In the 1980's there was a series of murders where taxi drivers were robbed, abducted and locked in the boots of their taxi's and then the taxi was set alight.

It takes only one ad picture of a woman in the boot of a car and then it is extroplated that this represents violence agianst women.

I think warren farrell may have been correct when he called men the hidden sex.

HRS, if you want to direct a comment to me, though how it relates to me I don't know, please spell my name correctly. It shows simple good manners.

Vanilla, under no circumstances would I advocate banning of the ad. Censorship does more harm than good, it pushes issues underground. Censorship concerns me.

What I think we need to discuss is why is it that a shoe company would want to run an ad targeted at women to buy their product with a scene where clearly the inuendo is a crime scene with a woman as victim.

My teenage daughter thinks it is more appropriate as an ad to highlight crimes against women. Her take was: 'wow those boots are cool, but what the ad says is: those boots make you look so good somebody will want to come and rape and kill you.'

I hadn't even thought of that.

So, why is it that a company would even want to create an ad like that? I actually don't think that this is 'accidental'. I really believe that there is a creeping sense appearing everywhere that violence is exciting and violence + sex/women is even more exciting.

Before any men start interpreting what I mean and getting it very wrong: I am not saying that this notion of violence as exciting is necessarily perpetrated only by men. Women are part of this as well. For me this debate is not actually a gender issue at all, but an issue about how glib we are becoming with depicting violence as being something cool.

A movie by Tarantino is not an ad. Advertising portrays something we should want-it reflects what is wanted by real people in our society. A movie does not necessarily have any reflection on our general society or tries to entice us to emulate something.

HRS, I've explained why you're a misogynist.

I accept you haven't directly criticised women, but I've revealed how that is a smokescreen.
You can't just substitute the word 'women' for the word 'feminist' and think that can hide your hatred for women.

If all it requires to be a feminist is to identify as one, why would it be impossible for good people to define themselves as feminists?

All they have to say is "I'm a feminist" then suddenly they're evil?

What the hell?

Does feminism then, just mean good acts that benefit women? Such as feminists who speaks out against the stoning of Saudi Arabian women?

I don't call criticism of feminists misogyny HRS.
By simple logic, it's easy to see you do indeed hate women but hide it, albeit not very well.

You've never been able to challenge this logic. All your replies evade the realities. You always just ask for irrelevant information as a distraction, or you fall back on the old 'I'm a victim, they're abusing me' chestnut.

You're no victim HRS, and I don't think it's right to let someone with such a genuine hatred of women pretend to be one, simplying by substituting 'feminists' for 'women'.

You can claim feminism as a whole is a movement that has passed it's used by date.
You can claim it's irrelevant, or that it's now more harmful than good. In those cases, I'll politely disagree.

But when you hate women so very much and hide behind this smokescreen, all you do is prove how much feminism is still needed to combat such illogical hate, especially when it's hiding beneath the surface.

Misogynists such as yourself are a liability to those with genuine criticism of feminism who employ logic and rational arguments, like Whitty and JamesH.

Can you actually challenge the logic in put to you, in how dumb it is to attack every feminist?
Or are you just going to pretend to be a victim again?

I don't think anyone's buying it any more and I'll do my damnedest to ensure it stays that way.

TurnRightThenLeft,

I wish you would stop zig-zagging around so much and instead took a moment to assess the annoyance. While HRS may be going overboard in his criticism of feminism (hey, just realised criticism is also an ism which probably makes HRS a criticist [my electronic dictionary suggested eroticist, but that can’t be right]), in his particular brand of inimitable style, we at least understand his motivations, and hope for his recovery. What’s your excuse?

I’ve been there with HRS, Timkins at al. I’ve only just started working through my “nice OLO people that deserve my apology” list (you’re not on it). We reserve the right to be enlightened by irrefutably sexy logic of Vanilla and her “ilk”; NOT yours.

R0bert,
You’re next on my list (and please don’t let the fact that you’re part of a long list, dilute its meaning). Sorry, mate. Keep up the good work.

TRTL:"I accept you haven't directly criticised women, but I've revealed how that is a smokescreen.
You can't just substitute the word 'women' for the word 'feminist' and think that can hide your hatred for women."

This is the same twisted logic that sees anyone critical of Zionism or Israeli activities labelled "anti-Semitic". It is a blatant attempt to generalise and dilute a specific set of criticisms in order to create the impression that the critic is nothing but a bigot. It's intellectually dishonest and does you no credit.

As to feminism, I suspect its day is done. The simple fact is that the so-called disadvantages that women suffer in Australian and other Western societies are at worst trivial, whilst the government assistance offered to overcome those minor issues is massive and disproportionate. The profession of feminist views has become an obligatory statement of faith if one wishes any kind of higher-level opportunity in academe or public service, not to mention Government. I've said this before, but the reason is simple: women tend to vote together, largely because they consume the same magazines and the same TV shows, all of which are pushing the same "feminist" line of
"poor disadvantaged women, terrible (or dumb) men". I suspect 'twere ever thus, with women in tribal societies sitting around the fire sharing the latest gossip about the inadequacies of the men whilst the men are out risking life and limb to bring home the bacon.

In short, it's a product of too much free time and too little obligation for self-support or other productive activity.

TRTL, Vanilla et al

I realise HRS is annoying to most people on here (he doesn't annoy me as I usually skip all his posts) but why do you waste time trying to reason with him. It seems some of you find it fun, but it looks like you are just picking on a guy who obviously has a lot of problems.

So, if your aim is to reason with him, I think you're wasting your efforts. If your aim is to shut him up, then I think ignoring him would be more effective. If your aim is to pick on him, then I think it's pretty low to pick on someone who seems to me may have emotional problems, and is perhaps at an intellectual disadvantage.