Nearly every mass killer is a man. Why aren’t we talking about that?

[CircleSquareCircleSquare]

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/26/mass-killer-toronto-attack-man-men?

“After the Toronto attack, there should be a debate about toxic masculinity, and the issues of identity and rage that turn so many men towards violence”

I don’t dare to read the comments.

or 'NAMALT is a cop out' is the real cop out.

There is pressing work to be done on finding out more about violent males that are out committing crimes such as homicides - as the authors say in this interesting paper ...re: the neuropsychological status of perpertrators of domestic homicide and nonhomicidal domestic violence, the empirical literature is extremely limited.

4/10 guys feel nothing when women talk about sexual harassment

www.news1130.com/2018/02/28/one-four-canadian-men-feel-nothing-women-talk-sexual-harassment-survey/

the neuropsychological status of perpertrators of domestic homicide and nonhomicidal domestic violence, the empirical literature is extremely limited.

Actually Jacqueline Campbell at John Hopkins is one of world's experts on DV and it's perpetrators and has developed a successful risk management framework that has significantly reduced DV homicides

To understand male violence one needs to understand that there is a significant minority of men who are predator-like. Imagine a cat stalking a mouse and relishing it - enjoying the hunt and the kill - that is what these men are like. It's impossible to tell most of them apart from other guys, on the surface.

The other men are largely pack animals according to them, who follow what their leaders do and "just follow orders" by enlarge - and as we have such poor quality moral leadership from most politicians - we get the NAMALT syndrome but no advocacy on behalf of, nor standing up alongside, women.

To understand male violence one needs to understand that there is a significant minority of men who are predator-like. Imagine a cat stalking a mouse and relishing it - enjoying the hunt and the kill - that is what these men are like. It's impossible to tell most of them apart from other guys, on the surface.

Sounds like a different type of offender to those involved in domestic violence - no hunting involved there, it would seem. Any idea as to the extent as to this level of significant minority - is there a reference ?

I disagree with you strongly there Babycham. History is always written by those in power.

@WichBitchHarpyTerfThatsMe

Ekphrasis, sorry if I'm being a bit thick but are you saying that in children with autism both boys and girls are equally physically assertive? If so, are both sexes less or more physically assertive than children who do not have autism?

This is observational anecdotalism

There are some children for whom receptive and expressive communication is extremely difficult and life is very challenging and they get very frustrated. Some revert inwards. Some may become physically challenging and if severely dis-regulated display what the average onlooker would interpret as violent behaviour. Some discover they enjoy the predictability of what happens if they do certain actions. I don't see a difference in the sexes here, but in neurotypical children, without any diagnoses of anything, there can be differences in primary age children between the sexes in terms of physical behaviour. However, it's interesting that there are considerably more boys in settings for children on the spectrum than girls. So it's extremely complex and I've confused myself.

I do think that when I've worked in primary schools in deprived areas there is a difference between the sexes which I can pin point to the social stereotypes those children are surrounded with at home but in culture and the children themselves can perpetuate. Calmer boys might get picked on for just being gentle etc.

Ever since I saw it I can't get over the difference in violent crime statics between men and women. Imagine a world where men had the same violent crime stats as women. There would barely be any.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_crime#Worldwide_homicide_statistics_by_gender

It's been said before, but we need to bring our boys up to be more like girls.

But how?

How can people, en masse, be encouraged to do this?

Failure to object is viewed as acquiescence. We have had this conversation about rape jokes over the years. Men who laugh along with the joke are bonding with the rapist and signaling their approval.

Men are capable of considering class analysis of every group except their own? No. The denial is a tool, and a very effective one.
10th rule of misogyny: The worst thing about male violence is that it makes men look bad.

@sawdustformypony Sounds like a different type of offender to those involved in domestic violence - no hunting involved there, it would seem.

Different kind of hunting: perp has to find a suitable victim then begin a pattern of control to wear the victim down so that, by the time the physical violence starts, the victim doesn't consider leaving to be viable. It's a psychological version of persistence hunting.

The problem with denying:

I’m white. I hope I’m not racist and I’m pretty sure I’m not. I hope I’ve never done or said anything that’s racist and again I’m pretty sure I’m not.

So racism is nothing to do with me and I shouldn’t feel guilty? Well... I shouldn’t be accepting personal blame over every single racist incident committed no.

But... I have to acknowledge that racism exists and that i have benefitted in my class from the way the world is set up to put white peoples over people of colour
Because I’ve seen it - being out (I’m an expat) with a black British friend and seeingvthe way we are treated differently. It exists, I’ve seen it, doubtless there are countless ways in which I’ve not seen it as well.

So for me to just shrug and say ‘nowt to do with me’ isn’t good enough.

And it’s the same with sexism. I’m sure both of you are decent, non sexist men. The Toronto van driver is not your personal fault. You’re both still benefitting from an entire social structure set up solely for men in which women are there to serve you.

The question we should be asking is how do we break this down? How do we make the world more equal? The first step to that is naming thebproblem and acknowledging it exists.

Yarn

I take issue with your point that society is set up solely for men with women only there to serve them

I think that kind of obvious hyperbole adds nothing to these kind of issues.

Men kill themselves at a higher rate than women, their lives are on average 10 years shorter, they are largely under represented in higher education, they on average serve longer jail sentences than women for the same offences etc etc (I could go on but you get the point)

Now thats not an argument that inequality against women doesn't exist, (of course it does), it's an argument that inequality between groups on different axis of measurement is a characteristic of all societies and always has been. As I stated earlier, addressing these inequalities is a fundamentally important part of any progressive society.

Everything starts with education and children, if we can get that right, the rest will follow. I'm a huge advocate for non traditional roles being promoted amongst children. I let my own son play with gender neutral toys, encourage him to play with girls just as much as boys etc, I (try to) teach him that it's ok to show emotion, that he shouldn't be violent etc. It's a long road but these kind of ideas are becoming more mainstream. Will it make a difference? hopefully yes. Like I said, I'm a gradualist not a revolutionary. Meaningful change takes time as old ideas that used to be mainstream naturally fall out of favour and become unacceptable as the generations pass.

That's because, historically, it has overwhelmingly been men who have had the opportunity to achieve these things. Women couldn't go to university, stand for election and so on until very recently. Nevertheless, women are responsible for a lot more than people generally think, as women's achievements are too often ignored. Look at the case of Rosalind Franklin only a little over 60 years ago - the major player in discovering the structure of DNA and so on, yet she received almost no recognition for decades.

Not only not receiving recognition, but women’s contributions being actively denied, or the credit stolen taken by men, and entire fields being derided as soon as they are seen as female-dominated. Look at medicine - in the West being a doctor is male dominated, respected, high-paid work. In Russia it is low-status and poorly paid, because it is seen as “women’s work”.

Also, re: NAMALT - innit curious how So Many men can do class analysis when it’s about anything except their privileges as men, or about the way all men benefit from the violence inherent in patriarchy. Doesn’t matter if they don’t want to, doesn’t matter if they disapprove - they benefit from the way society boosts them over women simply because they are male.

Drat, that was meant to be —stolen— . Not used to the formatting yet!

Gah!

It IS set up for men though. There were a couple of absolutely fantastic threads on here a while back (I’m on them under a different name) about ‘facilitated men’ - they’re some of the best I’ve ever read on here. Well worth a look at. Mainly about business and work. But to summarise:

Work is set up for men. The power and the real decisions are taken in a slice of the workforce that is expected to travel short notice, stay late, etc etc. That excludes women. Now you might say no it doesn’t - but it does and here’s why.

To get to that level, and to be at that level, you need a facilitator. You can’t do it while you’re doing the nursery run and having days off for childcare. Once you’re a mega earning exec that can be a nanny.

But what about the bit before that? That talented rising middle management level? You’re not paid enough to have a nanny. So you can only do that if you’ve got a facilitator- because it’s almost impossible to get a truly decent career going if you’re picking the kids up every day. So the men, and it usually is men, surge ahead while the wife goes part time ‘because it works for us’

Woman’s career stagnates, mans gets ahead. And then that C suite level is scratching their heads thinking well gosh, we’re enlightened men, we aren’t sexist but where are all the good female candidates? We’d love to hire a women but there just isn’t anyone (and then you get all the stereotypes about women not being up to it but that’s a different thread, let’s assume our execs are genuinely progressive.)

So the men get the jobs. And the decisions continue to be made on that golf course in Miami that Susan from couldn’t get to because she doesn’t have any childcare that can step in at a days notice but mark can because his wife is a sahm. Or at late meetings. Etc etc.

And what was really obvious about this thread was that the men in it were (mainly) decent types who had good intentions ....who insisted it was all nonsense and that women face no disadvantage. They don’t see it. Just like you don’t really see racism so much if you’re white, or notice that single step up to a shop unless you’re on crutches.

The number of times dh has been asked to travel to the USA on a days notice, declined and then been told ‘can’t your wife...?’

The Male suicide rate is shocking, and suicide prevention is something that needs more focus and more resources. At the same time it’s not an argument that the world isn’t set up for men. It is.

Women get treated worse at work, in medicine, and in society generally. A lot of it is quite insidious, but it’s there.

And I certainly don't think the bogeyman idea of 'the Patriarchy' helps.

It disenfranchises women and girls and convinces them that the deck is perpetually stacked against them, the system is rigged etc. It takes some examples of actual bias and conflated them with societal choices, external pressures and free will (and a fair bit of pseudoscience and conspiracy theory). It convinces girls and women that the only way they can possibly progress is to bring others down and that they need special measures to be put in place to allow this.

The problem with that is it can become a go-to response. 'I didn't fail because of me, it's the Patriarchy that inflicted my failure on me'.

Surely you can see how dangerous an idea for young girls such a catch-all excuse is? How an idea that is supposed to strengthen women can actually be disempowering to them?

For the avoidance of being misrepresented, is this an argument that we should just do nothing and accept the status quo? Absolutely not, I have outlined my ideas earlier in this thread and in other posts into his forum. But breaking the entire human experience down into two groups, oppressed and oppressor and structuring your entire view of the world along those lines is a binary and simplistic hypothesis that just doesn't explain how things actually work.

Getting strikethru formatting to work means you're initiated :)

Babel

I do see your points, but they presuppose that the 'facilitator' has to be a woman.

When my wife and I first decided to have children, we discussed who would be the primary carer and who would reduce their hours. She expressed a strong preference to do so. I would have been quite happy to stay at home and care for the children.

My (admittedly anecdotal) view on society is that this is most women's preference. Is that not true?

I actually have a male friend who is a stay at home dad. He loves it and his wife's career is progressing very well as far as I know. Now is that typical? No but there is no reason why it couldn't be.

When the landowner in the privileged group tells the serf that they have enough food from the scraps thrown to them, you know the landowner is being wilfully blind. It is also denying who's sat at the banquet table and showing a distinct lack of empathy and conscience towards plus willingness to hear the serf's cries of hunger and desperation at always getting the castoffs and crumbs

Talking about the canada attack:

The canadian policeman ended it with an arrest. No use of force.

Americans have condemed this saying he should have used lethal force. The policeman had a gun, he should have shot to kill.

So. Are americans naturally more violent? Higher hormone levels? Or is it socialisation and gun culture.

It’s the same here. Lethal force is a last resort. In the US shoot first, questions later.

Anyone who seriously uses 'men have achieved more than women's as an example of men's intellectual superiority is either incredibly stupid or under the illusion that everyone else is incredibly stupid. Up until 1918 women in the UK couldn't even vote. They also couldn't get degrees, own property or retain custody of their own children. Until 1969 they could legally be paid less than men and be fired for being pregnant. Until 1991 they could be raped with impunity as long as the rapist had claimed rights to their body with a marriage certificate. Many universities, including many of the Oxbridge colleges, didn't admit women at all until the 60s or later (Balliol College began admitting women in 1979). It turns out that if you actively prevent people from achieving they don't achieve. In spite of that many women did achieve incredible things, and were then ignored. The first statue of a woman (Millicent Fawcett) has just gone up in Parliament Square among 11 statues of men. Claiming men have achieved due to their greater ability is such patent nonsense I don't know how someone could not be utterly humiliated by how stupid it makes them seem.

Patriarchy Personified, you said:
'I'm a gradualist, not a revolutionary. Things that are important take time to change. As long as they are going in the right direction, I'm generally happy.'

I'm delighted you're so happy. How happy do you think the millions of women raped every year are? Or the families of the two women a week killed by men in the UK?

patriarchy

What you and your wife have is a good set up if it works for you. Decided on by talking it through and doing what works for you. And yes men can be stay at home parents - I wish more would!

My point is that sahd s are still the minority because society expects this of women - when I got pregnant, I was so so shocked at how dh and I were treated differently; he got congratulated and I got demoted - on a Monday I had a stellar performance review, told I was up for promotion etc. On the Wednesday I informed them I was pregnant. By the end of the week I was stripped of my reporting lines and they actively tried to manage me out. It was such an eye opener. Would I be taking more than a few weeks maternity? Ummm yeah.

And it’s continued - dh and I are as equal as we can be in the Home. Equal drop offs and pick ups, we keep it flexible but we try to do half and half. And yet his work still expect him to be available to jet off places overnight because wifey should be at home and my work have me firmly on the mummy track.

I don’t think most women do want to be doing it all at home and work tbh. Most women I know work and still do vastly more housework and kid stuff. Their careers stagnate, while their husbands (who all swear blind they ‘help out’ at home but don’t really) get ahead.

Then you hit your forties, divorce happens, the man moves on with his career and the woman is left in a financially vulnerable position, with no recognition that her staying at home full or part time has enabled that man to have his career.

It's a perfect demonstration of why NAMALT is so frustrating. We know. We fucking know that. But enough men are violent that it's an issue, and if we can't identify the common link between most violent crimes or sexual crimes, we can't bloody well figure out how to sort it.