OK, I’m neck deep in work, and I browse Freethoughtblogs for a little light relief, and what do I find? Cuttlefish tells me this ghastly (but familiar) story about a man who murders his ex-partner and children because she spurns him. Then Stephanie has another horror story about the nightmare a woman suffered when she dared to tell a man “no”.
I think I’m motivated to go back to the books now.
Ok, I was gonna comment with something snarky and funny…
And I deleted it, because damn. http://freethoughtblogs.com/cuttlefish/2012/09/05/no-she-said-trigger-warning/
So thanks PZ, for the link. It’s not that this is unacceptable (which it is), but that it is reality. And it’s just plain wrong.
Yeah, reality isn’t fun. Books are better, it’s a shame you can’t live in them.
This is the shit that drives me to keep listening to Sapolsky lectures.
Stephanie’s story: I only had to deal with that sort of shit for a few years when I was a small adolescent guy who committed the crime of liking school and not fitting in. Someone having to spend a lifetime with this sort of abuse is beyond nuts.
When I lived in NYC in the 80s I saw all sorts of crazy like this. A man following a woman down the street talking to her endlessly, often alternating between a cajoling idiotic version of “sweet talking” then suddenly switching to the sort of inchoate rage described in the Tumblr post. Women have to ignore them and not respond – any response “indicates interest.” Yikes.
One day when I was with a friend as we crossed the street such a pair crossed in the opposite direction. I walked ahead of my friend then accidentally/on purpose positioned myself in front of Mr. Charm making it look like the flow of the crowd had pushed me in his path. I “did the dance” with him feinting left and right over and over until he was able to move around me on the side I wanted him to take. Then my friend (one of those who understands what I’m up to without any words spoken) “did the dance” with the schmuck for a while. Oops. Sorry Mr. Deranged Jackass. (Not).
The woman was lost in the crowd before Rage-man got clear of us.
There are weeks when I despair for the human race. Not just hours, not mere days. Weeks.
And it seems to be getting worse.
…and then there’s Jen McCreight’s little announcement.
Both of those stories are ghastly and upsetting. I could especially relate to Stephanie’s post. I have a job in retail in NYC. Security isn’t tight and we always get men that continuously, aggressively, hit on my coworker and I, the only two women in my department. Just today, a man asked my coworker for a hug and a kiss. What the hell? We’re just trying to get our work done, can we exist without being bothered? I’m just happy that there are usually people around so things never escalate like they did with Bicycle Man. Btw, I never know what to do in situations like that. I just try to observe in case I need to call the cops or if the victim needs a witness.
Man, the creeps in the little towns I grew up in have nothing on these city creeps. Even the monkeys in the zoos are better behaved. There really does seem to be a generation that believes the world owes them everything – and it seems to be a global problem too.
This is not right. Anyone who thinks a culture that allows this is right, is a horrible person and should rethink their priorities.
This is why I refuse to give any ground to the sexists, and why I’m behind the Atheism+ people. Line in the sand. Cross it, or you’re not even worthy of consideration.
Shelters are full. For all the many good things they do they save abusers’ lives more than the lives of their victims.
Almost all restraining orders are violated according to NIJ studies which only count the ones the police bother to take reports on.
It’s things like this that eventualy made me a great fan of self defense for women. Not just “hit scream and run away” but “clear draw grip aim squeeze follow through”.
what could possibly go wrong?!
Yeah, self-defense only gives the women a choice between two shitty scenarios: being blamed by her suffering or being punished for defending herself.
The “Bicycle Man” story is tragic and my sympathies go to Stephanie but the man in question was very likely mentally ill, so you need to tread with a little care here. As for the young punks, yeah they were obviously acting on a socially imprinted misogyny, but also including the acts of the mentally ill in the same vein dilutes the message and frankly gives ammunition to those who seek to diminish it. People not familiar with mental illness are prone to ignore this as a trivial matter. Riding mass transit, you will always meet a higher than normal proportion of those suffering mental illness, for the simple reason that these people are often poorer or even denied driving privilege. No, this is not meant as a defense of this man’s actions. We can have the debate that societal misogyny even fueled the outrageous actions on this particular occasion, but it’s wrong to ignore the mental health dimension and regard this only in the realm of normal (bad) human behavior.
No, entitled violent douchebaggery is not a mental illness. People WITH mental illness generally are better behaved and don’t deserve being blamed and diminished by conflation with assholes.
It’s hard to make an armchair diagnosis from the information given, but if pacing back and forth, ranting about a dead mother doesn’t at least open the possibility of mental illness, I’m wondering what type of behavior does.
People rant about their dead (and live) mothers on TET almost daily, and it’s not because they’re mentally ill.
You’re starting from your preconception and then making the facts fit your narrative. It’s called confirmation bias.
We have at least three options to consider (there are more, but I’m lazy). He was an entitled asshole, he was mentally ill, he was drunk. No evidence obviously suggests that one of these is correct. However, Bayesian reasoning tells us there are more entitled assholes in the world than mentally ill people.
Everything “opens the possibility of mental illness”, you know. Sitting there quietly and looking out the window? Mentally ill people do that too. Hearing about bad behavior and rushing to categorize that as correlating with mental illness, while you don’t hear about good behavior and try to categorize it as correlating with mental illness, is thoroughly unjustified crazy-blaming.
Even if he was mentally ill, the form that took in this instance was one that is condoned and encouraged by wider society. Mental illness might partially explain some of the behaviour. It doesn’t explain the assumption that a random man is automatically owed a woman’s attention, or that threats are an appropriate response to not getting it.
After all, the teenagers behaved in basically the same way, they were just somewhat quieter in doing so.
Mental illness is not the problem. A culture that treats women as there for the pleasure of men is the problem.
Well, remember to enter into your Bayesian calculator the mass transit part, the pacing part, and the ranting about dead mothers part. The fact remains that this man could have been mentally ill. I don’t think I’m unduly stigmatizing mental illness. That people are abandoned without proper treatment is an evident and rather sad fact, at least for Americans; there’s no need to invoke confirmation bias. That they sometimes aggressively confront others is common knowledge to anyone who walks the streets of any major American city. The only pertinent question is whether this man was suffering from mental illness. Perhaps he was, perhaps he wasn’t. Sure, it’s possible to just assume he wasn’t and use this as an illustration of the rampant misogyny of our society, but that’s not actually something that we can afford to do. Why? Most importantly, it’s exactly what MRA’s are begging for you to do. They’re going to use any excuse to diminish actual misogyny and not just those kindled by mental illness. It’s critical to at least register the possibility of mental illness because it’s important to track as close to reality as is possible.
If your purpose is to suggest, yes, but even with the possible confounding factor of mental illness, this illustrates a misogynist culture, then I’m game for that discussion, but you then have to realize you’re in a different discussion with an entirely different set of criteria. That discussion is way more complex than the one about drunk guys calling women sluts one.
Yeah, I’m cool with this. It’s the not considering the possibility part that pushes my buttons. It’s related to how I feel about relegating mentally ill people to the normal criminal justice system. Again, I’m in no way condoning this man’s behavior, even if it was driven by mental illness.
Huntstoddard, if the complaint was “a guy was mumbling and ranting on the subway”, then I could see “He was probably mentally ill, cut him some slack” being a reasonable response.
That wasn’t the complaint.
The complaint was that the guy demanded her attention and behaved aggressively when refused it. The threats he used were also specifically gendered and sexualised, and fit into how our society treats women.
That is a problem, and doesn’t get to be waved away with “he was probably mentally ill”.
And the MRAs will dismiss instances of sexism no matter what we say. We should not let bigots and idiots define how we describe the world.
Okay, despite the fact that we have no way of knowing if bicycle man was mentally ill (and it’s pointless and offensive to speculate), I am so fucking sick of the people who will rush in to excuse this type of behavior. Whether he’s mentally ill or not doesn’t matter, the focus should have been on the woman who was (rightfully) frightened by his outbursts.
It may be that this man was mentally ill, but consider this: How many stories have you heard of a man being publicly screamed at, threatened, and physically intimidated by a mentally ill female stranger in a public place for rebuffing her advances?
DaveL, good point.
“I am so fucking sick of the people who will rush in to excuse this type of behavior.”
I guess you missed the two places I explicitly said I’m not excusing his behavior. Being “fucking sick” is not technically an argument.
the ranting about dead mothers part
That’s not a sign of mental illness. That’s just part of his explanation of why he deserved attention from any woman he desired attention from and how the writer was so absolutely evil for denying him that attention. How could she not talk to him knowing that his mother was dead? And anyway, he only asked what she was reading without any ulterior motivation at all, just trying to be friendly! This behavior is well within the limits of normal, neurotypical privileged male behavior.
Fuck you. That’s exactly what you’ve been doing in every single comment you wrote. Pretending you weren’t doesn’t change that reality. So shut the fuck up now, stupid asshole, because your input is neither relevant nor wanted. And, what DaveL said @22, which you noticed but apparently didn’t actually comprehend.
Oh, and “We can have the debate that societal misogyny even fueled the outrageous actions on this particular occasion”? Fuck you again. There isn’t any debate for anybody who has a fucking clue.
You’re either saying that Stephanie should not have shared that story — presumably because she was supposed to cooly and calmly reflect that maybe the guy hurling threats and abuse at her on a nearly deserted subway car was mentally ill — or you’re not saying that. Which are you saying?
If you’re saying she should not have shared that story then I think you are excusing the behavior.
While excusing and exceptionalizing his behavior.
*waits for the ‘guillotine’ and ‘shot behind the sheds’ memes to come out*
Mentioning that mental illness is neglected in this culture and IMPACTS EVERYBODY is not silencing the author! It suggests we ALL could stand to discuss the facts of this neglect. This story is much larger than what is presented.
Like hating slightly less than all of humanity at this point?
*nitpick*
The conditions of being an entitled asshole, mentally ill, or drunk are not mutually exclusive. In an inductive system* one should treat all three as independent parameters of a multinomial distribution…then you could use a Dirichlet as your prior.
*Bayes gets a little too much credit. Seriously. Jeffreys practically invented Bayes.
I guess you missed the two places I explicitly said I’m not excusing his behavior.
When someone says, “I’m not a racist but…” does that automatically make their next statement non-racist? You were excusing his behavior. What else could the statement about “tread lightly here” mean except that you believe that his behavior shouldn’t be criticized?
That’s all?
I just love that nearly every time someone relates a personal story of how they were mistreated some asshole feels the needs to, sans any evidence or personal knowledge of the event, find an excuse for the person behaving badly.
Yeah, we don’t get to talk about *the women* who got mistreated… just about the poor menz, with a bonus of the-MRAs-are-watching.
…I looked for a way to donate to the murder victim’s family, but they’re somewhere in Guerrero, Mexico.
Aaaand the idiots with penises for brains creep out of the woodwork to excuse the behavior of the entitled asshole du jour.
As always.
Should have called it, easiest bet ever.
Right alongside excusing his behavior. You’re not very good at this, are you?
Okay, if you weren’t excusing his behavior (by pulling possible contributing factors out of your ass), what the fuck was your point?
Also: I wasn’t making an argument, I was calling your behavior assholish.
It doesn’t really matter how often or how explicitly you say it, when that statement stands clearly out of sync with what you actually wrote before. The entirety of that stands on its own and will be judged on its own merits.
If you did not intend to excuse his behavior, then you crafted your words very poorly.
Maybe we should “tread lightly” with our criticisms of poor huntstoddard here. Maybe he just as a writing disability….
huntstoddard
6 September 2012 at 5:47 am
Well, remember to enter into your Bayesian calculator the mass transit part, the pacing part, and the ranting about dead mothers part. The fact remains that this man could have been mentally ill.
He must be mentally ill because we know that no True Man would do such a thing, right?
And EVEN IF the man in question was mentally ill, that DOES NOT necessarily excuse his actions, or make them immune to criticism. One can be mentally ill and still be capable of knowing right from wrong and exercising self-control.
Not all mentally ill people are raging, raving, unrestrainable, uncontrollable, dangerous lunatics, who cannot be held accountable for their actions and choices as “normal” humans are, and thus should not be treated as fully human.
(To be criticized for your actions is part of being treated as a full human being, a self-responsible moral agent.)
Next you’re going to tell us to “tread lightly” because the poor guy might be socially awkward. Poor guy! The abused better “tread lightly” or she may hurt the abusive fuck’s feelings! Oh NO! How dare she?!
For Fuck’s sake. And people wonder why women so often remain silent. Having so-called allies tell victims to tread lightly for fear they may hurt THE ABUSER is not fucking helpful. It is classic silencing and victim blaming tactics.
If you are unable to see that, you are not an ally. Hell, if you immediately get super defensive, instead of LISTENING and considering what the people you claim to be on the same side of have to say, you are not an ally. You are just another mansplainer who feels they know better than those who have experiance.
You know, if you had just admitted your mistake and problematic language – no one is perfect – and had taken the time to listen to all the patient people trying to help educate you, you would probably feel far less defensive right now.
Why do you have such a hard tine taking criticism? Especially from those you claim to be on the same side of? Is it perhaps because you are afraid to confront your own privilege?
Hunt Stoddard’s concern trolling in this thread should be viewed in light of his history on Pharyngula as a troll in general.
BTW, the woman on public transit was scolded on Tumblr for not being to her harassers. Appropriate response here.
Also, Happiestsadist sent this link to me yesterday. Tons of rape triggers. The OP was definitely raped, but she had to convince herself of that — and the comments are full of people, including known MRA trolls, arguing that she should have taken “personal responsibility” by saying no.
#11 nms
#12 vaiyt
Good self defense training includes how to deal with the police. And it doesn’t offer you a choice of “shitty alternatives”. It offers you a whole range of alternatives, period. Some of them are pretty damned good – Don’t get raped. Don’t get murdered. Don’t go to jail. Watch the criminal go to jail. And sue the fuck out of him for damages.
You can moan and cry and say “It’s so bad. It’s so, so bad. There’s nothing we can do about it!” Or you can empoower yourself. It’s not a complete solution by any means. It beats the fuck out of screaming for help while everyone ignores you.
Which is just another way of blaming the victim.
if this “moaning and crying” person is physcially incapable of taking self-defense class, well the she was asking for it!
if this “moaning and crying” person is financially incapable of affording self-defense classes, well than she was asking for it!
Not saying you’re intending to say that second bit, but a society poisioned by rape culture ALWAYS DOES.
And just to show you how incredibly wrong this “stop moaning and crying and arm yourself” attitude is, let’s remember this:
20 years for standing her ground
@anuran:
I’m going to be charitable and say you’re ignorant of how far the rabbit hole goes.
The post just above my post about “shitty scenarios” was precisely linking to the story illuminata posted again at @42.
Recommending women take self-defense as if that’s a solution doesn’t help because the problem is on the other end, with the shitheads who try to find excuses to condemn women regardless of what they do. It’s the fucking “defend your honor” all over again. Don’t defend yourself and you were asking for it. Defend yourself and you’re charged with assault or some other bullshit, and maybe called a bitch on top of that. So yeah, all scenarios are shitty and I fucking stand behind my assessment.
Police? You mean the same police that regularly dismiss the claims of abused wives and victims of stalkers?
Sue? You mean, take it to the courts? Google out some research on how little of the reported cases of rape end up in a conviction.
In an ideal scenario, those would be viable alternatives. For the women of today, in the real world, they’re NOT.
I haven’t rode on a train in D.C. for years now, but don’t most trains have a panic button (or panic strip)? The situation Stephanie was in sounded very dangerous. Wonder what stopped him from physically harming her. I worry about the next time he corners a woman on the train. Even if he is mentally imbalanced, he doesn’t have the right to rant and rave and terrorize people. Scary.
I had this happen 3 years ago, before we got the car.
I was on the train with my eyes closed because I was stressed, and all of a sudden I hear this bird tweeting. I ignored it because I thought it was someones phone, but then I had that ‘feeling’, and I looked up and this guy was staring at me smiling. “Trying to sleep?” He said, and I looked at him, shrugged and looked away and closed my eyes again. He didn’t say anything after so I thought, fine, he got the message. When I got up to get off the train he looked at me again and said, “you awake now?’ So I said matter of factly, ‘I’m just trying to ignore people’. He says what and I repeat what I said and then he said ‘you think I’m a bad person for trying to talk to you?’ and I said ‘no’. Then he says ‘You probably want to tell me to go to hell’, and I said no. And then he said ‘You might as well just tell me to go to hell’, so I said ‘Fine, go to hell!’ Then he says ‘Well, you’re just the worst person in the world’, to which I said ‘Fuck off!’ (I know, my biting wit had taken the day off) I got off the train mumbling about how I don’t need to act nice just cause some guy wants me to, and one of the women who was on the train asked me who he was, and I’m like ‘no clue. ‘You mean he was a complete stranger?’ someone else asked. Yup, and we had a short laugh about crazy* people.
I don’t like having to swear at random douchebags on transit, but I am glad that the train was full and there was no further escalation. But come on, who tweets like a bird to get someones attention?
*I’m technically a crazy person, with stupid mental issues that keep me from doing the job I love and used to be good at. What I’m saying here by ‘crazy’ is useless angry douchebag. No offence to actual crazy people meant
I already made my point entirely plain. If you still don’t “get it” then you might check your own blinders. It’s important to get things right, and including the possibility that we’re dealing with an ill man when it is clearly indicated is part of the story, and that was omitted. Otherwise you’re not entirely understanding the account, only one branch of the probability tree (talk about confirmation bias). I’m not sure how much more time I should try to spend explaining why that’s important. I don’t excuse his behavior (even if mentally ill) for the same reason I don’t excuse Charles Manson’s behavior. I don’t consider Charles Manson evil; I consider him insane. Unfortunately given our knowledge of the brain and mental illness, we can’t offer Manson anything other than our draconian criminal justice system. Considering Manson evil, and locating his actions within the range of normal human action is a throwback to the religious conflation of mental illness with true human intent. I hate to say it, but implicit in a lot of the comments here is the same implied ignorance.
For the sake of argument it might help if you assume the man was mentally ill. How does the discussion go then? You might argue that he was still acting on the sexist cues within our society. The focus actually shift away from one egregious example to the more pertinent aspects of culture. I’m not trying to sweep anything under the carpet. I’m trying to address one particular red flag that came up for me. Sorry if that upsets some people, but that’s the nature of discussion.
Nope, you never do. But then, you rarely have a point beyond you are impartial (har), and we are bad.
Problem is, of all the “crazy” people in the world, those are the ones you are probably going to interact with most. Those with entirely debilitating disease are either institutionalized or so heavily medicated with major tranquilizers that they won’t be the ones bothering you. And so you get the usual refrain about “most mentally ill people are not aggressive…” It’s pretty uncommon for people on these drugs, which we call “treatment,” to be aggressive.
There is a strange behavior I have observed (although not seen it for a few years now) in which a man makes whisping/hissing sounds at a woman. This has always been hispanic men and the noise is directed at hispanic (or what some would consider “hispanic looking”) women. The women always ignore them and the men typically do nothing more. If anyone has an explanation of this behavior other than some weird attention-getting crap, I’d be interested to know.
I’m often tempted to ask the guy if he sprung a leak.
I should go without saying that by supporting that view on Manson, I don’t at the same time think his victims deserved what they got, or “well, that’s just the way it goes…” I know that’s not going to stop the Internet Tough Guys spattering me with f-bombs, but it’s worth a try.
Translation: This woman should have not been riding the train and should have removed herself because this man acting like millions of assholes before him was clearly insane by my internet diagnosis. So in conclusion, it’s her responsibility to not be in a place to be bothered and she’s guilty for riding with a vagina.
huntstoddard, leading by example, assumes that Bicycle Man was mentally ill, and has successfully shifted the focus of this discussion to other aspects of our culture.
kudos, huntstoddard
Huntstoddard, pretender of impartiality, really an MRA fuckwit…
It’s not as if huntstoddard doesn’t have a history of trolling the MRA line on previous threads.
I know, but he really showed his stripes today, instead of pretending to hide them as he did on the other thread…I smelled him out from his first post or two there though. It’s hard to hide the bigotry when we (plural Pharyngulite regulars) know the dog whistles/code words.
Where’s the bigotry Nerd? I know, that’s challenging you to actually think and lay out an argument instead of issuing stupid knee-jerk responses, but if you have a coherent argument, go for it.
I’m waiting for yours, as I have since your first kumbaya post hiding supposedly hiding your MRA ideals.
Oh, and huntstoddard, your inability to address TF instead of us was your Achilles heel, telling everybody your true ideals. Think about that before your next post.
Translation of the translation: I have the right to ignore all matters of mental illness because my opinion trumps all others.
Deep down, I think the real intent here is it actually doesn’t matter to you whether this guy was mentally ill or not. The diagnosis I think I got most correct is the fact that you’re still mired in the legacy left by religious conflation of mental illness and true human culpability. Your minds haven’t changed that much from those in the 16th century.
Yawn, more MRA fuckwittery. All MRA fools have is noise. There is no cogent arguments. Right huntstoddard, if you are honest and have integrity (*snicker*).
In other words, you got nothing. Why am I not surprised?
“It’s not as if huntstoddard doesn’t have a history of trolling the MRA line on previous threads.”
Since it seems to be open season for dredging up history to make a point, some of you might remember this delightful little gem from bygone days, which is the main reason I’m sensitive to crass dismissal of mental heath issues here. I’m actually in awe of a person who can play life lottery and wind up so bereft of any awareness of the impact that mental health has on the world today, but apparently it happens. Serious mental illness strikes 1 to 5 percent of the population, and directly impacts much more, but I guess there will remain a portion who are utterly clueless to it. They should really thank their lucky stars, except of course, they don’t even know enough to know they’re lucky.
42 vaiyt
Love the snark. Love the condescending, dismissive burying of your head in the sand. And I love your complete ignorance of the field.
I’ve been in many phases of this business – Written peer reviewed, academic work on the subject, worked on crisis hotlines, done political activism, helped move a sizeable number of women out of abusive situations when the police wouldn’t do squat and more. So yes, I know my way around the territory.
There is a lot of productive things one can do. Changing the way we raise and socialize people. Legal and corrections reform. Victim services. Generational changes in the status of women. They’re all important.
No single one of them is a panacea. Each is the right tool for a different job. Saying “Well people should just not be mean” is nice if it leads to societal changes that help make people nicer or at least frightened of the consequences of acting bad. Maybe when Buddy Jesus comes back and everyone is a saint your “just ignore it and it won’t happen” approach will work. But I don’t believe in Heaven or Buddy Jesus.
It does nothing if you’re confronted with a person who wants to victimize you. And there will always be bad people who do bad things.
That’s when self defense becomes important. I Understand if you want to deny the reality. But some of us have to deal with it.
Do you even know what self-defense is? Really know? Or are you still under the mistaken impression that it’s about futilely punching and kicking?
You can improve your odds by prevention, knowing the real risks and arranging things so you’re less likely to be successfully targeted. But it will only improve the odds to a certain point.
You can get away from some situations by avoidance from moving out of a bad neighborhood to knowing when to run safely. Doesn’t work in chronic situations. Doesn’t work unless you can actually get away to somewhere safer than where you are.
You can use deterrence by de-escalating some situations – a whole huge topic in its own right – or by convincing the potential bad guy that what he wants isn’t worth what he’d have to pay to get it. It can be as simple as making eye contact at the right point or the way you walk.
And if none of those is appropriate or effective there’s resistance. It can be anything from swearing like a Marine D.I. with Tourette’s or tearing off soft bits. And in the absolute gravest extreme, if you are in serious danger and have no other choice, there’s the option of lethal force. These all work. Provably. Well. Even against bigger stronger people. I put them last because they are the last option; but if you are prepared for it it makes every single one of the other ones more effective.
So stop beating the strawman. Listen to what I’m actualy saying.
None of these is guaranteed. But knowing even a little
Here’s what doesn’t work:
Doing nothing.
Hoping it will stop.
Being angry the world isn’t the way you want it to be.
Begging for help.
irony overload
Considering how absolutely vigilant pharyngula threads have been about the abuse of references to mental illness (just spent a little time in the Thunderdome, or, well, ANY OTHER THREAD), huntstoddard’s transparently dishonest self-serving display of selective memory at @63 is frankly laughable.
Yes, Thunderdome, the unmoderated (self-moderated), anything-goes thread.
Where joking about mental illness is TABOO. And enforced not by PZ, but by the community of regular commenters.
It only takes nothing to answer nothing.
Because you are intimately familiar with having nothing?
All you need to do is read the thread I linked to refresh your memory. Mostly I meant that to illustrate PZ’s extraordinarily bad judgement in making that post, and failure to address the mistake even when given the opportunity to do so, and yes, the numerous people who eagerly defended that unconscionable post.
This post isn’t nearly as egregious as that one, which was outright repulsive, but there are shades of the same type of thing, the failure to even mention the possibility of mental illness, the fundamentalist assumption that no other issue could possibly mitigate the affront in any way, whether that might be an assault in this instance, or the temerity to voice creationism in the other. Granted, in this instance there is much less information to complete the story. There is a good deal of ambiguity. I don’t know for sure whether the man was mentally imbalanced or not. I have the opinion that if he was then that should mitigate his vilification to some degree. If he was then I have compassion for him at the same time as I have sympathy for Stephanie. Tough shit if that contracts the anal sphincters of some of the black hearts here. All that tells me is that you are not capable of perceiving a tragic episode, one where both parties are victims in different ways.
To those who say how dare I spend a second considering the hypothetical mentally ill man when the victim was clearly Stephanie and she should be the only one this is about: kind of shades of Dawkins and Muslima, don’t you think? The thing is, under Atheism+ you don’t have the luxury of focusing solely on one group at the expense of erasing another. You’re forced to look at the big picture, and your cause du jour is not the only one in the world! Your distaste for considering the man is driven by the possibility that he was not, in fact, mentally ill, which is quite understandable since that is a very repulsive picture. People who think that atheism+ shouldn’t work that way, that one cause can dominate others and be used to excoriate other righteous causes in a ranked order are going to ensure its demise. It’s only a matter of time before YOUR cause is demoted below others and you’re going to then feel the heat. Ultimately that is the type of REAL divisiveness, not the obvious tripe PZ is always harping about, that is going to drive the movement apart. Divisiveness that comes from the very heart of the movement.
Yawn, HS still showing us why it doesn’t matter to the regulars, and shouldn’t be listened with teal deer displays of fuckwittery. Thunderdome, or shut the fuck up. Nothing cogent, but it thinks it is.
Why are you so obsessed with Thunderdome? Do you have a stash of crack over there or something?
huntstoddard:
You are very dim; Stephanie linked to a post by another woman; she even states so explicitly: “And now, nearly a year later, we have another woman sharing an incident that demonstrates exactly the same thing.”
(Your cluelessness is vast)
You imagine excusing someone by guessing he may be “mentally imbalanced” is not a form of vilification?
(heh)
—
More relevantly: why are you so scared of going there, where your vapid ignorant ranting would not be out of topic?
(Bah)
Thunderdome, for the obvious and oblivious trolls like huntstoddard. Those pointless ones who think they have point. Those who think they are cogent, but who aren’t.
Bawk-bawk-bawk.
huntsdoddard, what do you think would change if the man was mentally ill? This was already being talked about in context as part of a larger societal issue rather than being solely about a particular person/incident right from the start.
And even if he has a mental illness, it’s not mental illness that made him feel entitled to her time and attention, and justified in getting mad if she refused him. The only diagnosis that involves feeling entitled to others that I know of is sociopathy, and he certainly didn’t show typical sociopathic symptoms. Please direct us to the appropriate illness in the DSM-IV that has symptoms that are identical to sexism, if you think this is a manifestation of a mental illness.
“(Your cluelessness is vast)”
My mistake. Misattributing it doesn’t change anything though.
“You imagine excusing someone by guessing he may be “mentally imbalanced” is not a form of vilification?”
As I’ve said all along, I’m not trying to excuse anyone. So you think mental imbalance equates with vilification? (You see how easy this game is to play, and how fast the tables can be turned.)
“huntsdoddard, what do you think would change if the man was mentally ill?”
First of all the vilification of this particular (hypothetical) man would be lessened. It’s possible the post itself would not be written, though I can’t say for sure, and I can’t say that would be a correct thing to do. The author might reconsider the merit or “importance” (her word) of recounting an episode involving a person suffering from an illness.
“And even if he has a mental illness, it’s not mental illness that made him feel entitled to her time and attention, and justified in getting mad if she refused him. The only diagnosis that involves feeling entitled to others that I know of is sociopathy, and he certainly didn’t show typical sociopathic symptoms. Please direct us to the appropriate illness in the DSM-IV that has symptoms that are identical to sexism, if you think this is a manifestation of a mental illness.”
Yes, but with those caveats I would have no objection to the article, if they were included for discussion. Am I correct in saying that you don’t believe mental illness in any way mitigates such behavior?
Still no evidence, just fuckwitted OPINION, expressed by huntstoddard. Either cite some evidence or shut the fuck up HS. Your OPINION is irrelevant, as you constantly show.
If my opinion is irrelevant, then so is yours, Nerd. I don’t see you spouting stats like Bill Clinton, so maybe you should follow your own advice. What exactly would you like me to do? Ride LA mass transit for a year and conclude that 9 out of 10 young women will encounter a man with a mental disorder?
99% of all blog crap is personal opinion, so go smoke your crack pipe in the Thunderdome.
[meta]
huntstoddard:
Mistake?
<snicker>
It clearly (heh) indicates that you (a) did not read the linked piece before bombastically opining, or (b) did read it but clearly (heh!) totally misapprehended it at a most basic level or (c) you’re bullshitting.
(Which was it?)
If you’re not trying to excuse, then the only relevance of your guess that mental illness was causative is so you can claim that condemning that behaviour was an instance of ableism — IOW, spurious and malicious sophistry.
(In passing, I note that by your very own contention, were I to claim that were you being mentally imbalanced would explain your apparent stupidity but not excuse it, you’d hold that I was not vilifying you)
This is no game, this is your trollish fatuity being exposed, and that you imagine you’ve made some sort of rhetorical point is indicative of how laughably stupidly you over-estimate your competence at discourse.
huntstoddard:
@76:
@77:
<snicker>
(I guess your lack of acumen mitigates (but doesn’t excuse!) the incoherence of your contentions)
“(Which was it?)”
Which “linked piece” are you referring to, oh anal retentive one?
“(In passing, I note that by your very own contention, were I to claim that were you being mentally imbalanced would explain your apparent stupidity but not excuse it, you’d hold that I was not vilifying you)”
Are you fucking drunk or something? EDIT!!!
Wow. You really do not get it.
“huntstoddard:
@76: “As I’ve said all along, I’m not trying to excuse anyone.”
@77: “Am I correct in saying that you don’t believe mental illness in any way mitigates such behavior?”
(I guess your lack of acumen mitigates (but doesn’t excuse!) the incoherence of your contentions)”
mitigate != excuse. And the second quote was a question. You know, as in…a question?
“Wow. You really do not get it.”
No, I do Get It. You see, I’m a member of the Get It club. Here, here’s my Get It card; it’s right here in my wallet. [Moves to pick card out of wallet.] Oppft. [MIDDLE FINGER]
How could it? That someone is mentally ill doesn’t lessen the effects of their behavior in any way.
Or instead of “mitigates,” did you mean to say “excuses”?
What the fuck does your question mean? Do you think you could mitigate the amount of fucking bullshit you’ve been spewing?
huntstoddard:
You’ve forgotten #73 already? :)
It’s the only applicable sense of the word, since the behaviour and its outcome is unchanged and only the degree of culpability can be at issue.
A rhetorical question, yes. Care to provide an answer to it? :)
—
(Face it: you’re done like a dinner)
huntsdoddard, you didn’t answer my question.
What mental illness do you think this guy has?
And now I have a second to add: what do you think “mitigate” means?
I am still wondering after reading this diversion: “Which mental illness?”.
There’s quite a few, and remarkably few cases involve the erasing of a person’s sense of right and wrong (i.e. render someone criminally insane). Huntstoddard appears to think waving his hands and claiming “Schrodinger’s Madness” is sufficient to cast doubt on this person’s actions, even mitigate them. I’m not so sure that speculation, vague as it is, isn’t simply prejudice by any other name.
Louis
{cough} should have read closer! It seems Carlie at least thinks the same thing! ;-)
Louis
Louis, we are, shall we say, on the same wavelength.Simpatico. Two brains throbbing as one…
um, I’ll be in my bunk.
Funny how huntstoddard always wants responsible adults like the regulars here to forgive the immature boyz for their harrassment and maltreatment of women. Obviously not a mature adult himself, otherwise it would know daughters need protection from the dimwitted immature boyz who prey upon women. And the boyz need to mature. He should be condemning the boyz for their bad behavior, getting in their faces, and getting them to become mature men who respect women.
HSs apologetics speak loudly at his hypocrisy. Otherwise, he would have taken TF to task by now for his arrogance and stupidity, instead of trolling Pharyngula ad nauseum.
Carlie,
Oh bugger, you poor woman! Lo siento (both literally and idiomatically).
Louis
Anuran, thanks for completely ignoring what Illuminata and Vaiyt said to you.
Stop fucking mansplaining to women how we “should” look out for our safety. You have no idea how any of us go about it. You have no idea of the results any of us have had.
And, despite all the “cred” you flash at us, you have no idea what it’s like to be a woman and constantly have society second-guessing your decisions. Like you’ve been doing in this thread, along with condescending horseshit like “moan and cry.”
really
Louis – as long as I can use the brain on the days I teach, I can share the other times.
Now now, rev, be nice. Huntsdoddard might have a mental illness that makes him a jackass.
Rev BDC,
I feel guilty, I laughed at the middle finger gag. It’s an old favourite…
…from way back in junior school.
Here, I have something for you in my pocket [MIDDLE FINGER]. Can you hear this? [SHOWS UPSIDE DOWN MIDDLE FINGER], no? Allow me to turn it up [TURNS MIDDLE FINGER SALUTE RIGHT WAY UP]…
…memories.
It’s still used now as a joke between some of my friends when it’s just the boys in the bar being juvenile arseholes between ourselves (which is occasionally fun). This is the phase of being 37 that I refer to as “Not realising I am not 18 any more”. It usually results in painful hangovers and unimpressed Mrses.
Louis
Yeah I had a buddy that would do the same thing, except with his cock.
Funny at age 15, now, not so much.
Rev BDC,
Oh come now! The cry of “Cocks Out!” is always funny.
Isn’t it?
Guys? Guys?
Where are you going?
Guys?
Can I come?
Why are you driving away? I need a lift. Guys?
Louis
Depends on the company…
Rev BDC,
Yeah some companies I’ve worked for didn’t like it at all.
I has a correct understandings, yes?
Louis
P.S. Sorry to deviate with a ridiculous interlude whilst Huntstoddard gets back to us with a precise remote diagnosis of which mental illness with which features can cause this man’s actions to be mitigated in any way. And how this misuse of mental illness magical remote internet diagnosis is somehow not playing into the stigma of mental illness and othering of people with mental illnesses.
mitigate != excuse.
actually it does, in exactly the way you have been using it.
People who think that atheism+ shouldn’t work that way, that one cause can dominate others and be used to excoriate other righteous causes in a ranked order are going to ensure its demise.
*looks for someone supporting this strawman…*
finds air.
Yes exactly
*thumbs through the HR associates handbook
Rev BDC,
Oh I save time and always do it actually in the HR offices.
Surprisingly, a large number of people join in…
Louis
So you worked a crisis line, Anuran? So did Ted Bundy. Your contempt for victims says a lot more than your unverifiable claims of cred.
BWA! Served.
Well, in ignoring what I said in order to “moan and cry” about vaiyt’s tone and flash some useless “cred” around, maybe I was wrong. Perhaps Anuran does intend the “well then you’re asking for it!” bit.
You know who else liked crisis lines?
Hitler?
Generic troll – positive claim X
Nerd of Redhead – Evidence please
Generic troll – POSITIVE CLAIM X
NofR – No evidence = opinion, dismissed
Generic troll – well you too!
It is POSITIVE claims, like Y has mental illness, that need evidence.
Why is huntstoddard doubling down on a standard creationist rhetorical strategy?
(Nerd, do you keep a running tally of how many times you’ve had this conversation? It happens so frequently, there’s got to be some way you can claim tax credit for it….)
huntstoddard’s syndrome
it’s a psychotic condition that can only be diagnosed through the internet, and, tragically, affects more than 95% of people who have at some point broken the law, broken social conventions, or who you don’t like.
No, I don’t keep track of it. Funny how the MRA contingent and the religious types like creobots and anti-choicers are the biggest groups who demand we accept their WORD in place of real evidence.
Even if I were a psychiatrist (and I’m not) it would obviously be impossible to diagnose from the info given. Each of us as (for the most part) typical mental subjects have an intuition when someone is acting “crazy.” If you deny that, then please explain your transcendent lack of opinion when you encounter a person acting bizarre. From the given account, in the given circumstance, it strikes me that this man could have been mentally ill. Perhaps he was psychotic? Maybe the auditory hallucination of his dead mother was speaking in his ear? There’s utterly no way to know for sure, as you damn well know. The only salient point is the intuitive opinion that this man might have been mentally ill. Now, perhaps you don’t think so, because YOUR intuition tells you otherwise. Guess what this makes? It makes “you say, I say” and you’re in exactly the same boat as I am. What you’re attempting to do is make an impossible specific demand, which, when unmet, you think will gain you a point. Great, clever rhetorical play. Utterly disingenuous, but clever.
Let’s take the dictionary def of “mitigate,” the first one you’ll get at Google:
Make less severe, serious, or painful: “he wanted to mitigate misery in the world”.
Lessen the gravity of (an offense or mistake).
I think you can see where the second one would apply.
Now, I’m asking you, Louis, Nerd, and anyone else who cares, once again, to answer my question:
In your opinion, does mental health mitigate behavior like this?
If No, a secondary question:
Does mental health mitigate criminal culpability in any way? If so, how?
I mean of course “mental health status,” or if you prefer “mental illness”.
“Funny at age 15, now, not so much.”
Dude, you want more than that, provide more than a mono-sentence insult. Otherwise…there’s something in my pocket, let me see…
huntstoddard:
By gumby you’re slow!
(cf. #88)
I’m using the words differently, and I think within the bounds of their definition. To excuse means an adequate justification has been provided. To mitigate means an explanation has been provided but no justification. Does that lessen the strain on your sphincter?
Let’s say you’re driving your pregnant wife to an emergency room. The circumstance mitigates your running a red light.
Let’s say you’re driving to the hospital and run an intersection due to a traffic light malfunction. Your action has been justified, and you are excused.
Who gives a fuck about answering a question from a obvious idjit troll? You have no point, you have no evidence, you have nothing worth discussing. Hence no need to have you dictate the discussion. Just your fuckwitted kumbaya attitude, which we don’t share due to the idiocy of it all. Why are you still here? What do you want to accomplish, and are you really progressing toward that? If not, why are you still here.
Hint: WE HAVE NOTHING TO LEARN FROM YOU.
Huntstoddard, instead of asking inane questions, lay out your idea like this: “This is what I think, and this (LINK) is the evidence to back up my opinion”. Easy, but it puts the burden of evidence where it belongs, on you, the claimant.
Inane questions try to make people defend something. You should be one defending your ideas to them. Why can’t you do that? Or, aren’t your ideas really defensible with evidence?
The argument is based on a counterfactual thinking at this point. Presentation of evidence (of the man’s sanity) becomes moot the moment I posit his hypothetical mental illness. The argument extends from that and becomes a theoretical one about how mental illness does or does not impinge on things like culpability for sexism or misogyny. This is the same kind of thing that seems to have eluded you before. You’re still trying to approach the argument with some kind of inductive scientific method. No wonder you’re entirely turned around backward. It’s a philosophical argument!
It’s a philosophical argument!
even a philosophical argument must stand on consistent logic.
yours simply… doesn’t.
Fixed that for you. You don’t do philosophy, you do sophistry and fuckwittery. Either lay out your idea, preferably evidenced, or shut the fuck up.
Here you must prove the guy was mentally ill. Not presuppose anything. Evidence. Hypotheticals are for those who can’t face reality.
I’m still waiting for someone to answer my question. The difficulty here is that it’s kind of the clash of the titans. On one side you have sexism and harassment, and on the other you have mental illness. No one wants to look like the fucker who comes down against one or the other, but since the reigning mode of thought here is so fundamentalist, the tools to address the problem otherwise are non-existent. Here, that is. Oh, they exist, but watching some brave soul fumble around trying to find them is going to be pretty amusing.
HuntDullard, you ought to read this blogpost by Colleen Doran, about her experience of having been stalked for years by a fan and his friends, and having her experiences brushed off by her colleagues in the comic book industry. She writes in her own comments:
And I’m still waiting for you to answer these:
Why are you still here?
What do you want to accomplish, and are you really progressing toward that?
If not, why are you still here?
You don’t deserve an answer.
Where did you find that much straw? Where did I fucking say that ignoring the problem would solve it? I disagree on where the problem is. I think that putting the onus of preventing assault on women is the bass-ackwards way of doing it. I think you are ignoring the real world when you think teaching women self-defense does jack shit while society blames them no matter what happens.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/11/marissa-alexander-sentenced_n_1510113.html
20 years in jail for standing up to her abusive husband. That was the story I was responding to. Tell me how good does “self-defense” in a society that does THIS to women who self-defend.
I’m getting a “reasonable precautions” vibe here…
You see, the problem is, we already got umpteen trolls trotting ways of “improving the odds of not getting assaulted” while gleefully ignoring the one factor in common between – the presence of
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
How clueless can you be? Many women do not have that choice, asshat. What they are going to do? Stop going out? Half of our population has to tiptoe around society, going only where rapists allow them to go? Does that sound right to you?
Tell me, how does that help the women who were raped/assaulted in their work/study environment? In a crowded train? In their own room? In broad daylight, with the tacit agreement of the other men around?
You see, your post sounds too much like bullshit that we’ve already seen in other threads in this very same blog, and elsewhere in my case. We’ve had countless trolls touting “reasonable precautions” about rape, trying to minimize the responsibility of the one party whose presence has a causal link to the whole thing. I’ve seen them so often that I can’t be arsed to argue the details and jump straight to the underlying assumptions.
The underlying assumption behind the “bad neighborhood” scenario being, “well, women shouldn’t be so stupid as to pretend they’re normal people with the right to go around without being a victim of violence”. Is that a reasonable thing to ask of all women? People might think a man is stupid for walking with riches on display in a bad neighborhood, but not for a moment it’s said that the criminals shouldn’t be prosecuted, that he was “asking for it” and therefore the blame lies solely on him. AND YET THAT IS WHAT HAPPENS WITH WOMEN AND RAPE.
Intimidation doesn’t work against the usual rapist in American culture. Not when getting viewed as a “bitch” is considered an offense to be punished – with rape, if possible. FFS, we see comedians joking about it.
Just imagine what would happen if every woman got self-defense training. There would still be rape, except now the victims get an extra heap of blaming for failing to defend themselves. A get-out-of-jail-free card for the smart rapists, who learn to avoid situations where a woman can retaliate.
Without fixing the culture and shifting focus to the actual cause of rape – rapists – such things are little more than placebo.
I’m still waiting for someone to answer my question.
why?
haven’t you yet come to realize why you think nobody has answered your “question”?
I suggest you retire to think about it some.
On one side we know she was being harrassed.
On the other you are assuming he had a mental illness, sans any evidence but your own internet diagnosis.
The only one being ridiculous here is you.
lol now I noticed an error from my previous comment at @129. I was going to get rid of the quote and response altogether, because I say the same thing just after. That’s what I get for not answering quotes in order.
On one side we have reality, on the other we have huntstoddard’s imagination.
On one side we have real, fully human women, on the other we have hypothetical completely normal fetuses 2 seconds from being born.
The moment huntstoddard posits HYPOTHETICAL mental illness without supporting evidence, the question becomes dishonest and useless.
For absolute proof of this, not just self-defense and size and strength being irrelevant but victims feeling extra shame because of it, look no further than men in the military – tough, fit, trained men – who get raped by other men.
(bolds mine)
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/04/03/the-military-s-secret-shame.html