Can we talk about female violence? I need to get my response straight

[GrassIsSinging]

I know this is celeb rubbish, but am finding my blood boiling over comments from FB friends and the like over the Solange Knowles -punching-Jay Z debacle.

Lots of seemingly conscious, smart, reasonable people condemning violence of any sort (great, agreed), but then saying things like 'the double standards in society sicken me...Chris brown beats Rihanna and he is a monster...Solange attacks Jay Z and people dont respond in the same way'. Others (people I thought were decent) saying 'You couldnt have blamed him for hitting back...people have a right to defend themselves' etc.

This riles me massively. Am I a freak for thinking that male violence against women IS often (not always, but very often) much more devastating than vice versa? Because men are usually physically stronger...because male violence against women is a huge problem in this world...? And that a decent man will not hit a woman, even if provoked. Is this an 'old fashioned ' view now?

Feminism doesnt mean we now have to accept men punching us, ffs!

Depressed...

"Psychology of evil" is a questionable term, IMO. Indeed, "evil" itself is not a useful notion in my view. It's merely condemnation used to self-righteously hand-wave the complexity of human behavior and human value-systems.

But yes, clearly both structural and individual factors are at play when considering crime or violent behavior or what-have-you.

Well watch the talk the title is meant to attention grab.

Heh, I like how he defines evil in a way that precludes one's being a non-evil political figure, or even a non-evil industrial magnate. Leaving the super-normal folk aside for now, he indeed makes evil inevitable by defining it fundamentally as "intentional" harm to another.

Aside from even that, it raises this familiar-but-dangerous fallacy:
that if the right "barrel-makers" rose to power, then they could change the system and make it ^"right and good".

because I think he was on the right track in the first place. If we are to speak of evil, then we must admit that evil and power are inextricable, that one produces the other, and that moreover, the very people who are powerful or who become powerful, are and become what he refers to as "dispositionally"-evil.

There is no escaping it. It's the nature of the meta-barrel. The only way to overcome it is to simply stake out some principles and goals, and work to minimize the inevitable internal and external "evil".

This is also why so-called "centrism" is just more of the same.

I see you like to conflate positions to extremes and if they do not stand up then the whole premise is invalid. Well as I am sure you are aware apart from the philosophical first certainty one can do that with every argument the human mind could care to frame.

Which brings us neatly to what needs to be injected into any practical application of thought, namely wisdom. If you are cooking and you love garlic, making a spag big with 95% garlic would make a pretty unpalatable meal. It would not however entirely invalidate the concept of spaghetti bolognaise as a tasty meal for many people.

You came here selfishly looking for philosophical constructs to incorporate. Again I implore you to dial back the sophistry down from 11 and remember that in philosophy wisdom bears a woman's name. Having a capable brain is like having an incredibly powerful engine, with no car frame or wheels. All it does when you use it is make noise and doesn't go anywhere.

I'm glad you got something from the TED talk though.

Well that's the thing. We stage a coup, form a non-violent dictatorship, but then to maintain our authority we would need to employ coercion...

It is thus that we would become the very evil we fought against.

But that is the responsibility of power ultimately: to do evil well. Evil in barrel-making is both inevitable and necessary, so the wise ruler(s) use it strategically and work to minimize it.

"I personally think that it is absolutely correct to assume that what is defined as 'evil' and what isn't is defined through the eyes of the powerful."

But we must not forget that much of what is shared in terms of morality is also that which is most intuitive to humans, things we begin to get an inkling of around ages 3-4, even without explicit instruction.

That's the very thing- what is acceptable is not so much imposed by the powerful as conceded to by them, and taken advantage of where possible.

Before you accuse me of sophistry, do ensure that your position differs meaningfully from mine...

"Why are you so keen to be as aggravating as possible to everyone?"

Well, it's pretty annoying to be misunderstood to the extent that someone lectures you on why you are wrong when your position matches theirs.

"Why not just say what you think, we'll do the same and probably we'll all be wiser and intellectually enriched by the process."

This is what I did until I started getting abuse...

"But as socialised and constructed beings, I don't think we're in a position to comment on how things would be if they were different. If things were different, then they might be the same (Lord of the Flies, Animal Farm etc). Or, they might be... different. I don't believe we can claim knowledge of this issue to the extent that you seem to feel you can."

I'm only really describing what has come to pass thus far (in our history). It's also why I advocate simply changing the nature of humans according to design, at the fundamental level.

As for socialization, I'm not quite sure what you mean there so I'll just note that it's impossible for a neurotypical human to lack social conditioning; even a "savage" raised by wolves, or a Tarzan, would simply invent a society whole-cloth from its environment.

So, I'm bit of a lazy anarchist, but you know, proper, processal anarchy rather than the absence of any structure. Government does not have to depend on authority; that is a patriarchal construct, in my view.

Also

Proper democracy is anarchic in the sense it does not imply institutional violence

"Proper democracy" - you don't see the trap?

Anarchy assumes that people will behave as "I" want them to, as a matter of faith.

("I" being a stand-in for any human subject)

Totalitarianism understands that coercion is necessary for numerous actors to cooperate, no matter how multi-polar the system - in direct relationship with the polarity within the system, in fact.

Actually anarchy means without ruler, it does not preclude structure, laws etc. It functions when the "I" strives to cooperate with other "I's" without recourse to coercion, force, or violence. You would have recognize that other people would act according to their own wills and not yours, and in fact encourage them to.

Also of course I engage in sophistry, but it is all a question of degrees isn't it?

Anarchy assumes that people will behave as "I" want them to, as a matter of faith.

No it doesn't. Are you just making stuff up now?

I advocate simply changing the nature of humans

• simple in what sense?
• human nature as in? Would you remove all arms to preclude the possibility of punching, for example?
• why are you here with this idea and not [email protected] or similar? Cos I actually have no idea what you think any of this adds to a discussion of violence or the way that feminists might read the situation between Solange and JayZ.

no matter how multi-polar the system - in direct relationship with the polarity within the system, in fact.

explain? give an example of where you perceive this happening?

Ha ha Buff, maybe Mont's whole arms make you violent thing is actually a twisted form of punnery?

I am going to look STERNLY at you both.

Dervel:

"Actually anarchy means without ruler, it does not preclude structure, laws etc. It functions when the "I" strives to cooperate with other "I's" without recourse to coercion, force, or violence. You would have recognize that other people would act according to their own wills and not yours, and in fact encourage them to."

See, this is the thing - anarchism merely hand-waves the problem of discord, the conflict of "wills". Unfortunately, it is a central property of the system as long as there are humans with divergent goals.

Outs:

"No it doesn't. Are you just making stuff up now?"

It ignores that structure demands consolidation and centralization, and these will violate wills in direct proportion to the polarity of a system - and in anarchy, there are as many poles as there are individuals. Every account or theory of anarchism or political libertarianism boils down to this. If you disagree, put one here in precis - but it's not clear if it will still be possible to call it anarchy by the original definition.

"Simple" in the sense of maxim-ality, not as a claim that the process would be simple.

"human nature as in? Would you remove all arms to preclude the possibility of punching, for example?"

For example, we could develop a human hive-mind. But that's only the most obvious solution.

"why are you here with this idea and not [email protected] or similar?"

I don't like echo chambers. I go to all sorts of places to discuss all sorts of things. Where there is a high level of discourse, where there is much to be learned, I make a home of. We'll see how it goes here.

"I actually have no idea what you think any of this adds to a discussion of violence or the way that feminists might read the situation between Solange and JayZ."

As I said, I have no idea what's going on between these two celebrities, and it doesn't really matter to the discussion of generalities, does it? The incident merely serves as the prompt, not the be-all end-all. Anyway, I understand that etiquette varies by forum but I usually see that people have no problem with a topic moving along to some related point or subject. Personally, I think dialogues may progress and should not be pigeonholed or very tightly restricted - after all, this is an Internet board for leisurely discussion, not a televised moderated debate. We spent a while discussing female violence, have gone off on a slight tangent, and so on. Nothing precludes the original discussion from become reinvigorated by new perspectives now that we have discussed these things. If, however, it's just going to be a rehash of the original discussion, if there's to be no connection to what has come before, then really it's just a waste of time, no?

Blah blah blah blah

again

I seriously think that's all your posts are worth.

I'm sorry but I do.

You're deliberately monopolising and derailing the thread. Like the usual MRA's who come here to troll. You may not be one of them but your impact is the same.

"I don't like echo chambers. I go to all sorts of places to discuss all sorts of things. Where there is a high level of discourse, where there is much to be learned, I make a home of. We'll see how it goes here."

How do you think it's going so far?

Reddit might suit you better?