What the fuck is wrong with Reddit these days? Today, the denizens of AskReddit are debating the topic: Is it wrong to hit a woman? You can probably figure out what the consensus is. (Hint: Two letter word, starts with N.) What’s especially striking is how, well, gleeful the discussion is. Redditor after Redditor weighs in with the exact same opinion on the subject; others reply with jokey assent; everybody gets upvotes, sometimes hundreds of them. This exchange captures some of the flavor of the, er, “discussion” there:
These aren’t people arguing dispassionately that in the interest of equality we should treat hitting women the same as hitting men, and that ideally no one should be hitting anyone at all. These are guys (mostly) using the topic as an excuse to complain about “bitches” and their rights.
Others, meanwhile, decided to use the topic as masturbation fantasy fodder, suggesting that the original poster had missed his chance for some hot sex with the woman he slapped. As toothsayer put it:
The single slap is disrespectful, shows that you are pissy bitch, and will not get you laid. However, catching up to her as she is walking away, scooping her up, bending her over the knee and repeatedly spanking that ass would have led to some seriously hard core sex.
47 upvotes for that hilarious suggestion.
Perhaps all of the commenters should simply up and move to Topeka, Kansas, where the city council is considering decriminalizing domestic violence in order to save a few bucks. Seriously.
Note: Once again, I have the fine folks (no sarcasm here; they actually are fine) at ShitRedditSays for pointing this discussion out to me. Here’s the SRS discussion of the whole stinky mess.
I pledge: my next post will have nothing to do with Reddit.
Exposing a woman’s chest has a very different connotation than exposing a man’s.
I can understand slapping her away to get her to stop or out of panic, though. But if she walked off and then he caught up with her and slapped her, that’s not self-defense any more.
Also, it’s kind of a moot point when most of the comments are clearly much more into gloating revenge or aggression than self-defense.
If ripping open a women’s shirt is exactly the same as ripping the buttons off a man’s shirt, I demand the right to go topless on hot days without being arrested/called a slut.
ToySoldier said:
OP guy said:
Evidently defense was not a concern.
Not much threat is implied in the woman’s actions.
Actually, that thread is quite witty. I was always under the impression MRAs are frothing and humourless.
“Suck up the yahoo bar, bitch.”
I LOL’ed at that. I’m personally opposed to hitting women, it just makes me feel ugly, excepting the obvious cases of genuine self defence I suppose. Even if a woman slapped me I probably wouldn’t hit her, since usually it’s just one slap, then nothing.
Realistically a woman is very, very rarely going to subject a man to a sustained physical assault that he actually needs to defend himself from. Yeah, I know this will be patronizing, but most women, in my own view, just don’t have it in them, physically or mentally, for the really nasty level of violence men can dole out. You would have to have quite a vicious, deranged or drunk woman and probably a passive man with strong “I’m a weakling, attack me” vibes oozing off him.
Having said that, I have heard that the absolute most obnoxious people bouncers deal with are primarily women. Could be it’s because they know the bouncer won’t break anything. Now, if somebody was really in my face continually, knowing I can beat them and knowing also that I won’t, then I don’t know, I’d have to be pretty Zen.
This is idiotic in the extreme, and this kind of thinking is a really good way to downplay what violence women *do* happen to do. Most *PEOPLE* do not have it in them to put out a real, sustained assault over nothing, anymore. They can posture and maybe throw a punch, at most.
Likelihood that MRA’s will completely ignore this sentence and go on to whine about how feminists always defend violent women while condemning violent men: Certain
Probably in this very thread even.
My official feminist position is that people shouldn’t go around hitting each other OR pulling the buttons off each other’s shirts, the former because violence is bad for society as a whole and the latter because it’s rude.
I have a feeling that trying to talk to MRAs about politeness wiould be a fairly frustrating endeavor, though.
Thanks for the “idiotic in the extreme”. I truly do feel well blasted and very retarded.
I think we’ll just have to agree to disagree on the “most people” stuff.
When I wrote my post I had in mind situations where you are in a very aggressive confrontation with somebody.
So, when I’m saying things like “most” men and “most” women I’m actually talking about “most of the men and women you will be in an aggressive confrontation with”. In other words, it’s “most” of a subset, not men and women as a whole in society.
If a man has got in my face and is being very aggressive, then there is a totally different set of probabilities involved as opposed to a woman getting in my face and getting very aggressive. Maybe you can agree it would be “idiotic in the extreme” to view both situations as being on the same level? If so, why? And if not, why not?
Let’s run a devil’s advocate scenario. Say everybody ought to have the right to hit everybody else. Say we’ve all become too gutless, too full of phony idealism and false principle.
Civilizations where it was accepted as part of everyday life that the strong were going to f up the weak used to grow cohesive, powerful, and secure. The overvaluing of the individual – not classes, races, even genders, but individuals – has been the distraction.
What do we think?
@ Raoul – We think that someone who considers that an ideal scenario is a sociopath? Or maybe that’s just me.
I admit to some sociopathic tendencies, acquired mostly as a kind of psychic armor against the way the world works. More than that I leave as an exercise to the reader.
Well, RW, the reason most women are less likely to dole out pain in a fight is not because they’re “nicer” or whatever, but because, frankly, they’re weak. All those women that slap their boyfriends? If that had an average man’s strength behind it, they would be knockdown punches.
Also, I do agree that it’s foolish to think of an aggressive man and an aggressive women on the same level. With a man, if you retaliate, odds are fairly high this situation could escalate real quick. Especially if it’s a bar-type situation or there’s alcohol otherwise involved. A punch or a slap will probably just inflame things, rather than ending them, so I’d advocate just walking away if at all possible.
On the other hand, with a woman, a good punch to the face might be just the ticket to putting her down and ending the confrontation. Women are super weak and also are generally not used to having people, especially men, hold them physically accountable. So basically, it’s better to hit women than men.
At lest, objectively speaking.
People who fantasize about a world where the strong rule the weak never seem to grok the possibility that they might not be guaranteed a spot in the former category.
And even if you’re vicious enough for Thunderdome right now, everyone gets old if they live long enough…
MRAL: Try getting on the field with the female fighters of my acquaintance and you might think better of that statement.
I think the pre-history archaelogist I live with would verbally smack you upside the head, hypothetical or not.
The thing is, human society doesn’t function well in that model. The evidence we have indicates strongly that co-operative societies are the ones that flourish.
“People who fantasize about a world where the strong rule the weak never seem to grok the possibility that they might not be guaranteed a spot in the former category.”
Quoted for Truth!
You know, MRAL, given that you keep describing yourself as a small man with a wonky eye, if I were you I wouldn’t assume that women are incapable of physically hurting you. Based on your self-description it sounds like a woman who was fairly tall and fairly fit could probably knock you down far more easily than you could her.
Whenever people get into this debate they always seem to forget that part of the strength differential between men and women is about overall size (not all of it, but part of it). I’m willing to bet that, say, Hope Solo is stronger than your average 5ft6 man who never works out.
By ‘aggressive confrontation’, do you mean ‘one already likely to erupt in physical violence’? Because that’s the only way it still makes sense. Hitting is just not that common an end to an argument.
pffffthahahahahahaha
Oh ho ho ho ho ho ho ho
Ah, that was hilarious. No, no, that’s not how you play devil’s advocate. The Devil’s Advocate is expected to put forth a strong case based on the facts as best understood. Amazingly wrong bullshit cribbed from fantasy novels is in fact *NOT* the way to go. What actually happens is that those ‘civilizations’ are themselves ultimately conquered by a civilization that has a rule of law, and are assimilated to at least some degree. In fact, that kind of attitude contributed to the decline of the Ottoman Empire, when the Janissaries did it. That’s off the top of my head, and I understand the Praetorian Guard were little better in this.
Oh god, you think every man is Manny Pacquiao? Or even the ‘average m an’?
In comparison to say, a construction worker, sure. In comparison to say, a college student, not generally. Weaker, perhaps, ‘super weak’, not so much.
Hahaha, I love the inevitable “I know female bodybuilders” shit. Yeah, okay, but they’re so rare as to be considered freaks. The average women is way, way, way, way, way […] way, way, way weaker than the average man.* Also, I’m not weak.
*citation: observing actual people, and not watching the women’s events in the Olympics and generalizing from there.
Trust me, I could kick the shit out of a 5’10 woman.
I study history for a living. Can you point out, specifically and with concrete details, what you think backs up this claim? Like, one country/period? Because I don’t see it.
In fact, in order to be “cohesive, powerful, and secure,” one of the things states have to do is ensure a flow of revenue to the crown/central administration, and a society in which it’s a daily event in which “the strong fuck up the weak” can’t make that happen with any regularity. The weak, after all, are the people producing your food and trading, which is where the money comes from. Meanwhile, the strong usually tend to have a de-centralizing effect on a polity.
One of the elements of what we call “modernization” (I don’t like that term, because it implies that there’s one script that everyone should be following, but whatevs) is the increasing power of the state not in comparison to the people on the bottom of the pile, but in comparison to the strongmen and nobles who otherwise would just be fucking things up for everyone else. And in my experience, periods where strong individuals wander around just doing whatever they please aren’t happy ones. We’re talking “last ten years of the 30 Years’ War” bad.
Now, if you’re talking just about personal relationships instead of broadly social ones, it’s less clear in this case but many would argue that modernization also involves the move away from from private violence and toward a monopoly of legal/morally acceptable violence by the state. We, with our comparatively “cohesive, powerful, and secure” United States, are also far, far less violent to one another than the residents of, say, early modern Germany. I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
The best cure for attitudes like MRAL’s that women are “super weak” is to enroll them in a martial arts class. I know one kung fu teacher who has incoming dudebro students spar with his teenage daughter for exactly this reason – there’s nothing like being knocked on your ass by a petite 13 year old girl to knock the bravado out of a sexist man (and also teach them never to underestimate an opponent, which is a good lesson to learn in order to avoid embarrassing yourself later). Especially when she does it using perfect form and he’s still tripping over his own feet any time he tries to do anything.
VoiP, there is basically one script that everyone should be following. Since western Europe, Australia, and the US are better than the rest of the world, and said countries share distinct similarities, they should be the sole ideal.