Why do men shout at women in the street?

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Stryder, Mar 25, 2011.

  1. DeeCee Valued Senior Member

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    I was going to have a crack at francois but I see the chimp did it for me. (and did it politely)

    We've had libido, culture, bonding ritual and even racial variation.

    Why no mention of "Power".
    It ain't about sex you know.
    Dee Cee
     
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  3. Stoniphi obscurely fossiliferous Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks Bells, those were pretty funny...in a sad sort of way.
     
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  5. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    That's not something that happens at random, at least not in the USA. It's concentrated in neighborhoods where civilization is breaking down or already has. After you've lived in a city for a while you know exactly which areas to avoid, especially if you're a woman walking alone. Since these are areas you probably have no need to ever walk through, it's not going to cause you any inconvenience to remember to stay off of those streets. The chance of a man behaving this way anywhere else is so low that it might happen to you a total of once or twice in your entire life.

    Lately cities have gotten in the habit of building concert halls, sports stadiums, etc., in run-down parts of town deliberately, both because it's cheaper to get the land there and because they'd like to improve those neighborhoods. If you drive up for an event when everyone else is arriving you've got the security of numbers. Here in Washington--and surely in places like New York and Chicago--it's tougher, because we have a very good public transportation system and it might be a three-block walk from the subway station to a concert. I know a lot of people drive to those things even though it's inconvenient and expensive, just so they can park right next to the theater.
    Only because Euro-Americans are less likely to be members of the demographic groups in which civilization is breaking down. We've been to college, we have good jobs, we drink in restaurants with our wives instead of in bars with the boys, we take our children to wholesome places. All of our lives we've spent among people who reinforce our sense of civilization, rather than those who would just as happily revert to the Stone Age.

    We can be just as crude as the next Neanderthal, but we tend to reserve that behavior for venues where we know how it's going to be received. I am far more likely to say something raunchy to one of my female friends--married or single--because we're all from the 60's generation and sex, drugs and rock'n'roll are still our Three Commandments. I already know they not only won't take offense but will say something just as rude back to me and we'll both end up laughing. I would never talk that way to a stranger.

    So just stay away from places where men would, and do, talk that way to strangers. If it happens anyway, maybe you're just settled into the wrong city, or the wrong country.
     
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  7. francois Schwat? Registered Senior Member

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    I meant most of what I said was about Northerners in general, not specifically Europeans. And I never said anything about better. I simply said that they behave better. Look at how the Japanese handled their catastrophe. Do you think just any population would handle a crisis like that with such equanimity?

    Almost everyone has the capacity for brutality, there's no doubt about it. The meek and polite Japanese perhaps have the greatest capacity for brutality of all. But they do appear to have a more civilized manner, in general, is it not so? So shut the hell up about the holocaust, Jesus.
     
  8. chimpkin C'mon, get happy! Registered Senior Member

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    Well, at best it's a broad statement that has no truth in observed fact, history, anthropology, or sociological data.

    Advanced cultures have risen and fallen irrespective of how far north, or south, they were located.
    Besides that, if the further north one was located correlated with one's "civility" and general "betterness," um, Soviet Russia?

    Not that I dislike or wish to rag on Russians, but the USSR wasn't a happy place for most. Nor was it very efficient, or civilized. Just grim, ugly, and brutal. Most things built horribly. But they did make very excellent tractors. Had a driveshaft made to withstand anything.

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    Wouldn't call them meek, just restrained...I personally attribute it to living in high population density and a history of doing that in paper-walled houses.

    Not going berserk under those conditions means developing selective hearing and good emotional control. So this became a cultural norm.

    To quote Dywyddyr, I won't mention anything about my second coming...

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    Last edited: Mar 27, 2011
  9. birch Valued Senior Member

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    that makes a lot of sense. i guess that's why crude honkey-tonk bars are most full of euro-americans not to mention those renowned cultural icons of sophistication at the finest trailer parks all over america. i hear nascar and grey-hound betting is a pinnacle of social wholesomeness. i've also noticed construction workers never make a peep when anyone female walks by. college campuses all over america are a beacon of wholesomeness with the frat parties, beer kegs and rampant fornication.

    also, hollywood only churns out the most wholesome as well. los angeles is clean as a whistle and so moral too.
     
  10. birch Valued Senior Member

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    genius, it's a combination of smaller population size, better social programs, and education.

    weather has little to do with it except perhaps colder it is, the less likely people can go out and be wild.
     
  11. birch Valued Senior Member

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    oh, did i even mention spring break? well, it has gotten a bit better it seems but it was so frigging raunchy that it would make the devil proud. i saw mostly euro-americans as well. i don't see this as a norm in most colleges in other cultures. they usually don't get that wild.


    yes, wholesome indeed just like the cocaine parties. i suppose when you do get married, settle down and have kids you've got to put that aside and be more 'civilized'. or at least pretend to be.
     
    Last edited: Mar 27, 2011
  12. Bells Staff Member

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    Ermm the problem of harassment and groping of women in Japan is so bad, that they now have women only cars in trains so that women can feel safe while commuting.

    And in Japan they don't just have do the brush against breast or what have you. They do full on grab and grope and sometimes try to actually penetrate with their hands if they can.
     
  13. chimpkin C'mon, get happy! Registered Senior Member

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    Yes, we trailer-park people are the creme de la creme

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    .


    That would figure...it's an even more sexist society than ours, but women are making their way into the workforce as close-to-equals.

    Men feel threatened, they respond by reasserting their ability to violate? Maybe?
     
  14. birch Valued Senior Member

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    that happens anywhere in one form or another. only 'nice' men don't do that.
     
  15. Me-Ki-Gal Banned Banned

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  16. visceral_instinct Monkey see, monkey denigrate Valued Senior Member

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  17. chimpkin C'mon, get happy! Registered Senior Member

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    I loved the way he wiggled it at them.
     
  18. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    I said, "Euro-Americans are less likely to be members of the demographic groups in which civilization is breaking down," not that we are unrepresented in those groups. Since we are still the largest ethnic group in the country we're in that demographic, but not proportionally.

    The comment to which I'm responding was that Euro-Americans aren't the men who shout at women in the street. My point is that we merely don't do it as often, and I explained why.
    I beg your pardon. We spent most of our lives in L.A. and it's a wonderful city; one of the world's greatest. I could show a woman the places where she shouldn't walk alone, and she'd probably ask, "What makes you think I would ever want to come here???"
    You don't understand the Japanese subways. They aren't just crowded, they are literally packed like sardines. They employ big sumo wrestler-type guys to stand at the back of the queue, and when the car is full and no more people can get on, they just start shoving and squeezing until everybody fits. The riders can barely breathe. A situation like that, where you're fighting for oxygen and you feel like your life is in danger, doesn't bring out the civilized qualities in anybody. "Shit, I'll probably die of asphyxiation before I get off this damn train, so I might as well grab one last handful!"

    Yeah, this is no excuse, but at least it's an explanation. I would certainly define a subway system that is this far over capacity, and nobody bothers to fix it, as a place where civilization has already broken down. Every civilization has its dark side.

    In the shelters where thousands of Japanese people are living in the wake of the tsunami, everyone politely leaves their shoes at the door, and they dutifully sort their trash into the recycling bins--of which there are 23 different kinds over there.

    Acting civilized when half of your friends and neighbors are dead, and acting uncivilized on your ride to work... Hey nobody said life was logical.
     
  19. SomethingClever Registered Senior Member

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    I've never understood the complaint about this- you feel violated, I suppose?

    I would be flattered by whistlers, but being the self-perceived handsome fellow I am, I just assume they are whistling on the inside

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  20. visceral_instinct Monkey see, monkey denigrate Valued Senior Member

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    Duh. You try feeling flattered when people bigger and stronger than you are yelling aggressively about what they'd like to do to you...
     
  21. birch Valued Senior Member

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    hmm, i guess it's just a matter of perception or rather a prejudicial view which we are all guilty of from time to time. i see examples of white collar crime like enron as well as poor decisions made by leaders just as much an example of civilization breaking down. i guess it's easier to just look at the more outrageously obvious such as street gangs or armed robberies etc.

    it's not as if euro-americans are not represented in prisons, divorce rates, drug and alchohol addiction, infidelity etc.

    i suppose one can tell themselves they are much better but considering that they are a greater demographic as well as usually cited to be more moral and also of higher intelligence, you would think it would be a lot less than it is.

    i know, hollywood is a kingpin of wholesome virtue. it must be the 'other' demographics fault for corrupting it.

    better to just agree to disagree.
     
  22. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    I lived in Hollywood for ten years. Wonderful place.

    Actually many of the studios are in Burbank and Culver City, not Hollywood.

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  23. Bells Staff Member

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    Picture if you will, you are walking down the street, on your way to work perhaps. And out of nowhere complete strangers start screaming what they would like to do with your body, describing how they think your butt, willy, hair, chest, etc looks - I am assuming, of course, that you are male. Then imagine they start grabbing themselves and telling you 'where they want you to stick it' and then they may try to determine the size of your penis, for example. And they keep screaming at you until you disappear from sight.

    Until it happens to you and it happens often (ie daily), it is hard to quite put a feeling to it. Humiliation is one. Embarassment is another. How about if they then decide to follow you and get really close? That is terrifying.


    Hmm..

    Just whistles, I think most could just shrug off. But when you have screams about yourself, sometimes having them come out and follow you, walk really closely to you while rubbing their crotch and telling you what they want to do to you, walk in front of you, barring your way until you get to your work place and you are able to lose them.. No.. That stops being flattering. That is quite terrifying. Especially if you have to leave work late for example, and it happens to you when there isn't a lot of people around..
     

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