When will we acknowledge sexism and violence against men is just as real?

[Mathematician]

Considering the effects alcohol has on inhibitions and the likelihood of being persuaded against common sense, that friend should definitely consider your advice. I think oftentimes when people hear rape they interpret it to mean violence when a lot of rapes are forced without a struggle - coincidentally this also implies women can rape men.

 

[dust1n]

Considering the effects alcohol has on inhibitions and the likelihood of being persuaded against common sense, that friend should definitely consider your advice. I think oftentimes when people hear rape they interpret it to mean violence when a lot of rapes are forced without a struggle - coincidentally this also implies women can rape men.

A least a small portion of young male rapists did so without even knowing, without the woman even knowing, and without anyone even knowing what happened, because they were both too ****** to understand each other, let alone talk openly about sexuality.

Then again, if you hold to the standard that any situation whether unwanted sex was had is rape, than things get fishy. I mean.. my pretty convinced my past girlfriend's have had sex with me, with consent, though they did not want to. It's just part of dating to take one from the team, and I'm sure that this has been the case precisely because I've had sex with partners at times when I didn't particularly want to have sex, but she did, so I consented and just did it anyways. Almost any guy has at some point. It's confusing indeed. Here's a snip from the convo:

ME: [Because this is 100 comments in, mostly men and women fighting!]
Wowser. That was interesting. Rape is one of those long-time evolutoinary embarassments, kinda like female selection and male mate fights. Nature can be ****** up. I don't mean to be insensitive or anything (rape is a pretty terrible), but ...I don't think rape can really be pointed down to 'rape culture', or that that term can really be defined. The ability to engage in sexual intercourse with someone against their will is not even a biological function available to most males. Also, most 'rapists' do so often, and seem to exhibit some very delusional mental problems, such as most rapists are under the impression that every male rapes, and that rape is a state of normalcy. 'Rape culture' might enable this, but it's not the birth of. Most people who 'rape' are just ****** up, whether male or female.

I can understand Clay's concern though. A very good friend of mind just a few weekse ago met a girl and at a bar. They were both drunk. They went back to his place, he ate her out, she cam, threw up and wanted to go home. My friend obliged and when he came home, there were 3 cops waiting for him. The girl had called the cops immediately after and reported him for rape. He was arrested at his house 30 minutes later, without his rights or charges being read to him, and spent the night in jail. Sometimes 'rape!' isn't actually rape. But that's rarer than the opposite of situations, more than likely.

Either way.. everyone should be aware that rape exists, and the **** that women (and men) go through following rape is usually just a confirmation of the terribleness of life that people are sometimes lucky to avoid. (And no, I'm not blaming women for rape in the least sense, but) Women, you should probably avoid 'cuddling' drunk with drunk guys. It's just not a good idea, and you are more than likely going to regret that decision, regardless whether or not a male is totally and utterly in the wrong. Avoid sketchy situations.

Reactionary Dumb Girl I use to be friends with: wow, dusty. evolutionary psychology and blaming the victim. dang. not even going to start on the former part of the post because it's so ridiculous. but, yeah, women should not cuddle drunk because men are incapable of not having sex with u...s if we do. saying you're not blaming the victim and then giving a woman advice on what not to do to get raped and then saying that she's going to REGRET whatever happens even if it's TOTALLY AND UTTERLY not her fault - uh, that's rape culture. god why am I still entertaining this.

ME: Don't be inflamatory. I didn't 'blame the victim', and rape is a byproduct of evolutionary factions... are you arguing against this? Rape is bad in all case. If you are going to treat it like it doesn't have physical causes, don't expect mu...ch work to get done. Women can do whatever they want... If you want to get drunk and cuddle, do it? If you were raped, it would totally still not be your fault for being raped -- I agree with that. Not all men are capable of drunking lying around with a girl without feelings of arousal, especially if it is two people... and... I know this may be difficult to imagine... men also get ********* to the point where they don't know what they are doing. Two drunk people don't communicate very effectively. I'm not justifying anyone doing anything. RAPE IS WRONG, BUT RAPISTS ARE ****** UP PHSYICALLY, WHICH MEANS THE URGE is a product of physical entities. Keep treating rapists like they are a representation of all men, who just choose to rape because their culture made women seem inferior, and then throwing them in federal prisons for years does not actually address rape. Treat rapists like mental patients, and you'd probably get a lot farther.

Entertaining it? Just seems like you read my post so quickly and assumed I was saying it was ever ok for anyone to rape anyone? It most certainly is not. And no, I didn't 'blame the victim'. I 'blamed' a non-human entity called genetics for the sole existence of rape, not as a justificiation for any rape...

But if you are quick to marginalize males in feministic approaches, don't expect males to take it seriously.

Never got a reply. So, there is one less feminist to take seriously...

Granted, it was a really heated discussion where some guys and some girls were both being huge dicks to each other, and I realized how prone to argument the genders are when talking about gender...

 

[work in progress]

Well, I'm pleased to read that you are aware of E.O.Wilson and are not condemning him. I bought and read "Sociobiology: The New Synthesis" when it was released in 1975. Back then, the book was anathema to feminists, who considered that it was a clever way to subvert feminist dialectic ! I was regarded with suspicion for reading it ! In fact the book was re-released in 2000, with a publishers note that it was unfortunate that such a significant book had been overlooked by many because of the zeitgeist at the time of it's publication, and that perhaps its time had finally come.

But you need to note that the zeitgeist at the time -- as you call it, was not because of mean feminists! It was because of the "zeitgeist" within the psychology fields which was still dominated by behaviourists, many of whom (including the most prominent feminists) were adherents to the Tabula Rasa or blank slate theory of mind that B.F. Skinner made popular a few decades earlier. There was similar outrage when a zoologist - Desmond Morris, presented a study of human behaviour (The Naked Ape) from an evolutionary perspective. That book spawned similar outrage from psychologists and from theologians coming from the religious angle. Both Morris's and Wilson's books followed an approach that scientists should have been doing since the time of Darwin -- knock Man off his elevated pedestal, and put him in comparison with other similar animals. Also worth noting that both books were using the science available at the time, and both authors admitted they went off on wrong tangents on occasion.

Much of the outrage from feminists to Sociobiology may have come from the fact that other scientists were using evidence from genetic research to make arguments for explaining gender differences and the subjugation of women in almost every culture. Red flags went up because the concept of gene expression wasn't understood at the time, and the general belief was that human characteristics had to either be caused by genetics or by social behaviour (nature vs. nurture), so those arguing for progress and equal treatment for women, would have understood any argument from genetics as an argument for behaviours being hardwired and unalterable.

I should also add here that genetic determinism reared its ugly head in the last ten years when a number of pop science books were using neurological evidence to claim that female brains are different than male brains. In brief, the books just make their observations from the way adult male and female brains differ, without providing the context of how a lifetime of learning and adapting to different gender roles have skewed the development of the male and female brain.

Your observation is correct, and there is a significant flipside ...
Because of the muscular advantage of men, womens power has had its basis in social skills.
Despite the lamentable depiction of men as unfeeling brutes which characterised much of the feminist rhetoric in the 60s and 70s and even later, the fact is that men are also emotional creatures with powerful attachments to their spouses and children.I have observed this even in men who are otherwise, at least superficially, "unfeeling brutes ". This is the handle which women have had on the physically more powerful men since time immemorial. And it is a handle which circumstances caused them to learn to manipulate with (sometimes unconscious) finesse. That is not a criticism BTW. I can easily empathise with that.

And this is where you start losing me! You seem to be unable or unwilling to put yourself in the position of what it would be like to live as a woman in a society where their freedoms are restricted and they are subject to physical abuse. Obviously, women who survive especially the worst hellholes of patriarchal societies would have to find other ways or means to protect themselves and their children. They could use guile, lies and deception, try to enlist another male to exact their revenge, blackmail (threaten to withdraw sex), use some sort of verbal abuse...and try to avoid pushing far enough to provoke physical attack, or throw another woman in the way for the man to abuse -- I get the feeling that this is what goes on in polygamous societies in many Muslim nations where the first wife sets herself up as a sort of queen bee of the hierarchy, and is abusive to a new young wife, and goads her husband to be abusive towards her also. It's worth noting that women who grow up in a society where they do not have to live in fear of men are far more direct in their social interactions with men. It has always struck me as ironic, that the most misogynistic, patriarchal societies are the ones where the men have the most complaints about how women act. It's even in the Bible....back in the Book of Proverbs I believe is where we find a passage ******** about the sharp-tongued woman. Considering the stories of how women were treated and had to live in the rest of the Old Testament, I would say that sharp tongue was justified.

This form of womens' power can be wielded to mutual advantage, or in the service of a controlling attitude. I have seen many, many men reduced to tears by the application of this kind of power ( though that response is, as far as possible, hidden from women, for reasons which are themselves affirmations of that power). It is legend in great literature. It would be disingenuous to ignore it.
Men do not get pregnant and breastfeed. The powerful bond between mother and child is assured by that biological context (research oxytocin for relevant detail). Not so for men. That bond is somewhat more fragile and dependent on the co-operation of the woman, and the men know it. And it matters to them, and always has ! Women have always had that power over men, and millenia of social adaptation have made a very powerful tool of it, a tool not to be underestimated.

No, first men can form a strong bond with their children if they are active and involved through the pregnancy, delivery and caring for their newborn. My relationship with my sons was much closer than the one I had with my father. But at the time, fathers weren't allowed to have any role in the birthing process...they had to wait out in the delivery room. It was also considered unseemly for a man to change a diaper or even bottle-feed a baby up till that time. We have the same hormones and neurochemicals as women (just in different quantities) so I would expect that the oxytocin and vasopressin release would be still be significant in the father who has been an active participant through the whole process.

You're losing me here. The family lawcourt situation has been a disgrace and a bleeding wound for decades. And it's the children bleeding as much as anybody. At the time when this was significant to me, custody to the mother was routine almost entirely regardless of the situation. A lot of the responsibility for men having meltdowns and refusing court orders is on the shoulders of those who destroyed mens relationships with their children and expected them to carry on as if everything was just fine, even if there was compelling evidence that the man would be an equally good or better parent. And the awful irony is that the men who cared most about their children were the ones most damaged.

Weren't you just telling me about how important that mother/child bond was above? Complaints about how family courts work have to be taken in context of where you live, because the courts where I am may have different procedural guidelines than where you are. The presumption that the children need the mother most, comes from the same earlier line of thinking that put the distance between men and their children in the first place. The changing expectations where a growing number of women are the primary breadwinners has also led to more cases where the father is considered the primary caregiver of the young children, rather than the mother.

Needless to say our genetic heritage has adapted to a hunter/gatherer life, and never even completely adapted to the age of agriculture and living in crowded cities...let alone adapting to a new reality where the traditional gender roles may even be reversed in many cases where the woman has more earning opportunities and career potential than her husband.

 

[apophenia]

But you need to note that the zeitgeist at the time -- as you call it, was not because of mean feminists! It was because of the "zeitgeist" within the psychology fields which was still dominated by behaviourists, many of whom (including the most prominent feminists) were adherents to the Tabula Rasa or blank slate theory of mind that B.F. Skinner made popular a few decades earlier. There was similar outrage when a zoologist - Desmond Morris, presented a study of human behaviour (The Naked Ape) from an evolutionary perspective. That book spawned similar outrage from psychologists and from theologians coming from the religious angle. Both Morris's and Wilson's books followed an approach that scientists should have been doing since the time of Darwin -- knock Man off his elevated pedestal, and put him in comparison with other similar animals. Also worth noting that both books were using the science available at the time, and both authors admitted they went off on wrong tangents on occasion.

I don't know your age, so I don't know if you were listening to general public debate back then. I was, and I can assure you that sociobiology was considered a threat to the feminist position.

Much of the outrage from feminists to Sociobiology may have come from the fact that other scientists were using evidence from genetic research to make arguments for explaining gender differences and the subjugation of women in almost every culture. Red flags went up because the concept of gene expression wasn't understood at the time, and the general belief was that human characteristics had to either be caused by genetics or by social behaviour (nature vs. nurture), so those arguing for progress and equal treatment for women, would have understood any argument from genetics as an argument for behaviours being hardwired and unalterable.

Correct. That was exactly the position. The issue as I remember from listening to feminists at the time was that Wilson's work appeared to validate such claims from anti-feminists in general, and so from the point of view of the political struggle, that work had to be invalidated.

And this is where you start losing me! You seem to be unable or unwilling to put yourself in the position of what it would be like to live as a woman in a society where their freedoms are restricted and they are subject to physical abuse
....
It has always struck me as ironic, that the most misogynistic, patriarchal societies are the ones where the men have the most complaints about how women act. It's even in the Bible....back in the Book of Proverbs I believe is where we find a passage ******** about the sharp-tongued woman. Considering the stories of how women were treated and had to live in the rest of the Old Testament, I would say that sharp tongue was justified.

That was precisely my point. Here is what I posted -

" This is the handle which women have had on the physically more powerful men since time immemorial. And it is a handle which circumstances caused them to learn to manipulate with (sometimes unconscious) finesse. That is not a criticism BTW. I can easily empathise with that. "

Going a little further, I am suggesting that any form of power can be abused, and in relation to the thread topic, I am suggesting that there are women who wield this kind of power in a way inimical to men, and not just as a response to patriarchal abuse. There are women who wield this kind of power against other women. I don't think it is that uncommon, as I said it is often discussed in literature and portrayed in movies because it is a commonplace.

No, first men can form a strong bond with their children if they are active and involved through the pregnancy, delivery and caring for their newborn. My relationship with my sons was much closer than the one I had with my father. But at the time, fathers weren't allowed to have any role in the birthing process...they had to wait out in the delivery room. It was also considered unseemly for a man to change a diaper or even bottle-feed a baby up till that time. We have the same hormones and neurochemicals as women (just in different quantities) so I would expect that the oxytocin and vasopressin release would be still be significant in the father who has been an active participant through the whole process.

Once again I agree. I was present at my daughter's birth, and quit work to become the primary care-giver for the first 6 months of her life because her mother was experiencing post-natal depression. My daughter was placed in my arms first at the birth, while her mother was attended to with surgical procedures. We formed a very strong bond .

My post said "Men do not get pregnant and breastfeed. The powerful bond between mother and child is assured by that biological context (research oxytocin for relevant detail). Not so for men. That bond is somewhat more fragile and dependent on the co-operation of the woman, and the men know it."
While your points are true about the situation of the modern father ( as I found myself), my point is really about the historical context, which is why I posted "Women have always had that power over men, and millenia of social adaptation have made a very powerful tool of it"

Weren't you just telling me about how important that mother/child bond was above? Complaints about how family courts work have to be taken in context of where you live, because the courts where I am may have different procedural guidelines than where you are. The presumption that the children need the mother most, comes from the same earlier line of thinking that put the distance between men and their children in the first place. The changing expectations where a growing number of women are the primary breadwinners has also led to more cases where the father is considered the primary caregiver of the young children, rather than the mother.

Needless to say our genetic heritage has adapted to a hunter/gatherer life, and never even completely adapted to the age of agriculture and living in crowded cities...let alone adapting to a new reality where the traditional gender roles may even be reversed in many cases where the woman has more earning opportunities and career potential than her husband.

Basically we agree on just about everything. My remarks about family courts were, as I have said, based on the Australian courts in the 70s - and if you look at that graph of divorce rates which I posted earlier it's easy to see that that was a unique time, divorce rates suddenly increased 6-fold for a very short period. During that very short intense period, a lot of **** happened, and it did leave some scars all round. Here's that graph again, in case anyone missed it -
http://www.aifs.gov.au/institute/inf...ivorcerate.jpg


I am not stating anything particularly provocative or anti-feminist, I am trying to contextualise how a small percentage of women get away with violent and abusive behaviour because of prevailing social conditions, and comment on the zeal of some feminists who feel obliged to discredit any and all such claims.

My experience just prior to my daughter's birth, when I had a part-time job in a sex shop and was almost incinerated by radical feminists, left a big impression on me. The way the media chose not to report that was offensive to me at the time, and raised a red flag about unbalanced media in the feminist direction. The way I was treated when I sought help dealing with my child's mother, who became consistently abusive, was very traumatising, and the effects of that continue to this day. The stories of other men who had similar experiences were similarly received.

So basically all I am trying to communicate is that, yes, violence and abuse against men is real, that those who suffer from it also suffer being accused of lying and misogyny, and that this can only be understood in the context of how feminism has shaped social opinion.

I would not want to roll back the changes feminism has made to society. I saw how patriarchy functioned as a child of a single mother in the 50s and 60s and it was ugly.

 

[Yerda]

You may be right...

So take up the challenge yourself - can you give us a scenario where a woman being shot in the vagina with a shotgun is funny ?

I doubt it, I'm not that funny.

What was the point you were making again?

 

[work in progress]

I don't know your age, so I don't know if you were listening to general public debate back then. I was, and I can assure you that sociobiology was considered a threat to the feminist position.

I'm 55, and I read Sociobiology a couple of years after it was published, not immediately when it came out. But, at the time there was a flurry of activity as critics coming from traditional social sciences were outraged that a biologist would try to apply evolutionary principles to studying humans and culture. My point is that it wasn't just feminists who were opposed, it was the leading academics in psychology and sociology.

Going a little further, I am suggesting that any form of power can be abused, and in relation to the thread topic, I am suggesting that there are women who wield this kind of power in a way inimical to men, and not just as a response to patriarchal abuse. There are women who wield this kind of power against other women. I don't think it is that uncommon, as I said it is often discussed in literature and portrayed in movies because it is a commonplace.

My objection was that it needs to be pointed out where women wield and abuse power in patriarchal societies, that it's the men who have to make the decision to change the culture. The women's lives, even the ones who are highest on the female hierarchy are still narrowly proscribed and they become suspect by the religious and political establishment if they get caught calling for reforms. It's not until the men decide in majority that things need to change, that anything can be done.

While your points are true about the situation of the modern father ( as I found myself), my point is really about the historical context, which is why I posted "Women have always had that power over men, and millenia of social adaptation have made a very powerful tool of it"

Well, that's not exactly true, because in patriarchal societies, women's sexuality is controlled by men. The women are at a disadvantage where they are depending on the good will of men to even support their own families, and have to put up with abuse and be unable to leave a bad situation because of having to care for young children.

I am not stating anything particularly provocative or anti-feminist, I am trying to contextualise how a small percentage of women get away with violent and abusive behaviour because of prevailing social conditions, and comment on the zeal of some feminists who feel obliged to discredit any and all such claims.

My experience just prior to my daughter's birth, when I had a part-time job in a sex shop and was almost incinerated by radical feminists, left a big impression on me. The way the media chose not to report that was offensive to me at the time, and raised a red flag about unbalanced media in the feminist direction. The way I was treated when I sought help dealing with my child's mother, who became consistently abusive, was very traumatising, and the effects of that continue to this day. The stories of other men who had similar experiences were similarly received.

So basically all I am trying to communicate is that, yes, violence and abuse against men is real, that those who suffer from it also suffer being accused of lying and misogyny, and that this can only be understood in the context of how feminism has shaped social opinion.

I would not want to roll back the changes feminism has made to society. I saw how patriarchy functioned as a child of a single mother in the 50s and 60s and it was ugly.

this is similar to cases of "reverse racism," since context has to be provided that one group is at a disadvantage to the other. So any attempts at balancing the situation may actually put the oppressed group in a more difficult situation.

I remember you talking about your experience previously, but even there, you have to note that the demonstrations (called Take Back The Night) where I live, were mostly coming from lower class women who felt ignored by the leaders of feminist groups, because upper and upper middle class women do not face the same public safety issues as women who have to work late shifts in restaurants or hotels and ride public transit home at late hours. There was an anarchistic element to some of the demonstrations, and many rape victims identified pornography as a cause of their problems, whether it was justified or not. You, unfortunately got caught in the crossfire by some abused women looking for an opportunity to vent.

 

[Mathematician]

My objection was that it needs to be pointed out where women wield and abuse power in patriarchal societies, that it's the men who have to make the decision to change the culture. The women's lives, even the ones who are highest on the female hierarchy are still narrowly proscribed and they become suspect by the religious and political establishment if they get caught calling for reforms. It's not until the men decide in majority that things need to change, that anything can be done.

We don't live in a patriarchal society. Women between 22-30 make 8% more than men, and economic power is the determining idea in power structures.

 

[work in progress]

We don't live in a patriarchal society. Women between 22-30 make 8% more than men,

You need to specify that it is within that younger age demographic where economic power has shifted...as has education, as I pointed out in a post a week ago here. This would provide one reason why I see an increase in misogyny and hostility towards women among younger men. When I was young, it was the old guys who were up in arms about working wives and the feminist movement in general. Nowadays, I notice that it is coming from guys who are in my sons' age bracket. This sort of hostility expressed by young men who see themselves as not reaching their expectations in education or career afterwards...while many of their female classmates surpass them in both, could be setting our culture up for the sort of hostility and even violence that a lot of younger men think is socially acceptable now.

and economic power is the determining idea in power structures.

Well, first let's see how long this trend is allowed to continue....and I mean ALLOWED...since there are still relatively few women with politcal power or control in corporate boardrooms; and right wing reactionary forces are fanning out from their American home base to spread the message that women cannot be allowed to have any choice over reproduction....other than the traditional method of escape -- become a nun and join a convent!

It should be noted that the trend you pointed to above is also class-specific; in other words, it's the young women from middle to upper class families that are moving ahead. But they also have control over reproductive issues, whether or not they are in Republican red states or not, because both they and their families have the resources to get that little "problem" taken care of if they need birth control or need to go out of state to get an abortion while still in high school. It's the girls who are at the lower end of the economic spectrum who are going to be the most seriously impacted by the phony concern for "life," since they will be stuck pregnant and unwed mothers at 15 or 16, and never make it to college in the first place. The best that they could hope for is that the baby-daddy or some other diamond-in-the-rough is willing to come in to their lives and support them and the baby so that they can actually have a chance to go to school, and break out of the welfare or minimum wage servitude. But what are the odds of that happening?

 

[Yerda]

Women between 22-30 make 8% more than men...

In the same job?

 

[The Sum of Awe]

 

[rageoftyrael]

That actually is a pretty good example of the double standard we live with on a regular basis.

 

[nnmartin]

double standards abound in this realm though.

I think it's a kind of payback to the situation in which it is generally considered acceptable for a man to sleep around but not for a woman.

It's all to do with Nature really.

 

[InformedIgnorance]

I find it ironic that so often (I initially wrote every time, but that is a generalisation) a woman faces court on charges of some act of violence against her male partner, it is so often written off as self defence - even at times when the evidence simply does not match their accounts of the events e.g. Abused wife jailed for stabbing husband to death - Yahoo!7

No evidence of abuse or even merely very flimsy circumstantial evidence of potential abuse is taken as iron clad justification for whatever was done. Were men charged with similar crimes the burden of proof required to exculpate them would be obscene and psychological or verbal abuse would suddenly no longer be a factor, sexual abuse would be laughed at while other forms of physical abuse would require irrefutable evidence (and unless there was a considerable size difference between the pair, it would probably be shrugged off)

 

[Yerda]

I find it ironic that so often (I initially wrote every time, but that is a generalisation) a woman faces court on charges of some act of violence against her male partner, it is so often written off as self defence - even at times when the evidence simply does not match their accounts of the events e.g. Abused wife jailed for stabbing husband to death - Yahoo!7

How often?

 

[Yerda]

Originally Posted by Eugene View Post
Women between 22-30 make 8% more than men...

In the same job?

Well anyway, from Wikipedia:

In 2009 the median income of FTYR workers was $47,127 for men, compared to $36,278 for women. The female-to-male earnings ratio was 0.77, not statistically different from the 2008 ratio.[2] The female-to-male earnings ratio of 0.77 means that, in 2009, female FTYR workers earned 23% less than male FTYR workers.

Male–female income disparity in the United States

 

[MysticSang'ha]

I find it ironic that so often (I initially wrote every time, but that is a generalisation) a woman faces court on charges of some act of violence against her male partner, it is so often written off as self defence - even at times when the evidence simply does not match their accounts of the events e.g. Abused wife jailed for stabbing husband to death - Yahoo!7

No evidence of abuse or even merely very flimsy circumstantial evidence of potential abuse is taken as iron clad justification for whatever was done. Were men charged with similar crimes the burden of proof required to exculpate them would be obscene and psychological or verbal abuse would suddenly no longer be a factor, sexual abuse would be laughed at while other forms of physical abuse would require irrefutable evidence (and unless there was a considerable size difference between the pair, it would probably be shrugged off)

I do have some female acquaintances who were arrested for battery after their husbands or SO's showed them a scratch on the face or some hair had been yanked out, but these women also showed the deep bruises on their ribs, or the red marks around their necks after choking attempts by their mates to the police.

I think it's equally dangerous to dismiss male violence as it is to dismiss female violence.

 

[work in progress]

I do have some female acquaintances who were arrested for battery after their husbands or SO's showed them a scratch on the face or some hair had been yanked out, but these women also showed the deep bruises on their ribs, or the red marks around their necks after choking attempts by their mates to the police.

I think it's equally dangerous to dismiss male violence as it is to dismiss female violence.

There is a whole cottage industry called Men's Rights Advocacy, which is nothing more than a repository for everything anti-feminist, and the MRA's are often contradictory, since they come from different directions and want different issues addressed. So, on one side we have the old fashioned Christian and Muslim patriarchs who believe that women are so fragile and need so much protection in this dangerous world, that they must be put up on a pedestal and protected from men. So, the modern movement of sex-segregated education keeps those vulnerable girls away from boys, and then directs them towards proper careers for females (if they are allowed to work outside of the home) and speaking of which -- when they are outside in that dark, dangerous world, they need to be protected by wearing long dresses and covering their hair...or wearing a bloody burlap sack that hides everything for guaranteed protection.

Okay, so we already know what they're all about! But on the other side, some of these MRA's tell us that it's the women who are violent, that they are beating and abusing men, but men are too ashamed to admit their abuse and keep it secret. So, are women the weaker sex, or are they the dangerous sex? Somehow MRA followers take in all this crap on their websites and never resolve that conundrum. These MRA's that follow the 'abusive female' meme present pseudo-statistics to support their case by just ticking the boxes when it comes to domestic abuse. As you noted, the severity of injuries to women in domestic abuse situations is by far more serious than the scratches that the men show the police to try to escape out of getting an assault and battery charge. So, we have to do more than check the boxes, we have to consider who is physically larger and who is more dangerous in a confrontation where violence might result. I don't care if some of these guys arguing a false equivalency between violence against women and violence against men are offended by the way I characterize this discussion as a man-bites-dog story, the facts are plainly evident that the vast majority of men do not have to live in fear of women, while a huge percentage of women do live in fear of men -- both intimate partners and fear of strangers if they work late hours and have to travel on public transportation at night. What bothers me most is that the odd story of the guy getting abused becomes justification for sidelining this issue with a stupid "they do it too" mentality, when what should be happening is that men should be concerned about the safety and wellbeing of women and children -- learn some of the signs that abuse is going on and report it, since it might cause more problems for the victim if they confront the abuser directly. Anyway, here's some of the real numbers:
Bureau of Justice Statistics Homicide trends in the U.S.: Intimate homicide

Female murder victims are substantially more likely than male murder victims to have been killed by an intimate

In recent years -

• About one third of female murder victims were killed by an intimate.
• About 3% of male murder victims were killed by an intimate.
• Of all female murder victims, the proportion killed by an intimate has been increasing.

 

[Me Myself]

my equation for the attraction stakes is as such:

Men go for 100% looks in the woman

Everytime you describe men I feel offended.

Maybe that´s what you do, man...

 

[work in progress]

Everytime you describe men I feel offended.

Maybe that´s what you do, man...

Maybe it's because I haven't been following this thread very closely of late, but I didn't notice the post you responded to.

I'm not going to say that I'm offended by the notion that men just go for a woman's looks, because it sure is pretty damn important to us, but you are right that looks aren't everything, and it would be a shame if women hear this all the time and just take it for granted also, because behavioural psychologists have noted for quite some time now with simple tests just asking men to grade or evaluate the attractiveness of women, that our perceptions of how beautiful a woman is are skewed by how we perceive her intangible qualities....whether we think she is a nice person, friendly, loving, sympathetic etc.. In the picture tests where men are shown faces, a friendly smile makes a huge difference in how the men perceive her attractiveness. So they would ask models to exhibit a range of emotions, and see how different men rated them when they are smiling, frowning, looking disgusted etc.. I know that on a personal level, back many years ago when I was dating, there were some girls that started looking a lot better after I got to know them, and a few that moved down in the other direction, like a couple who had great looks and great bodies, but were just horrible.

 

[Me Myself]

100%?? Obviously I look at looks, I am human, but I don´t subscribe to that whole *** of "gentleman prefer them dumb" (or however people call it in english).

If she is beautiful and braindead, I might have sex with her, but I won´t lose my time in trying to have an relationship with her.

To say men go 100% for looks and female for looks and money is such a pathetic outlook, as if we were emotionally devoid, as if we didn´t use our relationships to interact in deeper emotional levels.

I definetely take it as offensive. Ijust leave it at that because I think that in his very twisted worldview that´s actually true, so blah.