This is not a post I enjoy writing and not a post that gives the reader much enjoyment, either, but it is a post that needs to be written. Yesterday's massacre of little girls was not because they were Amish. It was because they were girls. And only a few days earlier another murderer selected smaller teenaged girls for his violence in another school. Yet this is something the radio news last night didn't mention when discussing "school violence". Indeed, the Air America news avoided a single mention of the victims' gender. And you need to read far down into the newspaper stories before you come across a one-sentence-aside about the hatred for girls these horrible acts clearly demonstrate.
Why this silence, this looking-aside? Why make loud comments about possible motives but not look at the obvious one: that these men hated girls? Is it because on some level the society accepts such a hatred, because if we start focusing on it we have to ask some mighty unpleasant questions?
I know that the individual murderers in these cases were mentally unstable, not normal. But most of us, the consumers of these news, are supposed to be fairly stable and capable of reasoned discussion on the issues. We don't have to be protected from the astonishing finding that misogyny is rife in the society, and if by bringing the topic up we might make a few small changes here and there, who knows? A future victim or two could be saved.
By the small changes here and there I mean speaking out when a general discussion deteriorates into woman-bashing or girl-bashing, by not giving a sympathetic sounding board to a recently divorced and bitter man who blames all women for his misfortunes, but by pointing out to him that his anger is about one woman only, by making it very clear that generalized hatred of a whole gender is wrong and based on emotions rather than analysis. By standing up for girls when an internet chat discussion uses them as the example of everything cowardly, stupid and damp. By caring about hateful sexism as much as many of us care about hateful racism.
Then there are the hate sites where haters gather, where hate becomes acceptable and natural and normal. Will such sites one day be mentioned in horrible news reports as the enablers of another massacre of women or girls? I have no idea, but I fear the likelihood for this exists, and we will not be saved from this by averting our eyes and by letting the misogynists rant in peace in their own little worlds.
Do you know what they talk about, over there? Here are a few unlinked examples:
In the 50's, women kept their mouths shut a lot more than they do today — in fact they kept their mouths shut almost all the time. Imagine that! That could be why there was so much less homosexuality in the 50's, but I wouldn't know. That's not my area of expertise.
Without all that gabbing, women were able to concentrate their tiny brains on doing three or four jobs competently instead of doing all jobs worthlessly. Obviously, I'm talking about cooking, cleaning, drink-refreshening, and nursing.
Today's modern woman is different than her 50's counterpart. She's fatter, she won't shut the fuck up, she can't cook, she's a complete mess, drinks are out of the fucking question, and worst of all she makes a shitty nurse.
....
A woman voting on anything other than American Idol or her personal favorite type of chocolate is like watching a small child run full speed into a wall. Clearly the fundamentals are understood. The child runs, it's going somewhere and there's no doubt about that. The child can run. But very quickly one comes to the understanding that somewhere, somehow, the process has been perverted. Then comes the wall. Then comes the crying.
Women would vote for Hitler. Not because a woman could be talked into buying a catsup Popsicle while she was wearing white gloves, but because women are all fascists.
....
Women are everything [...] says they are…Lieing, cheating, whores!!!! You women who get your panties in a bunch over this website are living a life of fantasy. You women are happy so long as you can find a man who is willing to trade in his masculinity…usually for some half willed poorly conducted sexual favor…and thus be blind to the fact that you are a WHORE!
So it goes.
Do sites like these serve to release some of the steam caused by woman-hating? Are they helpful in the wider frame of things? Or do they make misogyny honorable and reinforced?