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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To struggle with #metoo

362 replies

BookyBook · 17/10/2017 09:29

Is anyone else struggling with this?

I can't even articulate why and why I am so reluctant to post #metoo myself, although don't want to not either. My FB thread is full of it and I didn't realise it was a thing to do until yesterday and it has completely blindsided me.

Having said that I think it makes a very strong point, I just feel a little teary about seeing all the #metoos today in a way that is making me relive my own experiences that I have trained myself not to think about too much usually.

Is anyone else the same?

OP posts:
ThePeanutGallery · 17/10/2017 10:35

Okay. But in that case, what is the point, because virtually everyone is '#MeToo'?

That's the point!!! That's the point exactly. Virtually every woman has been a victim of sexual harassment and assault and that is NOT ok! And highlighting it is not meaningless!

Original poster
BookyBook · 17/10/2017 10:35

I don’t think posting is attention seeking at all and this thread has helped clarify my views.

I still won’t post though as I know I’ll be asked about it and don’t want to talk about it

OP posts:
Buck3t · 17/10/2017 10:36

My parents have no idea. My mum is on FB. I'd rather not. It's a great idea though.

HolgerDanske · 17/10/2017 10:41

Yes that clearly is exactly the point! It is all pervasive and it's true, decent men haven't a clue, because it wouldn't enter their minds to do such things.

But post, or don't post, it is entirely up to you!

I'm not posting, for various reasons.

LaughingElliot · 17/10/2017 10:41

I mulled this over earlier today after reading various #metoo stories shared by friends on FB.

The two biggest complainers were the same women who, when we were driving together recently, criticised teenage girls in the street for wearing high cut shorts. Their figures were all wrong apparently and it wasn’t appropriate.

Now I happen to think that girls and women should be able to go about their lives without being harassed. I also feel that they should be able to wear whatever the hell they like without being insulted, objectified or shamed by anyone.

And you are really not helping the cause by objectifying women in one breath then complaining that the same has been done to you in the next.

I’m guessing the point of the hashtagging is solidarity but I’m not sure that we understand what this means.

Personally I’d like to see a little less misogyny amongst women. Once we are more united we’ll be better placed to put this sexist crap in the past.

Batteriesallgone · 17/10/2017 10:41

I don't know whether to post or not.

I'm pretty vocal on mumsnet about all the sexual abuse I've suffered. But that's ok because it's anonymous. Don't really want to get into that conversation with family

MargotsDevil · 17/10/2017 10:42

I think for me the issue is how assault is being defined. If someone has been brushed against in a crowded train in a possibly sexual way or groped on the escalator briefly of course that's not okay - both of these have happened to me. Not pleasant but not significant enough for me to describe myself as a "survivor" and for me to post #metoo (although it would appear I meet the criteria to do so) is minimising the terrible experience of those who have been raped or suffered other serious assault.

ravenmum · 17/10/2017 10:43

But it's not obvious, that's the point. Most decent men have NO IDEA what women go through.
It is just so bloody obvious to any woman - and we women do talk to men and everything - that it just pisses me off that anyone would still need telling!

HolgerDanske · 17/10/2017 10:46

Of course they can be aware, but they can't ever truly be aware. It doesn't factor at all in their experience, they literally have no understanding of it.

It's depressing to me that it's all the halfway-decent, probably think of themselves as great, men who need the message most, and also the women who join them in shaming and judging and perpetuating it. But they really won't get the message. They won't internalise it.

ravenmum · 17/10/2017 10:47

Right, wasn't going to, but I'm posting something along the same lines as whiskyowl now ...

All you have to post is #metoo, you don't have to tell any stories or answer any questions. I wouldn't be putting anything otherwise.

Goldenhandshake · 17/10/2017 10:47

I think this is a very powerful social media 'campaign', and one that really does raise awareness. SO many male friends/colleagues have been talking about it, in utter shock, which can only be a good thing.
I think it has also opened their eyes to the nature of sexual assaults too, I had no idea until this # that so many thought sexual assault was 'only' rape.

It jolted me too, when I though I couldn't post #metoo and then thought back and realised I had been;

Groped forcefully by a male school 'friend' at only 14 who insisted on 'walking me home from school' and grabbed at my breasts on the stairwell up to my house.

Had my backside slapped so hard that if I wasn't holding on to someone's arm, I'd have been thrown face forward on the floor, it was so forceful. I was holding my husband's arm at the time.

Been walking up the stairs in a club, and the guy behind shoved his hand up my skirt, when I smacked him in the face, the doormen 'escorted' me out of the club for being violent.

Had my bum pinched/touched so many times in pubs/bars that I have lost count.

Had men leer at/make vulgar comments about my breasts since the age of 13 onwards, nigh on 20 years now.

Not half so bad as many many women have gone through, but bloody eye opening knowing that pretty much every female I know has had one or more similar experiences or worse.

HolgerDanske · 17/10/2017 10:47

And yes, I agree, what I've experienced is not by any stretch serious enough to warrant my describing myself as a 'survivor'. For that reason I will not post (and for other reasons).

buckeejit · 17/10/2017 10:48

Anothe who is uncomfortable here. Don't want other people thinking 'I wonder what happened to her' and also don't want my mum seeing it. There's got attached to being quiet though 😔

Batteriesallgone · 17/10/2017 10:48

I don't think it's minimising Margot. I've been raped multiple times.

In fact I really dislike the whole - what another poster referred to as 'top trumps' of sexual assault. Invariably it leads to discussion of 'real rape' etc etc.

Men shouldn't act as if they are entitled to do what they like to women's bodies. That is the point.

carefreeeee · 17/10/2017 10:48

I haven't done it. Think it's very silly. Most women will have had an unwelcome comment or wolf whistle and a grope of bum or boobs, probably several times. This (although not nice and can be temporarily upsetting) should not be majorly disturbing and people should be resilient enough to get over it and move on. These things have happened to me and actually until I really try and think back I have more of less forgotten and it certainly wouldn't be something I think about or that still bothers me.

On the other hand a minority of women have suffered something terrible such as rape or domestic abuse and it's minimising their problems if everyone who's had a bit of gropage in a club just claims 'me too'.

Plus the things that bother me on a daily basis are more to do with aggressive drivers and women bitching about each other. It kind of seems like we're picking on 'all men' most of whom have done nothing wrong instead of acknowledging there are unpleasant people of both sexes.

KoalaD · 17/10/2017 10:51

Um, no. Despite my reservations about the conceit, I completely disagree with you there, carefreeee.

It's not about 'picking on the menz', for christ's sake. Hmm

Mrsmadevans · 17/10/2017 10:51

I have ignored the whole thing after clicking on it . I just want it to stay where it is tbh, it is private to me no one else knows and I will keep it that way. I have taken a lifetime to forgive the man that did it to me but I will never forget.

TieGrr · 17/10/2017 10:51

I haven't posted because I feel massively uncomfortable about it. I use Facebook for occasional lighthearted updates about my life or to share a photo of DD etc. I don't post anything personal on there and this is one of the most personal things there is. There's parts of my past I still haven't shared with DP and he knows pretty much everything else about me.

whiskyowl · 17/10/2017 10:51

margots - those things absolutely DO count as sexual harassment. One of the things this is supposed to challenge is that minimisation that so many women do, which can actually work to normalise this behaviour ("Oh it wasn't so bad, I've had it much easier than most, we've all suffered, haven't we"). It's not about claiming ultimate victimhood in some kind of competition - it's about showing solidarity and saying "This behaviour is everywhere - in workplaces, schools, public spaces, homes, and, small or large, it is not OK ". People are talking about everything from groping and sexualised comments to violent rape, not just the extreme end of that scale. I would say being groped in public or having grinding on a train easily qualify.

carefreeeee · 17/10/2017 10:52

Also let's not pretend these minor things aren't done just as much by women to men.

Men do not get raped by women or in general suffer from serious sexual attacks.

But I'm sure that inappropriate comments and groping happen quite a it the other way as well. It's just silly human behaviour and completely different from rape etc which is a real issue but only a very small minority of men would think it was ok.

Cromwell1536 · 17/10/2017 10:52

Not on Facebook or Twitter, so won't be joining in the #metoo campaign. But it did occur to me, along with the writers of a couple of articles I saw this morning, that a more practical approach might be to circulate with workplaces and sectors the names of abusers, creeps, boundary-pushing jerks and sulky bastards who make it clear that their support for you in the next meeting is linked to how thoroughly you simper and respond 'nicely' to their flirting and 'compliments.' Why do women, again, have to expose their traumas for all to see? If the creepy blokes knew there was such a list circulating in their sector, might it not be the most effective deterrent?

whiskyowl · 17/10/2017 10:52

"Most women will have had an unwelcome comment or wolf whistle and a grope of bum or boobs, probably several times. This (although not nice and can be temporarily upsetting) should not be majorly disturbing and people should be resilient enough to get over it and move on. "

Seriously, fuck the fuck off, and then fuck off some more back to 1952. It's not OK, and you are not on the right side of history.

KoalaD · 17/10/2017 10:55

0/10, carefreeee.

Let's not rise to the bait, everyone else.

HolgerDanske · 17/10/2017 10:55

Wtf people should just dismiss it, put up with it and shrug because it's no big deal and that's just what happens? Oh that's just what men do, put up and shut up?, No! That's where you're utterly wrong.

For christ's sake. You're part of the problem!

How can you not see that it is an all- pervasive poison, that starts with exactly that attitude, that feeds into the much wider problem?

God dammit, things are never going to change whilst people maintain such limited understanding of how this issue needs to be dealt with.

And a 'minority' of women suffer serious assaults?? I think you'll find that minority is a LOT bigger than you might think.

The campaign itself isn't silly at all. It just isn't going to be very effective, sadly. Because nothing ever is.

HolgerDanske · 17/10/2017 10:56

Sigh. Too late, KoalaD!

There's always at least one isn't there.