It is an unfortunate fact that rape and other forms of sexual violence are being used as a weapon of war in order to humiliate, punish, control, inflict terror and displace women and their communities. These rapes and other sexual violence amount to serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, including war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Women and children are 80% of refugees and displaced people worldwide. International courts have recognized that rape is routinely used as a weapon of war (*1) and an estimated 50% of women seeking asylum in the UK are rape survivors (*2). Yet the UN Convention on Refugees which defines who is entitled to protection does not recognise the specific persecution of women. Each woman must battle against institutional sexism, and institutional racism if she is a woman of colour, forced to show how her case relates to the Convention.
Gender Guidelines, provided to the Home Office (*3) and immigration judges in the UK (*4) acknowledge how hard it may be for women to speak about rape, and give practical guidance about how to ensure women have a fair hearing. But officials have no statutory obligation to implement the Guidelines, and rape survivors seeking asylum are treated with disbelief and even hostility. Case law and international precedents are rarely referred to and frequently flouted. And while victims of torture are considered “vulnerable” people who should not be detained, many are detained, including rape survivors.
Even when women are believed, rape can be dismissed as “simple lust” or “random acts” by “unruly officers”, or women are told it is safe to live somewhere else in the country they fled – with no means of survival, except begging or prostitution.
Women are denied any support or even legal representation. As a result, many cases are closed and women fight for years to get justice. Trafficked women who escaped forced prostitution or other bonded labour, mothers of children conceived as a result of rape, under-age girls and other rape survivors, are left destitute and detained. Most are ultimately removed.
WE DEMAND THE OFFICIAL RECOGNITION OF RAPE AS TORTURE AND PERSECUTION.
sparks – thank you.
what more can i say?
x
No problem sw as it’s an area of great interest to me having worked face to face with it. Research by the counseling service at our R&A agency actually showed a 70% incidence of rape.
Have signed petition because as part of my women’s studies degree I researched aslyum definitions and also Geneva Convention on Aslyum. Guess what? Institutionalised and Government condoned male sexual and physical violence against women is not considered oppression because women are still not considered a ‘group.’ Hence women as a group supposedly cannot be oppressed or be suffer sexual torture because of their sex. Such acts are still considered individual and isolated ones.
Likewise our ‘wonderful and supposedly just country still refuses to even acknowledge the reality women of whatever ethnicity or nationality are commonly subjected to male sexual violence as a method of enforcing compliance or as punishment for daring to oppose patriarchal systems of power.
Yup Jennifer.
Who are they trying to fool? Every woman’s, humiliation, pain and distress does not figure on the patriarchies Richter scale because we are not viewed as fully human. Now mix that notion with a woman of colour seeking asylum; who figure even lower down that scale in the eyes of white men…
So yes,
You know, this is where I start to get really angry. Where very *nice* ‘lefty men’ get awffy upset about battery farming, the baybee seals in Canada and everything else to do with the unethical treatment of animals and potential global catastrophes. Though, as soon as you mention any oppression of women, including the treatment of lesbians, FGM, Sharia law, domestic violence, rape convictions, blah blah blah, they either glaze over or have this humongous knee jerk reaction.
Why?
Because it’s ’sex’. Not violence in their eyes, but sex.
Thanks Jennifer, I stand in awe your knowledge. In another case recently in the UK a woman from Africa was told that she couldn’t be a lesbian and was lying basically because she had been married and had a child, despite the fact that she had been forced into the marriage and raped to ‘cure’ her.
In all these cases there’s usually plenty of physical evidence of rape and torture also. And the UK goverment’s attitude in this area definitely lags behind others. For instance I understand that Canada has a significantly different attitude to granting asylum to women.
Of course rape is condoned in the UK as well.
I get it, so it can be classed as a war crime by the random actions of an individual or group. But women cannot be classed as an oppressed group targeted purely because of their sex.
Except when they blatantly are of course, historically time and time again.
The petition says 50% and as I’ve said before my experience is 70% of female asylum seekers are rape victims. So how the hell are these figures not seen as ‘women as a fracking GROUP are being targeted purely because of their sex’ ? Because 50-70% doesn’t sound that random to me.
Gawd I’m going to feed the ducks…
Part of the problem is that in order to acknowledge the oppression of women as a class, one must also acknowledge the specific CLASS who is performing that oppression. In other words, we’d have to blame all men — and not just some. But we can’t, for that would be too painful, so we only blame individual men and give Nigel a free pass.
We can’t blame one doood for all the harms committed against women, and we can’t blame the class of dooods without asking a few simply questions: How can a man oppress those he claims to love? How can a man sit idle while other men oppress those he claims to love?
No other oppression is committed by a class of people who claim to love those whom they oppress.
the more you keep asking those questions, the more we all learn about ourselves – as a man, the discomfort inherent in it being addressed strikes me as insignificant when set against what women suffer and what we can all gain.
I tried to get this through to Doctors Without Borders petitioners recently at a public demonstration, complete with mock up refugee village and doctor tents. They acted embarrassed on my behalf that I’d be gormless enough to say “mass rape” in public. And I did, in front of the hundreds of people the unbordered doctor was speaking to, pleading for financial support. What about the women you see in these camps, I began. What are you treating them for?
Huge euphemistic none answer.
Batty old lady repeats the question.
Embarrassed down cast eyes, mouth action, blushing, stammering, grateful response to another, more easily answered question.
I persisted, after, to one of the organizers. I was met with blushes. Yes. Blushes. I spoke about truth in history, what the youth (school buses unloading as we faced off) were going to know about war, and its effect on women. Discomfort, eyes anywhere but, blushing.
So why the blushing Sis. Is it because even they as an international medical agency are not addressing the problem as a separate phenomena. Or are they embarrassed because men are generating a sexual holocaust on women? (I guess a lot of the Sans Frontiers doctors are male)
Except maybe for animals. Nuff said.
Yes sw, maybe as you continue with your chosen path the ‘discomfort’ may also act as a catalytic force for you to peruse change. Where it is needed, within law, that is.
As long as you first get an AK47 and kill off the status quo within law SW. Good luck with the battle anyway. I tried, but I fought the law, and the law won.
But the status quo is not an option. (as somebody said).
i hope sparks is right.
i fear polly is right.
an all-out frontal assault on the law may be too casualty-heavy. i hope i can do a little bit about the conservatism that exists in the profession everywhere.
talking to some young women at my inn of court (hardly patriarchal at all…) about why the daily mail was a bad thing and it was hard to find a common language.
still, we got to do something about status quo and their lousy music.
And the denim waistcoats. My friend’s mum is a top barrister (well she makes loads of money anyway) and she reads the Daily Mail. Incomprehensible as she’s a bright woman, but apparently she doesn’t like anything too challenging when she’s not at work. And the Male is a good thing if you’re just looking for targets for satire.
She is however enough of a feminist to have taught my friend to go to primary school and repeat ‘woman are not men’s chattels’ in the playground.
Never mind hoping to do a ‘little bit’ about the conservatism…
well my first choice was obvious, but then i saw what tends to happen to barristers who start shooting people and i didn’t really fancy it.
Yup everybody makes a huge fuss when the police shoot them. Whereas of course if you’re just an Irishman carrying a table leg. Or a completly innocent Brazilian….
Re: the Male. My dad sent me a Peter Hitchens article from the male yesterday. It took me the longest time to get over the shock. Ooh, you have Irishman carrying table legs, we have MOC carrying wallets. How very cross-cultural (snark).
but i think the barristers probably deserve it.
(although this one was a bit unlucky as police seem not usually to shoot anyone who actually has a gun)
it felt significant that they put 6(?) rounds into him with about 20 being fired in total. i put this down to the fact that if you do get a chance to shoot a lawyer you really don’t want to mess it up.
Apology – Harry Stanley wasn’t even Irish, he was Scottish though the police were told he had an ‘Irish accent’.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3974461.stm
They were found guilty of breaking Health and Safety Laws over Jean Charles de Menezes though.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2007/11/01/menezes_emails_feature.shtml
And of course our police don’t all carry guns AW – just the ’specially trained’ ones. (thank dawg) Probably the difference in the number of fatalities.
Always last in following threads etc but Sis you know you dared to challenge male privilege and male power which of course is a BIIIIG TABOO SUBJECT.
It is common and almost global that certain taboo words must never, ever, be mentioned and what are these taboo words? Why male violence against women of course. Now we can say violence against women, or gender violence but on no account must we categorically state just who are the perpetrators. Why? Because of course, we are apparently claiming all men are rapists, women abusers, sexual harassers etc. etc. But and this is where it becomes interesting, it is apparently acceptable and routine for the media and society to consistently mention a certain phrase and that is ’she caused it, or she was responsible, she is to blame etc. etc.’ See it is okay to blame women and yes indeed this means all women but hey – women are not human and women do not have human rights so that makes it okay.
Which explains in part why women asylum seekers who have been brutally group raped by men because these women were lesbian, political activists, or simply because these women were women is still not seen as political oppression. Instead such cases of mass or individual male violence against women are treated as isolated individual cases. Of course there is no such thing as lesbian women because if there were, all women who identify as lesbian would not have had heterosexual relationships. We can ignore the fact lesbianism is still widely seen as deviant, demonic and supposedly downright dangerous. We can ignore evidence that not all women identify as lesbian from the minute they are born. We can ignore how male-dominated societies are determined to enforce compulsory heterosexuality.
Or to put it more simply just deny deny deny – deny everything, because patriarchy or rather more concisely male domination is all about denial and attempting to impose a male-centered and male-dominated view of the world. Why else is rape still narrowly defined from the male perspective, whereas male heterosexuality sexuality is still widely perceived as being naturally aggressive, coercive and dominant. It is ‘natural.’
Okay so we also need to add how class, ethnicity and race interconnects, but with regards to women seeking aslyum, if they so much as dare to ‘claim’ a man/men raped/sexually tortured them’, immediately the blinkers come out and the person in authority says ‘but what happened to you was an isolated incident. No way were you subjected to political oppression, now be a good girl and go back to where you came from. After all there must be somewhere in your own country which is safe for you. No? I don’t believe you because like all women you are lying.’ See how easy it is to erase women’s experiences because no matter how much evidence these women produce, still they have to endure being cross-examined and disbelieved by individuals who adhere to male-centered and male-dominated perspectives. Of course another huge factor is who has the power and who does not.
I do not see women aslyum seekers having power whereas I do see the predominantly male government having power. Yes I know, even if more women were elected, this would not automatically mean power would become more women-friendly.
So, having gone on far too long the central issue is that on no acount must we hold men as a group responsible for the continuing and unabated war on women. If the UN is too afraid to use those taboo words ‘male violence against women’ then obviously lesser mortals will be afraid too.
So, we must ask ourselves why? Not all men commit violence against women but that is because not all men need to since it only takes a few men for the patriarchal system to work. Add on how the law and societal views reinforce the supposed ‘naturalness of women’s inferiority and men’s superiority’ and we have patriarchy. Yes, I know it is more complex than that – but at the core is men’s refusal to challenge other men about their misogyny, sexual violence and contempt for women. Why? Because men as a group are afraid – not of women but of other men. If a man dares to speak out he will be called a ‘woman or other worse female sexualised insults and not many men are prepared to have their supposed ‘manhood’ subjected to such insults. Women of course do not have a ‘womanhood’ they are just men’s sexualised objects.
And I didn’t intend writing this long a comment! But the denials and justifications for claiming women are not a group makes me very angry. Yes we do have oppressed groups wherein they are oppressed because of race or ethnicity but guess what? These groups comprise both women and men (but of course women’s oppression is different to men’s). Any guesses as to why such groups are recognised but not women as a group?
“It is common and almost global that certain taboo words must never, ever, be mentioned and what are these taboo words? Why male violence against women of course. Now we can say violence against women, or gender violence but on no account must we categorically state just who are the perpetrators.”
They are but I think some headway might be being made. I recently got a book out of my library title “Rethinking the Man Question, Sex, Gender and Violence in International Relations.”
I haven’t had a chance to read read it yet, but with section titles like “Interrogating White Male Privilege,” “Porno-nationalism’ and the male subject,” and “national myths and the creations of heroes,”it seems quite promising.
re Polly @23. It’s only a matter of time before you all get tasers. (no I don’t have facts to back this up, but my new theory is that if it can go wrong it will…and in the sciences theories are held as truthful until proven wrong. So far, I haven’t had any evidence to contrary, unless you count the lack of nuclear holocaust.
“Any guesses as to why such groups are recognised but not women as a group?”
Because women (and children} are seen as property. The property of men. This is what rape law is based on. It is based on the idea that rape is a property crime which occurs when one man trespasses and infringes upon the property rights of another man. The crime is committed against the owner of the property, not the property itself. So when a rape occurs, the crime is considered to have been committed against the woman’s owner, be it her husband, father, brother, etc, not against the woman herself. Rape decreases the value of a man’s property and goods, therefore he must be compensated for that damage. So he’s given 2 cows and a pig or something. In cases where a woman has no owner, as is the case with lesbians, prostitutes or even single women, no crime is seen to have occured. Because unless the property is owned, no crime can occur. The property itself has no rights. Same goes for spousal rape. A man can do what he wants with his property. If he feels like setting fire to his property, so be it. No crime has occured.
The rape laws really haven’t changed all that much in 5,000 years, nor have the views and attitudes towards women, who are still seen as property, even today. The property of men.
“The rape laws really haven’t changed all that much in 5,000 years, nor have the views and attitudes towards women, who are still seen as property, even today. The property of men.”
Conservative men view women as private property. Liberal men view women as public property. Feminists bring forth the radical notion that women aren’t property at all.
To be honest, I’d forgot about the ‘property’ element Lucky. Tho’ I just wrote something yesterday about the institute of ‘marriage and property’…same shit.
nitpick – the law on rape doesn’t really reflect that property element, with things like the hugely-belated recognition of marital rape. the law still doesn’t WORK, of course, but that’s a different point. (i actually think the law itself on rape isn’t bad; it’s just that it can’t address the real problem which starts way before any potential court case – and i’ll spare you the lecture on things you know more about than i do).
i certainly wouldn’t argue with the proposition that men/male society tend to regard class woman as property of different sorts.
Yes, laws may change but mindsets often take a lot longer. “man & wife” taking of the man’s name and so forth.
To illustrate, beyond our shores, there’s still a lot of catching up to do.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/163076/when_women_are_property_husband_sells.html?cat=7
In addition, if any other group of human beings were targeted for this level of abuse – would be considered a Hate Crime.
No wait, you need to possess a penis for that…
Hmm if I can nitpick your nitpick SW. The rape of a virgin will still – in practice – be regarded as more serious than the rape of a woman with considerable sexual experience. So the law in theory doesn’t reflect the concept of property but in practice it sure as hell does. Law isn’t just what’s written down, as I’m sure you’ve gathered by now.
Also have you ever, ever heard of a man actually being convicted for raping a woman to whom he is married? No – neither have I.
I’m thinking of having a penis grafted on so I can whine about how oppressed I am.
Yes, the concept of ‘property’ is encoded into social norms on a psychological level (within this instance). It wasn’t that long ago that men had to ask permission from their prospective wife’s father to marry his ‘property’ Of course, still prevailing in many cultures. But yeah Polly the ‘virgin’ is a good example and likewise with married women whose husbands have had their ‘property’ violated.
still don’t see it (the reflection in sentencing of the value of the woman violated) – the property is not characterised as more or less valuable – unless it is a bad woman of whom we all disapprove, in which case it isn’t taken seriously.
though again, i do of course agree about marriage as the transfer of woman as chattel of father to chattel of husband. (and i know people – posh people obviously – who actually did ask permission of their prospective father-in law)
i thought the legal recognition of marital rape came about precisely when a husband was convicted of raping his wife – will check and confirm.
and i think law is what happens in courts and definitely NOT what is written down. i can’t even claim to be radical in that respect because they kinda tell you that on bar school day one.
But that’s it SW, there is a continuous series of unspecified items of deeply encoded beliefs that blend into each other so gradually and seamlessly that it is impossible to say where one becomes the next. In relation to the value of women – that is. For instance a virgin on her way home from bible classes and modestly dressed would be viewed completely different from a single woman ‘out on the toon’ even tho’ the latter is not viewed as ‘a bad woman’ she is still viewed as lesser than the former. And it continues ad nauseam…
yes she would, but not because of any difference in the property relationship. and that was where i started to nitpick.
it’s just like the good and bad people with hiv – the nice ones who got it from blood transfusions and the nasty ones who got it from sex and drugs.
i believe we place the arbitrary value on the woman who was the object of a rape not on an imagined value to the male owner but on how closely she conforms to our normative view of what the woman should be. virgin coming back from pub in short skirt is likely to be valued the same as more sexually-experienced woman coming back from pub in short skirt.
all of which when you actually write it out just makes you ever more conscious of how fucked up male society is.
But this is about male ownership. How else could we be even having this conversation? “How closely she conforms to our (men’s) normative view of what woman should be”
Do we have similar conversations regarding men?
similar conversations regarding men? what an idea! why would we? men are the norm, silly!
‘But this is about male ownership. How else could we be even having this conversation?’ – agreed 100%
the only bit i was querying was the detail of how it all looks to operate.
i think conversations are had about men when they depart from the normative ideal in various ways, homesexuality being the first that springs to my mind. the masters don’t like anyone being different from them. but this is an egg-sucking lesson for you, so i shan’t go on.
i think i am agreeing with you on almost all of this – perhaps the precise mechanic looks a bit different in my version. on all the othering, appropriation, diminishing of women i’m on the same page (i think, but i’m always keen to hear about the bits i’m not, cos that usually turns out to be the bits i haven’t thought about properly.)
i have flogged this particular dead horse quite long enough and will be quiet now. probably a silly nitpick in the first place – sorry. i have to read the protection of badgers act and that’s really important.
Badgers are Evol. And do not need protecting.
Well I came up with this SW via google. In the Republic of Ireland it took 12 years from the law being changed for a man to actually be convicted of raping his wife.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2139229.stm
12 years is a fucking lifetime (well a 12yr old’s lifetime, but you see what i mean). you would think that all laws would get tested and have both results quicker than that.
just a gut reaction but i don’t know what a reasonable formula would be for how soon you should expect both results to have happened.
whatever the formula, 12 years must be longer than one should expect.
any uk info?, he asked in a too-lazy-to-look-at-westlaw sort of way…
(i mean, there are badgers that need protecting – yes agree they are absolute buggers)
Hmm well I have just checked and the defendant in the original case was only found guilty of attempted rape. (There was no question as to what he did, which was attempting to rape and strangle his estranged wife) only whether he could rape his wife or not. Rape cases don’t get reported that much obviously, so I really don’t know if there’s been a similar case in the UK since then. I did know a woman who took a similar case against her estranged husband and lost though.
Badgers – the truth. Everyone thinks they are harmless cuddly black and white creatures. However not only do they spread Bovine TB (who can forget the Archers 900 part story on the subject) but are also no friends of archaeologists. One I know was trying to get permission to remove the beasts from Glastonbury Abbey (which they were merrily digging up with scant regard for the importance of the site) and was told he couldn’t because there were so many of them round about that there was nowhere to put them.
Endangered species – pah!
Newts – another supposedly endangered species that are thugs, vandals and generally all over the place!
Too true Polly, they have ate all the frogs for a second year running.
One of the little girl’s (pictured) grandmother owns the garden, so, as I’m doing my tour with the nursery she enlightens the group (pond stage) as to why the only frog we have is a ceramic one.
Oh dear.
I cheered them up with the story of the gnome who lives in the earth closet.
And everyone. I do have permission to use the pic.
that’s nature for ya – they eat each other.
Yup but why are we constantly told the damn things are endangered when there’s zillions of them? Bats – there’s another one. They even build them special houses now.
My Bats have gone into hibernation now…
[...] Thanks Sparkle. And thanks Simply Wondered. Women and children are 80% of refugees and displaced people worldwide. International courts have recognized that rape is routinely used as a weapon of war (*1) and an estimated 50% of women seeking asylum in the UK are rape survivors (*2). Yet the UN Convention on Refugees which defines who is entitled to protection does not recognise the specific persecution of women. Each woman must battle against institutional sexism, and institutional racism if she is a woman of colour, forced to show how her case relates to the Convention. [...]
I am a British white Woman aged 42yrs, i am a mother of a son aged 20 yrs nearly 21 yrs after christmas 2008. I have a daughter aged 6 yrs. I am a survivor of numerous rapes and gang rapes. Last year i was suicidal, nearly committed suicide on 2 occassions, if someone had not been there to get me into an ambulance i would be dead & not writingthis post. My parents are unsupportive ( i have nothing to do with them now) my parents when i was aged 18 did nothing to help me when i was gang raped on holiday by 11 teenagers, again they did nothing to help me when i was date raped by a man aged 20yrs at the time, infact they forced me to go out with him, hoping that they could get shot of me at aged 18 yrs & married off to the guy who kept raping me. It not just asylum seekers, it ordinary women in Britain people of it’s own country are being raped day in & day out.
All my attackers said to me was ‘ we get away with it and there is nothing you can do about it ‘, a predator who preyed on me & instigated gang rapes on me since i had been seventeen took it upon himself to find out when i was going through a divorce when my then son was aged 18 months old. I have dissociation due to trauma from an early age, i didn’t realise what was happening to me that this guy continued to have me raped & raped me himself when i was a single parent. This guy my step-brother got involved with was surrounded by drugs. The funny thing is when i was a teenager my parents moved all of us to a rich area & rented a house there, it was in this area that my life of horror began. No one cares about a teenager whose parents aren’t supportive of her, British law also still classifies women as ‘ property ‘ & it’s rape against the state not the woman herself, women are questioned as to her sexuality ( unless you are a virgin or married having been a virgin, you don’t stand much of a chance within British law), women are told by rapists that they can be raped & there is nothing that they can do about it, as sexual violence is covered up and also ‘ hard to prove ‘ women suffer the trauma of rape, the consequences of it too ( Suicidal/suicide) then on top they are bullied and tried as social delinquents called ‘ sluts ‘ & loose women. In fact when it boils down to it women are not regarded to have entitlement of thier own sexuality, thus according to freud that we are all sexual beings renders one to think that ‘ women are non human & therefore not entitled to thier own sexuality but are regarded as mere property’ property of thier husbands, thier fathers and the state. We are brought up to believe that thier is sexual equality in the modern world, but as with men every time who are physically stronger than women always get away with sexual violence of women on the grounds of dispute of ‘ It was a relationship ‘. if a woman tries to seek justice she is paraded as to her own sexuality, the woman living in the modern world is disillousioned to expecting equal rights & complaining of a crime committed against her person & her psychological trauma, within British law she is faced with the cold hard truth that she is not protected by the law, especially if she has had relationships of a sexual encounter.
I myself was brought up by a mother who’s father was a peodophile, she was emotionally un-intelligent, disragrded any of my emotional needs, left me at the hands of her abusive father, in which my grandmother would not protect me either, also my step-father ( Ken Pavey Founder of the shadow’s band, a one time English guitarist of the English Drifter’s) who sexually assaulted me from the age of 14 yrs of age through to my age of 19 yrs old until i left home, became engaged then married for the first time. My mother didn’t protect me from my step-father ( she was just like her mother). I myself once i was left in a dangerous situation of trying to commit suicide after i had been dropped from counselling ( a set period of 1 yr, which didn’t meet my needs, after all the abuse i had suffered in my life), i came into contact with police, there a young officer bullied me, i was just treated with contempt, even that officer called me a slut on occassions where i was suicidal & he was there on the scene at the time suppossedly supposed to be looking after me.
I have suffered sexual abuse & rape from an early age, all throughout my life, at times i still feel suicidal, howeversessions ofacupunture has stopped the impulses to go through with an act of suicide.
Rape is rape & it is sexual violence & torture of a woman, it leads to suicidal ideation and suicidal acts, in the worst cases death of the woman. It is age old and throughout history rape has been committed primarily women as the targets. It is evidently male dominance that leaves women un protected against this traumatic torture, including that of British law.there are differnet statistics concerning women and rape, however the reality will be much higher than any statistics shown, as women are forced to be silent about rape & the way they are treated as a result of it, however what ever age this has occurred with a woman, soon or later the scars re-emerge like a boil coming to ahead, she may survive for a time, but if not sooner, later the results will show the woman to be suicidal in each & every case. I have no doubts as with the law within Britain, the message gets sent that it will always be the woman that suffers & pays for the violence of men, i expect the reality will be that every 2 out of 4 women within Britain will have been raped, as concerning the ages band, with teenage rapes being higher, it will result in every 3 out of 4 women that will have suffered rape. Rape is common within Britain with women.
Shelley
Hi Shelly and thank you for your openness. I agree that the majority of abuse and exploitation occurs far from the public gaze and is not acknowledged by a fair proportion of society. And as was mentioned up thread I (and many others) continue to recognize that the concept of women as ‘property’ is encoded into social norms on a psychological level. I.e. laws may have changed but deeply held beliefs have not.
Absolutely, we have a socialized ‘masculine’ interpretation of our sexuality imposed onto us by men. And for example whether it’s by ‘Raunch Culture’ or the wearing of the Burka – it’s still men dictating what is deemed as desirable and essential in as far as our sexuality goes. This cannot be executed without a sense of ’property’
Thanks.
I signed it, Sparkle.
Hi all,
Who said ‘ men are the norm, silly ‘ . Perhaps i should opt for a sex change. I could whine & whine about oppression and hate crime about me then? Then i’d be part of the norm too, instead of depressed and wracked with anxiety.
The funniest thing is: All men start as a female fetous in the womb, so they had to be female first before the dreaded Testosterone kicked in and turned them male.
‘ Could you imagine the whole world full of just one sex? I mean the strongest by nature always survives, how would the human race exist without the female’. However it would serve them right if women weren’t around anymore!
Anyway, were do i sign?
Shelley.
Me again!
I signed!
Shelley
’scuse me sir or madam, I believe your blog has died.
Ooh, I get it, it’s on purpose. Sorrry, ducks out.
It’s not dead, it’s just under siege from Canada so I’ve made the post in question invisible.
You see there’s an article on the CBC.ca news website that contains a link to a post of mine from 2006 concerning the mainstreaming of pornography.
I’ve had over 6,500 hits in just over a day and a lot of men have wrote to me to tell me that I’m (we) are wrong. Quell surprise!
Here’s the 28 Nov 2008 article: http://xr.com/cft
That’s terrifying. Quell surprise indeed. You should temporarily post about the many wonderful uses of the enter button. That’ll confuse the visiting menz, and as demonstrated, me, me, me.
I could tell them that they are doin’ it ‘RONG.
Hi Sparklematrix,
i looked up the link you left of 28Nov 2008 article. Wallop Maddona in the face! Interesting.
However, that piece of history to do with the ‘ Bunny Girl ‘ i wonder where that came from?….Humping like bunnies no doubt, and who does that better than men, another dollop of thier transference again no doubt!
Is it just me or do others get the impression as well, that men will always want to subject women as objects and use them as mirror images of thier own sexual needs and fantasies.
Boy! are men ultimately selfish to the core!
I know that if a woman claims rape if she has been drinking alcohol or substance abuses, it is automatically taken by solicitors and a cour that she consented to sex and was not raped. However, under those types of intoxicating substances, she can’t be reasonably expected to consent to a medical examination! Crazy is not the word!
If the shoe was on the other foot and the man found to be drinking alcohol or substance useage, i’ll bet he is not automatically considered a rapist, but an innocent!
British Law is sexist beyond belief, it’s still socially controlling women. Control: another of men’s favourite past-times to the present.
Oops! I spelled Court as Cour.
Sorry.
‘I’ve had over 6,500 hits in just over a day and a lot of men have wrote to me to tell me that I’m (we) are wrong. Quell surprise!’
oh come on, sparks, traffic is traffic! i liked your ‘making up the numbers’ heckle on the locked spunk thread. i also loved the urban myth about spunk being good moisturiser. it really can’t have anything to do with a ‘can i come on your face, please – it’s soooooo good for your complexion you know’ line. even we wouldn’t think women were that daft – oh yeah fair point, we would, we do….. *shakes head at self*
and apparently a friend heard that misogyny is really good for women’s self-esteem.
delighted that bloke has friends who were university-educated and work in the adult entertainment industry. (tho when you called it the adult ‘entertainment’ industry, i think you meant the ‘adult’ ‘entertainment’ industry since it seems to make us ever more juvenile.
actually i didn’t recognise the moisturiser as spunk (more like custard) but i don’t think i have seen a money shot of that sort (that’s not me being virtuous, i just don’t happen to have seen porn films) so who knows? the blokes who made the ad may be different however.
Hi Shelly. I also think the Bunnie symbolizes, harmless, easily domesticated, ‘pink ‘n fluffy’ (see harmless) oh yeah and prolific shaggers. And yes I agree the male media’s sexist interpretation of female sexuality is undoubtedly their fantasies projected onto us. Which then of course takes on a life of it’s own and becomes ingrained in the cultural conception of womanhood. It’s like when folks say “yeah well, sex sells” naa it doesn’t, it’s sexism that sells.
Yeah sw the ‘go on it’s good for you’ wears a bit thin after you’re about six.
“eat your crusts – it will give you curly hair”
“but, I already have curly hair”
Ah SW. You ain’t seen nothing yet. You need educating. Got to go to school.
Or university maybe.
(I hope everyone now has the visual of Smashey and Nicey that I’ve got.)
i went to university to get educated and all they gave me was old books and old etonians.
*sigh*
It doesn’t matter where one ‘ cuts it ‘ so to speak, the Rape Laws in Britain will always remain sexist in favour of the male.
I mean would you credit it, for the actual amount of information about women and rape and the mere less than 1 % of false allegations of rape on men, British law still wants to protect the minority not the majority, the minority being males falsely accused of rape in comparision for the amount of say approx 65% – 75% of women who are actually raped. The figures accounted for, of women and rape varies all over the place they say 2 out of 4 on one survey, then it’s 1 out of 3, then another says 3 out of 4, also some accounts are saying that along with thier survey of 1 out of 3 the figure could be much higher…So what are they saying 2 out of 3 women are raped?
Which ever is the closest to the truth, it’s still British Law protecting the male rather than the female, and thus the minority is protected rather than the majority! It’s not crazy , it’s male domination and ‘ SEXIST ‘!
Shelley