Woman rapes 14 year old boy, escapes conviction, bemoans she'll be seen as a sex offender anyway

[Metaphor]

Sorry Met, it sometimes gets tough to follow you on this. Your style of writing suggests that you find it somehow wrong or unacceptable for women to acknowledge that men represent a threat (which we don't really have the physical ability to overpower).

But I don't find it wrong or unacceptable. I said feminists routinely advertise that prejudice in a way that would be completely unacceptable were it based on any other characteristic.

In terms of discriminating against men and forming policy on that prejudice... how do you feel about unisex bathrooms, unisex high-school showers, and unisex prisons? Do you think it's wrong for women to want policies that segregate those areas on the basis of sex, due to the completely understandable risk that men represent?

Unfortunately for women, the transgender mania currently gripping the Western world has already reduced and sometimes eliminated single-sex spaces for women, including in spaces of extraordinary intimacy and lack of free movement, such as transwomen with penises (that is, men) incarcerated in women's prisons. And feminists are leading the pack of destroying anybody who raises a hand to object.

I think there's a distinction between policies that discriminate on a reasonable and rational basis, and policies that discriminate on irrational bases. Disallowing perfectly able-bodied people to use the disabled parking spot is a perfectly reasonable discrimination. Allowing medical patients to specify the sex of their doctor for intimate procedures is a rational policy.

I don't know that I agree, but in any case we don't have that right now. If health insurance companies are forbidden from charging women more than men (despite the fact that women use more health services and have a higher actuarial cost) then car insurance companies ought be forbidden from charging men more than women (despite the fact that men cause more accidents and have a higher actuarial cost).

But I disagree that a policy such as sex-segregated spaces 'discriminates' against people by sex, inasmuch as either sex gets the use of equivalent space. But a policy that imposes a behaviour or restriction on one sex only does discriminate.

And, in fact, I believe there should be wider allowance for people practising their preferences, for any reason or no reason at all. Not because it's 'rational' for women to fear men, or for someone somewhere to decide on that rationality, but merely because women want it.

A few years ago in Australia, two men proposed a men's only, co-working space. The media, and ordinary men and women, lost their fucking minds. Just google 'men's coworking space'. The idea of it repelled them to the core. Some men said it made them 'ashamed to be men' that such a space would even be allowed to exist. Some women, who evidently hated the misogynist creeps who would even think of such an idea, nevertheless wanted to make sure that misogynist creeps could never voluntarily segregate themselves and wanted these misogynist creeps to mingle, presumably, in mixed-sex working spaces where they would rightly suffer every day under the oppressive cootie-gynocracy of working whamen-folk. I lost friends arguing on Facebook over this.

Here was my hot take (though I didn't realise I would be in such a vanishing and thoroughly detested minority report hot-take when I originally made it): let people voluntarily associate with whoever they want to, for any reason or no reason at all. It is enough of a reason that they want to do it. Their reasons don't have to be rational, you don't have to like it, you can even find it offensive if you want to.

Of course, the outrage at voluntary sex-segregation is aimed only at cis-hetero-male spaces. Gay and bisexual men can have a male-only sex-on-premises venues where women are not welcome (though I'm sure there are feminists who object to that also). Women can of course have women-only co-working spaces.

I'm not a cis-hetero-male, and sometimes they're weird and hard to understand. But let's say they opened up a cis-hetero-male only co-working space. So what? Why would I insist on club membership in a club that I don't qualify for and doesn't want me?

 

[Jarhyn]

I'll note that the expectations are generally something feminists fight against for either gender.

Careful. That seems tantamount to saying feminists are as much for and about both sexes!

Yeah, such a radical view! I'm a feminist as much because I object to stereotypes held and enforced for men!

I will absolutely accept the existence of a failure for many feminists to take the whole view, but then, you can't throw a stone without hitting some liber-publican idiot who only stands on principle so long as it benefits them and thought like that isn't in short supply in any group. Though admittedly some set that inability as a bar for membership and others try to weed it out.

I don't want to be a "man" or a "woman" but rather I want to be myself, whatever that means to me. I don't see what's so controversial about that, assuming that I do the bare minimum effort to at least make sure I'm not just a fucking asshole. It's a shame more people can't even be arsed to do that much.

 

[J842P]

I would say, by a long shot, the most dismissed type of rape, which occurs relatively frequently, is of male prisoners by other male prisoners. It is frequently the subject of jokes, and a lot of people seem to treat it as simply a part of the punishment package that comes along with prison. That is my impression.

I understand what you mean about the cultural bias against men. But I also think it is not entirely irrational. But yeah, it sucks.

That one gets messy. It's not just prison rapes that get downplayed (although they are a large proportion of them). In general, rapes of males by other males are downplayed.

Part of that, I think, is the ingrained social bias that men shouldn't complain, should "man up" and "be strong" and that they're somehow less masculine if they admit to being harmed by it.

That's probably part of it for sure.

Part of it, also, is a pretty strong aversion to honestly look at the very strong pattern of aggression - especially sexual aggression - that is almost entirely exhibited by males. It's a male characteristic, whether it's socially developed or has some evolutionary root, it's still a problem that needs to be dealt with at some point. And that means that males are going to have to get involved with it too.

Well, that I don't agree with at all. Where is this aversion to discussing the fact that males are much more likely to display physical aggression? I've never seen it, certainly not on this board. Indeed, it is a fact pretty much taken for granted in any sphere I can think of. You seem to think Metaphor wants to avoid that, but I don't see that. If this is what you believe, then I think you really need to reflect on that because to me that's just crazy.

And when you say, "that means males are going to have to get involved with it too", I'm astounded that you think they aren't. The courts, police, and people who research the topic are filled with men involved with it. In everyday life, it is almost always another male that is directly interceding in the case of an out of control, violent, aggressive male.

There is a kind of woman, and I hate to go there, but she is almost always white and almost always of means, who seems to have this idea that men aren't aware that there are violent men. Which is crazy, it really makes it hard to take people with that perspective seriously. No one knows how violent aggressive men are more than other men. I will hear women say that I, as a man, have no idea what it is like to walk around the world and be afraid for my life... which just sounds incredibly solipsistic. Like, you would have to have never payed attention to anything other than your own problems to say something like that. If I happen to accidentally bump into the wrong dude, or "look at them the wrong way", there's a non-negligible chance that that sort of thing will escalate into an extremely violent altercation. And if I don't have any friends there with me, I am just outside on the street, let's say, then it is unlikely someone will intervene on my behalf, except maybe after I've already suffered a serious beating and then someone might stop the other guy because "come on man, he's had enough".

 

[ruby sparks]

I don't want to be a "man" or a "woman" but rather I want to be myself, whatever that means to me. I don't see what's so controversial about that, assuming that I do the bare minimum effort to at least make sure I'm not just a fucking asshole.

It's not controversial at all.

 

[ruby sparks]

That's probably part of it for sure.

Part of it, also, is a pretty strong aversion to honestly look at the very strong pattern of aggression - especially sexual aggression - that is almost entirely exhibited by males. It's a male characteristic, whether it's socially developed or has some evolutionary root, it's still a problem that needs to be dealt with at some point. And that means that males are going to have to get involved with it too.

Well, that I don't agree with at all. Where is this aversion to discussing the fact that males are much more likely to display physical aggression? I've never seen it, certainly not on this board. Indeed, it is a fact pretty much taken for granted in any sphere I can think of. You seem to think Metaphor wants to avoid that, but I don't see that. If this is what you believe, then I think you really need to reflect on that because to me that's just crazy.

And when you say, "that means males are going to have to get involved with it too", I'm astounded that you think they aren't. The courts, police, and people who research the topic are filled with men involved with it. In everyday life, it is almost always another male that is directly interceding in the case of an out of control, violent, aggressive male.

There is a kind of woman, and I hate to go there, but she is almost always white and almost always of means, who seems to have this idea that men aren't aware that there are violent men. Which is crazy, it really makes it hard to take people with that perspective seriously. No one knows how violent aggressive men are more than other men. I will hear women say that I, as a man, have no idea what it is like to walk around the world and be afraid for my life... which just sounds incredibly solipsistic. Like, you would have to have never payed attention to anything other than your own problems to say something like that. If I happen to accidentally bump into the wrong dude, or "look at them the wrong way", there's a non-negligible chance that that sort of thing will escalate into an extremely violent altercation. And if I don't have any friends there with me, I am just outside on the street, let's say, then it is unlikely someone will intervene on my behalf, except maybe after I've already suffered a serious beating and then someone might stop the other guy because "come on man, he's had enough".

Several good points there, imo.

Now I just need to go back and read through all the threads metaphor has started on the undesirable outcomes of patterns of male aggression in society and what might be done about it. It'll probably take quite a while.

'Wait,' I hear someone say, 'that topic is already well-aired, so there is no need to do it'. To which I would say, 'sorry, but we're not accepting lame excuses today for those having a skewed personal perspective. They need to own that shit for themselves'.

 

[Emily Lake]

Well, that I don't agree with at all. Where is this aversion to discussing the fact that males are much more likely to display physical aggression? I've never seen it, certainly not on this board. Indeed, it is a fact pretty much taken for granted in any sphere I can think of. You seem to think Metaphor wants to avoid that, but I don't see that. If this is what you believe, then I think you really need to reflect on that because to me that's just crazy.

And when you say, "that means males are going to have to get involved with it too", I'm astounded that you think they aren't. The courts, police, and people who research the topic are filled with men involved with it. In everyday life, it is almost always another male that is directly interceding in the case of an out of control, violent, aggressive male.

There is a kind of woman, and I hate to go there, but she is almost always white and almost always of means, who seems to have this idea that men aren't aware that there are violent men. Which is crazy, it really makes it hard to take people with that perspective seriously. No one knows how violent aggressive men are more than other men. I will hear women say that I, as a man, have no idea what it is like to walk around the world and be afraid for my life... which just sounds incredibly solipsistic. Like, you would have to have never payed attention to anything other than your own problems to say something like that. If I happen to accidentally bump into the wrong dude, or "look at them the wrong way", there's a non-negligible chance that that sort of thing will escalate into an extremely violent altercation. And if I don't have any friends there with me, I am just outside on the street, let's say, then it is unlikely someone will intervene on my behalf, except maybe after I've already suffered a serious beating and then someone might stop the other guy because "come on man, he's had enough".

So that's not really where I was going.

There are a lot of men out there, who when women bring up the highly disparate rates of sexual assault and the prevalence of violence in men, respond with commentary of "man-hating woman" or decry that it's "misandrist" and "unfair". That it's bigoted and oppressive to view men as a class as potential predators, and to carry a level of awareness and low-grade caution with us wherever we go.

Men are going to have to get involved in a different way. Yes, while observing an actual altercation, men will get involved to stop it. But there's frequently an assumption that "she must have done something to deserve it". And when it gets reported, the police frequently don't act on it. Only the most egregious cases of domestic violence and abuse actually get convicted. Most sexual assaults don't get convictions. Even rapes are incredibly hard to get convicted. So yes... men "get involved" if they happen to be there and directly observe something they think is out of line... but they aren't helping solve the problem of violence against women frequently going unpunished. Some men are involved in the broader sense, which I appreciate. But there are a LOT of men who are not even remotely involved, and who frankly don't think there's a problem at all. They're the ones who regularly assume that women are liars and conniving bitches trying to play on emotions in order to stick to one of their brothers.

You say it's "solipsistic" and point out that once in a while you have to worry about some guy getting bent if you're alone and he's in a bad mood. Add a layer to that. Add the layer of 98% of those men being bigger and stronger, able to easily dominate you and leave you with no real way to defend yourself. Then add another layer of that man might sexually assault you or rape you. Then add an additional layer of women don't necessarily have to do anything at all in order to become the victim of that violence and aggression. In your scenario, you can avoid that violence by being aware and not accidentally bumping into that guy, right?

Do you ever worry that a random guy on the street might be a predator on the hunt and you're his prey?

 

[ruby sparks]

Well, that I don't agree with at all. Where is this aversion to discussing the fact that males are much more likely to display physical aggression? I've never seen it, certainly not on this board. Indeed, it is a fact pretty much taken for granted in any sphere I can think of. You seem to think Metaphor wants to avoid that, but I don't see that. If this is what you believe, then I think you really need to reflect on that because to me that's just crazy.

And when you say, "that means males are going to have to get involved with it too", I'm astounded that you think they aren't. The courts, police, and people who research the topic are filled with men involved with it. In everyday life, it is almost always another male that is directly interceding in the case of an out of control, violent, aggressive male.

There is a kind of woman, and I hate to go there, but she is almost always white and almost always of means, who seems to have this idea that men aren't aware that there are violent men. Which is crazy, it really makes it hard to take people with that perspective seriously. No one knows how violent aggressive men are more than other men. I will hear women say that I, as a man, have no idea what it is like to walk around the world and be afraid for my life... which just sounds incredibly solipsistic. Like, you would have to have never payed attention to anything other than your own problems to say something like that. If I happen to accidentally bump into the wrong dude, or "look at them the wrong way", there's a non-negligible chance that that sort of thing will escalate into an extremely violent altercation. And if I don't have any friends there with me, I am just outside on the street, let's say, then it is unlikely someone will intervene on my behalf, except maybe after I've already suffered a serious beating and then someone might stop the other guy because "come on man, he's had enough".

So that's not really where I was going.

There are a lot of men out there, who when women bring up the highly disparate rates of sexual assault and the prevalence of violence in men, respond with commentary of "man-hating woman" or decry that it's "misandrist" and "unfair". That it's bigoted and oppressive to view men as a class as potential predators, and to carry a level of awareness and low-grade caution with us wherever we go.

Men are going to have to get involved in a different way. Yes, while observing an actual altercation, men will get involved to stop it. But there's frequently an assumption that "she must have done something to deserve it". And when it gets reported, the police frequently don't act on it. Only the most egregious cases of domestic violence and abuse actually get convicted. Most sexual assaults don't get convictions. Even rapes are incredibly hard to get convicted. So yes... men "get involved" if they happen to be there and directly observe something they think is out of line... but they aren't helping solve the problem of violence against women frequently going unpunished. Some men are involved in the broader sense, which I appreciate. But there are a LOT of men who are not even remotely involved, and who frankly don't think there's a problem at all. They're the ones who regularly assume that women are liars and conniving bitches trying to play on emotions in order to stick to one of their brothers.

You say it's "solipsistic" and point out that once in a while you have to worry about some guy getting bent if you're alone and he's in a bad mood. Add a layer to that. Add the layer of 98% of those men being bigger and stronger, able to easily dominate you and leave you with no real way to defend yourself. Then add another layer of that man might sexually assault you or rape you. Then add an additional layer of women don't necessarily have to do anything at all in order to become the victim of that violence and aggression. In your scenario, you can avoid that violence by being aware and not accidentally bumping into that guy, right?

Do you ever worry that a random guy on the street might be a predator on the hunt and you're his prey?

Basically, I think it's a mixed picture.

What I do think might be the case is that guys who would never themselves hold certain attitudes can perhaps underestimate the proportion of men who do.

For example, after reading your post, I vaguely remembered the results of a poll of university students here in NI which caught my attention at the time. I dug out a reference to it:

https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-re...n-ireland-students-believe-woman-partially-or

It's from 2008.

"A new poll shows that almost half (46%) of Northern Ireland university students believe that a woman is partially or totally responsible for being raped if she has behaved in a flirtatious manner..."

(It doesn't say, but I'm guessing that both male and female students were polled).

 

[Bronzeage]

Feminists do not actually say the literal words "women have no agency..."

They merely betray their reasoning when, like in Bagaric's article, they frame women's criminality always as a response to the unfortunate circumstances pressed on them by a misogynist world.

I see. No citation this time. Not even one feminist. I would have accepted one, with the caveat I mentioned about you repeatedly generalising too much, while complaining at times about others doing it.

He provided a reference earlier. The article did note that the vast majority of female prisoners were physically and/or sexually abused as children, and that the majority of their offenses are minor crimes or are drug & alcohol related.

The article does not bother to look at how many male prisoners were abused as children. I would suspect a great lot of them.

This brings up a seldom addressed issue. The main reason there is greater pressure to punish a man who has sexual contact with an underage woman is we assume such contact is harmful to her. We have sort of abandoned the idea it reduces her value as a bride, but that was the original objection.

However, there's no general feeling that there's any harm done when an underage man is introduced to sex by an older woman. No one ever thought a man was a less valuable prospect as a husband because of prior sexual experience.

 

[Emily Lake]

What I do think might be the case is that guys who would never themselves hold certain attitudes can perhaps underestimate the proportion of men who do.

Oh, I'm fairly certain this is true.

 

[Emily Lake]

This brings up a seldom addressed issue. The main reason there is greater pressure to punish a man who has sexual contact with an underage woman is we assume such contact is harmful to her. We have sort of abandoned the idea it reduces her value as a bride, but that was the original objection.

However, there's no general feeling that there's any harm done when an underage man is introduced to sex by an older woman. No one ever thought a man was a less valuable prospect as a husband because of prior sexual experience.

Probably not wrong, unfortunately. There's still that underlying cultural madonna complex that views female sexuality as immoral. We're gradually moving away from it... but it's still a case of "slut versus stud".

 

[ruby sparks]

We're gradually moving away from it...

Very gradually. These things persist, for a variety of reasons.

ETA: I think those reasons fall into (the usual) two general categories, sometimes referred to as nature and nurture. Personally, I find the evolutionary/biological explanations at least as plausible as the social/cultural ones, and in a sense, I think they're both 'learned' but not in the same way (and some may validly dispute the use of that word for the evolved ones) or at the same speed, and they most likely interact (and are not wholly separate processes anyway). If you put me on the spot and asked me which of the (putative) two is the main driver for behaviour, I'd opt for what is called nature, which if true is arguably unfortunate, because that's the one that has always been by far the hardest to change (temporarily assuming that changing it is a good thing, for the species for instance) if indeed it even could be changed (pre-genetic science) which has left us us trying to modify (or train, or control or influence) the one that (I tend to think) has less input. And in between the very slow evolutionary processes and the fast 'individually learned' ones are the changes that can happen at what I might call medium speed, in cultures, over centuries.

I'm sure many here are familiar with some of the examples. For example, why do men, by and large all over the world and throughout history, tend to think a woman flirting or dressing provocatively in male presence is signalling a desire for sex (and even to some extent makes her at least partly responsible if it happens against her will)? Possibly sometimes because it is (at least signalling an interest I mean). But, in such situations and others like it, men tend to overestimate a woman's sexual interest and more importantly intent, it seems, partly by psychologically projecting their own interest and intent onto her. Some suggest that part of the explanation lies in the fact that in our species, females are choosy about mates and mating (because, they say, it involves much more potential investment of their various and valuable resources) while males, for whom the investment is typically/potentially much, much less, compete for it, indeed in some ways must compete for it (because if they don't there are other males who will). So if you're a male, you are probably 'programmed' to try not to miss what looks like a potential opportunity. According to that explanation, rule number 1 for all members of any successful species is "get your genes into the next generation". All other rules are thus secondary.

So in some ways, the results of the NI university poll I cited recently in the thread are not in the least surprising. Obviously, that does not mean that they are welcome or desirable, or that nothing can or should be done to improve things (and I am shocked if the results accurately represented what so many intelligent young adults in my country thought in 2008). And as I said, the results do not say that only males were polled, so we have the interesting question of why at least some women might say or think such things about other women. To me, it's probable that that's partly but not entirely because they have internalised the attitudes (and 'rules') of society, which has of course mostly involved 'male rules' being enforced, males being naturally more tangibly dominant and rule-making in many ways in our species. But also, in evolutionary terms, females are in some ways also, of themselves and independently of male influence, in natural competition with each other (for desirable males) for both survival generally and ultimately, successfully reproducing (including bringing up offspring). As a result, some dominant male behaviours are encouraged by females, including male aggression (because it indicates that he can/will protect her, and any offspring) and then this may be linked, as a natural, even if often unwanted by-product, to male aggressive sexuality.

How this might relate directly back to the OP topic, I'm not sure, I'd have to give it some thought before offering an opinion, but I wouldn't be surprised if it did relate in some way, and I think it's at least related to the general topic anyway.