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[Vector]

Yet another rape story.

At least it's here in time for Women's Equality Day.

Apparently an industry in which only 30% of books have female main characters (of any quality) is just too fucking girly.

Woman gets groped on airplane... no one cares.

Geek women and self-objectification.

[kaijyuu]

Geek women and self-objectification.

I mostly agree with this, but I do object to it claiming that all women do this for acceptance, attention, etc.


Just 6 months or so ago I would've been fully behind this, mind. Back then I was still playing world of warcraft and browsing the forums. On them I got into a discussion that's quite similar: skimpy outfits in the game. Some people were claiming that there needed to be more skimpy outfits, others less, and I was there wanting practical looking armor sets. One experience someone related stuck out to me.

At one of the blizzcons, a female gamer stood up and asked the developers why they were forced to wear skimpy armor all the time, and how they wanted to have less revealing stuff so as to not look so much like a sex object and more like an adventurer. Just after her, another female gamer stood up and asked if her character could ever get bigger boobs.

Is the latter gamer giving in and wanting to be objectified for attention? I don't think so. While I agree there's pressure for girls (in real life, and in game) to look "sexy" I don't think every one of them thinks it's a bad thing. And frankly, their opinion is more relevant than mine. Maybe it's not objectification but rather just trying to look (as they see it) simply good.


Is there a problem? Yes. Is it as pervasive as the article claims? Ehh... I don't think so.

[Vector]

No, I totally agree with you.  However, if you follow the links to the clothing paraphernalia, there was a very strong implication of "if you want your geeky man to pay attention to you instead of his other interests, you'd better be supplying sex."

I definitely don't think it's universal.  The point, however, is about options, and how women who don't dress up like that are treated.  We're often invisible in comic book stores, at cons if we're dressed in non-revealing clothing; there's terrible issues with women having cameras stuck up their skirts there (there's a tumblr documenting such things, which I didn't link to for semi-obvious reasons).

So if you've got options on your boob size, that's great.  And if you've got options on your hyper-revealing armor, and people will still talk to you when you aren't dressed up like sex in a bottle, that's also great.  I think it's really about expanding those narrow little pathways, rather than saying those fragments cannot exist in the larger picture we'd like to be able to enjoy.

[kaijyuu]

Right, fully agree with ya

[GlyphGryph]

Woman gets groped on airplane... no one cares.

Both Spirit representatives with whom I spoke continued to insist that I made a mistake by not immediately reporting it

Argh, this woman infuriates me. Yes, she's the victim. Yes, the airport responded like shit. But she DID make a mistake by not reporting it before getting off the plane. An understandable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless, and I think it's important that women start realizing this. It doesn't even matter what the crime is, you don't wait to report it. The fact that is helps the asshole who committed it isn't the fault of some terrible patriarchal society, its just how reporting crimes and wrongdoing works. Not to trivialize it, but you'd have gotten the same response if a guy had noticed someone steal his stuff on the plane and hadn't reported it until after leaving the airport.

Waiting does not help you. Report that shit immediately. Not doing so IS a mistake, and its a mistake that's going to potentially result in other people getting hurt and violated.

That said, the airport's response was absolutely terrible. Yes the above was a mistake, but you don't need to point that out and be an asshole since its over and done. Now you do what you can with what you have and know. It's a shame she had to escalate it all the way to the police to get a little freaking sympathy. I mean, I could understand that sort of response if she was telling them to kick him off the plane or something - how do they know she's telling the truth, right? But the request she made, just to make sure he's not sitting next to any other women? That is a perfectly god-damn reasonable course of action. Their response should have been:
"We're sorry to hear what happened to you, and we will do what we can. We will at least insure he's seated alone or not next to woman passengers on the remaining legs of his flight. We want to make sure something like this does not happen again if we can prevent it. As for yourself, I'm sorry you found yourself in such a situation, and I'd recommend contacting the police immediately about the issue. If you wish, I can transfer you to/give you the number of the airport police officer/nearest police station now."

Do people think that would have been an acceptable response?

[Virex]

Locking him in a toilet for the rest of the flight to hand him over to the cops would've been a better response.

No, I totally agree with you.  However, if you follow the links to the clothing paraphernalia, there was a very strong implication of "if you want your geeky man to pay attention to you instead of his other interests, you'd better be supplying sex."

Why would you want to draw the attention of a geek anyway? Because that seems to be the deeper problem, the idea that someone has to garner attention to be someone. To get rid of these and many more problems, it'd be better to teach people it's OK not to be liked, to be an outcast, that you don't need anyone to approve of you and that the whole world can go fuck itself. The whole idea that we need friends and society is pretty constricting and the whole reason behind things like this. Of course the other problem is that men don't have any self-control and that they will pay more attention to anything that looks like a possible love interest, but then again, teaching men not to do something like that is like teaching a cat to swim...

[Vector]

Just saying: she reports it, she can't move from where she's sitting, and... ?

What happens with this guy?


I think that response would at least be better, if not good.


People need society.  The right answer to "geek society ostracizes women" is not "okay, so women just opt out of society."  That's about as bad as the "if you're gay, just be celibate" answer.

[ChairmanPoo]

The problem is that "sour grapes" statements of that sort don't really work, because human beings are social animals. Sure, everyone can be alone for a while, and some people withstand it better than others, but in the end being an outcast is not a good thing, and noone likes being one long-term.

[Vector]

teaching men not to do something like that is like teaching a cat to swim...

Unsurprisingly, misandry is also not permitted in this thread.

[Virex]

Misandry? Where? I know it looks like I'm just saying something to hurt people, but the tendency of men to pay more attention to possible love interest is so deeply engraved, that it is in a sense the same as teaching a cat to swim. It can be done and it must be done, but don't hold the illusion that it's easy.

The problem is that "sour grapes" statements of that sort don't really work, because human beings are social animals. Sure, everyone can be alone for a while, and some people withstand it better than others, but in the end being an outcast is not a good thing, and noone likes being one long-term.

And how much of that is because we keep telling people they can't be alone? Because those inside society fear nothing more then those outside of it, for they don't have any control over them.

[GlyphGryph]

As an example of positives:
If you report something like that, they'd have it on record. They might have been able to swap her with a male passenger, too. They can have the police waiting, if need be, when the plane stops, to question both of them and start gathering evidence they'd need. They'd have, potentially, other witnesses to question. I'm not saying their response necessarily would have been better, but flight crews are usually a lot more human than the people you'll talk to over the phone, and there's a large assortment of "better options" that could have occurred than in regards to choosing to wait.

At the very least she should have reported it upon arriving at the airport.

Trust me, though, the airport has a lot more blame for "mistakes made" here than she does, it just grated on me after the fifth time she insisted she did nothing wrong.

Also, totally resisting the urge to respond to Virex. I can do it. I can respond to this thread productively, without arguing. Stay calm, me.

[Willfor]

Misandry? Where?

The assertion that men are incapable of self-control.

[Virex]

Misandry? Where?

The assertion that men are incapable of self-control.

I thought it was a given that men are naturally less capable of self-control? I seem to recall that it was one of the effects of a heightened testosterone level?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Misandry? Where?

The assertion that men are incapable of self-control.

I thought it was a given that men are naturally less capable of self-control? I seem to recall that it was one of the effects of a heightened testosterone level?

You are not your hormones.

[Mindmaker]

We're often invisible in comic book stores[...]

So?
It's a good thing not to be bothered all the time, when you're trying to follow up on your interests.
It's not like women are the only ones having those problems.
Sure men are "low-maintenance" in comparision, but we have our own troubles.

Maybe I'm simply missing the point, since I only quickly browsed over the article...