A comment I heard on the radio this morning

[Burney]

I was drinking until late in Soho last night. There were many men dressed as Freddie Mercury. I don't really know why.

Some of them may, i suspect, be gay.

Drinking, eh? On a Tuesday?

[Peter]

You are mental. No offence, like.

You are embracing the 'being mean culture' here.

Next stop Dachau....

[Burney]

It doesnt just trivialise rape. It obstructs any reasonable dialogue.

You can talk a bloke through why he shouldn't be grabbing a girl's tits in a nightclub and he might, just possibly, listen to you. If you effectively call him a rapist he is going to dismiss you as a nutter.

Do we really want to deal with the behaviours or do we just want to demonise people?

That's my point. They want to demonise men as a sex first and foremost and will accept trivialising rape and obstructing dialogue as collateral damage in that effort.

[Monty92]

That would make 'rape culture' the 'touching knee culture'. The whole point is that you name it after the biggest crime.

Unless you are happy with referring to the holocaust as just another part of the 'being mean culture'....

Fine, hate culture. Holocausts are fuelled by hate, so hate is the broader 'umbrella' crime.

[Sir C]

Drinking, eh? On a Tuesday?

No drinking on Monday to make up for it. This week the dry days shall be Monday, Wednesday and Thursday.

[Burney]

Firstly, I obviously agree. Secondly, I don't actually think anyone is suggesting they should be treated the same in any meaningful way. That's a bit of a straw man. No-one thinks a man who touches a woman's knee should be jailed.

A lot of people are pushing back against the idea that hands on knees are trivial because that doesn't tackle the 'culture' of masculinity that we both acknowledge exists. But anyone sane and worth listening to KNOWS it's trivial. The divergence comes when people claim that we need to have a zero tolerance approach to ANY expression of masculine sexuality in ORDER to tackle the more serious stuff.

We both think this is ****ing stupid.

Men put their hands on women's knees because they fancy them and wish to express the fact - however clumsily. It is not an assault and neither is it particularly traumatic. I'm not saying it's ideal, but it is ultimately pretty trivial. The point is that there has to be a hierarchy of behaviours that acknowledges the triviality of one behaviour in order that we can acknowledge the seriousness of another. To lump all transgressive acts in as suggested does serve to lessen the impact of the more serious ones while blowing the smaller ones out of all proportion.

[Monty92]

Men put their hands on women's knees because they fancy them and wish to express the fact - however clumsily. It is not an assault and neither is it particularly traumatic. I'm not saying it's ideal, but it is ultimately pretty trivial. The point is that there has to be a hierarchy of behaviours that acknowledges the triviality of one behaviour in order that we can acknowledge the seriousness of another. To lump all transgressive acts in as suggested does serve to lessen the impact of the more serious ones while blowing the smaller ones out of all proportion.

I agree entirely

[Burney]

I agree entirely

And that, of course, is why bandying catch-all terms such as 'rape culture' or 'toxic masculinity' around is profoundly unhelpful. As p says, a man who you wish to convince to stop knee-touching is instantly going to cease listening to you when you start lumping him in with rapists or demeaning his entire sex. He will simply - rightly - dismiss you as talking hysterical nonsense.

[Peter]

I agree entirely

Which would suggest that you believe that rape is fuelled by a man's desire to have sex with a particular woman- that they in some way fancy them.

Rape is not about sex, its about control. It is a man asserting his control over a woman, making her subordinate to him. This is the culture; this is the whole crux of the argument; this is why they argue that touching a knee, particularly in a power-imbalance environment, is effectively rape.

[Peter]

Fine, hate culture. Holocausts are fuelled by hate, so hate is the broader 'umbrella' crime.

I can live with that. As below, this makes rape part of 'control culture'. Say that and you will be accused of trivialising rape, as though comparing it to touching a knee hasn't already done that.

Sorry, it has to be holocaust culture or nothing. I dont make the rules....