Owww!
“It’s never ok to hit a woman.”
So a little while back there was this whole Chris Brown / Rihanna domestic abuse thing. And during that time a lady from one of the groups that endeavors to stop domestic abuse got on the radio and said; “Men have to learn that it’s never ok to hit a woman”.
Now I am all for these group that take care of some of the most vulnerable members of our society. They do good work and I donate to them ever Christmas. But still, hold the phone here; “It’s never ok to hit a woman”. This statement just seemed a bit off to me.
I mean what if the woman had a gun? Is it ok then? She’s clearly got the advantage there. Or a sword or even an aluminum baseball bat for that matter? What level of arming makes the playing field equal? What if the woman was a blackbelt and extreme fighting champion? It just seems odd to me to claim it is never ok to hit a woman. It puts women in a roll of perpetual victim, unable to do anything proactive to defend themselves.
On the same program the advocate when on to say “there is never a good justification for violence against women” and again I did a double take. Never? That doesn’t seem right. What if she was a muslem teroist and planning to set off a bomb to destroy Washington DC… well maybe not DC but a place people liked? Isn’t it justified to hit a woman then? Or even on the more mundane level isn’t there things that a woman can do in a relationship that are so horrible that hitting might be an appropriate response?
And again this statement seems to put the woman in a inferior roll where she is not responsible for her actions. If I went into a biker bar and found the biggest guy in there and said “you have no dick” to him. I would be beaten to an inch of my life and everyone would say to me “Why the hell did you do that. Of course he’s going to beat you up. It was his right.” But put a woman in the same situation and it’s wrong for the biker to hit her even thought biker out matches both me and this theoretical woman in terms of strength and fighting skill.
And yet when I think about it, the image of the biker beating on the woman is gut-wrenching where the biker beating on me is a little funny. There is a primitive instinctual level to this debate something coded into our very DNA. Logically there are probably many times when it is “ok to hit a woman” but emotionally our instincts tell us that we can not do that. Is it ok to eat babies? Our instincts say NO! Is it ok touch our eyeballs? Our instincts say NO! Is it ok to hit a woman? Our instincts say NO!
So that brings us to today’s Exiern. Peonie tied Tiffany to a alter and had a bunch of priest experiment on her. That is a situation where I would say it is justified to hit someone. And yet, it just seems wrong to hit Peonie for any reason. So I split the difference. I had Tiffany hit Peonie but I did not show the strike. I have made jokes about it being ok for Tiffany to hit women because she is a woman but honestly it still felt like abuse to show her hitting Peonie. The strange thing is Peonie has hit Tiffany and that seemed perfectly ok. I don’t know if that is because we think of Tiffany as a fighter or we still on some level remember that she used to be a man.
Well…. Peonie did dress Tiffany as if a virgin sacrifice to the Dark Gods
while she was unconscious, then chain her to an altar.
A more tactfull version might have been:
“You ok? Good. Now that that evil wizard is out of our hair, the monks here are going to
despell you. Put this on. It’s magically neutral. And streachy.”
Violence for no reason, not OK. Self-defense, yes. There is a difference between simple violence, and justified violence.
Except that it is not “instinct.” It is simply a cultural construct which is put on you, and everyone else in your culture, since an early age. Likewise, a person who grew up in different cultures think differently, or have different “instincts” which they see as universal and think you are weird for not sharing.
The reason i make this point is because as you stated, thinking it’s bad to hit women is actual part of a complex ideology that places them in an inferior position. However, it is not in any way natural to make women inferior.
Then again, I come from an ideology where all violence is bad, irregardless of which gender is involved in which role, but where self-defense is an appropriate response to violence.
LOL, at least Tiffany acknowledged the possibility of getting hit.
And why is it only never ok to hit women? Does that mean it’s at least sometimes okay to assault men? Children? Pets? Maybe we need a more blanket statement against violence. “There are very few situations that require violence as a solution.”
After looking at the old “Peonie hitting Tiffany” page, I submit that there’s a lot more humor in that situation, which is why it feels okay. Peonie isn’t tough enough to do more than annoy Tiffany, even transformed, even with her back turned. THe “BONK!” sound effect seals the deal. It’s like the funny of a closed-eyes swatfight. Peonie might as well have Nerf Fists, and she knows it.
Peonie was under the control of an evil wizard when she hit Tiffany. That does give her an out, of sorts.
As for the hit? It depends on the level of the hit. If Tiffany just smacked Peonie’s cheek or something like that, there is a significant less level of “not allowed” than if Tiffany just punched Peonie hard enough to leave a black eye or knock out teeth.
However, there is one bit that does pretty much make me forgive Tiffany just now; Peonie was all “I know you’d be angry enough to hit me but I was expecting you to be a guy so you wouldn’t be able to hit me.” Or in other words, she was expecting her gender to protect her.
Sorry. I have to call bullshit on that, and Peonie deserves a whap for what she did.
Rob H.
It’s like my aunt told me once, “never hit a lady, unless she hits you, then she’s not a lady”.
It’s not ok to hit PEOPLE, period, but our society has taught us all, from birth, that guys are violent and women are weak, so most of us have that coded as ‘it’s ok to hit guys if they “deserve” it, but not ok to hit women’. Really, the only time violence is justified is in defense of oneself or of others. Beating someone up for an insult is the sign of a person without the mental capacity to envision alternatives-ie ‘what the f!!k do I care what some random a!!!!!e calls me?’. Tiffany is NOT justified in hitting Peonie as revenge after the fact, because doing so says ‘violence against people is an acceptable response to them doing something you don’t like, or an acceptable way to attempt to ensure they do not do this or something similar again’.
Violence is acceptable as a defense. It is not acceptable as an offense or as a preventative or punitive measure.
I think a typically girly slap from Tiffany followed by a pause panel where they just stare at each other and in the last panel Peonie giggling and Tiffany saying “Oh, crap!” would have been hilarious. The implication being that Tiffany is becoming more feminine behaviourally as well as physically. I may be over thinking this though.
First: Peonie chained Tiff to a freaking altar against her permission. That alone merits a punch, especially given the circumstances given by Rob. I saw it more as Tiff walking up and giving Peonie the old ‘head or gut?’ question 🙂
Second: Hel, you must live a very sheltered life. Nice philosophical words, but they fail in the face of the real world.
Hel, why is it stupid to hit someone over an insult? Reputation is very important for making friends, who can help you succeed at anything you do. You don’t want to be known as a liar, or a womanizer, or trailer trash. If you want to reduce the behavior of tarnishing your reputation, then primary punishment – physical pain – works.
Even if the insults are true, it isn’t good business to let them get away with saying those things. That said, if you can’t hurt them without serious legal repercussions, then yeah, it’s stupid to do it. If it costs you nothing to mess them up, then it’s probably a good move.
The trick is to use violence logically and responsibly. Since most people can’t be counted on to do that, violence is pretty much despised in our society.
In the case of Tiffany, it’s perfectly sensible to jab her in the shoulder or something to let her know not to do that again. Hitting her in the face would be taking it a bit far, though, in my opinion.
Could it be because Tiffany is a Barbarian?
She’d have delivered a Penalty Punch regardless of gender.
From that point of view, she’s treating Peonie as an equal.
I’m enjoying seeing how this is playing out – sociologically, if for no other reason.
See… you’re all missing a crucial point here.
Drowemos states a number of interesting points in his post… but that’s all we have to go on.
It’s all implied.
Tiffany is cracking her knuckles… implying that Peonie is in for some whuppin’…. but we never SEE it.
How do we know that Peonie’s cry (Owwww) isn’t because Tiffany gave her a nipple-twist (naughty!) or the yell is Tiffany herself as she punches a wall in frustration?
Or it could have been Brother Thomas breaking a nail or twisting an ankle after falling in his/her new pair of Jimmy Choos. =)
We don’t know.
All we can do is ‘assume’ based upon what we decide for ourselves will happen.
Personally, though… my bet’s on the Jimmy Choos. =P
Also: The presumed punch does occur off-panel. Peonie can’t have a high pain threshold. Tiffany might have just pulled her hair or given her a wedgie or (yes please) a purple nurple.
My father told me never to hit a woman. That went out the window the day I responded to a Domestic Abuse call at Clarke AFB and the wife jumped me with a butcher knife. Normally I would never raise a hand against a woman, but you understand. There are a few very rare times when the butt of an M-16 comes in really handy.
On the other matter of that little page. I think she was hoping T would be a man again, for much less than moral reasons. Probably lifelong less than moral reasons. Can we believe that P just might be trying to get T back into a male body so she can chase him as an acceptable husband?
I am pretty sure that this strips creator doesn’t want to get into the FF situation. We of course can dream, but I haven’t sen anything yet that indicates P would like to lip-lock T in a female body. I could be wrong, but that is up to the creator to decide.
This is a fun story. I am enjoying it a great deal.
Me
the Mad Hatter
I think its rather simplistic to look at it as you do above, Drowemos. If we are going to take things to extremes it is evident that there are always some situations were you would or could hit a woman. I think its important to remember the context to this discussion. I don’t know what show you listened to, but if its about violence against women we are normally talking about abusive husbands or boyfriends that hit without due cause. For instance because they take out their own shortcomings on them.
In this setting, and I am fairly sure it was this setting they were discussing, it is NEVER okay to hit a woman. Even if she hurts you like no one else with her words you can never lay a hand on her. It is never acceptable to return words with a punch, no matter how smug she may be. You can scream at her and call her names and other things, but never strike her. Heck, these sorry sods we are talking about there probably doesn’t even have the right to scream at their women for they would be in the wrong doing so.
So in short, I think you have taken this matter out of context so the value of the discussion is minimal.
Yet as for the comic, I think that the hit is fine. Its meant to carry a comical effect and I am sure this effect will be obvious in the next instalment. Yet strictly speaking I don’t think it was justified to hit Peoni. What she did was extreme, but she did it with good intent and Tiffany was not harmed in anyway.
Time to add my two cents, as a female reader:
There seem to be two discussions going on. 1) Was it justified for Tiffany to hit Peonie? and 2) How morally sound is “it is never okay to hit a woman”?
1) While i do not think it was “justified” that Tiffany hit Peonie, I can certainly understand it. As mentioned by others, she/he is and always will be a barbarian, and that culture likely has different mores. Also, not really mentioned, Tiffany was not just chained up by priests… She was chained up by priests who she saw as personally responsible for the slaughtering of her people. While dressed as a sacrifice. I think the reaction was reasonable, even if not “justified.” She had been willing to cooperate once the situation was explained, but rather that waiting for her to wake up and explaining, the re-clothed her, chained her down, and then explained?
2)I do not feel that it is “never okay to hit a woman.” I feel that it is “never okay to hit someone sufficiently below you in ability.” If I was a black belt (or similarly skilled) and attacked a pencil pusher accountant, there would be no justification for it. Regardless of what had been said or done by the accountant. The physical threat levels are too different between us. Even though I am female and he is male. The assumption that the male is ALWAYS of greater physical threat, sits as uncomfortably as the idea that two women are of course of the same physical threat level. This is why Tiffany hitting Peonie was not “justified” even though it was reasonable.
(As an addendum to that, I feel that it is just as bad for Peonie to hit Tiffany, since, due to the differences in physical ability, Tiffany should not retaliate in kind. Rough housing, sparring, and general manhandling by peers is one thing. But Tiffany and Peonie will never be peers. Tiffany CAN think on her feet, and is MUCH more physically capable that Peonie, and short of a spell or a potion, I don’t see that ever changing.)
The concept that under no circumstances can women ever be assaulted carries with it the contempt of women same as, under no circumstances can women enter combat situations. If women are the perennial victims in any and all affairs, the concept that women can be equals to men is thrown off the table.
Yes, on the whole women have statistically less upper body strength than men, so physically speaking it is not a level playing field. But that’s not an act-like-a-dick-and-get-away-scott-free card. And in that stead, the saying “under no circumstances should a man hit a woman” should probably more accurately be limited to “under no circumstances is domestic violence acceptable,” since that’s the crux of the issue here.
Similarly, while violence of any sort is abhorrent in practically all social life, the phrase “under no circumstance” is still too strong, not only because it makes one party the victim no matter what the circumstances, but also that it gives the victim a social “out” for situations in which hitting a male would have been tolerable, if not acceptable.
“but if its about violence against women we are normally talking about abusive husbands or boyfriends that hit without due cause” – imo more complex than that because women also hit men without due cause, grab them, etc. Often this is seen as “funny”.
A recent example where if you reverse the guy and girl… http://www.thedreamlandchronicles.com/2009/11/24/page-1005/
Spanking would have been more appropriate.
David, there will always be the odd one out. That does not change the fact that this is a very real issue that is not to trifled with, but I agree that it is a complex matter.
violence is only acceptable with self-defense .
“It’s never OK to hit a woman” is a wrong statement. Just because of a gender one’s not supposed to get hit when that person is, for example, attacking or literally asking for it? I agree that abuse as such is never OK and should never be allowed, but this goes both ways. It’s NOT OK to hit anyone, not women neither men. I never understood it how society is such a two-faced bastard when it frowns when men hit the women but it’s perfectly OK when women hit men. Cases where, for example, the domestic violence is done by women to men are actually not rare, but men don’t speak out about it. Because the society would only do two thins then: first laugh at that man saying “Ha ha, you’re getting beaten by a girl!” and then “Well it was most likely your fault or caused by you!”. What the hell? And this is not such an “odd case”, this is everyday thing and unfortunately way more common then the society realizes. There are also plenty of cases where women intentionally grate and chip away and eat away at the nerve of a man, basically harass one intentionally so much with a single goal to get slapped by that man, so that then they could scream how they’re the victim and being abused and actually hide their own misdeeds. And yes, this is unfortunately also more common then we’d like to admit. One simple example is the wife of the person I know, he was working hard to provide for his family while wife didn’t care about working at all. She liked the easy life at home and doing whatever she wanted, or pretty much nothing. At one moment she “got bored” and decided to cheat her husband with another man. After that deed she became afraid that her husband may found this out and cut off her easy life and so she started to grate at him, literally doing psychological terror. As she confessed to one of her friends one evening after she drank a bit too much, her goal was to “get his husband so on edge with her whining and such so that he’d hit her, then he could use that as a weapon against him whenever needed and if he’d ever found out that she slept with another man, she’d say it’s because he hit her”. To her dismay that friend of her’s was also a good friend with that husband and she told about the wife’s “plan”.
Violence is never a right way to solve problems. Unprovoked violence is never a good thing either and shouldn’t be allowed, no matter whether it’s used against a man or a woman. But when one provokes it or initiates it by himself/herself then that’s the fault of that person and those provokers should receive no sympathy and should be, frankly, be punished as well.
I worked with a woman whose husband’s name was Caine. Caine was a refrigerator with a head, arms as thick as tree trunks, and the disposition of Godzilla. One day a group of young college punks started to maliciously screw with him, she hit him hard, he got angry and broke her nose. The rest of the group ran off. When he told his wife this, she responded, “Caine! You’re not supposed to hit a woman!” To which he responded, “I won’t hit a lady, but I’ll f*** a B***h up.”
Nalano, I like your restriction even better. As discussed, the problem isn’t so much violence as it is domestic violence. “There’s no reason for domestic violence” scans better than “There’s no reason to ever hit a woman”. To quote Chris Rock, “There’s a reason to hit EVERYbody. Just don’t do it.” 🙂
I would go for “It’s never OK to hit people except in cases of defense”.
I won’t even say “self defense”. I witnessed a case where a young girl attacked an elderly man with her fists and fingernails. At some point, a man in his 20s stepped in to defend the elderly man and took several lacerations and contusions himself. Ultimately he struck the girl in order to stop her. She called an abuse prevention line. The counsellor they provided filed charges against him. The charges were dismissed without a hearing.
Even the law recognizes that there are cases of defense that are not even self-defense in which it is OK, although not preferable to hit a human female.
In our situation with Peonie and Typhon-knee (ack) it wasn’t done in defense of anyone… but we would still probably have figured it was just-desserts if he’d (she’d) picked her up and tossed her in the nearest pond.
Tiff did have a good reason to hit P though. The fact that tiff had a different dress on ment that the soldiers or the priest striped Tiff naked, that’s a huge violation of privacy. Then there’s the fact that this was done without her consent. Why didn’t Pione just ask waited till she recovere?
Sorry, she very clearly deserved that punch.
The ends do not justify the means, therefore, Typhon-Knee had every reason to knock P senseless. I would have too, had I been striped, redressed, chained down by people who tried to end my existence, and forced to be part of a failed spell. Just f!!!!!g deserts.
All said allready I guess: Not ok to hit anyone regardless, except in self defense and “funny” situations (which includes this strip, I believe. :))
But then there’s all the various movies/comics/games etc where violence is a rather usual part of the plot… Should we ban all of those? Maybe in the future, when humanity has somehow reached the state of “ultimate peace”. Right now we’re still pretty far from that, I feel, and violence and war is still a great source of inspiration…
And in all such stories, I have to admit that there’s one thing that can really tick me off (or many actually, but let’s keep to the subject): When our main “good-guy type of hero” for reason get pitched in battle vs a female, who’s obviously of at least equal skill as himself, and he goes on saying “No, I won’t hit a woman!”:
That guy DESERVES a beating, and he usually gets it… but often in a funny way that completely messes up the female characters coolness!
And as I speak about female-fighting-coolness: I’m a guy, and I almost always play female characters in any video games if there’s a choice. Why? Just because I like to dress them up in various pieces of leather garment? Well, yeah… there’s a bit of truth to that too… But mainly because I’m all in for a more equal society: Should all women have the right and possibility to become all that a man can be? OF COURSE! Even at the price of sometimes having to take a beating from a pissed off barbaraian woman who’s just happened to once have been a man…
To quote my mother, “If a woman has enough balls to punch you, she has enough balls to get punched back.”
This was what I, a male, was told by my mother at an early age when responding to schoolyard violence. I was raised never to throw the first punch, never to be the first to strike, but to defend myself tooth and nail, regardless of gender.
The reason for this is a simple matter of your upbringing. My mother was in an abusive relationship for a decade before I was born, and we got out when I was two. It, of course, hadn’t always been bad, but abusers always have their excuses. The problem was? There were two abusers, my father AND my mother. There were times, my mother admits, when she would be the first to strike, and times when she was the one left standing at the end of the fight.
In her way, my mother telling me to defend myself from a woman was a warning against women who did the same as she did, with my father.
There are times when hitting a woman IS justified. But there’s also a matter of scale. I’m 5’10. If a 5’1 girl starts attacking me, I’m going to hold back more against her than I would against, say, a 5’10 woman. But for me, the same holds true with men, too. If my 5’1 ex boyfriend attacked me, I’d use the least amount of force I could to stop him, where as, if my 6’5 ex attacked, I’d be picking up a table and breaking it over his head to stop him. 😉
The whole ‘men can’t hit women period’ thing is totally sexist. I get really annoyed with girls- especially feminists- who believe it. One moment they’re saying ‘we’re equals, we can do anything a man can do, there is no weaker sex’ but if she attacks a guy and gets hit all of a sudden it’s ‘you can’t hit a woman, we’re too frail! We’re the weaker sex!’ Make up your dang minds! I think they just conveniently ignore the sexist reasoning behind it so that they can hide behind it if a physical confrontation should start.
In regards to the situation, Peonie clearly new the possible consequences of her actions, yet chose to go ahead with it any ways. It’s my personal belief that if you are going to do something, you should be willing to accept the consequences for your action. I could go on and on about that being the problem of society today, but no one gives a damn anyways, so I wont bother.
My grandma once told me something similar to what Jacob’s Aunty told him. “You NEVER strike a Lady, because a Lady will never give you a reason to.” And I’ve lived by that ever since she told me. I also began training in the martial arts when I was 14, and believe me when I tell you that I’ve met some women who could easily do serious injury to anyone. Thankfully, they all had tremendous amounts of restraint and only used what they knew in defense situations. But one thing that was drilled into us at the dojo was that when somone attacks you, they loose all right to be treated humanely. If they present a danger to you, or to your friends and loved ones, then regardless of their gender it is perfectly acceptable to do seriously bodily harm to them in order to stop them from hurting others. And it all depends on how much they wish to escalate things. Walk away when you can. Hurt rather than maim. Maim rather than kill. Kill only when your own life or the lives of others are in danger.
Also, I don’t think that when someone insults you, that it’s a justifiable reason to strike them. In that case, violence is recourse of a small mind that cannot come up with a way to make the person who’s insulted them loose foolish. If someone says something that makes me angry enough to want to hit them, then that’s a failure on my part. It means that I’ve allowed that person to manipulate my feelings. To push my buttons. Unless someone suffers from some sort of mental illness that prevents them from controlling their feelings (which some people do), there is no reason to get angry enough to commit violence on another person simply because they’ve spoken words we dislike……. Besides, it’s much more satisfying to turn their comments around to make them look foolish.
Now as to Peonie taking advantage of Tiffany being unconscious. That at the very least warrants a spanking. 😀 I can clearly envision the following panel with Peonie rubbing her butt and scowling at Tiffany, who has a satisfied look on her face. When I misbehaved as a child, I got a spanking, and as a result of not wanting to get another one, I didn’t repeat the behaviour that earned me the first one. The message was clear, even to my childhood mind: “Don’t you ever do that again.”
Peony is a princess. She’s apparently quite used to ordering people about. In fact, she was quite dismayed when she could not “arrest” Mr. Narration when he appeared nearby. Just for the fact that she’s a princess, it would probably not be good to strike her, EXCEPT considering the fact that her actions on an emissary of a neighboring kingdom (the northerners) could easily be viewed as an act of war (you NEVER tie down and dress as a sacrifice a woman of another country/ village/ etc. unless you’re wanting or expecting war with them). As a proper retaliation to an ACT OF WAR, violence is perfectly acceptable. Peony losing a few teeth would be getting of easy.
If women want equality they have to accept everything they can’t pick or choose. If it is okay to hit men it is okay to hit women. But they don’t want equality they want special treatment just because they got t!!s.
I don’t care what your race, gender, sexual preference, religion, you attack me I am going to beat the s!!t out of you, and if I have a gun I am going to blow your brains out.
When I was in my early teens, I was persecuted by the older crowd. Eventually I started taking martial arts classes, and that too was used to harass me. However, it came in handy when the persecutors decided to sic a young man with significant developmental disabilities (fething political correctness) against me. I managed to block every blow. And eventually walked away (he couldn’t keep up). Not once did I throw a punch back.
I try to avoid physical confrontations. I’m more the “turn-the-other-cheek” type (to the point that once the assistant manager of a grocery store where I worked decided to punch me for some reason I never got out of him; I stared at him while I pulled my cheek out of my braces (without flinching), he blanched, and fled for some odd reason).
Despite this, I see nothing wrong in what Tiffany is going to do to Peonie. While I would not do this… and while I’d intervene if I saw someone attacking another person in RL (actually pulled my car over on the side of the road and grabbed a tire iron out of my trunk when I saw three punks kicking a fourth while he was down on a bridge; all four ran off without me getting close to them – probably was an amusing sight as I was in a dress shirt and tie), I honestly don’t think I’d intervene in this sort of situation. Peonie not only did something that betrayed a trust there, but she also stated “I’m a girl and shouldn’t get hit for this.”
Actually, when you think of it, she said “if you were a man, you’d not hit me.” Nice way to emasculate a guy-turned-girl now, isn’t it? ^^
Rob H.
This may sound odd but I don’t go by the idea of not hitting a women, if a situation arises and a group of people are beating on a single person i step in on the side of fairness (not the best case for my health) I do try to stop further conflict but there are times where you can’t sort everything by words. In my experience I it is not uncommon for the the groups attacking a single person being mostly women.
Like tangent i was bullied and took up martial arts but I can’t let a unfair fight take place, usually ending in me protecting the someone half beaten already, I have taken satisfaction in that most of these groups of people have done more damage to themselves as I’m a bony git.
I read “if you were a man, you’d not hit me” in Tangents post and it occured to me that if Tiff was a man again she’d be happy enough about the outcome not to want to hit anybody. But Peonie didn’t phrase it that way (she used “couldn’t hit me”, not “wouldn’t want to hit me”). So we’re basically down to, Peonie did something she knew was wrong enough that someone would want to commit violence. The outcome was neutral, but it was a definite violation.
Suppose Tiff had done everything to Peonie that happened to ‘him’ in an attempt to change her into a guy because “I know she’d enjoy being a guy, because who wouldn’t!”
Actually, the reason doesn’t matter, but what do you suppose would be Peonie’s feelings about it?
Or suppose someone else, a male villain say, had done it, to either of them, for whatever inscrutable reasons. What would be their response then? And our response?
Personally, I think Phoebe got off lightly – Tiff allowed her knowledge of Phoebe’s good intentions to color her response. So she’s lucky.
the problem is the original ideahas been a bit bent it actually goes “never strike a lady” emphasis on lady , because usually if they truly deserve a smack its due to something very non lady like.
Male, female, it doesn’t matter, if you’re big enough to hit someone, you better be big enough to take the hit that’s likely to come back at you. I never got the whole “It’s NEVER ok to hit a woman” thing, simply because, well, if some chick goes up and flat out decks a guy, well, she was big enough to throw a punch, she better be big enough to take one in return. Now I completely HATE senseless violence and domestic abuse makes my blood boil, mostly due to the fact that I was a ‘victim’ (Much as I detest that word) of such when I was younger and my father got drunk, though he made one mistake: He thought I would be scared of him when I got old enough to fight back, and he was wrong.
Now some women can take a hit and deal one right back at ya, heck, at 6’1″ barefoot I’ve bested some ‘macho men’ in a fight when they thought boobs meant weakness and they were stupid enough to strike at me first, the fact of the matter is, gender is not an indication of strength or weakness, in that aspect it is the individual person’s skills, ability, tactic, strength and agility that come into play. I will say a lot of women (Speaking from my experience) seem to think they are weaker than men because it is drilled into their heads so much growing up, without the confidence and drive to put up a good fight, you’re always going to be bested, no matter what gender you are, women are just more targeted for this ‘programming’ from a young age.
What I’m trying to say here is that, as a woman myself, I am highly offended by the fact that so many treat us like fragile little flowers and worse yet, some expect us to act like delicate little toys, sorry, but when I can pick Mr. Macho up and throw him over my shoulder without any real effort and then walk around with him up there, I think it’s only proper for people to realize that I’m not exactly delicate just because of my gender.
Also, I don’t blame Tiff for popping the princess one, honestly, I’ld have prolly right out grabbed her by the throat, pinned her to a wall and ask her just what the heck she was thinking dressing me like that and having me tied down.
This girrr… boy is really, really too violent.
Nearly everyone here seems so level-headed and relatively courteous, saying almost everything I’d like to say. Where are you when I’m on other websites?!
Anyway, I believe people should be treated equally and with respect, unless they prove themselves to not deserve it. Sexism pisses me off, whether it’s the social inequalities that females enjoy in the United States society and other societies similar to ours, or the way women are discriminated against in the work place (after being hired) and political fields.
When I was in high school, I saw a lot of girls hitting guys. It was often funny to the girl, but she would be using such force that the punch (as it often was) was audible. “Comical” situations of females hitting males are not always comical. In real-life it’s rarely in good fun.
I have spent a lot of time contemplating “justifiable” and unjustifiable aggression and in using information from every source I could find, the answer to this problem seems to be to freely teach everyone how to exude that animalistic confidence that is conveyed through non-verbal communication to prevent the conflict, all together. Tangent seems to have this ability down. (By the way, I said animalistic confidence because this body, facial and tonal communication is done and understood by the vast majority of animals. I did not mean the person would have to act feral.)
Shonen anime/manga has opened my eyes to the most interesting of phenomena: the idea of fully non-malevolent fighting. It’s not very common in today’s societies, but the romanticized “warrior spirit” can still be found. It’s a beautiful thing when two people enter into a fight bearing no malice towards the other and fight to get an understanding of the others’ ideals, feelings, will and passion that cannot be communicated verbally. These feelings are not ones of hate, and this scenario will almost never be found in boxing and UFC matches, and even though it’s mournfully rare, it’s still out there and a potential situation. If done correctly, there will be no ill will between all parties involved before, during and after the fight.
After thought: The quickest way to stomp out sexism (against both sides) through understanding would require magic: everyone on Earth switching between the two sexes on a monthly bases, while the people have to start out with treating both sexes as they would normally, in their society. In a couple years, tops, this condition would eliminate sexism. (Although, for the guys who would not be mindful of women who are pregnant, they should have to spend nine more months as pregnant women, for the sake of understanding their situation.)
The interesting thing is, we have had dozens of pages of a woman pounding on every male in sight, and all anyone does is cheer her on. (Me too, btw)
Then, she (implied) thwacks a female who deserved some sort of whacking, most of the reasons covered above but also because she TOOK AWAY HER CHOICE AND CONTROL! Over a life-altering issue. Also because she in fact exposed everyone else present to the same problem, though she didn’t know that.
So endless pounding on males… YAY! BRING IT ON! Arguably deserved ‘owww’ from a maiden… SOCIAL DEBATE COMING OUT THE YINGYANG!
Bartender, I’ll have the standard! No wait, make it a double!
As a woman I’ve hit a guy a few times, mostly its a shoulder punch and we’re joking around.
I’ve done it seriously only a few times since i got boobs. One he deserved and i should have got up and done it a few more times just to be safe. In the other case (i was bonkers on bad pill homone conflict) i deserved to be hit back and he didn’t because with our strenghth difference he thought it was unfair.
Its never okay to hit soemone who can’t handle it. If its in play then you have to know how far you can go. I can punch guys but i can’t wrestle with them because they just give in. But i can playfight with some freinds, we leave bruises but we go to the pub after and dance. I’d never hit soemone weaker than me unless they hit me first.
I hate when females say things like ‘males who can’t change a ligth bulb are wortless’. It is OK for females not to know how to change a ligth bulb ? If a male were to judge women by their knitting skills, he would be called chauvinist pig. Good job researching weird gender-rules.
I’m in a unique situation, I can’t punch, or flick, poke or even touch someone else. I’m a quadriplegic. So my thoughts are observation based. I believe you shouldn’t hit some one else first, and that if you do fight, be as human as possible. If I was 6’2 and a 5’4 woman hit me, I’d probably just push them away, or grab there arms. If it’s a 5’11 man, I’ll be hitting, but probably not full on. But, being in a wheelchair, I don’t really get into physical fights. Sometimes I do bump my friends for a laugh, but comedy is different. I think Peonie deserves a punch in the shoulder/arm.
If you attack me, you cease to have gender. You become an opponent.
Simply put it this way: I don’t like fighting. I don’t hit women, but I also don’t hit men. I can get away with this because I’m 6’2″ and broad-shouldered. I don’t work out, I ‘m NOT in good shape, but because I’m not actually fat but happen to be large, I just sort of discourage fights. I also work hard to have a calming personality, so there’s that too.
But if (for whatever reason) someone DID decide to fight me, I would try and end it in the quickest and most painless way possible. And if that means hitting them in the face so they back off for a second, I would. Regardless of gender. Of course, this is only if I’m under the impression they really want to hurt me. And I’d still try to talk them down.
Yeah, I don’t have much use for violence.
BARBARIAN
they can hit anybody, especially women. There is only Honor in hitting other men but meh you don’t need that ALL the time. Thats what paladins and knights are for.