’m just going to use this because, I’m sorry, your username is just too damn long and copypastaing it every time gets tiresome :B) Yeah, I’d put insults and the like under the general umbrella of violence too. You know, like how verbal abuse is just as much of a thing as physical and sexual abuse. Some people can stand up to words better than fists– some can’t. I think a person’s capacity to better take some things than others is very clearly gendered and socially conditioned as well. As for my own anecdotal opinion and experience (which means… Read more »
“You never hear of someone being too humiliated to file a police report for a mugging or bar fight.” Hello, delurking here because I feel a compulsion to say something about this. It’s very interesting you’d use the word “bar fight” here. Just what makes it a “fight”? Fights, more often than not, start when someone elects to hits someone else, and (according to a study of uncertain validity cited in a magazine I read), in two thirds of the cases, the other person apparently doesn’t even hit back. And yet, the very term “fight”, as opposed to, say, “assault”… Read more »
@L: But if we include unwanted so-called compliments, cat-calls and the like in “sexual violence”, wouldn’t we also have to include calling people “idiot”, rude pushes and similar non-sexual insults in “non-sexual violence”? I’m still not convinced then that sexual violence would be much more common than its non-sexual equivalence. I’ve been groped and cat-called and stuff, and I’ve been through one attempted rape and one other sexual assault (or whatever is the right term for it in English – a guy facing me in the subway who pulled out his cock and started jerking off while looking at me).… Read more »
“You never hear of someone being too humiliated to file a police report for a mugging or bar fight.”
Unless it involved their wife beating them. Whereas the police will say the only remedy is for him to man up.
@Dvärghundspossen: But sexual violence isn’t just rape either. It’s being groped or getting your ass smacked by a stranger. It’s attempted rape and sexual coercion. I’d also put unwanted “dirty talk” or threats of sexual violence to be in this same general category, because I think they build up to a similar effect. So although it’s not easy to spell out EXACTLY why, I do think sexual violence is more of a violation of the victim than non-sexual violence of roughly equal brutality. Of course it is. Sexuality and nakedness is very personal and intimately tied to one’s very identity.… Read more »
“That’s right, fat ugly women can be desirable because of personality! Eat that, misogynists objectifiers.” To me this is no different than MRAs criticizing women for prefering alphas over betas, it’s both just different lists of traits that you should/shouldn’t base attraction of of. Which is why I like to say that Nice Guys(tm) are men who talk about women the way women talk about men. (that’s not to say all women do talk like that but it’s both expected and encouraged. No one would think of having a special name for women who say that guys are shallow and… Read more »