Feminism Thread

[archibaldcrane]

I really want to see Mazmaz and co.'s opinion on this.

It's not a terrible article - the fact that virtually every mass shooter is male does say something about masculinity - and if the Newton shooter was a female there would be tons of talk about the shooter's gender, whereas there is none when the shooter is a man. Anita grabbing onto this gender issue is pretty standard feminist theory fare, and honestly is the "feminists don't care about men's issues" counter that feminists should be applauded for, not condemned.

That being said, she didn't write the article, it's two years old, and the whole thing does feel a bit craven and shameless - I'm sure she got plenty of heat for her recent tweets about the Washington State shooting and is using this to say "see? I'm not the only person making this comparison!"

[hey]

Wow, Anita has really gone off the deep end.

https://twitter.com/femfreq/status/526092262845849600



This is seriously insensitive and borderline exploitative shit. If any case is indicative of the role of guns and mental illness, it's Newtown, and downplaying the need for some people to get treatment for mental health issues in order to gin up some self-serving propaganda only contributes to the stigma of mental illness that leads people to not get the proper treatment they need to deal with their issues.

It's one thing to make flawed arguments about video games that parrot intro-level gender studies material, but this is some fucked up shit on the same level as the NRA trying to argue that shootings would somehow be less common if everyone had a gun.

I really want to ignore her and hope that she goes away, but she's just making a mockery of herself now, and it's obvious she's doing it because it gets her more attention and blind devotion from her supporters.

She has a point though. Women get mental illnesses too, but they still don't go and shoot up schools. It's almost exclusively men who do that.

[archibaldcrane]

Plus it's hard to say that "failure to seek help for mental illness" has no intersection with "manly male masculinity".

[Mazmaz]

I really want to see Mazmaz and co.'s opinion on this.

I personally believe it's all 3. Men are raised in society to believe that masculinity entails acting certain ways, and constantly reaffirmed that violence and power domination is how they should be acting. Some with the lack of mental well being to ground these expectations fly off the handle and do something crazy with easily accessible guns.

How do you explain why men commit the most violence compared to other genders?
inb4 testosterone

[Mazmaz]

Plus it's hard to say that "failure to seek help for mental illness" has no intersection with "manly male masculinity".

Perfect.

[Blubbartron]

Did anyone stop to consider the possibility that perhaps men are more often shooting people because of testerone's effects on the mind as opposed to some kind of ridiculous theory about society making men into killers? Everyone, male and female, is susceptible to the fight or flight response, but men tend to choose fight, and women tend to choose flight. That seems a far more plausible explanation than just throwing "patriarchy" around as if it's some kind of panacea.

[Mazmaz]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

[chazzyphizzle]

why can't multiple reasons be considered and discussed rationally?

[Brill Weave]

She has a point though. Women get mental illnesses too, but they still don't go and shoot up schools. It's almost exclusively men who do that.

No they just drown their three children in a minivan that they drive into the lake. So yay for keeping it in the family I guess?

[hey]

No they just drown their three children in a minivan that they drive into the lake. So yay for keeping it in the family I guess?

Men still kill their children more than women do. See page 7. Although the difference is quite small.

[archibaldcrane]

Did anyone stop to consider the possibility that perhaps men are more often shooting people because of testerone's effects on the mind as opposed to some kind of ridiculous theory about society making men into killers? Everyone, male and female, is susceptible to the fight or flight response, but men tend to choose fight, and women tend to choose flight. That seems a far more plausible explanation than just throwing "patriarchy" around as if it's some kind of panacea.

I'm sure that body chemistry has a part to play, but you can't deny that men in society are taught to fight (as opposed to run like a sissy girl) much more frequently and in a way that defines them as opposed to how women are taught, right?

[Blubbartron]

I'm sure that body chemistry has a part to play, but you can't deny that men in society are taught to fight (as opposed to run like a sissy girl) much more frequently and in a way that defines them as opposed to how women are taught, right?

Sure, there's a stereotype that men should be tough and stand up to bullies, etc. However, what people are told to do, and what they actually do when the chips are down aren't necessarily related. I think body chemistry, in general, overrides thought. Especially in moments of high stress (or mental breakdowns).

[Quicklet]

Correlation is not causation though. To say that most of these mass gun shootings are due to "masculine culture" instead of, say, gender divides in access to guns or in mental state, is without serious basis at this time. To say that masculinity instead of mental state is the central issue for why Adam Lanza, Jared Loughner, or James Holmes did what they did is a ludicrous assertion. Some mental illnesses and conditions have different ratios among genders (schizophrenia, for example, has a significantly higher diagnosis rate in males than females). Men don't experience post partem depression, but you don't hear people go on about the dangerous culture of irresponsible motherhood whenever you hear about some mother drowning all her kids because she's mentally sick.

I think understanding the factors that go into what causes these events is important, and if there's definitive scientific data to back something up I'm always open to changing my view of an issue, but using the aftermath of a tragedy to push one's agenda with some massive flaws in the argument is something I find distasteful.

Plus it's hard to say that "failure to seek help for mental illness" has no intersection with "manly male masculinity".

I think this is a reasonable thing to say, but given what we know about Adam Lanza, which admittedly is not enough, it seems like it has less to do with masculinity in that case and more primarily with his mother not wanting to face the stigma of treating his mental issues.

I'm sure there are cultural cross-sections that could be as strong or stronger than gendered cross-sections as well, but Anita trying to reduce the argument to "No, we should be blaming masculinity more than anything else for why this is happening" is shallow and political.

[archibaldcrane]

I'm sure there are cultural cross-sections that could be as strong or stronger than gendered cross-sections as well, but Anita trying to reduce the argument to "No, we should be blaming masculinity more than anything else for why this is happening" is shallow and political.

Some people are going to say "No, we should be blaming easy access to guns more than anything else for why this is happening" and some are going to say "No, we should be blaming poor access to mental health care more than anything else for why this is happening" and some people are going to say what, ugh, Anita is saying.

None of these people are totally wrong - but you hear a lot more people trumpeting the first two issues and very, very few trumpeting the third. I think it is, at least, an under-considered factor, so I'm not going to flip my shit about someone pointing that out.

[Xajii]

No they just drown their three children in a minivan that they drive into the lake. So yay for keeping it in the family I guess?

this is basically it right here, i think this entire discussion should either be put into perpective (like, let's talk about total murder numbers with men vs women being the perpetrator) - which would actually be a more intelligent discussion - OR if we are going to talk about the high profile media drama let's include women since they do plenty of crazy terrible shit themselves, just most often not with a gun

[NynJa]

Men still kill their children more than women do. See page 7. Although the difference is quite small.

The fact that men committed 89.5% of all homicides compared to womens 10.5%, but the homicide rate of children under 5 is 63% by men and 38% by women (101% due to rounding issues) means that statistically, of all homicides committed by either sex, women are killing children more than men.

To more or less say "school shootings are misogyny" is really fucking stupid.

I'm sure that body chemistry has a part to play, but you can't deny that men in society are taught to fight (as opposed to run like a sissy girl) much more frequently and in a way that defines them as opposed to how women are taught, right?

Yeah, that same body chemistry that generally makes men stronger than women (inb4 evolution is misognyst)
And I'll just beat you all to the punch here

female body builder, who could probably make me her bitch
http://bodybuildingunlimited.com/wp-...odybuilder.jpg
This is someone who devoted their life to the gym and body building.

male equivalent of devotion
http://www.muscle.com.au/wp-content/...vsSuperman.png
HES HUGE LIEK XBOX

its not misogyny that men are generally stronger than women, and its very well could be a chemical thing in mens brains that trigger fight over flight.

[archibaldcrane]

this is basically it right here, i think this entire discussion should either be put into perpective (like, let's talk about total murder numbers with men vs women being the perpetrator) - which would actually be a more intelligent discussion

ok

men commit roughly 90% of the murders in the US.

Continue.

[Xajii]

ok

men commit roughly 90% of the murders in the US.

Continue.

I generally agree with your argument in this thread, all I wanted was for this to be the discussion and not "school shootings" because it's kind of a stupid way to look at the actual problem.

People have written dissertations on this shit, done decades-long studies, and the conversation about this subject stretches back to to the dawn of civilization, so I'm not really looking for much great discussion on this subject in a poopdeck thread.

[chazzyphizzle]

haha xajii said poop

[Priran]

why can't multiple reasons be considered and discussed rationally?

Sorry, you need to have a successful Kickstarter about video game criticism to be able to pull opinionated garbage out of your ass about a subject you have no authority on and have it discussed seriously on the internet.