. The Challenge of Recognizing an Abusive Woman (new title)
You mean misandry?I've posted a lot on this particular thread. I can understand where you are coming from Celtaf, Strangeways and dark empathy. I don't think that we should be quibbling over the nuances and small details in this issue. Increasing awareness especially in community about the misogyny
YES I hate voice to text Grrrrr! So sorryYou mean misandry?
I hear you. I really don't either. But around here, I do want to recognize that there are elements of society that are unhelpful when it comes to recovery from abuse.I don't get mad at misandry any more. It's just yet another face of the anger that seems to pervade absolutely everything these days. Debating it is pointless. But I do find myself weary of the constant veneration of motherhood as something pure. I think the sexualization of sons by mothers is a lot more common than people want to admit, or are even capable of recognizing. I know my mother was an extreme example, and it's left me damaged, but it's also left me more attuned to signs of sexualization than most people. I've met a surprising number of mothers who have naked pictures of their sons, usually as babies or toddlers, which they'll happily - even eagerly - show to their friends. They're not sexual pictures, I'm not claimimng they are, but there's something about the act of sharing them that is disturbingly familiar to me. Flip the scenario, imagine fathers eagerly sharing naked pictures of their daughters. They'd be run out of town. As the sons get older they tease them about the pictures, threathen to show them to future girlfriends. Again, it just seems playful, but again there's a disturbingly familiar power/control dynamic on display. I've watched friends' teenage sons squirm and blush in these situations while their mothers think it's hilarious. It's hugely triggering for me personally, but I don't call it out. They'd be in furious denial, and I understand why. It's not something anyone wants to be accused of. The other problem is that In to justify calling them out I'd have to at least refer to what my mother did to me, and I'm not prepared to do that. So I let it pass. Just like everyone else does.
Celtaf said:I know that if there is a #metoo conversation going on, that I need to simply quietly exit it or find some way to graciously change the subject. It is not simply that I want to be included; one of the things that added to my trauma was being accused of being the abuser or a sexual deviant myself, which denied me years of potential to get some kind of help out of fear of someone finding out something horrible about me as though I was Mr. Hyde or a werewolf. I feel in such conversation that I, an abuse victim, am being told that I need to prioritize not being an abuser.
The problem, as I see it, is that men being concerned about women's bad behaviour towards them is treated as though it is bad, rather than recognizing the need everyone has to be aware of how they are being treated. In general, there is a self contradictory idea that women cannot be threatening while at the same time insisting that they should be able to be powerful. Yet power comes with the temptation to abuse it. So are women better than men in terms of conscience and general treatment of others. So it is all but impossible to navigate, and is grossly unfair.I have a similar problem, though for me, the misandry in media is something I do! find triggering. Maybe it's that as a teenager, books and tv series were my escape, and now seeing something like Doctor who, He man, star wars or the wheel of time co opted to belittle it's original male characters is something I find upsetting, or maybe because actually feeling that being male is significant to me is something I've only experienced since meeting my lady, or maybe because all of this "male power", narrative is so directly against what I experience in my own life on a day to day basis.
At this point I'm just hoping the public idiocy burns itself out before I do.
Luke.
Let's face it: someone who is a dog in the manger about who deserves more compassion as an abuse survivor is not committed to helping others; they're just committed to a particular demographic.I am also concerned with the concept of "threatening the narrative". If survivors being brave enough to tell their (our) stories threatens a narrative, it's a week narrative. I myself have come close to suicide multiple times over this issue. I truly believe treating rape as a women's issue, or especially as a feminist issue, rather than a public safety issue is part of rape culture and even endangers the lives of millions of survivors whose stories are just as valid - and whose recovery process is usually much harder - as women's.
they need to reexamine their motives - I doubt they truly care much more about female survivors tbhLet's face it: someone who is a dog in the manger about who deserves more compassion as an abuse survivor is not committed to helping others; they're just committed to a particular demographic.
Possibly not, or at least not all of them. For example, women abused by other women.they need to reexamine their motives - I doubt they truly care much more about female survivors tbh
the problem is, post modernism only sees all relations in terms of power, with oppressor and oppressed, with absolutely no nuance or interactions but those directly involved with power.
For example, a paper I heavily criticised in my phd was one by Thomas Szasz, a post modernist who claimed that "disability", was the medical profession's way of categorising a person as perminantly ill, and thus maintaining the power of the doctor over their patient, since of course, all doctors are just their for power, and not to, ---- you know, actually help! anyone!
Lol it does have a "so bad it's good" quality to it.Oh, I loved the Star Wars Holiday Special. It was completely terrible, but in an entirely different way than the terrible self-seriousness of the prequels. Embracing the shittiness inherent in the whole concept should have been the way forward for Star Wars.
craptacular is the wordLol it does have a "so bad it's good" quality to it.