Comments on: Torture

By: Feministe » U.S. Marine Guilty of Raping Woman in the Phillipines

Feministe » U.S. Marine Guilty of Raping Woman in the Phillipines — Mon, 04 Dec 2006 15:34:44 +0000

[...] Sexual violence has permeated much of the war in Iraq, and we shouldn’t be surprised when U.S. soldiers — most of whom have grown up in a culture that eroticizes violence, and all of whom have been trained within a sexist, homophobic institution that further ties sex to violence and systematically denigrates women — commit violent sexual acts, or associate female sexuality with humiliation. Case in point: Torture pictures, which, as the article said, are taken with “the aesthetic of pornography.” As Twisty points out, there is littlte more humiliating than putting women’s underwear on men’s heads — because there’s something humiliating about being a woman. And sexual violence has been utilized in almost every conflict since before the Iliad — to demoralize the enemy by sexually conquering “their” women, to “pollute” or get rid of certain ethnic groups by attempting to impregnate women and thereby dillute the unwanted ethnicity’s bloodline (see Darfur, Yugoslavia), to systematically torture, to promote bonding among male soldiers. [...]

By: Ron Sullivan

Ron Sullivan — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 03:27:40 +0000

Pony nails it again.

For the record: Yeah, I have worked and volunteered at nursing homes. But you don’t have to go that far from home, really.

By: Pony

Pony — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 20:20:09 +0000

Julybirthday? It’s possible your grandmother is just uncaring and a too too tool of the patriarchy for bleaching. Then again, it’s possile there are other reasons. And if you still don’t get it, volunteer at a nursing home for a couple months.

By: julybirthday

julybirthday — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 18:46:48 +0000

On the subject of underwear: my grandmother finally asked the family to stop including her husband in our habit of giving all male family members goofy, colorful boxer shorts for Christmas. When we asked why, she said she preferred that he wear white shorts, so she could “Clorox” them. Because clearly anything that had touched male genitals needed to be bleached to high heaven.

By: finnsmotel

finnsmotel — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 17:17:09 +0000

“the brutality of the panties”

This cracked me up. I would’ve liked it as the heading! ;-)

By: Theresac

Theresac — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 14:30:50 +0000

Wow. Just…wow. I don’t know what to say except you are brilliant, Twisty. Just brilliant. You are spot on.

My only question would be this; due to the fact that this particular culture treats women in the most abusive, subservient, misogynistic manner anyway (worse than North Americans), would the panties on the head thing be even more of an insult to them? Women are less than nothing to these people (men) so IMO, this would be humiliation on a level like no other.

By: teffie-phd

teffie-phd — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 14:10:55 +0000

Luckynkl: too bad you didn’t aim lower.

Twisty: I would expect nothing less of those who torture than to replicate their own misogyny. Though I tire of a media that can’t seem to examine these kinds of actions without some acknowledgement of gender.

By: Ban the Burqua « Hidden Dragon

Ban the Burqua « Hidden Dragon — Sun, 26 Nov 2006 13:33:28 +0000

[...] Over at I Blame the Patriarchy, they are griping about the misogyny of putting women’s underwear on the heads of Muslim Terrorists at Abu Graib. Sheesh. Who has the perspective here? [...]

By: Luckynkl

Luckynkl — Sun, 26 Nov 2006 09:12:45 +0000

One day, I was walking through the park, and came upon a man playing a little pickle with his son, who was about 7. The man was obviously a bully and was needling his son by telling him he threw like a girl. He threw the ball at his son, really hard, and the boy of course, couldn’t catch it. As the ball rolled by my feet, I could see the look of misery on the kid’s face. I picked the ball up and the man held his hands up so I obliged him and threw the ball to him.

Ok, ok. I confess. I played baseball for a lot of years and I have a rifle of an arm that’s deadly accurate. I didn’t just toss it to the man. I shot that ball into his hands like it was blown out of a cannon. The man of course couldn’t handle it and dropped it, and then started dancing around, yowling in pain and frantically shaking his hands from the sting of it. I said to the boy, “Who knows? Maybe when you grow up, you’ll be lucky and throw like a girl, too.” The boy’s delight was obvious. His whole face just lit up like a Christmas tree and he gave me a grin as wide as the Mississippi. I winked at him and went on my way.

It wasn’t the first time, nor the last, I gave a man a real attitude adjustment and made him eat his words piping hot and smiled as he choked on them.

By: What I forgot to include in yesterday’s essay would fill a book at I Blame The Patriarchy

Sat, 25 Nov 2006 18:23:42 +0000

[...] Register « Torture [...]