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First person view of catcalls? Well, Sweden isn't big on it, or my town isn't, or I don't move in the parts of my town where it is, or I don't get that much attention. When someone approaches me, it's because they want me to give them pennies or because they want me to give up my mobile contract (over my cold, dead hands, it has unlimited surf). Or because they want me to sell HerbaLife or donate to the environmental mafia. It has happened that I feel uncomfortable being approached by these people, and in one instance where the guy was apparently psychotic. I got him to sit down and called an ambulance.
It seems to me that a culture where people talk to one another as opposed to "egads he talked to me, lucky he didn't murder or rape me too" cuts down on problematic communication. And of course, the one right nobody has in a free, open society is the right not to hear bad things. As Kirth and I stated, no solutions beyond catcalls are bad and people shouldn't do them have been forthcoming. If I did get a catcall and someone interfered to help me, I would REALLY hope it didn't end in violence.
Thank you for sharing, Madame Sissyl. Would you like a pamphlet?
Anyway, re: the anti-white male Slate piece: From my limited readings in black feminism, black feminists identify much closer with their male counterparts than they do with their white sisters even if they are sometimes exasperated by them. (See, for example, bell hooks' interview with motherf!*$ing Ice Cube in SPIN that I linked in feminist threads of days gone by.) That a young, bi-racial, presumably professional (she's writing for Slate, right?) woman reacts to yuppie gentrifiers making a video that dredges up every miscegenationist nightmare of the racist American psyche with a screed railing against "white men" (where, I gather from reading the piece, she means "upper class white men"--not many Teamsters get to harass women at frat parties, for example) doesn't surprise me in the least and, imho, is completely understandable.
That black feminists are still capable of being filled with class bias only goes to illustrate that feminism is a petty-bourgeois ideology that offers very little in the way forward towards the liberation of working class women. Which isn't to say that they aren't capable of some pretty profound insights.
For example,
"During the early stages of the contemporary anti-rape movement,
few feminist theorists seriously analyzed the special
circumstances surrounding the Black woman as rape victim. The
historical knot binding Black women - systematically abused and
violated by white men - to Black men - maimed and murdered
because of the racist manipulation of the rape charge - has just
begun to be acknowledged to any significant extent. Whenever
Black women have challenged rape, they usually and simultaneously
expose the use of the frame-up rape charge as a deadly racist
weapon against their men. As one extremely perceptive writer put
it:
The myth of the black rapist of white women is the twin
of the myth of the bad black woman-both designed to
apologize for and facilitate the continued exploitation
of black men and women. Black women perceived this
connection very clearly and were early in the
forefront of the fight against lynching."
--Angela Davis (commie) quoting Gerda Lerner (feminist).
Finish the Civil War! For black liberation through socialist revolution!
Class society is the bedrock of woman's oppression! For womens liberation through socialist revolution!
Vive le Galt!!!
Third posting of this, admittedly, minor (well, maybe not for Linda) example of the miscegenationist nightmares of the racist American psyche because it still makes me mad:
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*And, no, I didn't realize she was white either, until I posted this video. From wikipedia:
"In response to the success of her single, she received threats from white supremacist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, and retired from performance soon after.[1] She remained out of music and lived in Gainesville for the next 25 years.
"In 1993, rap group Salt-n-Pepa sampled "What a Man" for their hit single "Whatta Man", which was a massive hit. In the wake of the single's success, Lyndell began performing again, and in 2003, at the opening of the Stax Museum, she performed "What a Man" live for the first time ever."
F!!%in' 'Merica.
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The issue in question is an outgrowth of male pack mentality, and self expectation ("this is what I do to be a man, its what I should do"). Not that ALL men see themselves that way. First, this is not a hetero-male thing. I've been harassed and even chased by gay men, in Miami, back when I was in my late teens. Lesson learned: men in packs are capable of inordinate amounts of stupidity we would not normally be, solo. And it does not matter which way they lean, or if they lean.
Second, this is not going to be solved here, in an RPG forum, in a relatively "enlightened" community. It's just not. You want to fix this issue? Teach your kids to respect other PEOPLE, toughen them up to withstand peer pressure, and engender the idea that standing up for others is the right thing to do.
Racism is taught at home, not being an a****le can be too. Pick the latter.
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I wonder how does someone with the following personal history fits... White male. Born and raised in São Paulo - Brazil, then turned 18 and moved to NY where said person currently lives and graduated in engineering. Visits family in London about once an year and family in Brazil at least twice a year.Sounds like a rich white man, reeking of privilege. Unless he spends a lot of time White Knighting and asserting his supposed moral superiority over his other white male brethren, he is The Enemy.
Tsc... I always knew my alignment was best described as Neutral Evil... I just didn't want to see it. (Although, Evil or not, "rich" is not exactly accurate... Sadly...)
(...) Lesson learned: men in packs are capable of inordinate amounts of stupidity we would not normally be, solo. And it does not matter which way they lean, or if they lean. (...)
Quick correction here...
People in packs are capable of inordinate amounts of stupidity we would not normally be, solo. And it does not matter which way they lean, or if they lean.
Mob mentality is a (sadly) common phenomenon that happens in all sorts of situations that include more than 1 person.
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Black Feminists On Their Men: The Musical Interlude
Down with yuppie gentrifiers!
This reminds me of talks I've had about racism here in the south. We were discussing the Washington football team and the young white kids could not understand why someone would be offended by a racial slur when they were not offended by being called "honky" or "cracker." (Although I doubt they had ever actually been called that before.) To Lemmy's earlier point, just because you can understand someone else's situation without having experienced it yourself, doesn't mean you're actually willing to.
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For the people talking about the friendliness of the south. I've lived in the South my entire life, we're not friendlier. We just have slightly different social expectations in some very few situations, and even here a polite nod to someone passing on the street is still the most common and widely accepted and appropriate mannerism.
Here's a tip for guys, and I'm singling out guys because if there's a rash of women catcalling men we can redress the issue then, women on the street don't want to talk to you. Know that your need to say hello to women, and in the south yes it's still primarily women, is not showing friendliness, no matter how badly you want to show her how friendly you are by chatting her up based entirely on how physically attractive you think she is.
To Lemmy's earlier point, just because you can understand someone else's situation without having experienced it yourself, doesn't mean you're actually willing to.
True... But if I weren't, why would I be here, specifically asking questions about it? Notice that I at no point actually defended catcalling, at most, what I did was suggest it's not as serious as some make it seem (like the girl in the video, who compares it to sexual assault).
New Left Maoist on Yuppie Liberal Feminist Gentrifiers of Yore
RAPE, RACISM, AND THE WHITE WOMEN'S MOVEMENT:
AN ANSWER TO SUSAN BROWNMILLER
Different context, and I don't necessarily agree with everything in it, but still pretty apropos, I thought.
"Never before has the media been so friendly to radical feminism. But then again, never before has radical feminism been so eager to place itself at the forefront of the "fight against crime," wholeheartedly supporting the basic premises and institutions of our society that underlie all oppression, including that of women."
The "fight against crime," comrades will remember, is the segregationist's rallying cry in the age of colorblindness.
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Yes, at the dawn of the age of colorblindness. Liberal feminists making the same mistake forty years later is really disgusting.
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"Imagine, for a moment, that a significant portion of the population believed, based on your looks, that if they encountered you in public, you owed them a dollar. These people are total strangers to you, but they believe fervently that any time they see you in public, you are obligated to give them a dollar. They're willing to make polite conversation with you in the hopes that you'll willingly give them the dollar, but if you don't they're willing to follow you down the street and bug you about it until you fork it over. And if even that doesn't work, they're constantly scheming for ways to pick your pocket or steal your stuff in order to get the money that is rightfully owed to them by you and everyone who falls into the category of people like you who have spurned their dollar-seeking advances over the years."I used to live across from the homeless shelter in Troy, NY. This paragraph accurately describes my situation every time I'd step outdoors.
That's every day walking through downtown. Yawn.
That's every day walking through downtown. Yawn."Imagine, for a moment, that a significant portion of the population believed, based on your looks, that if they encountered you in public, you owed them a dollar. These people are total strangers to you, but they believe fervently that any time they see you in public, you are obligated to give them a dollar. They're willing to make polite conversation with you in the hopes that you'll willingly give them the dollar, but if you don't they're willing to follow you down the street and bug you about it until you fork it over. And if even that doesn't work, they're constantly scheming for ways to pick your pocket or steal your stuff in order to get the money that is rightfully owed to them by you and everyone who falls into the category of people like you who have spurned their dollar-seeking advances over the years."I used to live across from the homeless shelter in Troy, NY. This paragraph accurately describes my situation every time I'd step outdoors.
Did either of you find that to be enjoyable?
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Did either of you find that to be enjoyable?That's every day walking through downtown. Yawn."Imagine, for a moment, that a significant portion of the population believed, based on your looks, that if they encountered you in public, you owed them a dollar. These people are total strangers to you, but they believe fervently that any time they see you in public, you are obligated to give them a dollar. They're willing to make polite conversation with you in the hopes that you'll willingly give them the dollar, but if you don't they're willing to follow you down the street and bug you about it until you fork it over. And if even that doesn't work, they're constantly scheming for ways to pick your pocket or steal your stuff in order to get the money that is rightfully owed to them by you and everyone who falls into the category of people like you who have spurned their dollar-seeking advances over the years."I used to live across from the homeless shelter in Troy, NY. This paragraph accurately describes my situation every time I'd step outdoors.
Not at all. Just something I expect. But that is something that happens to anyone that either looks "nice" or has a little coin. What women go through in some places isn't regular day to day for everyone, and that is a problem. The yawn was just for panhandlers. I apologize for not specifying in my first post.
Sadly, the sole post in the entire thread offering anything close to a solution to catcalling -- thejeff's insightful list -- got slashed along with the back-and-forth stuff. :(
Doodlebug -- You posted that video, and now you seem to be insisting that this thread is about that video's subtext.
It's not.
And I don't very much appreciate the accusation implicit in your response to my post (both now since deleted).
The original post came about because of the personal experience of someone close to me, and I don't really see how race enters into that, since the perpetrators in that instance were caucasian men.
I'd appreciate an apology, and please stop trying to steer the entire thread in that direction. YES, there is an issue there, but NO, it does not describe the whole issue. The influence of Slate's reporting should not entirely occlude the discussion we were having here.
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I believe thejeff said something similar to what I did -- although he said it better :) -- that educating people on the topic was one of the most important steps. Not blaming, not yelling and all that, just educating.
I believe someone else said something similar as well, to start early and teach your children that it isn't cool to do this sort of thing.
It isn't going to be a fast fix, despite videos on the internet or on TV about it. Like most changes, it will take more time, more conversation, more communication on the topic.
It isn't going to be a fast fix, despite videos on the internet or on TV about it. Like most changes, it will take more time, more conversation, more communication on the topic.
I totally agree. And I find that, the more people focus on concrete solutions and less on how righteous they are, the more likely those solutions are to get implemented.