A juxtaposition
March 12th, 2009
Lenny summarises a Home Office study on violence against women:
16% of people in England and Wales think it is acceptable for a man to beat his wife or girlfriend if she nags; 13% think it is acceptable for a man to beat his wife or girlfriend if she flirts with other men; 20% think it is acceptable for a man to beat his wife or girlfriend if she dresses in sexy or revealing clothing in public; 11% think it okay to beat if the wife or girlfriend doesn’t treat the man with respect; 8% think it okay to beat if she is caught cheating.
Further, 36% think a woman should be held co-responsible for being raped if she is drunk; 26% if she is wearing revealing or sexy clothing; 43% if she flirts heavily beforehand; 49% if she does not clearly say ‘no’; 42% if she is using drugs; 47% if she is a prostitute; 14% if she is out walking alone at night.
Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre in a speech to the society of editors:
The judge found for Max Mosley because he had not engaged in a “sick Nazi orgy” as the News of the World contested, though some of the participants were dressed in military-style uniform. Mosley was issuing commands in German while one prostitute pretended to pick lice from his hair, a second fellated him and a third caned his backside until blood was drawn.
Now most people would consider such activities to be perverted, depraved, the very abrogation of civilised behaviour of which the law is supposed to be the safeguard. Not Justice Eady. To him such behaviour was merely “unconventional”.
Nor in his mind was there anything wrong in a man of such wealth using his money to exploit women in this way. Would he feel the same way, I wonder, if one of those women had been his wife or daughter?
As Justin notes, dacre’s Daily Mail has no problems spicing up an article on degrading advertisments to women up with some of the advertisments in question, despite Dacre’s moralising…
Do you think the results found in this Home Office study are surprising, considering the combination of patriarchal morality as displayed by this prominent newspaper editor in his speech and the salaciousness of the newspaper he edits?
Categories: Feminism
