Over on Boing Boing, Mark Frauenfelder has posted the excerpt below from A Love That Multiplies: An Up-Close View of How They Make It Work by Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar — yes, those Duggars — explaining how women “defraud” men when they dress in a way that men find exciting (in their pants).
This, sadly, is not exactly an original or even unusual notion in reactionary religious circles.
Indeed, a couple of years back, I found a rather scary post on a radically pro-patriarchal site called the CoAlpha Brotherhood in which one young man calling himself Drealm lamented that, as a man living “in a university town that’s overrun with young girls” he was literally “forced to stare at hundreds if not thousands of women a day, all of whom bring sluttiness to all new pinnacle”
Like the Duggars, Drealm thought that “a woman dressing provocatively and leaving a man in an unfinished state of excitement … is an assault on men’s sexuality.”
When women dress like this, he argued, he and other men couldn’t help but want to rape them.
[T]he only thing I want to do to a slut is rape them. … dressing like sluts brings out murders, rapists and sadists in men. … A society based on sluts, might as well be a pro-rapist society.
Reading back over this now, it’s all a bit too reminiscent of the thinking of Elliot Rodger. Indeed, after Rodger went on his misogyny-driven murder spree, one CoAlpha Forum member wrote that Rodger “would have been a true hero” had he only killed more sorority women; the site now adorns its front page with an homage to Rodger.
But it isn’t just those on the margins of the manosphere who think this way. In The Myth of Male Power, the 1993 book that essentially provided the ideological blueprint for the Men’s Rights movement today, Warren Farrell famously wrote of the “miniskirt power” secretaries allegedly had over their male bosses.
Farrell is a couple of decades older now, and apparently it takes more than a miniskirt to render him powerless these days. And by “more than a miniskirt” I mean less. As in no clothing at all. When Farrell put out a new eBook edition of The Myth of Male Power last year, he had his publisher put a rear-view shot of a nude woman on the cover, “to illustrate,” as he explained in an appearance on Reddit,
that the heterosexual man’s attraction to the naked body of a beautiful woman takes the power out of our upper brain and transports it into our lower brain
This sort of logic, like that of the Duggars and of “Drealm” from the CoAlpha Brotherhood, also conveniently takes the blame for (heterosexual) male behavior and transports it into the bodies of women. With the Duggars, we’ve seen exactly where this sort of logic can lead.
Farrell, much like the Duggars and the excerable “Drealm,” also seems to think that women commit a kind of fraud against men when they “stir up sensual desires” that they don’t intend to fulfill. As Farrell wrote in The Myth of Male Power, when a man pays good money to take a woman out, and she doesn’t repay him, as it were, with sex, she is in his estimation committing a kind of “date fraud” or “date robbery.”
Or even a sort of date rape. Farrell wrote that
dating can feel to a man like robbery by social custom – the social custom of him taking money out of his pocket, giving it to her, and calling it a date. … Evenings of paying to be rejected can feel like a male version of date rape.
Emphasis mine, because holy fuck.
This is what happens when your ideology makes women responsible for (heterosexual) men’s desires. Hell, it’s what happens when you make anyone responsible for the desires of someone else, regardless of gender or sexual orientation.
Your pants feelings are your responsibility. Not anyone else’s. Full stop.
And the Duggers (et al) formalise this ‘logic’:
(1) Men cannot control their sex drives:
“This is especially true for young women, who receive very little sex education because the church teaches us that women do not have sex drives. However, the opposite is believed of men: ATI teaches that men have nearly uncontrollable sex drives ready to erupt at the mere sight of a pant leg or a perm. To illustrate this point: ATI families are encouraged to maintain a “no computer” rule for their sons, but not their daughters. Gothard also encouraged men to turn toward the wall when dining at restaurants so as not to be “tempted” by a waitress or a stray attractive woman.
Not that our supposed lack of sex drive absolved us from sexual responsibility. ATI taught us that it is our job to keep men’s desires from erupting into lust or sexual activity. We were taught that it was our sin if we “cause a man to lust after us.””
(3) But men must be in charge (why, if they cannot control themselves, wouldn’t it better to lock them up?):
“A cornerstone belief of ATI is that God appoints husbands in an “umbrella of authority” over their wives, who are mandated by God to obey their husbands completely. ”
http://www.salon.com/2015/05/28/i_couldve_been_a_duggar_wife_i_grew_up_in_the_same_church_and_the_abuse_scandal_doesnt_shock_me/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow
@Lisa:
Do you need to do a mic drop after that? Because it sounds like you need to do a mic drop.
@Falconer:
Your kids have the bluest eyes since Paul Muad’dib.
@EJ: Thank you!
Y’know, when I hear that women lack sex drives, according to this particular flavor of Christian, I have to wonder if they’ve ever actually read Ezekial (23:20 is the well-known reference to the young woman who likes guys who compare favorably to horses).
Hello,
I’d just like to reiterate that I don’t believe that women dressing provocatively causes rape. I don’t believe (and haven’t said) that men aren’t responsible for their own actions. I think ( and I would have thought that this went without saying, but apparently not) that rape, murder,and torture are acts of evil.
My view is the following:
1) That a man who goes online and makes the kind of comments quoted in the OP is not thinking or behaving normally,and is emotionally disturbed, but also that making a comment about how something makes you feel, even if utterly distasteful, is not evil in the same way as actually committing the act is. (The man probably needs some kind of help and may well be dangerous.)
2) That there is nothing in the original statement about *uncontrollable lust*. That is simply something the commenters here have invented. It’s like if I said, “I saw $10 on the side and I was really tempted to take it” (implication is that I *didn’t* actually take it) and then criticizing this statement, not on the genuine grounds that it would be wrong to take the money, but rather with some bizarre argument about how I’m trying to argue against freedom of will or something.
3) The OP is obviously extreme and disturbed, but I think perhaps an extreme and odd reaction to normal sexuality. For most heterosexual men, the female form draws the eye – I can see how that might cause problems for some people – because sexual desire is powerful and potentially damaging there must be rules which aim to govern it. That may include dress codes.
4) I’m not a liberal – I don’t think “tough shit, I can do whatever I want as long as I don’t touch you”, is a particularly good argument or way to run a society (I wonder what people here would think about ultra-thin models and their effect on teenage girls?) As such, I think it is entirely reasonable to have public codes of dress (specifics differing dependent on the society in question.)
5) If there are men for whom this is a genuine problem, I think “rip your own eyes out/ leave society/ stop looking at women” is just about the worst and least helpful comment that could possibly be made. It’s a bit like telling a morbidly obese person to eat less.
6) I think that we just have to take someones word for it if they say that they feel a certain way – it might seem odd to us, but some people’s lives are ruined by horniness.
Anyway, I think that the ideas you are attacking do need to be attacked, I basically support your work, but I’m not convinced about the direction you are coming at it from.
@freemage: Isn’t that passage pretty much “Catherine the Great has sex with horses!!” ?
Oh look, he hasn’t flounced yet.
Methinks you’re confusing “liberal” with “Libertarian.”
@freemage I know. But I do wonder how much sex drive you can have if you’re either pregnant or nursing or looking after a-gazillion kids. I know my sex drive took a hit for a while after my son was born – well, basically until he was 18 mos old and started sleeping through the night. :-/ I needs my sleep.
I grew up not exactly in, but associated with, the Church of Christ. I remember taking a ‘sex ed’ book – the main message was don’t. It acknowledged that women had urges too, but still put the main responsibility on girls (the audience for the book) on maintaining purity. This was pre-purity ball days, so it probably would look pretty ‘liberal’ now.
But you’d still like them to cover up, because my lustful thoughts are their responsibility.
@falconer
Social liberals have pretty much the same attitude
Wow, you really don’t get it do you? It isn’t sexual desire that is problematic and dangerous. It’s people (mostly men like in the OP) who assign a disproportionate value to their sexual desires (trumping other people’s basic human rights) and who think that unfulfilled sexual desire is a good excuse to assault, rape and murder people that is the problem. NO AMOUNT OF DRESS CODES IS GOING TO SOLVE THAT.
The ‘rules which aim to govern it’ are the ones that say that rape and murder are illegal. Too bad that we live in a culture that blames the victims for what they are wearing and actively prevents victims from seeking justice, so the laws we actually have can’t do their job.
Falconer: Your babies continue to be the cutest! Although I bet pretty soon they won’t want to be called babies!
@Falconer:
Catherine the Great is namechecked in the Bible? I knew the old testamental prophets were, well, prophets; but even for prophets that’s impressive.
0_0
No, they don’t. Social liberals encourage equal human rights for all, and that those rights only end where another person’s rights begin. That isn’t an ‘I can do whatever I want’ attitude. Actions that could harm others still have negative consequences.
@Falconer:
Oh, my goodness, those are the cutest toddlers ever. (LOL@ Rand Fucking Paul. Kinda, but in a much more adorable way. Much, much more.)
@Lea:
How are women and girls supposed to accomplish anything if all we are allowed to think about is whether or not we are making men happy and avoiding being raped by them every where we go?
See, according to those guys’ beliefs, women and girls are NOT supposed to accomplish anything beyond pleasing men’s boners (and making sammiches). So thinking about whether or not we are making men happy and avoiding being raped by them everywhere we go should be women’s and girls’ main concern anyway.
Also, you are either trying badly to lie, or you really need to work on your reading comprehension some more.
You said:
The OP:
What the hell is this if not ‘uncontrollable lust’ being used as an excuse for rape?
Mark is boring, so I won’t weigh in on those recent comments.
But I have to defend crocs! They may not be pleasing to the eye, but they are so great:
– easily washed
– dry quickly – perfect beach shoe, garden shoe, canoeing/kayaking shoe
– they replace the snaps for free (or at least they did 8 years ago)
– let a breeze in
– slip on
– not ruined by leaving them out in the weather by accident
– come in many colors
– squishy in a way that makes them very comfy
– excellent for children
– alienate men who think only your appearance is important
– accommodate wide feet
– help you find out your true friends as you weed the croc haters out of your life
I’ll stop there before I think of even more!
Also, Lisa, you are on fire today! Great comments.
Everyone else is too. Y’all are brilliant!
@Falconer: your babies are so cute, and have the most beautiful blue eyes. My kids are teenagers, so by definition, they aren’t cute anymore. I think they are supposed to regain a certain degree of cuteness when they are past the teen years, but until then, I live in a pot full of boiling teenaged angst and drama, constantly being stirred up by external factors that don’t seem as important to me as to them (I’m sure, if I look back, I’d remember things that stirred me up when I was a teen that wouldn’t now). Ah well, at least I still have the memories of when they were totes adorbs.
@Lisa:
Thanks for that excellent Salon piece.
Religion-driven and / or excused sex abuse makes me especially livid. Patriarchal religions are basically sex abuse cults, not to put too fine a point on it.
RE:Tanya’s remark about women’s eyes possibly being considered “too sexy”. I actually came upon a YouTube video, I assume created by Muslims, implying that a burqa-clad woman wearing eye makeup, wasn’t “pure of heart”. Meaning, I suppose, that her eye shadow and mascara would tempt men into sexual sin.
Crocs!!! I want a pair!
Dress codes, snort! Seriously? Sure! Lets put men back in suits every day. I luvs men in suits.
@Tina S:
Is that considered unusual? I only get to wear civilian clothes on weekends, really.
I just need to agree on the beauty of men’s forearms and hands. There’s just nothing like a nicely articulated wrist. Gentlemen, please do feel free to roll up your sleeves.
Sorry, folks, the ol’ CPU is running slowly today. This is about legal abortion, isn’t it?
You shouldn’t have to look too hard to find the regulars’ opinions on cultural beauty norms. I’m having trouble connecting this parenthetical with the previous sentence.
Oh yeah, sure, nothing says We are competent administrators and we treat our citizens like adults like making a dress code into law.