The Myths About Women Who "Cry Rape"

[DontCallMePeanut]

From The Telegraph

Sorry, my head's not in the right place to provide any critique of this at the moment, but thought this would interest the members of the feminist section. Will attempt to comment when I have a clearer head.

How could it be a joke? I don't understand, explain please.

"As a forensic psychologist I can assure you that if a woman expresses herself in an assertive manner, she will most likely be recognised correctly as being assertive - not aggressive."

Don't try and pull the "I'm an expert, therefore I know more about this than you do" stunt on here. As a woman and a feminist, I can assure you that if a woman expresses herself in an assertive manner, she will very often be held to be aggressive.

There has been masses of research done on this. I can't remember who posted this ages ago, but there was some fascinating stuff about how in mixed groups, when women spoke for 35% of the time and men spoke for 65% of the time, the audience who was watching them, both men and women, agreed that the women had dominated the conversation.

As for a woman who is perceived to be aggressive when she's assertive:

Clare Short
Harriet Harman
Oona King
Linda McCartney (until she got cancer and then she was beatified)
Diane Abbot (until she became a national institution)
Heather Mills McCartney

That's just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are loads more but life is short.

Undefeated: I am in no doubt that people can identify and distinguish between assertiveness and aggression in both men and women. However, I also think that people use different adjectives when describing men and women being assertive or aggressive.
So a man is insistent, while a women is strident. Or a man is angry and a women is hysterical.
I wouldn't argue that people don't distinguish between the two states; I would just say that they tend to describe them in different ways. Also I would say that in my experience I find that the adjectives applied to women often seem to have more negative connotations than those applied to men.

Sorry I've just realised that my energetic response may be considered aggressive rather than assertive.

Apologies Undefeated.

Accepted HerBex - no worries - I was going to point out just the sentence 'Don't try and pull the "I'm an expert, therefore I know more about this than you do" stunt on here.' could come off as aggressive rather than assertive.

But while accepting that some of the women you list were possibly unpopular amongst some because they were women, ie for sexist reasons, I do not agree that most were seen or ever unfairly referred to as 'aggressive.' Politicians often do express themselves 'aggressively' (Alistair Campbell for example) and that can be seen as effective so it can be a difficult area to judge wider social attitudes. I honestly have never seen Harriet Harman criticised for being an 'aggressive bitch,' (the phrase I initially queried) - but perhaps you have.

The other exception I would make from your list is for Heather Mills - while I have some sympathy for the awful and often sexist way she was treated in the media, she did indeed express herself aggressively at times.

I would point out that for example on Dragons Den, all the Dragons are often assertive, though quite unpleasant. The female dragon, even in that scenario, is not seen as acting 'aggressively' compared to the rest. A good test case for your thesis off the top of my head.

Cat, I agree with your point about different terms for different sexes.

A man is persistent while a woman is a bunny boiler.

A man is authoritative while a woman is bossy

A man is confident while a woman is arrogant

Etc.

There is just no way you can pretend that women and men are not treated differently and conditioned differently. What point are you making about rape myths with regard to these issues, Undefeated?

There isn't a heterosexual male equivalent of a cock tease, is there? A man who doesn't want it just doesn't want it. A woman who doesn't want it is "just being a cock tease"... (heard that a few times)

Yes, "cunt-tease" hasn't entered common parlance...

Cunttease? Sounds like something you'd use at a certain time of the month...

(or to get rid of a twatty DP)

Look at this, this isn't directly about rape, it's about how women are seen when they try and negotiate on pay:

it's bloody endless

Slightly off topic (by about a mile) but And some people say the pay gap doesn't exist anymore...

There is a thread going now in AIBU about Harriet Harman, which kind of gives you an idea about how assertive women can be vilified.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1263421-to-rather-intensely-dislike-Harriet-Harman/AllOnOnePage#26526982

HerBex - "There is just no way you can pretend that women and men are not treated differently and conditioned differently. What point are you making about rape myths with regard to these issues, Undefeated?"

I'm not pretending that at all. I agree that society uses certain words (like 'feisty') about women only, and the effect is often demeaning. My point was that I see no evidence that genuinely assertive women are regularly referred to as aggressive, or aggressive bitches.

Take Joanna Lumley's Gurkha campaign - she handled herself confidently and assertively and was never called "arrogant" or "aggressive."

In fact I'd say the word 'arrogant' is far often used against (overconfident) men - perhaps a better negatively charged/sexist synonym that tends to be only used for overconfident women would be 'pushy'?

"What point are you making about rape myths with regard to these issues, Undefeated?"

As I said, I have nothing to add on the main topic of debate, it was your comment about assertive women being called 'aggressive bitches' that made me want to comment. x

Yes but that's because Joanna Lumley is a national treasure, and as such has leeway to be as assertive as she wants.

Sometimes, people get to a stage where what they say and how they say it, will be accepted due to their national treasure status. Others in that club include Victoria Wood, Alan Bennett, Julie Walters, Stephen Fry, Ronnie Corbett, Sheila Hancock etc. Deceased members of that club include Kenneth Williams, Thora Hird and Humphrey Lyttleton. People who imagine they are members of that club but are not (though horrifyingly, they may be in the future) include Peter Stringfellow and Katie Price.

HTH.