Why do male feminists assault women so often. Episode 3: #hetoo

[Valka D'Ur]

CraveTV has access to HBO. Although not sure if it has all their shows.

I've been considering it, but Crave would add $$ to my monthly bill. I get internet and basic cable as part of my rent (it was an incentive introduced a few years ago that I've just been assured has been grandfathered for the older tenants, and since I've been here for several years that means it applies to me), but any channels beyond the basics are extra charges I'm responsible for. I've added Space and Bravo (am thinking of dropping Bravo for the time being, until the new season of The Handmaid's Tale comes along), and am a bit reluctant to add more.

 

[Narz]

Most late night shows have most of their good stuff on YouTube

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Most late night shows have most of their good stuff on YouTube

And it happens that when I try to access some of them, I get a "this content has been blocked in your country" messages.

There's a lot of stuff on the net that's geoblocked in Canada.

 

[Patine]

And it happens that when I try to access some of them, I get a "this content has been blocked in your country" messages.

There's a lot of stuff on the net that's geoblocked in Canada.

I met a young man who was from China. He said 70% of the Internet (at least) was geoblocked there for them...

 

[MaryKB]

Mary's claim: Any unwanted physical contact is a form of assault.

The article: An assault is the act of inflicting physical harm or unwanted physical contact upon a person.

I do feel what I said is correct fundamentally, but I also totally accept you have varying degrees, but everything's still a type of assault, you know what I mean?

Like say you and I are both standing in a crowded elevator and someone shoves you and you bump into me, well my person was violated but it's totally an accident and no harm was done, I imagine you might apologize or at least say "excuse me" or something and we'd be fine.

But say you and I are walking down a sidewalk towards each other, and as you're passing me you lose your balance and fall into me, and you knock me over. And as I fall on the sidewalk, I break my arm: well you'd be responsible for my injuries, even though you didn't mean to you still assaulted me and caused me bodily harm, right?

And another scenario, if you and I are on a bus or subway or something, and because of momentum change you "fall" into me, and you decide to stretch out your arms to "brace yourself" by grabbing my chest and pushing me over, and you take your sweet time getting up and help yourself to some fondling while doing so, well I'd have every right to charge you with sexual assault, even if you claim it's an accident.

So I believe really your type of assault is going to depend on your motives, circumstances, and how your victim feels. Like accidents can be incidental assault, if you touch someone to try to harm or intimidate you're committing a crime, and touching in many ways (like groping, kissing, fondling, etc) is sexual assault, even if you don't feel that's what you're doing, you have to be concerned with how the other person you're touching feels. I feel often I see a lot of men seeming to have attitudes like "It's no big deal to me, and she's not a real person so her feelings don't matter."

 

[brennan]

Ah, someone who understands mens rea.

 

[Patine]

I do feel what I said is correct fundamentally, but I also totally accept you have varying degrees, but everything's still a type of assault, you know what I mean?

Like say you and I are both standing in a crowded elevator and someone shoves you and you bump into me, well my person was violated but it's totally an accident and no harm was done, I imagine you might apologize or at least say "excuse me" or something and we'd be fine.

But say you and I are walking down a sidewalk towards each other, and as you're passing me you lose your balance and fall into me, and you knock me over. And as I fall on the sidewalk, I break my arm: well you'd be responsible for my injuries, even though you didn't mean to you still assaulted me and caused me bodily harm, right?

And another scenario, if you and I are on a bus or subway or something, and because of momentum change you "fall" into me, and you decide to stretch out your arms to "brace yourself" by grabbing my chest and pushing me over, and you take your sweet time getting up and help yourself to some fondling while doing so, well I'd have every right to charge you with sexual assault, even if you claim it's an accident.

So I believe really your type of assault is going to depend on your motives, circumstances, and how your victim feels. Like accidents can be incidental assault, if you touch someone to try to harm or intimidate you're committing a crime, and touching in many ways (like groping, kissing, fondling, etc) is sexual assault, even if you don't feel that's what you're doing, you have to be concerned with how the other person you're touching feels. I feel often I see a lot of men seeming to have attitudes like "It's no big deal to me, and she's not a real person so her feelings don't matter."

Although, to be pedantic, the physical HARM has to be UNWANTED too, but just a default like the mere contact - or boxers, wrestlers, rugby players, competitive martial artists, etc., would be committing assault against each other legally every single time they had a bout, or even seriously practiced. And then, of course, there's consensual BDSM to consider as well.

 

[Narz]

Pretty much every time I drive uber on a Friday or Saturday night I have drunk women touching me while I'm driving, usually on the shoulder or briefly grabbing my arm while making a "point". Its pretty awkward especially since usually their man is sitting right next to them.

It's not assault, just an irritant.

 

[Farm Boy]

Narz, they're working off an expansive colloquial use of "assault." Like, as in, "I was assaulted by the wafting smell of cinnamon from the kitchen. I hate cinnamon." That runs the gamut all the way from beneath trivial to Lock 'em Up. It's not an incorrect use, but torts don't need mens rea to begin with, only reasonable damage. So fight over "reasonable." I suppose we could argue over pitching reasonable alltogether and going with purely subjective, but that's how we get areas of law that are super ridiculous, like Stand Your Ground, so I don't know that it's particularly meaningful outside of people who actually like that sort of thing and its massively disproportionate application.

 

[Yeekim]

So I believe really your type of assault is going to depend on your motives, circumstances, and how your victim feels. Like accidents can be incidental assault, if you touch someone to try to harm or intimidate you're committing a crime, and touching in many ways (like groping, kissing, fondling, etc) is sexual assault, even if you don't feel that's what you're doing, you have to be concerned with how the other person you're touching feels. I feel often I see a lot of men seeming to have attitudes like "It's no big deal to me, and she's not a real person so her feelings don't matter."

I agree, with a qualifier - the person being touched is also responsible for making it clear how they feel.
Yes, it requires no clarification that grabbing someone a la Trump without previous consent is unacceptable, but what about laying a hand on someone's arm? Shoulder? Or a knee? Keep in mind that either can be described as "groping" or "fondling". Regardless of the body part under question, if the person being touched tells the other one to stop and they don't comply, then yeah, it is an assault. But what if they do not? Or if they do, and the other party immediately complies and apologizes? Are they then still guilty of "assault"?

I mean, Trudeau case was discussed earlier. A Google search tells me that he "groped" and "inappropriately handled" some girl, but nothing about "motives, circumstances, or how she felt" (or more precisely, reacted!). We don't know what he did, don't know her reaction and don't know his reaction to her reaction either.

 

[cardgame]

Someone is probably going to reply with "Just don't touch anybody," but that's prison rules and I like being outside of prison specifically so I don't have to abide by prison rules. Real life doesn't work that way.

 

[MaryKB]

I agree, with a qualifier - the person being touched is also responsible for making it clear how they feel.
Yes, it requires no clarification that grabbing someone a la Trump without previous consent is unacceptable, but what about laying a hand on someone's arm? Shoulder? Or a knee? Keep in mind that either can be described as "groping" or "fondling". Regardless of the body part under question, if the person being touched tells the other one to stop and they don't comply, then yeah, it is an assault. But what if they do not? Or if they do, and the other party immediately complies and apologizes? Are they then still guilty of "assault"?

I feel I understand what you're trying to say, but I myself subscribe more to "yes means yes" instead of "no means no," and I think it might be hard to fully understand if you didn't grow up as a woman, but I'll try my best to explain how I feel about this.

As a woman, I was raised with many pressures all around me about my role, what my purpose is, and how I'm supposed to behave. And also an image of what men are and how I'm supposed to interact with men and treat men, and understanding I am weaker, and generally men have a "right" to my body (that principle "right" I feel what men's "rights" activists are all about, but I don't want to start that again here lol). You can totally see there's an effort to change this, but there's still really a long way to go, and much is still really ingrained, especially for us who've already grown up.

Have you ever had a man making passes at you, or catcalling you or something? Or had men touching you in sexual ways without asking you? (oh dear, and before saying "yes" please do remember it's different if you're a man than if you're a woman, my questions are meant as rhetorical lol) I can tell you how a man can get very scary very fast if you don't react how he's expecting you to, so often you just fake what he wants not because you like what he's doing, but because you're terrified of what he'll do if you don't. And generally people don't believe women when we say we didn't like something, you get blamed for encouraging him or something, because as a woman it's supposed to be my natural role and men have told themselves and us that I'm supposed to like it, and I'm corrupting natural order if I object.

And sometimes you're just confused and you're in shock and you don't know how to respond, both because of embarrassment, fear, and other emotions. Like as an example, one of my first memories of being touched inappropriately was in my tenth grade history class. My history teacher was an old man, maybe in his late sixties or something, and when my class was doing classwork he'd often walk around, and he'd come up to my desk and start rubbing my back and shoulders. He didn't do this to anyone else, just me, and I didn't really know why he was doing it, but I remember how uncomfortable I felt, and I didn't know what to do. If he'd asked me "Mary, would you mind if I rubbed your back?" I would've kindly said "Oh, no thank you, I'm okay!" and hopefully that would've been it. But he didn't, and I didn't speak up, and it took me a very long time to realize what he was doing was sexual assault. And if I'd spoken up, I probably would've gotten in trouble, and who knows what he would've done since has authority over me.

And I feel that's something people often neglect, is men naturally right now have power over women, I'm really sick of seeing men denying such a thing exists, in my opinion anyone who does so is either ignorantly or willfully clueless. So like if you touch me, you're making a move and if I react negatively I may very well suffer consequences, either violence to my person or my reputation (you know people are much more likely to believe a man who calls a woman a slut rather than a woman who says a man assaulted her?), and so your action carries authority with it.

I really hope I'm making sense, but basically my point is always clearly make sure you have her consent before touching her, it's totally not good enough to expect her to say "no" if she doesn't like it, because even if she's silent she may very well be quite unhappy with what you're doing but she's just too afraid to say something. And even if she does say "no", well you've already committed your assault, because obviously she didn't want you touching her and you already did, it's all unwanted touching that's assault not just what you do after she tells you to stop, right?

I do feel things would be different if men and women were equals, and I agree maybe things will be better one day, but that's not how it is right now. Thank you kindly for listening to me and considering my perspective.

 

[Yeekim]

I feel I understand what you're trying to say, but I myself subscribe more to "yes means yes" instead of "no means no,"

We might have to take a step back - what are we trying to agree upon? Rules for best, most gentlemanly behaviour? Or at what point does someone commit a (serious) crime? Because in my opinion there should be some distance between those two.
If the former, then sure - it is always best to ask first. But for the latter, "yes means yes" is just not reasonable standard, if we're extending this to any and all kind of physical contact, as opposed to grabbing crotch, breasts etc.

As a woman, I was raised with many pressures all around me about my role, what my purpose is, and how I'm supposed to behave. And also an image of what men are and how I'm supposed to interact with men and treat men, and understanding I am weaker, and generally men have a "right" to my body (that principle "right" I feel what men's "rights" activists are all about, but I don't want to start that again here lol). You can totally see there's an effort to change this, but there's still really a long way to go, and much is still really ingrained, especially for us who've already grown up.

Have you ever had a man making passes at you, or catcalling you or something? Or had men touching you in sexual ways without asking you? (oh dear, and before saying "yes" please do remember it's different if you're a man than if you're a woman, my questions are meant as rhetorical lol) I can tell you how a man can get very scary very fast if you don't react how he's expecting you to, so often you just fake what he wants not because you like what he's doing, but because you're terrified of what he'll do if you don't.

I get how one can be afraid of someone bigger and stronger, and I'm certainly not saying women need to fight tooth and nail to protect themselves against overwhelming force. However, it would have to be a rather extreme situation, where even asking "please don't" would be "terrifying". Sure, there's all manner of a-holes around, but everyone deserves at least one chance to do the right thing and show they actually can take "no" for an answer, don't they?

And generally people don't believe women when we say we didn't like something, you get blamed for encouraging him or something, because as a woman it's supposed to be my natural role and men have told themselves and us that I'm supposed to like it, and I'm corrupting natural order if I object.

I suppose there's always going to be idiots with horrible views - even while I really hope they're not so prevalent as you make it sound here. But we must not succumb to their idea of the "natural order", right?

And sometimes you're just confused and you're in shock and you don't know how to respond, both because of embarrassment, fear, and other emotions. Like as an example, one of my first memories of being touched inappropriately was in my tenth grade history class. My history teacher was an old man, maybe in his late sixties or something, and when my class was doing classwork he'd often walk around, and he'd come up to my desk and start rubbing my back and shoulders. He didn't do this to anyone else, just me, and I didn't really know why he was doing it, but I remember how uncomfortable I felt, and I didn't know what to do. If he'd asked me "Mary, would you mind if I rubbed your back?" I would've kindly said "Oh, no thank you, I'm okay!" and hopefully that would've been it. But he didn't, and I didn't speak up, and it took me a very long time to realize what he was doing was sexual assault. And if I'd spoken up, I probably would've gotten in trouble, and who knows what he would've done since has authority over me.

This situation was special, because a) you were a minor, and b) he was in a position of authority over you, so yes, this was him taking inappropriate advantage of you. However, if this was a situation between peers, I would absolutely expect you to speak up. You're a subject, not an object! And that means you have to act like one too!

And I feel that's something people often neglect, is men naturally right now have power over women, I'm really sick of seeing men denying such a thing exists, in my opinion anyone who does so is either ignorantly or willfully clueless. So like if you touch me, you're making a move and if I react negatively I may very well suffer consequences, either violence to my person or my reputation (you know people are much more likely to believe a man who calls a woman a slut rather than a woman who says a man assaulted her?), and so your action carries authority with it.

I really hope I'm making sense, but basically my point is always clearly make sure you have her consent before touching her, it's totally not good enough to expect her to say "no" if she doesn't like it, because even if she's silent she may very well be quite unhappy with what you're doing but she's just too afraid to say something. And even if she does say "no", well you've already committed your assault, because obviously she didn't want you touching her and you already did, it's all unwanted touching that's assault not just what you do after she tells you to stop, right?

But what other way to deny men this power, except clearly say "no!" when you mean it? "Being too afraid" may well be justified in a special case, like when there's already history of violence between you, but this really can't be a default position to fall back on... because if we start operating from a position where any man in question can be presumed to be, a priori, dangerously violent or petty and vindictive scumbag, it becomes all too natural to argue that for a man, even asking for consent is also a form of assault - because you might have been too afraid to refuse him and might have said "yes" even though you really didn't want to. And where does that leave us? Sorry, this was a long and rambling sentence, but I hope you see this from my perspective as well!

I do feel things would be different if men and women were equals, and I agree maybe things will be better one day, but that's not how it is right now.

I don't think there's a better way to become equals than to behave like equals and insist on equal treatment.

Thank you kindly for listening to me and considering my perspective.

Thank you engaging me honestly and in good faith - it is a pleasure to have a discussion with you.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Confirmation bias ftl. Maybe people in the public eye get noticed more and those that come outright as a label also get noticed more when they do something wrong.

I would actually address the actual content but I am very disintrested in these stream of conciousness ramblings. Have mercy on those with questionable attention spans. Perhaps reread it and wonder "would I really want to sit through this?"

 

[TheMeInTeam]

So I believe really your type of assault is going to depend on your motives, circumstances, and how your victim feels.

You really do need concrete rules. No matter how people feel about it, having shoulders bump while walking through a football stadium or something should not be "assault", unless we're talking about inordinate/injury causing force. In this context you can factor circumstances and to a much lesser extent motives.

If someone doesn't realize I'm behind and hits me lightly with a backpack while turning around it's not assault no matter how much I feel otherwise. Not even if they secretly did it on purpose. If they grab it by the strap and whack me with it, then yes.

Harm can't be the only threshold though. Someone continuing after being asked to stop is a concrete scenario also, regardless of physical harm. This goes more broadly. Like, if someone walks up to a person on the street and continually yells at them/into their ear, what should the victim be allowed to do in response?

 

[Farm Boy]

Somebody yelling continuously into my ear is almost certainly putting me in "reasonable fear of imminent harmful or offensive contact," intentionally, and thus is committing assault. Actually whapping me with a backpack after I've asked them to stop is intentionally committing battery. We have rules for this. Is somebody arguing that they're inadequate based on the reasonable person standard instead of a purely subjective one?

 

[MaryKB]

We might have to take a step back - what are we trying to agree upon?

lol, oh dear, I feel you're right, and I'm mostly thinking about overt sexual contact, you know what I mean? I'm thinking of things like touching in a sensual way, or trying to kiss, and so on. I made a post back a couple pages I think, where I was talking about different types of contact, and sometimes something can be accidental and non-harming and such, but many times it isn't, and I do agree you'll totally find different degrees based on circumstances and intentions. But I do stand very firmly believing positive consent is necessary before starting. Like say for example you decided you wanted to touch me in a sexual way, and after you do so I tell you "No, I don't want you doing that to me", do you feel you're only committing a crime if you continue? In my mind you've already done so by touching me without my agreeing to it, if I'm making sense? My viewpoint is default is "no" not "yes", and you need an affirmation of yes to change that, you know what I mean?

Like even between men, you can do things like cage fighting, where you agree you can hit each other. But you can't walk up to another man on the street and randomly punch his face, right? But you and he can have a situation where you can agree to do that without it being assault, but that's not how things are normally, you have to have like a proactive agreement, you know what I mean? And I feel sexual contact is exactly the same thing.

I've read a lot of your posts, and I think you sound to me like you're a very sensitive man, and my feeling is it's hard for you to understand that most men aren't like you. And you know how it is like how bad things stand out to you more? Like in my department, one area answers phone calls from customers about fraud alerts, and sometimes I've heard people complaining to their managers about something like "Every call today's been about such and such!", when really he's had only a handful out of his say sixty calls, but because those ones were difficult and similar they seem like most to him, you know what I mean? Well as a woman, I'm obviously not going to remember clearly decent men like yourself who don't actively threaten me, but I'm going to remember those guys who make passes at me. And I feel it's probably very difficult for a man to understand what cat calling feels like. You panic when it happens to you, you immediately feel a great sense of fear. You don't know how far he's going to want to go, or what he's really going to want from you, and you don't know what he'll do if you don't respond as he wants. You just want to be gone as quickly as you can, and you hope he won't follow you or say anything else to you. What I think might be difficult to understand, is other men are fully willing to force themselves upon women, and get angry if you tell him to stop.

I think your advice sounds lovely, but I feel you're not aware of how much more difficult it is for a woman than for a man. I can say "stop", but that doesn't mean he's going to listen to me like he would you, and women can make things worse for ourselves when we speak up (look what's happening to Dr Ford, right?) And of course we want to speak up and in many cases do, I'm just trying to explain it's not as easy as you make it sound, and fear of violence is very real.

A lot of the time you just sort of freeze, like you know you don't want it to happen to you, you know it's wrong, you know you want to tell him to stop, but you panic, if I'm making sense? It's easy to say here on a message board "I'm just going to make him stop!" but in reality you can be very confused in the moment and not be exactly sure what to do, have you ever felt like that before? Where you had a plan logically but you still get caught off guard?

Oh and there totally are times where even a "yes" is not a real yes, if you're coerced, you know what I mean? Like if you're afraid if you say anything other than yes he'll hurt you, and you agree, then that's totally still rape. I feel men really need to do a better job educating other men what sort of behavior is acceptable to do to women, right?

I'm sorry for rambling, this is not easy for me to say, and I have a feeling most men reading will just dismiss my feelings and experiences because what I'm saying is inconvenient for them. Thank you kindly again for considering my perspective.

Please take care.

 

[Yeekim]

lol, oh dear, I feel you're right, and I'm mostly thinking about overt sexual contact, you know what I mean? I'm thinking of things like touching in a sensual way, or trying to kiss, and so on. I made a post back a couple pages I think, where I was talking about different types of contact, and sometimes something can be accidental and non-harming and such, but many times it isn't, and I do agree you'll totally find different degrees based on circumstances and intentions. But I do stand very firmly believing positive consent is necessary before starting. Like say for example you decided you wanted to touch me in a sexual way, and after you do so I tell you "No, I don't want you doing that to me", do you feel you're only committing a crime if you continue? In my mind you've already done so by touching me without my agreeing to it, if I'm making sense? My viewpoint is default is "no" not "yes", and you need an affirmation of yes to change that, you know what I mean?

I think most people agree positive consent is necessary before initiating overt sexual contact. Problem is, different people - regardless of gender - have different ideas on what it means. Moreover, seeking some limited and relatively innocent physical contact (like placing hand on arm or maybe knee of another person) is a common (and generally socially acceptable? Or at least it used to be - I don't even know any more? Would it be too much in your opinion?) way of signaling sexual interest. It is also useful in that it gives the other person opportunity to respond without making it explicit to everyone else, and can thus avoid potential embarrassment for both. With women having quite different ideas about what is or isnt acceptable, I really don't know what it was Trudeau, for instance, actually did - and what I should think of him. If the victim could say, "I asked him to stop and he didn't", it would eliminate any such uncertainty.

I've read a lot of your posts, and I think you sound to me like you're a very sensitive man, and my feeling is it's hard for you to understand that most men aren't like you.

Uh... thanks. But I don't believe I'm different from "most". As you go on to say yourself, it's the few unpleasant ones who will, sadly, leave an outsized impression.

I think your advice sounds lovely, but I feel you're not aware of how much more difficult it is for a woman than for a man. I can say "stop", but that doesn't mean he's going to listen to me like he would you, and women can make things worse for ourselves when we speak up (look what's happening to Dr Ford, right?) And of course we want to speak up and in many cases do, I'm just trying to explain it's not as easy as you make it sound, and fear of violence is very real.

You're right, I'm probably not aware - I don't have a frame of reference here. And yes - drawing away or pleading to stop is of course not guaranteed to work. But it's still better than simply going through with it, isn't it? Unless you've been kidnapped by a maniac just looking for an excuse to "turn this rape into homicide", I guess.

A lot of the time you just sort of freeze, like you know you don't want it to happen to you, you know it's wrong, you know you want to tell him to stop, but you panic, if I'm making sense? It's easy to say here on a message board "I'm just going to make him stop!" but in reality you can be very confused in the moment and not be exactly sure what to do, have you ever felt like that before? Where you had a plan logically but you still get caught off guard?

While ago, there was a story of a female athlete who said her teammate had raped her years ago. Sadly, I don't remember her name, but she was in early twenties at the time, while he was a decade or so older. They were staying in same hotel after some event, he invited her into his room for drinks and then had sex with her. Crucially, she also didn't claim she had refused or resisted him, but rather said that she "froze". I'm just finding it so difficult to wrap my head around this. One minute, he was a teammate and a friend she trusted enough to accept a private invitation from - and the next, she is too terrified of him to say "please don't"? Ok, I'm willing to accept it may have been so, however irrational it feels to me after the fact - but should we tailor our expectations and rules around this?
Sure, personally I'll go an extra mile to make sure my partners are absolutely on board with everything. But if I was a judge over this case, I feel like I'd have to dismiss this and say "Look, you were an adult - this means you're presumed capable of saying "no"". Because otherwise aren't we just inviting argument along the lines: "See, women should have a male guardian around at all times, they're incapable of dealing with the world themselves?"

Thank you kindly again for considering my perspective.Please take care.

You're perspective is valuable - and I hope mine will likewise help you see men in a slightly less terrifying light.

 

[MaryKB]

I feel it's a majority of men who objectify women, and I see so many who do things they don't even realize, and even on small levels seem to feel a right to women's bodies.

I feel a great many men are physically terrifying, and enough you always have to be careful. And what I feel makes things really bad, is mostly all the other men just sort of look the other way, like it's an accepted norm how a man's allowed to aggressively pursue a woman, even when she's not interested. And you often get responses like "Oh he's just being a man", and even a lot of victim blaming.

I feel like a lot of what you're saying is to put burden of avoiding sexual assault and rape on women, like if I don't protest loudly enough or fight to defend myself, it's my fault what happens to me. Why isn't this more being directed at men to not commit these crimes? Why not tell men "make absolutely sure she wants you to do something before you do so, and if you see any signs she's uncomfortable then you need to stop," why is it always up to women to be responsible for men's behavior? Oh dear, I do hope I'm making sense?

I also believe men might really have difficulty understanding what it's like for women, because you'll see differences in how male-on-male crime compares to male-on-female crime, you know what I mean? Men kill other men, but it's mostly strangers and violence on violence, like gang related crime. But women are much more likely to be killed by our intimate partners than strangers, so we're not safe at home, because it's our "protectors" who are most likely to harm or kill us, and can you imagine how scary that makes things? Domestic abuse of women, and intimate partner rape, are extremely common. I have this feeling men picture rape as like you're grabbed on the street or something, but really it's more about your boyfriend or husband not respecting your person and your boundaries and forcing you to do things you don't want to do.

I can understand how you're having difficulty wrapping your head around her story, I'm really not at all surprised it's difficult for a man to comprehend what it's like for a woman. My suggestion is for starters, to believe her story and accept her feelings are genuine, and then maybe you can sort of work from there and try to view things through her perspective. You don't have to really be able to understand how it feels to be too terrified to say "Stop", you just can believe me that's how I feel and for me it's a reality, you know what I mean?

I don't feel women need a "male guardian", I feel men need to accept women have full rights to our bodies, and men have no right to us unless we wish it, and men need to take responsibility for themselves and not have a default position of "I can do anything I want to her unless she stops me," if I'm making sense? Because remember not only are men generally larger and stronger, but also have centuries of dominance and objectification behind them too, right?

Generally I've found men don't really care about women's perspectives, like you can read threads here and you can see so many men talking about women (instead of talking to and listening to women) and what they decide is best for us, and that's patriarchy in action right there. Men just dismiss women's feelings and make claims like "there's no power imbalance!" and other such lies, and that's why we still have so many problems.

 

[Farm Boy]

So, that's pretty much full bore agreement with conservative sexual mores? The ones about how to treat people, not the people stuck thinking who loves who could possibly be wrong. Like don't try to kiss her on a first date, be incremental to be certain, engage in the actual dance of courtship because even a yes isn't necessarily and indication of a real and unpressured yes, etc. Like when it comes down to the the sexual rubber hitting the road rather than the theory*. I mean, that's cool, because then we agree on it. Alcohol is a bad mix for dating, fast leads to mistakes and harms and all that stuff. No? I think everyone pretty much has the same goals when it comes to making everybody happy and secure in being the master of their own fate.

*which I would pretty much classify as "don't be a piece of $%*@," when talking to a male peer, or in the near enough future to my son.