Why are strong women seen as the enemy?

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You mean humorous and folksy?



"Deserving" is a very loaded and subjective term, but I've seen her make enough insulting, condescending, sarcastic comments to have earned that one, and a bit more too.



I'd really say you're more of a manservant/bodyguard, like Kato. If you're doing this for free though, she's paying too much.

I don't take that tone with everyone I dsagree with. Not at all. Hell, I've had very civil debates and arguments where both of us were passionate about our opinion on the issue. I once had a long, intense and very civil debate with AngelRho about abortion. He's VERY pro life and I'm VERY pro choice. It's very much a hot button issue. The difference was, neither of us were seeing possible abortion everywhere we looked and wanting things that reminded us of either legalized abortion or criminalizing abortion to be banned outright, and neither of us was actively trying to have our own views adopted as policy here or as would be the case with abortion, the government. Of course he wishes abortion weren't legal and I'm wishing it stays legal. However, neither of us has gone so far over the top about it that we have a knee jerk reaction to anything that could be remotely related to it.

He also respected me when I disagreed with him and didn't put me down as somebody who was brainwashed and refused to see the truth as he saw it. I respected him when he disagreed with me and didn't put him down as some antiwoman bigot who wants us barefoot and pregnant. He is simply against abortion because he believes that at conception it's an independent life, with a soul, and he has religious reasons for that. I am for it being legal because I feel that the woman should have the choice about when, if ever, someone else gets to live in her body. He's not stupid or backward or a reactionary for believing like he does, and I don't think he thinks I'm uncaring and someone who wants to destroy the family for believing like I do. In other words, when the debate is about an issue and not about what to do about policy changes when something reminds us of an issue, then it's going to be civil.

If I were to discuss actual sexism with ya'll on a thread, we would all be pretty much in agreement on most things I bet. Anything that is a social issue where change is needed can be taken too far. Hypervigilance doesn't lead to preventing the old problem from recurring, it creates not only a backlash where people stop taking the issue itself seriously and it leads to finding problems that aren't actually there. I can see these same folks getting in a tizzy if a man calls her "maam" or offers her his seat on the subway or stops and offers to change a flat tire for her, because if you look at it just right, it might possibly stem from some sexist notion, so it must be sexism and stamped out right away lest we be back making coffee in the secretarial pool and getting our butts pinched.

Once you get the grass cut and put the weed killer out and it's nice, you don't have to spend every waking moment crawling around in the yard with a magnifying glass and nail scissors trying to find something growing that looks like it just might be a weed. That's called overkill.

"Blah, blah, blah, personal crap, blah blah, pretend I don't take you seriously even though I keep making a point of engaging you, yadda yadda, get a bit more personal, bleh, bleh, yadda, insult your intelligence and..............more blah.

I was actually doing a pretty good job of ignoring you recently until you accused me of being here under false pretense, to which I don't take kindly to.

Thank you by the way, you know, for helpin' me wif ma werdz. If u hadn't-a dun thatt, I dun no how's I ever woulda ben able to reads my paidspokesdude-lines off thatt thur telapromper. I feel blest to haz ma werdz. Dox-on-fawnics werked fer me, folks! It'll werk fer u 2!

LOL Funny. I ALWAYS wanted to be a manservant, although I'm not going to lie, I always imagined I'd be manservant to a man rather than manservant to a bunch of women (no offense to the women )

Do you actually read what either of them writes? Sister Sarcasm over there flat out says that sarcasm is her primary mode of communication (that's a direct quote, I can link it if you insist), when she doesn't have the CAPSLOCK key pinned down of course, while her buddy here follows people around the forum picking fights on her behalf or throws spitballs from the sidelines. Actually, since you were talking about this the other day, how is he not a "white knight"? Don't you people normally object to guys thinking they need to fight woman's battles for them, even their female friends?

Did I say anything about fairness? I just wanted the relationship out in the open, so people could see the lay of the land; what's so bad about that?



Possible, sure, but likely? Here? In this context? The likelihood dwindles.

Or, this is an Aspergers forum, where odd tangents are more the norm than the exception, and Spam set a number of people off for one reason or another; which is more likely? You see sinister implications in discussions of processed meat, yet I'm the one accused of seeing conspiracies... The mind boggles.

Also, the number one beneficiary of that derailment was starvingartist, who got a helpful reprieve from people looking too closely at that ridiculous list of "examples" she posted. If the discussion was that "serious", she'd have been laughed out of the thread on that post alone.

I think you need to take the rage-hat off for bit and have a time-out. Maybe work on all of the lists you keep on us for a bit, gotta make sure you keep them all up-to-date.

And while you are doing that, I'm going to head to bed. Being a trained attack dog AND a spokesperson AND a white night, all at the same time, is very taxing. A manservant needs his his doggy sleep.

Fair thee well, oh Dox of the Intellectual Bullies, Helper-With-Wordz!

^
Keep that up, and I'm going to change your title from manservant to troll, and treat you accordingly.

I have no idea what's going on here; I just wanted to say that "Spam Conspiracy" would be an awesome name for a band.

Well, I believe at this point the technical term would be a 'pissing contest', though it started out as me rebutting a bunch of pile on posts that went up while I was at work. I originally called it the 'Spam-spiracy', which also would make an excellent band name, along with 'sinister meat'...

I've always thought a really cool name for a band would be "Occasion of Sin".

And I've always wanted to name a cat "Quadrapet".

That's about the most open thing I've ever seen from you, OOM. Thank you. I respect that and am going to think about it.

That said:



Not everybody is you, and not all the situations involving abuse and harassment have the same contexts and meanings that yours did.

Let me suggest something, a scenario. Suppose when you split from your ex you had a young kid. (Maybe you did.) And the law said "this kid needs her dad, maybe her dad's a wifebeating douche but he's never laid a hand on the kid, standard visitation and three weeks in summer." Now the kid has to go off with this guy all the time and has no choice about it even though she's terrified. And two years later he remarries and the wife doesn't enjoy paying child support, so they go back for shared custody, and the kid hasn't wound up in the hospital and he pays regular, so he's got shared custody. Now the kid has to go live part time with this horrible man and his awful wife. Hell of a way to grow up. Happens all the time, though.

Now imagine instead that thanks to the work of dozens if not hundreds of what you'd call whiners, women who don't just toughen up and get through and get out and go on, the law is different. The bar for visitation is not "does he smack the kid around and molest her", but "has he exhibited a pattern of abuse". Not just physical abuse, but abuse. Beating her mom in front of her when she was young. Belittling her mom and her. Shouting at her, threatening her. Saying she's a whore like her mom. Criticizing her body, making snide remarks to the effect that she dresses like a slut. Maltreating the new wife, calling her a b***h, even smacking her while the daughter's in earshot. Suppose there is a therapist who can corroborate that yes, all these things have gone on, and that -- because we know these slurs and misogynistic behaviors are detrimental to the development and mental health of a young girl, the more so if they're coming from her father -- there is absolutely no way she should be forced to live with him. And the judge agrees, and also orders supervised visitation because there's evidence that the guy retaliates and will try to get at the kid to hurt the ex-wife. Now, if he's going to see his daughter, he'll have to treat her decently or the visit will be over.

You don't think this is a better result? You don't think it'd be a huge relief for both the kid and the mom?

When I first became a single mom I used to talk to a lot of young single moms from backgrounds where they were told they'd be nothing, had never been on their own. And they were making it on their own -- kind of. Really they had hellish lives and lived in terrible neighborhoods with their kids and things were always on the verge of falling apart. Not infrequently they'd post saying they were homeless for now. They absolutely refused to go after the daddies for child support even when the daddies clearly had money, and were savage towards women who did go for child support, because it meant they weren't independent. These young women were totally hopped up on their first independence, and couldn't see what it was costing them and their children. They couldn't see that they could be strong while also fighting for what was rightly the kids': enough money from their dad so that their mom wasn't an exhausted, strung-out wreck all the time going from one emergency to the next, and so that they could live in a safe building -- they didn't know how to do that. Nor could the women see that knocking themselves out like that was going to cost them hard & wasn't sustainable. All they could see was that they were able to be alive and keep the family together this week on their own. But this is not a long-term plan and it cheats the kids.

What is important to you as a triumph is not necessarily the end of the story. Yes, in these moms' cases, independence was a crucial thing. But that still leaves safe housing, adequate provision for the kids in daily life, and all the rest as things to take care of. In your case you got out and it was transformative for you. But imagine how things would be if you had not wound up with the life you got, had not met a decent guy (about whom you complain endlessly, btw). "I found a decent spot, you can too" -- yeah, no, when things are so bad in so many ways for so many women, that's not something they can count on. Nor should they have to. And it's not as though that means they won't be strong people. Going through abuse and getting out is not the only way to become strong. And it's a little nuts to believe it is, because where does it end? You're only strong if you survived abuse. If you lived in a bad, gang-ridden neighborhood. If you lived in a war zone. If you survived a concentration camp. You wind up with Vonnegut's hobo, the one on the horrible train who's so dismissive of all the soldiers, keeps telling them this ain't nothing, things could be worse, till one morning he doesn't say anything because he froze to death.

Maybe I'll just leave it there. I get that toughening up was crucial for you, and that things worked out for you. But it's not the universal fix you're suggesting, and it leaves a lot of problems. Can we agree to stop with the weak/strong comparisons?

Oh no, I don't know what I'd do then. lol Thanks for the laugh

Edit: If you're going to call me names/assign titles to me, at least let me act the part

I'd think it's because most men are predators and prefer to go for what's easier. Having a self-esteem likely means hard to get in bed.

Don't feel like going tl;dr because I'm tired as ballsacks, just my two cents.

Another thing to think about is culture. Some cultures (the U.S. traditionally) are misogynistic. They love masculinity. Men have all the power and women are expected to be subservient and to like it. Any move toward power by a women is seen not only as a threat to the status quo but also a threat against femininity because being a "good girl" means being subservient and not complaining.

Other cultures are not so misogynistic. I think one of the reasons I don't fear strong women is because I come from Black African/Native American background. There isn't a stigma in the black community for a black woman to be strong. A strong black woman is not seen as less feminine. I don't think there is as much misogyny in Cherokee culture either (although I have not studied it much).

Why does women like strong men?
Have you ever considered, that much of that strength is considered a masculine trait?
Is a man looking to be attracted to the attributes of his own sex in a woman?
Or that of a woman attracted to the attributes of her own sex in a male?
Perhaps this should be defined first, considering heterosexuals as the average normal..

Which for me brings even a further question, why does woman expect men to accept them as their equals as like with other males, yet as partners, when they yet (for the most part) reject males that are more feminin as potential partners? seems a bit hypocritical to me.