Misogyny

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i responded in depth to your last comment, but it took time.

no, you misread my example. the rapist didn't hate all women - only certain categories.

Oops! That'll teach me to shoot me mouth off. Till next time ... *sigh*. Okay, thanks - will read and digest. xx

yes, i agree. and we did try even if we did not agree on the methods. he had a bunch of ideas to come away with but rejected them all.

lol, what you quoted is strong evidence I didn't misread your example.

Yet another WTF feeling I'm getting because of a post you make.

No need to feel shut out. I'll give you space to say what you have to say while I go take a good break for today.

Yes, that puts it clearly and surely goes to the heart of all the isms we're trying to dismantle.

I do think, however, it is sometimes useful to remind ourselves that it's not the 'ism' we are trying to root out; it is the actual harm and the potential for harm encapsulated by those attitudes. It is possible to become distracted, pour energy into winning arguments rather than persuading people to move on in their thinking. There is insufficient energy abroad amongst the world - especially liberal energy, even now - to waste it in this way. Over the years, I have seen far too much passion, pure-gold energy, irreplaceable fuel, dissipated in dogfights between what should be natural allies against the common foe. So now I've been outed on another personal axe-to-grind.

To set oneself up in an oppositional stance, or to personalise an argument, can cause a dissipation of persuasive energy if its only effect is to induce a defensive oppositional stance in the other party. Once someone is thrown onto the defensive, they will not give ground but will fight. To me, a fight to the death is destructive and wasteful. That's all. But I've had this discussion with vanguardists before; we usually end up agreeing to disagree; they patronisingly call me a 'bloody independent anarchist' and I find myself grudgingly conceding there might be a place for a vanguard but that doesn't mean I like to watch.


I get what you're saying here. To me, I guess I was okay with MCalavera using it just to create a general area of contradistinction rather than attempting to define a particular group (or set of behavioural tendencies) with any kind of finesse. I think I think that the thinking in groups bit alone is not quite evil as a standalone thing; I think it needs to be coupled with untested assumptions, generalisations and objectification to be misogynistic or whatever.

For example, at the moment, I can't think of any exception to my generalisation: 'I hate men who rape women.' That act alone is sufficient to place every individual who rapes a woman outside my boundary of acceptableness. I am not a misandrist, but I do have standards, and it does become personal. At that point, though, for that particular context, I don't think it's terribly helpful to start arguing about what is or is not rape. There are certain generally-agreed standards (such as 'non-consensual sex acts'), and then there are areas that are not generally agreed (such as penetration of what orifices, by what sort of non-penis items, to what extent; whether rape can be purely psychological; is it rape if it's not technically a sexual act, and so on), upon which each person will make a private judgment. A line will be drawn, but it may be a wavy line, and similar acts might fall on one side or other of any line, depending on circumstances.

This doesn't draw me to any conclusion other than it's essential, it seems to me, to focus on the particular evil being fought, because, while it may never be possible to agree on the specific definitions to the nth degree, consensus may be reached on a general concept, which is near enough for most purposes, without causing enmity within the ranks.

I think you could find many misogynists who would agree it's irrational. I find the process deeply interesting, especially in autistics who can talk openly about their irrational urges. I know that one way to help is by becoming a bigger god than the one who hurt them. You can help people learn how to become their own big gods, I suppose. Ah, but simply finding misogyny erroneous doesn't address the problem.

OP wanted support, btw. Just the usual relating to someone similar type stuff.



Their problem is the hate, not the potential miscategorisation. You have to allow that people can accurately decide what they hate. Again, that's a basic rule of interacting with people, you can't just gainsay their perspective.

I was about to make a joke about the definition of Misogyny, but the OP pretty much echoed it before I could say. One thing people should remember is that not everyone will want to go out with you. Pay attention to who might be interested in you, and look for signs of attraction.

Just be patient and make sure you learn the signs that someone is into you.

(And watch your timelines. Too soon or too late and you'll come off weird.)

Yes, we definitely did try. Check back on the earlier pages and you will see that is true. But the OP didn't seem to have his listening ears on. Perhaps some of the ideas have managed to percolate through, nonetheless. Hope so. I think anyone that asks for help or puts it out there - especially such an unpopular p.o.v. - has a good chance of getting better. The really scary ones are the ones that bury it without resolving anything; they're the ticking time-bombs.

aye, and there's the rub. do we all desire the same things, or no? do you think that you and i have the same goals in this discussion, and also fraac and MCalavera? i don't know if it is the case, and the thread itself has gone in several directions.

there is disagreement about the definition of the word underlying the OP's difficulty, but the common ground was not necessary in order for us to do the important work of trying to help. this is just a sideline after the OP abandoned his thread. whether or not we had ideological differences about the word itself, we had the same aim in mind. the debate didn't change that as we already worked on it.

i don't necessarily desire to bring people over to my side in an argument - for the most part, my intent is not to persuade the opposition at all. there are many other reasons why i engage in debate, but persuasion is not usually one of them. the way i see it, internet debates usually occur for the benefit of the people reading and observing, so that they can draw their own conclusions about the topic at hand. the debaters simply present their sides to the best of their ability to lay it out for people to draw their own conclusions about the subject matter.

in terms of harm, i think that harm comes from making generalisations about any groups - including rapists. to explain, i do not think that hate is a productive or helpful emotion is learning how to effectively prevent rape, for example. simply hating rapists will be extremely unproductive in preventing rapists from emerging in our society.

OP wanted support, not advice. No one offered.

you must know i'm gonna quote this back at you next time we engage in debate.

I remember it very differently. Yes, there was support, and yes, there was advice (he asked for help and got it). Several people offered both. 'Aw, son, you just need a good f**k' seemed to turn up a lot (Guybrush_Threepwood was one; you were another) - but I'm told that in Blokelingo that is considered supportive. I also offered support by saying all the signs were good for him, because he had revealed and was talking about it. Several of us (hyperlexian and yours truly included) believed he should seek therapy of some kind, and hyperlexian gave - initially, anyway - quite loving encouragement along with this. How is any of this 'not supportive', if being there and responding genuinely is the only means by which any of us can support anyone on WP?

Look, it's sad. But I think a number of people have really tried hard here, and - surprisingly, given the subject matter - hardly any obvious creeps turned up at all. Do we deserve to be criticised for being the ones that stuck by? I'm pretty sure I don't.

And I agree with hyperlexian this discussion has legitimately become a sideline anyway, since it appears OP has deserted his post. Literally and figuratively.

i didn't abandon the OP and provided advice until he left, so it's a bit underhanded to word it that way.

I meant the kind of support where similar people relate and they all feel better. It's clearly what he wanted.