Mostly agree Craig, The "men are evil, women are pure" is a strong theme in some circles, particularly in the corridors of the ABC.

It apparently is too hard to face the fact that girls/women like sex, like to look at porn and like to actually make porn.

For these people every time a girl/women does anything remotely sexual, its because a boy/man has forced them to do it.

When a boy/man does any of these things it's because they're evil.

If you speak to these latte set social worker types you would think that only boy/man look at porn, and looking at porn turns all boy/man into rapist.

but then again aren't all men rapist, wife bashing, peado thugs.

How much of this moralising is actually driven by jealousy of those better endowed. Most of the rampant women libbers I have seen would be told to go & cover up, if they did disrobe.

A link on one of my car sites led to a U Tube video entitled "Collage girls love showing their boobs/breasts" or something similar. It was some street celebration in Florida or New Orleans or similar, where lots of folk in skimpy outfits, or near naked, were wandering down the street.

People on balconies above the street or photographers on the street were giving any lady with bare boobs, or who would bare their boobs a necklace. Some young ladies had dozens of these.

It did appear that any lady immediately pulled her top up or down the moment a camera was pointed at them. They must have been aware the video was for publication, not private amusement. This video went for something like 20 minutes. On the theory of perhaps not seen one you've seen them all, but perhaps seen a few minutes of boobs, there is not much of interest to be seen in another 15 minutes, I went back to my cars.

I guess one would find as many bare boobs on a walk down any Gold Coast beach, however it was enough to convince me they are right. Girls, perhaps other than unexciting womens libbers, do love showing their breasts, & probably their other bits, if they won't get arrested for doing it. It appears the libbers want to have the boys arrested for merely helping the girls do it.

Clearly, if taken as a so called selfie? These pics are/were only ever intended for an audience of one! One has to wonder at the brain dead blame their victims attitude of immature "men" to share this precious intended intimacy with a world of decrepit creeps! And just downright dumb!

Young people with a pronounced predilection for so called sexting, need to understand, once this downloadable data hits the airwaves, it can become public property! And come back to bite you on your allegorical arse in later life and usually at the most inconvenient time Be warned!
Alan B.

Thanks for the responses folks.

Cobber, yes, there does seem to be an effort being made to create a modern form of "sanctified womanhood" as a default model in public discussion. There's nothing new in this concept, it's been a standard pretence of the petit bourgeoisie for at least several generations. As my Mum used to say of such people: "she's as pure as the driven slush"...

Hasbeen, girls getting their tits out for the boys has been a feature of gatherings of the young and young at heart for as long as I can remember. The wet t-shirt competition was a standard feature of all sorts of events for at least a couple of decades and there was rarely a shortage of competitors or enthusiastic spectators (including lots of cheering girls).

Alan, keeping the fear alive as always... Care to have a go at telling us just what dire consequences might befall a young lass if her image happens to fall into the wrong hands, or are you just another moral panic merchant?

I'd just like to point out that there was a serious question at the end of that piece. If feminism is a genuinely important school of thought and not just another political beat-up, which I think it deserves to be, then what are the serious issues worthy of adult discussion that it should be tackling?

How boring - little more than a collection of adolescent cliches.

To paraphrase Bill Shakespeare- there is much much more to feminism, Shakti,the Goddess, or the Feminine Principle than Craig's diminished "philosophy" allows.

As a starter why not check out the topic Voices of The Sacred Feminine: Conversations to Re-Shape Our World by Karen Tate.

"what are the big issues facing women, children and men today that are worthy of being properly considered within a feminist model?"
Craig, those questions have actually been addressed in the Anne Summers article you mentioned. Did you actually read it? Or did you just see the word "fight" and stop there :)
Personally I don't see what Feminism or Marxism has to do with the price of fish here... The kids were breaking the law, both boys and girls, pure and simple, by distributing photos of "underagers" (themselves included). The online creeps were breaking the law, too, but that's another story.
Both boys and girls like to attract attention. They are just not mature enough to realise that in the digital age they can't choose whose attention they are attracting. The moral panic is more about the adults/parents/teachers at a loss what to do with these kids and how to manage their online behavior.

yep secularism with all its stupidity somehow making out its a girls right to post herself nude on the internet and somehow think that men are not going to look. How dumbed down can the feminist go. To think that the education system has been overtaken by these people. Now in the name of 'safe schools' they want to put every perverted thought into the minds of young boys and girls and will be first to scream about the outcomes.

Thanks for the "contribution" Daffy, I'm sure you did your best.

Isprey, yes, I make a point of reading references before I cite them. The Summers piece was about typical middle-class issues, packaged as a political "call to arms". She's been doing the same thing for at least 35 years and has made a great quid out of it. Nothing new there, just the same old tired partisan political schtick.

I agree with you that this moral panic has little to do with feminism; that was the whole point of the article. It's merely another attempt to paint men (or boys, in this case) as morally inferior to women. It's hypocritical, cheap and tawdry gender politics, nothing more. If Tony Abbott did it the same people who are jumping on the bandwagon would be howling for blood.

Daffy Duck,

That author you recommend is certainly way out there.

Talking about 'Wonderful Womyn', the 'Goddesses' who are tragically destined to live in a world with those awful men and boys, whatever went wrong here,

<CEO of Mylan defends EpiPen price hike: ‘No one is more frustrated than me’
AUGUST 26, 2016

THE CEO credited with single-handedly ratcheting up the price of lifesaving, injectable allergy medicine has deflected the blame on to an “industry in crisis”.

Heather Bresch, the head of pharmaceutical company Mylan, was slammed this week after it was revealed the cost of an EpiPen had skyrocketed under her watch by more than 400 per cent.>
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/ceo-of-mylan-defends-epipen-price-hike-no-one-is-more-frustrated-than-me/news-story/5e8c18273b6d6c83b95014ba705b253a

Are the Heathers fallen angels? And are they blameless? All down to the bad done by men that made them slip too?

That goddess stuff is really wacko, but some women do go for that stuff. Do you watch the late night crystal reading too?

I have no time for feminists, but I think the young boys referred to in this article should be finding something better to do.

I vary between pity and disgust for the younger generation.

One the one side they face a very dim future with the overpopulation of the country, depletion of resources, a disconnect with nature, and increasing divisiveness due to multiculturism.

One the other side many of the younger generation seem to be fat, lazy, have minimal work ethic, and they are allowing themselves to become americanised by watching american movies, listening to american music and playing with their american spyphones.

Watching american movies, listening to american music and playing with american spyphones has been found to make people depressed, and the younger generation is setting themselves up future bouts of depression (which will probably make them eat more, become fatter and become more lazy).

The young boys and the young girls should find something better to do other than taking pictures of themselves with their american spyphones and posting them on the internet.

What harm may ensue? You're are joking surely?

For starters, what about the shame of being outed by folks never ever intended as recipients of your personal imagery, which by the way, ought to be protected by copyright; to keep out of the hands of sick salivating strangers and the paparazzi?

Who by the way, hounded Diana to her premature death just trying to get some intimate or scandalizing shot!

What harm? How about in a future contest for the otherwise deserved promotion and equally deserved rise, some of this ostensibly private, for your eyes only, personal property emerged!?

And if years later on the dawn of marriage, this immature, I trust you sweetheart, schoolgirl romance stuff emerged, to then completely foul the wedding plans and any future happiness?

It's just too easy for judgemental moralizing males to put licentious labels on Ladies, or their essentially innocent victims?

Or indeed, blame the victim as the Author has done so well here?

I hope he's not a parent of young women, given his blame shifting and very convenient attitude; and parsimonious sermonizing!

None of which would be possible if the intended recipients returned the pics instead of sharing with their salivating like pavlov's dogs, little shiites mates!?

It's not as if any of these lasses posed for public exposure in the mass media! Or intended that it find its way there!
Alan B.

The problem is started by the little tarts who pose for, and disseminate the photos to someone they think think that is trustworthy. If it were not for these grubby little sheilas, who are now complaining, there would be no problem. What the hell do they expect from testosterone-loaded young males - young males, incidently, who we are constantly reminded by feminists - are not as 'mature' as the girls. What a fuss about nothing! If you don't want your bits revealed to all and sundry, don't flash them around in the first place, idiots.

Oh dear Alan, abuse? You're not very good at this discussion stuff, are you? Never mind, I'm sure the chance of the media hounding you like the Princess you seem to think you are is vanishingly small...

As for not "It's not as if any of these lasses posed for public exposure in the mass media!" (love the hysterical exclamation point, Your Highness):http://tinyurl.com/h2jub7l

I'm sure that if you can tear yourself away from peering out the back window of your chauffered mercedes long enough to read the link, you'll find that thw website is now apparently back up, after the single offending image of an underage girl was removed...

Alan B,

I agree that returning the photos or deleting them would have been the manly thing to do.

Perhaps with a return message saying "Not interested in digital dolls."

If a girl sends a nude photo to a boy it is not a sign of endearment.

More likely the girl is attempting to manipulate, entrap or play some type of game with the boy.

The boy will have to learn how to handle that type of female behavior and female manipulation, or they will pay a much higher price later on.

'It’s an easy narrative to sell to stay-at-home Mums, resentful at yet another boring round of washing and vacuuming while Dad goes off to have “fun” at work. It’s an easy story to sell to women who have a biological clock ticking away that drags them from a career at its peak. It’s an easy sell to women who choose or are forced by circumstance into low-paying work. It’s an almost too easy sell to women facing marital breakdown and divorce.'

Well ... yeah. It IS an easy sell. You see, men as a rule don't have to face a life of boring washing and vacuuming; men don't have to drag themselves from a career at its peak in order to start a family; men are not usually forced by circumstance (i.e. having to be always, always available for their families' needs) to accept low-paying part-time or casual work. And men facing marital breakdown and divorce do not face the centuries' old tradition that they have to assume the custodial burden of children and the reduced employability/earning capacity/financial security that single custodial parenthood entails.

'Nothing is your fault girls, it’s those terrible men (and boys) oppressing us! If only we had women in charge…'

Oh, your poor, poor things. This is a much bigger problem than men feeling sorry for themselves. Blind Freddy can see that posting nude selfies of women online without their consent and rating them on their f*ckability/rapability is criminal in its potential to destroy lives.

If you want a gender equality argument, why aren't there hundreds of young men posting nude selfies to their girlfriends? Because, culturally it's a wussy and unmanly thing to do. Whereas the culture continually entrenches a belief in women that their worth is all tied up in their desirability. A lot of women grow out of this, but young girls are still enthralled by their conditioning - and should be legally protected.

Killarney, I agree that this is a much bigger issue than people "feeling sorry for themselves". It's about people spreading fear in the community, just as you are doing on this site.

If young women don't want their images to be "rated" by young men, then perhaps they should consider not posting them to seek attention, because after all, it's all about the attention, isn't it? "Look at me, aren't I sexy?". It's straight from the pages of Carol Gilligan's great work on the stages of female moral development.

The link in my last post made it quite clear that this is a complete beat-up: the Children's e-Safety Commissioner has investigated and after spending 2 weeks being pressured by the confected moral outrage of fearmongering nitwits has found just 1 image that was objectionable and so the site is back up.

My suggestion to young women is to stop listening to bitter old crones trying to spread fear and hatred. They and the rest of us would be much better off.

I note that you weren't up to the challenge I set in my last paragraph.Surely there's something a great defender of the right of women to blame men for everything can think of that's more important that this for feminist women to focus on?

Craig Minns

I would agree that feminists are encouraging women to portray themselves as being perpetually oppressed.

However the whole issue of sexting and taking nude photos with spyphones is now totally out of control.

Up to 50% of 13 to 15 year olds have sent nude or semi-nude photos of themselves.

It is highly americanised practice and totally stupid.

It is junk socialisation, that would go with junk food, junk movies, junk media etc.

There really needs to be a push to ban spyphones in schools and greatly reduce the use of spyphones among young people.

If not a special type of mobile phone that can only be used by young people to send messages to parents and family members, and that is all.

Interactive, I don't share your concerns about the use of phones. Quite the contrary, in fact: in my view the portable computing device offers an enormous opportunity to create a better and more integrated community. It's still a very young technology.
I'm also unconvinced about the problems you see with young men and women distributing pictures of themselves. With the greatest of respect, it reminds me of the fuss made about the wearing of bikinis back in the 50s. As Hasbeen pointed out, you can see semi-naked women on any beach and many other places during the summer months.

Someone made the point to me that the whole issue is highly reminiscent of the superstitious belief of some primitive tribes that photos somehow embody the person by stealing a part of the soul and I can't help but agree.

Craig Minns

The hero of so-called social media taps over the camera of his PC and the microphone of his PC, and uses open source as his email client.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/22/mark-zuckerberg-tape-webcam-microphone-facebook

There is nothing that is secure, and Mark Zuckerberg knows it.

Meanwhile, study after study has confirmed that using spyphones in the classroom does not improve the student's school work.

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/may/16/schools-mobile-phones-academic-results

Many companies are also banning spyphones at work, because they are so unproductive.

As for socialisising, spyphones are highly anti-social, and it is totally insulting to attempt a conversation with someone how does not look at you, because they have their eyes glued to their spyphone.

As for naked pictures sent by women, read Esther Vilar's book, "The Manipulated Man".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Manipulated_Man

And the number one way women manipulate men is through sex, or the suggestion of sex.

So by encouraging women to send photos of themselves naked, (or by being accepting of it), men are allowing themselves to fall into the trap of being manipulated by women.

As well, sending selfies of your naked self is pathetically americanised and just plain stupid.

Young people have to be educated regards all of this.

But it is likely that they are too young to learn, so the spyphones are simply taken from them.

Or young people are removed from their spyphones.

Either way.

Craig Minns

This 'horny boys' excuse has been done to death. Being horny does not give ANYONE the right to destroy lives by publicly humiliating women's private images of themselves.

Men just do not want to face up to the fact that women are every bit as sexual and horny as they are. Men and boys want to keep writing the rules on human sexuality in their own image: Men's sexuality is normal and natural, but women's sexuality is either slutty or pure.

I'm not interested in your holier-than-thou protestations that boys are victims because they choose to destroy a young girl's life by plastering nude images of her all over the internet and rating her on her f*ckability.

This is criminal behaviour and internet law needs to catch up with it.

interactive

'And the number one way women manipulate men is through sex, or the suggestion of sex.'

Other way round. It's MEN who manipulate WOMEN through sex. The culture is saturated with overt and covert messages that men are always out for sex and that women must meet their voracious sexual appetites or risk abandonment.

It's nonsense of course, but cultural messages run deep. The concept that women have their own sexual needs, that are every bit as important as the male sex drive, is still a cultural no-no

I think this discussion has run its course. Thank you to those who contributed, it's a shame that there are a couple who are incapable of anything other than mindless abuse.

interactive, I would be interested in exploring some of your comments, but this is not the place.

Killarney

What is female sexuality?

In this site there is an ad saying "Don't hide it, flaunt it".

That is an ad for Weight Watchers, and that company is run almost entirely by women.

And on the Weight Watchers site it mentions "showing it off"

"https://www.weightwatchers.com/au/pickyourplan?cid=40100

The teenager girls putting pictures of themselves (naked or semi-naked) on the internet are flaunting it and showing it off.

So female sexuality is basically females showing their bodies in an attempt to attract male attention.

Maybe that is how nature designed it, where a woman attempts to attract a man by showing her body, and the man might be attracted to that woman.

But if the woman is flaunting herself as some type of ego trip or mind game, then she is likely to continue playing her mind games, and women being manipulative and playing mind games is something men do not admire in women AT ALL.

Boys have to learn to avoid such females.

In the case of naked selfies, it originally came from america, and has now found its way into Australia.

america has heavily polluted the bodies of our young people by supplying so much junk food.

america has heavily polluting the minds of our young people by supplying so many violent movies and glamorising drug taking, and now america is supplying antisocial media and spyphones.

For the sake of our young, it is time to reject nearly everything that comes from america.

interactive, "For the sake of our young, it is time to reject nearly everything that comes from [A]merica"

Anti-America is just as foolish, throwing out the baby with the bathwater. What about its robust freedom of speech and democratic government? Perhaps your target is advertisers instead.

The problem is that many people stupidly allow others to do their thinking for them. The behaviour of the ABC's 'randomly selected audiences' (they should say self-selected from rather predictable sources), especially on Q&A and witness just how easily they are led by Jones and others, sometimes flip-flopping back and forth.

What is needed is better teachers who can model critical, independent thought and a broader, much deeper study and appreciation of literature. I would add the study of philosophy, but even there political correctness often rules. That is why students should be strongly encouraged to go direct to sources and become avid readers, not relying on middlemen, or middlewomyn as it so often is in education.

Craig Minns,

A worthwhile topic, thank you.

onthebeach

There is a school that has recently banned an app widely used by teenagers in Australia after "a cyber safety expert warns that there is pornographic content on the app and it publishes users' location information along with their videos"

http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/wenona-bans-social-media-app-over-concerns-about-risks-to-students-20160830-gr4f6i.html

There is very little on the internet or on spyphones that is safe, and the use of the internet and spyphones by children should be strictly supervised by parents.

Or spyphones are simply taken off the children.

Many generations of children have been raised without american junk food, american movies, american music and american spyphones and american spyware.

And those generations of children were less fat, less lazy, less dumbed down, less stupid and less americanised than the present generation of children in Australia.

Thanks OTB, I think it's an important discussion that has been avoided for a long time.

I was hoping for an open and honest discussion of the questions I asked, but this is OLO after all... Nonetheless, I hope it makes a few people think a little.

I'd like to take the opportunity to congratulate Clementine Ford on her new baby.

Interactive, every generation faces different challenges and solves them in its own way. Things may have been better back in some half-remembered Golden Age of your youth, but this is now. Given that humans have been prancing around all over the place in a naked state, I fail to see the problem you're calamitising about. If the issue is the location info, then simply don't enable it. The mere existence of an image means nothing at all. Girls who get good ratings don't complain, they send their pictures to the paper and put up an "I felt violated" spiel for the extra attention.

I asked a couple of questions at the end of the article, does anyone have anything they'd like to say to those?

Craig Minns

The issue with the school that banned the app shows how much parents should be closely supervising what children do on the internet and on their spyphones.

With all the weirdos in the world, no responsible parent would every want the details of their child published on the internet.

The school that banned the app should go much further and ban spyphones completely from the school.

As for the question you asked, the number one issue for men, women and children is sustainability and the overpopulation of the country.

With all the science in the world, no scientist has yet invented a single house in any street of any suburb of any town in the western world that is sustainable.

https://theconversation.com/no-sustainable-population-without-sustainable-consumption-1774

And yet our government wants to at least double the population.

If by any chance society can be sustainable (a very remote possibility), then I think the next issue would be the decline of our youth.

This was brought home to me recently when I happened to drive past a high school where the students were walking out at the end of the day. So many were overweight, with depressed looks on their faces, and so many were already looking at their spyphones.

Our youth is declining quite rapidly, and the americanisation of our youth would be the major factor.

Our youth will be a liability to this country in the future unless major changes occur (unless obese, sick and depressed individuals are regarded as an asset).

Craig Minns,

Thank you.

No-one has found an effective (and brief) counter to the noxious Hegelian Paradigm that features so often in the rhetoric of activists and politicians (all sides), and on the shameless ABC too!

A quick Googled example,
http://www.propaganda.news/2016-03-28-obamas-hegelian-dialectic.html

Maybe someone might have a go at an article on that.

Well Hegel had a lot of good ideas and so did Marx/Engels, but they were limited in their ability to both observe and interpret by their socio-cultural environment in much the same way that biblical texts are the product of their respective times. We have much more effective understanding of human sociological structures and how they interact with individuals these days, with many tools available to assist us to predict and manage socio-economic outcomes, few of which require ideological faith in the same way that Marx's and Hegel's sociopolitics do.

What they do require though, is the courage to stand against entrenched ideology, on both Left and Right.

I haven't come back to this discussion, because I've been busy. However, on checking back in again, I can see there is nothing much to come back to.

Lots of anti-feminist posturing - nothing new. Feminists oppress women. Women are victims of everything, because feminists say they are. Fighting the sexualisation of women in the culture, and the impact of this on girls' sexuality and their lives, is merely creating 'moral panic' and encouraging girls to see themselves as victims.

Yeah. This trope is as old as anti-feminism itself.

Of course, I am definitely one of the ones that Craig Minns has deemed to be 'incapable of anything other than mindless abuse'. Of course, he was only 'hoping for an open and honest discussion of the questions [he] asked'.

I'm sorry, Craig. You didn't want an open, honest discussion. You wanted a forum space in which you were completely agreed with. Anyone who disagreed with your basic premise, regardless of the rationality of their arguments, were just engaging in 'mindless abuse'.

So I take it you don't see a comment like this as 'mindless abuse':

'Surely there's something a great defender of the right of women to blame men for everything can think of that's more important that this for feminist women to focus on?'

It's openly patronising and provocative - just another form of 'mindless abuse'. You've pulled this passive-aggressive trick many times when people disagree with you on feminist and women's issues and always portrayed yourself as the victim. So, I'll leave you to chew the 'I so agree with you' fat with the other anti-feminists on the board.

Thanks for that Killarney. Was there anything you'd like to actually contribute, dear?

Killarney has nothing but sarcastic ad hominem, as usual.