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I just want to understand why people do this. If some men were afraid of losing their jobs because of a big influx of women I'd at least comprehend (but definit

I just want to understand why people do this. If some men were afraid of losing their jobs because of a big influx of women I'd at least comprehend (but definitely not agree with) that behavior, but it's a job free-for-all now and seems like it always will be, so I just can't see what the motivation could possibly be. If they're just pure sociopaths, why don't they harass men this way as well?

AdeptusAquinas 11y ago
Because they're insecure and want attention - if they can elicit a response from her then a woman has acknowledged their existence. Or because they feel innately that they are superior to women because they are male, and then cant comprehend that she is more prominent than they are, which makes them angry. Immaturity essentially, given teeth by the anonymous power of the net and some distorted belief in freedom of speech (on the part of the companies that should be excising this crap).
- __z 11y ago
  > Or because they feel innately that they are superior to women because they are male, and then cant comprehend that she is more prominent than they are, which makes them angry. http://www.sorrywatch.com/2015/04/05/everyone-deserves-a-second-chance/ http://www.sorrywatch.com/2015/04/05/everyone-deserves-a-sec... Mo’ne Davis got famous for being the first girl to pitch a shutout in the Little League World Series at 13. She also plays basketball and football - she is very talented athletically. She appeared on talk shows and the cover of Sports Illustrated. Disney announced that they were going to make a movie about her. A grown man (college baseball player Joey Casselberry) reacted to this with the following tweet: "Disney is making a movie about Mo’Ne Davis? WHAT A JOKE. That slut got rocked by Nevada" A grown man called a 13 year old a slut. A slut! Because she was getting well deserved attention.
  - cafard 11y ago
    Athletics tends to support arrested development. I have a hard time regarding a college baseball player, even one who almost certainly is taller than I am and packs a lot more lean mass, as a "grown man." I do hope that the athletic director at his school had a long talk with him that will make him think a long time before doing anything remotely like this again.
unimpressive 11y ago
Because women are the easiest target, essentially. The people who do this essentially are pure sociopaths, and they pick the easiest targets because they're bullies. Women are an easy target for several reasons: 1. Isolation. Women are a minority in tech and there's a larger social stereotype that women can't do math/are incapable of advanced reason/whatever tosh you want to throw in here. That means it's easier to tell women they're trash and undeserving and have them believe it. There's not a lot of people most women can go to to complain about this or receive validation that these are poisonous lies without triggering another stereotype, being weak and vulnerable. People would rather sit in silence and take it than be seen as a whiner. 2. In performance oriented cultures it's very common to shit on each other as an in-group building behavior. People who can 'take it' are the in group and people who get offended are the out group. Bullies can exploit this by knowing exactly how far they can push and make it seem like good natured ribbing even in a public social context. More subtle bullies can take things further by establishing unique contexts for minor slights to give them greater meaning that isn't there for other people, so that when the victim complains they seem irrational and crazy to observers. (Another stereotype of women.) 3. Cultural factors. All those stereotypes regardless of how much truth there is to them become self fulfilling prophecies. Women are weak and vulnerable is essentially an advertisement for bullies to go target women, bullies enjoy hurting women more for reasons that could be basically summed up as actual misogyny. As for harassing men as well, they do. They just use different words when they do it. It might be helpful to throw out terms like 'women-hating' or 'misogynist' and zoom out a bit to look at the ways bullies hurt people in different contexts. Bullies don't care who you are, they will hurt anybody who will give them the warm fuzzies of having gotten someone. And to do that they will use whatever tactics or words will hurt. These people use rape threats and death threats against women because they hurt. Women as a class are the most receptive to this sort of negative input for various cultural and yes physical reasons I won't elaborate on. But bullies have all sorts of tricks to use on other people. If you're a typical heterosexual male they'll tell you you're gay and unmanly. If you're gay and proud they'll tell you you're deviant scum. If you're a minority they'll call you racial slurs and insult you with stereotypes. If you have visible pimples they will tell you you're ugly. They will pick out whatever salient features are available to hurt you with and use them. It's less helpful to think of a lot of these people as racists or what not so much as optimization processes for suffering and tears. They don't care who you are, they will hurt anyone.
MollyR 11y ago
http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/ It looks like both genders are harassed quite a bit, younger people being harassed more. What surprised me in this article was men being physically threatened more than women.
- EliRivers 11y ago
  I suspect that if you put threats of rape into the physical threats bucket (it is, of course, a physical threat, but it often gets its own bucket, or gets put into a sexual harassment bucket) the results might be different.
antod 11y ago
Men can get harassed too, but threats of sexual violence understandably create a much more visceral reaction in women. Because men usually don't feel as vulnerable they can to a greater extent disregard certain types of threats or not get exposed to them (especially the sexual ones). Unfortunately the abusers/bullies have a larger more powerful arsenal for attacking women than men.

AdeptusAquinas 11y ago

Because they're insecure and want attention - if they can elicit a response from her then a woman has acknowledged their existence. Or because they feel innately that they are superior to women because they are male, and then cant comprehend that she is more prominent than they are, which makes them angry. Immaturity essentially, given teeth by the anonymous power of the net and some distorted belief in freedom of speech (on the part of the companies that should be excising this crap).

__z 11y ago
> Or because they feel innately that they are superior to women because they are male, and then cant comprehend that she is more prominent than they are, which makes them angry. http://www.sorrywatch.com/2015/04/05/everyone-deserves-a-second-chance/ http://www.sorrywatch.com/2015/04/05/everyone-deserves-a-sec... Mo’ne Davis got famous for being the first girl to pitch a shutout in the Little League World Series at 13. She also plays basketball and football - she is very talented athletically. She appeared on talk shows and the cover of Sports Illustrated. Disney announced that they were going to make a movie about her. A grown man (college baseball player Joey Casselberry) reacted to this with the following tweet: "Disney is making a movie about Mo’Ne Davis? WHAT A JOKE. That slut got rocked by Nevada" A grown man called a 13 year old a slut. A slut! Because she was getting well deserved attention.
- cafard 11y ago
  Athletics tends to support arrested development. I have a hard time regarding a college baseball player, even one who almost certainly is taller than I am and packs a lot more lean mass, as a "grown man." I do hope that the athletic director at his school had a long talk with him that will make him think a long time before doing anything remotely like this again.

unimpressive 11y ago

Because women are the easiest target, essentially. The people who do this essentially are pure sociopaths, and they pick the easiest targets because they're bullies. Women are an easy target for several reasons: 1. Isolation. Women are a minority in tech and there's a larger social stereotype that women can't do math/are incapable of advanced reason/whatever tosh you want to throw in here. That means it's easier to tell women they're trash and undeserving and have them believe it. There's not a lot of people most women can go to to complain about this or receive validation that these are poisonous lies without triggering another stereotype, being weak and vulnerable. People would rather sit in silence and take it than be seen as a whiner. 2. In performance oriented cultures it's very common to shit on each other as an in-group building behavior. People who can 'take it' are the in group and people who get offended are the out group. Bullies can exploit this by knowing exactly how far they can push and make it seem like good natured ribbing even in a public social context. More subtle bullies can take things further by establishing unique contexts for minor slights to give them greater meaning that isn't there for other people, so that when the victim complains they seem irrational and crazy to observers. (Another stereotype of women.) 3. Cultural factors. All those stereotypes regardless of how much truth there is to them become self fulfilling prophecies. Women are weak and vulnerable is essentially an advertisement for bullies to go target women, bullies enjoy hurting women more for reasons that could be basically summed up as actual misogyny. As for harassing men as well, they do. They just use different words when they do it. It might be helpful to throw out terms like 'women-hating' or 'misogynist' and zoom out a bit to look at the ways bullies hurt people in different contexts. Bullies don't care who you are, they will hurt anybody who will give them the warm fuzzies of having gotten someone. And to do that they will use whatever tactics or words will hurt. These people use rape threats and death threats against women because they hurt. Women as a class are the most receptive to this sort of negative input for various cultural and yes physical reasons I won't elaborate on. But bullies have all sorts of tricks to use on other people. If you're a typical heterosexual male they'll tell you you're gay and unmanly. If you're gay and proud they'll tell you you're deviant scum. If you're a minority they'll call you racial slurs and insult you with stereotypes. If you have visible pimples they will tell you you're ugly. They will pick out whatever salient features are available to hurt you with and use them. It's less helpful to think of a lot of these people as racists or what not so much as optimization processes for suffering and tears. They don't care who you are, they will hurt anyone.

MollyR 11y ago

http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/ It looks like both genders are harassed quite a bit, younger people being harassed more. What surprised me in this article was men being physically threatened more than women.

EliRivers 11y ago
I suspect that if you put threats of rape into the physical threats bucket (it is, of course, a physical threat, but it often gets its own bucket, or gets put into a sexual harassment bucket) the results might be different.

antod 11y ago

Men can get harassed too, but threats of sexual violence understandably create a much more visceral reaction in women. Because men usually don't feel as vulnerable they can to a greater extent disregard certain types of threats or not get exposed to them (especially the sexual ones). Unfortunately the abusers/bullies have a larger more powerful arsenal for attacking women than men.