Found on Salon this morning. I added the caption.
Beck mocks campus rape. #YesAllWomen pic.twitter.com/tMCRlSFBK1
— mahabarbara (@mahabarbara) May 29, 2014
Update: You’ve probably heard about the hashtag #YesAllWomen set up for women “to share their stories of everyday sexism and misogyny – and to tell the world that enough is enough.” Even those of us who have never experienced physical assault have experienced sexual intimidation, belittling and humiliation, aimed at us only because of our gender. And most of the time we put up with it, because what else can we do? Confronting some sexist bozo could turn an unpleasant situation into something genuinely dangerous.
So how has the poitical Right responded to #YesAllWomen? Mostly with more belittling. Charles Cooke at NRO, for example, dismisses the social media phenomenon as “groupthink.” We women can’t possibly know our own experiences, apparently, and simply imagine misogyny because we’ve read about it. Assimilated tool that she is, Mollie Hemingway ridiculed the hashtag as “asinine.” One of Hemingway’s points is that “It’s A Mockery Of The Real Problems Women Face Throughout The World.”
As the #YesAllWomen craze spread, a woman was stoned by her family in Pakistan for marrying someone of her choice as opposed to someone of their arrangement. While the #YesAllWomen crowds talked about the unbearable horror of being whistled at on the street, annoyingly being told to smile, and being given gendered McDonald’s toys, more than 200 Nigerian girls remained in slavery to Islamist extremist rebels. While we turn the murder of six into a narcissistic contest of victimhood, a Sudanese Christian woman married to an American Christian man gave birth to a daughter in prison.
As I said above, it’s a difference in degree, not in kind. Apparently we’re not supposed to mind violations of our human dignity because other women have real problems.
And conservatives wonder why there’s a gender gap.
Oh, a conservative comedy skit about rape?
Why, I bet it’s a veritable yuk-fest!
NOT!
More like a YUCK-fest!!!
Sorry, but I won’t watch it. I’ve had more than my quota of racism, misogyny, stupidity, ignorance, and bigotry, for this month.
I probably hit that quota on May 2nd.
As I’ve said before, conservative aren’t funny, because they all suffer from an “Irony Deficiency.”
And they love “humor” that most of us find cruel.
Everyone knows that BecKKK is a crackpot, misogynist, racist, bigot, etc. the scary thing is that is little vanity news channel “the blaze” is getting more and more mainstream acceptance. I saw one of his goons commenting on the weekend shootings on CNN just yesterday.
I see a clear pattern in Ms. Hemingway’s selective outrages, does anyone else?
[Waving hand] I know! I know! Ms. Hemingway thinks misogyny is only bad when the perp is a Muslim! Otherwise if misogyny gets people killed here, only a narcissist would complain about it.
As far as I can tell, they don’t wonder about that at all, nor about many other real things – too much of their psychic energy is wasted on fabricated issues.
And another thing – they are not conservatives – they are quite radical in their ideology. Stepping off soapbox now…
This guy was such a misogynist that it caused him to murder four men.
“This guy was such a misogynist that it caused him to murder four men.”
Yes, and his rage against other men also grew from his misogyny, a fact obvious to anyone with readig comprehension skills. This is not a “man versus women” issue. It’s a human dignity versus human objectification issue. And I realize this is going to fly right over your head, because if you were capable of anything but simplistic black-and-white thinking you wouldn’t be a wingnut. But I explain things to you anyway just because I respect you as a human being, if not as an intellect.
Wait a minute. Does Molly Hemingway actually think the examples she cites prove that violent sexism and misogyny aren’t pervasive?
joanr16 … Yeah I do. Sorta like the reasoning that says.. How can you whine about being in poverty when you have a microwave oven and a toilet? You don’t know what poverty is!
By Ms. Hemingway’s logic how can any women complain about being belittled, harassed, having her dignity trampled on, or express any trauma related to her sex if it has to be qualified against the extreme.
Just because a women doesn’t get her head bashed in for behaving outside of established male dominated societal norms it doesn’t mean that her experience isn’t valid and that she’s wallowing in self pity and victimhood when she expresses her experience.
For some reason.. Sen.Alan Simpson pops into my mind with memories of the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearing…Not verbatim, but close. ” Enough of this sexual harassment crap!” . Yeah, like it’s all in your heads?
Woman, know thy place!
Uhm…
And if our American Christo-Fascist American Taliban took control of America, are they telling me that they wouldn’t want to arrange marriages for their children, with like-minded religious nuts?
Or that contraceptives would still be available?
I know they’d outlaw abortions completely – and probably demand the Death Penalty for any woman who had one.
Or that every woman wouldn’t have to produce a “Quiverfull!”
Or that woman would have any existing rights?
Pahleeze!
The Dominionist Christian Evangelicals and the Taliban follower, are the exact same types of people, separated by one Prophet, and two books.
And our American Taliban is jealous, because the Muslims thought of Sharia Law first!
This guy was such a misogynist that it caused him to murder four men.
Conservative commentary is always a goldmine for fallacy spotters. Just visit any right-wing site with a textbook in critical thinking as a field guide, and have fun.
What we have here is a particularly egregious form of confirmation bias. Exhibit A is Elliot Rodger’s endless misogynistic rants, expressing rage not only at women but at the alphas who get all the women, ending with a proclamation that he’s going to murder some people for just that reason. But never mind Exhibit A, because Exhibit B is the fact that he killed four men along with two women. So obviously he’s not a misogynist. Just do the math.
(Seriously, critical thinking is fun! You should try it.)
Stephen — heh.
This guy was such a misogynist that it caused him to murder four men.
By the looks of that statement one could reasonably conclude that the wingnuts have expended all their shock troops and have sent in the heavy artillery.
The excerpt you posted was enough to put me out of a good frame of mind for rational thought or sensible comment. (I have a hard enough time with that under the best of circumstances.) When I followed the link, my trusty computer hesitated and I took the opportunity to bail.
Instead, I got to thinking of all the women I have known over the years, all close friends, who have been the victims of violence. When I think about them, I get very angered by the nonsense spewed by those who want misrepresent this issue and the women who are coming forward in solidarity. I suppose most of us have known women who have been done physical and psychological damage, we have to stand with them in this.
You’re right Stephen. If I ever trade in my codger flip phone for a smart one, I am going to spring for that “Fallacy Finder” app.
This guy was such a misogynist that it caused him to murder four men.
Ooh, snap! You must be some kind of a genius!
Next time it happens, about 5 seconds from now, try stepping between a violent, armed man and his female victim, and see how that works out for you. Seriously, give it your best shot. It could only make the world a better place.
I suppose most of us have known women who have been done physical and psychological damage, we have to stand with them in this.
Yes, the question isn’t even whether we’ve known women who have been hurt in one way or another, it’s whether we’re willing to listen to them. All you have to do is actually look at #YesAllWomen, and you will see very quickly that it’s not a bunch of spoiled females whining about “the unbearable horror of being whistled at on the street.”
I know one response you see sometimes to these kinds of statistics is to say, “Gosh, none of the women I know have ever been victims of sexual violence.” I don’t remember where I saw this, but a feminist blogger I was reading one time made a great point about this: Maybe there’s a reason they didn’t tell you. Maybe it’s related to the reason so many rape victims are afraid to speak out.
“But never mind Exhibit A, because Exhibit B is the fact that he killed four men along with two women”
Right and never mind those hand guns because he also stabbed three of his victims! Your right it is a classic form of confirmation bias, and internet trolls like Mr. Treach practice it well!
Not sure if this has been linked here but this is the best essay I’ve read on our gun problem (and I’m somewhat of a gun nut myself, though I have owned all my guns long before that colored fella got elected) Pierce nails it!
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/memorial-day-2014-052614
It’s all OK now; Beck has issued a “tearful†explanation that he can’t be questioned about matters concerning rape! That Glenn he gets so emotional!!!!
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/glenn-beck-sexual-abuse
Beck is a dickhead.. He’s trying to evoke sympathy through over wrought emotion and innuendo. When you’ve experienced real trauma it’s not the kind of thing you share as a public display to dispel criticism. It’s a deep personal wound that should be shared but only in an intimate setting where a healing value can be obtained. I have to wonder about Beck’s sincerity when he can be so insensitive to rape and the damage it can do to the human psyche and yet be choking with emotion as he relays the damage it has done in his own life.. I see an inconsistency or disconnect in his words. It’s beyond me to understand how a trauma experience can be understood in oneself but can’t be understood in another.
Again, Beck is a dickhead…and a major one at that!
“Beck is a dickhead.”
I was going to say “sniveling, pathetic excuse for a human being,” but “dickhead” works, too.
Steven – You make a couple of good points. First you picked apart the cognitive failure of the troll. Doing that impartially (as you did) exposes the foolishness of his comment in the light of critical thinking. The troll isn’t important, though. The second point you made is what I might have said.
There is a reason why if you are an adult guy no woman has told you about being a victim – of rape or persistent harassment. It’s because they don’t trust you. Don’t take it too hard – women aren’t inclined to trust ANY guys on the subject of sexual harassment at any point of the spectrum from mild to violent . Women have rarely broken form to discuss rape with me, and then with an eye cocked to see how I am reacting.
Beck has appropriated the argument that the Holocaust shouldn’t be trivialized here. Hemingway makes that much more explicit, though. But they are destroying it in their usage, which I’m sure they don’t intend in the least.
Try translating this argument back into Holocaust terms. Beck and Hemingway in different terms are saying we shouldn’t get upset about casual anti-Semitism and their use of Jewish stereotypes because there’s a real Holocaust going on. In those terms, I think the weakness of their position is clearly seen.
Joseph — Are you sure you’re on the right blog?
I think so, Maha. I find Beck and Hemingway to be odious, and you do, too. Is there some reason you think I don’t?
Joseph — it’s just that we weren’t talking about the Holocaust so I wasn’t sure where you were coming from.
Yes, I did bring that into the discussion. That’s what I see Beck doing here. He’s taking the basic idea of the Holocaust argument (don’t trivialize the Holocaust with silly comparisons) and trying to apply it to rape. However, his premises are bad. His examples of what aren’t rape or sexual harassment actually are.