NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/alt/feminism/6636

Internet Message Format | 1992-12-30 | 4.1 KB

Xref: sparky alt.feminism:6636 soc.men:21904 soc.women:21960
Newsgroups: alt.feminism,soc.men,soc.women
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From: [e-mail] (Bronis Vidugiris)
Subject: Re: Living in a State of Siege
Organization: Motorola, CCR&D, CORP, Schaumburg, IL
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 12:12:59 GMT
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Note - my alt.feminism feed seems to be temporarily glitched out (not sure if
some of my earlier stuff got out, and I may have missed some responses).

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
)[e-mail] (Daniel B. Holzman) writes:

)>Who is "we", Muffy?
)
)As I read it, "we" is "[those who] talk about the violence that is practiced
                                    ^^^^
)against women" and the "they" is "some people here [who] start shouting about
                                                          ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^
)the violence that happens to men."

No, no, WE are those who TALK about violence against men,  and THEY are
those who SHOUT about violence against women!  Sheesh!

)This is a well taken point.  I believe the point that Muffy was making is
)that we can't even *DISCUSS* violence against women, because people raise
)the big, red SEXIST flag and level accusations of misandry.  It would be
)*NICE*, IMO, to actually discuss BOTH.  Especially, since this is
)alt.feminism, about how both relate to feminism and sex roles in society.
)But everytime we try to discuss EITHER, we just enter these meta-discussions
)like the one you are having here and we never get to the issue.

Yeah, but when WE talk about violence against men, (some of) those talking
about violence against women accuse US of SHOUTING and SHOUTING THEM DOWN.
(I'm not sure exactly how one 'shouts someone down' on the net - there is
some psychological effect, but it's a bit nebulous.  It's certainly not like
the in-person case, where you literally cannot make yourself heard at the
same time someone is shouting.)

Some people start talking about the need for 'solutions'.  I was thinking
about this some more, and it occurred to me that perhaps this was premature,
and that more work was needed on the 'problem definition phase' - though
some 'solution stuff' might be OK if one actually has one.

Thinking about this some more, I see a very few issues which are
gender-specific, and some which were not:

Gender specific issues:

Men:  Violence against men is not as well publicized as violence against
women (IMO).  This seems to have a lot to do with sex-roles and expectations.

Prison inmates are skewed towards men more than the rate of crime comission
would suggest.

Solution: (IMO). Start talking about it more, even if you are accused of
(*gasp*) SHOUTING!

Statistically, murder mostly affects men.

Women:  Women seem to have some issues relating to fear, IMO. The fear can
be crippling even without the violence.  Why don't they just 'take it like a
man' :-) (??). Statistically, rape mostly affects women.

Solution: (??????)

Non-gender specific issues:

The US has a very high crime rate in general.  The US also have a very high
rate of people in prison or jail - crime rate is high in spite of a high
rate of imprisonment.  Contrary to rumor, it appears that only a small
fraction of people in prison are in prison because of drug offenses.
(38K out of 449K for state prisons, 1986 data - and other data shows most
people in prison are in state prisons, though I can't quote it offhand).

Domestic violence is often portrayed as a gender-specific issue, but the best
data (IMO) indicate that it is probably not, except for the prevalence of
injuries (actually seeking treatment for same, there may be some differences
in treatment-seeking vs. gender).  There may still be some differences in
needs even though the problem affects both genders in fairly comparable
amounts.