Recent Setbacks for Women/Women’s Rights

Post Reply New Topic

The following is something that’s been weighing on my mind and that I thought might be worthy of a discussion. Responses from men are welcome. However, given that it’s in Women’s Discussion and contains sensitive subject matter, I’d appreciate it if we could avoid dismissive or otherwise unsupportive commentary. Thanks!

Potentially triggering content.

The past couple of years have contained some obvious backsliding in terms of the rights and status of women in a lot of places. The US saw the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the concerning presence of the far-right, and President Rapist is now in office. Other countries are seeing a rise in far-right movements which may jeopardize the rights of women in disparate ways. The situation for women in Afghanistan is horrifying.

Things have also been bleak for women in war torn areas, like Israel and Palestine. It’s not been good for men, either. (I don’t want to discount the atrocities, including acts of sexual violence, committed against men!) The media reports of attacks on women and girls, some fabricated and others certainly not, have been overwhelming. Sexual violence is almost always a feature of war. Many female soldiers in the US who have PTSD were sexually assaulted by fellow soldiers. 1 in 3 female veterans and 1 in 50 male veterans report having experienced military sexual trauma with, perhaps, 89% of perpetrators inflicting violence on women in the military being in the military themselves. Sad but not at all surprising to me.

The rise of incels/incel ideology has caused problems, especially in online spaces. Women can’t even talk about their experiences with sexual assault and rape on designated subreddits without being contacted by a bunch of entitled creeps who say they are aroused by extremely traumatic things we’ve experienced or even suggesting that we deserved it. Then there are those who dismiss the struggles women face altogether - the women have it easier crowd.

There’s a lot I’m finding concerning, unsettling, and triggering. My mental health has not been great in recent months. I’ve gone to some really dark places that I would prefer to avoid. I’m going to prioritize getting more help for my PTSD in the coming weeks and months, as I’ve been working on my health overall, and avoiding likely triggers wherever possible for the time being. I wonder how many other women out there are facing similar struggles and concerns, likely a lot given the statistics I’ve cited before from RAINN.

I’m feeling a bit wary about what the next few years will bring, especially if something doesn’t change with the current trends I’m seeing. The political situation in various countries, the violence, the religious extremism, young men’s shift to the right, and the vile scumbag who’s currently running my country are all deeply troubling to me.

Its gonna be a roughh ride...It is alittle Trauma inducing to know these nutters are starting to take control.
not just alittle scarey ..Already oticing zex- low level Maga men , has started refering to me as a Nuerotic woman.
These where people whom I thought had been friends .For over ten years,a independant businessman with several employees . This seems to be starting a trend with the what used to be slightly mysognistic men. Now emboldened to speak out. About being crass and now decieteful aswell. This was not the man I knew for ten years...Only change is the
change in regime in this country.

I’ve noticed the same thing and had some similar experiences which amount to bullying, especially factoring in context.

It’d be a fascinating topic for sociological research. I think it really started taking off in the US during Trump’s first run for office when misogynistic language seemed to be part of his campaign which spread to his fanbase and anti-woke influencers on YouTube. I don’t think I realized back then how influential Trump’s rhetoric would be, the full extent of his misogyny, or how something like this, as well as other forms of bigotry, can snowball. That could be somewhat related to my ignorance about social media and influencers until just the past couple of years.

When you try to take a stand against it and maybe even present evidence to support your concerns if it’s appropriate for the situation, you’re branded as the problem which can serve to silence women depending on the platform. Given its insidiousness, I’ve had trouble grasping it until fairly recently. There’s almost a gaslighty component to it sometimes which I’m just now starting to recognize.

I can’t imagine telling someone in a marginalized group that I don’t belong to that they’re being neurotic when they express concerns about discrimination. That harkens back to the days when people often used to claim it was hysteria when women were understandably upset about injustices.

I'm worried that Australia is going the same way.
The LNP leader has already stated his intention to steer the govt away from DEI in favour of "merit-based".
(Yeah, I got so many job offers and promotions for being an autistic woman )
There've been high profile sexual assault cases where the perp got away with it, the judicial system simply doesn't work for the victims.
And we've got Neonazis in balaclavas parading on the streets doing Elon salutes.
It's scary.

^ Wow, that’s really concerning stuff that I wasn’t aware of.

At this point, my greatest concern is for all of humanity. Algorithmic biases are manipulating the world with discrimination and disinformation. As John M. Jordan states in his book, The Rise of the Algorithms: How YouTube and TikTok Conquered the World…”our essential properties—-religious beliefs, sexual orientation, fears and insecurities, networks of blood and kinship—-are mined and exploited.

Machine processes know and shape our behavior at scale on a daily basis, or as often as we choose to participate online.

The entire population is being played.

Other books worth reading in my opinion are:

Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI by Yuval Noah Harari

And

Free Speech and Turbulent Freedom (USA): The Dangerous Allure of Censorship in the Digital Era by Michael J. Glennon

My two cents, disconnect from the news and social media as much as possible.

The "As much as possible" is key - I was trying to describe why I felt insecure in my US state and someone told me not to worry about it and stop following the news. Great advice for me to end up in jail, given the discriminatory laws being passed. I need to know what's legal versus not, what will impact my healthcare access, and similar. Now I'm in the process of settling in a US state with better civil rights laws, which I highly recommend even if leads to financial hardship short term.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that I'm not some unimpacted sheltered person or someone metaphorically burying their head in the sand. Despite that, 95% of daily news and social media is noise. It will tell you a lot of bad things that are happening or might happen and it will expose you to a lot of people who have been algorithmically encouraged to judge others and form internet mobs. However, it's rarely going to give you actionable information or make it easier for you to help other people.

Alternatives are local groups, volunteer organizations, intermediary organizations like ACLU or planned parenthood, local healthcare nonprofits, etc. They will sort the wheat from the chaff and then you can figure out what to do with the wheat, rather than unsuccessfully trying to engage with each piece of straw without knowing its history. Much less discouraging and much less overwhelming. Bad things still happen, but for most of us in the US and similar countries they are not insurmountably bad. Not all alternatives will be good, but then move on to the next one.

For the people things already are insurmountably bad for, you want to be doing volunteer work, political activism, or earning money for donations if you want to do something for them. Sitting around "being informed" and feeling bad is less useful than doing something fun like walking in a park that will put you in a better mental state to do something for another person later down the line. Personally I have no interest in political activism, which requires a higher level of engagement with current events within one specific sphere of activism, but I have lots of respect for the people who do it.

I don’t use social media apart from WP and occasionally certain subreddits. I’ve also limited my consumption of the news since it triggers my PTSD. Over the next couple of years, I will likely get involved in some form of activism if I can get into the right mental space for it. In some ways, I think it could be beneficial for my mental health.

I fear that things could get much worse if the current trajectory continues which is a big reason why I think it’s good to be informed and talk about current trends rooted in evidence to some extent, especially since so many are continuing to dismiss evidence in favor of believing that there isn’t a problem. For that reason, I think that merely talking about current issues and raising awareness could be useful.

I have been trying to stop myself from reading and posting on old.reddit.com. I think it's the best 'modern' social media, but ultimately it increases your chance of seeing something bad or getting into unnecessary conflicts. Occasionally I need some information on there and I try to use my phone since it's more inconvenient, so I'm more likely to get out after I get what I need.

I think working with an organization will still ultimately be more helpful than talking about it at random, though since we're discussing this now it's clearly not completely useless. But eg campaign phone banking or working with an environmental welfare organization lets you do it in a much more focused way, with other people to support you and known strategies to be effective.

When I was living in the border region, I saw a lot of refugees (a group events are indeed getting very bad for) and heard a lot of awful sentiments about them. Now that I'm at a place a significant number of refugees end up after they leave the border region, I am finding myself wanting to find a way to help them. Talking about how refugees are regular people with families etc can be useful since I have life experience to back that up, but it would be exhausting to try to change everyone's mind one by one. I'm never going to win against facebook, CNN, etc. I also can't do anything to prevent the situation from deteriorating more. But I could volunteer with one of the organizations here or try to learn some skill that would be useful for them, something that would be beneficial whatever ends up happening.

Anyway, that's my perspective and my perspectives have often been incorrect, so other people should do what they think is right.

I think that in addition to raising awareness talking on platforms is useful in that it allows people to talk about their experiences and concerns. That’s not to say that it’s more helpful than volunteering for organizations, but it can be a useful stepping stone or outlet for people who’ve experienced discrimination themselves.

When I do use Reddit, I mostly just stick to a few subreddits that are centered on special interests. The exJW subreddit has been a very important community for me over the years. However, I’ve had really bad experiences on certain subreddits, too, so I won’t use those ones anymore.

In the past, I was similarly dependent on certain information only available from online communities, like how to deal with problems or where to seek resources. This mostly worked out okay with webforums like this one, but I've observed the risk growing while the benefit is decreasing. Since I already have most of my information, that's part of why I've disengaged to the extent I have. I could see someone else not being able to do this, but I would still proceed with a lot of caution if that were my situation.

A lot of people dealing with discrimination also start out blaming themselves; then when they learn more they externalize it and become angry. It's possibly an unavoidable step on the path to acceptance, but many online communities nowadays get stuck there. They start fanning the flames of anger while looking down on people who don't share their feelings, at which point they end up being the ones most harmed by their thoughts and actions.

Online communities may still be needed in some cases in terms of processing prejudice or discrimination, but I don't envy people trying to do this with modern social media.

I wasn’t meaning to imply that I am dependent on certain information from online communities, only that they can be very meaningful sometimes, perhaps especially for people who are marginalized in some way and don’t have a lot of external support for whatever reason. Caution is certainly important. I won’t post in certain subreddits because of the sexual harassment I experienced there for example. Well, I’ve experienced that here, but I’m more wary about who I trust and know what to watch out for these days.