As per usual, the only time it's ever acceptable to insist on equality is when it's to protect bigots. Al can denigrate women on a daily basis, but we're lectured/scolded/harangued into respecting his "views".

@ Octavious: "I feel that whatever our own views we should avoid dehumanizing those who hold different views to our own."

What, you mean like Al seeks to dehumanise women?

Really, Putin? I have defended you often enough. I have even defended maple at times. I am an equal opportunities supporter of allowing people to argue whatever crap they wish.

@ Jamie

What Al seeks is the sport of winding you, Lando et al up. It is rather childish, perhaps, but he is very good at it.

I believe you're mistaken, Octavious.

No, that's not what he is doing.

If that's what he was doing he'd do it with other topics. He only does this whenever a women's topic is brought up.

"Really, Putin? I have defended you often enough. I have even defended maple at times. I am an equal opportunities supporter of allowing people to argue whatever crap they wish"

I'm not clear about what it is you wish. You're on here complaining about the lack of conflict and drama and then you scold people for being mean to Al for hating women. I'm getting mixed messages. What I do know is that egalitarianism is ridiculed except when it comes to defending free speech.

"But Obi does try to go out of his way to point out that his friends are women. He's pointed this out about as many times as Al has made disparaging comments about women. It's as if we're supposed to be impressed."

1. I don't need, want, or try to impress you, Putin,

2. Were I to ever accidentally do so, please tell me, that I might immediately retract whatever it is I've said.

"Obiwan himself has taken sides in a dangerous struggle. I am singling him out for white-knighting a cause that has long suffered from too many white knights. Did he not want to be ridiculed for his effeminate views?"

1. I challenge you to find one guy on this site who thinks I'm a white knight...or a knight...or anything much above court jester, really. :p

2. Effeminate? O.o I don't care if my views are effeminate or not--is that supposed to be an insult, somehow?--but can you point out which views are "effeminate?"

"1. I don't need, want, or try to impress you, Putin,"

Then stop treating your friends like tokens and postage stamps. Thanks.

"
I really do have serious fears about my friends whenever something like this happens, this incident or Rodger's targeting women etc., etc....most of my friends ARE women...one of them gave birth to a baby girl 6 months ago...

I wonder what kind of generation she'll inherit in 25 years time."

Yes...saying I care about this issue all the more because I fear for the safety of friends was CLEARLY A move intended to impress an Internet Communist.

Especially when I said that to start off the thread and before you even entered and, as usual, started a pissing contest.

Yes, I clearly anticipated your arrival and said that JUST to impress you...

Yep. Three cheers for our ever-so-humble Mr. Putin33, folks!

It's not about me. It's your usual grandstanding to the webdip community at large. As ssoren likes to say, I'm irrelevant.

And given that that both this issue and this thread by its very title has to do specifically with women being attacked in such a way, it's entirely relevant therefore to mention that you fear for friends of yours which are women being attacked.

Not as if I shouted HEY A LOT OF MY FRIENDS HAVE TWO X CHROMOSOMES in the middle of a thread about Crimea...

Could you two stop de-railing this thread with your personal bitching, please?

"grandstanding to the webdip community at large"

Says the man who gets up on his high horse so often he has saddle sore.

OK, then back on topic:

Why does this sort of issue seem to be becoming worse amongst men (since it's probably fair to assume that the people hacking and leaking these nudes and posting the majority of these anti-woman/anti-Watson comments are guys.)

Don't get how this is derailed but whatever.

Is it becoming worse? The culture has become cruder and more misogynist since the dawn of social media. This is just the latest outrage.

"Is it becoming worse? The culture has become cruder and more misogynist since the dawn of social media."

...That would be it becoming worse?

"This is just the latest outrage."

I agree that this is just the newest, lowest point on an ever-dipping curve here, so part of this has been mounting for a while...

But I also think that, with the whole Elliot Rodger thing this year as well, these recent incidents all lumped together as well, that there's maybe a more recent cause to make that curve start to dip quicker and more sharply than it might otherwise have done, even if it was already headed downward in the first place.

No, people have fleeting attention spans and convince themselves that whatever is in the media right now is a big wave of something. The men's rights movement has been around for a long time. Stalkers and peeping toms posting pictures of celebrities has been going on for a long time.

Here's a question. If you're so outraged about violence against women, why not boycott the fucking NFL?

Why boycott the NFL? From what I can see the rate of domestic violence against women by NFL players is lower than the American national average. Are you advising we boycott America?

You base this on what? 538.com? Did they control for income? Because NFL players have far and away a higher rate of domestic violence than those of their income bracket.

The point is, if you're outraged about domestic violence, perhaps you shouldn't glorify a sport that destroys people's brains to such a degree that they have uncontrollable rage due to head injury , not to mention permanent memory loss.

But no, can't do that.

People don't boycott the NFL for the same reason that people don't boycott Chick-fil-A - it's too damn good!

And people, at the end of the day, don't give a shit.

Is low income an excuse for violence in your eyes?

I base it on the news reports we hear on the Beeb, which doesn't spend much time discussing domestic American matters or minority sports, but you get bits and bobs. The argument that was being made was that domestic violence is a matter for the American justice system, and there was some confusion over why the NFL was being singled out for criticism.

"Note that murder scores relatively high, but the raw numbers are extremely low (there are two in the database, though a third case — domestic in nature — resulted in suicide). But there are 83 domestic violence arrests, making it by far the NFL’s worst category — with a relative arrest rate of 55.4 percent.

Although this is still lower than the national average, it’s extremely high relative to expectations. That 55.4 percent is more than four times worse than the league’s arrest rate for all offenses (13 percent), and domestic violence accounts for 48 percent of arrests for violent crimes among NFL players, compared to our estimated 21 percent nationally.

Although this is still lower than the national average, it’s extremely high relative to expectations. That 55.4 percent is more than four times worse than the league’s arrest rate for all offenses (13 percent), and domestic violence accounts for 48 percent of arrests for violent crimes among NFL players, compared to our estimated 21 percent nationally.

Moreover, relative to the income level (top 1 percent) and poverty rate (0 percent) of NFL players, the domestic violence arrest rate is downright extraordinary. According to a 2002 Bureau of Justice Statistics Report covering 1993 to 1998, the domestic victimization rate for women in households with income greater than $75,000 (3.3 per 100,000) was about 39 percent of the overall rate (8.4 per 100,000), and less than 20 percent of the rate for women ages 20 to 34. "

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/the-rate-of-domestic-violence-arrests-among-nfl-players/

It could be that too. In some cases, I'm sure it is. I've considered boycotting the NFL for a number of reasons, but I keep coming back upon realizing that I don't watch for the NFL, I watch for football. I doubt you're one to accept this explanation, but that's how it is for me. As long as people, specifically football fans, are willing to give the NFL shit when they screw up like they did in this instance, their penalties will gradually become stiffer, their leaders will become more knowledgable, and hopefully it won't happen again. If it does, they'll hopefully take a hit again.

"Is low income an excuse for violence in your eyes?"

You should compare like to like, Octavious. But I see you're into deliberately muddying the waters here.

" The argument that was being made was that domestic violence is a matter for the American justice system, and there was some confusion over why the NFL was being singled out for criticism."

Of course, it's the BBC. I wouldn't expect anything less. Why would the BBC criticize an organization that has pinkwashed itself into the hearts of women fans, pounding its chest about how much it cares about women, only to defend and cover up domestic violence in its ranks?

It's not as if this problem is just with the NFL. It's not as if college football hasn't had the same problem.

Football is the problem. We will look back at this sport in 30 years time and wonder what the hell was wrong with us. It's like the plastic bag of sports.