Jules Crittenden has a good analysis of why men are hit in the groin:
If I had to get Freudian or Jungian or whatever about it, I’d say it has something to do with humiliating a patriarchal power figure in the place where his power resides, as an expression of rebellion, resentment to the suppression of matriarchal blah blah blah and as retribution for any prior and future offenses anyone of the offending gender may commit. But I suspect most ball-kick humor is actually perpetrated by men, which makes me more inclined to get Goodallian about it. As any chimp could tell you, kicking the alpha male in the balls is good fun if you can get away with it but beating up mom is bad form.
posted by Helen at 12:14 PM
7 Comments:
When fighting a stronger man, it's also the one thing that will equalize the battle.
That or a gun.
Humor me, I'm not trying take this off-topic. Same subject, different sex.
Last month I decided to view a film at the public library. The film was "The Quiet Man" with John Wayne, 1952. This film was supposed to be a classic and I thought I would enjoy it.
I was absolutely repulsed. The plot involves an unhappy married couple. Part of the plot is like this: The John Wayne character doesn't like something his wife has said to him, so he spanks her. Later they are in a crowd, the wife gets mouthy again and a woman in the crowd offers John Wayne a switch to beat the wife, and he does. After the wife is beaten she sees the error of her ways and promises to be subservient and quieter in the future.
So after the movie I approach the nice old gentleman who takes great pains to select the movies for the library and I gently express my concerns. He sort of looked at me totally confused, he didn't see a problem with the movie at all. He felt because it was a classic American movie it was okay for public consumption.
If you read the IMDB reviews, you see the mostly male commenters think it is a great movie and have no problem with the violence on the wife. Getting back to what Helen was talking about, we see gender violence and sometimes we don't check ourselves. Just because the general public thinks it's a hoot does that mean we can't question it? Is it right? Is it legal, moral or ethical? If the rest of the world jumped off a cliff would you jump along with them?
Cham, I will watch that movie, because if what you say is true that is really idiotic sexism. But usually it's not so dramatic as portrayed by the feminist (and I think you are a feminist by some definitions) and even if it is - it was a different time in which women also pulled their benefits. Like not getting drafted.
In any case, all of the "spanking the wife" idea is gone today, but the traditional roles of men remain.
I guess they will always have to remain, because someone has to friggin' do the real work of society. But still ...
I have to admit that I laugh at the crotchtastrophies on you tube and America's Funniest Home Videos. It shames me a bit to admit, but it is true.
I cannot say that it is any hostility toward men as I bear none. Perhaps it is something unconscious, perhaps it is from my mother who would cackle at slapstick humour, but there it is.
Trey
If the groin shots were a rare thing it might be relatively harmless, but every year there is more and more of it in more and more movies and television programs, with increasing levels of violence and cruelty, such as the Taser scene in "The Hangover." The police are actually doing this to men, and many men have been completely and irreversibly emasculated by it, some even left incontinent and forced to wear diapers for life. Yet the audience laughs at it anyway much as the Romans celebrated the brutal killings of Christians in their arenas. Celebrating cruelty is a bad thing, and when that cruelty is always directed at the same group of victims then it is an indication of a pathological hatred towards that group. In this case, the hated group is the entire male sex.
are we that out of control as a group that we need to be herded?
we rape, we fight, we talk loudly, we are physically strong (intimidating?), we see the gaps between things and drive confidently past...instead of slowing down. we build, lift, cut, drill, grind and otherwise construct, and we don`t incessantly think before we just do.
hmmm. i could see where there might be a broblem.
we are just naughty little boys who haven`t grown up yet, and we need to be told a thing or two about the "real" world.
and so along comes the ubermom and her minions.
when the bureaucracy become more and more feminised, then any assertive act will be seen as threatening...a potential attack needed to be pre-empted.
for some, even post-secondary education isn`t enough to castrate. more insidious forms must be implemented.
orwell missed this one by a country mile.
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