Safe place for budding feminists

[Mamaka]

As some of us have had our opinions, feelings and questions so completely bulldozed in other threads, I thought I'd try and start a safe place for newly questioning and of course veteran feminists to explore without fear of being misunderstood or ridiculed.

A couple of things I'd like to know:

I've just found out that there is no feminism group where I live and am seriously considering starting one but feeling a little unqualified for it. Any recommendations for where to start if I wanted to do this?

I've just read the equality illusion by Kat banyard in its entirety and now I'm feeling riled up. How can I start to move from anger and frustration towards positive action? (This is really what my previous thread should have been called!)

Batteries -

Like Buffy, I'm trying to bring my son up to be in the 60% (and using very similar strategies - "it's only a game if everyone is smiling", "you can say no to people touching you", "other people can ask you to stop touching them", "tickling stops when you say stop"). So, yes, I would consider it a massive parenting failure.

But your point about the impact of wider culture is well made. I had a discussion about this with a thoughtful male friend, who is also raising a son - he pointed to a folk saying in his native Poland from his youth: "her lips say 'no' but her eyes say 'yes'", and pointed out that this is the sort of shit we're trying to combat every day in bringing up our children. And the overt ones are the easiest to combat - it's the more insidious ones that are harder to work against. Bond comes up behind a woman, naked and in a shower and vulnerable, who's been in an abusive relationship and he knows to have been in an abusive relationship - and she immediately melts into his arms. A high proportion of the output of Mills and Boon (submission is lovely so long as it's with the right man, and screw the fact that the woman has no magic means whereby to see that this is the "right man" rather than yet another in a line of abusive users - his behaviour may be dominant, but in this case it's sexily dominant and he's a good 'un because his intentions are pure, and she can magically intuit this because she leurves him).

This puts our sons at risk of growing up in Buffy's 30%, and our daughters of growing up struggling with cognitive dissonance - for instance, she consents to sex, he has anal she doesn't want, but is so lovely and cuddly afterwards she can't put her finger on why she feels used and hurt and assaulted - because society hasn't equipped her with the cognitive resources to articulate why what's just been done to her is wrong. In fact society has put a lot of effort into telling her that this is just one of those things she should put up with - "sometimes it hurts to be a woman..."

And for Dilberry too. I too believe you are telling the truth about your assault.

I can only reiterate what I said upthread - that there are circumstances - such as jury duty - where it is inappropriate to go on statistical judgements, and that the only thing that matters is listening to testimony, evidence and the details of that individual case.

But there are also circumstances - making a snap decision in a long taxi queue as to whether to take someone up on their offer to share a taxi with them - where it is not unreasonable to make a judgement on the basis of statistical risk.

Thank you. It was more horrifying
than traumatising, if that makes sense. But it was still very unpleasant. But I really do find it upsetting to read that people would want more to see her as innocent because it fits in better with their theories.

which leaves about 60% men as not rapey at all. If the 60% and the 30% and their female allies unite in angrily denouncing any attempt to improve the situation for women by tackling the questionable behaviour of the 30%, because it hurts men's feelings to hear about it and that's not fair, rates of rape and sexual assault aren't going to reduce.

All of this is fascinating. My first thoughts are around these %s.

I think my wariness is around the "60%" group. Although 40% is a pretty big % to justify general wariness anywsy.

I have anger at the (majority?) of that 60% for propping up/enabling/whatever a culture of rape. Is there culpability in that group even? But I think I have been believing the 60+30% are actually a 90% of potential abusers. i haven't been seeing a division between those not "seeing" the problem and those who might act incorrectly. Has felt like a blurry line so interesting to read of the clear division.

I don't think there is a clever reason for my shock Fela. I think maybe I just haven't got your faith in unconditional love. I expect that's just because I haven't thought it all through though.

I don't quite understand why biology etc is rejected on the grounds of no motivation to change. I think like a lot of crime people act because a combination of biology/socialisation. The shaping behaviour for the good of society is necessary regardless of the cause? I get presentationally why policies would only tackle one element but if you back away from one part of the explanation might you not miss part of the solution?

It was said during this thread that someone would find it more difficult to believe if their daughter rather than their son was accused of something.

It's hard for me to talk about this objectively, so I won't say anymore on the subject. But it does give credence, in my mind, that demonising part of society can sometimes prevent the true pattern of shades and shades of grey from being distinguished.

Grr, this really makes me wish I had a life where I still used my brain. I don't even have the vocabulary for discussion these days, let alone the knowledge or analytical skills. I wonder if you can start at 40?!

If it was a date/acquaintance situation, then I would be utterly devastated, because it's overwhelmingly likely that my lovely son put his penis where it wasn't wanted. I would believe that he didn't mean harm, but would think that he had been INCREDIBLY stupid, careless, selfish, thoughtless, and as a result had harmed someone

I'm quite shocked by the double standard here. Other people's son's who do this are rapists. Your lovely son just put his penis where it wasn't wanted but he didn't mean any harm by it.

I'm quite shocked at Fela's minimisation of sexual assaults by women too.

I admit to not being sure how I felt about the second sentence you quote Lass.

But i didn't find my lovely son put his penis where it wasn't wanted minimising.Personally I found those words more shocking and uncomfortable than the word rape tbh.

But i didn't find my lovely son put his penis where it wasn't wanted minimising.Personally I found those words more shocking and uncomfortable than the word rape tbh

Really? "Putting his penis where it wasn't wanted" could describe the penis referred to in the waxing thread or a flasher. Both nasty but more shocking than "rape" ?

Ok I see your point of view.

I found the expression euphemestically twee. A man rubbing against a woman on a crowded underground train is "putting his penis where it's not wanted". It is not rape.

Other than the sentence I'm about to write I can't think of any legitimate use of the (non) word "rapey".

I think possibly Buffy's reaction is indicative of the level of cognitive dissonance many mothers would feel if confronted with the fact that their son had raped someone. This is after all the individual we can remember as a tiny baby, as an inquisitive toddler, as a chatty 5 year old. And society constructs narratives round rape and sexual assault which, along with the dichotomy of "the good girl who wouldn't" versus "the slag who's up for it with anyone", constructs a dichotomy of "the normal, decent guy" versus "the evil rapist who leaps out of bushes" - no overlap between categories allowed, no room for the idea that the good girl might quite legitimately want casual sex with a partner of her choosing (while at the same time retaining the right to say no to blokes she doesn't fancy), or that the everyday bloke you'd trust to back you up at work and chat to amicably about last night's TV also raped his last girlfriend (Schrodinger's rapist, NAMALT, etc, not saying all decent everyday blokes are rapists, but that many rapists may present to the world at large as decent everyday blokes). So it's really really difficult to frame the idea of the cuddly baby turned curious toddler turned chatty five year old turned thoughtful eight year old... has turned into "a monster". I know intellectually that my DS could turn out to be a rapist when he grows up - after all, all rapists were at some point some mother's small boy - but on an emotional level, my imagination won't do it. I'm guessing (I don't want to put words into her mouth) that Buffy's unusually "twee" (to use Lass's choice of adjective) wording is down to this instinctive "my imagination just won't go there" reaction. I say "unusually" because I've seen enough of Buffy's other posts to know she wouldn't usually word it this way. But I wouldn't rush to scream "hypocrisy" on this basis, when in fact this may just be a subject which pushes too many emotional buttons to produce an entirely detached response.

But is it necessary to have one's imagination go there in order to have a discussion about the subject? Is admitting the possibility on an intellectual level enough to get the ball rolling?

Shit. I'm really sorry. I really really appreciate the discussion and the honest answers. And yes the language is much less important than the discussion to me.
Sorry you need to leave the thread. It's a new area to me to have discussion of such difficult topics.

I expect if it were my son who did the act you describe you would call it rape and him a rapist.

I am sorry, yes genuinely, you are hurt but I still think it was a very odd way of applying standards.

Cross-posted with Buffy. And to Buffy too.

I'm sorry you were attacked too dilberry.
I'm also with buffy about the levels of censure here. What I say is just my opinion, based on my life and experiences. I'm trying to help others on the thread see that they aren't alone in their feelings about men, not minimise others experiences or perspectives.
I don't think I minimised female assaults. I said it was rare (true, and a fact). And I said that could change how I viewed an accusation against my daughter (total speculation and not relevant to anyone else's opinion). I also said I was thinking it through because that isn't a logical position.

Fela your posts have been helpful. Thanks.

The support and willingness to share is so amazing on MN that's it's easy to forget you are often making quite tough emotional demands on other posters when you pose direct questions. It's easy to.be so caught up in your own thoughts.

Sorry again.

Sorry. Name change failure.

Haven't read the full thread, and feel a bit ill so I'm just popping in to say I'll be back.