itt a strange man asks if you saw the ass on that one

Slammin, but I say so with certain reservations.

Geez could I post more about my dumb story? Sry for monopolizing thread.

! not dumb, no need to apologize...rape and the threat of rape are kind of at the heart of this thread, i think?

I don't think "dumb" is the world for that story.

I know but I'm just self-conscious about posting so much on one thread. Damn you ppl for making me think! I blame you all. ;)

ha yeah eventually all the things i have to say about this become personal, too. :-/

I guess that in some ways that is inevitable. I'm a pretty open person but after I wrote that all I was like damn I overshared etc.

move to TMI? srsly?

If E wants me to I will.

No!! Wait do you think it's TMI? I think I'm totally OK with it being here and ppl seeing it I was just sort of surprised that I'd shared all that without hesitation. In the end it's a story about some asshole and not something that I'm ashamed of or care about ppl reading.

fwiw E I don't feel like you (or anyone else) overshared or said anything TMI.

Yeah no, me neither. Leave it where it is imo.

but thanks for asking Ev!

when this thread was just getting started, on that fateful friday night, I balked at posting "hey sounds like you ran into my Uncle Grant," cause I've got this minnesota bachelor farmer uncle, black sheep of the family, goes by the name of Grant see, and he's family infamous for having once remarked about how "all men should be allowed one rape" in front of my sister, who was 16 at the time. to make things worse, he pressured her into eating an oyster later that night, which she promptly vomited up. for the rest of the trip out there she was visibly creeped out by him, and remains so to this day.

anyway, seems kinda counter-productive to discuss the ~these~ guys in your own family in an otherwise productive thread, but in the spirit of relating personal or at least familiar anecdotes regarding rape and the threat of rape... that's my Uncle Grant story.

he's family infamous for having once remarked about how "all men should be allowed one rape" in front of my sister, who was 16 at the time.

jesus christ

Pressuring someone to eat a raw oyster has no place in that story, imo. I had to be goaded into eating my first oyster, too. Now it's like my favorite food. But that is NOT a metaphor for anything, to be perfectly clear.

talk about controlling the "bad thoughts." who said anything about metaphors? it helps develop the character imo, slimy foods/slimy comments. feel free to tell your own ~that~ guy story and edit whatever details you want.

Now wait, you said he advocated rape early in the evening, and then "to make things worse" made her eat an oyster. Bit of a non-sequitor. She probably will hate oysters forever now because of him, but that's hardly the oyster's fault.

I'm v protective of oyster eating.

yeah, there's being creeped out about your rapist uncle, and then there's being creeped out about your rapist uncle while simultaneously experiencing shellfish-induced nausea. I didn't say "what's worse, an oyster got ate."

It sounds more like uncle-induced nausea.

(Or whatever. I'm not really all pissy about this or anything.)

There's something about oysters I heard once, um wtf was it now

"To make things worse, he made her eat green m&m's."

fwiw, i spend a lot of time trying to see stuff like this from a woman's point of view. and i understand completely why one wouldn't want to be constantly subjected to the quietly (and not so quietly!) leering attentions of strangers and acquaintances and maybe even friends. and the fact that male desire and sexual/romantic emotion is so frequently tangled up in violence and sickening depravity depresses me to no end.

i think i at least half understand the world of threat and gross, clammy, male graspingness that many (most) women inhabit, at least occasionally, whether they want to or not. all of that sucks, and is terribly unfair, and it's oppressive i'm sure, to some more so than others, and i totally agree that it shouldn't be that way. i try hard in my own life to provide the best counterexample i can.

but i'd also like to be able to explore this stuff in a fairly straightforward manner without the need to credential myself as a basically decent person. i am, honest!

finally, i get seriously bummed by the tendency of some people to warp ideas they disagree with into idiotic reductions that they can then mock like schoolchildren. but it's the internet, and i suppose ilx is way better than most boards for that kind of thing...

Speaking of schoolchildren, I had to take a scrubby sponge and clean my girlfriend's name and some filthy words off a wall of her apartment building a couple weeks ago, because someone had written something about her, and then someone else had responded with extra disgustingness, bathroom-wall style.

i spend a lot of time trying to see stuff like this from a woman's point of view

I try not to, tbh. It bums me out.

hokay, forgive me good people...

***

i made my all-too-obvious points earlier about the freedom of thought because i think there IS a contemporary tendency - both here @ ilx and in the world at large - to view people's inner selves in rather puritan terms. to insist in a weirdly passive way, without quite saying it outright, that all decent people MUST at all times be free of certain kinds of thinking.

this attitude results in constant self and community policing, especially among serious-minded liberal types (like myself). and in response to the pressure of this constant policing, people often go around making a big show of how pure and perfect their minds are, and how awful Awful AWFUL! any deviation from the social norm would be.

we must never show any evidence of racism... no wait - racism is not the right word...

we must never show evidence of anything that anyone else might possibly construe as racial insensitivity, ever, upon pain of being branded a bigot and publicly shunned. same goes for sexism (though as laurel points out, to a lesser degree). to display even the slightest trace of sexual oddity or awkwardness is to risk being labeled the worst sort of pervert.

this sad and stunted psychic police state is in part a product of what the conservatives like to call "political correctness run amok!!!" and of the larger social tendency to politically polarize everything we do, say and think. here, of course, it's a also product of the weird, competitive snarkiness of messageboard society - people always trying to prove how cool & on top of shit they are, so quick to mock or lambaste their less evolved peers.

fundamentally, i suppose it's nothing new. we've always had social rules that govern what one can and can't say in public, and how one should say certain things if one cares to risk it. but i nevertheless suggest that we've become extraordinarily puritan about certain thing over the past 40 years or so, often in ways that really and truly suck.

i say this as someone with a great deal of respect for the idea that we should be aware of cultural differences and sensitive to the political, social and personal implications of our words and deeds. i'm not bagging on political correctness, per se, but rather on the way we've allowed ourselves to become straightjacketed by a creeping rigidity & intolerance that i don't think we're sufficiently aware of.

ahh yes the psychic police state that asks us to treat others with common decency

sry if thats the kind of 'snarkiness' u dont like but uhhh that whole post is crazytown

also if that's the kind of intolerance that we can expect from ILX, then that's what I like about ILX.

ILX has blown for a few years now, however

Yeah, nothing is the way it used to be. Ain't that a bitch?

It's ok w me

that IS the kind of snarkiness that bums me out, deej.

like you, like everybody, i only post this shit cuz i think i'm otm in some way (yay me). it's cool that u disagree, but i've noticed that when we disagree, you often don't really offer anything constructive. instead, you just flip shit in this offhand "sit down and shut up" manner.

you don't have to engage any more than you want to, but i kinda hate that dumb-it-down-and-shut-it-down approach. i'm not saying that people don't have to treat each other with common decency, and i've got enough respect for your intellect to assume that you know that.

c'mon, man, meet me halfway...

contenderizer no one is responding to your posts because you seem to be responding to posts that no one made

i made my all-too-obvious points earlier about the freedom of thought because i think there IS a contemporary tendency - both here @ ilx and in the world at large - to view people's inner selves in rather puritan terms. to insist in a weirdly passive way, without quite saying it outright, that all decent people MUST at all times be free of certain kinds of thinking.

literally no one on this thread has even implied this

we must never show evidence of anything that anyone else might possibly construe as racial insensitivity, ever, upon pain of being branded a bigot and publicly shunned. same goes for sexism (though as laurel points out, to a lesser degree). to display even the slightest trace of sexual oddity or awkwardness is to risk being labeled the worst sort of pervert.

like i dont know where on ilx you are spending time that you would think this is true!!

especially given that someone dropped an n-bomb on this thread and it wasnt addressed for like 100 posts

anyway my disagreement with you is twofold

1) there is very little self-policing, on ilx, and frankly, in the world at large, w/r/t racial or sexual insensitivity--that is why this thread is almost a thousands posts long

2) self-policing w/r/t to racial or sexual insensitivity--w/r/t sensitivity in general--is a good thing

fundamentally, i suppose it's nothing new. we've always had social rules that govern what one can and can't say in public, and how one should say certain things if one cares to risk it. but i nevertheless suggest that we've become extraordinarily puritan about certain thing over the past 40 years or so, often in ways that really and truly suck.

finally i am now genuinely wondering what "really and truly sucks" about a world where people say less racist and sexist shit (nb we DO NOT LIVE IN THIS WORLD.) like what are you missing out on here?? the n-word??? your right to tell a woman how much you like her rack?!

I have a tiny bit if sympathy for contenderizer's point of view because one of my biggest pet peeves is when someone tells me to do something I'm either already doing or about to do, so his argument makes sense to me from the "I am already policing my thoughts, get off of my back" angle.

The problem is that this argument never seems to come from that angle.

dude deej said this upthread

'thoughts are sacrosanct' makes no sense. of course they are -- no one knows your thoughts. but goole's point, if im reading him right (& if so, then i agree) is that thoughts shape your worldview, and that being aware of how these thoughts are functioning, *why* they arise & how it might affect your outlook on the world, MATTERS & is worthy of ANALYSIS. simply backing up & saying "whoa whoa whoa -- these thoughts are sacrosanct!!" misses how thoughts work. They aren't a movie that flickers through your brain, they're your entire worldview, your natural reactions.

which is obviously a real, thoughtful response to what you said

the fact that you think this is about your mind being perfect and politically correct all the time makes it seem like you are reading some other thread

'thoughts are sacrosanct' makes no sense. of course they are -- no one knows your thoughts.

sacrosanct means "sacred" and especially "beyond reproach". Not "unknown" or "unknowable".

Not taking a side in this little beef, I'm just saying.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/eb/CMXCloacamaximaII.jpg

Is this the ass the thread is about? Sure seems like it to me.

itt a doobie borther asks if you saw the rear-mounted prop on that one

If someone starts up that prop, that ass is in for some immediate and severe reduction surgery.

'jetpack: the early experiments'

finally i am now genuinely wondering what "really and truly sucks" about a world where people say less racist and sexist shit (nb we DO NOT LIVE IN THIS WORLD.) like what are you missing out on here?? the n-word??? your right to tell a woman how much you like her rack?!

I don't think contenderizer is advocating for a world in which people are given carte blanche to be outwardly insensitive all the time -- more like a world where people aren't made to feel subhuman for thinking or saying certain "unacceptable" things. I mean, most people know they're not supposed to think or express thoughts that are politically incorrect or morally reprehensible, but it happens, anyway, because the brain is a complex, fertile thing and people have flaws and make mistakes.

The flipside is that other people are made to feel subhuman by these unacceptable things and what goes around comes around. If you don't want people to think you're a racist, don't do or say racist things. If you don't want people to think you're a sexist, don't do or say sexist things. It's a pretty unambiguous point, IMO.

The big issue here is that when these things happen, no one ever seems to want to apologize for what they did until someone literally screams at them; if the apologies/willingness to show concern/remorse for hurting other people was more forthcoming, I don't think people would be so "don't do it in the first place" about it.

Regarding no one in particular, I take it.