Caroline Criado Perez on male violence and rape

[ArabellaScott]

https://newsletter.carolinecriadoperez.com/p/invisible-women-not-all-menbut-how

Contains details of the horrific French rape case.

'The second thing we just can’t stop talking about is how many of them there were. In just this one small area of France. What does that mean about how many other men would do this if they had a chance? How many men in our lives? Men who are married. With children, and grandchildren. Who seem like devoted husbands and fathers?

This is the question we women have been asking ourselves in the wake of this story as we look at the men around us. The men we love. The men we know and trust. The men who, unlike us, are not talking about this story unless we bring it up with them.

And to these men, I have a question: why are you not talking about it? Does this story not disturb you as much as it disturbs us? Are you not as horrified as we are to be faced, yet again, with just how many men we’re talking about here? With how they live among us, so well-hidden in plain sight, behind happy suburban marriages? Why are you not talking about this to your male friends? Why are you not talking about this in public? '

He's been accused of rape,not 'performing in a sex scene'.

Thank you for finding it.

I wonder what the impact is on the jury of repeatedly hearing the (to me) minimising phrase, "sex scene" and not "rape". Do French juries all embrace that rape does not involve consent so they would endorse this usage as appropriate for the defendants rather than the complainant?

I posted earlier saying I'd asked my OH to read the article and talk about it with me.

Just had a long conversation. Interestingly, although he hadn't raised the case with me he had discussed it with a friend yesterday when they met for a drink. I asked what they'd talked about and he said "Is it any wonder some women hate men when so many are absolute shits?"

We talked about 'NAMALT' and he said, "yes - but it's always a man isn't it? If a woman goes missing and a body is found, it's always going to be a man who's done it.” I mentioned another thread on here where posters used Rose West and Myra Hindley as evidence that women do awful things too, which he described as 'utter bollocks’ because there’s always a man behind it.

He reminded me about a group he used to belong to years ago - a bunch of men who met in the pub once a month, it was supposed to be a ’safe space’ to be vulnerable with one another and talk about real stuff rather than jokes and banter. He said he would feel very uncomfortable being part of something like that now and when I asked why he said it was because it smacked a bit of ‘Poor men. Isn’t it hard to be a man?’ He said (I quote) “It’s all a load of bollocks, it’s not hard to be a man. Just do it properly.”

It was only after the conversation that I realised how fearful I had been that he’d dismiss it or try to defend the men in some way. He said himself, there is no defence. It’s literally indefensible. And also unimaginable, except that it really happened.

The thing that horrifies me most about this case, is how so many of the perpetrators lived so close to her. I would be less upset if it was a load of disparate, far away men. But to have such a high number within a small radius makes it so clear that there’s a high density of awful men in the population.

Aww. He sounds like a good one

Aww. He sounds like a good one

Well he hasn't given me any reason to think he isn't, and we've been together a very long time. But I think it's hard for men to really understand how differently we experience the world, compared with men - or it seems that few want to try, at least.

My OH was bullied in his teens, way back before people took bullying seriously in schools. He was small and slight and an easy target so for years he was terrorised by a group of boys who repeatedly beat him up on the way home from school. He was traumatised by it, tbh.

I wonder whether the fear he felt, and the knowledge of what they could do to him has given him a little glimpse of what women experience at the hands of men.

I am not saying it's the same, but perhaps the feeling of powerlessness and the knowledge of what males can and will do to exert their power has given him a bit more insight.

it’s not hard to be a man. Just do it properly.

What an adage!

But I think it's hard for men to really understand how differently we experience the world, compared with men - or it seems that few want to try, at least.

It really is.

I always tell men I know to ask women about their negative experiences. The ones that genuinely want to know do ask and are usually shocked. I think most men think being groped is a rare experience and being raped is almost unheard of. Whereas I think a more typical female experience is being groped is an occupational hazard (ie pretty common) and the majority of women have either been raped or been in a situation where they genuinely feared they could be.

If men genuinely listened to us I think they'd be horrified. Unfortunately many are predisposed to think that women talking about sexual assault are lying

One of the issues with being a heterosexual woman is the feeling, sometimes, that you are sleeping with the enemy. Even my lovely DH

Nailed it as usual.

It's not like the money would have gone to the wife.

I'm glad the stories mention it because I've seen a number of assumptions that the husband paid the men to do this or that they paid. I think it is important to note, if it is the case, that the men didn't pay nor were they paid. They all just wanted to do it.

@annejumps I see what you mean, yes, although I think it wouldn't downplay the sheer horror if the men were paid to do this.

Women are often belittled (and often by other women) for feeling anxious about doing things for fear of male sexual violence. We're told that we are being weak and that we shouldn't let men win by giving into terror. And then, on a daily basis, we are confronted by evidence of what men will do if presented with the opportunity. It's a different kind of violence from the violence that affects men. It's not necessarily about gang members or yobs, it can be about men who make every effort to seem unthreatening but who are biding their time to turn. Men have to worry about ruthless muggers or chest-beating aggressive types, but they don't have to worry about their taxi-driver planning to murder them or a police officer making a false arrest to murder them. They might worry about walking home past drunks at chucking out time but not about walking through the isolated countryside in the daytime.

They might worry about walking home past drunks at chucking out time but not about walking through the isolated countryside in the daytime.

There are some endurance cycle clubs that offer isolated rides through the countryside and check-in points to make official records of your mileage. Vanishingly few women participate except in a support capacity (organisers, suppliers of tea and fruit cake). The rides are by solo riders with a handful of large events when people come together. Women attend these larger rides.

The men tend to consider this as evidence of weakness and women not being interested in endurance length events. They overlook that the isolated routes on country lanes might not seem safe to women to the point where we don't elect to do them.

I don't know that I think men are all blase. But, what would they do about it?

I don't think them talking to their friends about it would really make any difference. They already know there are bad people out there. The fact that some men are sexually violent doesn't mean other men usually have some power to stop it, any more than women do. (Though, it's not like they never do, I've known men and even groups of men to come down hard on men who transgressed, including in a workplace setting.)

I think a lot of men know that many men can be dodgy, and that's why they tend, for example, to worry about their daughters going out and about. In some ways, I feel like we have actually tried, as a culture, to reduce this kind of understanding among men and we've called it paternalistic.

The story is unsettling though, the whole thought that many men in her community were aware when she wasn't is horrible.

I think categorising men as good or bad doesn't help either. We as women don't want to look it in the eye. The psychiatrists don't want to look it in the eye. They say this French guy had a split personality. No he didn't. Some of the hours of his life, most of the hours, he behaved as we expect a father and husband to behave. In the other hours he behaved like a rapist. That's the reality. Lots and lots of men want a normal family life, but they also think and do extremely depraved things when they can. That's not the bad men, that's a good chunk of all men I'm talking about. So putting them in camps of good and bad is not helpful. Your dad can be a good dad to you, but also look at voyeur websites. Your husband can fix your friends oven for you when you ask, and can also be having an affair. It's an inconvenient and uncomfortable fact, but until we accept it there is no solution.

I think a lot of men know that many men can be dodgy, and that's why they tend, for example, to worry about their daughters going out and about. In some ways, I feel like we have actually tried, as a culture, to reduce this kind of understanding among men and we've called it paternalistic.

It often is paternalistic, perhaps this is the point! Fathers look after their children, that really is literal paternalism, and necessary, but when this becomes an 'ownership' mindset it is often problematic.

But shaming men for trying to protect their children is another chip in the wall to reduce and remove boundaries and protections.

Combined with liberal sex posi feminism, this could be disastrous.

Encourage girls that any precautionary behaviour on their part is 'victim blaming', shame parents for protecting their daughters, shame older women for 'pearl clutching'.

Tricky situation. Women should be free to do as they please without fear. But ...

More damning research on the high prevalence of male abusers:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262661/

A quarter of a sample size of 423 young men between 18 and 35 admitted to having "made a woman engage in some type of sexual activity against her wishes over a one year time interval". And those are just the ones that admitted it!

I haven't read the full article yet.

Jesus.

If you’re talking about Audax, I never got the impression that men considered women not wanting to do longer independent rides a sign of weakness. But I never didn’t do an Audax through fear of anything happening to me in a remote location.

That's because there are many, many men out there who are with women not because they love & care them deeply as person, but because of the various services she provides.

My ex did change his stance on a few things, but for a while, he didn't understand why I was incredibly angry and upset at women being trampled all over in the whole trans rights issue. He expected me to agree or be sympathetic to his anger about things that affected him that were going on in political spheres, but didn't understand why things that would affect my safety at such a visceral & vulnerable level were worthy of such concern (or his).

However, if what affected him reached anywhere near the same level, I know he'd be furious about it...but because they affected me & women....they weren't as important?

Unfortunately, women's concerns are very much trivialised. Men's issues are held in higher esteem as being worthy of lofty though, consideration & anger, whilst our are seen as a bit of petty, non-important quarrelling at the bottom of the heap.

@CassieMaddox A close friend of mine was raped by a boyfriend. Earlier on, her male piano teacher had felt up her leg when she was 15 years old.

My housemate was raped by her father as a teenager. My colleague was almost abducted off the street. I'm not sure what happened to her but she was afraid to leave the house for about 6 months after that. She was pretty much house bound. The same colleague narrowly escaped getting raped by her male best friend. My friend was sexually abused as a girl by a male friend of the family.

I was groomed as a young adult by someone old enough to be my grandfather. I had no idea what grooming was at the time, but that's what it was. I was so sexually harassed in one of my first jobs I just cried under my hair one day, as I felt so miserable and just like a piece of meat to them, some entertainment.

I only know of other women's experiences because they knew I'd have a sympathetic ear. I'm sure I've missed out on a few. None of the above were reported to the police.

Then, my own partner of over a decade crossed a sexual boundary. In desperation, even had the manipulative cheek to try and blame me for not communicating it 'enough' when I had already sat down with him and spelt it out (he had already ignored several previous hints).

That, and a few other things meant that I left him. His arrogance that I wouldn't leave, selfishness, emotional stingyness and disrespect cost us both dearly. I'm now one of the despised single, older, childless women in that society still finds pretending and pitiful in equal measure.

Yes, paternalistic can perhaps get a bad rap.

In a lot of cases I think as a society we have to make choices about what risks we want to accept for what freedoms. I think the modern left gets this really long because they have an (often not conscious) sense of society as perfectible. So if people are just good and do the right things we can start from a sort of blank slate where people are good. Then there is no need to sacrifice freedom for less risk or vice versa.

The pp above who spoke about men being good and bad was right, I think, except that it's not just men, it's everyone. We all have the capacity to be bad, and sometimes really bad and selfish. So we structure society in ways to try and reduce that (bringing up kids with good habits so they control their bad desires) and also protect us from people who don't or can't do that.

I always remember Camille Paglia saying she had thought back in the 60s that feminism was about throwing off the shackled of sexual repression and control so women could treat sex like men did - but that this also meant giving up certain social protections and so increased risk of sexual assault and exploitation. I don't think I necessarily think that was something women walked into on purpose, but I do think in many ways it was a clear-headed assessment on her part. If you stop insisting on sexual self-control in young men and women, and get rid of restrictive social norms, of course that will increase the number of risks we are all exposed to and this will be most risky for women.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cyvpd7zyprdo

I think the fact that they didn't pay made it worse - the husband just hated his wife so much, he didn't even care about monetary gain.

The detail I wish I could forget is some perpetrators using the defense "her husband consented for her." I'd like to think they're just grasping at straws for a legal defense because the attacks were videotaped, but deep down I'm sure they actually do believe it was ok because the man said so.