Posts by Russell Brown
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to giovanni tiso,
I hope you’re intending to purchase the right consonants and vowels.
I knew that would happen. It is how it has always been spelled in my head ...
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to Emma Hart,
Mngh, see, I still feel like I can't really talk about this.
Sorry. And fair point about "triggering". I was just trying to give some form to thoughts about language that have been knocking around inside my head.
And now, having freed up disk space and performed sundry maintenance tasks on my computer (nb: not a brain metaphor), I will go and purchase the ingredients I require for a delightful spaghetti bolognaise.
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to Bart Janssen,
I have issues with the idea of a “rape culture”. To me it suggests that we know of a culture where rape doesn’t exist, as far as I know that isn’t true and has never been true.
I fully get the concept and why it really matters, but I'm sometimes uncomfortable with the phrase on a usage level. It can become a trump to play on stuff or people you don't like.
In that Stroppery thread we ended up with Vicki Anderson's affectionate story about Anika Moa and her wife as a manifestation of "rape culture". It is important to note that Anika expected the story to be rather more about her new album and subsequently made her feelings known to Anderson, but "rape culture"? No. It trivialised the term.
I'm starting to feel a bit uneasy about "triggering". Emma explained very well the purpose and meaning of the word, but Gio wrote this earlier:
Well, then let’s do that. I don’t know. Gheddafi (warning: immensely triggering link) is rumoured to be using mass rape as a weapon.
What information was in the word "triggering" that wasn't already in the words "using mass rape as a weapon"? The word sometimes seems to have a role beyond its ostensible one.
(I'm not having a go at you, Gio. You should be applauding my baby steps in critical thinking :-).)
At the extreme, you get something like the infamous Maia post discussed here a while back, in which she basically asserted control over key words in the feminist vocabulary and used that control to bully people. In a general sense, it's just not good for debate.
I hope I've explained myself well enough and that I haven't unduly upset anyone. I might take a little rest from the thread now. I'm still feeling a bit ill and this stuff is quite draining.
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Hard News: Bishop Brian: It's worse than…, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
You can’t go to someone’s house and be all nice, and then walk outside the door and slag them off, Maori or not.
Being able to state a clear position on humans rights and sexuality need not mean slagging off your hosts.
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to Deborah,
An interesting analysis of the extent to which some men think that all women are sexually available.
I remember the Colorado case unfolding. The political thicket around it was astonishing. Check this weird "it was the government's fault" analysis on the Fox News site, by a member of this Randian feminist group.
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to giovanni tiso,
I wouldn’t want to draw a line that leads directly to Key and Henry and Veitch, but policing the language of our public personalities is not a meaningless exercise.
Not at all.
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Hard News: Bishop Brian: It's worse than…, in reply to Sacha,
Chris, if you had seen the way they inserted their bigotry forcefully into politics during that time – including their infamous blackshirted march – you would understand the cynicism.
I was at the march, and wrote about it here. It was creepy.
One thing that I’ve always thought should have been more widely remarked upon was the presence of a small National Front contingent in the march.
I also saw Tamaki’s entourage in action when he attended one of the readings of the civil unions bill too. It was revolting: him preening amid his team of security heavies.
There was a pisstake of their website called Density, which stuck for many of us I suspect.
I for one greatly miss the regular emissions of Senior Pastor Brian Tamariki -- but his church website is still online.
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
Well, I’ll quite happily withdraw from the discussion if I’m being destructive – and no, folks, that’s not a flounce.
No, Craig, you have more right than most of us to be here in this discussion. You are truly valued. But I have made a couple of moderation calls where I felt what you did was unhelpful. As I said, I felt I had to be firm about it.
Paul Henry’s an easy target. But if you’re going to propose that he’s “the acceptable face of rape culture”, then you have to say the same thing, and more, about John Key sitting next to Tony bloody Veitch and scoring women out of 10. And you quite quickly reach the point where it’s not all that useful to explore the issue by pinning rape names on personalities. Talk about what was wrong with what they said.
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Up Front: Respectably-Dressed Sensible…, in reply to Emma Hart,
I have my problems with some of the use of “rape culture”, as I do with a bunch of other terms (mansplaining, ‘bingo squares’) that I feel are sometimes used to dismiss people or shut down discussions. But only sometimes.
Thanks. I have similar qualms. And yes, only sometimes.
I hope you didn’t mind me issuing the edict last night. I was just concerned that a good and productive discussion was not going to be helped.
Edit: I'm all too aware that my attempt to politely remonstrate over what I thought was a careless (not least, with claims about a well-known woman that were simply wrong in fact) contributed to the end of The Stroppery, so I wanted to be sensitive. But almost every other local blog discussion about Slutwalk has turned into a clusterfuck in one way or another, and the fact that this one is good and useful and full of experience is a minor miracle.
Anyway, over to you.
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2) When you’ve done that, please delete the comment a reasonable person could read as a claim I’ve called anyone a rapist here. I don’t like being exposed to potential defamation actions any more than you do
I felt it was a profoundly unhelpful way for the discussion to go, and I had to be firm about that. I wanted a couple of hours off and I didn't want to leave that unaddressed.
I do have serious misgivings about the careless use of the phrase "rape culture", and I thought yours was careless. "Rape" is a powerful word and even if you knew what you meant, not everyone would. It was an inflammatory statement that was of no service to the discussion. I had to be firm about that.