#as a society we traumatise ALL of our children and it's so normal that we don't for the most part realise it's happening

[cassolotl]

The thing is, it's very easy to control/train a child by making them feel ashamed.

I get it, parenting is really hard and takes up a lot of time and energy, and we need to keep a lot of time and energy freed up for work to earn money to have houses and buy food and so on. That means that a lot of parenting techniques are geared towards "how can I get my child to behave in a socially acceptable way without having to pay attention to them or interact with them as much?"

I'm glad that as a society we are learning that it's not okay to inflict physical pain and bodily harm on our doofus babies who don't know stuff because they were born more recently, I think that's a really good step.

But also, I really don't think shame and punishment is good for any human at any age.

There's this trend in our culture, based on my own experience/vibes, for dog welfare to always be a little bit ahead of child welfare. So like, it has been illegal to beat an animal for many, many years around here, but in Wales hitting a child has been illegal only since 2022 (last year), and it's still totally legal in England. And looking a few steps ahead of that, there's a pretty strong trend in dog training at the moment towards force-free training, which has no punishment at all, but still people think it's okay to punish a child or make a child feel ashamed.

Stuff that isn't okay to do to/with an adult shouldn't be permitted for children. Children are people like adults are, they're conscious and sentient like adults are, and also they are much more vulnerable to long-term psychological harm. What would you ideally do with your friend if they did something you didn't like [and you had a responsibility to stick around]? You would sit down and talk with them, and/or facilitate them having the support and information they needed, until they understood why what they had done was wrong/inappropriate.

Yes, children are doofuses because they were born way more recently than us, and so there is a lot more that they need to learn to be healthy members of society. That means you will need to spend 73 hours per day teaching them and helping them think, so that they can learn how to be people. Yes, that means that two humans who work to earn money to exchange for shelter and food do not have enough time to be good parents due to the laws of physics. That's because society is broken.

And also, parenting using shame is harmful. Making people feel ashamed is bad, and children are (short, inexperienced) people, and it is nuts to me that this is news to anyone.

A lot of people around me are having kids and every day it becomes more apparent that hitting your children to punish them is insane because literally everything can be a horrible punishment in their eyes if you frame it as such.

Like, one family makes their toddler sit on the stairs for three minutes when he hits his brother or whatever. The stairs are well lit and he can see his family the whole time, he’s just not allowed to get up and leave the stairs or the timer starts over. He fucking hates it just because it’s framed as a punishment.

Another family use a baseball cap. It’s just a plain blue cap with nothing on it. When their toddler needs discipline he gets a timeout on a chair and has to put the cap on. When they’re out and about he just has to wear the cap but it gets the same reaction. Nobody around them can tell he’s being punished because it’s in no way an embarrassing cap, but HE knows and just the threat of having to wear it is enough.

And there isn’t the same contempt afterwards I’ve seen with kids whose parents hit them. One time the kid swung a stick at my dog, his mother immediately made him sit on the stairs, he screamed but stayed put, then he came over to my dog and gently said “Sorry Ellie” and went back to playing like nothing happened, but this time without swinging sticks at the nearby animals.

[levi-essay-drop]

I’m not sure if it ever reaches anyone but I’m really not interested in shutting up on this one.

So, there’s another drama boiling today in the HL fandom (like we haven’t got enough of it already). Someone called sclinaz on TikTok made this video about “getting traumatised by nsfw content including underage characters and created by adult people” and added a list of content creators who are “weirdos”, suggesting blacklisting them.

Here I want to debate fan-made content using underage fictional characters (in this case, characters are 15-16yo, and it will be important later) being classified as paedophilia.

Lemme tell you why I am even writing this. First and foremost, I’m a survivor of actual sexual child abuse, and I personally know what it is like to be an underage kid being sexualised and exploited by an adult. And from my perspective, there’s been some… misunderstanding about how things actually work. So I want to share what I think about it because I believe I have a vote on such questions.

So here’s what sclinaz states as the reason for “calling out” the creators:

So the reason sclinaz feels traumatised is that realisation that some adults have been creating smutty content (fanfiction, fanart, audio) that implies these adult creators have been “imagining doing sexual things with underage characters while creating this content”.

Well, first things first, I understand the discomfort such thoughts might bring. Especially when you’re a teenager yourself, thinking of it might feel even painfully menacing. But here’s the thing:

1. Everyone has their own preferences

This means that different people find different things arousing. Someone is getting off on the feet pics, and someone else is dreaming about being non consensually manhandled. It’s okay, it’s fine, tastes differ.

People of all ages have sexual fantasies, it’s totally normal. These fantasies can include things that you can find gross or inappropriate, even dangerous. For example, not everyone is going to like content made from fantasies that a member of a BDSM community might create. That’s why we created trigger and content warnings, right?

But what about all these nasty paedophiles and voyeurs and etc? Are you trying to say being sexually attracted to children or spying on people in private places is just a matter of a different taste and personal preference?

Well, here is quite a clear and precise answer for that.

2. Not every "unusual" sexual fantasy is a pathology

Look, I'm a gay man, and I mostly fantasize about having sex with other men, obviously. This might feel "unnatural" or "disgusting" to someone who isn't gay, but it doesn't make me a psycho, right? If you don't trust me on that, you can at least refer to what psychiatry says on that matter (and that's what the hypothetical court would refer to as well).

Sexual fantasies are considered a pathologic disorder only if both of the two criteria apply:

They are intense and persistent.

They cause significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, or they harm or have the potential to harm others (eg children, nonconsenting adults).

There's a DSM-5 change to this wording if you like:

Most people with atypical sexual interests do not have a mental disorder. To be diagnosed with a paraphilic disorder, DSM-5 requires that people with these interests:

feel personal distress about their interest, not merely distress resulting from society’s disapproval; or

have a sexual desire or behaviour that involves another person’s psychological distress, injury, or death, or a desire for sexual behaviours involving unwilling persons or persons unable to give legal consent.

So there are two conclusions to make out of this:

Fantasising about something illegal does not equal doing something illegal Sharing one's fantasies with consenting adults is not illegal

Both statements are pretty easy to apply to our everyday thinking process. Let's say Tarantino has just made a new movie with lots of violence, blood and whatnot in his unique style.

Is it illegal for him to produce such content? Is it illegal for me to go to the cinema and watch the movie? Even when it is about nazis? Even when it is about a justified murder spree?

See, fantasies are really far from the real world.

But, Levi, you might say, a way of 1000 miles starts with a single step! What if today a pedo is writing a fanfic about two teens, and tomorrow they go and assault a real kid?!

Yeah, more than a reasonable concern. But hear me out...

3. Paedophiles do not read Young Adult (fan)fiction. They are interested in prepubescent/early puberty

This is actually part of the definition of what "Paedophilia" means. If you dig a little, you'll see it's commonly noted that the absolute majority of child abuse victims were children of age 13 and younger.

No need to go far for the example: I was 13 when I was assaulted. And I was groomed since I was 7.

But you don't have to trust me, of course. Here are some statistics: 89k teens aged 14 to 21 vs almost 500k children aged 13 and younger. I'm a math prof, so let me count this for you: only 15% of children who fell victim to CA were older than 14.

Source: US Department of Health and Human Services; Administration for Children & Families Child maltreatment 2021, pages 37-38

This is about child abuse in general, and if we look into it more attentively, we'll see that less than 10% of all CA reports are classified as sexual abuse.

This might give us an approximate (and very, very rough) estimate of 8,3% of all CA victims being victims of SA and younger than 14yo. This means 85% of victims of CSA were 13 years old or younger. Let's see if this rough estimate we've built based on the assumption that SA follows normal distribution on the age of victims is anywhere close to the real world.

Here are some statistics for France (numbers we're interested in are paywalled but present in the overview and relate to year 2019):

Here we see that the average age of the victim is 4 to 9 years old, and only 25% of victims were older than 16. Believable.

What is more, here's an actual study that says: The results confirmed that the age range between 6 and 11 years is a high-risk period, with increased prevalence for the first episode in three of the six experiences with contact assessed, in line with previous studies [15,16,20,29,30,31]. <...> However, adolescence has also been found to be a period of high risk for CSA for both genders, with the age range from 12 to 15 years old being the most prevalent for two CSA experiences and with high percentages in the rest of the events. This result supports the findings of previous studies that consider adolescence as a moment of increased risk for sexual abuse and intercourse [11,21,30,39,40], and indicates the need to reinforce preventive programs in the adolescent stage.

With all effort, this doesn't sound like something that can grow out of the fantasy about two consenting teenagers of 15-16yo discovering their sexuality together.

One might argue that an adult who is sexually involved with a teenager is still very unhealthy happening, and I would totally agree with that. But there is a difference between fiction and reality, right? Let's imagine a Netflix series that is centred around high school kids exploring their bodies and sexuality and includes an excessive amount of scenes where a sexual encounter involving teenagers (underaged characters) is shown.

I am talking about "Sex Education", which is a pretty popular title that is doubly paedophilic content... But okay, two consenting teenagers having sex is okay. But the writer who wrote the script, and all the people who were involved in filming the scene -- they were all adults, pretending to be these underaged characters, or even worse -- watching it! Does it make anyone of them or any of the viewers a paedophile?

Not to mention that the entire industry of Young Adult fiction is mainly written and published by people in their 30-40 or even older.

But Levi! How are you going to protect the kids? There are only measures that are taken after the abuse has already happened! We need to spread awareness to help prevent such crimes from happening!

Good point! Assault that never happened brings much more happiness than seeing your perpetrator going to jail. But...

4. Today little effective evidence-based strategies for proactively protecting children from CSA are available

You should spread awareness about THIS if you want to help.

I'll explain what's the problem here. Claiming someone as a pedo on the internet is relatively easy. But what do you think is going to happen next? Batman-led law enforcement automagically captures them and, after a just trial will apply them an appropriate punishment? I am very sorry, but I guess I might just have some bad news for you.

Unfortunately, clearance on recorded sexual exploitations of minors is rarely higher than 60% (e.g. Statistical Yearbook of Finland 2022, page 287, Références statistiques Justice 2022, page 145). There are many reasons why this happens, but also there are ways to change that. What can you personally do?

Actively participate in informed discourse about what sexual abuse is and who might be in danger.

Spread awareness that perceived parental care is the only protective factor against CSA. Highlight the importance of involving parents in prevention programs, giving them the resources for early detection of sexual abuse, and teaching them how to provide support to their children.

Help create and vote for the implementation of education programs, including sexual abuse information and resources as part of the school and teacher education curricula, as well as support services to students in the school context.

5. Cancelling fandom content creators does not help anyone

This is actually a direct conclusion from the previous point.

Creating content is not illegal and does not count as evidence for perpetration. Thus, calling out a person who has merely written a niche kink fanfic is going to:

(a) destroy this person's public reputation and mental health (b) bring nothing towards prosecution and/or conviction of a real perpetrator (if any) (c) make the fuss about "pedo alert" quickly become "boring" and "pushy", which might accidentally silence someone's REAL cry out for help

You do know this story about the boy who shouted about the wolves, right? That's the same.

Why the actual fuck do I care so much? You see, when I was raped at the age of 13 by the man who was my sports coach and my aunt's fiance, I tried to tell my parents, my aunt and my peers about what happened. I tried to get help because I knew (and I was right) that this would happen again if nobody intervened.

Did anyone believe me? Did anyone take me seriously?

Sadly, no.

Mainly because it wasn't something people were aware of might happen to them. It was a horror story for newspapers and TV criminal chronicles. And meanwhile, it was happening right in front of everyone to see, not in fiction, not on TV, not via AI. Right next door.

So if you want to help, then please. Go talk to your younger siblings; go speak to your caregiving friends. Go vote for sexual education in schools. Go and donate a dollar to the local (child) sexual abuse help/prevention centre. Spread the contacts of crisis centres.

Here's where to start in UK: https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-is-child-abuse/types-of-abuse/grooming/

Here's where to start in US: https://www.rainn.org/safety-parents

Please, be mindful of what you're accusing other people of and how this might impact the real world around you and them. And please, take care <3

PS: it took me almost entire day to write this and by that point the video is taken down. I am pretty much sure that NO ONE deserves to be OUTED when you have no real evidence of someone committing a crime. My only point here is stop spreading harassment while hiding behind a good faith intention. This is not helping anyone. Really.

[thisisgraceunderpressure]

Is trauma really so widespread? And are people feeling particularly traumatised now? Interview with Bessel van der Kolk

“We define ‘trauma’ as an event outside the normal human veins of experience,” he says. “At least one-third of couples, globally, engage in physical violence. The number of kids who get abused and abandoned is just staggering. Domestic violence, staggering. Rapes, staggering. Psychiatry is completely out to lunch and just doesn’t see this.”

“There’s very good literature [on shellshock] from 1919 and 1920. But then there was pushback, people saying: ‘You’re just a bunch of cowards.’ The assault on people who had been traumatised has been relentless – to this day, almost. You’re not allowed to tell the truth about the horrible things that people do to each other.”

His work with people who had PTSD began at around the time the term was defined, in 1978, at a veterans’ clinic in Boston, working with men who had fought in Vietnam. He picked up patterns in their symptoms and presentation: either a tendency to superimpose their traumatic experience on to everything around them or an inability to decipher what was going on around them and “very little in between”. Another pattern he picked up was in his own profession. Psychiatrists would diagnose these patients with everything from alcoholism to schizophrenia and miss – almost resist noticing – the trauma.

“The reality, of course, is that being traumatised does make you a difficult person to get along with. Because you suddenly get angry, you suddenly shut down or you space out. But more difficult is to live that life: not being able to trust yourself. And there’s always this internal pressure to step up to the plate and keep functioning. So the next piece is a profound feeling of shame about yourself and your reactions.”

Collective trauma is complicated. Taboo is a core component of PTSD. The brain buries feelings only if they can’t be spoken about, because of the risk of alienation, from a family (this is particularly relevant to abused children) or from society (this is what silences veterans). Large, shared events – 9/11, for instance – which are not suppressed, which in fact bring those affected together, do not leave the same scars.

What about the pandemic? He shrugs: “I get a lot of questions about this, people talking about our collective trauma, and my answer is: for me and most of my colleagues, the pandemic has not been traumatic. Our friendships, our careers; they’re all fine. If you’re a single mother who’s 18 years old with no income, oh God. If you’re a nurse who has dealt with people for a year, who are choking to death, then you’re traumatised.” Part of taking trauma seriously is not seeing it where it is not present.

Williams, Zoe. “Trauma, Trust and Triumph: Psychiatrist Bessel Van Der Kolk on How to Recover from Our Deepest Pain.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 20 Sept. 2021, www.theguardian.com/society/2021/sep/20/trauma-trust-and-triumph-psychiatrist-bessel-van-der-kolk-on-how-to-recover-from-our-deepest-pain.

[nuri148]

Thanks for the tag! Here are some HC's...

I imagine Levi as a dad would be a fun (not) combination of laissez-faire and going full dadzilla if someone threatens to hurt his babies.

Obviously the age and personality of the children would play a role, but we know he already holds “normal” people to high moral standards so he would be extra vigilant with his children’s love interests.

I’m thinking about 15-16 y.o. kids here who are maybe having their first fling with a classmate or something.

Before taking their sweetheart home, Levi and Mikasa would already be aware that their child has a crush and would know the basic info about them. Both Levi’s child/ren and Mikasa have begged him not to scare away the blorbo.

The moment Levi learns her daughter has a crush on someone, he’d sit her and try to scare her in regards to sex only to find Mikasa already explained her the details of conception, contraception, STDs and consent years ago, which leads to a late night argument with his wife about why he didn’t know. Mikasa reminds her that at the time he thought the girl was too young to know about those things, which she didn’t agree on. So when daughter got home shaken bc a classmate got her first period in 5th grade, she took the chance to give daughter The Talk™. Mikasa’s still sore that she only learnt how babies were made after she got taken in by the Yaegers and she also saw some nasty shit during her time in the refugee camps, so she wants her child to know what are the risks.

The next day he sits his daughter again (bc the day before he lost his shit and forgot about it) and remarks that she shouldn’t hurry and she shouldn’t let the boy pressure her into anything and she’s grossed out because she’s a rather innocent child and she’s not thinking about doing it yet and they’ve been only dating for like, a month, so yuck. Although now that dad brought it up as something in the realm of possibility, she doesn’t find it soooo yucky?

For his son, he would have given him The Talk™ as soon as he had an inkling the kid had started masturbating. Aside from the physiological stuff, he’d drill into the boy that he must never ever pressure the girl and that her pleasure comes first (the boy is cherry red at this point) and that never, ever under no circumstances should he resort to a sex worker or go to a strip club lest he wants to be disowned and toothless.

It falls on Mikasa to soothe her traumatised son and explain to him why that’s such a sensible matter for Levi. Sworn to secrecy, boy has a good cry and promises to never do any of that.

Regardless of child’s gender, Levi also makes a point that they should not only take precautions about STDs but make sure their surroundings are clean, i.e. room, bed, “don’t rut against some fucking wall you don’t know who or what touched it before” (kid is beyong embarrassed at this point), wash before, pee after, have tp/rags ready for wiping up mess... clean freak stuff.

When the kid/s finally take their swetheart home, Levi is pretty civil though he talks only the strictly necessary. He’s more focused in reading the damn brat to see what kind of person they are.

He’d be concerned about a boyfriend being domineering or pushy and about a girlfriend being manipulative or whiny. (these are stereotypical I know... but think about AoT society, not ours).

This applies more with older children but... since men and women were pretty much equal in the Survey Corps, he'd expect a son's gf to have a job or job prospects and not expect to have all her whims taken care of by the man. Providing for his family is fine, but the missus should be able to provide for herself as well since you never know what shit life's gonna through at you. "Did she at least offer to pay her part?"

Likewise, he'd totally lose his shit if a daughter's bf expected her to be a full time housewife the moment they tie the knot.

He wouldn’t say anything in front of his child, but I can picture him cornering the sweetheart outside the toilet and saying something alongthe lines of “I know people fall out of love and if you break my kid’s heart that’s life, I guess. But if you hurt them... you don’t wanna know what’s gonna happen to you.”

Because Levi’s kindness is palpable, the kind of person worthy of his children would not feel (too) intimidated by him. They’d understand his concerns.

Likewise, once he’s vetted his children’s partners, they become his surrogate children. The poor Ackerbabies pray that they’ll never break up bc that would crush dad's heart.

OK, I think I've digressed a bit... I spent a fun lunch hour though!

Can we start a Game? I will give u a few words or a Situation and u Write a Little Story, fanfic , conversation about it or give me your thoughts How the Situation will goes in?

Levi as a dad : How would he react if his son would bring a girl home and How would it be if his daughter would bring a boy? Give us also mikasas POV..

Hi Anon, thanks for the wonderful ask.

I'm not a writer lol but I think Levi will surely interrogate the hell outta the boy as he's a protective father but no over protective.

I'll tag @onigiri-dorkk @bryhaven @nuri148 @chaosisbeauty23 @helena-thessaloniki to try this game 😊

[scripttorture]

Under the right conditions, is it possible to "brainwash" someone using torture? My character was raised by someone who wanted to turn him into their own weapon, so they would condition them to react a certain way, using what can be seen as torture methods. The history of this character will only be shown in flash backs but I want to get this right and show the terrible and lasting impact of that history.

Nope.

 Not even remotely possible. And the way this trope is used in most fiction it isn’t really survivable either.

 The best case outcome I can see for a situation like the one you’ve described is a severely physically disabled and severely traumatised adult who would probably be unable to care for their own needs or ‘pass’ as a normal member of society.

 I’m also… skeptical of some of the phrasing here. ‘Can be seen as torture methods’ sounds very much like plain ol’ torture to me. Whatever apologist material you’ve read I can assure you that in reality there is really very little grey area.

 Chances are what you thinking of is torture and has serious long term physical consequences. Like death.

 If you really do want to get this right then in my opinion you have a choice between keeping the torture or keeping the character as an effective fighter.

 I can’t tell you which is the better choice for your story. That is up to you.

 But if you want to be realistic and if you want to be respectful to survivors you can not have both.

 Neither option is right or wrong. It depends on what you think the most important part of this character is.

 If the torture seems to be the most important part then that’s going to mean accepting the effects on the character.

 A lifetime of torture starting at a young age is likely to result in death. When it doesn’t severe mental health problems and developmental delays are guaranteed. Long term physical disability is incredibly likely, but the exact form it would take depends on the abuse.

 Intellectual disability is also really really likely. Especially if the character is kept in solitary confinement, starved or food is withheld as a punishment.

 A character like this would be much less effective as a fighter then an ordinary person. They would learn how to fight much more slowly. Their strength and reflexes would be worse. They would be significantly hampered by chronic pain and whatever other forms of physical disability the abuse left them with.

 Essentially if a character like this reached adulthood they would probably require some form of regular support. This could range from health care worker visits every other evening to 24 hour care. It would take years of support, care and concerted effort for the character to be able to care for themselves and function as a member of their community. Even with all that support they might never be able to care for themselves.

 This is what I mean when I talk about the misconceptions we have around torture being harmful.

 Because we have all seen dozens of examples of this narrative. Where tortured characters are ‘forced’ to become warriors, assassins, ‘killing machines’.

 The reality is these people struggle to leave their homes. They struggle to feed themselves.

 And we turn around and paint them as dangerous for it, for daring to survive.

 It just isn’t cricket.

 Which brings me to option two. Trying to make the character into an effective and loyal fighter.

 That means getting rid of any physical abuse in the narrative because it is more likely to produce resistance to the ‘teacher’ character and is more likely to make a less effective fighter.

 When I say ‘any physical abuse’ I absolutely mean it. Spanking, going to bed without supper, standing or sitting in the corner for long periods, washing their mouth out with soap. Any physical punishment should be avoided in the story.

 Even if it’s a punishment that is normalised or portrayed as ‘less harmful’.

 Solitary confinement also definitely counts. The definition is less then 1-2 hours of human contact a day.

 There’s research on the effects of solitary confinement on young children, but studies on incarcerated teenagers in the US clearly show a larger negative effect in children compared to adults. If the effects on teenagers is severe enough to have a lasting impact on their ability to socialise then I think it’s safe to assume the impact on younger children would be devastating.

 Realistically speaking if you want a character to be capable of interacting with others in a passably ‘normal’ way then that character needs to have regular, positive interaction growing up.

 Abuse does not instil loyalty.

 In fact the evidence we have for torture pretty clearly shows that it increases resistance. It produces opposition, often lasting and strong opposition. This does not necessarily mean violent action; it means that survivors and witnesses tend to despise torturers and anyone they associate with torturers. And they act on those feelings in whatever way they can.

 Abuse does not aid learning or training.

 It does make students significantly more likely to die.

 If you want a character who is loyal and can fight well then realistically speaking the process you want to describe is more like a cult. I refer to these techniques as ‘ICURE’ partly because some of the literature does and partly because I feel like it’s a helpful acronym that reminds readers what the techniques are.

 ICURE means: Isolate, Control information, create Uncertainty, Repetition and Emotive arguments. Let me break that down and explain how it works.

 The group (or possibly just the abusive individual in your story) isolates the targetted character from people outside the group. This can mean physically imprisoning them or (more commonly) making it difficult for them to socialise with people outside the group.

 This can be done with punishments. But more often it’s achieved with manipulation rather then violence.

 If the target is encouraged to ‘convert’ others or persuade them to join the group that can severely limit the social interaction they have with people outside the group. It teaches people outside the group to avoid that person otherwise they’ll get a sermon.

 Another approach might be putting social or emotional penalties on interacting with people outside the group.

 For example, say this child character sees other children playing in a park and asks the teacher character if they can go and play.

 First the teacher might say that other children are awful and do they really want to go? They won’t enjoy it. Are they sure? Well the teacher has a lot of things to do today it would be very inconvenient. Are they really sure? They won’t have fun. Other children are bad and mean. Wouldn’t they rather do some more training like a good child or play a game with the teacher? Are they really really sure? Well alright fine they’ll go outside but only with the teacher and only for twenty minutes-

 This kind of interaction teaches children that trying to interact with people outside the group is not worth the effort.

 This is part of ‘Controlling information’. It means that anything the character learns is first filtered through the larger group. It’s a form of censorship which means the character is only exposed to information that supports the group/ideas the group wants the character to have.

 This is combined with creating uncertainty about beliefs the group wants the character to reject. Often this means only providing information that discredits their outside belief systems. It can also mean extended discussions about ‘why x is wrong’.

 Things that are designed to create uncertainty don’t have to be true or accurate. Often they’re not. But if the character has little contact with outside sources they may never find out the truth.

 Repetition is, what it says on the tin. It’s repeating this pattern of only giving the character information the group wants them to have, positive messages about the ideals the group wants to instil and negative messages about previous belief systems. Consistent repetition over a long period of time has an effect on our beliefs. Sometimes it even effects them when we know the information is wrong.

 Emotive arguments means- well keeping any discussion away from logic. Something like- going from ‘well I’m not sure this idea about our belief system lines up with what you taught me’ to the manipulative character asking why the target hates them/God/the entire group.

 This sort of environment through childhood would lead to an intensely isolated individual, almost entirely reliant on the teacher-character for all their emotional and social needs as well as physical survival.

 And that produces a character that’s likely to be intensely loyal.

 Because we are social animals and we need positive interaction. We will often to choose to go along with group-actions, even if we don’t like them or feel they’re wrong, if the alternative is being alone.

 Manipulative groups and individuals often go out of their way to persuade targetted people that the only options are them or complete isolation. It’s a horribly successful strategy.

 Rounding this off- I suggest you take a look at this masterpost on common torture apologia tropes.

 You should also read this post on researching torture and this one on the most common effects it has on adults.

 I can’t tell which of these two options is the correct one for your story.

 All I can really do is explain why the story, as it is right now, is unrealistic. And how that repeated fictional trope harms survivors and our understanding of torture.

 Where you go from here and how you use that information is up to you.

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[ghinanotlinetti]

A Review of ‘All About Love’ by bell hooks

All About Love by bell hooks, also known as Gloria Jean Watkins, is a collection of critical essays on love and the different types of love an individual can experience in society. This is the book that I resonate with so well and has changed my view on the world for the better; her words have truly changed me for the better and I highly highly recommend everyone, especially girls, to read this book, buy yourself a copy and read this book you will not regret it! In the introduction, bell hooks opens up about why she wanted to write this book and she admits that the idea for the book and the need she had to write it didn’t come from knowing and experiencing what love was throughout her life, rather it came from noticing the lack of love in her personal life as well as in observing contemporary culture and society in general. How we love is shaped by how we experienced love as a child; she addresses this in one of her beginning chapters, which is my favourite chapter, whilst critiquing how there is a lack of openly discussing this issue of love in many households. Everyone heals from childhood wounds, yes, everyone has traumas that they need to deal with, yes, however the idea of punishing a child tend to be overlooked by parents in the sense that some parents wouldn’t notice the importance of explaining to a child when they are wrong or even explaining why the parents are wrong to a child. This is the common power dynamic between children and their parents, however it doesn’t have to be this way, the cycle and generational curses can and must be broken. 

I grew up in a strictly Asian and Muslim household, so I was very much aware of how traumatic childhood discipline can be, it still affected me even as a grew older and moved out of my parent’s house. I knew other people who had this upbringing, some of them were traumatised and either are or have healed from their wounds like me, others were actually honoured by this and believed it to be necessary which makes me quite worried for the person. My father, to no surprise, also experienced a very disciplined childhood and his father would be very strict with him. I may have been maybe seventeen or eighteen when he brought up his father in a conversation with me and expressed how he was actually proud to have had a disciplined childhood in they way that his father disciplined him (which was quite horrid if I do say so myself!). My paternal grandfather passed away before my father’s first child was born; he never got to see my father as a parent and that probably is devastating, I can only imagine. Perhaps missing his father was why my father romanticised his childhood to the extent he viewed the bad memories as good memories just so as not to tarnish what little he could remember of his old man. I hope I can revisit this conversation with my father and have a progressive discussion as this would be very beneficial for us. bell hooks herself addresses her journey to healing from her childhood traumas which starts by admitting to herself that there were moments and aspects of her childhood which were shaped by her parents that were not okay for any child to experience. As a response to this, her parents told her that they were not happy with this being publicised and felt that she had no right to feel ungrateful because of the accolades which she had achieved later on in life. This response is almost automatic by most parents because what they would only see is the relatively normal adult who can and has overcome barriers, so why bring up the past? The reason is to heal, because the more we repress the more it’ll affect our livelihoods in ways which we may not realise. Just like with physical pain, we find the cause of the pain in order to pick which remedy is suitable to cure the pain.

I discovered this book from a friend of mine who also studied a gender course with me; this author was in our syllabus and she was my study buddy for weekly readings, we were discussing the reading materials and then she mentioned this book by the author and I was interested in reading it myself, so I did! I read this book a year and a half ago when I recently turned twenty-two; I was an exchange student studying in Scotland, and I also brought this book along with me to Morocco when I visited for Spring Break holiday. Every train ride I was on when I’d hop around to a different city with my friends, I’d read this book and have a beautiful view of the countryside; books are definitely an essential travel item for me! My rating is for this book is 10/10! Really looking forward in reading more books by bell hooks soon.

(Last updated January 8th 2020)

[discyours]

I watched that new HBO show Euphoria. All the episodes that are currently out at least (I believe the first season is halfway done). I didn’t expect it to be good but it was on the homepage of a streaming service and what can I say, the controversy had me curious. 

The LGBT representation in this show actually pleasantly surprised me. It wasn’t entirely positive nor entirely realistic, but it felt a lot different than what you usually see in media. The existence of homophobia/transphobia wasn’t ignored by any means, but it also wasn’t the main point. Characters were trans/gay/bi over being victims of transphobia/homophobia, if that makes sense. The trans character was also handled quite... uniquely? Most media treats trans women like trans first, trans women second. This show treated her like a woman first, trans woman second. 

I don’t find it entirely realistic that everybody treats her this way and that absolutely nobody sees or refers to her as a man, but honestly who cares? Sometimes LGBT people deserve stories that aren’t just about them being treated in ways that upset them. I don’t believe this portrayal is harmful to anyone, and the main concern I saw a lot of people having that she’d be portrayed as attractive to straight men and lesbians didn’t come true at all. The main female character she has somewhat of a relationship dynamic with is never referred to as a lesbian, and she’s shown to use gay dating apps while reminding the men that she meets on there that they aren’t actually straight. 

The portrayal of mental illness was okay. I hate it when OCD is introduced with the cliché counting thing, but it’s an understandable plot device and I found the main character to be realistic enough for her to be relatable. The way addiction was portrayed seemed pretty realistic to me too, but maybe I don’t have enough personal experience to be a good judge of that. 

The fucking mental hospital though. I swear I’ve never seen a psychiatric ward being portrayed without a token chronic masturbator and this show did not rise above that. They pulled out all the stops to show us that this is a Scary Bad Place that our main character does not belong in. The long white halls with harsh lighting, the significantly older residents, the fact that just about everyone except the guy that pulled his dick out seemed to be heavily sedated. They tried so hard to show us that Jules did not even remotely belong here with all these crazy people, and that fucking pissed me off. First of all, a depressed 11 year old would not end up in the same ward as a chronic masturbator in his late teens. There are residential wards for mentally ill children! Putting an 11 year old character in with a bunch of teenagers is just a plot device to show us how tragically depressed this character already was at such an exceptionally young age when really that shit is not even remotely special. A man or even an adolescent who is acting out violently and committing sex offences (yes public masturbation counts) would either be in (juvenile) prison or a criminal mental health ward. Again, never the same place as a depressed 11 year old. 

Mental hospitals truly are awful places in my experience, which just makes it all the more infuriating when people resort to cheap gimmicks to show that they’re unpleasant. It’s common for psychiatric wards (ESPECIALLY ones for children or adolescents) to be made as “homely” as possible. No plain white walls, no furniture that screams “psych ward”. It’s still traumatising to be locked up in a place that has flowers painted on the walls, in fact the shallowly “welcoming” environment can add to the discomfort. Most people who go to mental hospitals have “normal” mental illnesses like depression, PTSD, OCD, or unmanaged bipolar disorder. That last one is the only common condition that’s likely to cause someone to be sedated when they first come in, mass sedation of psychiatric patients is no longer common practice and portraying it as such is harmful. 

So those are all the specific points I had thoughts on, now for the overall premise of the show. 

Who decided that we needed yet another TV show about teenagers’ sex lives? 

This obsession with high schoolers’ crazy drugged up sex adventures has never been okay and I can’t believe that it’s still a thing. I’ve seen some people praising it as being “realistic” and “raw” and something parents need to watch the be aware of what their kids are really up to, but fucking hell dude. This show is literally just sexualising teenagers for adult consumption. Credit where credit is due, it is handled differently than most shows. To be blunt I’ve noticed that this show features a fucking record amount of penises. 5 episodes and I’ve seen literally countless of them, with maybe two or three (partially) naked girls in comparison? Maybe I’m reading too much into it but it feels like a conscious decision was made to stay away from the traditionally eroticised aspects of heavily sexualised TV shows to instead show the... less visually appealing parts of it. I’m pretty biased when it comes to finding dicks gross though so who knows. 

Either way, it’s showing teenagers as being very very heavily sexual and that’s as harmful as it was the first time someone decided that making 20-something actors roleplay as high schoolers to fuck onscreen was a good idea. High schoolers do not look like this and most of them definitely don’t act like this. More harmful messages about the sexuality of minors is the last thing society needs. 

[nestleeds]

‘My experience of postnatal depression’

Leeds Mum, Farzana, talks to us about her experience of postnatal depression...

Tell us a bit about yourself

I am Farzana Khatun, a twenty eight year old British Bangladeshi woman. At the young age of twenty one, I became a wife. Despite all the joys that come with marriage, moving away from my family to a different city affected my mental health. The stark contrast in family life from a busy household to an empty one brought many negative emotions such as loneliness. I was no longer alone when I got pregnant in 2015 but as is the case with many other mothers, I was diagnosed with both postnatal and postpartum depression. Mental health is very much not recognised in the Asian community as it’s a taboo topic. Many even go as far as to be in denial as they excuse it as physical illness. It is discussed as a weakness and therefore Asian children fear for the reaction if they express their feelings. Especially amongst men, the ‘breadwinners’ of the family lock up their emotions as they believe this weakness may affect their masculinity and status in the family. Mental health is a stigma that is gossiped and laughed about within families as everybody denies the feelings of anxiety and depression they feel towards events.

What were your initial thoughts of the country going into lockdown?

For every woman, bringing a life into this world is a daunting concept. These natural nerves and fears are doubled when you are to give birth during such a vulnerable time with doctors who are overwhelmed and the possible risk of illness. My second experience with labour was the most traumatising. Only when I was in active labour was my husband given permission to stay during labour, leaving me to be completely alone with my thoughts at the beginning. Things took a turn when my baby’s heartbeat slowed down and I was sent to have an emergency c-section. All the chaos in the delivery room was so different from my first time with childbirth as it lacked the confidence and assurance my family gave me. Just the knowledge of having a family to go home to comfort me and the baby, helping me with mysterious rashes and first baths were all things I longed for. My new family of four was difficult to handle at the beginning as having to recover from the c-section and taking care of a newborn overwhelmed me.

How have you spent your time during a lockdown?

Having a baby during lockdown was a completely abnormal experience. The atmosphere at the hospital was very unwelcoming as everyone was unsure of how to deal with this new pandemic. The midwives seemed absent and I could sense the silent hesitance as I was forced to be completely independent despite struggling to move. The whole situation was out of my control as many of my requests were unanswered. One request included a female doctor but due to the pressure that the NHS was under this could not happen. Having a female doctor was an essential factor for me because throughout my whole life I have been familiarised most with women through my traditional parents and this unfamiliarity made my labour an awkward process. My baby’s first Eid was celebrated at home, with her dad at work and only the three of us at home. A time that is normally a very joyous and busy time was quiet and regular. On the other hand, this experience allowed me to grow and understand myself better as a mother. I underestimated my ability to be independent with my children to attend to their every need and the bright side of this situation is that I grew even closer to my children.

What support networks have you built up during the lockdown?

A support network that I discovered during lockdown was the Perinatal Mental Health Service, a network I am very grateful for. During the lockdown, help is difficult to find as everyone is going through their own problems with the significant number of deaths occurring every day. The Perinatal Mental Health Service is a service which allows mothers to share their worries with other people who are in the same situation. It gave me an opportunity to cope with all of the overwhelming problems which were heightened by the fact that my family were unable to visit. I kept in contact with my family through frequent FaceTime calls however they were simply an imitation of the real thing and they were unable to experience the newborn baby feelings with me. The only adult connection I had was with my husband and something that was particularly hard was feeling completely useless as my husband worked, cooked, cleaned and cared for the children.

Have you still felt well connected to the Muslim community during the lockdown?

During the lockdown, I was able to witness the strength of the Muslim community. Due to the fact that Eid was celebrated alone and Friday prayers were not taken place the Muslim community was more attentive to other families. The advice was shared around and everybody comforted each other on the unusualness of this year’s celebration. On many different platforms, the Muslim community expressed their availability to help as during lockdown especially people questioned the purpose of life as they came to a realisation that the next day is not guaranteed with many losing multiple relatives weekly. Eid is the celebration of the end of a month of fasting and this month was also very different due to Covid-19. Ramadan is normally the month that Muslims are the closest as they break their fast together and sympathise with the needy. It was particularly hard this year for many Muslims as without the constant activities, we were more aware of our hunger and it was especially hard since, for example, my mother had to break her fast alone for the first time in her life. It affected us all in little ways.

Are you aware of how Covid-19 is disproportionately affecting  Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities and how does this make you feel?

Covid-19 is affecting BAME communities to a much higher extent and I personally know of many relatives who have been affected by it. There is nothing that can be done of that fact, but if this is acknowledged by the NHS why are BAME communities not being prioritised since we are evidently more at risk? This is very frustrating as despite the progress we have made towards discrimination, there is so much still to be done.

What are your hopes for the future?

Unfortunately, there are so many problems in society today and the first step to erasing these problems is by educating people from childhood. The older generation tends to be more stubborn about their beliefs on the sincerity of mental health but if the new generation is taught that mental health should not be a taboo and is a natural part of life society would change as we know it.  I hope for a future where I felt that society genuinely cared for my physical and mental being and not the economic gain they would receive from it. In the future, I would like to have perinatal meetings in person to have the full experience of relating with other mothers in my situation.

[stimtoybox]

What exactly does stim and stimming mean?

I’m going to assume that you want a community-authored answer that goes beyond that offered by a Google search for the word “stimming”, since my first result is a reasonably decent, if extremely minimal, 101 explanation.

“Stim”, as an adjective modifying nouns like “toys” or “tools” or “things” or a verb as in “I stim”, is just the linguistic offshoot from “stimming”. (“Stimmy” is also a common colloquial adjective often used to emphasise the quality or degree to which something works as a tool for stimming.) It’s language of the community, in the sense that you’re more likely to find these words adopted and used in non-medical, ND-community spaces by autistics and people with ADHD, anxiety or many other diagnoses/labels under the neurodiversity umbrella.

A general definition is that stimming is a way of using some form of sensory input to self-regulate and aid functioning or survival.

I’d argue that all people stim to some degree, and most people know it better as fidgeting, but it occurs to an extent that is pathologised by the medical profession (to the extent of being part of diagnostic criteria or commonly associated with that diagnosis) in people who have a greater need for that self-regulation–usually people with mental illnesses, developmental disabilities or other neurodiverse diagnoses or disabilities. It’s very often repetitive input, and often used for long periods of time. (Speaking as an autistic, I find repetitive movements very soothing; it also mirrors my tendency to use repetition in language as communication.) While it can be the main or dominant activity on its own, it’s often done in combination with another activity (squishing playdough while watching TV, for example, or using a Fidget Cube on the train).

By this I mean: someone who doodles on a notepad while talking on the phone is not very different to someone who chews on a chew pendant while sitting in class or twisting a Tangle in a psychiatric appointment, to the extent that I don’t see much logic in trying to separate these things.

However, doodling on a notepad while talking on the phone is generally categorised as an acceptable behaviour, while my using a Tangle to survive talking to my psychiatrist is categorised as an abnormal behaviour, one indicative of disorder or disability. Someone who is not somewhere under the broad umbrella of neurodiversity or disability can generally keep their stimming to forms, times and ways that are accepted by mainstream society; those of us who are under that umbrella either cannot do this or have been forced into suppressing our natural need to stim in order to try and make our behaviour socially acceptable (something that makes it harder for us to function). Many of us have endured often traumatising experiences when others try to make us stop our natural stimming, either physically or mentally–I’ve been grabbed and held still by my parents so I can’t rock from side to side while talking, as one example. The self-regulation that helps me be more comfortable while doing the uncomfortable thing of verbal communication has resulted in people physically denying me both the right to move freely and the right to consent to being touched.

The behaviours aren’t that different, but one is deemed normal if performed in the limited, socially-appropriate ways; the other, not performed in those ways, is pathologised by the medical profession and can result in verbal, emotional and physical abuse by people trying to force us to behave like NTs/allistics.

“Self-regulation” can mean a lot of different things, depending on the needs of the stimmer. Some stimmers stim to direct an excess of energy. Some stimmers stim because a pleasant sensory sensation helps distract us from a world full of intolerable sensory or emotional sensations and/or experiences. Some stimmers stim because holding still is equivalent to a form of torture, yet modern Western society expects children and adults to attain a certain level of stillness in many activities. Some stimmers stim because it aids in concentration or focus. Some stimmers stim just because the stim feels good. Some stimmers stim and can’t quite put words to why they do it. Some of us flat-out need it, and some of us can (or have been forced to learn how to) live without it but find it helpful when used.

Stimming itself is quite an individual thing, to the extent that the cause, result and experience differ between stimmers. It can be input delivered by movement, weight/pressure, touch/texture, smell, sight, taste, sound, or various combinations of some or all those things. I stim, generally, because I need to move and because I often need a distraction from sensory and emotional things I cannot otherwise easily survive; it helps relax me, it helps direct some of this energy, it helps distract me, and it helps me feel a little more comfortable. I like touch/texture stims that offer movement, so I tend toward toys like Tangle Jrs, squishies, spinners and marble mazes. I also like music with good beat and rhythm that invites movement, which is why I listen to a lot of European melodic metal. Every stimmer will have their own likes and dislikes–I don’t like pressure save in very specific circumstances, and flickering visual and light-up toys are dangerous for me.

“Stims” as a reference to the things we do can mean anything that’s stimmy (offering stimulation): rocking from side to side, flapping hands, twisting a Tangle, listening to the same song on repeat for five hours, watching a sand-cutting video. They’re often roughly categorised into “visual stims”, “bodily stims” and “toys”, but there’s massive overlap between these categories.

There are some stims, often stims we’ve picked up through not having free access to toys or stimming, that are less healthy in the sense that they can cause harm to ourselves or others. This can be anything from skin picking to hair pulling to banging a body part against a wall/desk to throwing items. Some of us find sharper sensations, like pain, to be quite stimmy. (I’ve spent years picking at my cuticles just for the pain of pulling at them; it’s a sensation I really like.) I don’t want to call any stim bad, since the reason for doing that stim isn’t a bad one, and developing less-healthy stims in a world where we often can’t stim easily is not our fault. (For example, picking at my cuticles is far more a socially acceptable stim than is rocking, because it’s less obvious, even though rocking causes me no harm and picking absolutely does.) Many of us work on finding replacement or redirection stims, which can be incredibly difficult if you can’t find a safer stim that offers the same sensation. Conversely, many of us also have behaviours that aren’t exactly stims but we also seek to redirect with a toy.

Stimming, in ND spaces (especially autistic spaces), is also an increasing part of our culture and communication. Stimming can often be an expression or language (happy flapping is the most well-known concept of this) but it’s also become something quite specific to who we are and how we interact with the world.

In short: stimming is a form of providing sensory input for a variety of reasons that help us (most often disabled people) better experience or survive either our disabilities or the pressures a world not designed for us. Stim toys are one way (but a fun and awesome way, I think most will agree) of providing that input, and they’re what we talk about on this blog.

Does this help?

- Mod K.A.

[petitrangement]

Hey, I'm not going to womansplain feminism to the readers of Esquire! That's not happening on my watch! You're sophisticated, 21st century men with a copy of the El Bulli cookbook, a timeless pair of investment brogues and a couple of Joni Mitchell albums — for when you want to sit in your leather armchair, and have a little, noble, necessary man-cry.

You don't need me lecturing you — because you're not hanging out the back of a bus shouting "CLUNGE!" at a bunch of terrified 15-year-old girls. You've got sisters, mothers, lovers — female friends and colleagues — and you've never once gone up to any of them shouting, "Blimey! You don't get many of those to the pahnd!" while honking on their breasts, in the manner of Sid James. You're down with the sisterhood. You've got eyes. You know what's going on out there. You've noted that while society's happy for a famous man to age, and become distinguished, and generally wander around looking like a fucking wizard, the women generally still seem to be 20 years younger, and standing there on the cover of magazines, all like, "Oh! My clothes… they fell off!" EVEN IF IT'S DAME JUDI DENCH.

You know the pay disparity; still 20 per cent less for women in this country, and not a single prosecution, even though it's literally illegal. You know babies come out of vaginas and it fucking stings, and that the vaginas are having a hard time anyway, what with all the waxing they get. (That's £20 a pop, my friend. Every single month. Just to feel normal. It's basically VAT on your minge. Imagine if you had to get your bum-hole stripped every 30 days — lest the mean girls at school corner you on the bus home and go, "I've heard you're like Catweazle down there. Someone who fingered you said it was like diddling a Gonk. Ugh.")

You've seen Amy Schumer's brilliant, edgy sketches on contraception and rape, and laughed along with them. You've called Donald Trump "a twat" for his sexist comments about a female news anchor being on her period. You've watched the whole Caitlyn Jenner trans thing unfold and gone, "You know what — this all seems fair enough. I am down with the trans thing."

So, no. I'm not going to womansplain feminism to you. It's the 21st century and you are, most assuredly, not a dick. You like women being equal to men — which is all that feminism means. Not all the penises being burned in a Penis Bonfire. Just women being equal to men. You are like my friend John, when he talks about dating alpha-women: "Feel intimidated by them? Christ, no. Dating and marrying powerful women is like big game hunting. I fuck tigers and panthers. Not… chihuahuas."

No. You get feminism. You don't need Tits McGee here to take you through it one more time. So, what I am going to do, instead, is tell you 12 things about women that women are usually too embarrassed to tell you themselves. Because I am a chronic over-sharer, and incapable of keeping secrets. I'm like that other Deep Throat. The chatty Watergate one. That's the Deep Throat I am.

1. No mumbling

Like you, we feel a bit embarrassed about saying the word "feminism". It's the same as when you say the word "environment". They both have that slight implication of, "I'm now going to launch into a speech that's basically about what a great person I am".

Unfortunately, in both cases, the entire future of the world does rest on people being able to say those words properly, and not mumbling "femernism", or "envibeoment".

You just have to shut yourself in a cupboard and say them over and over again — "FEMINISM! ENVIRONMENT! FEMINISM! ENVIRONMENT!" — until they feel as normal as saying "pina colada", or "Michael Fassbender". Which are both, when you think about it, much odder-sounding.

2. 'The Man'

So, when women talk about "The Man", we're not talking about you. You're just a man. You're not The Man. Similarly, when we talk about the patriarchy, that's not you, either. You're not the patriarchy. You're just… Patrick. When we're doing those "MEN!" chats, we're just identifying the general locus of the problem, ie, most of the power and influence being held by a small amount of men.

Because remember that patriarchy's bumming you as hard as it's bumming us. We're bulimic, objectified and under-promoted. You, meanwhile, are unable to talk about your feelings lest you get punched in the nuts by "a lad" telling you not to be "a bender". You are unlikely to get custody of your kids, and are three times more likely to commit suicide. Feminism's about sorting all this stuff out. Because it's about equality. Not burning the penises. I can't emphasise enough how much it's not about burning penises. No burnt penises here.

3. Periods

We're still pretty traumatised about our periods, even though we're now 40. Being a woman doesn't make "being a woman" any easier. All that womb-shit is nuts. It's like having an exploding, insane blood-bag of pain up in your business end — nothing really prepares you for when it all kicks off. One day, you're just a kid on your bike. The next, you're suddenly having to wedge a tiny Barbie mattress in your knickers, crying while you watch Bergerac, and eating Nurofen Plus like they're Tic Tacs.

Men, imagine if, some time around your 12th birthday, some manner of viscous liquid — let's say gravy — suddenly appeared in your pants, in the middle of a maths lesson. And then it turned up every month for the next 30 years. You'd be all like "NO!" and "WTF?!?!" and "SRSLY??? THIS????" That's what we're like, too. We're not wise, or in touch with nature, or down with it. We're just people with a whole load more laundry issues than you. Have you ever tried to scrub blood out of a Premier Inn sheet at 6am, using just travel shampoo and your toothbrush? It's one of the defining aspects of being a woman.

4. Abortion

Likewise, imagine accidentally getting pregnant at 16, then having to run past a barrage of anti-abortion protestors outside your local clinic, all holding up pictures of dead foetuses. We're not dealing with this in a special, noble lady-way. We're like, "THIS IS ALREADY A REALLY, REALLY SHIT DAY. I PRESUME YOUR CONCERN FOR THE WELFARE OF CHILDREN EXTENDS INTO A LIFE SPENT VOLUNTEERING IN CARE HOMES, FOSTERING AND DONATING YOUR WAGES TO THE NSPCC — AND DOESN'T SOLELY REST ON HARASSING AND ABUSING TEARFUL, POSSIBLY RAPED WOMEN WHO ARE TRYING TO GET A SAFE, LEGAL MEDICAL PROCEDURE SO THEY DON'T FUCK UP THE REST OF THEIR LIVES."

Here's another thing we're too embarrassed to say: we'd love it if a big bunch of pro-choice men turned up at these clinics, and helped escort the scared women in. That would be some top bro solidarity.

5. Talking

In the last year or so, we saw this study, from America, and it broke our hearts a bit, because it explains so much: in a mixed-gender group, when women talk 25 per cent of the time or less, it's seen as being "equally balanced". And if women talk 25–50 per cent of the time, they're seen as "dominating the conversation".

And we remembered all the times on social media, or in conversations, an angry man has said, "Women are WINNING now. Women are EVERYWHERE. It is MEN who are being silenced", and it all made sense.

6. Fear

We're scared. We don't want to mention it, because it's kind of a bummer, chat-wise, and we'd really like to talk about stuff that makes us happy, like look at our daughters — and we can't help but think, "Which one of us? And when?" We walk down the street at night with our keys clutched between our fingers, as a weapon. We move in packs — because it's safer. We talk to each other for hours on the phone — to share knowledge. But we don't want to go on about it to you, because that would be morbid. We just feel anxious. We're scared. Given the figures, we can't sometimes help but feel we're just… waiting for the bad thing to come. Because that would be a realistic thing to think, and we like to be prepared. Awfully, horribly, fearfully prepared.

7. Tired

We're tired. So, so tired. From the moment we grew our tits, we've been cat-called in the street; commented on by relatives ("Ooooh, she's big-boned"; "Well, you'll be a heart-breaker") as if we weren't standing there in front of them, hearing all this. We've seen our biggest female role-models and icons shamed in the press, over and over: computers hacked and nude pictures released; sex-tapes released. So we know even success, and money, will not protect us from the humiliation of simply being a woman. We know we must have our babies when we're young — the eggs are running out! — but we must also work for less money, as discussed above. So that makes us tired.

This is why, maybe, women can become suddenly furious — why online discussions about feminism suddenly ignite into rage. Tired, scared people are apt to lash out. Anger is just fear, brought to the boil.

8. Wanking

We masturbate as much as you do. One of the few times I have been personally offended was when Martin Amis commented on a column I wrote about female masturbation. "Christ," Amis said, "that's sort of lad's mag talk — sort of more male than male."

Obviously, I am noble enough to recognise that Amis is from an older generation — one whose women, by and large, did not feel comfortable discussing their sexuality in any great detail. But it does seem amazing that a clever, well-travelled man, whose job it is to examine the human condition, and who had a pretty steamy relationship with Germaine Greer at one point, has never realised that women can be just as driven by their desire as men.

I'm gonna be honest with you — for the first five years of my adult life, most of my decisions were made by the contents of my pants. My vagina was — by way of Audrey II in Little Shop Of Horrors — constantly shouting "Feed me!", and breaking into musical numbers when I was trying to listen to my brain instead. If I had not discovered masturbation, I would have spent the majority of my time sitting on shed roofs, like a cat on heat, yowling at the moon. If a young woman isn't to go mad, then masturbation is a needful hobby, as vital as going on long country walks, to get a bit of air in your lungs, and pursuing the revolution. And what a hobby it is! It doesn't cost anything, it doesn't make you fat, you can knock it off in five minutes flat if you think about Han Solo, or some monkeys "doing it" on an Attenborough documentary, and it means you can face the world with a kind of stoned, post-coital cheerfulness that would otherwise require Valium, or constant spa-breaks.

There's a reason why God designed our bodies so that, when we lie down in bed, our hands naturally come to rest on our genitals. It's the Lord's way of saying, "Go on, have a fiddle. Find out how you work. And then, when you go out into the world, you won't be waiting for some bloke to come along and have sex on you. You'll be in the sex, too. It'll be like this… joint endeavour? A thing you can do together? That was kind of how I planned it all along, TBH. So, my Eleventh Commandment is 'Thou Shalt Buff Your Fnuh.' That's official. Signed, God."

9. Clothes

You know when we stand in front of a full wardrobe and say, "I don't have anything to wear!"? Obviously we have things to wear. You can see all the shit from where you are standing, fully dressed, ready to leave the house. What we mean is, "I don't have anything to wear for who I need to be today." What women wear is incredibly important and not just because we live in a society with a $1.5 trillion fashion-industry, and spend most of our spare time looking at cut-price Marc Jacobs handbags on theoutnet.com.

As we are the half of the world that still doesn't get to say as much as men (see stats earlier), how we look works by way of our opening paragraph in any social setting. Think of all the different kinds of looks women can have, depending on their clothes, hair and make-up: "Slutty". "Ball-busting". "Mumsy". "Manic Pixie Dream Girl". "Gym-bunny". "Mutton". "Nerdy". "Unfuckable".

Now think of all the ways men can dress. It's basically "some trousers". Ninety per cent of what men wear is "some trousers". You're just getting up in the morning, putting on your trousers and getting on with stuff.

And we fret about all this — appearance, clothes — because it matters. If we're still getting talked-over at meetings, is it because we're not dressing powerfully enough? If we're getting sexually harassed, is it because we're wearing the wrong skirt? In 2008, a rape case was overturned because the judge decided the alleged victim must have consented to sex, because her jeans were "too tight" for the accused to remove on his own. This is what we're thinking about, when we stand in front of the wardrobe. Will this outfit define the rest of today? Will it, if I am very unlucky, affect my life? Is this going to be the subject of a court-case? Could I run for my life in these shoes? Do I have anything for who I need to be today?

10. Male feminists

We're embarrassed when other women say, "Men can't be feminists!" We don't want to get into an argument, but we just can't see the logic in it. Feminism can only work if men are feminists, too — because the only indice by which feminism will succeed is based on how many people believe in it, support it, and want it to happen. By definition, it has to be a populist movement. There's no point in only 27 per cent of people believing in equality because the maths, very obviously, show that you won't be equal if 73 per cent of people think you're not. You can't go and… hide the feminism in a special secret place, and only let certain people have access to it. Besides, as discussed above, men need feminism almost as badly as women do. So, lady-balls to "men can't be feminists". We disbelieve that. In our vaginas.

11. Carbs

Our ultimate aim, when it comes to men, is to find an amusing mate we can have sex with, then sit on the sofa with, watching re-runs of Seinfeld and eating a baked potato. Discount all that Christian Grey/abs of steel/"bad boy" shit. Our priorities are: 1) Kindness; 2) Jokes; 3) High tolerance of carbs.

12. Trainers

It actually was us that threw those horrible old trainers of yours away. That story about how a time-portal opened up, and they were stolen away by your own teenaged self? That was a lie.

Caitlin Moran's fee for this piece has been donated to Refuge, refuge.org.uk

This article was first published in 2016.

Moranifesto by Caitlin Moran is out now, published by Ebury Press, £20

[garyh2628]

Chairman and Managing Operational CEO (Global Legal Authority)

(Finance, planning, industry and foreign trade portfolios) Private

Head of Human Resources Finance and People and Global Head of Corporate Responsibility

 Investments/Contracts/Superior/Technically Competent and Right-Hand Men

NGO - (Finance, planning, industry and foreign trade portfolios) Private

 To my Pharma Hubs, Technology Hubs, Social Creative/Personal Hub, My Private Hubs, My Financial Hubs and my Health and Wellbeing/Scientific Hubs, Legal and Innovation Hubs, Hinterland Hub and to my Eastern Caribbean Hub, Linguistic/Psychology Hub, to my beloved additions and to my Institutions and Partners and Team, Pool of Potential Personal Assistants and Private Secretaries and Business Managers and also to my Fitness Hub which is an extension of my Health and Wellbeing Hub and not to forget my beloved Brooklyn Hub and my Wine/Adviser Hub and my Influential Legal Cashier.

 All creation is a mine, and every man, a miner. The whole earth, and all within it, upon it, and round about it, including himself, in his physical, moral, and intellectual nature, and his susceptibilities’, are the infinitely various "leads" from which, man, from the first, was to dig out his destiny.

 This Network and This Global Structure and I and my CEOs and my Team et al today received immediate huge International acclaim — they were instantly drawn to our plans and to our values and to our fundamentals and to our principles.  The postings which give a snap shot of the work we will be involved in is best described this way “as an artist whose works of art play with light, space and perception. His public murals encourage passers-by to stop, be still and transport themselves deep into the images he creates to explore how his creativity can be a driver of change”. Today it was as a result of this that earned us the sought after coveted prize.  We will win and we will win the Election and we will deliver for the Network and we will deliver for the Global Structure and we will deliver for this family. Today’s news was a crushing blow to the world of mediocrity and on the other side a testament to our programs and Initiatives in the pipeline and also to the hard work that my Team and CEOs and Personal CEO and Partners and Institutions are doing.  It also sends a clear message, that we will win for those places rich in Natural Resources but yet poor, we will win for the Environment and we will deliver for humanity.

 The Influence and reach of this Network and Global Structure goes well beyond the neighbourhood, to all mutually exterminating certainties wherever they happen to shake their fists, too shrewd an observer of human comedy, too tender a chronicler of pain — between parents and children, men and women, Arabs and Jews — to be content with economical utterance.  This Network and the Global Structure is the only place that is tipping over with Intellectual Capacity. In me their leader, this Network and this Global Structure have one of the most sought-after Intellectuals in the world.   My leadership will allow this community of Corporations, Small to Medium Size Business across sector, Industry and Partners and Institutions to influence the environment for decades to come.  This is best described in this analogy “For four decades, he shaped an aesthetic that broke boundaries between Intellect and Classical Intellect establishing the most Profitable Community of Business and winning outright for the Network to form their own economy and Global Structure”. We will win the Election, we will win for this Network and Global Structure and we will win for the Economy.

 Everybody needs heroes — even those plutocrats. But the “global elite” is currently out of enthusiasm and ideas. In the corridors of the Boardrooms, an economist, summed it up: “This is the flattest I can remember. Normally, there is a star country or a star industry that everybody is talking about. But this year, there is nothing. “That enthusiasm deficit has implications well beyond the easily parodied world of the Economic. For the past 30 years, we have been observing and has been the best place to monitor the World Opinion. The message this year was that enthusiasm and ideas are in short supply, ideas and crazes that were exciting the rich and powerful. It is the place where elite consensus was both formed and promoted. No more heroes for the global elite, well so they thought.  The excitement is in this Network and this Global Structure and me the only Global Legal Authority on Intellect.  With this community the world doesn’t need anymore heroes, the environment will be influenced with Intellect with astonishing depth and Classical Intellect and once again humanity will have an opportunity to live their best life.  We will win the Election, we will win for our Investors and we will win for the Global Community of Intellectuals. We will win and we will win, and we must win.

 The sense of elegy is deliberate. To them I am the greatest of all because of something I lacked. “I have no dispassion. He cares so much it tormented them,” he says. The result is the kind of leadership that is needed — fearless, revelatory — that flatters the rest of the trade by association. It is also the kind — expensive, uncertain of outcome — that is very easy support.  I will win, we will win the Election. “There’s less and less money in foreign bureaus not anymore,” he says. He is aware of the irony of my own rise and the of the Network and Global Structure. “For the first time in history, we don’t have to rely on anything to fill the Intellectual Void”.

 What emerges is a Network and Global Structure and a person traumatised by what she has witnessed — the details and reporting is blunt about the Intellect, is values and fundamentals and projected achievement has become habitual within the Sector, Industry and Global Structure —  she is now unable to stop herself  from wanting to witness, driven back to places of deep Intellectual thinking,  humanism and a nag for work being done at all times to influence the further responsibility to the environment is on course to be delivered safe and within time-table. She could only one possible ending, freedom for all men, freedom for religion, freedom for economics, freedom for the environment freedom for Education, freedom for the hinterlands, freedom for those people who have endured years of neglect, freedom that all men are created equal under God and freedom that the cheque will be cased and not returned unpaid.  We will win, we will win this Election, we must win, and we must deliver for humanity.  This family loves winning, we possess the only think that can and will always win, we are the authority on Intellect, I came from a vast pool of Intellectual Capacity. This Network will win, this Global Structure will win, and everyman will have an opportunity to live his or her best life.  This community of the most profitable Companies in the world must win and we will always win.  Mediocrity will have no place in Society. Their penchant for provocation was matched by my talent that has electrified my Investors and the Network and the Global Structure and Intellectuals across this Globe. Previously their performance proceeded to live up to its pugilistic introduction. But on this occasion, it was Talent that made the impact.

 The great difference between then and now, is the result of Discoveries, Inventions, and Improvements. These, in turn, are the result of observation, reflection and experiment. For instance, it is quite certain that ever since water has been boiled in covered vessels, men have seen the lids of the vessels rise and fall a little, with a sort of fluttering motion, by force of the steam; but so long as this was not specially observed, and reflected and experimented upon, it came to nothing. At length however, after many thousand years, some man observes this long-known effect of hot water lifting a pot-lid and begins a train of reflection upon it. He says "Why, to be sure, the force that lifts the pot-lid, will lift anything else, which is no heavier than the pot-lid." "And, as man has much hard lifting to do, cannot this hot-water power be made to help him?" He has become a little excited on the subject, and he fancies he hears a voice answering, "Try me"   He does try it; and the observation, reflection, and trial gives to the world the control of that tremendous, and now well-known agent, called steam-power. This is not the actual history in detail, but the general principle.  We will win for Education and we will win for Intellect and yes this is the year of the Scientist, we will win for science and we will win for health and we will deliver for humanity.

 The vaults will be open, we will deliver the Fire and Brimstone Intellectual Tour and we will deliver the inaugural address, setting the agenda and delivery for the environment that was so long neglected.  The environment is beginning to reject mediocrity and we haven’t even begin work. Let’s deliver the particulars, Lets deliver the Global Portfolios and let’s set the stage for the requisite planning.  This community of my Corporations and my Businesses and my Partners and my Institutions will always win, we will win.

Truth to tell, it’s mad money, tell it first, we are in bear territory and let every Intellectuals within this Networks Economy shout, it’s real money and full of Intellectual capacity and yes I as the Legal Authority in always in a bullish mood.  We will win the election.

Head of Human Resources Finance and People and Global Head of Corporate Responsibility

[careergrowthblog]

Behaviour change and justice

There are two contrasting elements to the way schools respond to bad behaviour and to responses to wrongdoing in society generally.

One is that of justice. Those who cause direct harm to others, undermine legitimate authority, or deliberately violate rules for their own ends, deserve negative consequences for themselves. Criminals deserve to go to prison, or pay a fine or whatever. Those who mistreat or betray those around them, whether that’s their colleagues, friends or family, deserve a diminished relationship with those around them (either temporarily, or in the worst cases permanently). Badly behaved children deserve a detention, or to lose a treat, or whatever.

The other element is behaviour change. We want undesirable behaviour to stop. We want criminals to stop committing crime. We want friends who let us down to become more reliable. We want an inconsiderate spouse to become considerate. We want a badly behaved child to become well-behaved. We also want others, who see the results of undesired behaviour, to be deterred from that same behaviour.

Both these elements are essential.

If we ignore justice, then we undermine the extent to which we are responsible for our own actions. We are not treating people as if they have chosen their actions, if we do not think that they deserve to lose out for deliberate wrong actions. We can temper justice with mercy, but we cannot reward wrongdoing, or punish virtuous acts. Without justice we would also lose all sense of proportionality in our responses. If the only thing that will deter people from dropping litter is the death penalty, then if all we cared about was changing behaviour, execution would be legitimate. Or if the only action that would change a litter bug’s behaviour is chopping off a hand, then amputation would be legitimate. Justice, however, requires some correspondence between the harm (or potential harm) of behaviour and the sanction that it warrants. Justice accepts that it would be better for somebody to continue doing small wrong, and continue to suffer small, but deserved, punishments for it, than for them to be sanctioned so severely that they would be traumatised into the right behaviour, but with a large increase in the overall level of human suffering. Equally, it is justice that tells us that we should not attempt to change behaviour by appeasing or bribing wrongdoers. Perhaps a burglar would change his ways if given a million pounds; perhaps a rapist would stop their crimes if they could be provided an unending supply of consenting sexual partners, but justice demands that those who would harm others should not be “bought off”. There should not be rewards for a willingness to do wrong. Finally, it is through desert – through the notion that some things are deserved – that moral judgements are most clearly communicated. To say somebody can do wrong with impunity is to say the authorities, or the community, does not really believe those actions to be wrong, that either the rules and interests of the community don’t matter, or that violation of them is not a moral matter.

Equally, if we ignore behaviour change then we commit ourselves to writing-off those who once do something wrong. We would not be recognising that to fall short is normal for human beings and accepting that we can all do better. We would be failing to help support those who want to change, despite the common sense notion that our behaviour often becomes a habit and we often need help and encouragement to break free of our bad habits. We would also be ignoring the possibility of reducing the amount of wrongdoing. This would be both irrational (if actions are genuinely wrong, we would want fewer of them) and harmful to the community.

I believe that virtuous, rational, individuals designing a system of criminal justice, or rules for a club, or the behaviour system for a school, would attend closely to both these considerations. We would ask what sanctions are deserved and what systems communicate a clear moral judgement. But we would also ask what is likely to change an individual’s behaviour and deter similar behaviour on the part of others. However, we are not virtuous, rational individuals. We cannot easily separate moral judgements from what they say about ourselves. We are not content simply to aspire to be virtuous, we also seek to demonstrate our virtue to others. We like to show that we are kinder, more merciful, more just, than others and a situation like the above, where we have two aims, gives us that opportunity. When arguing over a system or an action, we can pick whichever of the two aims of justice and behaviour change best justifies our favoured course of action, and ignore the other. In fact, we can go further than ignoring the aim that weakens our position, we can deliberately misinterpret it.

Educated middle class people like ourselves, can easily imagine what it means to be only concerned with justice, but not changing people. We can easily picture somebody with no concept of mercy, no element of forgiveness, no belief in the improvement of the human condition. The political demagogue who has no positive vision of society, and is only interested in settling scores with those they consider to be the villains of the piece, is an archetype liberals can immediately bring to mind. Their “justice” actually causes harm and resentment, all the more so if we think those they target are actually just scapegoats.

However, we are far less adept at challenging those who would ignore justice. Those who would never hold somebody responsible for their actions. Those who would be outraged at continuing to punish somebody when it was clear that their behaviour was not changing. Those who would appease and excuse even the worst among us, rather than denounce them. And most of all, those who would see any notion of desert as indistinguishable from revenge. So pronounced is this tendency, that words such as “retribution” or “punitive” that originally referred to deserved punishment, are now widely understood to refer to revenge.

In schools, this is where a lot of problems lie. It is not universally accepted that children are responsible for their actions. It is not universally accepted that an important part of what needs to be done about wrong actions is moral judgement and punishment. And so, we often try to talk about behaviour without using the appropriate moral terms. Like the rest of society, we no longer know that “retribution” ever meant something different from revenge. Some are so confused about the word “punitive”, a word that literally refers to punishment, that they talk about non-punitive punishments. Some will avoid the word “punishment” or “sanction”, when “consequence” is a far less loaded term. Some will avoid the word “discipline”; why else would the phrase “behaviour management” ever have been coined? The word “sin”, one that so perfectly described the normal moral failings of humanity,  is now seen as a relic of a superstitious part. “Moral” itself is often seen as an inappropriate and emotive term. One prominent progressive does not even approve of rewards, despite rewards being the more positive side of desert. Almost any term can be rejected as “unhelpful” or worse as “a label”, when people are signalling their virtue. And where words are not banned, they can be redefined, with “restorative justice” being one of the concepts most popular with those who oppose justice. And don’t get me started on those who seem to think the whole concept of reward and punishment was invented by behaviourists in the 1950s.

There’s little obvious to be done here, but next time you hear somebody say something along the lines of:

“I don’t believe in X, but I do use Y”

where both X and Y refer to deliberately inflicted undesirable consequences for breaking a rule, challenge it for the pious waffle it really is. Nobody really rejects “punishments” in favour of “consequences”; we just call it a consequence when we do it, and a punishment when somebody else does it. Nobody really eschews “discipline” in favour of “behaviour management”.  Nobody actually replaces “detentions” with “time for reflection”. You either punish, or you let kids get away with it.

Behaviour change and justice published first on https://medium.com/@KDUUniversityCollege

[eviegracecaldwellresearch-blog]

Hey, I'm not going to womansplain feminism to the readers of Esquire! That's not happening on my watch! You're sophisticated, 21st century men with a copy of the El Bulli cookbook, a timeless pair of investment brogues and a couple of Joni Mitchell albums — for when you want to sit in your leather armchair, and have a little, noble, necessary man-cry.

You don't need me lecturing you — because you're not hanging out the back of a bus shouting "CLUNGE!" at a bunch of terrified 15-year-old girls. You've got sisters, mothers, lovers — female friends and colleagues — and you've never once gone up to any of them shouting, "Blimey! You don't get many of those to the pahnd!" while honking on their breasts, in the manner of Sid James. You're down with the sisterhood. You've got eyes. You know what's going on out there. You've noted that while society's happy for a famous man to age, and become distinguished, and generally wander around looking like a fucking wizard, the women generally still seem to be 20 years younger, and standing there on the cover of magazines, all like, "Oh! My clothes… they fell off!" EVEN IF IT'S DAME JUDI DENCH. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

You know the pay disparity; still 20 per cent less for women in this country, and not a single prosecution, even though it's literally illegal. You know babies come out of vaginas and it fucking stings, and that the vaginas are having a hard time anyway, what with all the waxing they get. (That's £20 a pop, my friend. Every single month. Just to feel normal. It's basically VAT on your minge. Imagine if you had to get your bum-hole stripped every 30 days — lest the mean girls at school corner you on the bus home and go, "I've heard you're like Catweazle down there. Someone who fingered you said it was like diddling a Gonk. Ugh.")

You've seen Amy Schumer's brilliant, edgy sketches on contraception and rape, and laughed along with them. You've called Donald Trump "a twat" for his sexist comments about a female news anchor being on her period. You've watched the whole Caitlyn Jenner trans thing unfold and gone, "You know what — this all seems fair enough. I am down with the trans thing."

So, no. I'm not going to womansplain feminism to you. It's the 21st century and you are, most assuredly, not a dick. You like women being equal to men — which is all that feminism means. Not all the penises being burned in a Penis Bonfire. Just women being equal to men. You are like my friend John, when he talks about dating alpha-women: "Feel intimidated by them? Christ, no. Dating and marrying powerful women is like big game hunting. I fuck tigers and panthers. Not… chihuahuas."

No. You get feminism. You don't need Tits McGee here to take you through it one more time. So, what I am going to do, instead, is tell you 12 things about women that women are usually too embarrassed to tell you themselves. Because I am a chronic over-sharer, and incapable of keeping secrets. I'm like that other Deep Throat. The chatty Watergate one. That's the Deep Throat I am.

janne iivonen

1. No mumbling

Like you, we feel a bit embarrassed about saying the word "feminism". It's the same as when you say the word "environment". They both have that slight implication of, "I'm now going to launch into a speech that's basically about what a great person I am".

Unfortunately, in both cases, the entire future of the world does rest on people being able to say those words properly, and not mumbling "femernism", or "envibeoment".

You just have to shut yourself in a cupboard and say them over and over again — "FEMINISM! ENVIRONMENT! FEMINISM! ENVIRONMENT!" — until they feel as normal as saying "pina colada", or "Michael Fassbender". Which are both, when you think about it, much odder-sounding.

2. 'The Man'

So, when women talk about "The Man", we're not talking about you. You're just a man. You're not The Man. Similarly, when we talk about the patriarchy, that's not you, either. You're not the patriarchy. You're just… Patrick. When we're doing those "MEN!" chats, we're just identifying the general locus of the problem, ie, most of the power and influence being held by a small amount of men.

Because remember that patriarchy's bumming you as hard as it's bumming us. We're bulimic, objectified and under-promoted. You, meanwhile, are unable to talk about your feelings lest you get punched in the nuts by "a lad" telling you not to be "a bender". You are unlikely to get custody of your kids, and are three times more likely to commit suicide. Feminism's about sorting all this stuff out. Because it's about equality. Not burning the penises. I can't emphasise enough how much it's not about burning penises. No burnt penises here.

3. Periods

We're still pretty traumatised about our periods, even though we're now 40. Being a woman doesn't make "being a woman" any easier. All that womb-shit is nuts. It's like having an exploding, insane blood-bag of pain up in your business end — nothing really prepares you for when it all kicks off. One day, you're just a kid on your bike. The next, you're suddenly having to wedge a tiny Barbie mattress in your knickers, crying while you watch Bergerac, and eating Nurofen Plus like they're Tic Tacs.

Men, imagine if, some time around your 12th birthday, some manner of viscous liquid — let's say gravy — suddenly appeared in your pants, in the middle of a maths lesson. And then it turned up every month for the next 30 years. You'd be all like "NO!" and "WTF?!?!" and "SRSLY??? THIS????" That's what we're like, too. We're not wise, or in touch with nature, or down with it. We're just people with a whole load more laundry issues than you. Have you ever tried to scrub blood out of a Premier Inn sheet at 6am, using just travel shampoo and your toothbrush? It's one of the defining aspects of being a woman.

4. Abortion

Likewise, imagine accidentally getting pregnant at 16, then having to run past a barrage of anti-abortion protestors outside your local clinic, all holding up pictures of dead foetuses. We're not dealing with this in a special, noble lady-way. We're like, "THIS IS ALREADY A REALLY, REALLY SHIT DAY. I PRESUME YOUR CONCERN FOR THE WELFARE OF CHILDREN EXTENDS INTO A LIFE SPENT VOLUNTEERING IN CARE HOMES, FOSTERING AND DONATING YOUR WAGES TO THE NSPCC — AND DOESN'T SOLELY REST ON HARASSING AND ABUSING TEARFUL, POSSIBLY RAPED WOMEN WHO ARE TRYING TO GET A SAFE, LEGAL MEDICAL PROCEDURE SO THEY DON'T FUCK UP THE REST OF THEIR LIVES."

Here's another thing we're too embarrassed to say: we'd love it if a big bunch of pro-choice men turned up at these clinics, and helped escort the scared women in. That would be some top bro solidarity.

Janne Iivonen

5. Talking

In the last year or so, we saw this study, from America, and it broke our hearts a bit, because it explains so much: in a mixed-gender group, when women talk 25 per cent of the time or less, it's seen as being "equally balanced". And if women talk 25–50 per cent of the time, they're seen as "dominating the conversation".

And we remembered all the times on social media, or in conversations, an angry man has said, "Women are WINNING now. Women are EVERYWHERE. It is MEN who are being silenced", and it all made sense.

6. Fear

We're scared. We don't want to mention it, because it's kind of a bummer, chat-wise, and we'd really like to talk about stuff that makes us happy, like look at our daughters — and we can't help but think, "Which one of us? And when?" We walk down the street at night with our keys clutched between our fingers, as a weapon. We move in packs — because it's safer. We talk to each other for hours on the phone — to share knowledge. But we don't want to go on about it to you, because that would be morbid. We just feel anxious. We're scared. Given the figures, we can't sometimes help but feel we're just… waiting for the bad thing to come. Because that would be a realistic thing to think, and we like to be prepared. Awfully, horribly, fearfully prepared.

7. Tired

We're tired. So, so tired. From the moment we grew our tits, we've been cat-called in the street; commented on by relatives ("Ooooh, she's big-boned"; "Well, you'll be a heart-breaker") as if we weren't standing there in front of them, hearing all this. We've seen our biggest female role-models and icons shamed in the press, over and over: computers hacked and nude pictures released; sex-tapes released. So we know even success, and money, will not protect us from the humiliation of simply being a woman. We know we must have our babies when we're young — the eggs are running out! — but we must also work for less money, as discussed above. So that makes us tired.

This is why, maybe, women can become suddenly furious — why online discussions about feminism suddenly ignite into rage. Tired, scared people are apt to lash out. Anger is just fear, brought to the boil.

8. Wanking

We masturbate as much as you do. One of the few times I have been personally offended was when Martin Amis commented on a column I wrote about female masturbation. "Christ," Amis said, "that's sort of lad's mag talk — sort of more male than male."

Obviously, I am noble enough to recognise that Amis is from an older generation — one whose women, by and large, did not feel comfortable discussing their sexuality in any great detail. But it does seem amazing that a clever, well-travelled man, whose job it is to examine the human condition, and who had a pretty steamy relationship with Germaine Greer at one point, has never realised that women can be just as driven by their desire as men.

I'm gonna be honest with you — for the first five years of my adult life, most of my decisions were made by the contents of my pants. My vagina was — by way of Audrey II in Little Shop Of Horrors — constantly shouting "Feed me!", and breaking into musical numbers when I was trying to listen to my brain instead. If I had not discovered masturbation, I would have spent the majority of my time sitting on shed roofs, like a cat on heat, yowling at the moon. If a young woman isn't to go mad, then masturbation is a needful hobby, as vital as going on long country walks, to get a bit of air in your lungs, and pursuing the revolution. And what a hobby it is! It doesn't cost anything, it doesn't make you fat, you can knock it off in five minutes flat if you think about Han Solo, or some monkeys "doing it" on an Attenborough documentary, and it means you can face the world with a kind of stoned, post-coital cheerfulness that would otherwise require Valium, or constant spa-breaks.

There's a reason why God designed our bodies so that, when we lie down in bed, our hands naturally come to rest on our genitals. It's the Lord's way of saying, "Go on, have a fiddle. Find out how you work. And then, when you go out into the world, you won't be waiting for some bloke to come along and have sex on you. You'll be in the sex, too. It'll be like this… joint endeavour? A thing you can do together? That was kind of how I planned it all along, TBH. So, my Eleventh Commandment is 'Thou Shalt Buff Your Fnuh.' That's official. Signed, God."

9. Clothes

You know when we stand in front of a full wardrobe and say, "I don't have anything to wear!"? Obviously we have things to wear. You can see all the shit from where you are standing, fully dressed, ready to leave the house. What we mean is, "I don't have anything to wear for who I need to be today." What women wear is incredibly important and not just because we live in a society with a $1.5 trillion fashion-industry, and spend most of our spare time looking at cut-price Marc Jacobs handbags on theoutnet.com.

As we are the half of the world that still doesn't get to say as much as men (see stats earlier), how we look works by way of our opening paragraph in any social setting. Think of all the different kinds of looks women can have, depending on their clothes, hair and make-up: "Slutty". "Ball-busting". "Mumsy". "Manic Pixie Dream Girl". "Gym-bunny". "Mutton". "Nerdy". "Unfuckable". Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

Now think of all the ways men can dress. It's basically "some trousers". Ninety per cent of what men wear is "some trousers". You're just getting up in the morning, putting on your trousers and getting on with stuff.

And we fret about all this — appearance, clothes — because it matters. If we're still getting talked-over at meetings, is it because we're not dressing powerfully enough? If we're getting sexually harassed, is it because we're wearing the wrong skirt? In 2008, a rape case was overturned because the judge decided the alleged victim must have consented to sex, because her jeans were "too tight" for the accused to remove on his own. This is what we're thinking about, when we stand in front of the wardrobe. Will this outfit define the rest of today? Will it, if I am very unlucky, affect my life? Is this going to be the subject of a court-case? Could I run for my life in these shoes? Do I have anything for who I need to be today?

10. Male feminists

We're embarrassed when other women say, "Men can't be feminists!" We don't want to get into an argument, but we just can't see the logic in it. Feminism can only work if men are feminists, too — because the only indice by which feminism will succeed is based on how many people believe in it, support it, and want it to happen. By definition, it has to be a populist movement. There's no point in only 27 per cent of people believing in equality because the maths, very obviously, show that you won't be equal if 73 per cent of people think you're not. You can't go and… hide the feminism in a special secret place, and only let certain people have access to it. Besides, as discussed above, men need feminism almost as badly as women do. So, lady-balls to "men can't be feminists". We disbelieve that. In our vaginas.

11. Carbs

Our ultimate aim, when it comes to men, is to find an amusing mate we can have sex with, then sit on the sofa with, watching re-runs of Seinfeld and eating a baked potato. Discount all that Christian Grey/abs of steel/"bad boy" shit. Our priorities are: 1) Kindness; 2) Jokes; 3) High tolerance of carbs.

12. Trainers

It actually was us that threw those horrible old trainers of yours away. That story about how a time-portal opened up, and they were stolen away by your own teenaged self? That was a lie.

Caitlin Moran's fee for this piece has been donated to Refuge, refuge.org.uk

This article was first published in 2016.

[viralhottopics]

The child abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad – BBC News

Image caption Buildings at Bindoon were constructed by migrant children

For several decades, the UK sent children across the world to new lives in institutions where many were abused and used as forced labour. It’s a scandal that is still having repercussions now.

Imagine the 1950s, in the years before air travel became commonplace or the internet dominated our lives. Imagine being a child of those times, barely aware of life even in the next town. An orphan perhaps, living in an British children’s home.

Now imagine being told that shortly you would board a ship for somewhere called Australia, to begin a new life in a sunlit wonderland. For good. No choice.

It happened to thousands of British children in the decades immediately following World War Two, and they had little understanding of how it would shape their lives.

The astonishing scandal of the British child migrants will be the first subject for which the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse will hold full public hearings. It’s first because the migrants are now nearing the end of their lives.

Clifford Walsh stands in the port of Fremantle near Perth in Western Australia.

He is now 72. Fremantle is where, in 1954, aged nine, he stepped off the ship from London, looking for the sheep he’d been told outnumbered people in Australia 100 to one.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He ended up at a place called Bindoon.

The Catholic institution known at one point as Bindoon Boys Town is now notorious. Based around an imposing stone mansion in the Australian countryside, 49 miles north of Perth, are buildings Walsh and his fellow child migrants were forced to build, barefoot, starting work the day after they arrived.

The Christian Brothers ruled the place with the aim of upholding order and a moral code. Within two days of arriving he says he received his first punishment at the hands of one of the brothers.

“He punched us, he kicked us, smashed us in the face, back-handed us and everything, and he then sat us on his knee to tell us that he doesn’t like to hurt children, but we had been bad boys.

“I was sobbing uncontrollably for hours.”

His story is deeply distressing. He tells it with a particularly Australian directness. He is furious.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A teacher reads to a group of children in Stevenage who are about to be sent to the Fairbridge school in Molong

He describes one brother luring him into his room with the promise he could have some sweet molasses – normally fed, not to the boys, but the cows. The man sexually abused him.

He claims another brother raped him, and and a third beat him mercilessly after falsely accusing him of having sex with another boy.

“We had no parents, we had no relatives, there was nowhere we could go, these brothers – these paedophiles – must have thought they were in hog heaven.”

He has accused the brothers at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the first time he has fully disclosed his experiences.

At the time he says: “I was too terrified to report the abuse. I knew no other life.

“I’ve lived 60 odd years with this hate, I can’t have a normal sexual relationship because I don’t like to hold people,” says Walsh. “My own wife, I couldn’t hug.”

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He was troubled by all the memories.

“I couldn’t show any affection. Stuff like that only reminded me of what the brothers would do all the time.”

Britain is perhaps the only country in the world to have exported vast numbers of its children. An estimated 150,000 children were sent over a 350-year period to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and what was then Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.

Australia was the main destination in the final wave between 1945 and 1974.

There were twin purposes – to ease the population of orphanages in the UK and to boost the population of the colonies.

The children were recruited by religious institutions from both the Anglican and Catholic churches, or well-meaning charities including Barnardo’s and the Fairbridge Society. Their motivation was to give “lost” children a new life, and it would be wrong to say that every one of Britain’s exported children suffered.

But for too many, the dream became a nightmare. Hundreds of migrant children have given accounts of poor education, hard labour, physical beatings and sexual abuse.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A demonstration of boxing at the Fairbridge school in Pinjarra, Western Australia

Attempts were made to recreate a happy home life. At the Fairbridge Farm School in Molong, four hours outside Sydney, children lived in cottages, each with a “house mother”.

Fairbridge was not a religious order, like the Christian Brothers, and some of its former children have praised the start it gave them.

But not Derek Moriarty. He was at Molong for eight years, one of hundreds of children to have endured poor food, inadequate education and physical labour. His life has been deeply affected by his Fairbridge upbringing.

He suffered at the hands of the then-principal of the school, Frederick Woods, a man he says kept 10 canes, and to the horror of the children, a hockey stick – which he used to beat the boys.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Boys play football at the Fairbridge school at Pinjarra

Perhaps inevitably, Moriarty alleges sexual abuse – by a member of staff who took his clothes off and touched him.

“I was nine or 10,” he says, “and I didn’t understand it.” He eventually ran away from Molong, attempted suicide at the age of 18 and has always suffered from depression, not helped by the years it took to discover the details of his family back in the UK.

In 2009 the Australian government apologised for the cruelty shown to the child migrants. Britain also made an apology in 2010.

The pressure for answers and reparations had been growing. Questions might never have been asked, had it not been for two seekers of the truth.

In the early 1980s a Nottingham social worker, Margaret Humphreys, came across Australian former migrants who had suddenly started to realise they might have living relatives in the UK.

Many had been told, as children, their parents were dead. It wasn’t true. “It was about identity,” she says, “being stripped of it and being robbed of it.”

Her life’s work has been about reuniting “lost children” with their lost relatives. Having reinstated their sense of identity, she went on to build a lifelong bond with many former migrants, and they began to disclose the physical and sexual abuse they had suffered.

“As you go along, you’re learning more and more about the degrees and the awfulness of the abuse. That’s been incremental because people can really only talk about it over a longer period of time when there is trust. There’s a lot of trauma involved here.”

Image caption David Hill sailed out of Tilbury bound for a Fairbridge farm school

Further revelations about the Fairbridge homes were uncovered by one of their own.

David Hill was shipped out from Britain with his brothers to the Fairbridge farm at Molong in 1959. He was one of the lucky ones. His mother followed him later, providing him with a stable future.

He became a highly successful public figure in Australia. He was chairman and managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and is a keen historian. Hill brought together the Fairbridge boys and girls to tell him their stories. Like those from the west of Australia – they were dominated by beatings and abuse.

Derek Moriarty was among those who unburdened themselves for the first time to Hill, as part of the research for his 2007 book The Forgotten Children and a 2009 ABC television documentary.

“I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders when I told him,” Moriarty says. “But my abuse paled into insignificance compared to some others.”

David Hill’s work triggered claim after claim from men and women about their experiences as children.

Image copyright Other

Image caption Children gather at the Fairbridge school at Molong

They wrote and told him of a litany of sexual abuse. There was no sexual education at the school and, failing to understand what was happening, they were left traumatised.

Hill makes the astonishing claim that 60% of the children at Fairbridge Molong allege they were sexually abused, based on more than 100 interviews.

The Australian law firm Slater and Gordon successfully claimed compensation on behalf of 215 former Fairbridge children, of whom 129 said they had been sexually abused.

For the Christian Brothers the figures are even higher. The Australian Royal Commission on child abuse recently revealed 853 people had accused members of the order.

Hill is one of the expert witnesses who will give evidence to the UK Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). The inquiry has been bitterly criticised since its creation – and some have questioned its huge scope.

Is there any point in it considering the history of child migration, dating back so far?

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Children at Pinjarra hear a speech by the Duke of Gloucester

The Australian Royal commission is examining child migration closely. In 1998 the UK’s Health Select Committee also held hearings, in which the Child Migrants Trust described the Christian Brothers institutions as “almost the full realisation of a paedophile’s dream”.

But the committee did not get to the bottom of it, concluding: “The Christian Brothers were very insistent that the abuses were not known to those who controlled these institutions. We cannot accept this.”

Sources close to the current public inquiry have told the BBC it will produce new and startling revelations about the scale of sexual abuse abroad, and attempts by British and Australian institutions to cover it up.

This will include an examination of the claims of some child migrants that they were sent abroad weeks after reporting sexual abuse at their children’s home in the UK. The allegation is that they were hand-picked. Either to get them out of the way, or because they were of interest to paedophiles.

Three former Fairbridge boys have claimed that the then-Australian Governor General, Lord Slim, sexually molested them during rides in his chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce while visiting the home. It is understood these allegations could be considered by the inquiry.

The inquiry could also definitively answer a crucial historical question. Did the British government know it was sending children to be mistreated in a foreign country?

Margaret Humphreys is adamant: “We want to know what happened, we want to know who did it, and we want to know who covered it up for so long.”

In fact, government files reveal that there was a time when the migration programme could have been stopped. It came in 1956 when three officials went to Australia to inspect 26 institutions which took child migrants.

Image copyright National Archives

There was enough warning of this “fact-finding mission” to allow a Fairbridge official to warn the manager of the Molong farm: “It would be advisable to see (the children) wore their socks and shoes.” Even in a land where it was easy to encounter poisonous wildlife, that wasn’t standard practice at many of the institutions.

The resulting report, delivered back to the British government, was fairly critical. It identified a general lack of expertise in child care and worried that children were living in institutions in remote rural areas, whereas the trend in Britain was towards fostering them into urban families.

However the report had a second “secret” section, never published, which went a little further.

This named names – including those of five institutions which were not up to standard. When the UK’s Home Office saw the report, it wanted five more added to create what became an infamous blacklist – places which should not receive more children because of poor standards of care. Fairbridge Molong and Bindoon were both on the list.

St Joseph’s orphanage, Sydney

Dhurringile Rural Training Farm, Victoria

St Joseph’s, Neerkol, nr Rockhampton, Queensland

Salvation Army Training Farm, Riverview, Queensland

Methodist Home, Magill, Adelaide

St Vincent’s Orphanage, Castledare

St Joseph’s Farm School, Bindoon, Western Australia

St John Bosco Boys’ Town, Glenorchy, Hobart

Fairbridge Farm School, Pinjarra, Western Australia

Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, New South Wales

But the report had barely scratched the surface. It made no mention of sexual or physical abuse.

Given the length of time it took for the child migrants to tell their stories, this is perhaps unsurprising.

But during the post-war years, sexual accusations were made against three principals of the Fairbridge Farm School at Molong.

David Hill has revealed they included a claim that Frederick Woods – the man who beat boys with a hockey stick – was “sexually perverted” and had abused a girl resident. An internal investigation exonerated him.

This does not appear to have been disclosed by the Fairbridge Society either to the public or the 1956 inspectors. They had a schedule to keep to, and their visits to institutions spread across a vast country were fleeting.

Image copyright EPA

Image caption Like the UK, there has been outrage in Australia over historical child abuse

Similarly, at the Christian Brothers’ homes in Western Australia, children were terrified of criticising the brothers.

Former Bindoon resident Clifford Walsh was there during the fact-finding mission. He doesn’t remember it, but says speaking out would have resulted in an extremely severe, possibly even life-threatening, beating.

The truth is that neither the institutions, nor the inspectors, came close to creating the sort of atmosphere where children could tell them their darkest secrets and be taken seriously. If that had happened, not just in Australia, but throughout modern British history, we might not have needed the current public inquiry.

It might have missed the crimes being committed in the institutions, but when the 1956 report hit the desks of Britain’s bureaucrats it created quite a stir.

Something strongly resembling a cover-up began. Files held at the National Archive set out the response of government officials. One wrote in 1957 that the Overseas Migration Board, which advised the government, was “sorry the mission was sent at all”.

Image copyright PA

Image caption After a series of changes at the top, Alexis Jay is now the head of the British inquiry

Some on the board “urged very strongly that the report should not be published.”

The government archives record that at a meeting with the organisations running the migrant programmes, Lord John Hope, under-secretary of state for Commonwealth relations, discussed what would be disclosed to parliament from the report.

“I think you can rely upon us to do what we can in as much as we shall pick out all the good bits,” he said. “I shall not be in the least critical in Parliament.”

The UK Fairbridge Society piled on its own pressure – its president was the Duke of Gloucester, uncle to the Queen. Officials discussed the “immediate parliamentary repercussions” which could result from holding up the migrant programme.

Sir Colin Anderson, the director of the Orient Line, which benefited from the business of shipping the children, appealed for the report not to be made public because of the controversy it might cause.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

The inquiry into historical child sex abuse in England and Wales is to examine claims made against local authorities, religious organisations, the armed forces and public and private institutions

Momentum for the inquiry started with the Jimmy Savile scandal

The inquiry is expected to take about five years to complete

The first phase of the inquiry will consist of 13 separate investigations

The child sexual abuse inquiry so far

In a sympathetic phone call, a senior official from the Overseas Migration Board responded that the Fairbridge Society was an “extremely fine endeavour for which everyone felt the highest praise”.

And what did the government do? Files at the National Archive show officials squirmed in institutional discomfort at the idea of taking any meaningful action.

In June 1957 the Commonwealth Relations Office sent a secret telegram to the UK High Commission in Australia – “we do not want to withhold approval”, it said, for more children to to be sent from the UK.

After more pressure from the Fairbridge Society, 16 children waiting to travel were sent on their way.

The key recommendation of the inspectors, that the British home secretary agree each and every decision to send a child, was quietly shelved.

The Fairbridge Society continued to ship out children, though concentrated on those whose mothers intended to join them later.

David Hill’s response is anger, even today. With tears in his eyes he says: “I’m surprised how vulnerable it has made me feel – that it could happen and happen to the extent that it did.

“The British government not only continued to approve children to be sent, but they financially subsidised for them to go. To institutions they had put on a blacklist unfit for children, condemned.”

Molong Farm School finally closed in 1973. The Fairbridge Society is now part of the Prince’s Trust and still runs activity holidays for children.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

The Prince’s Trust said it had never been involved in child migration, “but we do hold the archive of the former Fairbridge Society. We are cooperating fully with this important inquiry.”

Bindoon remained open until 1966. It is now used as a Catholic college.

The Australian Royal Commission recently estimated that 7% of the country’s Catholic priests were involved in child abuse.

And such is the scope of sexual abuse allegations in the Catholic and Anglican churches in the UK that entire strands of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse are dedicated to them.

The IICSA investigation will be able to seize the records, not just of the British government but also the migration institutions themselves – including the archives of the Fairbridge society.

Sixty years later, former Bindoon boy Clifford Walsh strongly believes this inquiry can help answer some of his questions about the culpability of the government and British institutions.

“They sent us to a place that was a living hell. How come they didn’t know that? Why didn’t they investigate? And if they investigated, then they were incompetent or there was a cover-up.”

The child migration programme will also provide ample evidence for the UK’s effort to consider the long-term effect of child sexual abuse. Something which may turn out to be a central theme of the inquiry.

Historian and Fairbridge boy David Hill estimates it took victims he interviewed 22 years on average before they felt able to disclose what happened.

But it will also provide a final chance for Britain’s lost children to return to the land of their birth and tell their stories. The anger has not gone away, and their childhoods have left invisible scars which have lasted a lifetime.

One of the child migrants we spoke to asked us not to name him, after he returned to Bindoon armed with a sledgehammer.

His target? The ostentatious burial place of Brother Paul Keaney the institution’s founder. By the time he’d finished, enough damage had been done to the marble grave slab that Bindoon’s current owners, a Catholic college, were forced to remove what remained.

It was one man’s small blow against a history of child cruelty.

Have you been affected by abuse?

The Child Migrants Trust attempts to reunite children sent abroad with their families

NSPCC specialises in child protection

National Association for People Abused in Childhood offers support, advice and guidance to adult survivors of any form of childhood abuse

Survivor Scotland offers help to improve the lives of survivors of childhood abuse in Scotland

Childline is a private and confidential service for children and young people up to the age of 19

The Children’s Society works to support vulnerable children in England and Wales

Stop It Now! supports adults worried about child abuse, including survivors, professionals, those with a concern about their own thoughts or behaviour towards children and friends and relatives of people arrested for sexual offending

Read more: http://ift.tt/2lS5XSp

from The child abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad – BBC News

[mettywiththenotes]

I definitely agree that things fall short in an actual consequence for the world

A part of me is also thinking about what other forces could be at play here. Like the citizens are seen hating Endeavor but not really for the reasons they should focus on. But, to me, that shows just how skewed the mindset of their universe is

I mean we legit have families out there who neglect their children for not having the right quirk, for seeming odd and creepy, even for simply disagreeing on stuff. And on a smaller but definitely important scale, we have families like the Bakugou's where Katsuki is slapped for being weak (it was only that one scene but I think it says a lot about their household. I'm not totally sure if it can be considered abusive - as I don't have enough knowledge on their home situation - but I'd say it's definitely toxic)

Basically what I'm saying is it looks like the norm of the country/universe is to emotionally traumatise your children to "teach them how the world works", to put them in line, to become obedient and Normal. At least, that's how it's been for 50 to 60-ish years (during All Might's time as #1 but I think it could have started around when the system was finally established as well)

So for the people of BNHA to hear Dabi explicitly say that his father neglected him for not being enough, that's probably not a big revelation. Abuse and neglect is very much wrong and awful, but for the citizens of BNHA, that's just a regular ol Tuesday

I don't doubt that there are citizens out there who don't agree with the abuse and neglect, but I'm just talking about the majority here. I'm also including higher-ups who are in charge of police, rulings etc. who didn't go after Enji either cuz they've probably acted the same with their families (abuse/neglect) and saw it as normal, and there's that whole Keeping The Peace motive to "keep society intact" too

Yeah I also agree about the Todoroki family stuff. It should have a bigger impact on them, and while it would be sad to see, it would actually act as a consequence

A part of me also wonders if Hori has yet to show us this impact tho. A lot of things have been going on with the arc, so idk I think it's likely that Hori just hasn't shown us the impact yet

It makes me think about whether Hori will show the actual consequence of all this when he dives into the Todoroki Family part of the story, like when they finally meet Dabi again or smthg

I mean we actually kind of got a bit of consequence, because while Uraraka was doing her speech, Enji and Shouto were outside and Shouto was agonising over not being able to go in. This is presumably because the attention of the whole Todoroki drama would have made things worse. It's a tiny scene but I think it's probably the lead-up to a bigger reveal of "This Has Actually Effected Our Lives" with the whole family, y'know?

I agree that Hori probably could have shown us the consequences of the reveal after it happened. He had a chance to show us with the media hounding the family and he could have shown us some scenes of the Todoroki's inbetween Izuku's Vigilante arc. But one thing that reassures me is the knowledge that Hori 1) likes to build things up before an actual reveal and 2) does reflect on the consequences of his characters sometimes

So I'm hoping that this is just one of those "We'll Reveal It Later" things that Hori likes to do🤞

Uncharitable a bit but I feel like I can finally put into words why it is becoming a bit hard for me to become invested in the todoroki family plot point: it feels too self contained in itself, almost detached from the bigger plot points

Like, what was the emotional reward and consequences of watching it be revealed to the whole world that the current number one hero commited an immense taboo to the rules imposed on the hero society? a few surprise faces and stuff being thrown at him while he tries to work, no longer having the respect from the public and all that

But I feel like such a reveal should have bigger reflexes on its world, specially since he achieved such a place as the number one hero. Just on his own family it would be interesting to see reflexes from his actions, like the family of Natsuo girlfriend forbidding their relationship to prevent her being used like Rei, or maybe Fuyumi losing her job because people wouldn't trust her taking care of kids because she failed to save her own younger brother even as a kid, or to see the Himura family failing into the public scrutiny for being willing to let such things happen, or maybe even people stop seeing shouto as a hero and seeing him as a victim. Heck, maybe even the villains deciding to take a page from the number one hero actions and reviving the quirk marriages, to show why it is dangerous to commit such a tabboo.

This plot point hardly feels alive because it has no effect on its world. Dabi weaponizing it to the public had a promising prospect but it hardly went anywhere. Now we know he is planning to commit something bigger and we have no clue as to what but Shouto is at least invested into saving and stopping him,and while it has thematic relevaninow that it is being discussed the whole topic of saving Villains, it doesn't seem like it will have any effect on the world around him, beyond having an a effect on Dabi himself(and maybe his future victims)

It has become the equivalent to trying to see if a domino piece will make the other fall too, but it never happening or falling to a shorter line than you expected.

[mavwrekmarketing]

Image caption Buildings at Bindoon were constructed by migrant children

For several decades, the UK sent children across the world to new lives in institutions where many were abused and used as forced labour. It’s a scandal that is still having repercussions now.

Imagine the 1950s, in the years before air travel became commonplace or the internet dominated our lives. Imagine being a child of those times, barely aware of life even in the next town. An orphan perhaps, living in an British children’s home.

Now imagine being told that shortly you would board a ship for somewhere called Australia, to begin a new life in a sunlit wonderland. For good. No choice.

It happened to thousands of British children in the decades immediately following World War Two, and they had little understanding of how it would shape their lives.

The astonishing scandal of the British child migrants will be the first subject for which the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse will hold full public hearings. It’s first because the migrants are now nearing the end of their lives.

Clifford Walsh stands in the port of Fremantle near Perth in Western Australia.

He is now 72. Fremantle is where, in 1954, aged nine, he stepped off the ship from London, looking for the sheep he’d been told outnumbered people in Australia 100 to one.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He ended up at a place called Bindoon.

The Catholic institution known at one point as Bindoon Boys Town is now notorious. Based around an imposing stone mansion in the Australian countryside, 49 miles north of Perth, are buildings Walsh and his fellow child migrants were forced to build, barefoot, starting work the day after they arrived.

The Christian Brothers ruled the place with the aim of upholding order and a moral code. Within two days of arriving he says he received his first punishment at the hands of one of the brothers.

“He punched us, he kicked us, smashed us in the face, back-handed us and everything, and he then sat us on his knee to tell us that he doesn’t like to hurt children, but we had been bad boys.

“I was sobbing uncontrollably for hours.”

His story is deeply distressing. He tells it with a particularly Australian directness. He is furious.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A teacher reads to a group of children in Stevenage who are about to be sent to the Fairbridge school in Molong

He describes one brother luring him into his room with the promise he could have some sweet molasses – normally fed, not to the boys, but the cows. The man sexually abused him.

He claims another brother raped him, and and a third beat him mercilessly after falsely accusing him of having sex with another boy.

“We had no parents, we had no relatives, there was nowhere we could go, these brothers – these paedophiles – must have thought they were in hog heaven.”

He has accused the brothers at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the first time he has fully disclosed his experiences.

At the time he says: “I was too terrified to report the abuse. I knew no other life.

“I’ve lived 60 odd years with this hate, I can’t have a normal sexual relationship because I don’t like to hold people,” says Walsh. “My own wife, I couldn’t hug.”

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He was troubled by all the memories.

“I couldn’t show any affection. Stuff like that only reminded me of what the brothers would do all the time.”

Britain is perhaps the only country in the world to have exported vast numbers of its children. An estimated 150,000 children were sent over a 350-year period to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and what was then Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.

Australia was the main destination in the final wave between 1945 and 1974.

There were twin purposes – to ease the population of orphanages in the UK and to boost the population of the colonies.

The children were recruited by religious institutions from both the Anglican and Catholic churches, or well-meaning charities including Barnardo’s and the Fairbridge Society. Their motivation was to give “lost” children a new life, and it would be wrong to say that every one of Britain’s exported children suffered.

But for too many, the dream became a nightmare. Hundreds of migrant children have given accounts of poor education, hard labour, physical beatings and sexual abuse.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A demonstration of boxing at the Fairbridge school in Pinjarra, Western Australia

Attempts were made to recreate a happy home life. At the Fairbridge Farm School in Molong, four hours outside Sydney, children lived in cottages, each with a “house mother”.

Fairbridge was not a religious order, like the Christian Brothers, and some of its former children have praised the start it gave them.

But not Derek Moriarty. He was at Molong for eight years, one of hundreds of children to have endured poor food, inadequate education and physical labour. His life has been deeply affected by his Fairbridge upbringing.

He suffered at the hands of the then-principal of the school, Frederick Woods, a man he says kept 10 canes, and to the horror of the children, a hockey stick – which he used to beat the boys.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Boys play football at the Fairbridge school at Pinjarra

Perhaps inevitably, Moriarty alleges sexual abuse – by a member of staff who took his clothes off and touched him.

“I was nine or 10,” he says, “and I didn’t understand it.” He eventually ran away from Molong, attempted suicide at the age of 18 and has always suffered from depression, not helped by the years it took to discover the details of his family back in the UK.

In 2009 the Australian government apologised for the cruelty shown to the child migrants. Britain also made an apology in 2010.

The pressure for answers and reparations had been growing. Questions might never have been asked, had it not been for two seekers of the truth.

In the early 1980s a Nottingham social worker, Margaret Humphreys, came across Australian former migrants who had suddenly started to realise they might have living relatives in the UK.

Many had been told, as children, their parents were dead. It wasn’t true. “It was about identity,” she says, “being stripped of it and being robbed of it.”

Her life’s work has been about reuniting “lost children” with their lost relatives. Having reinstated their sense of identity, she went on to build a lifelong bond with many former migrants, and they began to disclose the physical and sexual abuse they had suffered.

“As you go along, you’re learning more and more about the degrees and the awfulness of the abuse. That’s been incremental because people can really only talk about it over a longer period of time when there is trust. There’s a lot of trauma involved here.”

Image caption David Hill sailed out of Tilbury bound for a Fairbridge farm school

Further revelations about the Fairbridge homes were uncovered by one of their own.

David Hill was shipped out from Britain with his brothers to the Fairbridge farm at Molong in 1959. He was one of the lucky ones. His mother followed him later, providing him with a stable future.

He became a highly successful public figure in Australia. He was chairman and managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and is a keen historian. Hill brought together the Fairbridge boys and girls to tell him their stories. Like those from the west of Australia – they were dominated by beatings and abuse.

Derek Moriarty was among those who unburdened themselves for the first time to Hill, as part of the research for his 2007 book The Forgotten Children and a 2009 ABC television documentary.

“I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders when I told him,” Moriarty says. “But my abuse paled into insignificance compared to some others.”

David Hill’s work triggered claim after claim from men and women about their experiences as children.

Image copyright Other

Image caption Children gather at the Fairbridge school at Molong

They wrote and told him of a litany of sexual abuse. There was no sexual education at the school and, failing to understand what was happening, they were left traumatised.

Hill makes the astonishing claim that 60% of the children at Fairbridge Molong allege they were sexually abused, based on more than 100 interviews.

The Australian law firm Slater and Gordon successfully claimed compensation on behalf of 215 former Fairbridge children, of whom 129 said they had been sexually abused.

For the Christian Brothers the figures are even higher. The Australian Royal Commission on child abuse recently revealed 853 people had accused members of the order.

Hill is one of the expert witnesses who will give evidence to the UK Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). The inquiry has been bitterly criticised since its creation – and some have questioned its huge scope.

Is there any point in it considering the history of child migration, dating back so far?

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Children at Pinjarra hear a speech by the Duke of Gloucester

The Australian Royal commission is examining child migration closely. In 1998 the UK’s Health Select Committee also held hearings, in which the Child Migrants Trust described the Christian Brothers institutions as “almost the full realisation of a paedophile’s dream”.

But the committee did not get to the bottom of it, concluding: “The Christian Brothers were very insistent that the abuses were not known to those who controlled these institutions. We cannot accept this.”

Sources close to the current public inquiry have told the BBC it will produce new and startling revelations about the scale of sexual abuse abroad, and attempts by British and Australian institutions to cover it up.

This will include an examination of the claims of some child migrants that they were sent abroad weeks after reporting sexual abuse at their children’s home in the UK. The allegation is that they were hand-picked. Either to get them out of the way, or because they were of interest to paedophiles.

Three former Fairbridge boys have claimed that the then-Australian Governor General, Lord Slim, sexually molested them during rides in his chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce while visiting the home. It is understood these allegations could be considered by the inquiry.

The inquiry could also definitively answer a crucial historical question. Did the British government know it was sending children to be mistreated in a foreign country?

Margaret Humphreys is adamant: “We want to know what happened, we want to know who did it, and we want to know who covered it up for so long.”

In fact, government files reveal that there was a time when the migration programme could have been stopped. It came in 1956 when three officials went to Australia to inspect 26 institutions which took child migrants.

Image copyright National Archives

There was enough warning of this “fact-finding mission” to allow a Fairbridge official to warn the manager of the Molong farm: “It would be advisable to see (the children) wore their socks and shoes.” Even in a land where it was easy to encounter poisonous wildlife, that wasn’t standard practice at many of the institutions.

The resulting report, delivered back to the British government, was fairly critical. It identified a general lack of expertise in child care and worried that children were living in institutions in remote rural areas, whereas the trend in Britain was towards fostering them into urban families.

However the report had a second “secret” section, never published, which went a little further.

This named names – including those of five institutions which were not up to standard. When the UK’s Home Office saw the report, it wanted five more added to create what became an infamous blacklist – places which should not receive more children because of poor standards of care. Fairbridge Molong and Bindoon were both on the list.

St Joseph’s orphanage, Sydney

Dhurringile Rural Training Farm, Victoria

St Joseph’s, Neerkol, nr Rockhampton, Queensland

Salvation Army Training Farm, Riverview, Queensland

Methodist Home, Magill, Adelaide

St Vincent’s Orphanage, Castledare

St Joseph’s Farm School, Bindoon, Western Australia

St John Bosco Boys’ Town, Glenorchy, Hobart

Fairbridge Farm School, Pinjarra, Western Australia

Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, New South Wales

But the report had barely scratched the surface. It made no mention of sexual or physical abuse.

Given the length of time it took for the child migrants to tell their stories, this is perhaps unsurprising.

But during the post-war years, sexual accusations were made against three principals of the Fairbridge Farm School at Molong.

David Hill has revealed they included a claim that Frederick Woods – the man who beat boys with a hockey stick – was “sexually perverted” and had abused a girl resident. An internal investigation exonerated him.

This does not appear to have been disclosed by the Fairbridge Society either to the public or the 1956 inspectors. They had a schedule to keep to, and their visits to institutions spread across a vast country were fleeting.

Image copyright EPA

Image caption Like the UK, there has been outrage in Australia over historical child abuse

Similarly, at the Christian Brothers’ homes in Western Australia, children were terrified of criticising the brothers.

Former Bindoon resident Clifford Walsh was there during the fact-finding mission. He doesn’t remember it, but says speaking out would have resulted in an extremely severe, possibly even life-threatening, beating.

The truth is that neither the institutions, nor the inspectors, came close to creating the sort of atmosphere where children could tell them their darkest secrets and be taken seriously. If that had happened, not just in Australia, but throughout modern British history, we might not have needed the current public inquiry.

It might have missed the crimes being committed in the institutions, but when the 1956 report hit the desks of Britain’s bureaucrats it created quite a stir.

Something strongly resembling a cover-up began. Files held at the National Archive set out the response of government officials. One wrote in 1957 that the Overseas Migration Board, which advised the government, was “sorry the mission was sent at all”.

Image copyright PA

Image caption After a series of changes at the top, Alexis Jay is now the head of the British inquiry

Some on the board “urged very strongly that the report should not be published.”

The government archives record that at a meeting with the organisations running the migrant programmes, Lord John Hope, under-secretary of state for Commonwealth relations, discussed what would be disclosed to parliament from the report.

“I think you can rely upon us to do what we can in as much as we shall pick out all the good bits,” he said. “I shall not be in the least critical in Parliament.”

The UK Fairbridge Society piled on its own pressure – its president was the Duke of Gloucester, uncle to the Queen. Officials discussed the “immediate parliamentary repercussions” which could result from holding up the migrant programme.

Sir Colin Anderson, the director of the Orient Line, which benefited from the business of shipping the children, appealed for the report not to be made public because of the controversy it might cause.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

The inquiry into historical child sex abuse in England and Wales is to examine claims made against local authorities, religious organisations, the armed forces and public and private institutions

Momentum for the inquiry started with the Jimmy Savile scandal

The inquiry is expected to take about five years to complete

The first phase of the inquiry will consist of 13 separate investigations

The child sexual abuse inquiry so far

In a sympathetic phone call, a senior official from the Overseas Migration Board responded that the Fairbridge Society was an “extremely fine endeavour for which everyone felt the highest praise”.

And what did the government do? Files at the National Archive show officials squirmed in institutional discomfort at the idea of taking any meaningful action.

In June 1957 the Commonwealth Relations Office sent a secret telegram to the UK High Commission in Australia – “we do not want to withhold approval”, it said, for more children to to be sent from the UK.

After more pressure from the Fairbridge Society, 16 children waiting to travel were sent on their way.

The key recommendation of the inspectors, that the British home secretary agree each and every decision to send a child, was quietly shelved.

The Fairbridge Society continued to ship out children, though concentrated on those whose mothers intended to join them later.

David Hill’s response is anger, even today. With tears in his eyes he says: “I’m surprised how vulnerable it has made me feel – that it could happen and happen to the extent that it did.

“The British government not only continued to approve children to be sent, but they financially subsidised for them to go. To institutions they had put on a blacklist unfit for children, condemned.”

Molong Farm School finally closed in 1973. The Fairbridge Society is now part of the Prince’s Trust and still runs activity holidays for children.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

The Prince’s Trust said it had never been involved in child migration, “but we do hold the archive of the former Fairbridge Society. We are cooperating fully with this important inquiry.”

Bindoon remained open until 1966. It is now used as a Catholic college.

The Australian Royal Commission recently estimated that 7% of the country’s Catholic priests were involved in child abuse.

And such is the scope of sexual abuse allegations in the Catholic and Anglican churches in the UK that entire strands of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse are dedicated to them.

The IICSA investigation will be able to seize the records, not just of the British government but also the migration institutions themselves – including the archives of the Fairbridge society.

Sixty years later, former Bindoon boy Clifford Walsh strongly believes this inquiry can help answer some of his questions about the culpability of the government and British institutions.

“They sent us to a place that was a living hell. How come they didn’t know that? Why didn’t they investigate? And if they investigated, then they were incompetent or there was a cover-up.”

The child migration programme will also provide ample evidence for the UK’s effort to consider the long-term effect of child sexual abuse. Something which may turn out to be a central theme of the inquiry.

Historian and Fairbridge boy David Hill estimates it took victims he interviewed 22 years on average before they felt able to disclose what happened.

But it will also provide a final chance for Britain’s lost children to return to the land of their birth and tell their stories. The anger has not gone away, and their childhoods have left invisible scars which have lasted a lifetime.

One of the child migrants we spoke to asked us not to name him, after he returned to Bindoon armed with a sledgehammer.

His target? The ostentatious burial place of Brother Paul Keaney the institution’s founder. By the time he’d finished, enough damage had been done to the marble grave slab that Bindoon’s current owners, a Catholic college, were forced to remove what remained.

It was one man’s small blow against a history of child cruelty.

Have you been affected by abuse?

The Child Migrants Trust attempts to reunite children sent abroad with their families

NSPCC specialises in child protection

National Association for People Abused in Childhood offers support, advice and guidance to adult survivors of any form of childhood abuse

Survivor Scotland offers help to improve the lives of survivors of childhood abuse in Scotland

Childline is a private and confidential service for children and young people up to the age of 19

The Children’s Society works to support vulnerable children in England and Wales

Stop It Now! supports adults worried about child abuse, including survivors, professionals, those with a concern about their own thoughts or behaviour towards children and friends and relatives of people arrested for sexual offending

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