Mass sexual assaults in Cologne on New Years Eve Part II

[Pinkchampchoccies]

Just in case people want to continue discussing this.

What a ridiculous, nasty piece of shameful wtoiting by the Guardian. I stopped reading it years ago because of their patronising 'family' section so I can't even boycott it. How dare they excuse the perpetrators of this on the grounds that the women are privileged by their freedoms and being able to work to afford mobile phones! Of course it would make the poor men so confused that they would have no choice but to assault them!

LBC are covering it now, along with the media blackout. Definitely worth catching it on catch up if you can. I'll link when I can.

onthephone
The arm length advice is ludicrous because:

• it is not workable, think travelling on public transport, going to a party etc.

• It isn't women who get invade the personal space of men but the other way round

Imagine the worldwide public outcry if Ms Reker had suggested that all young migrant men should from now on to stay an arm's length' from German women thus curtailing their freedom to move. The Guardian would have had a field day.

Yes Inkanta some of the men were. This has been confirmed by police. They knew that some of the men they dealt with in cologne on NYE were from Syria, Irak and Afghanistan.

Thanks for the pointers re burglary pink.

I read the Graun article and the word "obfuscation" popped into my mind. Thankfully btl comments are roundly pulling it to pieces. Or they are until the moderators wade in.

The problem with the mayor is that she won the vote (to become mayor) on a refugee-friendly stance. Well, that is not a problem in itself, but now she has to stand by those policies. Thus women's rights are thrown to the wolves. Germans aren't stupid though and her reputation has been irreparably damaged.

Oh, God, she then goes on to say,
'When allegations about older Asian men preying on white girls in northern cities initially surfaced, well over a decade ago, it was the BNP that first took up the cudgels. Unfortunately, that meant journalists and politicians instinctively shied away, wary of giving the BNP publicity'
So WHY was it the BNP that 'first took up the cudgels' after the allegations surfaced? What was to stop a journalist doing so?

She wonders which was the primary motive - assault or robbery? I think the primary motive was to frighten and humiliate women. WHY that was the primary motive is another matter.

onthephone, you really want to get over to the Feminist Chat boards and ask that question. There are some damn clever and knowledgeable people over there who will be able to help you, they like helping newbies learn to think. Here's a blog that's often been linked to for a start, loads of stuff on it though. finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com

Luna, from what you've described of Czech Rep, I'm not surprised you are worried. I think it's good to be reminded of where it can go viz racism, but don't forget we're talking about women and we also know where society can go with sexism - we do not want to see our daughters enslaved to Islam extremism. The prospect makes me wish I hadn't had a daughter, or kids at all.

So suppose we all do start to lobby about this incident. There are ways to do that, ways of starting petitions, change.org, 38degrees, or the parliamentary petition system which can directly force debates in parliament. What would we want them to talk about? We could also email women's organisations - reclaim the night might be a start perhaps?

More utter bs that it was fear of the BNP that made anyone shy away. It was fear of being labelled as racist and LOSING your career if you were employed by the government!

The only person able to drive forward cases in the NorthWest without this fear was the Pakistani heritage guy who led the prosecutions.

Claig's extremist conspiracy theories are usually entertaining, and there's some interesting bits mixed in there. I don't think there is one conspiracy, but there is a class of extremely rich priviliged predominantly men who have steadily gained control over the governments of the West. More like 1000 shifting alliances. Our governments cannot be trusted to act in the majority of their nation's peoples' interest any more. Not saying they never do, just that they cannot be trusted to.

I'm hoping that investigative journalism still has some life left in it. Andrew Norfolk at The Times did a fantastic job uncovering the Rotherham situation, despite being called a racist and right-wing sympathiser in the years it took for it all to come out.

I'm completely baffled by the Guardian piece - not that they'd published it, but that anyone can think well those women are rich and enjoying themselves and the men feel sorry for themselves so it's completely acceptable to rape them. It's very reminiscent of Elliot Rodger's thinking - that women need to be punished for not being sexually available to him.

This is a terror attack and ought to be treated as such. Imagine if 100s of men had been digitally penetrated and anally raped instead - would we still be seeing such complacency? Of course not, but yet again it's far easier to expect women to make sacrifices of very basic freedoms of movement and security than to resolve the situation.

The official left is truly an alternate universe these days.

LBC Listen live

This video of NYE in Cologne is being shared widely on FB today

m.huffpost.com/uk/entry/8937024?1452247195& This has taken a long time too.

I couldn't watch much of that, onthephone.

I will say my DH watching news reports mentioning harassment was totally shocked when I explained what I had read online about what had opened to the women that night. Harassment to me is some twerp making a lewd co ment. I don't think a lot of people watching two minutes on the BBC report would have realised what the harassment consisted of.

Onthephone - I just watched that, and it is not NYE in Cologne, it is in fact a extract from exactly the same video of the American woman journalist being raped (at least, the lead up to her being raped) in the Tahir Square demonstrations that was linked to in the first thread. (Warning - it is absolutely terrifying. It is the video that led to the mumsnet "comment" on the first thread, because they edited the post to give a trigger warning).

Unfortunately, it's an example of the same kind of propaganda as followed the 9-11 attacks, with clips of people from the Middle East dancing in the streets from several years earlier, over totally unrelated events, being shown as if they were responses to the two towers.

I say this not to minimise what happened in Cologne in any way (see my other posts on both threads), but it is frightening how fast misinformation can be deliberately spread by those with a political agenda.

I don't buy the 'incredulous' response to suggesting that mens' freedoms be curtailed to deal with this problem as opposed to women's. As though it's just too much a response. Bollocks to that.

I live in an area that, years ago, was over run by gangs, groups of male youths intimidating people in the areas they 'hung out', organising 'running battles' between rival gangs, drug dealing on known corners etc. This problem troubled the authorities for years. Then, the police, youth charities, the local authorities all worked out a series of measures to tackle the problems. The police 'ring fenced' a large exclusion zone, in the main areas these gangs hung out, which meant that anyone who was found in groups of more than 2 people were 'rounded up' and taken away - they were taken to areas that were specifically set up to deal with them - various centres/clubs/organisations which then addressed the reasons these young boys/men had nothing better to do than 'hang out' in gangs, committing various crimes. They were offered the chance to do things they wouldn't have had the chance to do - sports, study, recreational activities that also came with training opportunities etc.

It was a massive undertaking, the resources it took were not inconsiderable, but you know what? It worked. Liked a dream. My area has never returned to being that place where gangs of young boys/men could 'hang out' or organise mass gatherings to have 'fights' or running battles, intimidate locals or local business etc. Lots of clubs that were born out of this initiative are still going, still giving the disenfranchised youth an alternative to the criminal life they would have chosen instead.

Why can't authorities who have these particular problems with large groups of young men to deal with,who are participating in these horrific attacks, curbed from gathering in such numbers? If there are resources being funnelled to deal with the massive influx of immigrants, why not include these sort of measures to address this trend? The fact that these gangs of men are targeting women/girls in this manor doesn't mean their actions/behaviours/cultural beliefs cannot or should not be addressed & specifically targeted with giving the police the right to 'round up' these groups & then deal with the criminal activities as well as address the cultural beliefs that would appear to fuel such behaviour - the Norwegian efforts to address these cultural issues would be entirely appropriate in these circumstances IMO.

Thanks Polentapies - I'm tuned in!

Well we all know where the Guardian stands now. OneFlewOver had it. They are viewing the women out with smartphones on NYE as lucky and privileged and we should all roll over and think of, Germany, presumably, as soon as any male with a sob story turns up in gratitude for our continued privileges. Not equal with those men, or indeed any other xxx issue that happens to come up.

franke I've heard the burgalry analogy before (though it usually refers a car).
It's a false analogy because 'property' ie the contents of the home or car is not the same as a woman's body. A woman's vagina and breasts are not property, they are intrinsically part of her.
Crimes against property(theft) and crimes against the person (assault) are different, and this is recognised by law (at least in British law, hopefully it is in German law).
And don't forget, bodily automony is a basic human right, no matter what a law says.

It is at times like these that we need the Womens' Equality Party. What are they saying about it?

BungoWomble, yes, it is very concerning when behaviour carried out by extremists is being blamed on women for not taking adequate steps to protect themselves. These people should not be pandered tó and I agree women should not modify their behaviour.

I agree the section in the Guardian piece on explaining away the behaviour was woeful and inexcusable. Women and children are being abused on their journey as refugees. Should the gangs attacking them by offered sympathy as victims too? It is ludicrous, they are not the victims.

I don't think she was saying it was acceptable to rape them because of that, but she was offering it as an explanation. It is a terrible thing to say and entirely wrong. It was also not incidental to the crime of robbery and really was minimising.

As for rich men not acting in our interests, I see this all over Europe at the moment.

'A reply to my comment was deleted - it basically said that you can see which minority group the Guardian supports now. Immigrants trumps women - or words to that effect.'

Good grief!!