Vengeance and Violent Men (Manly Monday)

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[@TheArceusftw]

This pretty much my childhood in a nutshell. I was the quiet kid who got the brunt of the bullying. And when I decided to get an authority figure involved I was branded the school snitch. Keep in mind I'm black, and while I grew up in a semi-decent neighborhood, there still was this prevelent "anti-snitching: culture that's so hevily engraved in black culture. So i figured once I got into middle school, I basically felt like I needed to actively stand up for myself, either clapping back verbally, or using physical retaliation. But unfortunately that just ended up giving me the short end of the stick(I think even got suspended once) So I just ended up making me figured why bother, and just driven me towards a more antisocial outlook going into high school, wheer I basically developed a quiet yet fierce resentment towards a good majority of my classmates. Where it did get to the point where I did harbor some very dark fantisies about my classmates getting their just desserts either. (Basically, the classic case of "If I had superpowers, I'm burning this wretched world to the ground.") Hence why when I finally gradutated, I felt immense satisfaction from knowing I never have to put up with those people ever again.(I even fantisized about giving a graduating speech about how much I absolutely hated every last one of them.) But still, the damage has been dealt. So again I'm constantly in a bind of "Do I grow a backbone and stand up for myself even if it means resorting to phsyical means of self-defense, and risk being branded an out of control meathead with rage issues who thinks that violence should be the immediate solution to my problems?" "Do I take this up with an authority figure, and risk being branded a coward and a snitch who needs a helicopter mom, big brother, or babysitter to swoop in like Underdog and save the day?" or "Do I do nothing, just pray that they either get bored, or karma takes the wheel." And more often than not, I find myself relying on option C. But even that's just an absolute shot in the dark. Because bullies often than not love to flip the script and play the victim whenever they're cornered by the consiquences.(Not to mention I highly doubt the "Swiper no Swiping" approach would work in real life.) But for me at least, it feels like it's better than nothing because sometimes in life, the mentality of "The best way to win, is to not play at all" is the best approach. But even then I find it massivly hypocritical where it's considered impoilite to tell certain people to walk away and "be the bigger person". But when it's being done to someone who society deems less worthy of defending; it's suddenly okay?(A classic case of "Small bean syndorme".) Doubly so to people on the spectrum like me. Where If I do decide to fight back, I'm seen as no different then a rabid badger, or the type of out of control kids you would see on Dr Phil or Beyond Scared Straight. Someone who was never properly disciplined, and had his violent behavior coddled, enabled, and excused because of his autism. Again, proving my points that most people who preach about the importance of mental health are only doing it when it's convient for them, and when it's for someone who fits the ideal victim mold.

[@AkbarZeb-p6f]

Amen! That was also my childhood in a nutshell. Though it got even worse when we kids were forced to go to a ghetto school where it was the black kids vs the white & Mexican, island kids. We all had a fight club in 3rd grade. That was the only thing we halfway bonded over - was fighting on the playground. The quiet, black kids never stood up for anyone because they knew that when they went home, the bullying would be worse for them as they had to go home & live with those assholes. Then 2 years later, the school was shut down & everyone was consolidated into an all white school & they handed out suspensions like candy for fighting, but the problem literally vanished within a week. The white kids were still assholes, but were sneakier about it. But if you fought them off school grounds, no one really cared either. Since that experience, as we moved around a lot, the best way to deal with bullies was to take 'em to the ground & mop the floor with them on the first instance & risk the suspension, which was largely meaningless, but at least they didn't mess with you after that. Some of the sneaky, stupid ones did & thought they were smarter than the system, but they got their own beatdown regardless in the end. After that I was just the "psycho" quiet kid who was left alone, which was better than being surrounded by a bunch of snakes pretending to be your friend.

[@RobsDogs20]

The thing about men and women both having similar feelings of anger but men acting on it more just reminds me of the suic*de topic where men are more likely to choose a more violent method

[@HalasterBlackCloak-u2w]

Great video! Its so terrifying dealing with guys bc they are like this. We need to get rid of the vengeance thing yeah.

[@azamonra]

The thing that gets lost in revenge stories is that they (the good ones) are tragedies. In order for someone to get revenge they need to have something to avenge; wanting to be John Wick is basically wishing somebody would shoot your dog. There is also the deeper aspect that getting revenge isn't a prize, it's a necessity because justice is absent. The classic revenge story goes like this; a simple farmer returns home from the fields to find his village burned and his family dead, either at the hands of marauding bandits the nobles don't care to stop or by the nobles themselves, so with no other choice and nothing left to live for the farmer takes up his pitch fork and sets off to kill the ones responsible. Most likely with the intent and/or expectation to die in the process. Regardless the former farmer can never return to the life of farming they chose and becomes little better than those that he fights with the only positive being that perhaps in killing the other monsters another farmer will be able to farm into old age with their grandchildren playing in the next field over. There is a sense of nobility in there somewhat, fighting the good fight for no reward and the idea that others will be safe. But no matter what way you slice it, it's a bleak prospect and not something anyone should wish for. I wonder if it isn't that men want to be that guy but they want to believe that they would be that guy if it happened? Sort of like the burning building scenario; we'd all like to believe we'd run in to save the baby but most of us assume we'd be in the crewed watching.

[@jakeice893]

This video hits hard! I was a volcano of rage when I was a tote (Always the smallest and the oldest due to school year), I believe I put 3 separate kids into a bin and broke a hockey stick in frustration due to bullying, and I got similar advice as Liana did, "Do not start fights, but always be the one to end them", and at the same time "We do not hit, that's not gentlemanly" 0.o Like how was I supposed to have a good relationship with anger if I was receiving conflicting advice! -.-

[@armtieaquila]

Yes, and I'm glad it does! It's the same kind of unwinnable situation as women get just different framing.

[@katetoldness4220]

This is kind of a long story but I think it is the ultimate illustration of a deep societal belief about men acting and women being acted upon. During my childcare days, I remember this one time we took the kids swimming at a local pool during summer programing. We usually went about 3 times a week. On this particular day, there was a protest where a bunch of mothers were going to come out and breastfeed their children at the pool, standing in solidarity with a mother who'd been asked to "cover up" by a male employ while feeding her child. The breast feeding itself wasn't a problem. None of the kids were bothered or really took any notice of the moms whatsoever. The problem occured when a news crew showed up and started filming. We had kids in programing at the time who could absolutely not be on camera because of custody disputes and the like. I tracked down the person in charge of filming and learned to my relief that this wasn't live coverage and that they would make sure not to have any kid's faces visible once the footage was broadcast. I called our communications director (who by the way, should have called or emailed us but did neither- major DYFJ) and told them what had happened and my response. They said I'd handled it well and to catch the news tonight to make certain none of our kids were identifiable. So when I got home I tuned in to the local news and to my relief, the news team were as good as their word and none of our kids were identifiable. But I also heard the full story of the incident and protest and rolled my eyes so hard I'm suprised they didn't get stuck at the back of my skull. It was true that a 16 year old lifeguard had asked the original nursing mother to cover up. It was his first day on the job and he was quite anxious about it going well which made him overzealous. The mom immediately spoke to the kid's manager. The manager apologized to the mom and clarified the pool's actual policies to the new lifeguard who also apologized. The mom accepted and finished feeding her kid. That should have settled the matter but a bunch of the woman's other mom friends were outraged on her behalf and decided to descend on the pool to protest. And I thought, protest what? The pool's actual policies put the mom in the right. So what were they protesting? A teenage boy working for minimum wage as a part time lifeguard. How reified must be someone's view of gender to view that as a legitmate way to "stick it to the man" however underage and underpaid he is.

[@winterburden]

Happy Monday!

[@UMTongo]

Always with these discussions its nature vs nurture when imo its a bit of both you don't get someone with psychopathy from nurture or autism and those affect the entire life of those effected by it, i think it would include the sexes as well but it dosen't invovle how we react to those feelings

[@AkbarZeb-p6f]

I have to wonder how much of autism is really just childhood neglect as those who are poorly socialized before age 3 will be "weird" their entire lives because social skills develop far faster than we can catch up to.

[@PostmortemVideo]

This has me wondering how much 'male violence' is female violence, by proxy, or on behalf of women. If pubs at closing time are any measure, most of it.

[@death31313]

Probably quite a bit,the challenge is though that the real numbers are really hard to sus out since women who engage in proxy violence are almost never arrested or cited in court documents. Our statistics on violence pretty much all come from court and police records.

[@MacN-gx3jv]

True

[@patriciaturnham453]

Your talking about your father beating you brought back so many memories. My father was a real artist when it came to that. He could hold us by one arm, take his belt off with the other, and beat us with one fluid motion. He would also make us go outside and cut our own switches for beatings, and if they were too wimpy for his purpose, we'd have to do it again and get a worse beating on top of it.

[@silvanbarrow86]

"What is a man?" You mean the answer isn't "are shit", "ain't shit", or "a miserable little pile of secrets"? But yeah. It may be correct to deduce that a lot of male behaviour boils down to social conditioning/mistreatment that could be avoided, but as usual opponents seem to want to treat men like the Harris campaign by baiting them into a response and and then using that response as justification of their stance. Little wonder that some men conclude that the safest way to avoid losing the game is to not play.

[@jimplaysric]

Good thoughtful, video, entertaining too since it's prompting some turgid !ncel cope treatises in the comments.

[@michaellewis1545]

So what do you mean by protection? I have always understood protection to be placing someone or something between your self and possible danger. So I am crouis what a world were we protect people would look like.

[@armtieaquila]

Depends on how "protecting people" is framed. Currently, there is a growing number of attacks that are based in social media. The vast majority of people who think they can handle physical aggression don't know how to navigate relational aggression. There's also a weird excitement factor that just doesn't make sense. I've had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know some TRULY dangerous people in my time, including a Special Forces group (battalion) commander, and at least one Army Ranger; not a single one of them gets excited about having to exhibit violence. Back to the base of your question. The first thing one needs to do to protect someone else is understand the person you are protecting, what THEIR threat envelope and threat tolerance look like. Next, assess your own envelope, profile, and tolerance and see how that matches up with whoever you're trying to protect. Then, and only then can you effectively talk about protecting someone. Issues like how you communicate a perceived threat or how will you, the protector, know how/where/when/why to stand down, are critical pieces of information. If you don't have those in hand, are you *really* protecting them, or are you just helicoptering for others to see?

[@furynotes]

Wish that Gina would stop being used as pawn by people like the nerdrotic.

[@hades217]

12:46 …so you were in trouble from your Mother and not your Father? I get the feeling you were making a point about hypocrisy in what happened, but if it was two different people I’m not sure that’s fair. Am I getting that wrong?

[@RedLianaK]

My mother punished me for fighting. My father punished me for not winning the fight because that was embarrassing to him.

[@hades217]

@@RedLianaK Ok so I better understand now. One of the things I am striving for in raising my own daughters is not shaming them. If mistakes happen, they happen. If a bad decision is made, we address that, but never with shame because I grew up with crippling shame. Not even a thing of my parents, but from the adults in the education system that saw me, a head taller and 50 lbs heavier than all my classmates, and assumed I would bully the other kids, meanwhile being severely bullied myself.

[@lorzon]

I'm going to post this separately to keep it some distance from the storm that's happening in my other comment. Firstly, men create hierarchies. It doesn't matter the setting, the activity, or the age range. Males create hierarchies. Your position within a hierarchies includes certain privileges certainly, but also duties and responsibilities. Women, whether you want to accept it or not, generally occupy a special place within most hierarchies. And, yes, you do have to work harder than men to move away from the default stations of daughter, girlfriend, wife, mother, and grandmother, but the floor is much higher for women than it is for men. You can't fall as far as men before someone offers to catch you. Moving back to the topic at hand, vengeance and revenge are not the same thing, but they can be confused for the other. Revenge is a simple thing. You feel wronged, maybe you were, maybe you weren't, but you feel wronged. So you exact your revenge. YOUR revenge. Revenge is selfish, often petty, and always damning for the one seeking revenge as it is for the one being sought. As the saying goes, if ride out seeking revenge, first dig two graves. Vengeance, or more accurately, retribution can be considered just. But unlike revenge that can and will go wildly out of control with consequences for the seeker and the sought, vengeance is very social. The reason it's social is because it, in part, governs one's position within the hierarchy. If your hierarchy is honor based and your honor is damaged, it is necessary to satisfy the slight by inflicting similar damage against the one that slighted you. How this is done also governs how you are seen going forward. Our society is reputational and trust based. Of late, thanks to certain progreessive social movements, the level of trust has degraded precipitously. It's why women almost universally see the average random man as dangerous rapists and brutes who want to hurt them. Women, since they are generally less physically capable of violence, deal in reputational attacks far more than men do. Modern women will ruin a man's reputation, something he might have struggled to cultivate his entire life, over petty or vindictive reasons that are wholly their own and have little bearing outside of their relationship, but they will happily put them on blast on every social media they have and burn his life to ash. Is it any wonder many men are swearing off women? Feminism and it's ancillaries have much to answer for as our society crumbles. There I've said my piece other than to warn people off of the Tim Walz and the Cackler propaganda train. Kamala got to where she is on the back of destroying evidence as a prosecutor in California and otherwise a good little toady, and like any other person of her caliber placed into a position of power way outside of her capability, she will get us into at least one war and possibly scale it until she's responsible for many deaths just to prove she deserves the position. Whereas Mr. Walz exploded the Minnesota economy during the pandemic. Neither of them are capable or deserving of the power they seek. And I'll say it, Trump is an asshole, but he's at least proven that he won't start more wars that kill young Americans. Lastly, and I mean this from the heart, if you can't vote in the upcoming election, stop carrying water for the propagandists Stateside. I don't care what your opinion of Walz, The Cackler, Trump or Vance is.

[@lorzon]

*CAVEAT*Without having watched the video. Let's not confuse, conflate, or intentionally mislabel abusive beatings with simple spanking. Spanking, or corporal punishment, is a disciplinary action to be used when other less severe methods have proven ineffective. They are to be applied to the buttocks only and aren't supposed to go on for more than 10 or 12 seconds(3-5 swats) and are usually applied with a paddle, a coiled belt(so that it's solid and doesn't whip around to cause injury), or a switch(usually made out of some light, flexible tree limb). The purpose of a spanking is to reassert dominance and associate the pain of the spanking with bad behavior as a form of negative reinforcement to not persist in the behavior that caused the spanking to be necessary. Spankings are not: - done with a closed fist, bat, or other weapon. - applied anywhere aside from the buttocks or upper legs - last longer than 10 - 15 seconds(the actual striking, the fighting to immobilize and chasing might go on longer) It's punishment for perceived infractions and instills respect for social hierarchy and personal boundaries. You can always tell children who are spanked when necessary and the ones who are allowed to run wild. And in my humble opinion, there are far too many adults running around who were never spanked as a child. And to be perfectly clear and to reiterate spanking is not abusive beating. If a child is being beaten, the bastard parent should be tossed in the klink.

[@kshadehyaena]

🙄

[@RedLianaK]

Next time, watch the video first.

[@lorzon]

I did, and nothing that was said changes my original comment in this particular thread. Spanking is legitimate correction for misbehavior, it is not beating. If you were beaten, I'm sorry you had to endure that. But that does not equate to spanking being bad because your mom and/or dad couldn't manage their anger or shame better. Yeah, I'm saying it, Liana your dad was probably a bastard because he was ashamed of himself for not being able to hold a job. That doesn't make ANYTHING he did to you right or proper, but it explains why he was like he was, he didn't want you turning out like him and if you didn't, he accomplished his goal as a parent.

[@RedLianaK]

​@@lorzonJust how loud is the screaming in your head when you close your eyes at night?

[@lorzon]

@@RedLianaK Insufficiently loud enough to spur me to do anything other than pontificate on ye Ole Interwebz.