This continual claim that men are such violent beings compared to women is a joke. Sorry ladies but if you want to be treated as equals then don't complain when you are treated that way in a fight too. Yes women tend to be hurt more often but do you feel sorry for a small bloke who picks a fight with a bug one and gets his rear beat? Then why is that a problem when a woman picks the fight? Women in shelters admitted they threw the first punch in 52% of the cases during early research and we are finding now it is even more often they are throwing that first shot.

If a slap is domestic violence by a man deserving of helping her and punishing him, then it should be treated the same if a woman slaps. The same with sex and someone being drunk, when they molest a minor and etc. As it stands, they are not treated equally by any long shot and I see the feminists here don't REALLY want equality in treatment but instead laws that will just punish men. Now why they have that hatred of men is their issue but instead of hiding behind claims of inequality that are bogus, just admit you have a serious problem and get help.

How about this, try to actually address the numerous studies and statistics as well as issues mentioned to you instead of dodging and hiding behind propaganda.

http://www.divorcenet.com/states/new_york/politics_of_domestic_violence
http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/1999/10/25/restraining_orders/index.html
http://www.supportguidelines.com/articles/art199903.html
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=2e012098-a2f8-44a6-ad48-90756f74f64a&p=1
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/520686/

There are plenty of links for you now. Final challenge though, show me a single case in the USA, Canada, UK or Australia where a MAN has successfully used being the victim of spousal abuse to beat murder charges after killing his spouse. We have plenty of cases like that where women have managed to use that defense but why not any men?

@pelican

That "man" I spoke of is my brother in law. I will not drive that sort of wedge into my own family.

If male consent is taken seriously why do we never hear about it? As I’ve already stated the existing advocacy and outreach never references it. Take the article this thread relates to as an example. Regardless of framing it as being about footballers it still devolves to the "horrible things men do to drunken women". Meanwhile it is just as possible, and probably just as likely, that men fall victim to women in the same way and with potentially far greater consequences.

I've got into the habit of encouraging men to say "no" and do it regularly. It serves the dual purpose of giving them a modicum of self determination in sexual transactions and of educating them about how women can respond when THEIR advances are rejected. Notably, under domestic violence laws influenced by US feminists, Mexican men have lost their right to consent. If men aren't made aware of this right they may well lose it in other places as well.

As you say there are "services" which are available to men and boys. However they tend to only pay lip service to male victims and almost never openly reference them in their outreach or promotion unless they are same sex victims. The only way of finding any information is to go seeking it. By then, for the victim, it's far too late.

The typical male victim doesn't come out of the woodwork until their forties and then generally only because their health has been seriously compromised. Our culture doesn't allow males to be victims of abuse particularly of the sexual variety.

No matter how you look at it all the information dispensed in our culture is predicated on the female victim of the male abuser. Nobody speaks to the male victim.

As I said previously if you don't speak to them they can't answer.

>Articdog wrote about men, I however have a number of gay female friends and their stories, well if a bloke behaved the way they did, it would be classified as sexual assault.<

Yes, I did write about men. I worked in support groups for both men and women who had been abused, both as adults and as children. Many of the gay people had been violently, and frequently, abused by men as children - a smaller number by women. Many (not all) people who have been thus abused do tend to use violence as adults. Once again, though, the majority of violence is perpetrated by men. The male support groups offered support and help for men who were victims of domestic violence and there were added problems to do with pride and masculinity that were not present in women. Still, compared to the women and children, few of the men ended up in hospital with # jaws, # eye-sockets, # limbs, gunshot wounds, knife wounds etc. So I stand by what I said - it is men that are perpetrating the majority of violence. The point that the author, Melinda Tankard Reist, was trying to make is that violence by men is so common that women have become so desensitised to it that they accept it as part of their world. It is this culture that is wrong. If we have to teach young men that it is not acceptable the culture is so skewed that something is desperately wrong with the way we are living. Why aren't we in fact addressing the problem she poses instead of resorting to the ho-hum, "I know somebody who did....." ad nauseum ad infinitum. WE SHOULD BE DOING MORE TO STOP ALL VIOLENCE TO ALL PEOPLE.

gwallan

The law does not distinguish between the genders when it comes to rape but I do agree with you that men are often too afraid to speak out about rape and other issues to do with DV for the reasons that arcticdog outlines. And there is certainly not enough attention in the media and by governments to address issues that affect men in this area.

For men and women who have been raped there is always a conflict whether to report, sometimes it is easier to just get on with your life and not go through the whole court case scenario where as a victim you may be treated as though you somehow asked for it. Difficult and a no-win situation really, as a civilised society we are obliged and expected to provide a defence to the accused who is presumed innocent. It is a real balancing act and I am not sure how we as a society could do it better.

Can I add that any woman who might allege a rape that has not actually occurred is equally repugnant as any rapist. This is a serious allegation and can impact greatly on a man's life.

BOTTOM LINE is:

If we all treated each other with respect and compassion then these situations are not likely to occur. We are all adults, we know what rape is and what constitutes rape and what doesn't, we don't have to define the grey areas and skirt the issues - what if this, what if that.

If I was a man and the woman I was with was drunk, even if she 'appeared' willing to have sex I would choose not to partake no matter how strong the urge in respect of her condition. As a woman I would do the same if the man was drunk. This is not rocket science just plain decency and common sense.

Posted by csteele, Friday, 29 February 2008 1:05:59 AM

That's a really good analogy, but doesn't take into account the guys sexuality. If both were gay, I'm sure your argument is severely weakened.

Posted by arcticdog, Monday, 3 March 2008 12:42:42 PM

'Until you take the situation in hand yourselves, and start behaving the way decent folk do, stop the whingeing.'

Notice how you have villified all the men of the forum and virtually called them rapists and abusers. Why should they 'listen up' and start behaving like a 'real man'. I have never taken advantage of a women, and you have no evidence any of the other posters have. But since other men have, we are constantly having to deal with this kind of attitude. It's extremely offensive.

Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Monday, 3 March 2008 2:38:35 PM

I'd imagine that is exactly the case. But notice only the men need be 'educated'. To violence against women, Australia says no. To violence against men by women (which is 50% of it, and likely to lead to further violence against women) Australia doesn't believe it ever happens, or totally condones it.

Men have sole responsibility for a woman's ability to consent to sex, regardless of how drunk they both were, and sole responsibility for any violence in a relationship regardless of whether the woman threw the first punch.

Propper dealing with the issues are really hampered by this attitude. Only the other day a report came out showing a 25% increase in statistics of women being charged in domestic violence. IMMEDIATELY the women's rights organisations threw out their propaganda to silence this, offerring every excuse under the sun, and virtually saying it should be ignored to protect women who may be mistakenly seen as the aggessors. The police should be 're-trained' to see men as the aggressors and women as the victims. It's better to protect these few women, and let the rest get off scott free, and maintain women's exclusive victim status.

arcticdog,

You may stand by what you said based on personal experience but as someone that has tried to enforce the laws, even when men report it you are pressured to arrest him and not her. He can then plan on being shamed and laughed at by all kinds of groups and people to keep him quiet. When they have found that 38% of ER visits due to DV are by men, then don't you think it is a lot more serious than it is being taken?

I suggest you read the links I provided in my post and also try taking up my challenge. For some reason it is acceptable for a woman to beat a man and claim self-defense but if a woman has a mark on her and he was the one doing the defending, he can plan on going to jail. Same goes with sex offenders in double standards. When males report being raped or molested they are not believed and mocked for it. Even when they are believed they are mocked for it and their perpetrator is likely to get parole at best but when you reverse the gender it is suddenly an outrage.

http://www.canadiancrc.com/female_sexual_predators_awareness.aspx
75% of sexual predators are male and 25% are female.
86% of the victims of female sexual predators aren't believed, so the crimes go unreported and don't get prosecuted.

However, in six studies reviewed by Russell and Finkelhor, female perpetrators accounted for 25% or more of abusers. Ramsay-Klawsnik (1990) found that adult females were abusers of males 37% of the time and female adolescents 19% of the time. Both of these rates are higher than the same study reported for adult and teen male abusers.

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/520686/

A 32-nation study of violence against dating partners by university partners found that about a third had been violent, and most incidents of partner violence involve violence by both the man and woman. The second largest category was couples where the female partner was the only one to carry about physical attacks, not the male partner.