salm wrote:Broomstick wrote:No argument there - but when have people ever been rational?
Also keep in mind that while men are more likely to be victims of violence in general, women are FAR more likely to be sexually assaulted, and even today sexual assault can have life-long negative repercussions to the victim.
So, if men are more likely to be assaulted are women being unreasonable for being scared or are men unreasonable for not being scared enough?
Yes.
Or is the violence caused on men not as bad as violence caused on women.
I think man-on-man violence should be just as objectionable as any other form of violence. However, I think there are two issues regarding this that need to also be addressed. As usual, I'm full of words so if folks just want to skip over my dissertation I won't be offended.
I mean, if you´ve ever been on the recieving end of a fist you probably know that it´s not really earth shattering in most cases. Being on the recieving end of knife or univited dick on the other hand is rather likely to be.
So perhaps most violence caused on men are just fist fights which tend to be rather undramatic.
Human men are male mammals, which to some extent is DUH! but which is also important. Most male mammals do engage in dominance fights, which among other things are characterized by being (usually) less than lethal or maiming. One of the classic portrays of this are Hollywood fight-fights over a girl, or a girl's honor, or to get the girl, or protect the girl.... you get the idea. Back in the days when schoolyard scuffles were treated as such instead of as criminal assaults older boys/young men would, indeed, have fights in said schoolyard. The usual tactic was to observe, let the two involved have it out for a bit, and intervene if things got too serious. This is NOT bullying, several-on-one, and the like. There were problems with that "system", but it did let the young male apes get rid of some aggression.
The male human tendency for dominance battles is not as strong as between, say, deer or elephant seals but it's still there. Fortunately, it can be channeled. This is why men tend to be more competitive than women, compete more often than women, and tend to be more aggressive in competition. I hasten to add this is all
on average - human males are also quite capable of non-aggressive behavior, and human females can be extremely competitive.
Anyhow - this is a reason that sports can be beneficial for young men. It gives them a safe outlet for their natural urges to compete against other young men. These urges can also be channeled intellectually, hence chess clubs and the appeal of FPS games for young men. With the world getting more crowded and personal weaponry (in some cases) becoming more dangerous/lethal encouraging young men to express these tendencies on line is rather than in actual physical conflict is, in my mind, a plus.
That's one sort of male violence and you're correct - being on the receiving end of a male mammal dominance fight is, in the greater universe of violence, not that big a deal. Yes, it hurts, you can wind up with bruises or worst-case a cracked rib but a body recovers fairly quickly.
Then there's the other form of violence. The one where there is real intent to harm or kill, where the goal isn't dominance but either taking resources or eliminating perceived enemies. The one where the knives and guns come out, where each side calls for buddies to come along in an attempt to get a numbers advantage, when you get ambush instead of face-to-face confrontation. It ranges from the mugger who knifes his victim to gang warfare with guns. This is the violence men should fear, and because men are more likely to be out and about in the world, are more likely to travel alone or at night, they are more frequent targets of this.
Women tend not to be out and about on their own so much, and for most of history were under the protection of men (husbands and relatives, mostly) which gave them a level of protection the men did not enjoy. When attacked, though women tend to be more vulnerable due to being less physically strong and usually unarmed, and in addition there's that whole raped-woman-as-damaged-goods thing that seems to crop up so often. Women are subjected to violence (outside the family - violence inside the family is a different matter) less often, but the consequences are often different. If a woman is raped and her society then treats her as an outcast she no longer has the protection of others and is thus more likely to be victimized again and again.
In short: There are, broadly speaking, two categories of violence. One is largely (but not entirely) for show and is our equivalent of the male dominance fights seen in other mammals. The other is the variety that causes maiming and death. It's definitely the latter one that's most important to avoid.
Sometimes, the male dominance stuff escalates into the deadlier violence. I think that's what we see sometimes, when some walking turd goes from feeling butt-hurt for not being acknowledged the way he desires to getting a gun and shooting a dozen or so people.
