Ah, August, when the colours of the street bloom in the afternoon sun, and in the swelter of Kensington market, you can hear the drums of the buskers and the ice rattling in the tall glasses of caf? patrons. On the street, girls and women stride in loose clothing, having shed the remaining vestiges of cool weather. For many a man, the sight of a woman in flower dress is something that they cannot resist. They have to look. Demanding that they don’t is like telling a woman not to peek into the display window of a discount shoe store.
In this often unavoidable predicament, men have different lines of action. Not wanting to get caught looking, some men dawn dark sunglasses. Some have learned the method of turning their heads in the direction which the woman is walking and therefore allowing the temporary object of desire to enter freely into his line of vision. And other men, usually in the company of their buddies, take to becoming obnoxious.
Where a man’s eyes wonder is often the centre of a lot of debate in the community newspapers. One rather angry reporter, obviously not to keen on men looking at her, portrayed herself in her article as a street goddess, and men in society nothing more than packs of Pavlovian dogs, slobbering at her feet.
Is checking someone out really this bad? When does looking cross the line and become ogling?
A comedian once said that “there is a fine line between eye-contact and the stare of a psychopath.” Once when sitting in a park, me and my girlfriend watched a man stare, nonstop, at two young women playing frisbee, for about half an hour. Most men know the difference between an ogle and a look. I think it has something to do with the intent of the stare. Some men look because they like women, and others look because they don’t. As for the latter, these are the men who yell from car windows, flick their tongues when at a red light, and make kissing sounds in the shadows of bus shelters.
In the past, something happened to them. Some event jarred their minds like a record player and they lost the ability to make the connection between the mothers and sisters who love them, and wives and girlfriends and women they hate. They are stuck in a savage boyhood, unable to move forward. These are the men who will lovingly kiss their mothers goodbye, and within the same hour violate a women on a public bus with a hurtful comment or salacious sneer. When these men look at women, it is for the sole purpose of them making a feel uncomfortable and frightened. My advice to these men:
1. Grow up.
2. Go home and beg your mothers for forgiveness for having been two-faced liars and putting the members of her gender through so much abuse and scorn.
3. Contact all you ex-girlfriends and ex-wives and apologize for all the hostility and neglect that you’ve heaped upon them.
4. Go to your usual place of ogling with an armload of roses give one rose to each woman who passes by. Do this every day for a year.
Then, there is the other side of the coin: the yin for the Misogynist’s yang. As much as there are men out there who will go to no end to make women feel like nothing more than an object, there are women out there who do their best to be objects themselves. You can see it in the lineup of summer wear worn by 16-20 year old North American girls that, as Bill Maher said, is leaving prostitutes wondering what they’re going to wear. Strangely enough, while women are wearing less and less – the crotches of the newest bathing suits becoming more and more like ribbons – men are wearing more and more – the cuffs of their bathing trunks now hovering well below the knees. I am not sure why this is happening, possibly because women, young women, are becoming more bold and confident with their bodies, and men are becoming more insecure. How many men out there, have been told, at one time or another, that men’s private parts are ugly, and their bodies plain? How many men out there are embarrassed by their hairy chests, and back? While North American men have developed tastes for the young-looking supermodel look, North American women have also developed tastes for younger looking men: Brad Pitt, Ryan Philippe, lean and hairless as 14 year-old-boys.
Now, as much as the above described how Misogynists curse and mumble about the “stuck up” women who do their best to ignore their charming advances, certain women will complain about the looks and comments they receive on the street. Now before some of you start rattling out angry responses, please allow me to clarify myself. In this society, no one has the right to make someone else feel uncomfortable, period. There has always been the pervert in the park and the dirty old man in the subway, and it is my deepest hope that time will take care of them, but if I decided one morning to wear a shirt with the message “just do me,” should I be surprised and shocked that I receive comments about the shirt? No. I am not wearing this shirt for its comfort, or the way it makes my feel (pretty, attractive etc). I am wearing it to get a reaction. Now, I can really only speculate but, if I were a woman, and one day decided wear a lacy tube top clinging to my body by my erect nipples, and a pair of sixth grade pants tight enough to give me a frontal wedgy, I:
1) wouldn’t be wearing this outfit for comfort.
2) wouldn’t hope that only the people I choose, are going to give me looks and comments.
3) wouldn’t rely on the decency of the strangers I don’t choose, to avert their eyes and mind their own business.
Society has limits to public decency, which are always being tested and pushed. Now if you want to ride those limits, good. It’s a free country and you should be allowed to wear what you want. The rest of us need people like you to force the change in people’s attitudes. However, there are reactions – looks, leers, and comments – that I would have to expect if I were to do this.
Between these two extremes, we have the huddled masses. If this middle ground bears a common characteristic to these extremes, it is the frustration caused by the rift between how we want society to behave, and the way it does. Young men who want every attractive woman they look at to find them attractive in turn, and young women who, while for the most part want to be able to walk down the street without being gawked at, feel that spine of jealously when their friends get more attention then they do.
There is nothing wrong with checking someone out, but long gone are the days of Dean Martin’s “Watching All the Girls Go By.” And while we are all demanding more from each other and society, we can make summertime appreciation of one another other more tolerable by compromising. For the guys: if you see a pretty girl who you are not going to approach, dawn your shades and treat her like the sun. If you are planning on approaching her, instead of making a lewd comment, gather some courage and walk up to her and say: “Hi, my name is Joe, I was wondering if you would like to go for some coffee.” (Hey I never said I was Don Juan). And for the girls, while I realize that you have to put up with a lot of schmucks, all men see better than they think, so even the nice guys will occasionally rubberneck. This is not a perfect world, and many of these nice fellows you probably won’t find attractive. I just ask you not view them all as Pavlovian dogs. Besides, wouldn’t it stroke your ego if you could once, just once, be the cause of a minor traffic accident?
Very interesting and amusing, Rocco. I’ve heard European women complain that Canadian men don’t look enough. The great fear of being smacked that harnesses men from Muskoka to Moosanee (things are different in the East and in Quebec, I believe)makes European vistors feel ugly.
I don’t mind it if men look at me, but I’m too old not to be flattered by it. However, that said, I get tired of the same old thing which is “Wow, you gotta lotta hair.” “Great hair” is good; “What do you do to make your hair look like that?” is bad. And I always hear comments like, “I thought she was a sheep”: these suck.
One thing about younger girls, though. They can’t see men over 40. Men over 40 are either invisible or sexless blocks of wood that do not exist beyond their professional functions, e.g. teaching, serving coffee, building office towers. So when men over 40 intrude on a 14 – 29 year old girl’s/woman’s consciousness, she gets freaked out and disgusted. Oooh, icky. Man over 40. When I turned 30 (yesterday-ahem), I noticed 40 year olds could actually be attractive. Alas, they are often married, too.
Good piece Rocco. Couldn’t have said it better or agree more.
It’s funny how women of the clubbing world in Toronto will spend so much time, say three hours to doll themselves up, and they’ll be lucky if they even stay in the club that long. As soon as they get gawked at in a club they take so much offense to it, like as if they weren’t there for it in the first place.
People often mistake gawking for appreciating a woman’s beauty. I am not saying there are not utter pervs out there, no doubt, on both sides, but is being mindful of a woman’s beauty in a candid fashion that much of an offense? If that is so, I am a major criminal.
The real question is who is more worth all of this attention. The ones who look good, or the ones who try to look good, and are you so sure you can differentiate so easily.
Valentino, I think you might be being too hard on the clubbing girls. I suspect they’re shy and maybe even frightened that the way they look elicits so much response. Frankly, we’re not really taught how to be sophisticated in this country. European girls have the edge on us as far as handling men is concerned. Since birth we are told that true love is the end all and be all of our female existence and, by the way, men are scum. Quite the disconnect.
Growing up in a ‘pilgrim’ society, sex is something that insn’t easily mixed into the equation of dating, partying and romance. Men party and have sex, and brag about it to there buddies the next day (except me), girls have sex and don’t mention it to there friends for a long, long time. Anyway, I think that North American woman tend to substitute attention for casual sex, in between relationships. I have a feeling, Dorothy, that girls whofrequent clubs especially 20 year olds, know exactly what the guys there want. They may be uneasy about the attention, but if they didn’t like it why spend three hours getting ready and go to such a place?
When i lived in Vancouver, I had this friend and she complained that all her new guy friends would always make passes at her and try to talk her into relationships. I suggested that she go make friends with some gay guys, that way she could be in the company if men without all that pressure. She promptly replied : Uh-Uh, I like hanging out with REAL men.”
Something tells me that despite the awkwardness from men’s urges, it is the urges that women miss when men are not around. This excludes gropers and dirty old men and may have something to do with club girls getting pissed of at guys trying to talk to them or looking at them, leaving angrily and vowing never to return, only to return the next week.
Rocco, why do the twenty year olds go to the clubs? Because they are in fantasy land. Because ( a.) staying at home on a Friday night SUCKS when you’re 20 ( b.) their friends are going (c.) girls compete like crazy with their friends for male attention (girls also dress to impress their friends) (d.) they honestly think that this is the night the ONE might be at the club. Point (d.) is the fantasy land part. I don’t think French girls (I’m relying on foreign films and some books here)worry about the ONE as much as they worry about Life Experience, unless they are religious or infected by dopey American romance novels.
Another disconnect: The American male fantasy is the whorish virgin and we all know it. Every Catholic schoolgirl knows it when she sees her uniform fetishized on a poster or in the video store. So don’t expect girls to be forthcoming with their sexuality when they’re not sure if they’re supposed to be admitting to having one today.
If this were fifty years ago and you were in Italy, you wouldn’t have to worry about this because I’d bet my little Irish potato patch that you’d be married and this would no longer be an issue. How does this make you feel about the Sexual Revolution?
Dorothy,
Very good points. The whorish virgin pervaids a lot more than just American culture mind you. Korean girls are expected to offer confused looks when guys give sexual innendos, even though they fully understand what the guys are talking about. Not entirely related to sex, Japan is famous for their honeymoon divorces, usually caused by the fact the bride knows more about making hotel arrangements, scheduling tours, and simply getting around town than the groom.
Men have such fragile egos, and most women come to understand this, hence the fantasy of the whorish virgin women often play out. The movie “Chasing Amy,” covers this.
Then again, sons often date their “mothers” and daughters often date their “fathers.” Could it also be that the “whorish virgin” is not so much a role imposed upon them, but more a result of the conflict of being both “daddy’s little girl” and a fully sexual being. When it comes to guys well, the childhood notion of being a “bad boy” perhaps transforms more easily into the adult notion of being a “BAD boy,” than that of “naughty girl” to “NAUGHTY girl.”
Staring at someone is fine — if the other person doesn’t know or seem to care. But if your staring is making someone uncomfortable, you are infringing on their rights. Ditto for cat-calling, wolf whistles, and certain unsolicited remarks. If you are staring at someone and they give you a dirty look or move away from you, yu are violating their personal space — perhaps not physically, but psychologically.
People have the right to wear what they want. If you choose to wear a skirt or shorts up to here and a shirt down to there, thet’s your right. If I look, that’s my right. But I have absolutely no right to stare, whistle, and/or make raunchy comments to the point of making you uncomfortable. It’s your right to go to a bar wearing snazzy clothes, and it’s my right to look at you. But if my actions — verbal or not — infringe on your right to feel comfortable socializing in a public place, of course you’re going to be upset.
Excessive staring, whistles, and sexual comments are a judgement call. They tell you you are violating some unwritten code of social behaviour. You are here to drink, dance, and of course collect a few admiring glances — not to have your morals questioned. Just because you wear flattering, flimsy, or revealing clothes does not mean you are cheap or loose — but in response to the ogling eyes you feel kinda small and trashy. Those stares reduce you to an object, a thing , a sexual “it”.
Gentlemen, women notice more than you give us credit for. We notice that half-second before you look away — we feel that *click-zing* of momentary eye contact — we can tell when you’re laughing a little too loud, trying to get our attention. You don’t need to holler, stare, or whistle.
(One warm memory I have is of walking into my usual hangout wearing something a little…different from my usual black-on-black getup. As I stood in the doorway, I noticed from the corner of my eye one of my guy friends staring just a second too long and fumbling with his drink — as soon as I glanced his way, he looked away, then “noticed” me and waved. Charming! Won my heart.)
Of course the 19-year-olds in miniskirts and tubetops keep returning to the clubs where they felt uncomfortable — they’re stubborn and have not yet been beaten down by social pressures. I too would wear tiny skirts and tube tops — they’re cooler in the summer heat and add up to smaller laundry loads — but I don’t want to deal with the harrassment of disapproving stares and snarky comments. In the long run, it’s sometimes easier to go with the flow of (judgemental) social dictates.
Rocco, I know that this is the mystery of the ages but WHY do men have such fragile egos?
Another point: Schoolyard wisdom was that the quickest way to lose a guy’s interest was to show that you liked him. Thus, if a girl liked a guy, it was thought she should use a kind of mocking flirtatious distain in her communication with him. In hindsight, this does not seem to have been a good policy. (Or maybe that which works at twelve should be dropped at twenty-two.) What do you think?
Jaywalker: I can’t entirely agree. Clothing sends a message and the responsibility for the message sent lies with the sender, not the receiver. I wouldn’t wear shorts in Egypt or try to enter an Italian cathedral in a bustier or wear an orange t-shirt to an Irish pub on July 12. On the other hand, I have deliberately worn a tight shirt and miniskirt to a seminar on “Holy Sexuality” to send a message to any potential prudish freaks. I didn’t get any hard stares (I guess the prudish freaks stayed home), but if I had I would have ignored them or Started a Dialogue.
You’re right Susan, excessive staring is awful, and makes you feel incredibly uncomfortable. I know this first hand from visiting areas of the world where people with my complexion are scarce in number. And even in these places the stares I received were more from innocent curiosity than from negative feelings. But how would they know it made me feel uncomfortable?
I’m not sure where the line should be drawn. Is it the intention behind the stare that decides whether it is right or wrong? Having an old man look at my girlfriend for twenty minute on a subway would tell me it?s not OK, judging by the way I felt. Now lets say my girlfriend liked being stared at, would it still be wrong? Doesn’t the rightness or wrongness of the action also depend on how it?s received? We love here stories of a man who follows a complete stranger to her house, asks her out, and following that quickly becomes the women’s husband and soul mate. Was it wrong for him to follow her to her house? If not, what if she called the police and had the man arrested? Would it be wrong then?
Or maybe you can think that, if the receiver likes the attention, she doesn’t know any better. She should be educated on what is appropriate behaviour and what is not. I recall my mother sighing every time she saw the Sunshine Girl, claiming that these poor girls must have be coerced in to prostrating themselves before a camera. Some like my mother believe that these poor, innocent girls are being exploited; others would believe they are liberating themselves from the confines of patriarchal conformity. If these girls are to be educated on how to behave, is this not another form of dictation?
Susan, what you want is ideal, but I have to say is: dream on. I’m sensitive, but even I don’t have time to be THAT sensitive. If spend my time worrying about HOW each girl eye see on a bus wants to be looked at, I simply wouldn’t look any more. And is that what you want? For guys simply not to look?
I remember once, on my travels, I was tricked into a lap dance at a strip club in Thunder Bay. During the entire ordeal, I was stiff as a board (MY BODY), determined not to act like the usual “misogynistic sleazebags” who actually enjoy these “exploitive” lap dances. Halfway through the song, the stripper was visibly angry about my behaviour. At the end of the song, she grabbed her clothes and stormed away, offended by my unresponsiveness.
Who was wrong here? She was offended, so I must have done something wrong. Was my behaviour inappropriate? Was it wrong for me to assume about this girl what my mother would assume?
The bottom line is that we don’t live in a vacuum. Would something be risqu? of there was no one there to gasp? It’s you right to push the boundaries, but you have to expect people to push back. Would going to a demonstration be nearly as fun if there were no police with riot gear?
As for the fragile ego’s, As much as I hate pointing fingers, it probably starts with being told how “strong” you are when your a baby. Just like a women’s low self esteem, begins when she is told how “pretty” she is. I think fragile egos and low self esteem are very similar, where a fragile ego is dependent on what the world thinks of you, and low self esteem depends on what you think of you.
I want to say its okay to stare
Another thing that helps create fragile ego: say what you want about the “whorish virgin,” at least men KNOW WHAT THEY WANT.
Rocco: I’m sorry about what happened to you at the strip club. Peer pressure can be a very insidious thing. (You know you can walk away from unwanted sexual attention, right? I suspect it happens to straight men rarely enough for them to freeze for fear of hurting girls’feelings/looking like a wuss, etc.)Whatever you want, it wasn’t that and yet you put up with it, confusing the stripper. Don’t think I’m on her side here, buddy. I’m not; it sounds like it was a horrible, violating experience. I’m just pointing out that actions and motivations are not always clear cut for anybody. Personally, it took me years to discover that it was okay to want what I want, from eating too many cookies to writing stories instead of doing math to turning down dates without apologizing. I don’t think this is because I’m female but because of the way I was socialized, i.e. brought up. Before you condemn all women for not knowing what they want, ask yourself why you didn’t get up and leave the strip joint.
Dorothy: I must have explained myself poorly. I wasn’t condemning all women, what I was saying
is that for different social environments, the single action/ or inaction might be taken differently.
While in one environment my politeness may be seen as touching, in another it is seen as
offensive. Is the action/inaction wrong? It depends. I believe that deciding whether an
action/inaction is morally right or right depends as much on the receiver as it does the giver. This
is what I was trying to say in the argument.
Also what brings what a stripper wanted from me, and what say, Jaywalker wants from men, into
the same ballpark is how what they expect from the world differs from what they actually get.
Jaywalker asks: wouldn’t it be nice if guys would look at me in a certain way? As a counterpart
male, I could ask: wouldn’t it be nice if every girl I look at would want me in a certain way? To
me, both hopes are justified, however they aren’t likely to happen. Not because there is something
wrong with either of us, it?s just that the world has a life its own. And we have to come to grips
with this discrepancy, and either accept the consequences or make some compromises if we are going to have some peace of mind.
the next time we get on a bus, or go to a caf?.
The point about women not knowing what they want was completely separate. I watched a Chris
Rock special last night and I liked the way he summed it up:
What men want: Food, Sex, and Silence
What women want: EVERYTHING
In response to Rocco’s comment about “what (I) want from men”, his statement that I was asking “wouldn’t it be nice if guys would look at me in a certain way?” and his suggestion that I should “dream on”:
Okay, so if someone is staring at me to the point that I can’t concentrate on the newspaper I am reading, and I make eye contact and give them a dirty look that says “phuck awf”, if they continue to keep staring I should just take it without complaint? If your girlfriend were in the same situation, would you give her the same advice? What if the staring person were a runny-eyed old man? a hot young guy? a woman? (assume the person being stared at felt equally uncomfortable and reacted the same in all these examples).
I don’t recall saying anywhere that staring wasn’t okay — as long as the person you’re staring at isn’t *visibly* uncomfortable, go right ahead. However, if the person you’re staring at starts giving you dirty looks, moving away from you, lifts the newspaper they’re reading so they can’t see you, or gets up and walks away, I don’t think it takes a psychic — or much sensitivity — to figure out you’re making them uncomfortable.
…Or should I just still “dream on”? Oh yeah, that’s right, I am a woman and “women want everything” — ergo I’m just asking for one more unreasonable thing. (rolling the eyes)
If I could get my membership fee back, I’d resign from the human race.
GO TO HELL ROCCO!!!!!!!
And FUCK YOU IF YOU”RE A WOMAN!!!!!!! HOW DARE YOU PUBLISH THIS CRAP SO ANYBODY CAN COME ABOUT IT USING THEIR BROWSER!!!! THE HELL WITH YOU AND OTHER WOMEN THAQT READ THIS SHIT!!!!!! FUCK YOU!!!!!!
Well, there’s an unhappy person.
You all seem to live in such pristine worlds. Where I grew up and still live men (especially the uneducated)think it’s their inalienable right to say something, anything to a woman who enters their field of vision, as long as in their estimation she looks good. Pu**y, honey, beef, and etc. are what you get called. If you ignore them you feel their wrath… you are verbally raped/abused, or threatened with rape and/or violence. Reduced to the worthless piece of trash that they know you are. Young women walking down the street modestly dressed suffer the same fate as those skimpily or ‘sexily’ dressed. I’ve come to the conclusion that it is the nature of the male to abuse females…some sort of primal urge.
It used to be a nightmare to go anywhere. As you approached a male you tensed. Even if he spoke to you politely you could NOT understand while he felt the need to say anything at all, and invariably they expected a response. This happens every 10 steps you take. It’s like compulsive/obsessive behaviour. Imagine if you had to pause to have a conversation with all these males. You’d never get anything done. Besides you just want to be about your business for Christ’s sake, you didn’t leave your house so that men would want you to stop every few steps and give them your number/address. Some would even seek to physically restrain you…how dare you continue to walk by… someone who is superior to you spoke to you and you didn’t even respond! These bitches need to be taught a thing or two! Then comes their true colours… the abuse!!
Rocco has your girlfriend ever told you some of the things men say to her when she is alone… the ones who you would say hate women that is?
Sorry I didn’t give my name… me from the less-that-pristine-world… You can call me ‘At-a-Loss”
At-a-loss.
Yes my girlfriend has told me about some of the things men have said to her – though she added that it hasn’t been so bad for her because Toronto is a more tolerant place (tolerance or banality, you pick)
Anyway, I am aware that there are a lot horrible assholes out there, I’ve known and been a party to the objectification and degradation of women at one time or another, just as I know that there an equal number of awful bitches out there who’ve hurt and crushed myself and a lot of my good friends. However, I am also aware that there are a lot of decent men and decent women out there, so I can’t paint the world black and white, like you have. As much as it has been tempting for me, in my darkest hours, to write of girls as “bitches,” it is just as unrealistic for someone like yourself to write off all men as beings whose nature it is to abuse women. Unrealistic, but a nonetheless easier thing to do than having to go through life with an opening mind.
In a way, your world is more prestine, as you attempt to clense it by writing 50% of it off.
At-a-loss, I don’t know you, I have no idea what you’ve been through, but I can tell you the way you think about men is the flipside of the coin to the way these assholes, the one’s you hate, think about women.
If I can offer you any advice is very simple: stay away from the people that make you feel bad, and hang out with people that make you feel good. If you don’t feel its’ worth your while to change the people in your neighbourhood, then I suggest moving to another one.
I agree with Rocco and add that some communities are so riddled with violence or hatred or systematic discrimination, that the only thing you can do is move away and try to see your new location with new hope. In a way every woman has to do that when she leaves an abusive relationship and finds herself offered one that might be functional.
Wherever it is that you are, I hope you leave. There are many good communities and millions of good men. (I can think of 20, just off the top of my head.) There’s no reason to live in what to me reads like a hell on earth. Just don’t bad memories get in your way of a happier life.
Hey Rocco and Dorothy, I know I MUST COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM… economics get in the way. 50% of the population imposed their behaviour on me (as early as age 12 when grown men made passes at me or attempted to touch me inappropriately) and CAUSED me to write them off. I ask what gives them the right to make my life uncomfortable? I am another human just trying to be happy but the 50% seem to think I have no right to be happy unless I’m making them happy. Rocco at the times when ‘bitches’ have crushed you and your good friends were you objectifying them? At-a-Loss
At-A-Loss
I’m not sure what you question means. But if you are implying that myself and my friend deserve what we got because we are men, then you are demonstrating the same hostility as the men you hate. But I think you know that already, and it makes you feel good to be able to hate. If this helps you get through things, fine, but I can’t guarantee nothing in you life will improve because of it. Ask yourself, is all this hatred a reason, or an excuse?
At-A-Loss
I’m not sure what you question means. But if you are implying that myself and my friend deserve what we got because we are men, then you are demonstrating the same hostility as the men you hate. But I think you know that already, and it makes you feel good to be able to hate. If this helps you get through things, fine, but I can’t guarantee nothing in you life will improve because of it. Ask yourself, is all this hatred for a reason, or an excuse?
Rocco, you’re getting defensive here… Which one of my statements make you say I hate men? I most definitely did NOT say that. Or did you assume that I MUST, given my less-than-pristine-experience. I guess you think these men deserve to be hated then. My question is merely trying to solicit an explanation of what you consider a ‘bitch’ to be. I’m at a loss… I don’t socialise with persons who use that word, I only know it’s used in anger. I asked because you have admitted to having been a party to the objectification and degradation of women… if any of them got angry at you for doing so would that be an occasion to call her a bitch. do you think the dancer at the strip club thought of you as an asshole for acting the way you did. Actually I think her reaction was exactly the same as the “Pavlovian dogs” who hurl insults when you don’t respond to their advances. You were in a strip club… she KNEW why you were there and she did her best to fullfil your dreams…You did not respond to her ‘advances’
At-a-Loss”
At-a-loss
No doubt you are someone I know. Why the secrecy?
I don’t usually respond to trolls but for arguments sake?
It doesn’t take a detective to find hate in your vitriolic comments, if not hate, then an intense, hostile dislike of men. If I am the first to point this out to you, please allow me: you are a man-hater. I think neither men nor women deserve to be hated, but I do think assholes and bitches deserve our scorn. What’s a bitch? A female counterpart to an asshole. I don’t know where you are living, though it?s probably in Toronto or Vancouver, but if you don’t associate with people who use the word “bitch” then you are not associating with women, unless of course you are a nun. Women these days use the word far more than men.
And yes, as you know, I’ve been to strip clubs. And yes, as you know, I was given a lap dance, which I didn’t enjoy. Strip clubs aren’t my thing. The stripper wasn’t at all pleased with my reaction, but I don’t consider her a bitch for her resentment. And though I agree that men at strip clubs are “Pavlovian Dogs” they are not assholes. At the very worst, the activities at strip clubs are pathetic.
The word “objectification” is an old school feminist weapon that holds no relevance in today’s world. As long as it is consensual, there is nothing wrong with objectification. Men go to their strip clubs and watch adult lesbian movies. Women go to their own strip clubs and watch man-love on late night Showcase TV.
Now, you know who I am, why don’t you tell me who you are?
Oh Rocco YOU JUST SHOWED YOUR TRUE COLOURS…
Don’t worry, you don’t know me, nor i you. If you call my statements vitriolic I wonder what these last remarks of yours were… Anyway it seems you would have this troll believe that in Toronto women harass men as they go about their business: attempt to grab their crotch; whistle and blow kisses at them from bus sheds; call them pricks,dicks and etc; shout obscenities at them from vehicles; rub up against them in crowded trains; undress them with their stares… Then they are truly the counterparts of assholes. They are a disgrace to their gender, trying to be like the guys. My three visits to Toronto may not have been enough to draw conclusions but I know that is not generally the case (if it happens at all.) But I would like to say that in your world a woman is a “bitch” when she fails to respond the way you want her to even when youv’e reduced her to the status of object (and to her face at that) Detective Rocco you need to take your own advice and grow up At-a-Loss
Sigh….I’ve done this long enough to know when I’m going to have to repeat myself….
“At-A-Loss”, or whoever, when did I ever hide my true colours?
I’ve already said that I look at women, and I’ve been a party to the degradation and objectifaction of women at one time or another.
So,exactly what have I revealed about myself?
That I have been to a strip club? Is that all?
This is no no longer a dialoque, this is yourself asserting your own hatefilled perspective onto other people. Tell me, all the woman who are married or with boyfriends, or hang out with guys after work, are they blind to something? Are they brainwashed? Don’t they start looking concerned when you start frothing at the mouth about men?
My advice to you is to read J Dennie’s new article on Yoga, and start practicing it, ’cause girl, you got anger in you.
At-A-Loss,
Having been called on my objectification a bunch of times, I can atest that the majority of the people talking this game certainly aren’t playing it. You’re so-called “criticism” of Rocco suggests a lot more than a politically correct argument for the objectification of women. I sincerely think that because you invested so much time in this debate, and perhaps survived some sleepless nights, that indeed animosity is in you for some reason, and J’s article on Yoga won’t help.
Those women that like to look down on “chauvanists,” or “perverts” like myself or Rocco, should really smell what they are shovelling. If you’re going to preach to someone about objectification and all this other stuff in the “Women’s Studies” text book from your University, make sure that you’re gender doesn’t have a pocket or flaw in it. The same women that have talked this game you speak of, fail to convince me when two weeks later they are flashing their tits to strangers. I sincerely doubt you have never objectified men, or in some subtle subconcious happenstance, made yourself an object and not minded.
Thanks Val,
Like a bible thumping televangalist, a pious environmentalist, or a self-righteous politician, people like this usually have hypocritical skeletons in the closet. It isn’t there fault really, they set such high standards for themselves that in the end something has gotta give, and out pops a call girl, or in At-A-Loss’s case, an Eminem CD.
But dispite her anger and blind hostility, she does indirectly raise an interesting point. Is a “bitch” the flipside of an “asshole”? In the general sense, I think they are. When someone is incredibly selfish towards you, or goes out of their way to hurt your feelings or make you feel uncomfortable, they are either a bitch or an asshole according to their gender. Please keep in mind that this lables are temporary in that at one point or another every man has been an asshole, and every woman a bitch. Redemption comes with this realisation.
Bitches and assholes share some generic techniques, like name calling, or schoolyard or workplace bullying.
However there are situations when their techniques differ. When a person is a bitch or asshole, their objectives are self-gratification and the discomfort of others. As I have mentioned in the above article, and as At-A-Loss has repeatedly and obsessively pointed out out, an asshole will often make woman feel uncomfortable with inappropriate stares, comments, or physical contact. A bitch however, will not do the same to make a man feel uncomfortable. Not for any moral reason but simply becuase she knows these methods won’t usually upset a man. In fact he might even see it as humourous. Bitches have their own methods of hurting members of the opposite sex, which are more acute and personal. Unlike assholes, who usually target strangers on buses, subways, nightclubs etc. Bitches will often target someone they know personally, someone whose soft spots and pressure points are known to them. Like an asshole the reasons for the attack are many, possibly marital or work stress, or maybe the demons of a failed relationship, or some minor tresspass the prey, or someone who resembles the prey, committed in the past. The attack comes in the guise of spiteful comments barbed with personal information concerning the prey, or long drawn out mind games, or even longer heavily, pretensed forms of manipulation. While an asshole tends to be obnoxious and brutal, and bitch tends to be subtle and cruel.
Can men be bitches? Yes. Can women be assholes? I believe so. What is sad about both is that the objects of their cruelty and agression are, more often then not, innocent bystanders. Instead of facing the source of their anger, they choose to take it out someone who is not involved.
Okay, everybody. Cool down. All this anger is covering a world of hurt. Rocco, I think your word “troll” set something off. At-A-Loss has been dealing for years with systematic discrimination and harrassment of women. I’m thinking it must be in some small community, perhaps one in which she might lose rights and certainly her current economic situation if she leaves. People who have known nothing but fear and violence are going to react to slurs like “troll”, “bitch”,”asshole”, etc. Words that don’t hurt us, may hurt others. And Valentino, why do you assume At-A-Loss was in Women’s Studies or went to University at all?
At-A-Loss, is there any kind of programme or bursary to get you, however temporarily, out of your community? If you are First Nations or come from another minority, there should be. You obviously are a well-spoken, thoughtful person with a lot of passion and the knowledge that things should be different. There are opportunities for women like you.
Dorothy,
Thanks for the comments. The word troll nowadays means anyone who leaves comments just to stir up things on a message boards, which At-A-Loss has done nicely. I believe that At-A-Loss is someone who knows me, because she described a unique situation I found myself in, a fews years back in a strip club.
Please understand our stance on this situation. Imagine if you will, that you are eating a ham sandwich and a person comes over to you and starts telling you off about eating meat, about cruelty to animals, about the enviromental damage that you are contributing to from buying meat products, the whole bit. This vegetarian’s arguments are accurate, so naturally you feel guilty. Who can argue against slaughterhouses, and environmental damage. Now, imagine about a week after this verbal thrashing, you catch the vegetarian sucking back a double quarter pounder with cheese at the local Mcdicks. How would you feel about this vegetarian? Now imagine that over the process of a number of years, you discover that about 80% of the ardent vegetarians you have met, sneak off to grab a happy meal twice a month. Would you still take vegetarians as seriously as you had before?
This has been my experience with some women. I have tried, struggled to give them the benifit of the doubt when i or one of my friends are pounced on for the mildest of tresspassess. When your wrong, you’re wrong, and who can argue against sexual descrimination? But i can guarantee that within a two week period about 80% of feminists who tell me off for one reason or another, will do something completely hypocritical.
It seems to me Dorothy, that there are some people that enjoy being outraged, because being the continually offended by something or other, gives them power in a conversation or social setting.
I can understand your need to pacify the situation Dorothy, but would you have been so patient if At-A-Loss was having an equally aggressive go at your gender?
I’ve wanted to say something about this for a while, but not really known how to articulate my thoughts. Rocco, you’re really taking a lot of flak on this one, but I happen to agree with you. (I can already hear the rifles loading, ugh). It’s human nature to look. It’s what we do. And there’s nothing wrong with it. Blaming a woman’s choice of clothing is ridiculous. I’ve been checked out wearing a baggy turtleneck sweater and huge coat. Men are gonna look at you if you’re there and breathing. And I’m not insulting men, it’s just how you are. Most men try to be reasonably discreet, some are even nice and it’s a great coversation opener. Hell, some are even cute (Dorothy, some older guys are hot too, not everyone wants a man who looks like a shaved rat) and I’ll return the glance. It’s all in how you respond to it. You can choose to be offended – AND IT IS A CHOICE – or you can just take it as a compliment or you can take it as nothing. Looking is not sexual assault. Every man whose eyes happen to land on you is not a drooling pervert plotting to rape you. If you’re that bothered by admiring glances then buy a bhurka. It won’t matter if you’re wearing pasties and a g-string or a turtleneck sweater and a baggy overcoat. We’re human, we have eyes, that’s what we’ll do. And what’s so wrong with looking? Jeebus, I’m looking forward to the summer. I thoroughly enjoy people-watching, make that man-watching in the summer. I’m a bigger pervert than most of the men I know and it’s okay. I wouldn’t want to be a guy and be told you’re a horrible creature for doing something that just comes naturally. If you don’t want people looking at you – go move to a deserted island somewhere. Would you be pissed off at a blind man for sniffing the air as you walk by because he likes your perfume? You live in a world where there are a lot of other people around you and interaction is part of day-to-day life. Get over it. A look is just a look. Now, if some stranger tries to touch you and you haven’t invited the advance then yes, you have a right to be angry about that. But, men are not assholes for looking. You don’t have the right to judge all men for what a few jackasses have done to you. If that’s the way you want it, all women should be judged for my mistakes and believe me honey, you don’t want that load on your shoulders.
Hm, Rocco. Everybody knows about the strip joint because you mention it above. Therefore, don’t worry about At-A-Loss being somebody that you know. I looked at her message suggesting you and your buddies were crushed by those you “objectified”, and you’re quite right: that was unreasonable and unfair. However,I think perhaps she has never met decent men, or listened to a male buddy after a bad break-up.
Well well well, finally somebody’s paying attention!! Dorothy, you will notice that much of the venom spewed my way was based on the false premise that I must be somebody who knows Rocco, and who was doing some subtle bitching, aiming at his Achille’s heel. If you look carefully at all my comments you will see that all I was accused of I never actually said, he jumped to the conclusion that since I asked pointed questions then I MUST be some feminists bitch ready to spew my feminist rhetoric ad nauseum. Based on a ‘false conclusion’ he launched an offensive and accused me of the same things he’s guilty of. Now imagine me labouring under the illusion that this was a regular magazine run by scholarly types. (The article came up as one of hundreds of results of a search and the title caught my interest) I didn’t have time to check out the e-mag, I just read the article and all the comments and marvelled that men’s looking at women could be creating such a stir. On impulse I commented on how much more obnoxious men here in my less-than-pristine world are and hey presto… it turned into quite an exercise. Rocco and others jumping to conclusions all over the place; me being nonplussed at the responses and doing battle with the non sequiturs; me guessing Rocco’s age (he must be a teenager to be taking things so personally); him running scared that I must know him and am going to reveal sordid details of his more inglorious and ignominous moments; “Chokker Bloc” jumping to the conclusion that I have done a course in Women’s Studies” (I’m 30+ years a woman, what do I need that for?); and who called anyone a pervert? Ah yes and who said i didn’t want men to look at me. And ahh… that aside from Val on ‘objectification’. And Paisley! WOW! By now I’m wondering if anyone is paying attention…or if you all think in some other language and were losing nuances in the translation… or if thes e-mag is a high school project. Or some of this isn’t just trolling on rocco’s part.
I guess it must be really hard living in a metropolis such as Toronto eh guys… all these causes to defend yourselves against.
Well finally I got fed up and browsed around Latchkey a little. Saw your bio Rocco, and the veil was lifted from my eyes. I had you figured to be about 18 – 25 though (what with all the jumping to conclusions)
Anyway I’m a scientist, trained NOT to jump to conclusions, that’s why the pointed questions. I was trying to get to the answers I needed to prove or disprove my hypothesis. Which all this…(I’m at a loss for words)…has proved for me. That is, your article would have us believe, you to be a nice guy advocating that it’s okay to look from behind dark sunglasses… but you’re really what you subsequently proved/confessed to being. (I shan’t repeat it lest I get flamed again) You just think it’s ok to bask at the nicer/more gentlemanly end, if you will, of the continuum of ‘men who look at women for the sole purpose of making them feel uncomfrotable and frightened’. At the other end being louder and more obnoxious are the assholes/rapists etc.
Imagine the reaction you’d have if you wrote an article advocating that bullying is a fun thing to do as long as people stayed on the cleaner/nicer/gentlemanly end of the continuum of bullying activities, you know like name calling, threatening gestures and etc. and leave the more barbaric acts like gang beatings, rape, lynching to the assholes.
Well I learned the new meaning of troll but all in all, the experience was JUST LIKE taking a walk down one of my less-than-pristine streets and having obnoxious louts abuse me for failing to respond to them the way they felt I should.
Hey, At-A-Loss, as a scientist, you know that rational discourse has to be disciplined and that personal attacks detract from everyone’s search for the truth. I’d like to say, as a woman who has met some nasty men (and women) and a lot of really terrific men (and women), that Rocco is one of the nice ones, a good poet, and a devoted site editor. If he and Valentino get a bit overexcited about slurs against men, I put it down to 1. artistic temperament and 2. a passion for the truth. Forgive me for writing this, but I think you are abusing them “for failing to respond to (you) the way (you) feel that (they) should.”
Hey, At-A-Loss, as a scientist, you know that rational discourse has to be disciplined and that personal attacks detract from everyone’s search for the truth. I’d like to say, as a woman who has met some nasty men (and women) and a lot of really terrific men (and women), that Rocco is one of the nice ones, a good poet, and a devoted site editor. If he and Valentino get a bit overexcited about slurs against men, I put it down to 1. artistic temperament and 2. a passion for the truth. Forgive me for writing this, but I think you are abusing them “for failing to respond to (you) the way (you) feel that (they) should.”
Hey, At-A-Loss, as a scientist, you know that rational discourse has to be disciplined and that personal attacks detract from everyone’s search for the truth. I’d like to say, as a woman who has met some nasty men (and women) and a lot of really terrific men (and women), that Rocco is one of the nice ones, a good poet, and a devoted site editor. If he and Valentino get a bit overexcited about slurs against men, I put it down to 1. artistic temperament and 2. a passion for the truth. Forgive me for writing this, but I think you are abusing them “for failing to respond to (you) the way (you) feel that (they) should.”
At-A-Loss,
For a high school level website, you are certainly paying us a lot of attention. Checking out my bio, sniffing out my “achilles heel”. I think I have a fan (sniff). For a scientist, you sure do have a lot of free time on your hands.
I could respond to all your potshots, but your not winning any hearts or arguments here. It’s more fun watching you dig your own hole.
And Dorothy, thanks for defending me, but its not needed. And don’t get caught up with rherotic like “artistic temperament” or pretty soon you’ll be coining phrases like “achilles heel” and “the veil was lifted from my eyes” as well.
Your last point hit the nail on the head. If At-A-Loss can convince herself that all men in the world are exactly the same as the ones she lives with, then there is no point in making a change, in getting up and improving her life, is there?
But of course, this all for if you still believe she isn’t a troll.
Hey Rocco,
I didn’t know what a “troll” meant on the internet, so thanks for clearing up the confusion. Previously, I thought a troll was just a mythological creature said to live under bridges and terrify Scandinavians or a person considered ugly. Meanwhile, my character reference wasn’t for your sake, but for At-A-Loss’s, you snappish bandersnatch. You’re just cross because I didn’t challenge her to a duel at dawn in Queen’s Park. That’s L’s job.
Comparing bullying to a healthy and normal expression of human sexuality is just silly. I find your verbal/typed abuse of Rocco and Val to be childish and immature. For someone who claims to be a scientist, you should be better informed about human nature. There are bad people and good people and judging the bad with the good is assinine. You should be ashamed of yourself for perpetrating the same kind of abuse you claim to detest.