dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Dave Gross) (05/26/90)
As evidence of the androcidal rhetoric that the feminist movement feels free to use, and then deny when convenient -- I offer the following: I was browsing through my local progressive bookstore this evening when I reached the magazine section. I pushed aside a copy of "Motherhood" magazine and found the latest issue of that oft-mentioned feminist journal "Off Our Backs." The cover illustration was a brick wall with the following graffiti: DEAD MEN DON'T RAPE. -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- "[T]he verbal excesses [of radical feminism] also result in a rhetoric of genocide every bit as single- and closed-minded as racial and ethnic pogroms have been in the past." --Dan Dervin
sdk91@campus.swarthmore.edu (05/31/90)
In article <265df9d5.1abd@petunia.CalPoly.EDU>, dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Dave Gross) writes... > >As evidence of the androcidal rhetoric that the feminist movement >feels free to use, and then deny when convenient Hmm. As far as I can tell, the feminist movement covers an amazingly broad and diverse range of beliefs. I can't see this generalization as appropriate. Is there a particular organization you're referring to? > I was browsing through my local progressive bookstore this > evening when I reached the magazine section. I pushed aside > a copy of "Motherhood" magazine and found the latest issue > of that oft-mentioned feminist journal "Off Our Backs." > The cover illustration was a brick wall with the following > graffiti: DEAD MEN DON'T RAPE. Well...we couldn't rape anyone if we _were_ dead, could we? I don't know about you, but I can maintain an erection only so long... :) Could someone who's active in the movement respond to his posting? I don't feel, as a man, that's it is quite my place to discuss this issue. --Steve Karpf
ellene@microsoft.UUCP (Ellen EADES) (06/02/90)
Reply-To:ellene@microsof.uucp (Ellen Eades) In article <265df9d5.1abd@petunia.CalPoly.EDU> dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Dave Gross) writes: > I [...] found the latest issue of that oft-mentioned feminist journal > "Off Our Backs." The cover illustration was a brick wall with the following > graffiti: DEAD MEN DON'T RAPE. I infer from this that Dave was overcome with hostility and did not bother to read the article linked with the cover photograph. I happen to be a proud subscriber to _off our backs_. The brick wall runs along a bicycle trail in Arlington, Virginia, a trail that runs parallel to the I-66 highway. It is a well-lit trail that is used all hours of the day and night by runners, bikers, strollers, and folks heading to the subways. It is picturesque and peaceful, and it gives the impression of safety and security. On March 31st of this year a young woman took the trail on her way to the subway. She was traveling to her own birthday party. When she did not arrive, her friends went out looking for her. They found her in a back staircase the next morning. She had been pulled off the trail, beaten and stabbed to death. That same evening, the man who is the prime suspect in this murder also chased a jogging woman (she outran him) and then grabbed another woman off her bicycle and sexually assaulted her. The graffiti Dave refers to is now appearing along the wall at the site of the murder and assaults on women. In the current issue of _off our backs_, two women, Angela Johnson and Carol Anne Douglas (both members of the off our backs collective) write contrasting commentaries to the previous issue's cover article. Johnson finds the shock value of the graffiti empowering, and the anger a message to both women and men that rape and murder will no longer be tolerated by women, that women refuse to be victims any longer. Douglas writes that she loves individual men and while she understands and shares the pain and anger of the graffiti writers, she does not support the idea of killing all men (I point this out to refute Dave's implication that all feminists, or all of the oob collective, support the killing of men to eliminate the rape of women). I find _off our backs_ an extremely valuable news source for information on women's issues which I would not find in any ordinary journal. I learn that Amnesty International does not concern itself with wife-burning, sexual mutilation, the killing of prostitutes. I learn that the National Hate Crimes Bill specifically excludes women's issues. I learn that a recent Radical Women conference was more concerned with Marxism than with feminism. I read a feminist review of the movie "The Handmaid's Tale." I get to laugh with the comic strip _Dykes to Watch Out For_. I read abortion news, health news, international news. Dave just looks at the pictures, I guess. Ellen Eades (uunet!microsoft!ellene)
amy@cs.washington.EDU (Amy Martindale) (06/02/90)
In article <265df9d5.1abd@petunia.CalPoly.EDU> dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Dave Gross) writes: > >As evidence of the androcidal rhetoric that the feminist movement >feels free to use, and then deny when convenient -- I offer the >following: > > The cover illustration [of "Off Our Backs"]was a brick wall with the > following graffiti: DEAD MEN DON'T RAPE. >"[T]he verbal excesses [of radical feminism] also result in a rhetoric of > genocide every bit as single- and closed-minded as racial and ethnic pogroms > have been in the past." --Dan Dervin You're not serious? I find it somehow distressing that women are encouraged to overcome opression, just so long as they don't express any anger that they might be feeling. It's so, well, unfeminine. Especially if that anger might happen to be directed towards men. Heaven forfend we should view them as oppressors! Also, before becoming too incensed by the rhetoric, it is a good idea to look at the power-base of the source. When a white, male, upper-class, oh, say, President of the United States refuses to support AIDS research because it would be a jolly good thing if all those awful homosexuals died out anyway, I would be frightened. Especially if I were a gay male. The speaker has the power to enforce his (fallacious) "homo"-cidal opinions. But to imagine a minority group, however radical, to be capable of androcide is laughable. A pogrom implies persecution, and persecution implies possession of enough power to be unstoppable in carrying out that persecution. The use of angry rhetoric serves as a tool to rally support and to incite action, yes - but the action is unlikely to include mass-murder. Get real. amy amy@cs.washington.edu ------------- Reuben, Reuben, I've been thinking what a swell world it would be, If the boys were all transported far beyond the Western Sea.
amanda@mermaid.intercon.com (Amanda Walker) (06/04/90)
In article <54993@microsoft.UUCP>, ellene@microsoft.UUCP (Ellen EADES) writes: > The brick wall runs along a bicycle > trail in Arlington, Virginia, a trail that runs parallel to the I-66 > highway. It is a well-lit trail that is used all hours of the day and > night by runners, bikers, strollers, and folks heading to the subways. > It is picturesque and peaceful, and it gives the impression of safety and > security. The trail (which is very long, being made from an abandoned railroad roadbed) is indeed beautiful, and the Arlington and Fairfax county police regularly warn residents that it not at all safe after dusk. Ironically, one of its biggest advantages (its relative isolation, at least visually) evidently makes it something of a haven for drug trafficking and other criminal activities, since it allows easy but hidden access to many northern Virginia communities. Every couple of months there are articles in our community paper about robberies, rapes, and assaults taking place on or near the trail after dark. It makes me furious, because the trail itself truly is a wonderful thing. >The graffiti Dave refers to is now appearing along the wall at the site of >the murder and assaults on women. In this context, I hope the police leave the graffitti up. -- Amanda Walker, InterCon Systems Corporation -- "If we don't succeed, then we run the risk of failure." -- Dan Quayle
jha@lfcs.edinburgh.ac.UK (Jamie Andrews) (06/06/90)
What I find uncomfortable in the oob graffiti, and in
Ellen's and Amy's responses to Dave Gross, is not the anger but
rather the narrow focus of that anger.
I feel that anger against rape and rapists is justified
and should be acted upon. Part of this acting-upon is to
strengthen rape laws, to encourage victims to complain and
police to prosecute, to provide shelters and post-rape relief
for rape victims, and to educate the public about rape myths.
However, the slogan "Dead Men Don't Rape" and Ellen's comment
> Johnson
>finds the shock value of the graffiti empowering, and the anger a message
>to both women and men that rape and murder will no longer be tolerated
>by women, that women refuse to be victims any longer.
seem to imply that things like this are sufficient.
The implicit belief seems to be that we can stop rape by
stopping the rapists from "doing what they want". This belief
in turn seems to be predicated upon the idea that men "do what
they want" all the time and the only social conditioning they
receive is that they have a right to "do what they want". This
belief is disturbing to me (as a men's libber), but it also
makes me (as a pro-feminist) despair that people who hold it
will ever achieve their ends -- because I believe it's so
misdirected.
At least some of the anger about rape should be directed
against society and the media establishment, for insisting on
men being hypersexual and violent and all combinations of those
things, and for denying men sex, love, comfort and basic human
respect when they fail to be those things.
Slogans like "Dead Men Don't Rape" not only miss these
points, they even appropriate the language of the tough-guy
movies to load men with yet another burden of individual guilt
and responsibility for what is a systemic, societal problem.
Dead men don't rape; live men who rape should be punished;
but live men who have not been warped and conditioned by our
society -- these men have no desire to rape.
--Jamie.
jha@lfcs.ed.ac.uk