Cornflower thanks.

Grim, I'd not actually noticed your challenge but having read it I don't consider it valid. A couple of points, it would have to be a academic discipline that had spent a lot of effort in attacking women for the similarity to be relevant and I'm kind of hoping that we can do better than people did in the past. Your posts on this thread seem to be all along the lines of we think that men did this to women in the past so it's ok for women to do it to men now. Most feminists claim to be working towards a better society not a repeat of the mistakes of the past.

I don't care that much about academic feminists other than where their views impact on public policy (or are taken seriously by students). I've highlighted the term academic feminist repeatedly to try and provide a point of distinction, the hatred of men expressed in much of their writings and Pynchme's comments is not in my view normal for a lot of feminists.

Eg whilst Severin and I clash from time to time my overall impression is that she quite likes men.

I don't like the extreme's on either side, the men who blame women for all their woes are no better than the women who blame men for all their woes.

I do find it interesting that I can cause upset by suggesting that women have had a role in shaping society (and unless you consider nurture and early childhood learning to be completely irrelevant women clearly have had a role) yet Pynchme's comments don't seem to warrant comment other than by Cornflower and myself.

R0bert

Vanna: <"The author's numerous maligning, denigrating comments about "men" would definitely be within the area of discrimination, but I doubt very much that Monash university cares in the least">

Sorry but you'd need to point them out. I only saw an article where she felt sad about Steve Irwin's untimely death.

Robert: What are women doing to men that men did to women? Raping them on a regular basis then punishing the victim or ignoring their plight? Lobbying hard to get age of consent lowered so that even youngsters are prey to a system that priveleges rapists over their victims and helps protect men who sexually abuse kids? Are women wahoooing over the deaths of male children or talking about them denigratingly ? Are women lobbying for laws, or making laws or policy, that would systematically prevent men from entering any avenue of education or profession? Have any women done street protests to keep men out of any field of endeavour?

The answers are repeatedly no. Quite the opposite; women (and many feminists) continue to work hard to obtain justice for boys as well as girls.

But what - SOME relatively FEW men have had to adjust to having their automatic ownership of children and assumed 'right' to harass their wives thwarted. Gee how mean.

I don't hate men Robert. Quite the opposite. But I cannot sit quietly and not correct the ideas set down (which if repeated, unchallenged, long enough, become further internalized) that display ignorance and lack of empathy. THAT's the lack of humanity to which I refer - the denial of what women have experienced and the lack of acknowledgment, if not outright resistance, that it's reasonable to object.

cont/d:

If feminists or even a lot of women hated men, don't you think we might see reports by the hour and by the day of men turning up showing gross physical abuse or murdered ? - and wouldn't a lot of women be not only be indifferent about it, but sneer at how stupid/evil those men were to put themselves in that position? Some of us might even get orgasms out of it (as per porn).

Oh, that's right - that's women and girls and boys that are turning up dead and injured every day. No prob. Not your problem anyway is it.

Pyncheme,
I don't rape or pillage. In fact, I often work in a port area and have a security clearance. When I was a cleaner, I also had a high security clearance because I cleaned in a number of high security government offices.

"Quite the opposite; women (and many feminists) continue to work hard to obtain justice for boys as well as girls."

This is rather amusing.

I once had a series of meetings with some teachers of a school where the boys were getting very low marks, (below state average in a state that is beleived to be below world average in a number of areas of education).

At the start of these meetings, all the teachers assured me that they were not feminist and "liked males".

Then they never once said a single positive word about the boy students. The boys were "lazy" or "misbehaved" or were "disruptive" etc.

It appears that the boys were responding to the teachers, and the teachers did not know how to motivate the boys.

The same appears to be occuring in universities, where so many feminist denigrate 50% of Australians, and then wonder why so many people in Australia don't like a feminist.

'Oh, that's right - that's women and girls and boys that are turning up dead and injured every day. '

I always wonder at what point in pynch's head the nice little 'boys' (The innocent) turn into those evil men (The guilty by virtue of their gender). Men often turn up injured and dead too, and as pynch says commonly, more often at the hands of men. But the way she talks, not just here but often I get the same impression from other threads, all men should bare the guilt for the sins of the few.

She is often wanting the male posters to show enough empathy for her victims, the boys, girls, and women. I believe no amount of empathy would suffice, because as men, well, we're guilty anyway. As men (the abusive gender), we doubly have to 'prove' our innocence. Shout it louder boys.

I think it's wasted breath. In pynchme's eyes, we are all taliban, we are all slave drivers. Except for the few loverly men in her life that is, the exceptions to the rule. I'm not racist, some of my best friends are black!

I think I've said my piece regarding Pynchme's comments about men, almost ready to move on. I would like to know what other feminist posters think of those comments, none so far have commented on them.

A/ Share the sentiments expressed (most men are the equivalent of slave owners or the Taliban)
B/ Don't think that way yourself but consider it acceptable for other feminists to talk about men that way
C/ Consider it Ok to talk about members of any group defined by biology in that manner
D/ Don't like it but don't like to publicly disagree with other feminists on OLO - got to stick together
E/ Treat the comments the way some of the men treat many of Formersnag's comments, so extreme that they are not worth bothering with
F/ Other?

Now onto another diversion.
Gaol rape - if it's of real interest we should start a new topic but I'll float a few comments here to gauge interest.

I think before we can address that issue we need to decide as a society what incarceration is trying to achieve.

Punishment, rehabilitation, deterrent, protection for the rest of us.

Probably a mix of all of the above.
Some risk reduction strategies (eg providing access to consensual sexual activity or even privacy and some porn) would not sit well with those wanting punishment or those with strong moralistic views.

Other alternatives such as removal of the offending anatomical components would cause some concern on other fronts.

On a broader social front getting rid of a lot of the prudery around sex might help encourage better attitudes to sex and reduce some of the issues which contribute to sex offenders choices (a personal view).

R0bert