Let's talk about psychopathy. Psychopathy is kinda meaningless now. Or at least it must be because the way this word is used irritates the fuck outta me as a counselor (yeah turns out a lot of things bug me now that I'm a counselor XD). Psychopathy has become stripped of its original meaning and description by movies and armchair activists and is now ascribed to anyone who does something bad. That's not psychopathy. Simply being a bad person is not psychopathy. Sociopathy is not psychopathy, despite how much they might crossover into each other. I will not only be examining the differences between sociopaths and psychopaths, but I will also be talking about what a psychopath is and how you can spot one, because I am very sick of how overused this word has become.
To begin, psychopathy is a mental disorder. One does not simply become a psychopath; you have to be born as one. One thing that psychopaths and sociopaths share is antisocial personality disorder, though with psychopaths, the case is more complex and difficult to deal with for reasons I am about to explain. With a psychopath, their actions come from nature. What I'm about to say might be controversial, but it's important to keep in mind that psychopaths aren't malevolent, they simply...are. They don't have any specific reasons for their bad behaviour. They just do them. They tend to rationalise their actions by saying "this is just who I am and people will have to accept that". Most of what people know about psychopaths is just glamourised Hollywood tropism. Movies portray psychopathic villains as bloodthirsty tortured souls or are batshit insane, both of which are misconceptions. There are plenty of evil people out there with completely normal mental states, normal meaning fully functioning hypothalamus and amygdala, both of which are impaired in psychopaths. Plus, psychosis and psychopathy are not the same thing, even if they tend to overlap. Hollywood also tells you that psychopaths are geniuses, when the reality is that on average, psychopaths are actually pretty dumb. Keep in mind that just because they have brain disorders and typically don't know better, that doesn't justify their bad behaviour.
Another thing psychopaths are known for is lying. When a psychopath becomes aware of their affliction, they will try their damnedest to hide it from others. They will be cool and calm, tell some jokes, put on a noticeably fake smile, all of that to hide their instability. They're also pathological liars, and can form cover stories as they go along. One thing to note is that whilst psychopaths regularly lie, they're also kinda bad at it. It's easy to catch them in a standard lie, since they don't carefully plan them out if they're making it all up right then and there, and you can pick up on some discrepancies that contradict something they said. That's why sociopaths aren't psychopaths as many people would confuse. A sociopath would be upfront with what they're like, and they were socialised to be the way they are. Psychopaths are worse off than sociopaths, since their mental state is natural and can't be fixed, only treated, but sociopaths are more prone to violence than psychopaths, since their violent impulses come much more unpredictably and they have very short fuses. Psychopaths have specific triggers. Not like shell shocked people, but they have a specific type of tick that causes them to lose their shit. However, once their episode is done, they'll resume as if nothing happened. Also, contrary to popular belief, psychopaths and sociopaths are capable of empathy, but very little of it and it tends to be selective.
What about their patterns of violence? This is usually the defining difference between sociopaths and psychopaths. Sociopaths are volatile and destructive and don't care about the mess they made. Psychopaths on the other hand hate sloppiness and will make sure no one sees what they've done. Psychopaths don't bathe in their victims' blood (unless you're Richard Chase but I digress), they don't make sunglasses out of fingernails, they don't do anything of that sort. Sorry Hannibal Lecter :/. In fact, DC Comics's Joker is a prime example of the mislabeling of a psychopath. Whilst he meticulously plans out his schemes, his volatility and impulsion ultimately makes him cross over into sociopath territory. Sure he's insane, unlike most people with APD, but he's still a sociopath nonetheless. But what if you're dealing with someone who's just plain evil? Well, for starters, "evil" isn't really a medical term, and is simply an adjective. No therapist or mental hospital is gonna diagnose someone as evil. If someone is just pure evil and shows no signs of APD or psychopathy or sociopathy, then their mental state is normal. People like Hitler and Bashar Al-Assad are what we consider evil since they don't exhibit psychopathic tendencies and have/had clear reasons for what they do/did. Being a murderer or criminal doesn't automatically make you a psychopath, as I mentioned before. I could easily say that the members of ISIS and the KKK are psychopaths, but I'd be wrong.
One thing that may freak you out is that the general population exhibits plenty of psychopathic traits. We've all lied to cover our arses, we've all thought of violence or committed it, but that doesn't mean we're mentally unstable and are bound to destroy a nursing home or whatever. People aren't perfect after all.
The last thing I wanna talk about is the concept of remorse, which psychopaths apparently are incapable of. This is also a misconception. Psychopaths can feel remorse for what they do, but the level of remorse they feel is not enough to create full on guilt, especially since they never fully realise the gravity of their actions. They'll treat breaking a person's arm as if they accidentally bumped into them, for example. Either that or they'll blame you for it, even if it wasn't your fault. I'm not trying to scare people into thinking that psychopaths are all over the place, because they're not. The world population of psychopaths is around 1%, and you'll likely have run into one of these folks at least once on the street and just don't know it yet. That might sound contradictory, but the fact is that Hollywood has planted seeds in your head that warp reality about these people just to get you to buy a ticket about some guy who launches nuclear missiles at people when he hears the word "chicken".
So what false facts about psychopaths did you believe? Did this help your perception of them? Do you now feel like you can properly identify one? Psychopathy is still a mental health issue, let's not let the movies force that out of our minds. The better we understand something, the more effective we'd be at dealing with it.
Thursday, April 19, 2018
Tuesday, April 3, 2018
The Problem With 'Reversing the Genders'
One thing I'm absolutely tired of seeing is the 'reversing the genders' argument. I already kinda touched on this in an earlier blog post, but I'm gonna go into more detail here since I don't think I highlighted the real issues with this philosophy. It usually goes like this: "if it were a woman doing X to a man then no one would care" or "if it were a man doing X to a woman then it'd be a national crisis". To any rational person, you'd see the flaws of this. It also gets thrown around when discussing race or religion, but I'm focusing on gender because it's never been more prominent than there.
Let me bring up the most relevant example: a couple weeks ago on American Idol, Katy Perry snuck a lip kiss onto a 19 year old man without his consent. She had promised him a cheek kiss but instead she toyed with him because he admitted he'd never kissed a girl before. On the surface it seemed like a nice gesture, because let's face it, I'm sure a lot of guys wouldn't mind doing something like kissing Katy Perry, but in this case, Ben, the victim (yes I'm calling him that for framing reasons), was clearly not on board with this, and she should've picked up on that and understood the basics of consent. Now Ben was pretty brave about it, and he claimed that whilst he was embarrassed and wanted his first kiss to be special and on his own terms, he didn't feel assaulted. Now I and a lot of other feminists infer this to be denial, since admitting to being assaulted is a rather embarrassing thing to do. Then a bunch of slacktivists on the internet quickly threw this gem out: "if an older man kissed a 19 year old girl on TV there would be World War 3".
I have a HUGE problem with this statement. The obvious being that men get away with this shit all the time. In fact, the only people I've seen criticising Katy for what she did are feminists. Everyone else is cheering her on and saying how lucky Ben is, further reinforcing this harmful idea that men should just deal with getting sexually harassed. Hell, even Luke Bryan and Lionel Richie, Katy's fellow judges, were jumping for joy. Katy had previously done a similar thing by constantly flirting with another male contestant, with Luke immediately calling him 'dreamboat' as soon as he introduces comes in. It's obvious that they think that consent doesn't apply to guys, which it does. But people act like men immediately get shot for doing this. Where was the lynch mob coming after Ray Rice when he sucker punched his fiancée in an elevator on video as it went viral? Nowhere. In fact, people were defending what he did because she hit him first. But when a woman on Facebook shares a story of her beating up a guy who was groping her, suddenly waves of idiots come out and say that she was overreacting and rushed to excessive violence. But I guess men are just allowed to be violent right? And Whoopi Goldberg's stupid arse defence that "women shouldn't expect men to respect them all the time" or whatever didn't help matters.
Plus, most men assault women in private, which is why you don't hear about it that much. Katy did it on live TV like a moron, which is why that one was a bit easier to go after. Did she think that she would've gotten away with it? Perhaps, and from the looks of it, American Idol doesn't have any intentions of dealing with her behaviour. I'm not gonna deny that people do generally get more angry at men committing sexual violence than if women do it, but at the same time let's not act like women always get away with these things. When female teachers commit statutory rape with their male students and are quickly charged with the crime and yet male rapists get anti-humourous sentences for the same crime, I fail to see the double standard against men at play here. Female victims aren't treated better than male victims, they're treated differently, to quote the Angry Feminist. Women get told that they were asking for it or are just looking for attention, men get told that they should've enjoyed it or that they are lucky. Which would you prefer? Neither is the correct answer.
There is a way to cover male victims of assault without having to throw female victims under the bus. In fact, a male victim of abuse by a woman even publicly stated that he absolutely hates it when people use the "reverse the genders" bollocks because if anything it exploits his pain for political means. Stop promoting victim competition and start promoting the deconstruction of institution that rich celebrities have created to get away with abusing people. It's a fine solution wouldn't you think?
Let me bring up the most relevant example: a couple weeks ago on American Idol, Katy Perry snuck a lip kiss onto a 19 year old man without his consent. She had promised him a cheek kiss but instead she toyed with him because he admitted he'd never kissed a girl before. On the surface it seemed like a nice gesture, because let's face it, I'm sure a lot of guys wouldn't mind doing something like kissing Katy Perry, but in this case, Ben, the victim (yes I'm calling him that for framing reasons), was clearly not on board with this, and she should've picked up on that and understood the basics of consent. Now Ben was pretty brave about it, and he claimed that whilst he was embarrassed and wanted his first kiss to be special and on his own terms, he didn't feel assaulted. Now I and a lot of other feminists infer this to be denial, since admitting to being assaulted is a rather embarrassing thing to do. Then a bunch of slacktivists on the internet quickly threw this gem out: "if an older man kissed a 19 year old girl on TV there would be World War 3".
I have a HUGE problem with this statement. The obvious being that men get away with this shit all the time. In fact, the only people I've seen criticising Katy for what she did are feminists. Everyone else is cheering her on and saying how lucky Ben is, further reinforcing this harmful idea that men should just deal with getting sexually harassed. Hell, even Luke Bryan and Lionel Richie, Katy's fellow judges, were jumping for joy. Katy had previously done a similar thing by constantly flirting with another male contestant, with Luke immediately calling him 'dreamboat' as soon as he introduces comes in. It's obvious that they think that consent doesn't apply to guys, which it does. But people act like men immediately get shot for doing this. Where was the lynch mob coming after Ray Rice when he sucker punched his fiancée in an elevator on video as it went viral? Nowhere. In fact, people were defending what he did because she hit him first. But when a woman on Facebook shares a story of her beating up a guy who was groping her, suddenly waves of idiots come out and say that she was overreacting and rushed to excessive violence. But I guess men are just allowed to be violent right? And Whoopi Goldberg's stupid arse defence that "women shouldn't expect men to respect them all the time" or whatever didn't help matters.
Plus, most men assault women in private, which is why you don't hear about it that much. Katy did it on live TV like a moron, which is why that one was a bit easier to go after. Did she think that she would've gotten away with it? Perhaps, and from the looks of it, American Idol doesn't have any intentions of dealing with her behaviour. I'm not gonna deny that people do generally get more angry at men committing sexual violence than if women do it, but at the same time let's not act like women always get away with these things. When female teachers commit statutory rape with their male students and are quickly charged with the crime and yet male rapists get anti-humourous sentences for the same crime, I fail to see the double standard against men at play here. Female victims aren't treated better than male victims, they're treated differently, to quote the Angry Feminist. Women get told that they were asking for it or are just looking for attention, men get told that they should've enjoyed it or that they are lucky. Which would you prefer? Neither is the correct answer.
There is a way to cover male victims of assault without having to throw female victims under the bus. In fact, a male victim of abuse by a woman even publicly stated that he absolutely hates it when people use the "reverse the genders" bollocks because if anything it exploits his pain for political means. Stop promoting victim competition and start promoting the deconstruction of institution that rich celebrities have created to get away with abusing people. It's a fine solution wouldn't you think?
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
When Women Grope Women "As A Joke"
Say it ain't so, a feminist actually criticising something women do? Well ok, it's not unheard of from me, I did after all lambast The Red Pill, which was directed by a woman. See I'm not ready to go on about how "females nowadays" are spoilt c*nts who think they can get away with anything they want, because I'll send anyone who says that all the way over to India, where your father can pay your arse off to marry a man who you won't meet until the engagement party. I'll send them back to before the 1920s when women couldn't vote. But one thing I've noticed is unique to this generation of women is that they think that sexual violence doesn't apply to them. They think that there's a loophole in sexual assault where if a woman gropes another woman, then it's fine cuz it's all in good fun. And I've noticed that it's slipped under many people's radars. Of course you have MRAs saying that lesbians are just the epicentre of abuse and rape, but they don't actually know or care what they're talking about. So how about a perspective from a half-lesbian ;D.
Let's answer the initial question. Can women be sexual predators? Yes of course they can. I myself in fact get groped by females quite a lot myself. Of course, men do it more to me, but there are some ladies that tried getting a piece of my pie. Chances are, you're a woman who's been groped by another woman at some point. Naturally, we don't necessarily see this as serious as if a man were to do it to us, which is understandable. After all, the stats do say that men are much more of a threat to us than our own sisterhood. But let's disregard all that for a moment. The reality is, she touched you without your permission. But how did you react? You likely stayed silent, which is fine, there's no correct way to respond to being sexually violated. But if you went to call her out on what she did, she'd probably either play the woman card (which honestly is very unlikely) or she'll say "it's just a joke". But is it really though? Why is that a woman can grab another woman inappropriately and it's funny when that's not the case if a man grabs a woman inappropriately? Well, it's because we've been socialised that way. However if a woman was raped by another woman, she certainly wouldn't be in on the humour.
The main gist of what I wanna talk about is when straight women who are friends with each other grab each other's breasts and bums. Now, I can confirm that this happens, in fact it does in my circle of female friends too. This can be boiled down to some inherent trust amongst women. We're much safer around other women than we are around men, and as such we probably take advantage of this more than we should. Sometimes the playful butt-touches will become a hand straight in your crack because you happened to bend over in front of her. And yes, I've had that happen to me. But to be clear, it's ok if you, a straight woman, touch your female friend's butt. Just as long as it's, say it with me now, C O N S E N S U A L. Even if the consent is "implied", if at any point she's becoming visibly uncomfortable, or tells you to stop and you keep going, congratulations, you've committed sexual assault. You aren't joking around, you're hurting her. It doesn't automatically become "ok" if you're both straight women. Not to mention it just looks bad for women everywhere because when they go to report any assaults that they were involved in, people are just gonna be like "oh yeah? Well women grab each other all the time and no one cares". And I'm sure we can all agree how fucking annoying that is. Remember when Melanie Martinez was outed for raping a woman? I can't count the times on my hand that I saw someone say "women can't rape women".
To conclude this post, this idea that women can freely grope women as they please without an ounce of consent is just wrong. I can sort of understand if it's some kind of reclamation of our sexuality, but if becomes a regular habit and you start doing it to women you've never met before, then you're a predator, plain and simple. Just be chill. Women don't exist to be grabbed, and if there's anyone who should understand that better than anyone else, it's women.
Let's answer the initial question. Can women be sexual predators? Yes of course they can. I myself in fact get groped by females quite a lot myself. Of course, men do it more to me, but there are some ladies that tried getting a piece of my pie. Chances are, you're a woman who's been groped by another woman at some point. Naturally, we don't necessarily see this as serious as if a man were to do it to us, which is understandable. After all, the stats do say that men are much more of a threat to us than our own sisterhood. But let's disregard all that for a moment. The reality is, she touched you without your permission. But how did you react? You likely stayed silent, which is fine, there's no correct way to respond to being sexually violated. But if you went to call her out on what she did, she'd probably either play the woman card (which honestly is very unlikely) or she'll say "it's just a joke". But is it really though? Why is that a woman can grab another woman inappropriately and it's funny when that's not the case if a man grabs a woman inappropriately? Well, it's because we've been socialised that way. However if a woman was raped by another woman, she certainly wouldn't be in on the humour.
The main gist of what I wanna talk about is when straight women who are friends with each other grab each other's breasts and bums. Now, I can confirm that this happens, in fact it does in my circle of female friends too. This can be boiled down to some inherent trust amongst women. We're much safer around other women than we are around men, and as such we probably take advantage of this more than we should. Sometimes the playful butt-touches will become a hand straight in your crack because you happened to bend over in front of her. And yes, I've had that happen to me. But to be clear, it's ok if you, a straight woman, touch your female friend's butt. Just as long as it's, say it with me now, C O N S E N S U A L. Even if the consent is "implied", if at any point she's becoming visibly uncomfortable, or tells you to stop and you keep going, congratulations, you've committed sexual assault. You aren't joking around, you're hurting her. It doesn't automatically become "ok" if you're both straight women. Not to mention it just looks bad for women everywhere because when they go to report any assaults that they were involved in, people are just gonna be like "oh yeah? Well women grab each other all the time and no one cares". And I'm sure we can all agree how fucking annoying that is. Remember when Melanie Martinez was outed for raping a woman? I can't count the times on my hand that I saw someone say "women can't rape women".
To conclude this post, this idea that women can freely grope women as they please without an ounce of consent is just wrong. I can sort of understand if it's some kind of reclamation of our sexuality, but if becomes a regular habit and you start doing it to women you've never met before, then you're a predator, plain and simple. Just be chill. Women don't exist to be grabbed, and if there's anyone who should understand that better than anyone else, it's women.
Monday, January 1, 2018
Stop Comparing Anita Sarkeesian To Jack Thompson
Ah, GamerGate. Easily the hottest topic in all of contemporary feminism. So why am I coming to it when the movement has essentially subsided? Well, because it's making a comeback, and boy is it not pretty. Truth is, though, I can't call it a comeback because it never really went away. We just stopped talking about it. Bad idea. Very bad idea. Nothing's changed with them. They're still racist, sexist, and desperately trying to convince us that they're just a noble movement aiming for fair and balanced journalism. I would talk about their recent resurgence regarding NBC supposedly calling all gamers racist neo-Nazis, but honestly I don't know all about it and it isn't really relevant to my blog. Instead I'm gonna talk about one of their more famous and favourite flagship points, that being their comparison of Anita Sarkeesian to Jack Thompson. The argument cropped up a few years ago, but I'm gonna talk about it anyway because people still bring it up as if it's a valid thing to say.
Before I debunk the comparison, I'm gonna give a rundown of GamerGate's version of the ordeal. This analogy came from none other than Christopher Maldonado, better known by his YouTube name Chris Ray Gun. He described Jack Thompson and Anita's history fairly accurately with a few exceptions, which I'll get to. Jack Thompson is a former DA who in 2009 claimed that video games cause real world violence. As you might've predicted, this was not taken well, and was debunked almost right away. He was constantly harassed, received death threats and eventually lost his job because of his stance on gaming. He is still universally hated today. A couple years later, Anita comes into the fray and states that video games cause real world sexism. Same thing happens, people attack her for what she said about video games. She was even doxxed and had to leave her home. However, despite her huge ongoing hatred from GGers, she was defended by the gaming journalism media and was considered a sort of heroine for not backing down against her haters. Now according to GamerGate, they think that Anita got a free pass because she's a woman and of course pulled the misandry card.
Here's the actual truth. Jack Thompson did in fact receive notable flak for his stance on video games, but he was not disbarred from the Florida bar for it. He was disbarred because he was corrupt and even framed a political opponent for possessing child pornography. In that scenario, it's kinda impossible to defend him. Anita on the other hand never claimed that video games caused sexism. She said that sexist elements in video games reflected reality, that's about it. She never even wanted to take legal action against video games, just for the industry to improve. Plus, Anita used the leftover money from her GoFundMe to buy a new home and register Feminist Frequency as a C3 charity organisation. What has Jack Thompson been up to? Framing guys for kiddy porn. Yeeeaaaaah, starting to look pretty dumb now ain't ya? Gender had nothing to with it. Anita's just a more likable person, plain and simple.
I'm sure plenty of people are gonna come at me with their what-about-isms and claiming that Anita really is the devil's favourite demon and I just don't see it, but fact is, GamerGate's always had it wrong (no surprise there). The double standard exists because it's not a double standard. It's just that it's easier to defend an innocent woman than a fucked up individual willing to slander anyone he dislikes with a massive claim like child porn possession (btw good on the MRAs for ignoring the fact that this counts as a false accusation, but I guess it's only bad when women make them :/). Hopefully now I'll actually have drilled through some thick skulls.
Before I debunk the comparison, I'm gonna give a rundown of GamerGate's version of the ordeal. This analogy came from none other than Christopher Maldonado, better known by his YouTube name Chris Ray Gun. He described Jack Thompson and Anita's history fairly accurately with a few exceptions, which I'll get to. Jack Thompson is a former DA who in 2009 claimed that video games cause real world violence. As you might've predicted, this was not taken well, and was debunked almost right away. He was constantly harassed, received death threats and eventually lost his job because of his stance on gaming. He is still universally hated today. A couple years later, Anita comes into the fray and states that video games cause real world sexism. Same thing happens, people attack her for what she said about video games. She was even doxxed and had to leave her home. However, despite her huge ongoing hatred from GGers, she was defended by the gaming journalism media and was considered a sort of heroine for not backing down against her haters. Now according to GamerGate, they think that Anita got a free pass because she's a woman and of course pulled the misandry card.
Here's the actual truth. Jack Thompson did in fact receive notable flak for his stance on video games, but he was not disbarred from the Florida bar for it. He was disbarred because he was corrupt and even framed a political opponent for possessing child pornography. In that scenario, it's kinda impossible to defend him. Anita on the other hand never claimed that video games caused sexism. She said that sexist elements in video games reflected reality, that's about it. She never even wanted to take legal action against video games, just for the industry to improve. Plus, Anita used the leftover money from her GoFundMe to buy a new home and register Feminist Frequency as a C3 charity organisation. What has Jack Thompson been up to? Framing guys for kiddy porn. Yeeeaaaaah, starting to look pretty dumb now ain't ya? Gender had nothing to with it. Anita's just a more likable person, plain and simple.
I'm sure plenty of people are gonna come at me with their what-about-isms and claiming that Anita really is the devil's favourite demon and I just don't see it, but fact is, GamerGate's always had it wrong (no surprise there). The double standard exists because it's not a double standard. It's just that it's easier to defend an innocent woman than a fucked up individual willing to slander anyone he dislikes with a massive claim like child porn possession (btw good on the MRAs for ignoring the fact that this counts as a false accusation, but I guess it's only bad when women make them :/). Hopefully now I'll actually have drilled through some thick skulls.
Wednesday, December 6, 2017
7 Arguments Against Male Privilege, And Why They're Bollocks
So let's have some fun today, shall we? Whenever the topic of white/male privilege comes up, you're bound to hear this at least once: "But what about situation X where this one guy faced some sort of adversity?" as if that actually means anything. This time I'm gonna take some of the most common arguments against male privilege and dispel them one by one. Before I start, understand the idea that having male privilege does not in any way mean that men have perfect lives. It means that they're at a systemic disposition to have better lives than women. Now that I've clarified that, let's begin the epic takedown.
1. Men Take Up The Majority of Combat Deaths in the Military
Might as well start with quite possibly the first thing out of anti-feminists' mouths as soon as you bring up male privilege. Firstly, this is true. Men do in fact die more in the military than women. However, let's look beneath the surface here. And to do that, we'll have to use facts, something antis claim to care about until the facts are used against them. The most glaring flaw with this argument is that men are the overwhelming majority in the military. Women only take up 15% of the US Military, whereas men take up 85%. Furthermore, women were barred from combat roles for the longest time. And to cap it all off, you can't really be oppressed by something you chose to be in. No I'm not saying that soldiers deserve to die, not in the slightest, but they can't be oppressed if they willingly enlisted, trained, and dedicated their lives to being in the service. Before anyone brings up military conscription, literally no one of this generation has been drafted into war. That shit died in the 70s. If it was still around you'd maybe have more of a case to go off of. But it's not around, and you don't have a case. So shut up.
2. There Are More Men In Jail Than Women/Men Get Harsher Sentences Than Women For Identical Crimes
I always laugh whenever this gets thrown at my face. Why is that? Because it's incredibly clear that antis didn't research a bloody thing about the issue. Whilst it's true that men take up the prison population more than women, it certainly isn't a result of sexism. It's no secret that just about almost every perpetrator of crimes is a man. As of 2014, men committed 98% of rapes, 90% of homicides, 77% of assaults, and 87% of robberies. Assuming these convictions were true, as they come from the FBI, it's hard to consider that oppressive. These men could've easily not killed, raped, or robbed anyone, but they chose to ruin others' lives. On the flip side, most of the crimes committed by women were nonviolent offences, such as shoplifting or vandalism, which normally carry much more lenient sentences. As far as identical crimes go, I have absolutely no idea where they're getting that from. Whenever a woman rapes a young teenage boy, usually in those statutory rape cases, the woman's rightly carted off to jail for a few years. I cannot say the same for men because they either never get convicted or only serve a few months. Or ya know, become elected officials. Sure, sometimes women get off easier, but that is not the norm. In the case of violent crimes, the reason women are likely to get more lenient sentences, especially when it comes to domestic disputes, is because 9/10 women who hit their husbands, or anyone else for that matter, do so in self-defence.
3. The Majority of Workplace Deaths Are Men
This is probably one of the easier ones to debunk. Mostly because the main reasons for these workplaces fatalities is due to a failure of equipment, aka accidents. The biggest way to solve this issue is just to take the proper safety precautions, which can be done by dismantling the idea that men taking steps to make themselves safer is wimpy. What's more is that the number one cause of workplace fatality for women is homicide. No really. Can only imagine what they'd say to that. However I have a feeling I may not like the answer.
4. Men Are Victims of Homicide More Than Women
Ok can I just say that it's incredibly dumb how much dying is a motif for MRAs and such? It's getting to a point where I literally am starting to hypothesise that they think women are immortal or something. As stated above, men are the primary cause of these homicides happening in the first place. Also, women are statistically just as likely to be a victim of a homicide as men, and this isn't even including how many women are murdered as a result of intimate partner violence. In fact, the stats for that are just gutwrenching. Like, there are more women killed in domestic disputes than there are soldiers killed in the Iraq war. One can only imagine what the stats were for any other time.
5. There Are More Homeless Men Than Women
Yes, but women are also more likely to live in poverty. The difference here is that women are more likely to seek out resources for their situation. This, as you could guess, is a result of patriarchy backfiring on men. If you want to solve the homelessness situation, encourage men in financial turmoil to seek benefits and tell them that it's ok if they do so. This also applies to suicide. I'd bring that up, but I already made a blog post about that a while back.
6. More Men Are Raped Than Women If You Include Prison Rape
This is merely bollocks since the claim itself is based on incomplete data, or at the very least the data was highly misinterpreted. You see, the Daily Mail article this originated from is not only a Daily Mail article, which therein is a good indicator of quality (or lack thereof), the study only accounted for one Ohio city. It reported that only 50,000 women were raped in that city in 2008 and 2011, but within those years, there were 200,000 male inmates who had been raped by fellow convicts or prison guards. The article's actual data contradicted its headline, which claimed that it accounts for the whole country. I did some digging on the topic, and the highest percentage I could find for prison rape statistics that included both men and women was 20%. 17 million women are raped a year as opposed to 2 million men according to RAINN. Sure, prison rape is a pandemic, I'll grant them that, but to say that more convicts are raped than civilians is just simple dishonesty, no more, no less.
7. Women Win A Majority of Custody Battles
And finally we reach this little nugget. I'm getting kinda sick of having to argue patriarchy each time, but it's never been more prevalent here. One, gender bias in court is greatly exaggerated. The reason women win most of the time is because both parents agree that the kids should go to the mother. This is also a result of patriarchy dictating that a woman should resign to being a housewife upon the birth of their first child. Despite what MRAs will tell you, women don't get custody of the kids right away just for being women. If that were true, Bristol Palin wouldn't have lost her custody battle. There's no dark magic at play that gains women complete control over divorce court proceedings. Stop thinking one episode of Judge Judy mirrors reality. In fact, studies say that 70% of fathers who fight for custody are likely to get it. I think it's time dads got up off their arses and actually put in the effort to win these things since the scales are tipped in their favour.
So there you have it. 7 arguments against male privilege totally dismantled in one short post. I know a bunch of these articles exist already, but I don't care. I have my own perspective on the issue and I'm gonna give it. I just hope you learnt something from this, no mater what your biggest takeaway from it was.
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Stop Oversexualising Latinas/Hispanic Women
I know I talk a lot about the sexual objectification of women, but I don't think I've ever narrowed it down. After all, not all women are objectified equally. White women are objectified for their submissiveness, hair colours, eye colours, weight, and possibly other racist reasons, black women are objectified for their posteriors and "twerking", Asian women are objectified for reasons that make me wanna vomit shards of my own pelvis, and Latinas are objectified for their posteriors, breasts, faces, skin tones, and even attitudes. I'm gonna focus on Latinas and Hispanics given how I am in fact half Spanish. Here I'll go over the stereotypes and ways which the media reduces Latinas y hispanas to nothing more than flagrant and offencively dehumanising trophies.
The biggest example of the stereotyping of Hispanic women in the media is Gloria Pritchett from Modern Family. Sure she is played by the Colombian Sofia Vergara, but just because you have an actress for a non-white character, it doesn't mean you can write them however you like. I brought up this problem with Watch Dogs 2, where Marcus, a black male, was written like a white guy. I won't touch too much on that since I'm not black and that isn't my battle, but many things apply here too. Sofia employs a much more emphatic (and somewhat annoying) accent for Gloria to add to the idea that she is a South American immigrant. Sofia's natural voice is not that grating, I promise you that. But because the show is written through the white gaze, which is the racial equivalent of the male gaze, Sofia must have her character appear as obnoxious as possible to her own kind. But that's not all. Her character isn't a strong Hispanic woman, she's your standard sexy mum, because apparently all Hispanic women are just walking sex appeal. Even her 13 year old son sexualises her. That is fucking disturbing. Say what you will about American Dad's Steve Smith wanting to fuck his mum, but at least that show knows to make Steve's oedipus complex look unnatural. Plus I expect gross humour from Seth MacFarlane. I don't expect Modern Family, which prides itself in having a mixed and gay couple (though the gay couple isn't revolutionary either), to pull this bollocks. Every single joke revolving Gloria is how hot she is. At this point I expect the show to just make her go nude every episode and have her breasts swing around at all times.
Another one is Eva Longoria's character Gabrielle Solis on Desperate Housewives. At first glance, she is portrayed as a strong and in-your-face no-bollocks type of woman. Sad thing is, she still falls victim to the hot Latina stereotype. You see, since Gabrielle is attractive, she's allowed to be a strong lead. But "ugly" Latinas like Consuela from Family Guy (I know she's Mexican but same idea) are just jokes. Consuela is an obnoxious housemaid, another bigoted stereotype of Latinas, and Gabrielle has her shit together. Not only does Gabrielle exist through the white gaze, but the male gaze as well, a killer combination. That's why you won't see black actresses in roles that aren't racially demeaning 85% of the time, but again, not my battle. Zoe Saldana is a small exception to this. She is a black Latina, but mostly is cast in roles that aren't total bollocks. She went from being a world-class assassin in Colombiana to the strong-willed María Posada in The Book of Life. Both of these roles go against common tropes laid out for Latina characters, and the Devil must be given his due. Unfortunately, Saldana alone can't break boundaries for Latinas everywhere, but she's a fine place to start.
Now it's time for the most common depictions of Latinas and Hispanic women: we are aggressive and violent. Almost every angry Latina in film and television has at least one scene or even episode of them beating someone up with a shoe or a broomstick. Well I dunno about you, but I haven't clobbered my husband with any kitchen utensils. Sure there's that one time he tickled my foot and I mule kicked him in the chest, but that was an accident :P. Back on topic, this paints Latinas in a very bad light. It makes it appear that if you end up with a Latina, she's gonna beat your arse over the most trivial shit. And it's usually venial screw-ups that set movie Latinas off isn't it? Forgot to leave the toilet seat down? SMACK. Accidentally got crumbs all over the floor? SMACK. Woke her up 5 minutes before her alarm? SMACK (ok that one's kinda justified XD). I sometimes say violent things, but you won't see me act on them. But movies and TV shows like to make Latinas and Hispanic ladies look like the fucking Hulk. It's not true. But still, you don't wanna piss us off :P.
I think I've kept you waiting enough. I'm finally gonna touch on the sexualisation of Latinas and Hispanics. We are incessantly, and I mean INCESSANTLY, turned into sex objects. More so than any other race or ethnicity in fact. If there's a Latina character in a movie or show, there's a good chance there'll be a see dedicated to staring at her bum. Latinas barely have any diverse body types either. They're either rigidly fit with massive bums and breasts, or have giant legs and small torsos. Trust me, my girlfriend is a white Italian and has a bigger bum than me, and I'm British and Spanish (British girls are known for having big bums too BION). You're more likely to find Latinas with a UK size 6 than anything else. We're also expected to have perfectly round bums that glisten off the sunlight. Well hate to burst your bubble boys, but that ain't the case, or at least not with me. I've got cellulite, stretch marks, and blemishes back there. I wouldn't want it any other way if it means destroying stereotypes. We're allowed to have our own insecurities and imperfections. And I'll be damned if they tell me otherwise.
Just let me say right now that I can't speak for every case. I'm just giving my perspective and the prevalence of these tropes in my immediate surroundings. So what can be done about these stereotypes? STOP TOLERATING THEM ON ANY LEVEL. 1 in 6 Latina women are victims of sexual violence, and the sexualisation they face today helps not. It really isn't that difficult to assign personality to a Latina character, why not start now?
The biggest example of the stereotyping of Hispanic women in the media is Gloria Pritchett from Modern Family. Sure she is played by the Colombian Sofia Vergara, but just because you have an actress for a non-white character, it doesn't mean you can write them however you like. I brought up this problem with Watch Dogs 2, where Marcus, a black male, was written like a white guy. I won't touch too much on that since I'm not black and that isn't my battle, but many things apply here too. Sofia employs a much more emphatic (and somewhat annoying) accent for Gloria to add to the idea that she is a South American immigrant. Sofia's natural voice is not that grating, I promise you that. But because the show is written through the white gaze, which is the racial equivalent of the male gaze, Sofia must have her character appear as obnoxious as possible to her own kind. But that's not all. Her character isn't a strong Hispanic woman, she's your standard sexy mum, because apparently all Hispanic women are just walking sex appeal. Even her 13 year old son sexualises her. That is fucking disturbing. Say what you will about American Dad's Steve Smith wanting to fuck his mum, but at least that show knows to make Steve's oedipus complex look unnatural. Plus I expect gross humour from Seth MacFarlane. I don't expect Modern Family, which prides itself in having a mixed and gay couple (though the gay couple isn't revolutionary either), to pull this bollocks. Every single joke revolving Gloria is how hot she is. At this point I expect the show to just make her go nude every episode and have her breasts swing around at all times.
Another one is Eva Longoria's character Gabrielle Solis on Desperate Housewives. At first glance, she is portrayed as a strong and in-your-face no-bollocks type of woman. Sad thing is, she still falls victim to the hot Latina stereotype. You see, since Gabrielle is attractive, she's allowed to be a strong lead. But "ugly" Latinas like Consuela from Family Guy (I know she's Mexican but same idea) are just jokes. Consuela is an obnoxious housemaid, another bigoted stereotype of Latinas, and Gabrielle has her shit together. Not only does Gabrielle exist through the white gaze, but the male gaze as well, a killer combination. That's why you won't see black actresses in roles that aren't racially demeaning 85% of the time, but again, not my battle. Zoe Saldana is a small exception to this. She is a black Latina, but mostly is cast in roles that aren't total bollocks. She went from being a world-class assassin in Colombiana to the strong-willed María Posada in The Book of Life. Both of these roles go against common tropes laid out for Latina characters, and the Devil must be given his due. Unfortunately, Saldana alone can't break boundaries for Latinas everywhere, but she's a fine place to start.
Now it's time for the most common depictions of Latinas and Hispanic women: we are aggressive and violent. Almost every angry Latina in film and television has at least one scene or even episode of them beating someone up with a shoe or a broomstick. Well I dunno about you, but I haven't clobbered my husband with any kitchen utensils. Sure there's that one time he tickled my foot and I mule kicked him in the chest, but that was an accident :P. Back on topic, this paints Latinas in a very bad light. It makes it appear that if you end up with a Latina, she's gonna beat your arse over the most trivial shit. And it's usually venial screw-ups that set movie Latinas off isn't it? Forgot to leave the toilet seat down? SMACK. Accidentally got crumbs all over the floor? SMACK. Woke her up 5 minutes before her alarm? SMACK (ok that one's kinda justified XD). I sometimes say violent things, but you won't see me act on them. But movies and TV shows like to make Latinas and Hispanic ladies look like the fucking Hulk. It's not true. But still, you don't wanna piss us off :P.
I think I've kept you waiting enough. I'm finally gonna touch on the sexualisation of Latinas and Hispanics. We are incessantly, and I mean INCESSANTLY, turned into sex objects. More so than any other race or ethnicity in fact. If there's a Latina character in a movie or show, there's a good chance there'll be a see dedicated to staring at her bum. Latinas barely have any diverse body types either. They're either rigidly fit with massive bums and breasts, or have giant legs and small torsos. Trust me, my girlfriend is a white Italian and has a bigger bum than me, and I'm British and Spanish (British girls are known for having big bums too BION). You're more likely to find Latinas with a UK size 6 than anything else. We're also expected to have perfectly round bums that glisten off the sunlight. Well hate to burst your bubble boys, but that ain't the case, or at least not with me. I've got cellulite, stretch marks, and blemishes back there. I wouldn't want it any other way if it means destroying stereotypes. We're allowed to have our own insecurities and imperfections. And I'll be damned if they tell me otherwise.
Just let me say right now that I can't speak for every case. I'm just giving my perspective and the prevalence of these tropes in my immediate surroundings. So what can be done about these stereotypes? STOP TOLERATING THEM ON ANY LEVEL. 1 in 6 Latina women are victims of sexual violence, and the sexualisation they face today helps not. It really isn't that difficult to assign personality to a Latina character, why not start now?
Sunday, November 26, 2017
Bisexuality and Open Marriages
As you recall, I am bisexual. I know I identified as "bi-romantic" before, but things have changed and I'm a full-fledged bisexual. But one thing that I'm sure spans across the board with all bisexuals is the killer urges we get to act on our bisexuality (note: I'm gonna be saying bisexual a lot here). For some, it's harder than others. Now for this reason, most bisexuals remain single so they don't have to worry about being hitched to a man but desperately want to have it off with a woman, or vice versa. But to those already married? You might find yourself in a pickle. You might pleasure yourself to pictures of models of the opposite sex, or you might boldly go where few are brave enough to travel. That's right, I'm talking about open relationships. Or at least more specifically, ones where you're dating both a male and female partner.
Now if there's one needlessly oversensationalised taboo, it's polyamory. You've got people saying it's practiced by rapey Muslims in the Middle East (they say as they go on to cheat on their wives with a new street walker every week), you've got people saying it's selfish and ruins the sanctity of marriage, which is incredibly laughable, or that if it gets legal then slippery slope and all that shit, and you've got these libfems thinking that polyamory is just a way for men to control women, which I honestly don't get the impression that that's the case. If anything, a man with multiple girlfriends is pretty much on thin ice XD.
Let's get one thing out of the way: Polyamory is one of the most wrongly attributed matrimonial/romantic practices out there. Why is that? Because stupid men use the banner of polyamory as a defence when they get outed as womanisers, or as an excuse so they can cheat on their wives. That's not what polyamory is. Having sex with new people whenever you feel like it is not polyamory. Polygamy is not polyamory, even though they are used interchangeably. Polygamy is multiple marriages whereas polyamory is just an open relationship. Polyamory is more meant for people with high sex drives or just aren't cut out for monogamous relationships, since honestly, being with the same person for all your life can get pretty tedious and often leads to divorces and bitter breakups. Not every bisexual person is polyamorous but the ones who are typically describe their experiences as positive. Marriage counselors have stated that bisexuals in open relationships usually are happier and their relationships last longer, which makes sense. However, not everyone's partner is ok with this and often times will lash out and accuse them of infidelity. As an alternative to polyamory, simple experimenting is also a recommended method to help bisexuals in monogamous relationships sate their desires to be with the opposite sex.
Just remember that you are not biphobic for not being comfortable with such a thing. Poly relationships are something that require immense levels of trust in order for them to prosper. What WOULD make you biphobic is hating your partner and saying "I should've known you bisexuals were sleaze bags". And if you do happen to be in a poly relationship and at one point you feel you prefer monogamy, you're free to stop at any time. Bisexual love doesn't have to be taboo. All that matters is doing what you're comfortable with.
Now if there's one needlessly oversensationalised taboo, it's polyamory. You've got people saying it's practiced by rapey Muslims in the Middle East (they say as they go on to cheat on their wives with a new street walker every week), you've got people saying it's selfish and ruins the sanctity of marriage, which is incredibly laughable, or that if it gets legal then slippery slope and all that shit, and you've got these libfems thinking that polyamory is just a way for men to control women, which I honestly don't get the impression that that's the case. If anything, a man with multiple girlfriends is pretty much on thin ice XD.
Let's get one thing out of the way: Polyamory is one of the most wrongly attributed matrimonial/romantic practices out there. Why is that? Because stupid men use the banner of polyamory as a defence when they get outed as womanisers, or as an excuse so they can cheat on their wives. That's not what polyamory is. Having sex with new people whenever you feel like it is not polyamory. Polygamy is not polyamory, even though they are used interchangeably. Polygamy is multiple marriages whereas polyamory is just an open relationship. Polyamory is more meant for people with high sex drives or just aren't cut out for monogamous relationships, since honestly, being with the same person for all your life can get pretty tedious and often leads to divorces and bitter breakups. Not every bisexual person is polyamorous but the ones who are typically describe their experiences as positive. Marriage counselors have stated that bisexuals in open relationships usually are happier and their relationships last longer, which makes sense. However, not everyone's partner is ok with this and often times will lash out and accuse them of infidelity. As an alternative to polyamory, simple experimenting is also a recommended method to help bisexuals in monogamous relationships sate their desires to be with the opposite sex.
Just remember that you are not biphobic for not being comfortable with such a thing. Poly relationships are something that require immense levels of trust in order for them to prosper. What WOULD make you biphobic is hating your partner and saying "I should've known you bisexuals were sleaze bags". And if you do happen to be in a poly relationship and at one point you feel you prefer monogamy, you're free to stop at any time. Bisexual love doesn't have to be taboo. All that matters is doing what you're comfortable with.
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