A Voice for Men: we’ll support women in combat only if the proper percentage of women get killed.
Woman officially not in combat role.
As everyone reading this blog no doubt already knows, feminists have hailed the Pentagon’s decision to open combat jobs to women, which will allow women the same opportunities to serve as men. The decision is also a backhanded acknowledgement that, for all intents and purposes, women are serving in combat today already. (Congresswoman Tammy Duckworth lost both of her legs in combat in Iraq – but officially, what she was engaged in wasn’t combat.)
It seems inevitable that, as a result of this decision, young women will be required to sign up for selective service alongside men. While virtually all feminists I know oppose the draft, most agree that as long as registration is going to be required, it should be required for both men and women. Indeed, when selective service was reinstated in 1981, the National Organization for Women brought a lawsuit demanding this sort of equality.
Reaction amongst Men’s Rightsers to the Pentagon’s announcement has been mixed. Some have welcomed the change, as a “what’s good for the goose” acknowledgement of equal rights and responsibilities. Others, like most of the regulars on The Spearhead, predict catastrophe, as inherently unqualified women are sent to the front lines. Regular Spearhead commenter Uncle Elmer joked:
After this experiment runs its course, how many men will have died while bringing tampon supplies up to the front?
Can anyone tell me the additional garbage load from tampon-related issues on all-women submarines? Could a mission fail if some gal flushed her tampon down the toilet instead of following the proper mil-spec procedure?
But the most telling reaction has come from A Voice for Men, which in an editorial suggested that it would only support the move if women were required to die as often as men.
No, really. Here’s what the editorialist, presumably site founder Paul Elam, wrote:
AVFM supports the spirit of the new Pentagon Directive … However, any blanket approval of the new measure thus far would be premature. …
[T]he only way this new policy will have any meaning will be if it is mandatory that women face combat on the front lines. With 20% of the military being comprised of women, that means roughly 20% of combat related fatalities should be female. 1 in 5 of body bags being filled overseas should contain the bodies of mothers, sisters, daughters, wives and girlfriends.
AVFM isn’t alone in hoping that one result of the Pentagon’s new policy will be increased injury and death for women. On his blog the self-designated “counter-feminist agent of change” Fidelbogen quoted – with a weird sort of semi-approval – one comment from an unknown person he says he found online:
I know this isn’t a laughing matter but this is pretty fucking sweet. Now those very same women who complain about how hard childbirth is get to experience real pain and misery by getting their arms blown off by enemy fire or their legs blown off by mines. Or getting infections when they have to stay at their post for days at a time without taking a bath. Those same women who say all men are rapists can now see what real rape is when they are taken as POW’s and gang-raped by foreign men at gun point and passed around like a piece of meat and then their heads blown off when they are done. This is real war ladies, are you ready for your cup of true equality?
In the comments on AVFM, meanwhile one Rick Westlake helped to make clearer the vindictive subtext of the AVFM’s editorial, suggesting that the Pentagon’s decision could be good for men if it served to
rub … some high-ratcheted, ‘entitled/empowered’ noses in the misandric, disposable-male double standard of the Selective Service system.
Our current society, including our military, makes mock of ‘equality’ by divorcing ‘opportunity’ from ‘consequences,’ ‘choices’ from ‘costs,’ and ‘benefits’ from ‘responsibility.’ Princesses are awarded all of the opportunities, choices and benefits and are excused from all the responsibility, costs and consequences. ‘Draft-pigs,’ meaning men, are made to shoulder all those dirty, nasty, dangerous and demeaning responsibilities, consequences and costs on behalf of the Entitled Empowered Princesses.
Putting women on the combat line would be disastrous for the military … But the fact remains, enough Princesses have clamored for the ‘opportunities and benefits’ of serving in the front line, heedless of the consequences and the costs.
By requiring Princesses to register for Selective Service, before they can claim the benefits that ‘draft-pigs’ can only receive if they’ve registered – and by declaring them liable for the same fines and penalties as the draft-pigs, if they don’t – we at least remind them that freedom isn’t free, that choices have costs, and that true equality includes responsibility and consequences.
I can already hear the thin, reedy screeches from the Princesses. Fine. Let them learn what it is to hump 35-pound fifty-cal ammo cans to feed Ma Deuce in a firefight. Or let them scuttle back to the home and the hearth, and give thanks for (and to) the Brave Men who will defend them.
Elam himself echoed this vindictive “let them eat equality” stance in a sneering comment posted under his own name suggesting that in the wake of the Pentagon’s new policy plenty of women won’t find the “aroma” of equality to
be so sweet … This is what feminism was always about, and now, after three waves, the chickens are going to come home to roost. Because feminism never was about anything but creating tax paying, laboring, consuming, bleeding and dying servants to the masters of corporatocracy.
They lured women in with visions of corner offices and autonomy, and now that they have fully taken the bait, the doors are going to be slammed behind them and locked. They will be left to languish in their “freedom” as corporate wage slaves, and when needed they will be forced to contribute to the rivers of blood required to keep it going.
NOW and others will likely succeed in keeping the last part “optional” for while, but it won’t last.
The grand daughters of today’s college woman is as fucked as any man in history.
To which every feminist I know would say: bring it on. Feminists are well aware that equality, along with its many benefits, brings certain costs. Putting more women into combat roles means, inevitably, that more women will be injured or killed. The feminists supporting the Pentagon’s decision are aware of this. Unlike many MRAs, though, they look at combat injuries and deaths as one of the sad but inevitable consequences of war — not as something to rub anyone’s face into.
Here’s a hint to any MRAs who think that either AVFM or the more blatantly sadistic commenter quoted by Fidelbogen has a point: Civil Rights activism is about uplifting everyone, not making others “pay.”
When the American civil rights movement took up the issue of voting rights, civil rights activists demanded that black people be allowed to vote without harassment or other obstacles like “literacy tests” standing in their way.
Civil rights activists didn’t demand that whites be kept from voting.
The Civil Rights movement called for historically all-white colleges to be opened up to blacks. It didn’t call for white people to be banned from these colleges too.
This is how you can tell that the Men’s Rights movement, as it stands today, is not a true civil rights movement. Because insofar as it is about anything other than complaining about (and sometimes harassing) feminists and women in general, it’s about tearing down rather than building up.
Instead of trying to build domestic violence shelters and other services for men, for example, the MRM is more interested in defunding shelters for women – even when their efforts in this area directly harm male victims.
It’s telling that when Father’s Rights activist Glenn Sacks had an issue with the advertisements being run by one DV shelter, he encouraged his followers to bombard the shelter’s donors with phone calls in order to cripple the shelter’s fundraising efforts – even though the shelter in question also provides services for men. It’s telling as well that MRAs rail endlessly against the Violence Against Women Act, and have celebrated Republican opposition to it – even though the act is officially gender neutral in everything but its name, and would provide funding for men’s shelters if MRAs got off their asses to build any.
Instead of fighting for the rights of male victims of rape, the Men’s Rights movement is more interested in downplaying the rape of women, wildly exaggerating the number of “false rape accusations,” and in endless discussions about whether or not having sex with women incapacitated with drinks or drugs is really rape. All of these things contribute to a “rape culture” that harms male victims of rape as well as female.
Not that most MRAs actually care about male victims of rape except as a debating point — perhaps because that would require acknowledging that the overwhelming majority of their rapists are other men. (MRAs do get outraged in the rare cases in which women are the culprits.) The group that does more than any other to fight for male rape victims is the anti-prison rape group Just Detention. Try to find even a mention of this group on any of the leading Men’s Rights sites. (The only mention of the group on AVFM is a comment in a post attacking a feminist writer noting that it isn’t part of the Men’s Rights movement.)
There are endless other examples, because this is in essence the way that the so-called “Men’s Rights” movement does business.
When you take a certain pleasure in the notion of women being “made to pay” or otherwise harmed when they seek equality, you’re about as much of a civil rights movement as the Klan.
Posted on January 26, 2013, in a voice for men, antifeminism, are these guys 12 years old?, douchebaggery, feminism, gloating, hate, men who should not ever be with women ever, misogyny, MRA, paul elam, princesses, reactionary bullshit, taking pleasure in women's pain, the spearhead, women in combat and tagged a voice for men, antifeminism, men's rights, misogyny, women in combat. Bookmark the permalink. 1,143 Comments.
“And in those sentences you erase all the women and children who did the same work and suffered the same punishments for crimes.”
No I don’t. I can quite easily acknowledge both, however I was specifically addressing your claim that men created this society for other men. It is absurd, working class men have always been screwed over, just as working class women have been.
“You’re also blithely indifferent to laws written specifically to control and limit women’s lives in various countries and times – laws written by men.”
Written by RULING class men, which I didn’t blithely ignore but in fact mentioned! The tiny tiny tiny minority of men remember?
“Can you really look at societies where men wrote all the laws, where they were the rulers with power, where women were not even allowed to retain property on marriage, and claim there was no patriarchy?”
No, no not men, ruling class men. Working class men were the servants of dudes that had all that control.
“I like the way Cassie plays her oppression cards one at a time. Mention LBGT issues? ”
Cassandra stated that I thought I should not be consulted on LGBTI issues not LGBTI people. I am a LGBTI person, it isn’t a reveal it is a correction of someone elses ridiculous assumption.
I also object to you referring to oppression as a “card”, that does remind me strongly of what MRAs say about feminists actually.
Yeah, no. I disagree very strongly here. Society oppresses trans* people, especially trans* women, with its misogynist narratives, all of which arise from patriarchal norms. “Acting like a girl” was one of the worst things I could do as a “boy.” I received nothing but scorn when I expressed femininity. People had high expectations of me because I was a “boy”, and no “boy” would ever dream of the possibility of being feminine and/or female because femininity and femaleness were things to be ashamed of. I was so afraid of being “caught” liking things associated with women and girls that I myself became viciously misogynistic in order to avoid looking “inferior.” Patriarchal misogyny has affected me every single day. And frankly, as someone who has been very aware of how the patriarchy messed up my childhood and continues to be an obstacle in my current life, I find it very insulting when I hear people blindly say that patriarchy doesn’t exist.
If you want to see good evidence for the existence of patriarchy and how it affects LGBT* people, check out Bonnie Bullough and Vern L. Bullough’s book Cross-Dressing, Sex, and Gender. Another good book to check out is Julia Serano’s Whipping Girl, which is a major work in trans*-feminism.
I’m feeling a bit congested to wave my cane around, can’t I just wave my iPod instead?
“People saying cruel things doesn’t make them oppressors.”
Cis men going on at length about how only this one narrow definition of rape is really rape =/= merely saying cruel things. Calling you childish? That’s saying cruel things, because, see, there’s nothing like a threat there, no self-satisfaction that if you rape someone other people will agree with hey, raping a POW is worse!
Fuck, how am I even explaining that calling one type of rape “real rape” is oppression??
Oh, I know how to make this clear (major rape trigger warning here) — so, Cassie, you like women? Well you just need a penis inserted into you in just the right manner and then you’ll be screaming the perks of heterosexuality!
…I feel dirty saying that even to make a point about corrective rape, and my apologies to every survivor here.
“Also, mxe is right, drop the T in GLBT, and probably the I too,”
This is how the trans people I know use the term and how they like me to use it as well. They would be on my ass for it if I left the T and the I off and excluded them. So I should drop it because you said so? I don’t think so!
“presenting as feminine isn’t a factor in oppression, just class, you’re of no use to anyone who isn’t comfortable as their biological gender”
I never said anything even resembling that. Enough strawmans please.
“Can you please display some honesty it is getting boring.”
…holy shit an honest to gods example of irony!
“Yeah, no. I disagree very strongly here. Society oppresses trans* people, especially trans* women, with its misogynist narratives, all of which arise from patriarchal norms. “Acting like a girl” was one of the worst things I could do as a “boy.””
It isn’t my intention to insult you. However I don’t agree these are patriarchial norms as I don’t believe men oppress women how this story is meant to show that men oppress women. Can you clarify further please?
We KNOW it was ruling class men, you moron. The point is that they made laws and had customs which hit women of all classes harder, or specifically, when they didn’t hit men. One example: You think it was men of any class who were being sentenced to death for petty treason when they killed their spouses? No, it was women. Husbands were the ones likely to literally get away with murder.
You also evidently know nothing about rape culture or any of the problems faced by women today – despite your claims to be concerned about things like the defunding of Planned Parenthood, which overwhelmingly hits women’s health – if you claim men (or rather, the patriarchal culture) don’t oppress women.
Just piss off back to your rainbow land where women don’t need feminism at all because you said so.
“so, Cassie, you like women? Well you just need a penis inserted into you in just the right manner and then you’ll be screaming the perks of heterosexuality!”
You or anyone else saying that to me is not oppressing me. It is saying nasty things to me that remind me of my vulnerabilities and the oppression I do face in society.
Actually I feel like I just insulted Mr Al. He may be a jackass but I don’t think he would ever write anything as illiterate as “strawmans” unless he was actually trying to take the piss.
The stupid just gets worse and worse.
Cassandra, waving an iPod would be fine, just make sure you put it back on its nice doily afterward though. ;)
I don’t think even Steele managed “strawmans”!
“You also evidently know nothing about rape culture or any of the problems faced by women today – despite your claims to be concerned about things like the defunding of Planned Parenthood, which overwhelmingly hits women’s health – if you claim men (or rather, the patriarchal culture) don’t oppress women. ”
This is where your argument begins to crumble as more and more women get into politics and positions of power what you find is they push the same ole misogynist laws, just like obama pushes the same ole racist laws. It has nothing to do with having a penis and everything to do with being in a position of power.
Working class men do not oppress women.
“Just piss off back to your rainbow land where women don’t need feminism at all because you said so.”
Another strawman! very nice.
Cassie lost me hours and hours ago with zir initial false analogies, and holy crap is this a long thread where my eyes just glaze over and stay that way.
vcxnmig!
“@ Argenti
This is like what would happen if Mr Al had a baby with Camille Paglia.
(It would have to be Mr Al who taught baby how to write. As ridiculous as Paglia can be she can construct a much tighter argument than this mess.)”
Lol, good point.
“Or don’t your convict foremothers count?”
I care about indigenous rights! Wasn’t want happened to the white convicts horrible!
Ok, maybe this is my lack of personal knowledge of Australian history and politics, but you really just got under my skin big time. (Cassie, not you kitteh) US and Canada wise, trying to claim that your white male ancestors were so oppressed because they were poor is, well, completely at odds with indigenous rights. (I again plug #OpThunderbird for those of you who care about First Nation oppression)
Also, here’s the thing. Cassie doesn’t believe in patriarchy (she also doesn’t understand what it means, but let’s put that aside for a moment). She’s entitled to believe whatever she wants, but the thing is, if she doesn’t believe in a concept as basic as patriarchy that means that she’s never going to agree with the majority of the other commenters here, and we can decide that we don’t consider her an ally or a person that we can work with.
(Shrugs) So it goes. People are entitled to their beliefs, and other people are entitled to write them off if they think those beliefs are foolish.
“I’m feeling a bit congested to wave my cane around, can’t I just wave my iPod instead?”
Did I make you feel old? If so, recall that I only recently discovered your any older than I am and that whole discussion! (Yes, wave your iPod, it’s probably newer than mine anyways!)
” if she doesn’t believe in a concept as basic as patriarchy that means that she’s never going to agree with the majority of the other commenters here, and we can decide that we don’t consider her an ally or a person that we can work with. ”
How sectarian of you! Sectarianism is more of a threat to the left than MRAs.
The ideological differences are great it is true. I do however support a lot of the same things you do, full abortions rights, equal pay, challenging rape/raunch culture and so on. If you can never “consider someone an ally” because they don’t think men oppressing women is a thing then…well what can I say to that?
You really need more clarification? Ok.
I was perceived as a boy. I was expected to be tough, rational, heroic, and so on. When I tried to be feminine or liked things associated with femininity and femaleness, I received heaps of scorn. That wasn’t simply because of the rigidity of gender norms. It was specifically because I was acting like a girl. There was something wrong with me acting like one because I was a boy.
I also grew up noticing that girls who acted like boys, while also judged and criticized from time to time, were criticized much less often and they were only criticized for reasons that had nothing to do with some perceived inferiority of masculinity. The concern was that boys wouldn’t like butch girls. Butch girls wouldn’t be good mothers and daughters. And so on. What I learned was that being a “boy” (or boy) wanting to be feminine was a crime against nature, whereas a girl (or “girl”) acting like a boy was weird, unexpected, but overall tolerable.
That’s not all. Even today I am overwhelmed by our culture’s strong policing of gender norms for women. Womanhood, in the mind of a trans* girl like me, is extremely narrowly-defined, whereas manhood is much more flexible, the hypersensitive aversion to femininity notwithstanding. Speaking of that, never in my life have I heard people say “Be a woman” in the same sense as “Be a man.” Why? Because manhood implies superiority, and womanhood implies the opposite.
Clearly not all men oppress women. But it’s quite clear, at least to me, that society’s misogyny is a product of sociocultural male supremacy (AKA patriarchy), which is upheld by both men and women regardless of their class.
Way to miss the point of a patriarchal culture which I just mentioned in what you quoted. It goes beyond individual men, and women are not immune to it – hell, we’re brought up in it. And if you really think there’s anything like the weight of numbers, and of numbers of women who don’t buy into patriarchy (plenty do, in politics and out) then you’re living in a fantasy land. It’s anything but my argument crumbling: it’s an illustration of how pervasive male-based power structures are.
You’re the one who said feminism gets in the way; you made it pretty clear you don’t think much of it – probably because you know as much about it as you do about the US draft situation.
“Working class men do not oppress women.”
Oh no, they are all the purest of the pure. Or do you really think economics are all that count? You’ll be saying next that white working class people never oppressed working class PoC. It’s just that stupid.
“Ok, maybe this is my lack of personal knowledge of Australian history and politics, but you really just got under my skin big time. (Cassie, not you kitteh) US and Canada wise, trying to claim that your white male ancestors were so oppressed because they were poor is, well, completely at odds with indigenous rights.”
Not at all. It is wrong to lock people up because they steal because they can’t afford food and it is wrong to attempt genocide, how are those things contradictory? Because you think white people are the oppressors? They aren’t, the ruling class whites are. My convict forefathers (and mothers) did not have a choice in what happened, blaming them is rubbish.
Btw, are you Australian? If not trying to insist you know more about my own country than me as a form of colonialism I was told.
““Also, mxe is right, drop the T in GLBT, and probably the I too,”
This is how the trans people I know use the term and how they like me to use it as well. They would be on my ass for it if I left the T and the I off and excluded them. So I should drop it because you said so? I don’t think so!”
Yeah, including the letters to save face, while ignoring the actual issues? I don’t really give a shit wtf you claim to you support, not when you’re discounting trans* issues so blatantly. And fuck, including T just because you’d “be on [your] ass”? Nice way to show how much you actually care!
““presenting as feminine isn’t a factor in oppression, just class, you’re of no use to anyone who isn’t comfortable as their biological gender”
I never said anything even resembling that. Enough strawmans please.”
No, you just said that patriarchy isn’t a thing, ignoring mxe regarding patriarchal oppression of trans* people, and particularly trans* women, and said that class was the biggest factor.
If you think I’m going to feel even a twinge of remorse for synthesizing your statements, you have another thing coming.
Argenti – Cassandra was replying to me, I said you just like seein’ the rest of us bang our walking sticks at you. :D
“Working class men do not oppress women.”
Yeah, especially not the working class men who rape, abuse, and restrict the freedom of women.
“Clearly not all men oppress women. But it’s quite clear, at least to me, that society’s misogyny is a product of sociocultural male supremacy (AKA patriarchy), which is upheld by both men and women regardless of their class.”
Ah ok, you are using patriarchy differently to what I thought. I wouldn’t tend to use that term to describe it still though, but yes I agree there are sexist narratives that are forced on people. Male supremacy is probably a better term.
““so, Cassie, you like women? Well you just need a penis inserted into you in just the right manner and then you’ll be screaming the perks of heterosexuality!”
You or anyone else saying that to me is not oppressing me. It is saying nasty things to me that remind me of my vulnerabilities and the oppression I do face in society.”
I don’t even…
How about that corrective rape is actually a thing that people actually do? Is that oppressive? But saying it’d be good if that happened to you isn’t?
And you know, never mind, this hypothetical is just making me feel dirty.
“Actually I feel like I just insulted Mr Al. He may be a jackass but I don’t think he would ever write anything as illiterate as “strawmans” unless he was actually trying to take the piss.”
Touché, his Steele grammar was almost brilliant in its highly intentional failure. He really should write up instead of trolling us.
“Yeah, especially not the working class men who rape, abuse, and restrict the freedom of women.”
Rape is not in itself oppression, it can be an expression of oppression or it can be indicative of oppression, but in and of itself it isn’t.
Society is set up to privilege men but that doesn’t make them the oppressors it makes them privileged.
“They aren’t, the ruling class whites are. ”
Fucking bullshit. You really think it was only the upper class murdering the indigenous people? You think none of the convicts ever killed them? Or that my ancestors – peasant farmers from Germany – probably didn’t do just the same thing? You’ve a real fantasy land notion of what the lower classes are like and do. And just as mxe said – working class men are just as capable of brutalising and murdering women as upper class men are. Or doesn’t that count as oppression for you?
“And you know, never mind, this hypothetical is just making me feel dirty.”
I have already given you your answer. Honestly people thinking saying things to people is the same as oppressing them? What nonsense.
Oh, so now we’re a rape apologist too, if rape itself is not oppression.
This is getting to banhammer time.
“Fucking bullshit. You really think it was only the upper class murdering the indigenous people? You think none of the convicts ever killed them? Or that my ancestors – peasant farmers from Germany – probably didn’t do just the same thing? You’ve a real fantasy land notion of what the lower classes are like and do.”
Sure some did, just as sometimes cops now lock aborigines in vans in 40 degree heat and let them cook to death. However the police are not oppressing them, they are merely enforcing the oppression on someone elses behalf just as working class people were if/when they murdered aborigines.
“Or doesn’t that count as oppression for you?”
Oppression is institutional, dictated by the state, not by people floating about in society.
I suppose she thinks kids have never committed suicide because of mere words, either.
Cassie, go get a bad case of Lego constipation, you’re revealing yourself as a disgusting human being.
“Oh, so now we’re a rape apologist too, if rape itself is not oppression. ”
No I really am not a rape apologist, because I disagree rape is oppression and think rather it is or can be a function of oppression.
Am I oppressing a man if I rape him? Is a man oppressing a boy if he rapes them? What about a man raping another man is that oppression?
““Ok, maybe this is my lack of personal knowledge of Australian history and politics, but you really just got under my skin big time. (Cassie, not you kitteh) US and Canada wise, trying to claim that your white male ancestors were so oppressed because they were poor is, well, completely at odds with indigenous rights.”
Not at all. It is wrong to lock people up because they steal because they can’t afford food and it is wrong to attempt genocide, how are those things contradictory? Because you think white people are the oppressors? They aren’t, the ruling class whites are. My convict forefathers (and mothers) did not have a choice in what happened, blaming them is rubbish.
Btw, are you Australian? If not trying to insist you know more about my own country than me as a form of colonialism I was told.”
Didn’t I start that by saying maybe I was misusing something about Australian history? Haven’t I said, repeatedly, that I’m American?
That aside, and again, no I don’t know Australian history, and certainly not better than the Australians here — in the US and Canada, yes, the Europeans (whites) oppressed, and continue to oppress, the First Nations people, Native Americans, and other indigenous populations. Or do you think it’s ruling class men who sneak onto reservations to rape FN/Native women?! Only ruling class men murder FN/Native people and get away with it when almost no investigation occurs?!
So yeah, locking people up for stealing food is wrong, but that doesn’t somehow mean that only ruling class people oppress indigenous people.
You know nothing about oppression you stupid piece of shit. You really think homophobia or racism cease to exist when laws finally outlaw them? You don’t even know what oppression means, it is NOT just about government-mandated prejudice.
Just fuck off.
“Argenti – Cassandra was replying to me, I said you just like seein’ the rest of us bang our walking sticks at you. ”
Whoops, missed that!
“Rape is not itself oppression…”
Ok, you seriously need to get back to us when you’ve got your non-socialism 101 topics covered. Might want to start with rape as a weapon of war (*cough* which is on topic *cough*)
“You don’t even know what oppression means”
We have different definitions of oppression, deal with and while you are there get a tissue and wipe all the spit you just sprayed over your computer in your self righteous tantrum.
See? If we find ourselves in a situation where working class men are oppressing working class women, this person is useless to us as an ally. Which is why there’s no reason not to write her off.
She’s welcome to piss and moan about it if she likes, but we don’t have to care.
They have agency. They have power, and they are using that power to subjugate groups. That it is done on another group’s behalf is irrelevant. They aren’t helpless slaves.
“Ok, you seriously need to get back to us when you’ve got your non-socialism 101″
The fact it doesn’t jive with feminism doesn’t make it socialism 101
“Might want to start with rape as a weapon of war ”
Yes I agree that in that situation it is oppression. Which is why I said “rape in itself is not oppression”. Because it isn’t the rape that makes it oppression it is the war.
Is Cassie illustrating what is known as “Tilting at Windmills?”
“See? If we find ourselves in a situation where working class men are oppressing working class women, this person is useless to us as an ally.”
Depends what you mean by oppress if by that you mean abusing their privilege you bet your bum I would be helpful in that situation.
“They have agency. They have power, and they are using that power to subjugate groups. That it is done on another group’s behalf is irrelevant. They aren’t helpless slaves.”
No they aren’t helpless slaves, but the options aren’t helpless slave or oppressor, that is a false dichotomy.
““And you know, never mind, this hypothetical is just making me feel dirty.”
I have already given you your answer. Honestly people thinking saying things to people is the same as oppressing them? What nonsense.”
I was going to drop this, because yuck, exactly zero parts of me want to do this hypothetical, but I’m good at the devils advocate thing, and at channeling MRAs, so here we go!
Forget that these are words on a screen, pretend that line about how you just need to be raped until you’re straight was being said to you by, idk, someone you thought you could trust to give you a ride. Not oppression because he only said he should rape you and isn’t yet actually raping you?
If so, I call for banhammer on grounds of disgusting levels of rape apologism. If not, here, have some extra strong coffee, it ought to help you actually get the damned point.
Everyone else, if it wasn’t 4 am here, I’d s shower after that, and am terribly sorry to have had to get that explicit to make the point.
This does make an op topic point though — I can’t get more explicit than that, it’s too obscene and demeaning. Yet the quotee up there described the rape and murder of POW women…that isn’t some hypothetical, that’s wtf he thinks should happen, wtf he wants to happen.
Definiton of “oppression” (The Free Dictionary):
1.
a. The act of oppressing; arbitrary and cruel exercise of power
b. The state of being oppressed.
2. Something that oppresses.
3. A feeling of being heavily weighed down in mind or body.
Hmmm…
“Forget that these are words on a screen, pretend that line about how you just need to be raped until you’re straight was being said to you by, idk, someone you thought you could trust to give you a ride. Not oppression because he only said he should rape you and isn’t yet actually raping you?”
Am I oppressing a man if I rape him or threaten to rape him? Is a man oppressing a child if he rapes the child or threatens to rape the child?
No they aren’t helpless slaves, but the options aren’t helpless slave or oppressor, that is a false dichotomy.
They can still be oppressors even if they’re doing it on behalf of some group.
@ Argenti
Eh, no worries. Anyone who’s a regular commenter here has read far worse than that, in fact they read it in the OP
“Am I oppressing a man if I rape him? Is a man oppressing a boy if he rapes them? What about a man raping another man is that oppression?”
Women raping a man? In a society where men are shamed for anything resembling weakness or a resemblance to anything female (btw, see mxe above on this topic)? Yeah, that’s a form of gender oppression.
Is an adult oppressing a kid if the kid is raped? Genders moot here, you yourself noted ageism above.
Man raping another man? In a society where the raped man will be shamed for the supposed homosexual nature of the rape? Ding ding ding we have GLBT oppression!
Note that homosexuality being legal doesn’t change that, and that mxe already explained, in likely painful detail, the first point.
“They can still be oppressors even if they’re doing it on behalf of some group.”
Yes they can be doesn’t mean they are, please demonstrate that in this case they are.
““Ok, you seriously need to get back to us when you’ve got your non-socialism 101″
The fact it doesn’t jive with feminism doesn’t make it socialism 101″
Reading comprehension fail, let me try that again!
Gt back to us when you’ve done at least 101 level reading on topics that are not socialism. Clear now?
“Yes they can be doesn’t mean they are, please demonstrate that in this case they are.”
Anyone who uses power to subjugate a group or person is oppressing that group or person.
Argenti
Interesting.
Just like when a bunch of racists beat up some lebanese people at cronulla years ago, the racially fueled violence was not oppression but a manifestation or function of oppression, in the case of rape it is (or more accurately, can be) a function or manifestation of oppression. The oppression itself comes from elsewhere.
So it’s dark now, and still no power. We tried to go to the supermarket earlier but they weren’t open because they had no power either. We tried to go down off the mountain but the roads are flooded. Guess what saved the day?! Scented fucking candles!
“Eh, no worries. Anyone who’s a regular commenter here has read far worse than that, in fact they read it in the OP”
Thanks Cassandra, but it still feels so very wrong — the OP is obviously being shamed, that’s the context of it, I’m afraid I sounded like I was actually endorsing corrective rape and fuck, I kind of want to gag at that.
Cassie — I answer all that and all I get is “interesting”?! You aren’t going to reply in depth? Nothing?
What, was this all a ploy to get a feminist to say that men can be oppressed? Because you could’ve saved us 6+ pages and just asked if we thought men could ever be oppressed.
“Anyone who uses power to subjugate a group or person is oppressing that group or person.”
I don’t agree.
So this conversation ends as it began, with Cassie quibbling over semantics, because apparently that’s a more important issue to focus on than the other horrible stuff going on in the OP.
Like I said earlier, not a useful ally, focus almost comically off kilter.
It must be noted that there isn’t just one kind of oppression. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppression
Popping back between DVD episodes. This conversation reminds me of one I had with a staunch socialist around 18 years ago – one who had the collected works of Lenin, and had read every volume. Yet again I was hearing about how Russia/Cuba was such a shining bastion of human rights. When I pointed out, as a for example, how the gender pay gap exists in Russia – being a doctor there is traditionally a female job, so doctors are low paid compared to other occupations – I got told “but isn’t it wonderful that most of the doctors are women”.
Equality/oppression removal understanding FAIL.
I see Cassie continues to move the goalposts, including redefinition of any term she uses (most glaring recent examples: oppression, patriarchy).
She has also not responded on any point where she has been called out in the past, including on the OT. So yeah, either an 18-year-old who has started sociology 101 with a focus on Marxism, or a fuckwit who has fixed on Marxism.
“Cassie — I answer all that and all I get is “interesting”?! You aren’t going to reply in depth? Nothing?”
I don’t really have anything to say on the matter, I was just curious about your perspective there and if we could find commonground. A swing and a miss.
“What, was this all a ploy to get a feminist to say that men can be oppressed? Because you could’ve saved us 6+ pages and just asked if we thought men could ever be oppressed.”
You are a little paranoid. No, that isn’t likely as I don’t think men are oppressed as men, I would rather you said the opposite.
@ Kim
Do you at least have food, water, etc?
What. The. Fuck?
Violence and rape are just examples of manifestations of oppression, not themselves oppression?!
And cats are just manifestations of felines, not themselves felines. That noise you just heard? Tat was my head exploding.
Kim — you mean literally right? Because sometimes you really need the room to smell pretty and to be able to see where the fuck you’re going! (Hope the power’s back soon!)
“Yet again I was hearing about how Russia/Cuba was such a shining bastion of human rights.”
I don’t view russia or cuba as socialist, well russia was for a few years but that went south in the 20’s
“I see Cassie continues to move the goalposts, including redefinition of any term she uses (most glaring recent examples: oppression, patriarchy).”
I have redefined nothing. Words have multiple meanings, particularly in political contexts. Using different meanings to you does not mean I have redefined the term and as long as I am clear on my use of the term you can respond to that. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet afterall.
““What, was this all a ploy to get a feminist to say that men can be oppressed? Because you could’ve saved us 6+ pages and just asked if we thought men could ever be oppressed.”
You are a little paranoid. No, that isn’t likely as I don’t think men are oppressed as men, I would rather you said the opposite.”
Paranoid? Around here? *dies laughing* anyone got a count on the number of trolls who’ve done exactly that? Or did it turn out to be Mr. Al in various incarnations?
I used a scented fucking candle earlier, to clear the smell of dinner (it’s too cold to open a window). Thus my misandric duties for the day have been completed.
Please note that when Cassie uses a term in a way that others find odd, that’s an example of words having multiple meanings, but when other people use words like “oppression” in ways that Cassie doesn’t agree with, that means that they are incorrect about what is happening.
“And cats are just manifestations of felines, not themselves felines. That noise you just heard? Tat was my head exploding.”
I don’t agree this analogy fits at all. Better than being called a rape apologist though.
“Please note that when Cassie uses a term in a way that others find odd, that’s an example of words having multiple meanings, but when other people use words like “oppression” in ways that Cassie doesn’t agree with, that means that they are incorrect about what is happening.”
No, I think you can use it that way if you want. I just don’t think it is very useful. I prefer the manner in which I use it. Which by the by doesn’t make me a rape apologist.