What’s the difference between a lad mag and a rapist? Aside from one being a magazine and the other a person, albeit an reprehensible one, apparently not very much.
In a study soon to be published in the British Journal of Psychology, researchers at Middlesex University and the University of Surrey showed people quotes about women from British lad mags (FHM, Loaded, Nuts and Zoo) and from convicted rapists. Most survey respondents – men and women both – could not tell the difference between the quotes from the magazines and the quotes from the rapists. And most of the male respondents identified more with the quotes from the rapists than from the lad mags.
Here are some of the quotes the survey respondents were asked to react to. (You can find more at Jezebel.) Can you tell which of these are from rapists or lad mags?
Mascara running down the cheeks means they’ve just been crying, and it was probably your fault . . . but you can cheer up the miserable beauty with a bit of the old in and out.
You’ll find most girls will be reluctant about going to bed with somebody or crawling in the back seat of a car . . . But you can usually seduce them, and they’ll do it willingly.
Some girls walk around in short-shorts . . . showing their body off . . . It just starts a man thinking that if he gets something like that, what can he do with it?
I think girls are like plasticine, if you warm them up you can do anything you want with them.
In case you’re wondering, the correct answers are: Lad mag, Rapist, Rapist, Lad Mag.
Creepy, eh?
Lead researcher Miranda Horvath of Middlesex University explains why she feels this is so troubling:
Rapists try to justify their actions, suggesting that women lead men on, or want sex even when they say no, and there is clearly something wrong when people feel the sort of language used in a lads’ mag could have come from a convicted rapist.
I would say so.
And so, you might wonder, how did the regulars on the Men’s Rights subreddit react this this research? Take a look.
The comment with the most upvotes offered some nice juicy denial:
The comment with the second-highest number of upvotes completely missed the point:
And then there was this hot mess:
In case anyone is wondering, that quote from French is actually a quote from a character in one of her novels. And it’s pretty easy to distinguish it from things posted on Jezebel, because none of the writers on Jezebel ever say anything even remotely like that.
The Men’s Rights subreddit, responding to evidence of rape culture by going “la la la I can’t hear you” since March 2008.
LJ: You need to learn to use pseuds better, dude.
More links:
http://www.4dudes.com/2011/10/ways-to-end-rape.html
http://www.menendingrape.org/theory.htm
If 1 in 6 building were churches, would you say churches were prevalent in the community?
If 1 in 6 veterans had prosthetics, would you say amputations were prevalent among war wounds?
If 1 in 6 toppings on your pizza was olives, would you say they were prevalent on the toppings?
If 1 in 6 dogs in the park were Rottweilers, would you say they were a prevalent breed of dogs that day?
Yet, you play semantics with it when discussing rape.
That makes you either terrible at math, terrible at comprehension or a terrible person.
@Cynickal: That makes you either terrible at math, terrible at comprehension or a terrible person.
Or, ALL of the above!
Well, you’ve had 111 prior opportunities to do just that — you have posted over 1 in 6 of the comments in the thread and a number of them are verbose mansplaining like your complete missing the point reply to mine above. Seriously, consider walking away, Mr D.J.Z. (yes, I looked at your blog).
Just catching up with this thread. Monsieur sans nom’s “funny” rape video was obnoxious and inappropriate; I’ve removed it and will put him on moderation.
PS Oh, and in case you missed it – since your observation skills are sorely lacking, as you are in other areas – you should have been able to search through the thread to find that I introduced the word endemic into the discussion a couple of pages ago, and I did so because it is an entirely appropriate synonym of the word “prevalent”, as are other words such as “widespread”, “pervasive”, and “ubiquitous”, and I was somewhat curious to discover whether the slightly different meaning of each of these words prompted the same semantic Blue Screen of Death. Your reply to me above touches on the semantic argument at length, but I see no recognition on your part that the dictionary or the thesaurus simply don’t agree with you on what the word means.
@Xanthe: OMG, you mean that LJ has been PREVALENT in this thread! Even, dare I say it, ubiquitous, endemic, pervasive, and downright sliming all around the place.
I wouldn’t call that prevalent or anything.
*runs away
@ ithiliana, well, I wouldn’t use the word ubiquitous (i.e. found everywhere), since he only started posting on page 2, and dropped out for a while between pages 3 and 6; but according to my dictionary “prevalent”, “pervasive”, and “widespread” all seem apropos!
@Xanthe: Good point, but I have to say I like using the word ubiquitous!
It’s a nifty word to say and type!
UbiqUItous! Just rolls off the tongue/off the fingertips.
“If 1 in 6 building were churches, would you say churches were prevalent in the community?”
Not if 3 in 6 were homes.
“If 1 in 6 veterans had prosthetics, would you say amputations were prevalent among war wounds?”
Not if 5 in 6 had war wounds that did not have prosthetics.
“If 1 in 6 toppings on your pizza was olives, would you say they were prevalent on the toppings?”
Not if 2 in 6 toppings are pepperoni.
“If 1 in 6 dogs in the park were Rottweilers, would you say they were a prevalent breed of dogs that day?”
Not if 3 in 6 were rottweilers.
It would have to be the prevailing thing in order for it to be prevalent.
I can feel my IQ drop every time I read your posts.
Dealing with you is like dealing with a toddler, only the toddler will get it eventually.
@ ithiliana, and of course, the original Latin word ubique is awesome too. Seeing as unique derives from a similar substitution of the word for one (unus) for the word for where (ubi) it’s typically inconsistent of English for the two Latin words to have different constructions for the adjective forms are different, unique and ubiquity/ubiquitous, of which only ubiquitous and unique can both be modified by +ly and +ness suffixes for adverbs and nouns. (And unique is frequently misapplied to non-singular cases, just like ubiquity is for non-everywhere.)
http://www.safercampus.org/blog/2011/12/disgusting-uvm-fraternity-questionnaire-sparks-outrage/
fraternity at U. Vermont has questionnaire asking members among other things who they most wanted to rape.
*will post link to petition to sign after I sign*
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/end-rape-culture-now—shut-down-sigma-phi-epsilon-vermont-gamma/
Daniel, you’re concentrating so hard on the 1 in 6 women who have experienced rape directly that you have noticed that the other 5 out of 6 experience repercussions indirectly in their daily life: women (and probably a small subset of disadvantaged men) adopt behaviours and strategies to minimise risk at an almost unconscious level, because they don’t want to be one of the 1 in 6.
* which should read, … that you haven’t noticed that the other 5 out of 6…
By the way, it was there in my post earlier this afternoon at 3:30 pm, right in the middle of the first sentence I wrote, and you still went on harping about the 1 in 6 who directly experience rape, as opposed to the probably larger number of women who’ve had a narrow call or lucky escape, and the indisputable majority of women who are sexually harassed in various ways.
@Xanthe: I think he is concentrating so hard on himself that he cannot see anything outside his own ass. That dickbiscuit move of answering the questions like he did was bloody ridiculous.
He has no idea of what women go through at all stages throughout our lives–the first time an adult male made a pass at me, I was 14. I was serving punch at a faculty function at my parents’ house–my father was DEAN of a fucking college. One of the faculty got drunk (booze flowed freely at said faculty functions in private homes), and made a pass at me. Freaked me out. The adults all laughed indulgently and my 12 year old brother was told to ‘protect’ me. I suspect he was freaked out by the command as well. And just to head off NWO slave, the dress I was wearing had a high collar, long sleeves, and came to my knees (it was purple with pearl buttons, smocked top, my mother made it for me, and I loved it, but it was always a bit tainted after that afternoon).
Those “1 in 6” women are all connected to other women and to men. The rape culture affects us all: it’s not JUST the “literal” rape of the percentage that TrollCrap has decided isn’t prevalent enough.
xanthe:
Wow. So much assumption there and no fact.
Of course there are repercussions on the other 5 out of 6.
Of course nobody would want to be one of the one in six.
Had you just simply asked me “do you believe the other 5 in 6 have repercussions because of the other 1” I would have simply answered yes. But you didn’t bother to ask. You just assumed.
Anybody else want to claim to know what I am thinking?
hellkell: I went to a close friend who teaches English in a university. She agreed with me. I went to people who deal with numbers and statistics with whom I work with. They agreed with me. Most people I have spoke with outside of this website have said that in order for something to be prevalent, it has to be the prevailing thing.
Now, all also agreed that 1 in 6 women getting raped is damned depressing.
xanthe and ithiliana: You both are aware that I am agreeing that there is a rape culture, right? You both havn’t skipped over those posts of mine? Right.
Your belated and very grudgingly conceded admission that you have changed your mind rings very hollow, coming after the rape apologism you started with back on page 2 of the thread.
JESUS CHRIST DAN IT’S LIKE YOU WON’T SHUT UP.
Mind you, I don’t fucking care whether you and every fucking person you know feel that the word “prevalent” can ever apply to something that happens to 1 in 6 people in a country. I largely just think it’s shitty that you went to one web site about rape culture, saying that you had a completely open mind about whether rape culture exists, and you got tripped up because the very first sentence said that rape is prevalent, and although you really honestly are very concerned about rape and think that 1 in 6 is too many, you just can’t agree that 1 in 6 meets your definition of “prevalent.”
In other words, Dan, it’s not your idiosyncratic definition of “prevalent” that bothers me, but your inability to see through the web site’s possible misuse of the word and try to read the fucking web site about fucking rape culture with a fucking open mind. Someone with an actual open mind might say, Well, possibly the person who made the web site had a different definition of the word “prevalent” than I do. THEY WOULD NOT TURN THE POSSIBLE MISAPPLICATION OF A SINGLE WORD INTO A REASON TO DISMISS RAPE CULTURE. NOR WOULD SOMEONE WHO HONESTLY IS CONCERNED ABOUT RAPE AND VICTIMS FUCKING DISMISS VICTIMS’ STORIES WHEN THEY’RE TELLING HIM ABOUT THEIR OWN EXPERIENCES WITH RAPE CULTURE.
Damn, this fake earnestness is really fucking pissing me off, Dan.
Dan is about as “concerned” about women being raped and oppressed as he is “concerned” about anything else.
Waaaahhhh, misogynist doesn’t like to be called misogynist, concern troll doesn’t like to be called a concern troll http://images.t-nation.com/forum_images/4/d/4db77_ORIG-look_at_all_the_fucks_i_give.jpg
xanthe: grudgingly? No. I was presented with a logical argument that I cannot refute. I am not saying that grudgingly. I am saying that very willingly.
Questioning something I did not understand does not make me a rape apologist.
Bee: Yes. I will not shut up when people misrepresent my words and call me what I am not.
I am in the process of reading the other sources provided for me. But for some damned reason instead of discussing the other things people insist on harping on that one damned definition of one word and insisting that because I do not view 1 in 6 as prevalent that I am some rape apologist woman hating troll.
EVEN WHEN I DID NOT AGREE THAT THERE WAS A RAPE CULTURE I did not say that the use of one word by one site was a reason to completely dismiss the entirety of sites claiming that there is a rape culture. I am fairly certain that I said that fairly specifically on this thread as well… that it is just one definition that I found flawed.
And now that I do agree that there is a rape culture, I will still say that people should not dismiss the fact that there is a rape culture because one website uses one word.