Our thanks to John for sending us this, a photograph of a Women’s Aid anti-male poster. He writes:
Mike, my wife found this advert on the back of each toilet stall door at Trinity College in Dublin in July. The advert shows a young man looking over the shoulder of a young woman, and reads, “Know the difference between Safe and Sinister. 2in2u.ie. Spot the danger signs. Protect yourself and your friends online. http://www.2in2u.ie. Women’s Aid.”
Young women are facing this toxic propaganda every time they use a toilet at the university. This constant viewing must surely condition them to think of men and boys as creepy spies constantly looking over their shoulder – as it’s designed to. It consciously and subconsciously shapes their views and creates a false and negative stereotype of men.
It is also discriminatory as there is no equivalent advert in the men’s toilet. It creates anxiety amongst young women, and could turn them into nervous wrecks when it comes to their views towards men and boys.
I hope you can give some exposure to this anti-male poster campaign.
Regards,
<name redacted>
They just keep passing laws that take away more and more away from men while we come here to complain about it instead of getting off our ass and doing something!
Decided to have a look at the website promoted on that poster and it’s quite interesting, particularly the quiz. Apparently the site is a “vital source of information for young women” so lets look at the quiz. I tested it out and teh correct response to every question is A
Question 1: “Does your boyfriend complain about your friends and say you spend too much time with them? ”
Correct answer: “No, he likes my friends and knows I love hanging out with them and respects that.”
In other words, even if you partner has one friend who’s a compete idiot (or worse) you’re not allowed to utter a single word hinting as such. Even response B where the boyfriend “sometimes” complains is not permitted.
Question 2: “Does he pass comment on how you look or dress?”
Correct answer: “He gives me compliments, but that’s it really.”
Again, no negative feedback about your girlfriends appearance is permitted, no matter how true or constructive it might be.
Question 3: “Does he complain any time you spend time away from him?”
Correct answer: “No, he knows I’m involved in other things and respects that – he has his own life too.”
So, no complaining and don’t you dare be keen on spending time with the person you want to marry or show that it makes you happy.
Question 4: “Does he send you constant texts checking up on you when you’re not with him?”
Correct answer: “We keep in touch, but no more than I do with other friends.”
One of the wrong answer is as follows: “Sometimes, he likes to know what I’m up to.”
This question and set of answers is the worst of the lot. Women’s Aid deem it unhealthy for a guy to sometimes like to know what his girlfriend is up to. Furthermore, they’ve decided that his frequency of communications with her should be absolutely no different to any other random friend.
I really have to wonder if any of the feminists behind the organisation have actually even been in a serious romantic relationship with anyone else. Furthermore, for an organisation supposedly concerned about the safety of women then it’s a pretty shitty message for them to encourage women to think its wrong to actually tell the most important people in their lives what they’re up to. If Women’s Aid get their way its’ going to make missing persons cases a hell of a lot harder to solve as no missing female will have ever told their partners very much at all about any of their planned movements.
TBH if a women is in a relationship with a guy who just “keep in touch”, doesn’t really like to know what she’s up to, isn’t bothered about spending time with her and isn’t able to be honest in conversations with her about something as basic as clothing or any obnoxious friends/acquaintances then it’s probably not going to work out too well in the long run if it’s already off to such a poor start.