I disagree with Sady Doyle. A lot. Pretty much any time she brings up male privilege as an inherent advantage men have over women I just want to cringe. But today’s post is, frankly, amazing. It is about class and hipsters and “trash” and social justice and middle-class versus poor and abuse and Occupy Wall Street and, yes, there’s some problematic stuff in it but most of all it is a brilliant post.
It’s always interesting to read really good social-justice-y writing as a privileged person. There’s that little sick clench in your stomach of “oh godDAMMIT I do that and I never realized before how fucked up it was” (why, yes, I did make fun of Bush for being a hick!), and the glow of getting a little more understanding of an area of human experience you previously knew nothing about and, as always, the pleasure of reading some very well-written prose.
Check it out.
I’m closing the comments on this thread. There is clearly no productive discussion going on here, and as far as I can tell the primary benefits of this thread are: a) Making abuse survivors feel like their experiences are being erased. b) Pissing off people who are, in fact, ON THE SAME FUCKING SIDE. c) Giving everyone involved lots of practice with arguing with the imaginary people in their heads as opposed to the ones on the other side of the computer screen. d) Making me embarassed to have y’all as readers. Take this to the Open Thread or any… Read more »
Okay, okay. Mea culpa. I’ll give myself 20 extra lashes for unleashing the “B” word. Still, Bad female interference. Over a dream. And the worst part is that the kyriarchal nature of “high school” only amplified and intensified my worries. To a point even that NOT EVEN MY OWN PARENTS BELIEVED ME. This was the point where I considered suicide. This was my lowest ebb. I haven’t spoken of it in so long. I haven’t had to think about how it damn near cost me my GCSEs, my future. I haven’t had to think about how I was a small… Read more »
@typhonblue: I attempted to be polite to you because you were triggered. You can be triggered; triggers are irrational by their nature. This does not now, and will never, reflect that you are correct. You think that because you are triggered we have to stop explaining violence against women as the result of male privilege and a sexist society. Again: you can be triggered. Triggers are irrational. But that doesn’t mean you’re right. Your desire for a “trigger warning” would, essentially, mean that any feminist content about violence on the Internet be labeled “dangerous content.” And honestly, I feel it’s… Read more »
“I didn’t fully realize at the time that there is, apparently, a dedicated subculture that will not discuss anything other than how men got it worse than everyone ever, ” What in fact you did not realize is the dominant culture privileges harms to women over harms to men almost exclusively. Do you really think the Natalie Holloway business was some kind of on-off? It wasn’t – it’s standard data. It shows up in the way war casualties are counted and valued and reported, it shows up in the way work-related accidents are reported or more often ignored and it… Read more »
“(For the record, I’m not white.)”
And I’m not a man. Neither is Typhonblue.
“Do not, for one second, for one SINGLE second, presume to tell me how to behave, how to feel, how to think, how much you are like me, how much you are “there” for me, how much better it will be when I’m on “your” side, how you will buy me a drink. I do not want your goddamned drink, and I do not want your condescenscion.” “I do feel for what you’ve suffered, TB, and I do hope you are healing from it. I also regret that you’ve chosen to find healing within an anti-feminist space, as I feel… Read more »
“If three puppies and one kitten are stabbed to death EVERY NIGHT, I’m going to start thinking this society has a serious problem with puppies.” Sady, men are on the receiving end of the vast majority of violent crimes. In popular culture, when violence is meant to be funny or otherwise acceptable, a man has to be on the receiving end in the vast majority of cases. (Women can be the victims if the perpetrator is another woman, though.) When violent crimes are prosecuted, sentences are harsher if the victim were a woman rather than a man. By most measures,… Read more »
I refuse the notion that the assumption that men are always up for sex (even when they’re sleeping) does not translate into female privelege or entitlement (how can one not be entitled if the notion that the other party won’t consent is incomprehensible and just not a possible option?). I refuse the notion that she must’ve made that assumption from any another reason than just my gender (we only met the same day). I refuse the notion that any male privelege I have had any relevance to what I experienced as it sure as hell weren’t enough to prevent her… Read more »
SD: I skim the other comments on this blog, and I see men claiming that their greatest fears from “misandry” are (a) women calling them out on their sexist behavior, and (b) the fact that they might be seen as sexist or bad for engaging in sexist behavior; I see those same men claiming that the solution is for men to be “allowed” to be misogynist.
I don’t see this at all; but it does make sense if SD’s definitions of “sexist” and “misogyny” are vastly inflated beyond the typical English language usage.
because I acknowledge the reality of male privilege, which is deeply threatening to anti-feminist bloggers.(SD) Actually that is not it. Your idea of privilege is not threatening, its insulting to all the men who still get abused and all the men who were once boys and were abused regularly both in private and public. The idea is so repulsive because in many of our experiences(personal and private) we witness other males being abused regularly and NOT females(not denying that it happens to women also). The idea of privilege did absolutely nothing to stop this, in other words we were just… Read more »
@SD Okay, you want my story? You want to hear how I hide behind a Facade of being “The Magnificent Mister Simon J Broome”? About how teenaged girls of low class FUCKED MY LIFE UP? Made me distrust FUCKING EVERYONE? How it took me TEN FUCKING YEARS PLUS to get to a point of even being able to trust a small circle of friends? I feel for your brother. And it’s beside the point whether he was raped by a man/woman/trans/SFCfAC. But don’t tell me, NEVER tell me, that I’m Anti-feminist. I’m Anti-WRA, sure. I’m not too keen on the… Read more »
Sady Doyle: ‘I also regret that you’ve chosen to find healing within an anti-feminist space’
Ha.
Feminist spaces can be toxic for many people who do not accept the ‘woman as victim-man as abuser/oppressor’ construct. I have been (and I hate to use the word but I do for emphasis) *abused* in feminist spaces, even when I have shared my own traumatic experiences of violence, in my case from an ex boyfriend.
Aside from the abuse I suffered, the worst trauma in my life has been the complete, deafening denial of it. I see a constant stream of portrayals of abuse that look nothing like what I suffered. Think about what women say about not seeing their own faces in politics or business or academia. Or what minority and large women say about not seeing themselves under the word ‘beauty’. Or any number of marginalized groups who don’t get to see themselves reflected in the world around them. I remember reading a Shakespear’s Sister thread on *absence of rape* being a trigger.… Read more »
@SD: Apologies for losing my temper dont worry, it happens to everybody; me included. But I like to ask you a question, if im allowed. You wrote this sentence ” I see men claiming that their greatest fears from “misandry” are (a) women calling them out on their sexist behavior, and (b) the fact that they might be seen as sexist or bad for engaging in sexist behavior; I see those same men claiming that the solution is for men to be “allowed” to be misogynist. I see those men advocating the same ideas — for a formal call for… Read more »
“You want to erase the existence of male privilege, so that you can win what is (explicitly, according to your own statements) a “victim pissing game.””
Is this some kind of projection? I haven’t really seen anyone here deny that men can be priviledged over women in some things. You, on the other hand, have been very keen on insisting that women can’t ever be priviledged over men in anything.
If im allowed to come with a small rant talking, speaking in general, usually I find a waste of time talking to people who are antagonistisck and have no intention to dialogue but only argue. Somebody who comes in a debate with a inquisitor attitude and throw accusation in all directions, only to walk away in anger when challenged (im not pointing to anybody here). This person obyusly shows some extraordinary lack in debating ability and a talent for trolling. It reminds me some christians or and creationist’s in some science forums, when suddently they start to pull out bible… Read more »
All this over a trigger warning on a blog that says it’s about helping men (admittedly I’m not exactly the target audience but I feel a lot of kinship with the other ‘types somewhere below’.) I know for a fact that survivors of female violence read this blog and if I’m triggered by something that genders violence (even if other people think it doesn’t because it doesn’t explicitly say ‘abuse is male on female’ or ‘abuse is more important when it’s male on female’ or ‘well it was just a rape joke, it was supposed to be funny!’) I also… Read more »
Apologies for losing my temper. I do feel for what you’ve suffered, TB, and I do hope you are healing from it. I also regret that you’ve chosen to find healing within an anti-feminist space, as I feel the succor offered by blaming women or denying sexism is false — understandably tempting, but false — and ultimately might even be harmful. I skim the other comments on this blog, and I see men claiming that their greatest fears from “misandry” are (a) women calling them out on their sexist behavior, and (b) the fact that they might be seen as… Read more »
@ SD “You did this because your own experience was of a woman abusing a man (and you) and you believe that any story which is not your story “erases” your story and therefore “triggers” you.” The way you ascribed the abuse you suffered at the hands of your father (which was eerily similar to some of the abuse I suffered at the hands of my mother) as a result of patriarchy, *was* erasing. Was my abuse at the hands of my mother also a result of her programming to become a patriarchal oppressor? What if I said, ‘financial abuse… Read more »
@Cheradenine: I realised that one of the things an emotionally-abusive ex of mine used to do, was use “I was triggered!” as a justification for abusive behaviour. Out of curiosity, did he also use that to then make his abusive behavior your fault, and even turn it around to make you seem like the abusive one? “You triggered me! You know I have [insert issue here], and yet you clearly don’t care, you creep!” It was like walking on egg shells, because there weren’t actually clear and obvious ways to avoid triggering her. Plus, humans make mistakes, and normal relationships… Read more »
@typhonblue: What you are interested in is, precisely, a “victim pissing game.” I know this because you insisted a “trigger warning” be posted because of a paragraph in my post that acknowledged male abuse of women under certain circumstances, on the grounds that it did not also include a whole paragraph about female abuse of men, in a story in which no female abuse of men occurred. You did this because your own experience was of a woman abusing a man (and you) and you believe that any story which is not your story “erases” your story and therefore “triggers”… Read more »
@Cheradenine: On re-reading this before hitting the Post Comment button, and reflecting on some of the stuff within it, I realised that one of the things an emotionally-abusive ex of mine used to do, was use “I was triggered!” as a justification for abusive behaviour. You too? I dated an abusive radfem, and she used that along with a lot of other feminist theory in her emotional abuse of me. But I absolutely agree with your larger point. A point which means, for example, that my experience does not give me license to then be an asshole to other people,… Read more »
@ SD This is what I see. You have a belief system that creates a hierarchy of abuse victims. Some on top–co-incidentally those that have experiences most like your own–others on the bottom. You believe this is justified based on certain things you’ve observed. You label any counter-points to your beliefs as ‘misogynist’ or ‘denialism’ or ‘erasing female victims’ so no one can argue them in good faith. No one here is denying that your abuse is non-existant or even ‘lesser’ then anyone else’s. No one. I think, at most, people are saying your abuse is JUST AS IMPORTANT as… Read more »
For the record, this conversation also began with erasing the experience of a male survivor of abuse. My brother. But then, he was abused by a man, so that’s really irrelevant to the subject of “men’s rights,” isn’t it.
@James: I clearly, specifically state that men are abused and that abusing them is not okay. I clearly, specifically state that women can abuse men and other women. I do this several times. People continue to deny that male privilege exists, and state that my acknowledgment of male privilege is “insulting” or “erasing” to male survivors. This, on a thread that began with the deeply insulting erasure of my personal experience, and my family’s experiences, as survivors, on the grounds that the story of my life was not sufficiently flattering to men. I am asked for “specific examples” of a… Read more »