Saturday, July 24, 2010

I'M NOT SHOUTING

Here's some folk wisdom garnered over a lifetime of dealing with my father (a dear man in many ways, but pure Id, and born without even a Volume switch much less an Off switch), with two of the blokes  from my chequered past, and now with five years' worth of blog discussions: if in an unguarded moment you are unwise enough to point out to an angry, aggressive man that he is being angry and aggressive, he will turn on you with the anger and aggression ramped up to the power of ten and say I AM NOT BEING ANGRY AND AGGRESSIVE!!!111!11!!

And he will genuinely believe that that is true.

14 comments:

Deborah said...

I've been avoiding some blogs for the duration... #notworththeeffort

Capcha: dead

Su said...

Can I get some of this folk wisdom in an intravenous pack to last me the next month or so, along with some valium and Deborah's amazing restraint : )

Mindy said...

((((hugs))))

I notice that you, Fine, TT and su have been fighting the good fight over there, at least tonight. I don't have the energy at the moment. They just can't see it can they?

(Deborah is probably wrangling 9 year olds tonight, which is far more important anyway)

Kerryn Goldsworthy said...

It's really hard to tell what's really going on in their minds. I think what really depresses me is that if these are the men young enough to have become adults when feminism was already in the air, and who pride themselves on their progressiveness -- if even these men are so blind to their own tone and attitudes, what on earth are all the others like?

Give me the 9 year olds any day.

Mindy said...

Tony Abbott? That support has to come from somewhere.

Just read over there that TA's claims that Julia is faking it is a dogwhistle for MRAs who think that women fake DV allegations. Just lovely.

Shelley said...

I needed this reminder a week ago.

Bernice said...

Well I gone through surprise, bewilderment, "you're joking?Right?" to outrage and back again. Trying not to now just poke them with the annoying stick (not terribly succesfully)

And its not just gender - I've been all of the above in the last few months over issues of race and sexuality from young(ish) persons who I expected much much more from.

Zoe said...

This is very cryptic, is it an LP post or something?

Kerryn Goldsworthy said...

Yes, Z, in a word. But not so much a post, more a way of life. I much prefer your links to raspberries and photos of high goat and fab guest foodies and so on.

Deborah said...

Deborah is probably wrangling 9 year olds tonight

I was! It was a very successful party. Details here: Star the twenty-third

Link said...

Men in their thirties huh? Hmmm. Yes I've crossed swords with one of these. Figured he was too young to have been influenced in his thinking or to have paid much attention to the waves of feminism, but was just the right age to have comfortably accepted the 'backlash' against it and resumed a centuries old outlook.

Then there was the six foot six bloke who stood up at the table to lean in my direction and roar at me, jabbing his finger angrily in my direction, accusing me of the burn-her-at-the-stake crime of 'hating' men, because I had suggested that perhaps men had become the dominant gender because they could physically dominate women. As he stood, towering over us, in a right proper state, I simply had to think, "I rest my case", a thought bubble which infuriated him all the more and he finally sat down.

Ann ODyne said...

'feminism' and Domestic Violence':

I always think of that poem
'he is not dead, he has merely awakened from the dream of life'
ie
It is not an ism so much as a mere awakening from the nightmare that Life was.

This week in the supermarket i saw a couple and had barely-controllable physical waves of revulsion that I had to leave swiftly to avoid confrontation.
They were of a certain 'type' I will not describe (to escape accusations of Judgementalism), but He was short and pugilistic; She had a badly bruised face. He and I exchanged Hard Looks. he knew I was not a type he could have escaped injury from if he had tried the same treatment.
Hisss! Scratch!

tigtog said...

I particularly found the reaction to your generous ascription of the modifier "unconscious" to obvious examples of sexist double-standard at play to be bewilderingly obstreperating, by accusing you/me of not being able to prove that anything, let alone sexism, was unconscious.

D'oh, the unconscious bit is not the part you need to be rebutting, double-standard defenders.

Kerryn Goldsworthy said...

Thank you TT, generous was indeed what I was trying to be. But I've learned that there are a lot of bloggers (and not always male, apparently) who scream with outrage at the idea that there might be some things out of their control, especially when it comes to their own behaviour. I also think that particular person was just pirouetting.

Thank you for explaining it, too. I had given up.