Re: The Bigger, Badder, Even More Serious Thread

[Mrs Figg]

There is always the element of risk and a background sense of fear of meeting a stranger on the path. Even the most innocent looking places are a threat- Figg

{{yes but how much of that is societal perceived threat and whats real? How often have you been out a walk, or going down a street and actually been asualted by a man? Whats the reality of it versus the perception of it?
At same time that poor women was murdered there were sevral fatalities in the UK of men by men. No one is talking about the risk to men of going out and to certain places.
There are places and time of day when Im out as a precuation I have one hand in my pocket with my house keys between my knuckles, just in case. Almost never actually have a confrontation, but there have been a few over the years, but still feel the need to have my keys in hand, more so as I get older.
I can imagine that 'feel the need to' is much greater for women, but is it because the risk of assualt whilst out and about is actually greater?  (women are more likely to suffer domestic abuse stastically than men, but men are far more likely when out to be assualted by another man than a woman is). Statistcially men have more to fear when out and about than women do. But socierty doesnt give a crap about that.
}}

You seem to have forgotten that generally men can defend themselves from other men, you have a lesser risk of ending up in hospital or dead if physically attacked, unless he has a knife or weapon. Women have zero chance of defending themselves. ZERO. The men who go about assaulting people look for weaker vulnerable people rather than other big blokes with equal body strength unless they are pissed and don't care who they attack, because attacks are all about control and bullying, why risk a beating when there is a little old lady at the bus stop. The worrying thing for women is not your average pissed up bloke in the pub looking for a fight, and easy to avoid, but the random sneak attack, also the statement 'men have more to fear when out and about' is frankly ludicrous. and yes I have been assaulted on the street, assaulted on a bus, assaulted on a train, assaulted on a plane and assaulted in my workplace and assaulted in my own home. That's the way women live in our society.

[Pettytyrant101]

{{ Statiscally men do have more to fear as they have a higher chance of being violently assualted.

'Men are nearly twice as likely as women to be a victim of violent crime and among children, boys are more likely than girls to be victims of violence.
Over two thirds of murder victims are male.
Men make up 73% of robbery victims.
One in three victims of Domestic Abuse are male. Only 51% of men tell anyone they are a victim of domestic abuse (81% of women tell someone). When it comes to refuges there are 37 organisations with 204 spaces with only 40 of those places are dedicated for men. Many parts of the UK have no or limited places at all.
Every year, 450,000 men in the UK are victims of stalking.
12,000 men are raped in England and Wales every year (considered a 'base figure' as surveys show men are a third as likely as women to report sexual assualts against them).
A quarter of victims of revenge porn are male.

When was last time you heard any of these issues being adressed or help offered? Neve rof course as the narrative given is that women are only victims of these acts and men always the perpetrators of them.
Where are the campaigns to educate women about violence against men?
The Crown Prosecution have a 'end violence against women and girls strategy' but there is no equivelent end violence against men strategy even when far more violence occurs aginst men.
After all we are men, we should just suck it up, take it and deal with it without complaint or tears, crying about it is not manly afterall.}}

[Lancebloke]

Halfy - There is casual none head treatment of everyone, just most of the time men are told to "be a man", "suck it up" or something similar.

To add to Petty's stats men are 3+ times more likely to kill themselves than women.

And your comments about the Metoo movement going to far is what I mean... the far left getting hold of the narrative and taking it too far.

The majority of people wouldn't want there to be violence against women or men because most of us have a good deal of empathy and don't tend to have obsessive compulsions in that direction.

And I don't mean we shouldn't be talking about all this, especially with younger people who are maybe starting to see this as normal (girls and boys!!!!!) as well as trying to do work helping to educate other cultures where this really is normalised (which is where our foreign aid budgets should go!).

My point here is that bashing men in general is not helping and is more likely to create a bigger issues when you are constantly belittling people that have never and will never be in a position where they would committ such an act. It is just putting up more barriers.

Petty - having been a juror on a rape trial where it turned out the story was fabricated and the man nearly went to prison for 15 years.... couldn't agree more about the believing thing. Nobody should be automatically believed, but everyone should go through the process fairly.

[halfwise]

The main reason for believing victims of rape is if they are paying a high price to come forward. As it becomes normalized to 'admit' to being raped and there are modelled behavior of how rape accusations can be used for hurt, this automatic acceptance of rape accusations needs to be rethought. Doubtless most accusations are still true, but there should no longer be automatic trust of each one.

[Mrs Figg]

ah I see, you want to give some stats to make out a case that male violence is not endemic in society, ok....

Rape cases,
It is estimated that approximately 85,000 women a year are raped: 90% of women know the man who raped them, so that means 8,500 women a year, 23 a day, are raped by a man they don’t know.
-Only one in 25 reported rapes ends up in court.
-A tiny minority end up with a rapist behind bars.
-Only 1.4% of cases of rape reported to the police resulted in a charge by the CPS.
-At least 1,000 fewer men accused of rape are currently being prosecuted than two years ago.

"The state is failing women and minimising violence by men against women, be it at the extreme end or the countless micro-aggressions that women live with and never report."

"In ways that have become second nature to us, women modify their behaviour and choices because of the fear and threat of men’s violence. Not all men are violent but all men benefit from sex inequality and all women’s lives are either directly or indirectly restricted or altered by the actions of men."

Murder,
-A woman dies at the hands of a man every three days.
-Two women a week in England and Wales are killed by a current or former partner over half a million women are raped or sexually assaulted each year.
-More than nine out of 10 killers were men.
33% of female homicide victims were killed by partners or ex-partners, compared with 1% of male victims.

-Almost one in three women will experience domestic abuse
-Two women a week in England and Wales are killed by a current or former partner
-More than half a million women are raped or sexually assaulted each year.

Domestic abuse,
During the first national lockdown the National Domestic Abuse Helpline saw an 80% increase in calls.
-So-called “honour-based” abuse and forced marriage reported a 162% average increase in caseloads.
-With 92% of defendants in domestic abuse-related prosecutions in the year ending March 2020 recorded as male, and 77% female victims – the crime is heavily gendered.

-The majority of defendants in domestic abuse-related prosecutions were men in the year ending March 2020 (92%), In contrast, the majority of victims were female (77% compared with 16% who were male.
- the proportion of female victims would be 82%, with 18% male victims.

-One in three women aged 16-59 will experience domestic abuse in her lifetime.

-There are more than 135,000 women and girls affected by FGM living in England and
Wales
-A third of girls report having experienced sexual harassment at school.

oh dear

[Pettytyrant101]

you want to give some stats to make out a case that male violence is not endemic in society- Figg

{{No, you have missed the point. About 70- 80% of everyone, male and female are non-violent, dont go about harrassing people, sexually asualting or violently assualting anyone.
Its male violence I have a fear of when Im out on my own in certain areas late at night.
Point is most men are at just as much, or in case of violent assualt and robbery, at much higher risk of being the victims of these people than anyone else is.
The problem is when they say the problem is all men- when the vast majority are not in fact a problem but are as likely to be a victim of the minority of violent men as a women is.
Society at least acknowledges the women, has steps taken to support and help them, there is nothing for men. And worse societies repsonse to it is we are just supposed to take it and not complain because we are men and shouldnt whine like babies. We have to man up. Deal with it. And if we dont we are mocked or rejected for not being man enough. This is why male suicide is so high. There is nowhere to turn to, and if you do society judges as you being less than a real man and any show of weakness is punished or mocked.}}

[Lancebloke]

I don't think anyone is saying that this does not happen and that, when it does, it isn't horrific.

Endemic means that the behaviour is native to a people or culture... so you are saying that the UK has a culture of male violence. By highlighting sexual assaults I assume you also think a rape culture?

So, let's get in to some numbers:

85,000 estimated (I would like to know the source of this) versus a female population over 15 of around 20 million. So 0.004%.

That isn't a culture even if the estimation is correct which I doubt (having only a direct experience of a rape allegation thay DID get to court that was false).

Sexual assaults... I would like to know what the definition of sexual assaults is here and how the estimation was gathered. If it is inappropriate touching then I would love to know the counter figure as I can categorically tell you that, as Petty has too, I have been inappropriately grabbed by women on a number of occasions as have a lot of men that I know. For some reason it seems more socially acceptable if a man's arse is grabbed than a women's....

Domestic violence... it doesn't surprise me that more men commit domestic violence. Men are more physically violent by nature and that is something the majority of men probably won't deny.

Unfortunately, women tend to be more emotionally abusive and the only stat that I can bring up is male suicide because men need to man up and stop being a pushy if they are under their wife's thumb... dont they?

What leads men to be physically violent? Do they turn up at home after a hard day work and get the leather belt out? I am sure sometimes they do and those people are fucking arseholes. But to quote Bill Burr "not every ass whopping falls out of the sky." Without much research (because who the fuck cares about male well being) I would guess that a lot of physical abuse is the result of a long period of mental abuse.

FGM.... fucking disgusting practise aimed at removing a females ability to experience pleasure during sexual encounters. No worse than circumcision though but nobody talks about that too. Why is that?

Sexual harassment... now that is a can of worms as it is SUPER subjective. What is sexual harassment... is it being overtly and consistently sexually suggestive to someone who doesn't want that attention? Is it a single innuendo? Is it a look that was a little too long?

What is your red line and how am I supposed to know.... do a survey? Do we need a contract every time we want to fool around or have sex? If that is the case I can tell you the next complaint will be men not being able to keep a hard-on after completing the forms in triplicate!

Now.... all that being said I hope you can see where I am coming from? In my opinion, violence is very rarely justified and sexual violence is NEVER justified. However, there does seem to be a narrative being spun that is aimed squarely at straight white men covering a whole hist of things that are often not based in objective reality.

There are a lot of very specific problems that need to be addressed thay aren't being addressed either directly or indirectly hampered by this narrative. Things will only get worse if we carry on down that track and don't step back from emotion (which is hard) and look at the objective facts.

[halfwise]

There's a wide range of female genital mutilation, and most of it is much worse than circumcision.

As for the rest of it, rape may be comparatively rare compared to mugging, but women still are subject to far more lower level harassment than men are; or at least they used to be. I think the MeToo movement has wised a lot of men up, but of course there's no good statistics on this lower level harassment.

[Mrs Figg]

This is why we need to educate boys so that they don't hurt others and don't hurt themselves. Boys don't get any help with their feelings of anger and sadness and that's why they lash out and develop nasty tendencies as adults. If boys were helped instead of adults saying 'man up' there would be less suicides and less aggression. It is men who tend to become isolated, turn into flashers, and incels. I have never heard of a female flasher, and there must be something going on there about control, fear and weird shit. Women have an outlet for their anger and sadness in tears and having a meltdown, their outlet for control and aggression is turned into bullying and being bitchy, but they are 'allowed' to have an outlet, boys and men don't. I think boys are naturally aggressive and parents either supress this with physical violence or ignore it, both being damaging. Boys should have a healthy outlet for aggression and be taught some boundaries for those who are vulnerable, like girls and women. Its about mutual respect and education.

[Lancebloke]

Figgy - that is the closest I have come to agreeing with you on this all yet!

I hope you understand a bit where I and Petty are coming from here? There is so much that white males are being scapegoated for right now that the cause of a lot of problems is just not being addressed, we just have some people being temporarily satiated until they find the next target... the everyone is passed off and we are even further from a solution.

And I am also not in the "poor white men" camp either... it needs everyone to take a step back and really understand where a lot of this comes from. A lot of this is genetic, that is people do not choose if they are born without empathy or the ability to process emotions well or the levels of testosterone their body produces. A lot of this is societal, the expectations we put on each other and the roles we expect people to play or we expect ourselves to play.

Education is one part of it and will be an eternal fight against tradition!

Halfy - Yes, there is a lot of FGM but the removal of a body part from an unwilling host to dull down sexual urges is still wrong. The only saving grace for men is that is it somehow acceptable and therefore has much better medical practice whereas for girls it very often isn't!!

[Lancebloke]

On a side note, it would be very interesting if one day we could all get in a room and discuss everything from the colour of horses to this kind of stuff. I wonder who would get punched and then make up over a nice gesture first?

[halfwise]

Boys also seem to have less emotional intelligence about how hormones are dorking with their emotions in varying social situations.  I don't know why that is.  Maybe it's because girls have bigger physical changes going on that remind them that something is truly different and it grounds them.  They still get silly and confused but seem to have a better clue as to what is going on.  This feeds into later behavior.

Lance - one big difference is that circumcision is not being performed to damp down sexual urges.

[Mrs Figg]

yep there is no comparison between male and female circumcision. Male circumcision doesn't negatively effect sexuality, or health one bit.

[Lancebloke]

Well there is a comparison... the genitals are being changed for the sake of something stupid!

Halfy - well, hypothesis is it was actually to increase fertility, a tradition that was then picked up by the Jewish and repackaged as something that was agreed between God and that other dude (Abraham?).

[Mrs Figg]

it might be 'stupid' but there is an argument it actually improves health, as allegedly it is cleaner. it isn't done to control male sexuality either.

[Mrs Figg]

for those with access to BBC 1 tonight there is a documentary on the subject of young men and suicide tonight. Roman Kemp is the presenter. might be interesting and on-topic.

talking of white men...just watched ITV/Channel 4 adverts, is England now a colony of the West Indies? sure looks like it.

[Lancebloke]

talking of white men...just watched ITV/Channel 4 adverts, is England now a colony of the West Indies? sure looks like it.

You would think so wouldn't you. 90% of the country is white but we must represent the minorities (only some of them and nine of the white ones) by making sure they are everywhere all the time... even in historical, period dramas!

[Mrs Figg]

It seems like the only advert without a multiple BAME quota are the Meercats.....its just a matter of time. Its not the vastly out of proportion BAME quota that irritates me as much as the cynical marketing ploys, you can just imagine them sitting round a table discussing using BAMES to sell their products, because ''its a fashion now isn't it." and they all thought they would compete to out-BAME each other, "what you have a Chinese, and Islamic woman!" well we have a disabled person and a BAME! Hah! "(that's a real advert btw) To be fair its quite a cute advert.

[halfwise]

[Mrs Figg]

Lemurs?

Talking of adverts, the new English KFC advert is an essay in disgusting racial stereotyping. I mean, Black people and chicken wings?, strutting down the length of a KFC with literal chicken legs/cock strutting, really?????  cocks?????? ffs

Martin Luther King did not die for this shit. He died for a bit of respect and dignity.

[Mrs Figg]

[halfwise]

I was kinda thinking of lemurs as a racial variation of meerkats.

[halfwise]

I can't stand that we keep losing cheerful young people to suicide!

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/instagram-influencer-lee-macmillan-dead-012146774.html

There needs to be as much money poured into this as into cancer. Just look at her, cheerful as can be in all the photos, then she's gone. And for each one of her I'm sure there's dozens who didn't get the support I'm sure she's had, with even less chance of pulling through. Makes me angry and sad.

[Lancebloke]

I think a lot of people use social media and the following they gather to paper over the cracks of personal issues (as do a lot of traditional celebrities).

All very sad!

[Pettytyrant101]

{{ Well this stinks to high heaven.

David Cameron, former PM, who as PM hired a firm called Greensill to do work for the government for which they were handsomely paid has been acting as a very dodgy agent for them.
Upon leaving office Cameron was offered a cushy job for Greensill (presumably his reward for getting them the contracts).
Fast forward to the pandemic and Greensill are sniffing about for more sweet government contracts and tax payer money, so they deploy Cameron.
Cameron gets in contact with various current government ministers, including the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Health Secretary who would handout the cash, and there followed private meetings, private calls, all unrecorded off the record stuff.
Sunak tells Cameron that he cant do what he asks as its against the rules, but he is "pushing officials to explore alternatives."
They failed to find legal alternatives however in time and Greensill went under taking a couple thousand jobs with it. Though Cameron walked away a much wealthier man.

But the entire process of a PM giving a company contracts when in government, moving straight to working for them after leaving office, and using his former contacts to inside lobby the government off the record for contracts for that company is dodgy as hell and speaks volumes to the standard Conservative model. Politics is merely a means into ridiculously high paid 'consultancy' work. A means to an end, its not about serving the people, its about serving one person. The Tory game of politics is one in which the upper classes compete to see who can dupe and fool the stupid masses the most in order to afterwards get the maximum wealth, influence and power.}}