I need feminism because...

AndreaCollins

Randy Shafter wrote: »

After watching the video Yumcha posted of the woman walking along the street, two main things stuck out to me:

1. While most of the calls were objectifying the woman, others seemed fairly harmless and just people being wishing another person a good day. Of course, people can perceive comments in various ways.

2. There is also a chance that the video was edited in such a way as to omit genuine, friendly and non-threatening responses the woman may have received.

The video is a reflection of what happens when a girl with a nice ass in tight jeans walks around THE HOOD in new york. This is a very low class area of new york. It's obvious that will happen. This girl wouldn't have got a second look in midtown new york and in many other areas because those areas are more educated and because she would be distinctly average compared to the girls you'd see in those areas. This video would be like an Irish girl with a nice ass in tight jeans walking around some council estates in ballymun and the Ballymun flats area on a sunny day and then being shocked at some of the comments she gets from some of the resident scrotes.

YumCha

AndreaCollins wrote: »

The video is a reflection of what happens when a girl with a nice ass in tight jeans walks around THE HOOD in new york.

Which part of these areas are "THE HOOD"?

"We walked in a lot of neighborhoods. We’d hop on the subway, head to another neighborhood. Midtown, Soho, Harlem, Brooklyn Bridge, South Ferry area. We went just a tad into Queens. The two-minute video couldn’t show all that we did. There was a lot of ground we covered."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/10/29/the-story-behind-that-10-hours-of-walking-in-nyc-viral-street-harassment-video/

Some responses to the people trying to minimise this:

"So hello leaves me unsure, constantly second-guessing myself, not wanting to be all "uppity" but not wanting to leave myself open to uncomfortable situations."
-- The Politics of Hello

“Compliments are meant to make the compliment receiver feel good and confident and happy. Your comments make me feel nervous and vulnerable and angry...”
--An Open Letter to my Street Harassers

Tigger99 wrote: »

As for the remarks being fairly harmless, well there is no way of knowing which situation will escalate into something more serious. And listening to that rubbish gets very tiresome and intimidating.

Clearly we need a random man with us at all times to identify which is which - heavens forbid we would get it wrong! Won't someone think of all those poor innocent guys misidentified as street harassers :rolleyes:

FactCheck

AndreaCollins wrote: »

The video is a reflection of what happens when a girl with a nice ass in tight jeans walks around THE HOOD in new york. This is a very low class area of new york. It's obvious that will happen. This girl wouldn't have got a second look in midtown new york and in many other areas because those areas are more educated and because she would be distinctly average compared to the girls you'd see in those areas. This video would be like an Irish girl with a nice ass in tight jeans walking around some council estates in ballymun and the Ballymun flats area on a sunny day and then being shocked at some of the comments she gets from some of the resident scrotes.

I see over on the main thread you're pretending to have lived in NY. I actually have. She is very clearly in SOHO and Midtown in several of those clips. She's right outside the Port Authority in one of them. It's hard to tell where she is in most of the others to be honest. She could be almost anywhere. She could easily be in the (very chichi, just so you know) UWS, where I lived.

Are you still pretending to be a 17 year old girl as well or are you just going to quietly drop that?

Lucyfur

MOD

AndreaCollins, less of the location bashing and calling people scrotes, ok?

FactCheck, report the post, don't attack the poster. Even if they are trolling.

YumCha

On the back of "Why women won't report" regarding the victims who have come forward against Jian Ghomeshi:

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/sandy-garossino/jian-ghomeshi-women-report-sex-assault_b_6059124.html

We have a 14 year old girl who was gang raped, called a slut and whore after reporting, and has just watched her attackers walk free after 4 YEARS of trying to pursue justice:
http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/three-kildare-men-sentenced-for-sex-abuse-of-teenage-girl-649354.html

This is just utterly heartbreaking and terrible But also "go to the police" is so often thrown at victims of rape and sexual assault sharing their stories - I'm finding it very tough to see what the upside for victims in doing that is.

Tigger99

So the judge apologises for the delay, then only gives them a suspended sentence?

That poor poor girl.

Morag

We desperately need consent based sex ed in our schools asap

Ambersky

This is the wonderful Mary Lambert the person behind the voice in the Macelmore song Same Love that sings "She keeps me warm". She has quite a bit to say for herself as a pretty productive artist and has a wonderful collection of spoken word as well as her own songs ranging from something deep and dark like the video below to stuff thats more upbeat and quirky like Secrets.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqqqV50zaAc

This piece is about rape and it carries a trigger warning because some people find it moving in a way they dont want to go right now. I think it is a powerful piece and asks at least one important question.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MY5PFFyFGII

GarIT

YumCha wrote: »

On the back of "Why women won't report" regarding the victims who have come forward against Jian Ghomeshi:

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/sandy-garossino/jian-ghomeshi-women-report-sex-assault_b_6059124.html

We have a 14 year old girl who was gang raped, called a slut and whore after reporting, and has just watched her attackers walk free after 4 YEARS of trying to pursue justice:
http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/three-kildare-men-sentenced-for-sex-abuse-of-teenage-girl-649354.html

This is just utterly heartbreaking and terrible But also "go to the police" is so often thrown at victims of rape and sexual assault sharing their stories - I'm finding it very tough to see what the upside for victims in doing that is.

This is obviously a very serious crime but I would like to point out that it was not rape. The court found that the girl was sexually assaulted and not raped. There must have been some circumstance that meant it was not rape. Labelling this as rape is most likely defamation against the defendants that were not found guilty of rape. The victim's side of the story would appear to be something we would class as rape but the victim's story is not the whole story and the courts thought differently.

Rosy Posy

GarIT wrote: »

This is obviously a very serious crime but I would like to point out that it was not rape. The court found that the girl was sexually assaulted and not raped. There must have been some circumstance that meant it was not rape. Labelling this as rape is most likely defamation against the defendants that were not found guilty of rape. The victim's side of the story would appear to be something we would class as rape but the victim's story is not the whole story and the courts thought differently.

The three men, who were 16-years-old at the time, on one occasion took turns to have sex with the girl in a forest clearing.

Sounds like gang rape to me.

Mod

I understand that emotions will run high with cases like these, however please remember that no conviction of rape was handed down so please bear in mind the legalities of your posts.

Thank you.

Ambersky

Remember the "Have you ever been sexually assaulted" thread.
The arguments about what is and what is not rape are not only very painful they are also very telling. So many women in that thread could not say they were raped even when they were.

Statistically it seems only a fraction of rapes that occur are reported and only a very small percentage of those end in conviction. How can anyone talk about it and how can anyone have the courage to report it when there is so much denial it ever happened.

This is a 2009 report dont know if things have gotten any better doubt it.

In the context of adult sexual assault, only one per cent of men and 7.8% of women reported their experiences to the Gardaí, with slighter higher rates of reporting to medical professionals and counsellors/therapists. This trend of low reporting was reiterated by the Rape Crisis Network in 2007. Moreover, “approximately 1% of these incidents [of sexual offence] will end in conviction with 95% of cases reported to the Gardaí falling out of the system prior to any adjudication by the courts.”

http://humanrights.ie/criminal-justice/rape-and-justice-in-ireland/

From the above statistics it seems rape dosent really happen in Ireland except in very rare circumstances and if we mistakenly think it did there will be someone to drop by shortly to tell us we have not only misjudged but defamed the gentleman in question and to correct our understanding of sexual assault or probably just a misunderstanding really which we ultimately bear the responsibility for.

FactCheck

They were convicted of rape.

Rape of a child is called defilement in Irish law. They were found guilty of defilement.

FactCheck

Back on topic, I need feminism because the Irish Independent continues to use offensive, insensitive, misleading photos of women who are 7, 8, or 9 months pregnant to illustrate stories about Ms Y.

Ms Y was only at most 24 weeks pregnant when the State forced a caesarian section on her.

It is very unlikely that, on her first pregnancy, she had any sort of bump at all then. Certainly nothing that could be seen when covered with clothes.

It is appalling that a national newspaper uses such emotive, inaccurate stock photographs.

If they wanted to actually illustrate what she looked like, they would simply need a perfectly ordinary picture of a woman. Albeit probably one that appeared distraught and suicidal.

This isn't the first time, they ran at least one story in August with a similar picture.

meeeeh

You are trolling right? At 24 weeks I was a size of an elephant and no I was not in any way overweight.

FactCheck

I guess everybody is different.

I had no bump until after 25 weeks on either of my pregnancies and I have no stomach muscle strength whatsoever.

I do not think that photo is an accurate depiction of a woman 20-24 weeks pregnant.

Why would I be trolling?

Edit: Also Ms Y was concealing her pregnancy from people who knew her (apart from the professionals). She did not have a bump.

meeeeh

FactCheck wrote: »

I guess everybody is different.

I had no bump until after 25 weeks on either of my pregnancies and I have no stomach muscle strength whatsoever.

I do not think that photo is an accurate depiction of a woman 20-24 weeks pregnant.

Why would I be trolling?

I had a bump at 12 weeks. People could tell I was pregnant then so yes I do think you are exaggerating. A weight gain at 24 weeks is about 14-16 pounds. How is that not to show in most cases when people are normal weight?

Edit: oh right, I didn't realise you know what she looked like. Then I will bow to your superior knowledge.

FactCheck

meeeeh wrote: »

I had a bump at 12 weeks. People could tell I was pregnant then so yes I do think you are exaggerating. A weight gain at 24 weeks is about 14-16 pounds. How is that not to show?

Edit: oh right, I didn't realise you know what she looked like. Then I will bow to your superior knowledge.

I don't know why you're being so aggressive. And there is no need to accuse me of trolling (what a bizarre accusation).

Have you read the news coverage? It reported that she was concealing her pregnancy.

Have a google of "24 weeks pregnant". Most women on their first pregnancy do not have enormous bumps at 24 weeks. They may look like they have gained weight, but in baggy clothes they do not look pregnant.

That is not an accurate depiction of Ms Y. It is misleading. It suggests that she was much further along than she actually was. And Irish newspapers frequently illustrate stories about abortion with pictures of women who are 8 or 9 months pregnant.

meeeeh

Because I really can't understand how someone could claim that bump isn't showing at 24 weeks. It could be that some people don't show it but seriously, without knowing how she actually look like it is hard to say if picture was accurate or not. I just think you are being outraged for the sake of being outraged.

Google images will hardly be reliable source for bump sizes but never the less. That picture Indo posted is perfectly ok.
https://www.google.ie/search?q=size+of+a+bump+at+24+weeks&client=firefox-a&hs=v0x&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=fflb&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=KHZXVOCwDtKS7AaN_IDoAw&ved=0CCwQsAQ&biw=1280&bih=689

And yes I genuinely thought you are trolling because that pic actually looks a bit small for the size i was at 24 weeks.

Mod

Meeeeh, drop the attitude and don't accuse people of trolling.

eviltwin

I didn't have a bump on my first pregnancy either, I was still wearing normal jeans right up until the week before she was born.

Factcheck is right, you only have to look at the regular articles on the likes of the journal when they discuss abortion, they use a picture of a woman with a large bump, totally lazy and ridiculous seeing as most abortions happen before a bump ever has time to form.

FactCheck

FactCheck wrote: »

They were convicted of rape.

Rape of a child is called defilement in Irish law. They were found guilty of defilement.

Mod

I have asked for clarification on this from our legal gurus.

Please bear with me, thanks.

Ambersky

As Ive said before I dont think this thread is fit for purpose and still I find myself having a look every now and again to see whats going on, bad idea cos I only wind up getting upset and joining in.
Those of you who do post regularly, I admire.
Being able to talk about rape seems to be a basic requirement in any feminist discussion but the challenge to it seems never ending.

<snip>

Mod note: do not discuss other forums

Mod

It is against the charter to discuss other forums, you were already warned on thread not to do so.

As I said already, I have asked for legal advice on the "semantics" of this case. Until that is clarified there is to be no further discussion of whether or not this was rape. I thought I made that quite clear earlier, evidently not.

rainbow kirby

The sheer volume of mansplaining that is happening in the comments about a post about running while pregnant on an FB group I'm in, and the disturbing similarities in the language used by some of the men to that used by the pro-life movement.

KomradeBishop

While I agree with your point, the term 'mansplaining' isn't a great one to use, because it portrays a certain set of traits (being lecturing, dismissive, or assumptive about another person having a lack of knowledge - when that may be untrue), as being unique to men, when those traits are not gender-specific.

It's a fairly loaded term, which - even though you don't use/intend it this way (so not accusing you of this ) - can be considered sexist.

Das Kitty

:pac:

Tigger99

Lol, the irony.

KomradeBishop

Uh-huh - so if this is ironic (meaning: I am redundantly explaining the problem with that term, to people who are already aware of how it can be considered sexist), that means people would be knowingly using the term, knowing that it can be considered sexist...

See how the term suddenly just becomes a way of lazily dismissing people, even when they bring up a valid point? (and, dismissing them based on their gender...)

Actually illustrates part of the problem with the term, quite well.

Lyaiera

Ha! You got us with words. What a victory!