A feminist view on the hack

[PuntasticUsername]

I was just reading the fb comments (yes I know, someday I'll learn) below the ITV News article about the hack and the swatting shite, which was fronted by a photo of MNJustine.

There was precisely one sympathetic remark - from a woman. Otherwise, men are suggesting that getting hacked is our own fault for being a website that is all about slagging off men; women say we're all boring and up ourselves anyway ("airy fairy women with personality disorders"); and most-liked of all is a man's comment saying "Christ, [Justine] looks just like how I'd imagine the typical wet blanket mumsnet user to look".

People really do hate women for having the nerve to get together and have opinions about things, don't they?

Actually, I don't like the poster. I agree, it does seem to be trying to imply that all men in the home are violent.

I don't agree with the F4J article mind you, nor the way they have conveniently misused statistics.

An ex of mine was/is a photographer. A few years ago I noted that all the F4J photos had his copyright on them (they don't now, but F4J is bigger and photos are a lot easier to come by now). I've often wondered what happened to make him support them. It certainly wasn't the type of photography he used to do.

I think it shows what violent men are capable of and that they are the main perpetrators of domestic violence, it's showing the problem. Men are uncomfortable with it because violent men belong to their group and move amongst them freely, they laugh at these mens jokes and don't pull them up on their behaviour.

Ah, OK EBear!

The thing about that article is that on the face of it it seems so reasonable: "It's not fair to brand all men as violent, we just want to be good dads to our children but women are stopping us and the court system is so heavily skewed in their favour that we can't get proper access". Throw in a couple of extreme cases to pull at the heart strings and get the reader nodding along even more vigorously. Then chuck in a reference to MN as part of the problem, and in one fell swoop - despite a measly press notice saying that F4J doesn't support the hacking but that no-one much will have seen - Telegraph readers are saying to themselves "well, I'm not surprised MN is being attacked, they aren't exactly innocent in all this are they?"

I think the poster is deliberately provocative because otherwise it will be unnoticed - think of those AIDS posters with huge gravestones on, for example

Ive posted this elsewhere but im really not sure a bored teen is responsible.

He seems to be quiet on weekends Could it be possible that is when he has access to his kids. Im still going on the assumption its a disgruntled ex.

re the F4J article-" a minister for men and boys" I would be laughing if it wasn't so horrifying.

The rebbeca minnock case I thought would have tempered F4J a bit.

Obviously we all have bias but within the family friends circle I know only 1-2 mothers that have gone extreme but there are several feckless fathers, (have money for own hobbies as priority "but they'd do anything for their kids"), are begrudging) several did runners during pregnancy.

I just find the belief by some of these F4J tyes that this happens equally between men and women laughable.

It is laughable BreakingDad and it is harmful to real victims trying to get help. Abusive men will often accuse their victims of being abusive, F4J take this seriously and take the abusers side every time.

Surely their list of mothers who have harmed their own children could easily be counterbalanced by the list of men who have killed partners, children and anyone else who happened to be in the house at the time...

I have pointed those figures out Solid y'know, those actual figures that show crime committed by violent men. I was shown lots of links to obscure research that backs up their claims, the office for national statistics not being a valid source obviously.

I was also told that in those rare cases of male violence it was probably the woman wot started it. It's cognitive dissonance fueled by misogyny, and they're being listened too.

Unfortunately, they have been very successful in promoting the dual idea that women are not only responsible for committing at least half of the violence, they provoke a good deal of male committed violence, making them responsible for that, too.

That's the line abbleanders, which goes against every known fact available.

Ah yes the office for national statistics. The same department that count workfare as being employed.

I'm sure their figures for murder victims are correct, not exactly the sort of information you can twist is it.

However, they consistently fail to control for the bitches were asking for it effect.

I wondering if 'provocation' is something in itself that needs to be unpicked in our society.

It seems to get used to excuse a lot of male behavior e.g she was wearing a provocative dress / dancing/acting provocatively etc.

I think that emphasising how important proportional response is in British Culture - ie. that it doesn't matter if you were provoked, you need to respond reasonably.

I feel very strongly that the American idea that if someone's in your house they deserve all they get is a terrible, horrific idea, that the British idea that people, including criminals, are always worth more than things (so you can't shoot a burglar) is a good philosophy.

This works back to everything else - just because a woman is in a short skirt/the wrong place/drunk, raping is clearly not a proportional response.

If someone has punched you, a proportional response might be to punch back, but a proportional response is not to push them off a balcony etc.

And, if men like my ExH are to be believed, provocation basically equals women not having the psychic ability to know what the correct response to any situation might be this time.

A woman might have worn infinite short skirts, danced like Salome her entire life or mimed any number of sex acts and not been raped, but the one time she is, it's blamed on her actions, not the actions of the criminal who raped her.

I think you've got to look at proportional response in reference to systematic abuse as well. What is a proportional response to years of verbal, emotional, financial, physical and sexual abuse?

'Proportionate response' and abuse are things that are looked at and defined from a male perspective. Look at the people trying to justify Berk's reaction to being hit by a woman. Men who kill their partners often cite 'nagging' (aka a woman trying to make a man take responsibility around the house/with children).

Your first is really, really hard scallops - I don't know, it needs a lot of thinking about.

For your second, that's easy, nagging is words, it's never an excuse for physical violence.

I know that's easy and glib to say, but I can't think that I support anyone using violence as a response to words.

Yet women who have been abused for years often say the emotional abuse is worse than occasional physical abuse? It isn't unusual for an abused women to snap and lash out at their partner physically, even if he hasn't been physical to her. I certainly wouldn't be judging her for that. Abusers know what they are doing. (And of course that little statistic gets marked down as female on male DV).

Personally I think abuse needs to be much more recognised and understood on a wider scale before an answer to that question can be given. And perhaps equally as importantly the traits of abusers need to be recognised and condemned. Too often they aren't recognised, accepted, or are even lauded in certain circumstances.

It is a complex issue. Some abusive people take great delight in needling and tormenting others until the tormented person lashes out - the abuser can then play the victim card - 'S/he hit me! Bwaaaaa!' and isolate the victim further.