AIBU to have just about fucking had it with men?

[PurpleFeather]

I’m sure some of you will pile on me to tell me “it’s not all men”, but right now I don’t fucking care.

Woke up to read about more horrific sexual attacks on women along my favourite running route (there have been many lately).

Dealt with some horrific sexism in my work meeting today (a “hilarious” conversation between male members of staff as to why men are just so much smarter than women).

Ended the day by receiving an e-mail from someone I line manage about how she approached inappropriately by a customer today.

So we can’t run safely, we can’t do our jobs and be seen as “equal”, and we can’t serve customers without getting harassed.

Today I am so so so angry. I am done with making excuses for men, and giving them the benefit of the doubt (“He probably brushed past me by accident”, and “he was only joking really”, etc). I am just totally, utterly done with male privilege and male violence rearing it’s fucking ugly head in every area of my life.

Fuck the patriarchy!

Cathays murder trial: Madog Rowlands guilty of killing fiancée
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-55259883
Another day, another story about a poor victim of domestic abuse at the hands of a man. I wonder what percentage of women are physically and mentally capable of a crime like this?

Wtfdidwedo

Thanks for that perspective: just to clarify I'm not saying I believe that lesbian relationships are automatically better or without drawbacks (and I'm very hetero and have never wanted to be in a relationship with a woman).

But I can't help feeling that a marriage or partnership between two women is likely to be much fairer and to allow the women to be themselves in a way which they women can't with a man: women limit themselves so much in relationships with men -- even good, tolerant men have so many societal expectations on women and these are often so damaging.

I read two very depressing stories today, in both cases “step fathers” murdering their “step daughters” both young teens age 16/ 17 one in U.K. , one I think in Australia or New Zealand. Both inflicted severe violence on the girls, really horrific and unnecessary even after they had died and I thought to myself does that ever ever happen the other way round? Ever?
Has any middle aged step mother ever sexually assaulted and horrifically murdered her 16 year old step son? Ever?
And yet two cases the other way round in one day.
I always find it useful to reverse the sexes in these stories as it really makes you realise how much violence is predominantly one way in society from males to females

The car analogy is utter bullshit.
Ive never had or been involved in a car accident.
Ive done thousands of journeys in cars.
Ive not slept with or been in relationships with thousands of men.
A significant minority of the men I have been close to have raped or assaulted me, verbally abused me, cheated on me or been otherwise abusive.
That's without all the random wankers on the street at work or online.
Bullshit..
The determination of some to dismiss what hundreds of women are saying about their own experiences is weird, and fucking frustrating.
There must be something driving it.

And there’s a female hiker currently missing presumed abducted in the Pyrenees at the moment. By a man I would imagine. Do male hikers ever get abducted by women?

The determination of some to dismiss what hundreds of women are saying about their own experiences is weird, and fucking frustrating.
There must be something driving it.

There is. It is a deliberate attempt to be offensive and insulting to women. To minimise the experiences of women who've openly stated on this thread that they have been raped, to compare those women to material objects, and to suggest that because minuscule examples exist of female-on-male violence and abuse rather than the overwhelming majority of cases which are the other way round, it minimises the experiences of the many women who have suffered at male hands in this way.

Some of the worst misogynists are not necessarily men. But the massive percentage of those enacting violence because of their misogyny, are.

The people making these posts are doing so intentionally to minimise female experiences and to goad those who have been victims of men. They are aware they're on a wind-up, are enjoying the angry responses and having fun derailing the thread. That's the dictionary definition of trolling and I refuse to engage further with this BS.

@MarieIVanArkleStinks sadly I don’t think it’s all trolling. I think a significant number of women want to blame it all on women, minimise their experiences and insult them because to do otherwise would be too disruptive to their own lives.

If they have to question why their bread winning father/husband succeeds professionally when better qualified women don’t, they would have to admit they benefit from sexism.

If they have to admit that men are the ones to blame in sexual assault and rape then they might have to question why their partner has never listened to them saying no.

If they have never experienced sexual assault, agression or discrimination they’d have to admit it isn’t because they don’t get drunk, don’t dress ‘provocatively’, only go out at night in the company of men or behave better than ‘those’ women but down to pure luck, which can run out.

They blame women for the actions of men because they think it saves them from the worst of what men can do. It doesn’t.

But there are also certainly female misogynists who hate women as much, if not more than men.

@Coseynightin

No one is saying women are possessions.

Women are aggressive as well and cause trauma for men and this does not get widely reported

Can you link to a source? Because unless you can back that you it's totally BS

@MoonPomme

Ive recently had a horrible experience. He didn't rape me but I was scared that he might. So I went along with it. As the least risky option to me. In a situation I couldn't easily get out of with a man who had showed himself to be quite sick and probably dangerous. I knew, it crossed my mind, that if I struggled and he raped me, even violently, he would get away with it. This was someone I've known a long time and trusted. I doubt he thinks he did anything wrong at all. Would he care even if he did know? Who's gonna stop him from scaring and hurting women?

If you went along with penetrative sex because you were frightened that you would be beaten up or killed if you didn't - they he DID rape you.

Rape doesn't have to involve hitting, kicking, punching or physically forcing - the power imbalance which makes a woman submit when she doesn't want to is the decider.

exPR

"I think a significant number of women want to blame it all on women, minimise their experiences and insult them because to do otherwise would be too disruptive to their own lives.

If they have to question why their bread winning father/husband succeeds professionally when better qualified women don’t, they would have to admit they benefit from sexism."

I think this is spot on. I don't think its trolling, I think its a combination of ignorance and wishful thinking.

If you are a heterosexual woman who benefits in any way from patriarchy (either financially or otherwise) facing up to the degree to which patriarchy limits and harms women is a big ask. No woman who is in a relationship with a man least of all one who is financially supported by a man wants to delve too deeply into this.

I don't think its trolling, I think its a combination of ignorance and wishful thinking.

I think the above two PP who make this point are right, particularly in a general sense. There's a particularly goading undertow to the posts of the PP who persists in doing this, though. They seem to be actively enjoying taking those pesky rape victims like Yours Truly down a peg or two by suggesting that we left the door open and 'invited' them in.

It makes me want to puke, but I can hardly claim to be particularly detached or dispassionate on the subject.

Pedophilia, rape, human trafficking of children and women to satisfy male demand, intel's, high school shootings etc. How can anyone deny that men, as a group, are dangerous, violent and have a very dark and disturbing sexual nature?

How about men work to prove they're not like that? Speak out against men who are? Campaign for stricter sentencing etc? Instead of whinging at women that they're 'misandrists'

On a less grave note I'm also deeply bored of them. Bored of their voices, bored of their opinions, bored of how much space they take up, bored of their neediness and expectations that we're meant to centre their needs, bored of them pestering exhausted women for sex, bored of them being lazy at work, bored of the woke ones lecturing women about transphobia etc etc etc.

Yeah I'm done too. As to what we should do about it clearly we should get the ones who can't or choose not to control themselves off the streets and away from the people they prey upon but no we just keep releasing them and letting them destroy more women and children's lives and reinforcing the message that it's ok to rape and abuse and destroy.

@Coseynightin

No one is saying women are possessions.

Women are aggressive as well and cause trauma for men and this does not get widely reported

This here, in two sentences, highlights the problem. Because 1. Most women are NOT aggressive and most women do NOT cause trauma for men and MOST men are not traumatised by women. and 2. the small number of women who DO do these things does not negate the bigger picture issue we're talking about here which is that overall women are at significant risk from men ranging from the extreme (murder, rape) to the irritating (prejudice, career issues etc).

TheHoneyBadger

"I'm also deeply bored of them. Bored of their voices, bored of their opinions, bored of how much space they take up, bored of their neediness and expectations that we're meant to centre their needs, bored of them pestering exhausted women for sex, bored of them being lazy at work, bored of the woke ones lecturing women about transphobia etc etc etc."

You have basically summed up my entire worldview .

I might get this written out in neon above my bed.

[quote exPR]@SpaceOp I think the whole thing with Weinstein and the men that didn’t step in is complicated.

There is a casting couch scene for straight men too which is just as predatory, exploitative and traumatic and some may have not wanted to step forward in case their own stories came out.

The more common reason is the attitude that powerful men are untouchable so why would I get my hands dirty for some stupid women who clearly want to sleep with him. And maybe one day when I’m rich and powerful too, I’ll get to have my pick of all the pretty girls and I won’t want anyone sticking their noses in.

Have you seen the latest Hollywood Reporter article on Johnny Depp? It is jaw dropping - he is not only very clearly an abuser but deeply deeply misogynistic. He called/texted literally every power player in Hollywood asking them to help destroy Amber Heard, calling her a whore, cum guzzler, fish market and bragging about how he can get nice young Russian ‘pieces’ now instead. He thought as a powerful man that it was his right to do that. And that no one would find it offensive or refuse him.

This behaviour does not pop up over night so there has clearly been a cover up for a long time. Many years ago Ricky Gervias said if people knew what Depp was really like, no one would work for him and he was called bitter. He was telling the truth.

And if you look at who is publicly attacking Amber Heard and blaming her for Depp being dropped from the latest Fantastic Beasts films, it is women. Young girls, young women, mothers, middle aged women. That’s how successful the powerful man narrative is.[/quote]
I take your point here on the HW stuff, but only up to a point. Because I can sort of understand people (other men mostly) thinking that women on the casting couch were making a conscious, if distasteful, choice. But it went far further than that and we saw men commenting on his behaviour in public as being a little inappropriate etc rather than realising up front that it was just awful. Because these men do genuinely think that power and wealth ARE naturally attractive and so they didn't really think about how those women would feel when HW is pawing at them.

As for the Depp thing, it's so deeply disturbing. I keep hearing that they "are as bad as each other" but all I can see is the proven crap about his behaviour and it is awful. I haven't watched one of his movies in years in my own small attempt to make my feelings count via my wallet.

@MarieIVanArkleStinks I’m sorry you’ve been made to feel like that, and by a woman.

I think their goading is rooted in fear. That they think their NAMALT magical thinking will protect them from anything as horrific as your experience. That things like that only happen to other women who ‘allow’ it.

I have given all of the handmaidens on here too much of my time. No more.

To you and to all the women who have been brave enough to state your experiences in solidarity

MarielVanArkleStinks I'm also sorry and I didn't mean to minimise.

But I think a lot of women have this sort of magical thinking that avoiding any association with feminism or speaking out is the best way to protect themselves from bad treatment by men. It dates back from the days of the playground when you were singled out for being too clever/cocky or from adolescence when you were singled out for talking too much or in any way posing a threat to male ego.

The girls who get picked to be girlfriends and the ones who are accepted are the passive, accepting ones who go along with it and laugh at the "banter" and don't put their heads over the parapets or draw attention to themselves in any way. The other girls absorb this.

I think for a lot of women this leads to a terror of appearing to bite the hand that feeds. The goading, if you want to call it that, is more a sense of "there but for the grace of God go I... thank God I'm not one of these scary feminists".

It takes having to face the reality of patriarchy: that its basically a deal with the devil, to actually accept how badly you've been shafted by this. A lot of women never go through this process and the NAMALT crowd don't want to have this presented to them: its unsettling.

@SpaceOp I wasn’t using the casting couch as a get out at all and apologies if it seemed that way.

Hollywood is a small place and the power rests in a small number of hands. One pair of hands were Weinsteins so it was the easiest thing for those men to say ‘oh we didn’t know’ when what they meant was ‘we didn’t want to know because then we might have had to do something and suffer for it’

And I think Weinstein was the tip of the iceberg.
There is far more to come out about the culture of bullying and acceptance of sexual assault in the film industry.

Depp is disgusting but give it a couple of years and he’ll have rehabbed his image, will do the press circuit about the hell he went through without ever admitting he did anything and will go on making money and likely win an Oscar at some stage and become Hollywood royalty. There is almost nothing a man who makes money for those studios can do that will mean he is shunned permanently.

@exPR don't worry, I knew what you meant. I was just talking about separating out disgusting casting behaviour from day to day behaviour - there were stories of how he'd be with women at parties etc etc. But overall, absolutely - a lot of the time men don't want to know because they they might feel responsible. And they don't want to educate themselves for the same reason.

DH is finding reading Invisible Women quite traumatic because he keeps coming across things that he can relate to personally and then he has to consider how, as a man, he has benefited (eg as a piano player to a very high but not quite concert-level standard reading the section on pianos not fitting women's hands he found himself having to really think about whether he really WAS the better pianist or whether, under different conditions, there were women who would have been better. Exacerbated by him having slightly small hands for a man so he WAS aware that he struggled a small amount compared to other male pianists, but just accepted this and if he had thought about it, would have felt that women just need to accept it too. Now he's actively considering whether we should be buying a keyboard or piano designed for women if DD gets into piano too).

Depp is disgusting but give it a couple of years and he’ll have rehabbed his image, will do the press circuit about the hell he went through without ever admitting he did anything and will go on making money and likely win an Oscar at some stage and become Hollywood royalty. There is almost nothing a man who makes money for those studios can do that will mean he is shunned permanently.

I'd like to think this isn't true but it is. And mostly because SOOOO many people can tell themselves that Heard was also badly behaved so really, is Depp's behaviour SO bad? Boak.

@SpaceOp

Depp is disgusting but give it a couple of years and he’ll have rehabbed his image, will do the press circuit about the hell he went through without ever admitting he did anything and will go on making money and likely win an Oscar at some stage and become Hollywood royalty. There is almost nothing a man who makes money for those studios can do that will mean he is shunned permanently.

I'd like to think this isn't true but it is. And mostly because SOOOO many people can tell themselves that Heard was also badly behaved so really, is Depp's behaviour SO bad? Boak.

Sorry, spamming thread now but... on this point, a thread a few weeks ago about a woman whose partner was refusing to help with the baby, physically and verbally threatening her and the baby etc. But she had grabbed his Play Station and dropped it on the ground.... cue 500 posters coming on to tell her she's as bad as he is. It was awful.

Facebook has just flashed up a suggested post for me which is the Daily Mail reporting the Depp will be the face of Dior Sauvage which is hugely popular as it is. The comments section is awful and appears to mostly be women saying it doesn't matter what he does in his personal life or that he hasn't been convicted or that Heard is clearly abusive and noone cares about his feelings.

I wasn't scared he would beat me up or kill me.
Im not comfortable calling it rape.
He said things that frightened and repulsed me.
I wanted to get away but logistically couldn't.
He had pretty much just admitted to me he was capable of rape so it crossed my mind that if I did try to leave he might stop me and or rape me.
So I stayed and did what he wanted because it felt like the easiest and safest thing to do at the time.
I consented. Knowing that when I could get away I would and I would never have to see his sick face again.
And knowing that if i didn't he might do it anyway and get away with it.

Im not sure what to call it.
He didnt overtly threaten me or force me.
I just know I feel awful and that I dont want him near me.
This is probably not the best place for it so I'll think about talking to someone.

@MoonPomme

Im not sure what to call it. He didnt overtly threaten me or force me. I just know I feel awful and that I dont want him near me. This is probably not the best place for it so I'll think about talking to someone.

I'd call that him coercing you into having sex. You were uncomfortable, didn't want it, but the things he said and did made you feel like it as the better option. Sadly, agree its unlikely you'd ever get a rape conviction. But that doesn't mean it wasn't traumatic or that you shouldn't feel perfectly justified in cutting contact AND seeking help. Also, the fact that he has been trying to hound you and "explain" himself 100% makes it clear that he knows perfectly well that this was not a happy consensual encounter.