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Sitting On Offence

Like they say, your mileage may vary. By all means comfort people who are upset, although in a lot of situations that is likely to get you into further trouble, for example conflict with parents.

You are assuming everyone else thinks like you or ought to. I don't, and actually I'm pretty reasonable. Really :)

I just no longer believe that its my job to set the world to rights, and anyway my idea of what is right probably isn't yours.
 
Cochise, as I made clear, you have made a statement that is feminist i.e.
Cochise said:
... treat people as people, each complicated in their own way
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Some people do not feel that way, and treat other humans with contempt, are you saying that such people deserve the same consideration from you as those who are oppressed by that contempt and the actions founded in that contempt?

You seem worried about "getting into trouble", would you worry about getting into trouble if you saw a rape in progress? At what point does the severity of the offense over-ride your concerns? You suggest that people might get into trouble defending and offering comfort to a 12 year old - so what? Is the trouble you attract in that case in any way more serious than the psychological or physical harm that child would suffer without your intervention?

Essentially if you can live with yourself by failing to intervene that is fine. I cannot live that way, the comfort and freedom of others is more important to me than any temporary embarrassment I might feel from interfering.

Let me remind you of the words of Pastor Niemoller
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me
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I'm perfectly aware of Pastor Niemoller. 'Getting into trouble' - shorthand for all sorts of unintended consequences, from reinforcing the parent's misguided assessment of the situation to being accused of paedophilia yourself. None of which will help you convince anyone that your interpretation of how the world should work is better than theirs

I'm not responsible for the way other people choose to live their lives, or what they choose to believe. Neither are you.

You are assuming your picture of the world is right for everybody else and that what you do could not possibly cause harm. Well, when I was younger I used to assume much the same. Since then I have become all too aware of the law of unintended consequences. I'm not going to erect straw men or try to disillusion you or to describe the experiences that have lead to my current views.

You may or may not eventually have similar experiences.

There is something complicated i would like to say but I don't really know how to say it. A couple of things, actually.

One might be summarised by the contrast between the two proverbs 'look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves' and 'penny wise pound foolish' . While the West is obsessing over whether whistling at a pretty girl is harassment, in large parts of the world women are being treated worse than cattle - as it happened, just after yesterdays post I was watching a program largely centred on the rape and witchcraft crisis in Papua New Guinea. Now that really was 'horrifying' - to quote this thread's title. One pregnant woman who had been suspected of witchcraft had been tortured with heated weapons in unimaginable ways for two days and had lost her baby. Perhaps the most horrifying thing was the matter-of-fact way she described what had happened to her, as if she had slipped over while going to the shops or something.

The other is, there is a difference between preventing actual cruelty and assault and encouraging everyone to treat others with respect. It becomes even more complicated when dealing with 'psychological harm' - something which most laymen are neither equipped to assess or to treat. It actually seems to me that the more PC our society has become, the respect and tolerance with which we treat each other has become less - substantially less than in the 60's and 70's which was the era of my youth. Coupled with this there are a whole raft of the above mentioned unintended consequences which means that different groups in our society have less meaningful interaction with each other than they did back then, so much less chance of the principles of one group moderating the principles of others.

As I say, I may have expressed the above two points in an unclear way - these are deep and complicated issues. I gave up believing in simple yes/no answers and that there is one 'right way' that I can impose on others a long time ago. In reality, everything in this imperfect world is a shade of grey, and everyone needs to decide for themselves what their sticking points are.
 
Cochise said:
I'm not responsible for the way other people choose to live their lives, or what they choose to believe. Neither are you.
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If you really believed that then your neighbour could go out killing, maiming, stealing or performing any other socio- or psychopathic action without any intervention from yourself; sorry, but I am part of society (the communal effort that allows humans to live together) and part of being part of society is intervening when another's actions threaten that society. A failure to act or to speak up contributes, however infinitesimally, to the degradation of society. You claim to be aware of Niemoller's statement yet you seem to regard it as having no bearing upon your own actions, despite the fact it is a clarion call to intervene before the abusers become so strong that you, and the society you belong to, are destroyed.

You fixate upon the immediate harmful consequences of intervention without considering the long term consequences, possibly preferring to leave it up to any "higher authority" to prevent harm to yourself and others. You claim that you have been subject to ill effects from acting, well whoop-de-do.

Suffering unintended consequences is a part of living. Personally in relation to the subject at hand, I was beaten up by a gang of guys who were attempting to beat up another; I have been assaulted for trying to call the police to stop a man beating his girlfriend; I have stood on the steps of the South African Embassy in Trafalgar Square knowing that the British security services tracked such participants; I complained when a manager called a customer a "fuckin' Paki" behind his back and was nearly fired until the business owner realised the said customer was one of the company's best; I was screamed at when I intervened to stop a mother beating her child in public; I was banned from an atheist MB for complaining about the sexism of some of the commentators.

But the above are only particularly memorable because of those consequences, there have been countless times that I have intervened or spoken up suffering no ill effects. Nearly always there has been a positive result or response - mostly in cases where men were molesting or belittling women.

I am not asking that you act as directly as I tend to do, but I am asking for you and others to support and offer aid both to those do intervene and to those who are affected by prejudice, assault and rape. Additionally I am asking for those who do regard women as more than sex toys to speak up and make it clear such behaviour is not tolerated. Consider it a paradox, some intolerance is required to ensure wider tolerance.
 
Maybe I've been coached by all the PC stuff in the media these days but I did find the Lewis Hamilton thing quite offensive - on several levels.

There is obviously the blatant sexual connotation of a grinning male squirting liquid into an uncomfortable woman's face. Whether intentional or not it doesn't look great.

Secondly you have the multi-millionaire getting his kicks by spraying someone, who is probably not being paid a huge amount in comparison, with champagne knowing that they will presumably have to take it in good humour for fear of not getting hired again. She has downplayed it, but wouldn't you if you wanted to continue working in those kind of jobs.

Thirdly, it was in China which is quite well-known for being a reserved nation. That kind of boorish behaviour might be par for the course in Britain or the US but in another country I think it is only decent to respect the culture and behave in a fitting manner. "When in Rome..."

And finally, it is just obnoxious behaviour. Flat out.
 
schwadevivre, I think I've made it pretty clear that I do not support your approach.

I'm not fixated on anything, I simply don't believe I have the right or the skills to intervene in other's actions unless I can see actual violence is being perpetrated. You can try moral blackmail all you like, but since my set of morals is clearly different to yours you are missing the mark.

How do you actually know you've done good? Because people tell you so? Are you sure they aren't just being nice to get you to go away? How do you know you haven't damaged their self image or their ability to be self reliant? Are you a psychiatrist?
 
Just a couple of responses because I know I will not change your mind

You ask how I know an intervention has done some good? Well:
  • when a man stops punching his girlfriend in the stomach to attack me, I call that effective;
  • when I can stop a child being slapped repeatedly by his mother no matter for how long, I call that a win no matter what names she calls me;
  • when a woman cries for 10 minutes and seeks a battered woman's refuge because I have listened to her about her husband beating her, I think that has done some good;
  • When a woman is feels able to talk to me about how her lesbian lover bullies her, I feel I may have helped;
  • If I can stop an online troll from ranting at a vulnerable person then that's a bonus.
You believe nothing you can do will make it better, fine; but luckily not all people have that view.

As to the following you may regard the following, I do not:
Schwadevivre said:
I am not asking that you act as directly as I tend to do, but I am asking for you and others to support and offer aid both to those do intervene and to those who are affected by prejudice, assault and rape. Additionally I am asking for those who do regard women as more than sex toys to speak up and make it clear such behaviour is not tolerated. Consider it a paradox, some intolerance is required to ensure wider tolerance.
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The risk with some of those things is that you have made things worse but aren't there to see it, eg I wouldn't confront a woman about hitting her child in public because I grew up around people who did that and have a fair idea that if I did, the mother would take it out on the child later.

I don't think there is a way to 'win' against people who are that low. Even if you can do some good, they can do some harm just to spite you.
 
OneWingedBird said:
I don't think there is a way to 'win' against people who are that low
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I'm not saying that every harm can be stopped permanently, but I have to give it a try. If it stops the immediate damage then that is definitely a plus. Of course you are right about what happens when they get home but ongoing abuse is probable in such a home so not much has changed. However action may put it into an abusers mind that a busy body might file a report with to Social Services.

If a few more people became "busy bodies" then abusers be at greater risk of discovery. If a few more people stopped the rapist before he takes the intoxicated woman out of the bar then there would be a small reduction in rapes. If a few more people accepted the accounts of those damaged by sexual abuse then there there would be more chance of discovery.

Anecdotal evidence but still a true story. I was friends with a woman for some years and eventually she felt able to tell me about her teenage brother raping her from the age of 8 until she was 12. After the first two she did tell her mother (a psychologist) who denied that it could have happened. Coming to the UK when she was 18 the lost contact with her brother until he showed up in the UK when she was 26. He sought out my friend and apologised, then he started talking about his own family and his 6 yo daughter. My friend recognised the sexualised terms he was using were the same terms he had once used about her. My friend talked to me and found she was not judged, but believed.

I found out later that my friend had contacted her mother again who was now able to entertain the idea of child sexual abuse, investigated and realised the infant daughter was being groomed. The mother got her son help and was able to ensure that no harm came to her granddaughter. I am not claiming responsibility for my friend's actions but she did tell me that talking to me had helped her deal with her fears.
 
Cochise and OWB have made some very valid points and I take a similar view, you can never be sure that your actions won't have an unintended consequence somewhere down the line. In the 1970's-80's things were different; workmen did whistle at girls but it wasn't thought of as an insult, which it is now, but if a man was beating up his girlfriend in public people did tend to step in and challenge him.

Would I intervene if I saw a child being sexually harassed? Yes, because I am a middle aged grandmother and I would turn homicidal if it was one of mine that was being accosted, so I would feel I had a right to act. Would I encourage any of my male relatives to do the same? No.

It seems to me that, in these days of 24-7 surveillance and almost everyone possessing a camera phone, the easiest way to address this is to call the police and let them deal with it. If a crime has been committed it is their job to do something about it.
 
Rosebud said:
Cochise and OWB have made some very valid points and I take a similar view, you can never be sure that your actions won't have an unintended consequence somewhere down the line
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But you can be certain that inaction will have unpleasant (at best) consequences. You would act in the case of sexual abuse, that's great! But all to many people would not.

I repeat I am not asking everybody to be as proactive as I am, but I am asking that everybody does something, no matter how minor, to mitigate some type of abuse. You rightly observe that there are video cameras everywhere but these are useless unless they are examined and that only happens if someone is told about it. Like the man dragging a crying girl child out of the men's toilet, someone has to tell store security even though it might be nothing.

You, personally, are willing to act in certain cases and I just think that others should do the same. Read the Reddit thread, read the reports on "Everyday Sexism," read the newspapers and you will see the result of a laissez faire approach to these problems. Look at the Bradford cases where no-one acted to protect the girls because it might be called racist and the girls were "asking for it". Look at the way abusers manipulate the system; Jimmy Savile and Bill Cosby being prime examples. Too often children, male and female, fall through the cracks because everyone who has the chance to act does not. Look at bullying in the workplace or the everyday sexual harassment of staff; it thrives in an environment where everyone says "Oh, it's not too bad."

We do not live in "the best of all possible worlds". Given that, how are things to change if not through the actions of ordinary people?
 
Schwadevivre said:
Like the man dragging a crying girl child out of the men's toilet, someone has to tell store security even though it might be nothing.
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What if it was a woman dragging a screaming boy child from the female toilets.

I imagine that is a far more common scenario, but the one time I saw a child being abused physically in public it was a woman who full force slapped a early teen boy, certainly no more than 13, in the face. She was European, he was Asian - so she clearly wasn't his birth mother. My thought was if she will do that in public on a busy street what goes on at home? Did I do anything? No. Mainly because I was still picking my jaw off the floor at what I had seen and they had disappeared off into the crowd but also I didn't speak enough French to begin to convey what I wanted to.
 
Schwadevivre, I'll try one more time. In my opinion - intervention of the kind you apparently practice tends to have the opposite effect of what the intervenor intends.

There are different kinds of intervention. As I'm sure you would, if I see a crime is being committed I'd report it to the police. That is a quite different situation to verbally confronting someone you think is a bully. I can assure you, from my childhood when I was bullied, that doesn't work. It will simply result in worse consequences for the victim when you are not there. I won't digress into how I eventually solved my problem.

And to clarify, it is not the consequences for myself that have ever worried me, it is that consequences may either rebound on the other people involved, or will cause their attitudes to harden rather than soften.

Edit - shortened a bit - I tend to get too verbose!
 
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McAvennie said:
I imagine that is a far more common scenario,
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Well I've never noticed it and the point is that, even if it such things are innocent events, it needs to be noted so that, if necessary, the store video is examined. (BTW In the case I cited I was not the only person telling store security, I arrived about 10 seconds after another busy body and was able to confirm what we had seen).

As to what you saw, I know it is not possible to act in every case but at least you saw what happened and were shocked. For future reference in a similar case make a note of when and where and ask the British consulate to inform the local police.

Do the simple things:
  • stop when you see someone fall over;
  • help at the scene of an accident;
  • take a first aid course;
  • ask your local police how to respond to events such as these;
  • if you work for a company with an HR department speak to them about how to report bullying and abuse;
  • knock on the door of the bad tempered neighbour you haven't seen for a week.

No-one is a superhero, but everyone can do something. If, instead of waiting for to pay back, we paid it forward life would, possibly, be better
 
Cochise said:
In my opinion - intervention of the kind you apparently practice, in any situation less than physical violence, tends to have the opposite effect of what the intervenor intends
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Your opinion is fine, but go and talk to people who do get involved. Talk to the abuse charities, talk to HR departments, talk to the local Social Services, talk to people who have been abused - not just one or two. You might find that your opinion is not valid.

I know you disagree and, as I said, I really do not expect you change your mind but when I read the Reddit thread I cannot see how inaction helped any one of those women.
 
Schwadevivre said:
Do the simple things:
  • stop when you see someone fall over;
  • help at the scene of an accident;
  • take a first aid course;
  • ask your local police how to respond to events such as these;
  • if you work for a company with an HR department speak to them about how to report bullying and abuse;
  • knock on the door of the bad tempered neighbour you haven't seen for a week.

No-one is a superhero, but everyone can do something. If, instead of waiting for to pay back, we paid it forward life would, possibly, be better
Click to expand...

I do these things and I imagine most decent people do.

With regard to the man dragging a screaming child out of a toilet, most parents will tell you that they have had to do something similar when the said child has had a public meltdown. Seeing that is not sufficient grounds to 'call security' or do anything in fact. It's called being a busybody.

I remember reading a blog post from one guy who was accused of abducting his own daughter by a bunch of harridans. I'll see if I can dig it out later.
 
drbastard said:
With regard to the man dragging a screaming child out of a toilet, most parents will tell you that they have had to do something similar when the said child has had a public meltdown. Seeing that is not sufficient grounds to 'call security' or do anything in fact. It's called being a busybody.
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How do you know? and I have not denied being a busybody.

As to blog posts, if you wish to quote such evidence, fine, but blog posts are anecdotal at best and you could equally quote the despicable "A Voice for Men" webs(h)ite. Alternatively you could look at actual news reports of real abuse cases, you could also read the Reddit thread and wonder why such anecdotes are so common.

I note that you use the word harridans, funny about the context in which demeaning words are used, isn't it?
 
Schwadevivre said:
Your opinion is fine, but go and talk to people who do get involved. Talk to the abuse charities, talk to HR departments, talk to the local Social Services, talk to people who have been abused - not just one or two. You might find that your opinion is not valid.

I know you disagree and, as I said, I really do not expect you change your mind but when I read the Reddit thread I cannot see how inaction helped any one of those women.
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Well, let's agree to differ. I accept I'm going by personal experiences and general observation rather than consulting with people involved professionally.

It'd be silly to have a falling out anyway since we are about 75% in agreement.
 
Schwadevivre said:
How do you know? and I have not denied being a busybody.

As to blog posts, if you wish to quote such evidence, fine, but blog posts are anecdotal at best and you could equally quote the despicable "A Voice for Men" webs(h)ite. Alternatively you could look at actual news reports of real abuse cases, you could also read the Reddit thread and wonder why such anecdotes are so common.

I note that you use the word harridans, funny about the context in which demeaning words are used, isn't it?
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I stick by my use of the word 'harridan'. These people fall into the same category as the yobs who go around hunting paedophiles (or anyone who looks like one). In reality they're just looking for a fight; any old face will do. It's usually got very little to do with combating abuse.

The blog post is relevant IMO because it elicited a lot of replies (mainly from women) leading to an interesting discussion about when and if one should intervene in such a situation. But fuck it, I won't post it now. I can see from your "A Voice for Men" webs(h)ite" comment that the last thing you want is an actual discussion.
 
I was polite about the dog whistle you blew on a thread concerned with abuse, and if you have a high opinion of Paul Elam, his minions and his honey badgers then I have a very low opinion of you and your attitudes.

Ignored
 
Jesus.

This, FTMBers is a textbook example of what belief taken to extremes does to your mind.

I don't even know who Paul Elam is. But as I'm now ignored I guess scwadevivre won't give a shit either way. :p

Oh..and reported.
 
I'm deeply disappointed that I've not yet received an apology or had the moderators step in and warn 'Scawadevivre' (a misnomer if ever there was one) for accusing me of being all manner of vile things than I am not.

Ramonmercado made an effort and I thank him for that. But unless action is taken soon I'll be posting my full riposte, and I guarantee it won't be nice.
 
You do know that you have ceased to exist on this board for him? Ignoring on this board wipes all traces of the ignored from the ignorers view. Unlike on the old MB where you would get a little notice in place of the post telling you "You are ignoring this poster."
 
I will get involved to a point, ie: call the police, and if my own life isnt in danger.
I have first aid training, but would i help? no, too many people out there willing to sue your ass off.
 
Monstrosa said:
You do know that you have ceased to exist on this board for him? Ignoring on this board wipes all traces of the ignored from the ignorers view. Unlike on the old MB where you would get a little notice in place of the post telling you "You are ignoring this poster."
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Another board i go on puts up the sign that this poster is on ignore, but hey, im a woman, i gotta peek. Anybody else do that?
 
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