Just feeling really angry at all the murder, assault, rape of females that goes on

[BornStroppy]

I told my husband how horrible it is being part of a gender that is constantly attacked, murdered, etc. He had never thought about it. He doesn´t need to. So we have Tia Sharp, the lady who disappeard in London, an old lady in Scotland murdered by son´s friend, another one murdered in a taxi in Birmingham - this is just over two weeks.

I have one son, pregnant again and just hope its another boy to be honest.

Why is it OK? Apart from raising gentlemen, what the hell can we do? As a gender, we give birth, nurture, raise, care for them, and as a gender we are the ones who suffer at their hands.

its so depressing.

[TheDoctrineOfEnnis]

I agree, it is horrible. I am very aware of trying to raise the DSes to respect their bodies and other people's. I'm starting there and will continue to work on it as they get older.

[Himalaya]

Men are both more likely to be the perpetrators AND the victims of violent crime, so it isnt accurate to say that women are the gender that is "constantly attacked, murdered etc..".

Over three quarters of murder victims are male (US stats, but similar in Europe i think) and men are more likely to be victims of all kinds of violent crime.

Women are more likely to be the victims of domestic violence and sexual violence. This is something to be angry about I agree.

But the idea that women should see themselves as the victim class is not accurate or helpful.

We should bring our sons up to be gentlemen and our daughters up to know that no one has the right to hurt them. But statistically our sons are more likely to be the victims of violence, so we also do need to think about that.

I think the women-as-victims idea as often ends up making girls fearful (e.g. Of walking out at night) rather than protects them.

[pornmonkey]

StewieGriffinsMom Sat 11-Aug-12 08:48:27
Those aren't sweeping generalistions. The vast majority of violent crime is by men. The vast majority of the victims of violent crime are women and children.

I'm pretty sure that 2nd sentence is wrong and actually the vast majority of victims of violent crime are men. Maybe you were thinking of domestic violence?

[Whatmeworry]

Those aren't sweeping generalistions. The vast majority of violent crime is by men. The vast majority of the victims of violent crime are women and children

In the real world the vast majority of violent crime is by young disaffected men, the vast majority of victims are men.

I also get fed up with this continual "women as helpless victim" ideology.

[pornmonkey]

keep digging...

[CardgamesFTW]

Yes OP, it so horrible. It's like being stuck in a nightmare world but the news are real.

We aren't even supposed to acknowledge the problem, but we must.

Agree with SGM and Artex's posts.

[Whatmeworry]

Nope. What happens is that the government separates the states for violence (I.e. physical assaults) from stats on sexualised violence and domestic violence. If you count sexualised violence and domestic violence under the heading of 'violent crimes', the vast majority of victims are women and children.

Nah, stats say that all DV is about 15 - 25% of all violence (depending on what is counted as DV - emotional, financial etc rather than just physical), so that doesn't wash.

Google delivereth the crap, wikipedia delivereth the facts.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I know this is my fault, so no-one needs to answer, but I'm finding some of this hard to follow without links/details of where the stats are from. I'm looking at wiki, which seems to have a lot of 'citation needed' markers on articles, but can't find easy figures to compare as one article says:

'The National Study of Domestic Abuse for 2005 reported that 213,000 women and 88,000 men reported being victims of domestic violence at some point in their lives. According to the study, one in seven women and one in sixteen men were victims of severe physical abuse, severe emotional abuse, or sexual abuse.[4]
In the United Kingdom, the police estimate that around 35% of domestic violence against women is actually reported.[citation needed]'

That's the article on epidemiology of DV - another on statistics for violent crime is looking at different numbers and a different way of reporting:

'According to the Home Office, there were around 880,000 "Violence against the person" crimes in England and Wales in 2008?9, equivalent to 16 per thousand people in England and Wales. There were about 50,000 sexual offences during the same period, just under 1 per thousand. '

I don't know how to compare these ... if anyone does have a minute to explain I'd be grateful, but if not, please don't let me distract from the discussion.

[amillionyears]

Agree with Himalaya and whatmeworry.
Smaller men go around frightened of larger men all the time.

I would have to say,as a general rule,men go around frightened of other men,and in broad daylight,to a much larger degree than women going around frightened of men.

[bloodyfurious]

Regarding sexual assault/rape of males - one charity I was involved with through work, estimates male unde reporting to be 10 times that of female.

Sadly until more work is done on supporting victims of both genders in coming forward and accessing services and support once they do - we will never really know the true picture.

[bloodyfurious]

Regarding sexual assault/rape of males - one charity I was involved with through work, estimates male unde reporting to be 10 times that of female.

Sadly until more work is done on supporting victims of both genders in coming forward and accessing services and support once they do - we will never really know the true picture.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Thanks SGM.

amillion - I don't get that impression - I've seldom heard men saying 'I wouldn't go out at night here, but of course, my wife would', but I know lots of women who'd say 'I wouldn't go out after dark unless my husband was with me, or a male friend'. It gets brought up pretty often when there's media discussion of rape or violence.

Not relevant to the stats, I know, just saying.

I think for lots of women, being afraid is almost something we're used to - we avoid situations where we'd be scared, like walking home alone in the dark, because we're so used to the idea it wouldn't be safe.

Under-reporting of crime seems to be a huge problem for both men and women.

[Whisky4Tea]

Pointing out how women are abused at the hands of men is not making them victims or victimising them. The men who abuse them make them victims. I would have thought that was obvious. If i didn't know better, I would think those argung against the OP were trying to make out that protesting against violence against women is the cause of this violence. But they wouldn't be doing that would they? Because that would be patently silly.

Neither is campaigning against this violence creating a victim mentality or scaremongering. It is simply informing women of how they could be treated. This is important. To give just one example, one of the rape myths always being challenged here and by other a anti rape groups is the idea that rape is usually a stranger-in-a-dark alley crime. Another is that how much a women has had to drink is relevant to whether she was raped or not. Both these myths are alive and kicking in most of "rape prevention" advertising (the West Mercia police campaign being the most recent). It is behind the fear of going out at night, of walking home on your own, etc.

But as we all know, stranger rape is quite rare. Most rapes are committed by someone the victim knows and/ or is already in a relationship to. In such rapes, what the victim was wearing, what she had been drinking, how she had got home is totally irrelevant. "Rape prevention" of this nature deceives women by telling them that they can "avoid" being raped by not indulging in "risky" behaviour. An emphasis on the fact that most sexual and -in fact- all other types of violence are committed against women by family members or close acquaintances is telling them where the danger lies. It is not scaremongering but fact telling.

Personally I would like to see a recognition that violence is gendered. Yes, both women and men are victims of violence; but the perpetrator is almost always male. Men hurt women and they hurt other men. Until society recognises that this a problem and takes steps to deal with it, it will continue.

[amillionyears]

Men dont say a lot of what they are thinking, out loud.

Ask some discreetly.See what they say in private to you.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Sure they do.

Men I know say what they're thinking out loud.

I also do talk to them about this stuff.

The only bloke I know who is routinely afraid of going out in situations where I would also be afraid, is a big scary-looking 6'4 guy who constantly gets drunk idiots wanting to take a swing at the big guy. It's really unpleasant for him, I will admit, and I am sure it does have to do with what he looks like.

[Viviennemary]

That is a sweeping generation and distortion of fact. I think somebody told me once that a young man was the most in danger of being seriously attacked. Statistically speaking.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I've never met anyone who's not an 'exception' ... are you sure it's men you're thinking of, who don't say what they're thinking aloud, not the sphinx/the sibyl of Cumae? I'm fairly sure sphinxes don't say a lot of what they're thinking out loud, but you can usually distinguish them from men, who usually have fully functioning mouths, brains, and (as President Bartlett would say), the necessary connections between them.