Can we have a sensible discussion about Cologne.

But I am worried that attributing the attacks purely to cultural or religious factors glosses over the ways in which European men do pretty similar things (attack and sexually assault women, albeit not in a coordinated fashion like Cologne, I'm not trying to minimise what happened), for similar underlying reasons.

Gang rape or gang assaults on women in public are thankfully quite rare in the UK. In the majority of cases of rape in the UK the perpetrators are known to their victims. The more recently reported cases of gang rape have all been committed by immigrants. I'm in a rush but I'll come back later with some links.

Many of us on these threads have said the British justice system needs to step up and increase sentences for such crimes, regardless of who commits them.

I find it worrying that people whose instinct might be to minimise what they might regard as simply 'laddish' or 'natural' behaviour by white men (not anybody I've seen posting here, please note), or blame the victims of it for where they are or how they are dressed, suddenly become champions of women's rights when immigrants are doing it.

I've read all of the Cologne threads and wrote the email to lots of people.

If the minimising, victim-blaming and deliberate misinterpretation of events in the replies from those few who bothered is anything to go by, I think women will be clutching at absolutely anyone who champions women's rights in the face of such frightening, hitherto unseen on this scale, attacks.

And the left and liberals will only have ourselves to blame because the debate was shut down and labelled racist for too long.

If I wish anything on IWD, it's that politics can be taken out of a debate that is essentially one about sexism and culture clashes.

Its disgusting. More should be done to show immigrants how to behave in their new countries. If they really want to settle and make better lives they should be willing to do their best to treat the inhabitants with decency and respect.

From that article shabby

police said they 'have never seen anything like it in Östersund'

I believe those exact words were uttered by the German police after Cologne. So that's Swedish, German and Austrian women been advised not to go out alone . Western women's civil liberties are being stripped at an alarming rate and still people don't want to talk about the real cost of immigration. Maybe we'll have to wait until British women are advised not to go out alone, of course by then it will be too late.

Or maybe just because he could.

One of those attacks described seemed to have no sexual motive; the woman was punched in the face and knocked to the ground and her face pushed into the asphalt.

Not robbed, not raped, just punished.

For what? Being out? Being alone? Being a woman?

Again women are being told to change their ways. Where is it all going to end?

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3481882/Women-warned-not-night-Swedish-town-multiple-sex-attacks-foreigners.html

I think there does need to be a rethink on what constitutes harassement and we may need to come down on things harder to get the message home to some of the male population. Perhaps on this day of all others we need to think about the rights we have and going forward into the future making things better and not worse.

Isay absolutely.

I read a link yesterday about a sexual assault in Torquay. Although it should not of happened, I was glad that the person had been found and arrested, and his plea of ignorance was dismissed.

He only got community service, but I would hope that the fact he was caught, and prosecuted. Will hopefully make him and any like minded, to think twice before acting on their "impulses"

I said as much on the Cologne threads ISay , there have actually been thousands of 'sensible' posts on those threads but unfortunately some posters seem intent on picking apart the words of a few.

Good post Isay

I have been doing a lot of thinking about this as an immigrant myself. Cologne, I think, might open up opportunities to discuss our own laws around harassment and assault. After all, didn't the attacks highlight that, under German law, they didn't really count as a sexual assault?

I also recall a very long thread on here about minor sexual assaults that posters had experienced here which makes me wonder are we less misogynistic or are we just better at hiding it?

I suppose what it comes down to for me is that I think we need to show that we are ahead in women's rights by our actions and the application of the law. If we can show that, then we have a much stronger leg to stamp out greater misogyny wherever it comes from and that would be good for everyone.

I really hope no one feels attacked by my post as that is not my intention. I am only saying what I think and no one has to agree with me. I feel the disclaimer is needed as these threads can get heated.

Anyway, Helena, that's the best I can do at a sensible post.

My first question would be: "Why?"

My second is: "Can I have more details?"

See it gets more complicated by the second...

Is it just me or does OP not seem at all interested in having a sensible discussion about Cologne? The whole thread seems to be a thinly veiled disguise to have a go at certain posters.

Some people assualted some other people in a big square in a certain place

discuss...

Easy

Dont know what you are worrying about sporting

Sensible discussions usually rely on a discussion of the facts in their entirety. Not sure how we can do that without mentioning certain facts in this case. Not doing so makes it in fact meaningless and lacking in context.

If we're going to do that we might as well not bother at all.

So no we can't it seems have any kind of discussion that isn't framed as brown men bad, white women good

I think this is a despicable thing to say and suggests that you are trying to minimise what happened in Cologne and all over Europe. You are trying to alter what happened to whom and by whom

I agree Britt how that remark was meant to be conducive of a sensible discussion is not clear.
.

"Can we have a discussion on the events of Cologne that isnt racist or sexist "

What does this mean? Is it racist to acknowledge that the cologne attackers were by and large from one particular culture/region? I'm not sure if there is a way to discuss it and face up to the issue without mentioning that.

Yes I'm getting lost too. It seems to not really chime with the whole sensible discussion as it totally takes the focus off what happened at Cologne and puts it onto another issue. If we are worried about very young motherhood we need to start a separate thread and discuss that. Socio economic factors may have something to do with Rotherham but we're not discussing that or that's what the thread title implies. Having seen interviews with the victims of Cologne, none of them looked to fit that model.

So when is the discussion re-starting?

Helena I've messaged you.

This thread makes absolutely no sense. Your title says "let's have a sensible discussion about cologne", then in your opening post you start talking about pregnancies - and now you're accusing me of gas-lighting?

Stranger than a strange bear.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslighting