What can you do?

If you are a parent teach your kids to be kind, have respect for others and to interact. I am shocked at the sexism already at my kids infant school.
The Dads are to afraid to have their boys like pink or play with dolls. The Mums excuse the boys bad behaviour and their laziness with “boys will be boys”.
Their behaviour is so bad the girls are already learning to fear and not mix with them.
How can we expect good intersex relationships when they can’t even talk to each other at 5.

At work apply the Rock test https://www.google.com/amp/s/humanparts.medium.com/amp/p/73c45e0b49af

Yes call out sexism when you see it but from the experiences above be careful.

Like any change – be the change you want to see.

How can we expect good intersex relationships when they can’t even talk to each other at 5.

Like any change – be the change you want to see.

Both valid points. I’ve been involved with my lads Scout group since he was a Beaver aged 6. The dynamics of units with girls in are totally different and more positive to the all boy groups.

I am shocked at the sexism already at my kids infant school.

That’s not ideal.

The Dads… The Mums…

Oh

Women are significantly at less risk of violence everywhere except in the home compared to men.

Feelings seem to trump facts these days.

Statistics can be very deceptive at times and I’m pretty sure we are talking about sexual violence and intimidation here.

A couple of years back my we (wife, me & two daughters) pulled over to help a woman who was out late at night and clearly distressed, I was horrified to see how long it took her to realise we were a family of mostly women and just how terrified she was of a random car pulling over to help her.

I resent women having to modify their behaviour or clothes to go out. Wolf-whistles are about exercising power not about getting friendly with you,

Agreed.

I know it is pretty insignificant but I was out riding with a couple of mates yesterday and during a couple of our normal stop-and-chat moments we were giving this subject a bit of thought. Mainly we were trying to put ourselves in the position of a woman we might meet while running, cycling, walking back from town etc and thinking about how we minimise any stress and anxiety our presence might cause.

Small steps, but maybe some evidence that a message is getting through.

Women are significantly at less risk of violence everywhere except in the home compared to men.

(Serious conservative anti-woke grifter face on)

Masculinity is NOT toxic 😡

its also about the continual low level offensive behaviour

This seems to be a symptom of modern society, possibly fuelled by social media where everyone is encouraged to believe the pithiness and popular impact of the comment is more important than engaging in a dialog where you are willing to listen to other peoples’ points of view.

(Serious conservative anti-woke grifter face on) Masculinity is NOT toxic 😡

Just like this.

^ Did I need to go the extra mile and label /satire?

Probably/sadly.

More than happy to discuss how popular media and partisan prattle/pithy punditry has undermined progress with addressing toxic masculinity. Which is the issue I was attempting to encapsulate via parody/satire.

So I am just back from walking the dog.
Walking up a path, saw a man in the distance put his dog on a lead. Mine was on a lead anyway as not got great recall and it was an area where it’s not safe to let her off. She is a super friendly dog and always wants to say hello to other dogs but, having had a reactive dog in the past, I always ask if it’s ok for her to do so.
He confirmed his dog was friendly and while they were greeting each other he asked if I could not see that as we were approaching.
I said of course not.
He then started having a go at me for reasons best known to himself.
I let myself down, and more importantly my dog down, and instead of walking away, reacted and the f word came out from both of us.
Now, he was clearly a weapons grade ahole and obviously I could have handled things better.
I just wonder how it would have played out if I had been 6ft and built.
Quite possibly worse.
Not sure there’s much point to this story. I’m just finding it harder and harder to share this planet with people such as this.

Dickyboy

A couple of years back my we (wife, me & two daughters) pulled over to help a woman who was out late at night and clearly distressed, I was horrified to see how long it took her to realise we were a family of mostly women and just how terrified she was of a random car pulling over to help her.

I have had this situation plenty of times over the years – seeing a woman broken down at the side of the road – and have never stopped.
I then end up spending the rest of my day feeling guilty & wondering whether I should have stopped to offer help; how would I feel if I saw in the news there had been an accident involving a broken down car in that location, or someone with sinister intentions having stopped instead & abducted/mugged/assaulted that person etc.

To any women engaged in this thread – what would be the best way to react to this situation? Perhaps dial 101 to let the local police there is a woman broken down on her own? Do nothing? Stop & offer help from a distance?

It’s terrible to feel that I don’t know what the best way to approach this situation is – all you want to do is help, but worry you are going to be labelled as a leering predator or a sexist pig for offering a woman help (I am perfectly capable of looking after myself…) or scare the woman out of their skin because you have stopped near them while they are in a vulnerable position.

I’ve just remembered a situation at uni like this. A mate & I were driving into uni & stopped at some traffic lights, my mate noticed the car in front had the filler flap open & the cap was clipped over it still. He jumped out & ran up to the car to sort it out before the lights changed. This was a busy junction on the Uxbridge Road.
I don’t think he even thought he would be seen as a threat, but as he approached the window to get the woman’s attention she started screaming & scrabbled to hit the central locking button on the car door. At the point where he jumped out of the car, we hadn’t even registered if it was a man or woman in the car. He raised his hands in a non-offensive posture & started talking to her to explain what he was doing. Once she calmed down she realised what he was saying, let him put the filler back & close the flap & then admitted that she thought we were going to carjack her & steal her car!! She had kids in the car as well.
We found it funny in hindsight that she thought we could be considered carjackers, but also slightly mortified that was her initial reaction. Looking back at it, he should not have run towards the car, but he was conscious that the lights were likely to change soon, and we’d then have blocked traffic.

I offer help to women struggling with buggies on stairs etc. and have always had a positive response to this, but this is always in busy shopping areas etc. I have to say, I’ve never thought whether this would be misconstrued, or cause the person to be fearful or distressed.
I suppose I know the person that I am, but a stranger doesn’t.

I also stopped a few years back while driving home in my car from work. I was almost home & there was a woman cycling along on a shopper bike with a virtually invisible rear light. This was in a town, not a country lane scenario. The roads were busy, it was dark & drizzling – I felt like I should try to help out – she looked like an accident waiting to happen.
I overtook, pulled up ahead, got out of the car & managed to get her to stop. I explained why I had tried to stop her as her light was not visible & I thought it was a dangerous situation. It turned out her boyfriend had fitted her coil lock mount in such a position that the lock completely obscured the light & she hadn’t realised. We removed the lock & she put it in the basket on the bike.
This was another situation where I really agonised over whether to stop or not. If it had been a man I wouldn’t have thought twice, but I realised in this situation it was going to be very hard for me to not look like I was stopping there to either give her abuse for being a cyclist, or just be some kind of weirdo predator.

Some really thoughtful comments on this thread. Another angle that could be taken if you’re involved in education (have kids at school or are a governor/pta member maybe) is to ask questions of the PSHE provision. Are topics like consent/porn/revenge porn/sexting etc being covered? Can the materials used be shared with parents so those conversations can be continued at home?

@stumpy01
I’d like you to stop and offer to help.
Maybe call 101, give the call handler your details including your car reg, tell the person you’ve done that, ask her to confirm with 101 and then help.
Don’t know if that would work?

@thepilot – not a bad idea to ring 101 first & make it clear I am doing so, although when I have rung them in the past it can take 10 mins or more to actually get through to someone. Worth a try though.

Other option could perhaps be to pull up a distance from the car, rather than right near it & shout to them if they need assistance.
Could always suggest that they call 101 to explain what’s going on, to put the woman in control of that situation – i.e I could say to the woman that I am on the phone to 101, but how would she know that I wasn’t just pretending with the phone at my ear?

Regarding angry dog bloke – it sounds like you offended his dog training ability, or besmirched the good nature of his dog 😉
Although how you would be able to tell that from a distance I don’t know! Sometimes it’s just that (a lot of) people are dickheads.

The PM, from the BBC:

“I think the fundamental issue that we have to address as a country, and as a society and as a government is that … women in particular must feel that when they make serious complaints about violence, about assault, that they are properly heard.

“We are going to make sure that that happens.”

The prime minister’s comments come after criticism that a new policing bill does not go far enough to address violence against women and girls.

All very well to be heard/listen, it is the action after the listening that is the difficult part. And the listening is not the fundamental part, the doing is the fundamental part surely? (Unless you read an awful lot into the “properly” in “properly heard”.)

“I think the fundamental issue that we have to address as a country, and as a society and as a government is that … women in particular must feel that when they make serious complaints about violence, about assault, that they are properly heard.

Interesting that he claims the fundamental issue is not the violence itself, but the efficiency of the complaints process thereafter

The issue is Boris is most likely slightly predatory and sleazy towards women so he doesn’t want to have to change that behaviour.

I actually saw some uncalled for behaviour today while out on the bike towards two young ladies out jogging. Riding past Roath Lake in Cardiff and some lads sat on a bench were obviously eyeing them up as they ran towards them and as they got close one of them said ‘Bouncy, bouncy’ in that tone famous in Carry-On films. I was too far away to immediately respond myself but one couple nearby did tell them off. Maybe they would have told them off anyway but it was still good to see that not everyone just ignores it.

In my opinion the violence against women is caused by the power imbalance that is ingrained in our society. I do believe that the last 50 years or so has seen significant improvement, but this is one of those issues where any amount of it is too much.

I think the answer is probably best arrived at by studying some of the dichotomy that exists within perpetrators of violence against women, but also in general. Take, for example, the Russian soldiers murdering and particularly raping their way across eastern Germany in 1945. Many of them would still have been writing letters to ‘sweethearts’ back at home. How can a person carry on a ‘normal’ life in one regard whilst perpetrating horrific acts in another? It seems impossible to a ‘normal’ person, but too large a proportion of those soldiers were engaged in it for it to be dismissed as a few bad apples. ‘Everyday’ perpetrators of violence against female partners must actually spend the vast majority of their lives being ‘normal’, otherwise how would they get or hold down a job?

I’m probably not wording this very well – I find it extremely hard to understand to be honest. 🤔

One other thing that did come to mind, though, and it is a question I believe the answer to which could also be revealing….

How could so many women in the US vote for Donald Trump? He admitted to the “grab ’em by the….” comments and dismissed them as some kind of ‘norm’. I am probably misunderstanding again now, but as a man, let alone a woman, that would just make me say “even if I agree with everything else, I cannot vote for that man”. There are some lines that cannot be crossed.

Is it that women who voted for Trump were too beaten down by sexism since the day they were born to care any more?

@dannyh

“Them and Us”

People have always done this. They’ve always cried over their loved ones whilst holding slaves or revering those who’ve killed other people’s loved ones. Humans are pre-programmed to value in-groups (aka “us”) over out-groups (aka “them). The real difference between the bad and the good (in my opinion) is where we draw the line – the locus of ‘us’.

@dannyh Women voted for Trump because voting for Trump did not require one to be of male gender, it required one to be an ahole. And being an ahole is not the preserve of men.
I think some women would be uncomfortable with the idea of a woman president too. There was also the fact that Clinton came with a whole ton of baggage but some would not have voted for a woman whoever she was.
Trump is also a narcissist and had a certain charm. It clearly worked on some.

“Them and Us”

One analogy I heard (might even have been on here) in order to get a sense of perspective was a cycling one. Actually @dannyh touched on it ^^ with the comment about power imbalance too, that holds true in this analogy.

As a man, put on your lycra and go for a road ride. Doesn’t matter where, could even be a commute. For the purposes of this experiment you are “a woman”. Most pedestrians and other cyclists also count as “women”.

All those other vehicles, the cars, motorbikes, buses etc? They’re all “men”. All colours, sizes, shapes, some are loud, some quiet, some flashy, some tatty. Might even be a couple of really nice looking ones in the mix. Just like in real life.

Ride along the road – all the “men” that pass you, most will be fine, no real interaction at all. Some will be really considerate, hang back, give you a wide berth. Some will be a bit ignorant but won’t really mean any harm – a slightly too close pass or an overtake coming up to a red light; the equivalent of pushing past when getting onto a bus perhaps. They don’t mean any direct harm but they’re just a bit thick.

And a few will be actively dangerous. Punishment passes, objects thrown out the window, leaning on the horn, abuse. The equivalent in real life of being groped, leered at or actually assaulted.

The way it was explained was a really good analogy – in the same way that as a cyclist you are constantly on the alert for that one dangerous overtake that could flatten you, basically women are walking through daily life *constantly* thinking that the next man behind them is going to be the dangerous one, constantly experiencing the cycling equivalent of an impatient driver.

Vast majority of the time it’ll be fine, no issues at all, completely neutral.
The remaining small % is a mix of the considerate “wide overtake” version”, the “ignorant but not deliberately malicious” type and finally the “punishment pass”. And you can’t really identify which version you’re going to get until it’s right next to you.

Women voted for Trump because voting for Trump did not require one to be of male gender, it required one to be an ahole.

Totally agreed but the explicit sexism and misogyny of Trump should, in my opinion, have trumped (hah) any degree of aholery. In my opinion.

But in any case, the point I was trying to make is that ‘othering’ combined with power imbalance is probably behind much of the issue here.

But Trump’s sexism and misogyny would have appealed to some women because some women are sexist and misogynistic. It is exactly why they voted for him. As to why they are that way, well I guess that’s because it’s so prevalent in society. While some women might choose to reject the politics of sexism and misogyny, others align themselves to it in the hope of surviving and it’s because all they’ve ever known. They align themselves with those who have power and close their eyes to the disservice they are doing themselves and their fellow women. It is very much an individualistic approach. If you can’t beat them, join them, kind of thing.
All that ties in with ‘othering’ and power imbalances. It’s just the other is those that challenge the status quo not those that are of a different gender.
I think at least. I don’t know, maybe they just ticked the wrong box 😉

It’s a similar situation when rather than help other people emigrate here from other countries, some immigrants become anti-immigration and want to close the borders once they are in. They don’t want to align themselves with the powerless but the powerful, however abhorrent that must feel to them if they were ever to allow themselves to properly think about it.

^^^^

Stockholm Syndrome on a societal level?

More than likely, yes.

I thought gender was a social construct? Will we be “educating” other groups of people who commit disproportionally more crime or violence?

Just some questions that come to mind.

Totally agreed but the explicit sexism and misogyny of Trump should, in my opinion, have trumped (hah) any degree of aholery. In my opinion.

But in any case, the point I was trying to make is that ‘othering’ combined with power imbalance is probably behind much of the issue here.

This is what I’ve been getting at, you can’t deal with violence against women without having a conversation about humanities ability to to “other” out groups and commit violence against them. As violence against women often stems from “othering” or dehumanizing them, it’s partly a derangement or consequence of our propensity to do that.

Well put @dannyh
I am afraid I follow the Welsh stereotype and like to use 20 words when three would do 🙂

Despite being female, I don’t often comment on these threads. I am an old lady. Yes, a real one, not one those those fake 40-something “old ladies” – I even have my state pension!

So I accept that I’ve been “beaten down by sexism since the day they were born”, and younger people might find my opinions outdated, or just plain weird.

However crazy-legs analogy with cycling fits neatly with my approach. I used to ride a motorbike every day, and tried to practice “defensive driving” techniques. So I assumed that every other road user was an aggressive idiot, out to kill me, and made sure to stay away from them. For example, simply let them overtake, rather than me accelerating away, to get some space between us.

I also dressed in an appropriate fashion for motor-biking (eg no bare arms or legs). And I tucked my long hair out of sight (mainly to prevent it going ratty) which affected other people’s perceptions of me.

I’m happy to be cautious on the road, and on my mountain bike, and generally when “”out and about”. It’s kept me relatively safe so far, and I no longer have to even think about it.

So there we have it, just one old lady’s observations . . .

Along with the cycling analogy, I think this explains it pretty well..

Seeing as no one else has mentioned this, I see that 8 Asian women have been gunned down by an Incel terrorist in the US.

Mainly we were trying to put ourselves in the position of a woman we might meet while running, cycling, walking back from town etc and thinking about how we minimise any stress and anxiety our presence might cause.

Did you come to any conclusion because I just say hello to people and go about my business. I have stopped and changed wheels for people before also, an old lady in Slovenia had a policeman chase me down to pay me! I saw two young ladies walking their bikes a few weeks ago and saw one had a puncture, I asked if they wanted me to fix it they said no thanks we are almost home and I went on my way. Am I doing all this wrong?

Crazylegs

The way it was explained was a really good analogy – in the same way that as a cyclist you are constantly on the alert for that one dangerous overtake that could flatten you, basically women are walking through daily life *constantly* thinking that the next man behind them is going to be the dangerous one, constantly experiencing the cycling equivalent of an impatient driver.

AA

Did you come to any conclusion because I just say hello to people and go about my business. I have stopped and changed wheels for people before also

idiotdogbrain

I think this explains it pretty well..

It doesn’t really say what IT is … or whilst asking questions what “violence” includes.
To keep with the canine analogy, every dog in a litter will experience a few warning nips from siblings and mum … but it doesn’t grow up to be afraid of ALL dogs…

Extending this further my mum always takes rescue dogs and the previous one was certainly nervous around men .. including my brother who she’d nip at. She was completely different with me … totally subservient not that I did anything “special”, she just did what I said and fawned for my attention. She’d come and lie on my feet or cuddle up on the floor but wouldn’t jump on the furniture whereas she’d jump up and try and push my brother off a sofa.

I think the analogy here is my brother would never have hurt her (indeed he paid vast sums for her vet bills) but maybe he tried too hard. I love dogs but this one was particularly stupid and I wasn’t particularly attached to it compared to other dogs.

Anyway, for whatever reasons we had an equitable relationship … but she wasn’t scared of ALL men .. but then she didn’t watch TV and browse social media.

As has been mentioned multiple times (and I didn’t read pages 2-3) women are far less at risk of violence than young men but the media likes to have a field day and fear sells papers, clicks or whatever the modern equivalent is.

Perhaps someone has the figures for risk of serious injury because in perspective is the chance larger, smaller or about the same as driving a car to drop the kids off or cycling on the road? (or dying from Covid ??)

Then there is unpleasant behaviour … and perhaps due to the media this is being lumped together with actual risk and the two do overlap but perhaps much of this is a lot of expectation/perception.

On one side there is an implicit threat that is mostly not there. Just because some guy on a scaffold with his jeans down his crack wolf whistles or cat calls doesn’t mean there is any violent intent, he’s just a nob. It’s NOT acceptable but equally it’s not something to be scared of.

AA described a lot I identify with … the difference is perhaps I treat people in the way they treat me not some idealised way. Some people will just fall back on violence, I don’t really care so long as there are no witnesses or if there are they clearly hit me first. Otherwise this is the same as AA described, at the point you say something and especially as a guy you have to be prepared for it to escalate to violence and possibly a knife.

As a society we seem to have forgotten that for some people violence is the only language they understand and in other’s is just the safest option. A decade or more ago I was going through a metro tunnel with my mum and we encountered a old guy being robbed by a youth. I didn’t piss about as he quite probably had a knife but after when the youth was bleeding semi-concioius on the floor my mum asked why I didn’t try and talk to him first. 2 reasons were that I had my mum with me and he probably had a knife and he obviously had no problem with violence and the youth had obviously chosen a place with no cameras.

If I were to follow what is taught now I should have walked away and phoned the police because there is some misguided perception that violence doesn’t solve anything unless we outsource it to someone like the police to do it on our behalf. To me this is like saying you’re vegetarian because you only eat cling film meat that someone else has killed and prepared.

In the same way my kid was being bullied in school, the kid has already been moved due to his behaviour and in 2 consecutive days he stole and broke my kids lunch box and threw his headphones on the school roof. He did as he was instructed and “told a teacher” who apparently talked to the parents. Obviously nothing changed so I told him to just hit him in the face a few times. The kid is double his weight so he can’t just push him back… problem solved and next day the kid brought in £10 … he has to the end of this week to pay up for the new headphones and lunch box and I suspect somehow he will find the money. Most importantly perhaps it changed the relationship not only for my son but any of his friends.

However, what this does highlight is my risk for seeing someone being bullied/mugged or whatever is not getting hurt (I fall off bikes for fun) … but the legal consequences.

5-6yrs? ago I was outside Aberdeen station (having a smoke) and a group of youths (17-18) were harassing younger kids as they left the station.
Eventually a couple responded and they were surrounded by the youths. I reluctantly put out my cig and walked in .. but the truth is there was nothing I could do except intimidate them that wouldn’t see me in court and intimidating a group of youths who tower over you isn’t easy.
It kinda worked out as I got the 2 lads away but the same group of youths were back the next night…. people were ignoring them knowing they can’t actually do anything without being at risk of prosecution.

I’ll just point out that it was the girls/young women who were choosing the victims for the boys and encouraging them.

Same way I had a load (350kg) of scrap metal on my drive and have had multiple people just try and steal it. Talking to them just ended up with threats of violence or “no speak English” each time … so I kept a steel bar by the front door. This worked far better … one of the early ones returned and suddenly spoke English including advanced use of the vernacular. They claimed to not have been before despite me having their van reg and stealing on camera … sometimes violence is the only language someone will listen to and societies lack of acceptance of this causes all sorts of knock on problems.

This is why I try not to get involved when I see unpleasant behaviour (to women or otherwise). That guy on the scaffolding has 5 mates (witnesses) that will all swear blind I attacked him and if I even comment there is a good chance he’ll climb down and have a go.

I’m not surprised women are scared if we’re teaching them that every man is a potential rapist.

i_scoff_cake

I’m not surprised women are scared if we’re teaching them that every man is a potential rapist.

That’s the beauty of populist media driven policy.
You can ignore every actual fact except for likes and clicks.

I’m not surprised women are scared if we’re teaching them that every man is a potential rapist.

That’s the beauty of populist media driven policy.
You can ignore every actual fact except for likes and clicks.

Reminds me of something I saw recently from that godawful (swid?) Dennis Pr*ger

Jaw-dropping. I link a ‘review’ rather than the original. I’ve of course no firm evidence for whether or not the likes of Pr*ger actually believe the stuff they peddle. But that’s not the issue is it? The fact is they are pu$$$$hing this stuff, day in, day out.

women are far less at risk of violence than young men but the media likes to have a field day and fear sells papers, clicks or whatever the modern equivalent is.

I don’t think this is it. Men know that there are certain danger scenarios – heavy drinking, football matches etc – and then the rest of the time it’s fine. Very few men are a threat to me, and I can avoid the ones that are.

But it’s different for women – they are frequently subjected to low grade abuse and unpleasant behaviour of varying degrees from actual physically present men, and it can escalate at any time. And this kind of behaviour is enabled and effectively condoned by a lot of media in subtle ways. And this is the real problem, not just the headline statistics.

You can’t blame the media for inflating this. You’re a man, and you’re dismissing women’s concerns as being all in their heads, whilst being a man and never having experienced it. Despite what you may think, you ARE part of the problem here.

@crazy-legs, great analogy, thank you.

I’m not surprised women are scared if we’re teaching them that every man is a potential rapist.

That’s the beauty of populist media driven policy.
You can ignore every actual fact except for likes and clicks.

FFS, how are we still not getting this..!?

Women are not scared because of the media – women are scared/cautious/fed up because of their actual direct experiences of being harassed, groped, intimidated, threatened, etc. by men.

Those of us who are not women, we DO NOT get to tell women how they feel about it. That’s part of the root of the problem – men assuming that they know better that the people who actually experience this behaviour. Just like white people don’t get to tell BAME people how they feel about racism.

We do not get to say “but statistics”.
We do not get to say “but violence against men as well”.

What we do is we listen, and we try to understand, and we do what is asked of us. It might feel uncomfortable to feel that we are not doing things right, but damn it, it’s less uncomfortable than what women have had to tolerate since forever.

“It’s like a situation where one person has been beating another with a stick for years. The person with the stick is afraid that if they stop the beating and drop the stick, the other person will pick it up and beat them back. But the beaten person just wants the beating to stop.”

@molgrips, yes, that!