And if we don’t congratulate him, then what happens?
Do you really need a pat on the head for NOT sexually assaulting someone?
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This is what I’ve been struggling with, for Al Frankens’ resignation. Zero Tolerance for any form of bad behavior, seems as bad a idea with sexual harassment as it does for drug use or kids pretending to play with guns.
Yet the country is so far away from any sort of proportional response yet, there is so much rug to be unswept over, I’m more interested in seeing how much farther this can go, than in making sure no man is treated as unfairly as women are routinely treated.
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how about we create a pin that says ‘I don’t do that!’ and everyone who ‘doesn’t do that’ can wear it while they ‘don’t do that’?
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Well, it’s just so hard being male. There are so many restrictions on what we can do!
(You did notice my /s, right?)
No I did not.
Carry on!
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One day at a time my friend. One day at a time.
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I will congratulate him when he personally thanks and congratulates me for every single time I have chosen not to be an asshole. I’ll be waiting… but not holding my breath.
Sorry Matt, we still won’t forgive you for Great Wall. It still sucked.
Obviously, all men are unobservant cretins, who are just waiting for the opportunity to assault women. They may not have done so yet, but they will.
Let’s not forget he knows Weinstein as well.
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How can a man know how other men act and what other men do when they’re alone with someone of the opposite sex? He surely isn’t going to be looking for clues about an issue that he’s never personally experienced. It’s arrogance of Mr Damon to think he knows his male friends with such certainty.
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How can a man know how other men act and what other men do when they’re alone with someone of the opposite sex?
The same way we all do, close observation and surveillance. Duh.
He’s not asking to be congratulated, he’s just saying that all men are not automatically sexual predators, and that some offenses are worse than others. He’s not defending any of the offenses.
As a member of a consistently attacked minority myself, I agree with Damon that not all offenses are the same.
Watching a comedian adopt a lisp and a limp wrist is offensive. When a co-worker tells a faggot joke, that’s more offensive. If it’s more than once, and management is ok with it, it becomes abusive. Being denied an apartment by a landlord because he doesn’t rent to queers is abusive but not scary. Being chased down the street by guys yelling “faggot” and trying to catch me and beat me up is much more abusive and very scary.
Someone telling a joke with a lisp and a limp wrist is just not as serious as being chased with intent to do me major harm. Neither one is defensible, both are seriously wrong, but they are not equivalent.
I also understand that the constant drip drip drip of minor abuses builds up, and each one feels worse because of what has gone before. And it’s not fair that women have to take action to protect themselves - abusive men should just stop. Like gay-bashers should just stop. But the world is not fair, and women do need to take action to protect themselves, even if they were brought up to just accept bad behavior.
Matt Damon is not the enemy. It’s easy to attack Matt Damon, he’s not harming you, and he won’t start harming you. The person you will actually need to stand up to and stop is the next man who does something abusive towards you or another woman. That will be much more difficult than taking pot-shots at Matt Damon.
And men like Matt Damon, and me, will be supportive and help you stop men who do abusive things when you make it public - because we think abusing women is despicable. But we can’t be supportive if we don’t know it’s happening, so the culture of silence and acquiescence has to stop.
" I have learned about this network and have been allowed into the loop by some close female friends. It’s there, it’s real. This happens in your social circles, and the men don’t know because no one tells us. There’s a good reason for this. It’s seriously unsafe to tell us about the nice-vs-rapey lists."
Does anyone think this is a good way to operate? Really? Us gay men have found that secret enemy lists were and are useful, but they don’t change anything. We have had to (and continue to have to) more openly confront gay-bashers of all kinds and get the help of non-gay allies to bring about more serious changes. And in the process we found that it’s not nearly as dangerous to stand up to our abusers as we had feared.
And who are the allies of women who stand up to abuse? Men who also think that abuse of women is despicable. In fact, men like Matt Damon. Who has not in any way defended any abuse of women, and seems to be trying to let women know that there are lots of supportive men out there who can easily be recruited to help end the abuse of women by abusive men. But that can’t happen while women don’t speak up.
No one said that. Ever.
I agree that one is worse. But they aren’t entirely disconnected, though. One can lead to the other, in that the consistent demasculinazation of gay men starting with jokes with a stereotypical gay voice or mannerism, can lead others to think that it’s okay to chase a man they deem as gay down the street and beat the shit out of him. And given that the gay stereotype is effeminate, at least some of this is misogynistic, too, aimed at keeping those who don’t conform to gender standards (of either hetero sex or not being like a woman) in line, or at least silent. But you sort of already say this…
This is where I think you’re pretty wrong. It’s clear that he’s giving some behaviors a pass because they don’t cross what HE deems to be an unacceptable line. But it’s not just the most egregious behavior that is so soul destroying… it’s the constant drip of misogyny on top of the possibility of worse.
Well, when we speak out, we tend to be told that we need to be quiet and not rock the boat. We’re dismissed, laughed at, fired from our jobs, black listed, mocked and made fun of, and summarily ignored. This is not in our heads, it’s a major part of the problem.
The only reason this is all coming out now is because it was building up for literally decades, women making complaints, not being taken seriously, talking about it with friends, and now, finally, something has caught on. And we’re being told by the likes of Matt Damon that the little things don’t matter and we only need to focus on the most serious of crimes.
What do you think has been happening since Cosby? It wasn’t men that brought this shit out in the open… men like Damon are only now speaking up to make sure us women only focus on the “real” crimes and not the whole culture the enables it.
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@ Mindysan33
“Well, when we speak out, we tend to be told that we need to be quiet and not rock the boat. We’re dismissed, laughed at, fired from our jobs, black listed, mocked and made fun of, and summarily ignored. This is not in our heads, it’s a major part of the problem.”
Yes, I remember going through that too. It’s a great description of how gay men were treated in the 1970s and 1980s - and sometimes, in some contexts, still today.
Maybe I missed something he published, but in what I read he didn’t say that the little things don’t matter. He said that all of the bad behavior was wrong, but there was a difference in degree. And that’s just true. If you tell I’m a faggot and should die, that’ - a bad and abusive thing. Call me a faggot and try to kill me - a much, much worse abusive thing. If I have to choose, I’ll stop the second one first, and deal with the first one later.
I understand that, but we need to deal with both now. Both the abuse aimed at gay men and the abuse aimed at women. Hell, the whole ball of wax aimed at people who aren’t straight, white, cisgendered, christian, and male. Obviously, in the moment, getting out of danger is critical, but we’re not talking about in the moment, we’re talking about the culture that allows for the whole spectrum of shittiness. It’s not just about the moment, but the culture that allows for all those little, belittling moments and those more dangerous ones.
Later is NOW, for all of us. Right now.
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