Uncomfortable feelings about the teaching of "consent"

[Tootickyandsnufkin]

I hope I explain this ok. I'm not entirely sure this makes sense, or if I'm expressing something obvious.

Consent comes up a lot on here/MN. Usually the discussion is around whether consent is confusing etc. Everyone is familiar. I hope isn't is prompting the usual debate. But I guess maybe that where it goes.

The idea of teaching "consent" to boys/young men bothers me. I wonder what it says about men that they have to be taught. Then i think about what else we teach our children. Thinking on the go....I guess we work to develop empathy in many areas but how do they develop naturally otherwise? isn't there some sort of innate compassion that stops people, eg, committing acts of violence? Or is it consequences that shapes behaviour. Which of course there is generally a lack of in terms of non consensual sex/sexual acts.

And if we try to teach our sons about consent, are those who have ignored a lack of consent simply those who weren't adequately educated?
Is it depressing to think there are a huge group of boys/men for whom its an educational issue? Or is that a very negative way to think?

Your maleness is not just a physical characteristic. It is a social, cultural and political position. And, in a world where white men still have disproportionate money and power, it is likely to be one from which you have significantly benefited.

Our identities are not simply individual - they are formed in collectives too. Go away and read some Iris Marion Young, for heaven's sake, and come back when you're better informed.

Yes. To the last thing. Well done you do sort of get it. Progress!!

But you feel threatened by it, which is an excellent thing.

I wouldn't say I feel threatened by it. I actually agree with most of it. What i think is dangerous is that a lot feminists actually just don't like men very much but they try to put themselves behind the spotlight and pretend their positions are logical and harmless because at least they aren't murderers (like the men). I would place you and your chums on this forum firmly into that category for the removal of any doubt should there have been any.

What feminist positions do you think are illogical and/or harmful? What is the danger you fear from these feminists and their positions?

I think it's the people who assert that nothing can be done about male violence that don't like men very much, or at least think very very little of them.

Ah now comes the argument that I am not to have any opinion on society or my or others place in it because I haven't read the correct literature. If i said go and read Niall Ferguson to see what he says about the terrible white man whom you hate so much and don't speak to me until you've finished all his books and considered his analysis....I would sound like a complete arsehole, would I not ?

To be very honest though I don't give one shiny shit whether men think I like them or not, because why the fuck should I care? Do you think women think men like them? Women criticise men on a forum and men say 'women don't like us.' Men rape women in their millions across the world and women are suppose to think what? That men adore them??????

What feminist positions do you think are illogical and/or harmful? What is the danger you fear from these feminists and their positions?

They try to teach young boys and men to be ashamed of themselves for things they can do nothing about. I actually came to this forum hoping for sensible discussion about the effects of the now obvious backlash that this is causing, but rather i just see more of the same boring old stuff about white guys are the spawn of the devil and responsible for all the worlds ills. Women obviously had nothing to do with anything since they had no power.

I posted (all over the place) from a position of feeling despair about men in general. I acknowledge its wrong that I don't like men.

But you add nothing useful at all to the discussion.

There are women here who can engage with you, can answer you, have probably done it a lot. But personally what was an interesting discussion previously has been lost.

Men rape women in their millions across the world and women are suppose to think what? That men adore them??????

Any statement such as "men like women" or "women like men" is absurd from the get go and doesn't really warrant much thinking about.

On the other hand individuals who post statements about how they feel about men are ripe for criticism I feel.

I don't hate men. At all. That's just another stupid straw man, an age-old bogeyman of the ugly, bra-burning, angry woman who is "probably a lesbian anyway".

What I do hate is the fact that women have, for centuries been treated as second-class citizens who do not have a right to control their future or their body. The rules around consent are part of a long, long fight - going back centuries - to insist that women are treated as people who have a right to some kind of self-determination over their own lives. Basic, fundamental rights: the right to vote, the right to own property, the right to work, the right not to be raped in marriage are very recent. Why was this? I can tell you, it's not because every woman prior to 1920 was individually too stupid to vote. It was because collective power relations were configured in a particular way that systemically disenfranchised, disempowered and devalued women. This was partly political, partly legal, partly institutional, partly cultural.

So don't come on a fucking thread about gender inequality and tell women that it's 'all about individuals' now. Only when we reach a utopian situation where women aren't disproportionate the victims of gendered violence, aren't paid less for the same work, aren't doing more than 50% of the housework on top of equal full-time hours, and aren't disproportionately the losers when it comes to childcare can we even begin to start saying that collectives and cultures don't matter when it comes to gender.

If you'd done even the most basic amount of reading on gender studies in any discipline, you would know this already.

'They try to teach young boys and men to be ashamed of themselves for things they can do nothing about. I actually came to this forum hoping for sensible discussion about the effects of the now obvious backlash that this is causing, but rather i just see more of the same boring old stuff about white guys are the spawn of the devil and responsible for all the worlds ills. Women obviously had nothing to do with anything since they had no power.'

So men and boys can do nothing about male violence. But women can do something about it??

Tooticky

Sorry you feel that way, I wont post again in that case. it is your thread.

Good.

ugly, bra-burning, angry woman who is "probably a lesbian anyway".

growapear. I didn't mean it like that. Posters don't own discussion threads.

Ok have 1 in 4 white people been assaulted by black people? No they haven't thus it's not a fair comparison.

I should probably say 'bogeywoman' not 'bogeyman'. Can't emphasize enough how stupid I find that caricature of feminism. Most bra-burning, angry lesbians I know are gorgeous.

Just for the record, I don't hate men either. In fact there's several men I adore and more that I quite like.

What I can't stand is assholes.

Stop being one and we'll be cool.

So men and boys can do nothing about male violence.

As i've said so many times the idea that men are not interested in controlling male violence is nonsense.

Thought you weren't posting any more?

So why did you say that feminists want to make men and boys ashamed of themselves for things they can do nothing about?

What are the things they can do nothing about?

Thought you weren't posting any more?

Only because I thought the OP wanted me to. Since she said that wasn't what she wanted and since questions were addressed to me it seems reasonable to reply to those. Is that OK with you ? FFS

So why did you say that feminists want to make men and boys ashamed of themselves for things they can do nothing about?

Because they can do nothing about being men. Being a man is the problem since your analysis holds that men are bad.

" Being a man is the problem since your analysis holds that men are bad." really? is that what you genuinely get from what people have been saying?

"the idea that men are not interested in controlling male violence is nonsense."

Really?
How much effort have groups of men put into reducing male violence? Or dealing with the effects? Cos shelters for people fleeing domestic violence (almost all perpetrated by men) seem to rely on funding from potential victims. Haven't seen charities taking out TV slots or posters to tell men that a violent man is scum and if your mate thinks violence is funny, ditch your mate. Haven't seen male politicians standing up and demanding harsher sentences for violent domestic crime or more support for victims - women do, and then get derided for being shrill/only interested in domestic stuff/not supporting male victims of violence.

Where are all the men working on this stuff, because if they are, their media profile is seriously shit?

Is that OK with you ?

Perfectly.

FFS...?