Acquiescence

I was pretty, or so I thought I can't say really, but told all of the time that I was beautiful. So when blokes said that I had 'nice tits' I thought it was a compliment, even at 15 when the men were 26-30. Perhaps I should refrain from telling my dd, that she's pretty, as much and that someone talking about 'sexual attractiveness' is unacceptable....unless it's invited.

I too wonder whether being 'attractive', I'm really trying not to sound like a dick, is more of a burden when it comes to men and what they want from you. The flip side is being ignored though isn't it. And women can't be universally attractive in other ways like men, men can be funny, wise, successful, articulate, smart....whereas women are bitchy, old, hard nosed career women, smart arses and know alls.

posie similar thing the other day with me,during the stand off my 2 ds got out of the car both over 6ft and he moved,he shouted at me that "you women think you are brave when behind the wheel"twat.

With regards to raising dds i always tell mine including the boys,that if someone is asking you to do somthing you dont want to it doesnt matter if you are rude cos i will explain that later for you and you wont be in any trouble.I also never hug or kiss my dcs if they dont want to and always ask permission to go into their rooms(when older)
Small steps but maybe they will help.

I have always said to my boys to look at my face when I'm talking and listen to my tone to judge the meaning of what I'm saying. I have to say they're pretty good at it, some of their friends are dreadful and can't pick up when they smack someone on the head that it's not as funny as they find it....

I had a great opportunity the other day for a little lesson when getting trapped on a road in a stand off. The Afro Caribbean (relevant) male in his sixties saw me turn into a road with cars parked either side in over crowded bristol roads. Instead of pulling in in one of the huge five car spaces on his side he sped up to force me to pull in, in my huge car, to a very small space. As there were cars behind me I refused. After 5 mintes, with six cars behind me, a woman behind got out to ask him to move. I told the children that if Daddy had been driving the man would have pulled in, DH is pretty large. I got out to give the other woman support and the man started effing at me and calling me 'woman' repeatedly. I told him that being a woman was a wonderful thing and not to try to insult me with my gender!

The children asked why I didn't like ebing called 'woman' as I was a woman, I explained that for some men it was a way of being demeaning and implied that it was bad to be a woman. I phoned the p[olice as there was no way of anyone but this driver to move.....whilst on the phone he moved.

Posie
Yes I agree, there is a lot to be said for teaching boys. Society does not. I plan to teach DD and DS about porn, and I plan to teach DS about empathy.
It sounds stupid, to have to teach your son this, because of course we all hope our sons naturally have it. BUt I don't see anything wrong in spelling it out to them, in the same way you spell out that stealing is wrong etc. It doesn't mean you expect your kids to steal but they need to know your opinion on it. A lot of this is swept under the carpet because we live in a patriarchy.

As a teen I was nn 'dirty Pos' because a boy had forced himself on me in a public toilet and wouldn't let me go, with nasty grinning I'm just joking but you will do what I want' sort of way. I guess the level of wanting to please and politeness doesn't extend to many men I've encountered and I wonder why.

I see the beginnings of this is DSs friends, the lack of empathy and belief that they can do whatever they want....not Dss though, in fact I worry that they are too eager to please friends, dd however talks her way in and out of situations and has done from a young age. She has been less likely to hit and more likely to negotiate with friends about what they should play. If her friends don't share she asks them to.

I'm struggling with what I'm trying to say, but if these boys are not shown empathy and are shown the route to what you want is just to take it...accepting that boys fight, boys don't talk things through etc , then no wonder when they reach exploration age with girls they just plough ahead with what they want, regardless.

BUt I think you're right Chandon in that this is the root of why patriarchies have always been obsessed with keeping women apart

she actually said that men's biggest fear when they pass a group of women is to be laughed at. Women's biggest fear when they pass a group of men is death.

I think Greer's point was to show the power imbalance between men and women as it stands right now. To show men's privilege as men: that they never fear for their life when they pass a group of women.

According to Greer, men's biggest fear (when it comes to women) is being laughed at,
women biggest fear when it comes to men is violence.

that surely must be at the root of things?

Put them back in their place...

I think parents should not just teach their daughters to be nice and polite, but also where to draw the line.

my parents were always telling me to be nicer (fair enough, I could be a moody teen).

I have been touched up both by Sunday school teacher when I was 12 (parents always told me: the poor man has lost his wife, the poor man we must be kind to him.). So when he started putting his hands of my thigh, moving it higher bit by bit, I was paralysed in thinking: "but he is nice, and I must be nice to him. I can't hurt his feelings". I tried to edge away, hoping he'd stop, but never saying: "What are you doing?!" This was in front of other kids, who were younger and did not register it at all apart from one boy (also 12) who would always shout at me in in the street that I was a sexbomb, which mortified me (I was prepubescent at that age! so very confused and felt "guilty" somehow).

I have also been touched up by men in swimming pools, by my piano teacher, who would let his hand slide from my shoulder downwards...I froze (again, my parents had told me to be nice to the poor man as he had recovered from cancer), and my blimming driving instructor! Oh, and my maths tutor. I thought there was something wrong with ME rather than them (and still wonder why it happened to me so OFTEN)

I have often been told I was "sexy" so therefore deducted it was my own fault. I was just a normal girl wearing baggy jeans (twas the 80s, sandals and a ponytail, you can picture it). I spent my late teens trying NOT to look sexy because that brought trouble.

By the time I was 20, I was confident enough to dress attractive and fend men off, but I think young women can be full of confused messages and it takes time to develop this kind of confidence.

like I knew that being attractive to men was a good thing (as women are taught), yet if they took it too far it was your fault for "leading them on".

I bet you I am not the only woman like this. I still find whistling builders, and leery men scary and it makes me feel bad, not good.

Sorry, that was just a personal story and maybe doesn't add much to this debate?

the subject just made me think, and I still wonder why it happened to me, on so many occasions.

I don't have daughters, but if I did, I would teach them self defence and a stronger attitude, and I'm afraid I'd be wary of many men.

yes, the deference and compliance is subconscously a way of making sure they don't "get wound up a bit"
Assertiveness can be lethal for women in certain situations

I have been watching this thread and wondering if a conversation i had a while ago with friends is relevant.
A friend told us that she had met a guy in a club and they had spent the evening together.They shared a taxi home as he said he lived nearby,when she stopped at hers he jumped out to and made a huge joke out of "coming in for coffee" he was very insistent but in a grinning laughing way,she asked him to go repeatedly but he stayed and eventually began to try it on with her again whilst managing to keep the mood jokey.To cut a long story short after what seemed like hrs she had sex with him to get rid of him.There were lots of us women there during this conversation,mostly intelligent proffessionals but a lot of people sadly had a similar tale to tell including me.
Again we are afarid to get too nasty/forcefull,in case its turned back on us or he gets upset,after all we did accept drinks and maybe "wind him up a bit" made me feel very sad especially as a Mum of dds.

If someone offers you a drink when you're alone in a cab and you refuse, then they insist unless you're pg/religious/tee total I'm sure most people would accept, out of politeness.

I come back to the previous point I made that erosion of how we are treated leads us to miss certain cues.

I think that part of the problem is what we are told to consider acceptable and how we are taught to behave.

I was sexually assaulted when I was about 12 (possibly younger) when a man called out to me with something approximating my name and having politely corrected him I found myself somehow tied to him with no strategies for getting away, increasingly scared and miserable but totally unable to do anything about it (it was a sunny weekend in the park, so plenty of people around). In the end having come out with a lot of rubbish about how I couldn't possibly be his girl friend because I was a Catholic, because I had strict parents etc I did manage to run away.

Because I was scared of him I ran to a friends house, not my parents and I am incredibly glad I did so because they took me totally seriously, rang the park police, told me it wasn't my fault, and talked to me about their experiences and tactics for difficult situations. In short they were fantastic. I never told my mother, and subsequently found out that both my sisters told her about being flashed at, to be told something along the lines of 'that's men for you'.

So more than one set of attitudes to be changed.

Very interesting thread though :( for all those who suffered abuse. I was 10 when I was touched by a hotel worker who then thanked me, apologized and I, as a polite and well mannered child told him it was fine with a reassuring smile on my face. I cried after and never told anyone in RL.

As a slight highjack how do we raise our daughters (and sons) to be nasty, crazy, rude frigid bitches? DD is a baby but I want her to be stronger than I am.

to clarify: if deference and compliance are survival techniques in a male- dominated patriarchal society then what happens to women who don't comply? What happens if they are assertive? They face immediate hositlity and may possibly be attacked where they might not have been if they'd continued to be deferent, girly and compliant.
It's lose lose for women.

As you all probably know by my frequent mentions of it (!) I am reading Beauty and Misogyny and there is a part where it touches on how being feminine is a way of keeping women safe in a culture of male dominance. Deference is a survival tactic for women, the eagerness to please, the ability to read body signals (HerBex's earlier point) . Underlings always have to understand and decipher the emotional goings on of the people who have power over them, be that children (in any family, not just abusive ones) , victims of DV, or women (and gay men ) in general. This translates into a particular type of biddability.

BUt I've got to agree with Dittany that this is absolutely irrelevant when it comes down to it.
Deference can't "actually" save you from being attacked by a rapist. Looking beautiful and feminine can't "actually" stop you from being the target of misogyny. So all in all, the deference, the willingness to comply is a survival technique that only takes us so far.
There is nothing you can do to stop a man attacking you, if that is what he has decided he is going to do.

Also agree with claig that there is nothing wrong with trusting. The system would fall apart if people didn't trust one another.