I find it hard to believe these men didn't know what they did was wrong - but I think I do...

[WolfGate]

If I am correct, that is actually a worse problem overall than if they really did know and just denied it.

Placido Domingo apology prompts new accuser to step forward

I saw the linked article about Domingo reversing course and acknowledging and apologizing for his "abuse of power" and "unsolicited physical touching...groping". His initial stance was that everything he did was welcome. Cynically maybe his apology is just trying to do damage control, but it is more direct than others I've seen and makes no excuse other than his ignorance.

Weinstein from all accounts was genuinely shocked he was found guilty. The facts in his case were largely undisputed - it came down to whether they were wrong or not. Which seemed obvious to me that he was a rapist, but looking at some threads after the conviction many seem to not agree.

I look at the statistics of the number of women who are harassed and that shows it extends way deeper into society that just those at the very top of business, arts, politics, etc.

One common argument is essentially that the harassers know it is wrong, but it's about power and control and a feeling of impunity. Which is bad enough. But now I'm really chewing on the idea that culturally the problem runs so deep that a large percentage of men grow up learning that kind of behavior is OK, all part of the dating/mating game, and even that women appreciate the attention and see it as flattery. How else do you explain the victim blaming we see?

As I said earlier, if that is correct, I think it's a much bigger problem than people knowing they are wrong and choosing to harass anyway. Makes no sense how they couldn't know, but sometimes it looks that way.

Curious about the thoughts from this forum as things are often seen through a different lens here than some of the others. (Also, this place has been dead..)

 

[archer75]

I will say that it can be hard to know just what people want in these circumstances.

That said, I don't think there's the slightest chance that Weinstein didn't know what he was doing was wrong. I don't think anyone who does this stuff really is deceived about what they're doing. They know it's wrong and they do it anyway. Certainly I have done things that were wrong, I knew it and did them anyway (not this kind of thing, for the record). It's common, right? I mean, taking actions you know to be wrong and doing them anyway.

They feel compelled to behave this way. With serial abusers / rapists / bullies in workplaces, their entire professional persona is there just to keep them supplied with victims and the power to keep the victims quiet.

And to anyone who thinks this happens because they just "need sex" -- come on. Weinstein was rich and well-placed in his profession. He didn't have to be sad and lonely. He had plenty of opportunities for consensual relationships, consensual one-night stands. But he wanted it to be rape.

No threat of punishment in the future is sufficient to overcome the compulsion they feel. Which is part of why we need, in my opinion, SINGLE-PAYER health care and mental health care in this country. If men who are 20 and feel these compulsions could go to therapy for a couple years and work on themselves, they would less often go on to behave in this way.

 

[Paidiske]

I think some men feel so entitled to women's attention and bodies that they don't stop to ask themselves whether it's right or wrong. There's a great TED talk by Thordis Elva and Tom Stranger; Tom raped Thordis, and they talk about the process by which he realised that what he had done was not just sex, and came to recognise the harm he had done. Without rewatching it right now I'm not sure whether the rules here would allow me to link it, but it's worth googling.

When I think about the times I've experienced harassment, the men concerned didn't seem to be aware that they were wrong. If anything they were offended and confounded by my attempts to draw boundaries; in one case, I would say he was enraged. They felt entitled to my time, attention, body.

Some men know, and get off on their ability to control others. Some men, it seems to be buried so deep they just have an unquestioned assumption that women in some sense "belong" to them, and that they can do what they like.

 

[WolfGate]

I will say that it can be hard to know just what people want in these circumstances.

That said, I don't think there's the slightest chance that Weinstein didn't know what he was doing was wrong. I don't think anyone who does this stuff really is deceived about what they're doing. They know it's wrong and they do it anyway. Certainly I have done things that were wrong, I knew it and did them anyway (not this kind of thing, for the record). It's common, right? I mean, taking actions you know to be wrong and doing them anyway.
.

I would have firmly said the same thing I highlighted in your post until recently. I think what I've been noticing more in some of these cases, and it happened Weinstein, is people around the perpetrator saying they were genuinely surprised they were found guilty, or arrested, or lost their job, etc. And when I look at the threads on the subject on this board (not just Weinstein) the number of apologists for these types of perpetrators pushes me the same way.

And I just saw Paidiske's post where she indicates as a victim she's noticed the same thing in her harassers. So I'm really questioning my previous belief.

 

[WolfGate]

I think some men feel so entitled to women's attention and bodies that they don't stop to ask themselves whether it's right or wrong. There's a great TED talk by Thordis Elva and Tom Stranger; Tom raped Thordis, and they talk about the process by which he realised that what he had done was not just sex, and came to recognise the harm he had done. Without rewatching it right now I'm not sure whether the rules here would allow me to link it, but it's worth googling.

When I think about the times I've experienced harassment, the men concerned didn't seem to be aware that they were wrong. If anything they were offended and confounded by my attempts to draw boundaries; in one case, I would say he was enraged. They felt entitled to my time, attention, body.

Some men know, and get off on their ability to control others. Some men, it seems to be buried so deep they just have an unquestioned assumption that women in some sense "belong" to them, and that they can do what they like.

Ugh. That has to be frustrating. That message is getting taught somewhere.

 

[archer75]

I stand by to learn more. I really thought it was (very often) as I said.

No idea where anyone gets the idea that Paidiske describes above...

 

[Paidiske]

No idea where anyone gets the idea that Paidiske describes above...

I remember - this is a fairly low-level example, but I think it's neatly illustrative - years ago, I guess in my late teens, I was taking the bus from A to B. It was fairly full and there weren't a lot of empty seats. A guy sat opposite me - I suppose he was a young adult, he was older than me at the time - and over the course of the 40 minutes or so that we were on the bus, not only was he talking to me a lot, asking personal questions, but he couldn't keep his hands to himself. My legs, my knees, he kept groping them.

I felt too intimidated to speak up, but eventually the bus driver spoke up and told him to knock it off. (Today I'd have more confidence, but most of us don't have that as teens!)

The guy? Couldn't understand why the bus driver said anything. Was clearly highly offended and felt like he was being attacked unfairly. Meanwhile I got off the bus shaking and terrified, and didn't catch that bus again for months lest I see the same guy.

But what's in that guy's ahead, other than entitlement? What makes him think it's perfectly okay to grope a complete stranger on public transport?

Where does he get those ideas, except from what he observes in everyday life, what he absorbs from the media, what his culture tells him? This is what we mean when we talk about "rape culture," the social conditioning that denies, minimises, excuses, trivialises sexual violence and blames those who are the victims of it. Where women are treated as objects and misogyny is pervasive. Where male dominance and female submission are promoted as ideal.

Just yesterday, I think it was, I was arguing on another thread on CF with someone who thought we could solve domestic violence if only women would have more sex. And that's just one example.

 

[archer75]

In response to @Paidiske 's post with horrifying personal story...

I'm very sorry that guy did that vile stuff. I don't know what else to say.

I have heard such stories, and worse, a number of times from friends. Maybe something is wrong with my mind, but every time, I just think the guy was deranged. Like completely gone as a person (speaking according to the convention of the world, not in any Christian manner). Some sort of total maniac. And I kind of imagine that when people say "The culture permits this," they mean "there's some glitch in the programming of our culture that makes this particular crazy behavior big unstopped". Like if we weren't allowed to object to the actions of rabid dogs.

But I suppose what they are saying is that this behavior is actually encouraged or taught.

So again, I stand by, queasy, to learn more, because I am searching my mind and cannot think when I was taught to behave this way. For the record: I'm not saying it isn't so, just that I seem to have missed the boat. Not the first time...

 

[Paidiske]

I think having missed the boat on this one is a good thing.