What constitutes Misogyny?

[wintler2]

..author's name is LeGuin, tho

Another novel that might be of interest is The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood.

Ya ya. Also maybe The Good Terrorist by Doris Lessing, and .. i'll stop there.

[Project Willow]

Your comment, Miss Willow, reminded me of conversations that I've had, with several women, about this very issue. So I'm piqued to ask you a clarifying question or two, if you don't mind.

You say that you don't expect to know what that feels like. Does that mean that you don't know what being loved, for whom you are, feels like?

If it does, and you don't know what it feels like, how do you know that it is absent then?

I ask because for me to know that a certain feeling is absent, I first need to know what that feeling feels like.

If I do and it's not there, then I can attest to its absence.

But if I don't, than I can't attest to it being absent.

Know what I mean?

TIA

I think it's instinctual, we all, men and women, need to be loved and valued, it's part of survival, is it not? I think I may have difficulty taking in feelings of appreciation, I never really learned what to do with them, much as I crave them.

I also think I threw myself a helluva pity party last night, with wine.
It's some man's fault, of course.

I liked Revolution From Within. when I was young. (Willow I'm pretty sure you had a more lofty work in mind, but this book was my primer to feminism and I can say that it changed my life - I was a teen let's not forget)

I liked that book also, when I read it in my, uh, twenties.

IWhat I remember of it was that it gave voice to all these fears and frustrations I'd been feeling but didn't understand. I learned that I wasn't crazy for feeling these feelings, and that I wasn't alone.

Yes, that kind of awareness is invaluable, life saving almost.

Yeah, but you know - women, who can please 'em? They're never happy.

It's easy, just don't be a jerk, and communicate every once in a awhile.

[Nordic]

Nordic, Nordic Nordic, dude, just pick one, single, 2nd wave feminist text and read it. Please dude, if for only your daughter, it won't hurt you, it may very well help her.

Willow, in all seriousness, I could do that, but it would fall upon deaf ears in her case. She would not be remotely interested. Perhaps when she's in college and isn't just interested in her social life and shopping for clothes ..... And she's got a lot of homework, too, that she HAS to do .....

It's frustrating with her because she has father issues (due to her biological father) and although she has only been on one "sort-of" date and has never had a boyfriend, the issues are manifesting themselves already in some powerful ways as far as her relationships with boys, even as superficial as they are right now.

Having once been a teenage female, I can assure you that even the super-shallow ones from Southern California, have, you know, inner lives.

Now c'mon, you're better than that, to suggest I was implying that she has no "inner life". Really, how dare you.

I'd really rather not go into the details of my stepdaughter's "inner life" with strangers on an internet forum. I've probably revealed more than I should have at this point.

Suffice it to say, my stepdaughter is currently overwhelmed with that which is already in her life at the moment, and her plate is full. Maybe down the road we'll bring up some of these things, but for the time being, she and we have plenty to deal with.

[Cosmic Cowbell]

[23]

Your comment, Miss Willow, reminded me of conversations that I've had, with several women, about this very issue. So I'm piqued to ask you a clarifying question or two, if you don't mind.

You say that you don't expect to know what that feels like. Does that mean that you don't know what being loved, for whom you are, feels like?

If it does, and you don't know what it feels like, how do you know that it is absent then?

I ask because for me to know that a certain feeling is absent, I first need to know what that feeling feels like.

If I do and it's not there, then I can attest to its absence.

But if I don't, than I can't attest to it being absent.

Know what I mean?

TIA

I think it's instinctual, we all, men and women, need to be loved and valued, it's part of survival, is it not? I think I may have difficulty taking in feelings of appreciation, I never really learned what to do with them, much as I crave them.

I also think I threw myself a helluva pity party last night, with wine.
It's some man's fault, of course.

Thanks for the clarification. I have a better idea of where you are coming from.

As for "all, men and women, need to be loved and valued, it's part of survival, is it not?", I will say that I have met several people who have claimed that they have outgrown the need to be needed and/or loved. In point of fact, they all shared the perspective that: a) the need to be needed and/or loved was what skewed their view of other people in the first place, and; b) you expand a lot more from loving others than being loved by them. I valued my conversations with them a lot.

Thanks again.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Stevo this is the cop shop where this century or very late last one reports including medical evidence were presented to the coppers regarding the pack rape of two girls (both U15) by a bunch of young men and no acytion was taken. In fact the complaint was laughed out of the station and the two girls in question criticised for being young teenage girls - obviously they were asking for it and deserved everything they got.

I know cos the girls left my place to make the reports and came back here rather upset about the situation.

Its now 2 am and I'm too tired to respond to your comments so you'll have to wait till I get some sleep.

Did you file a complaint with whatever your local equivalent of the Independent Police Complaints Commission may be?

I didn't cos it wasn't me. AFAIK the girls were going to but someone talked them out of doing it. (Could have been because they lived on a hippy commune that grew lots of weed and didn't need the hassle from police that such an action would inevitably bring to their friends and neighbours.)

ON EDIT

I might have mentioned earlier that all the victims of sexual abuse I know of have real issues with approaching the cops. Put yourself in their shoes for a minute (if thats possible - I dunno if it is for anyone who hasn't been thru something that horrible) having been thru a horrific experience that totally shattered your worldview and faith in humanity you attempt to approach the people who are sposed to protect you and bring you justice and get the case laughed at.

How much of a hurry would you be in to go back there, for whats probably going to more humiliation on top of that you have already suffered?

[82_28]

What with it being Sunday and all, I just thought I would humbly bring up I just got home from this:





Can't recommend the fellowship enough.

What with it being Sunday? The day of the Lord?
Men's Group. In a misogyny thread? you see no problem with this?

edit: on re-reading, that sounds much more defensive than I intended! I'm just messin.. sorta.. a little context would be helpful though.

Oh, it was just a joke C_W. I fucking hate the Promise Keepers with a burning searing passion.

[compared2what?]

Also maybe The Good Terrorist by Doris Lessing, and .. i'll stop there.

I have a special love for that book, recall it often, and re-read it every couple of years. But I can honestly say that I have never actually thought about it for as much as one second in my whole, entire life. Some novels just take me that way. And I'm pretty sure that I can't be the only one, that being one of the things that novels are good for. Though far from the only one.

Anyway. It's about feminism? No, wait. Don't answer. I don't really want to know.

[blanc]

following JH's remarks
"I might have mentioned earlier that all the victims of sexual abuse I know of have real issues with approaching the cops. Put yourself in their shoes for a minute (if thats possible - I dunno if it is for anyone who hasn't been thru something that horrible) having been thru a horrific experience that totally shattered your worldview and faith in humanity you attempt to approach the people who are sposed to protect you and bring you justice and get the case laughed at.

How much of a hurry would you be in to go back there, for whats probably going to more humiliation on top of that you have already suffered?"

Statistics for rape, and false accusations of rape are seriously skewed by a legal system which makes it very difficult to get convictions, or as one criminal lawyer stated on a BBC prog. very easy to get the accused off. It does start in the police station, where the unsympathetic treatment is often 'justified' by the fact that if a prosecution is brought the victim will need to be extremely tough to take what the defense throws her way. This leads to an enthusiasm to no crime the crime at the police report stage, saving them a lot of paperwork and investigation time. According to the lawyer mentioned above, a standard technique is to make the victim out to be a liar, which is very easy, by questioning and then inflating any difference between her story and the original report made to the police. Having found a difference, the defense then pounces 'so you lied?'. As traumatised victims rarely recall everything in exact detail all at once, this is easy. These tactics can reappear in child abuse cases held in camera. Its not unknown for judges to find (ie order) that the alleged assaults did not take place despite the testimony of the child and supporting medical evidence. I wish this thread was not primarily debating with someone who has decided his position and finds factoids to fit it, the tit for tat and predictable responses to serious problems gets tiresome.

[compared2what?]

That one's a website. If no-one mind a book, which I believe may be on Google books, Blackstone's infamous commentaries on the Laws of England has this to say:

But though our law in general considers man and wife as one person, yet there are some instances in which she is separately considered; as inferior to him, and acting by his compulsion. And therefore any deeds executed, and acts done, by her, during her coverture, are void; except it be a fine, or the like manner of record, in which case she must be solely and secretly examined, to learn if her act be voluntary. She cannot by will devise lands to her husband, unless under special circumstances; for at the time of making it she is supposed to be under his coercion. And in some felonies, and other inferior crimes, committed by her through constraint of her husband, the law excuses her: but this extends not to treason or murder.

The husband also, by the old law, might give his wife moderate correction. For, as he is to answer for her misbehaviour, the law thought it reasonable to intrust him with this power of restraining her, by domestic chastisement, in the same moderation that a man is allowed to correct his apprentices or children; for whom the master or parent is also liable in some cases to answer. But this power of correction was confined within reasonable bounds, and the husband was prohibited from using any violence to his wife,

The tl;dr version is this: married women were not considered under the jurisdiction of the law because it was assumed that all their actions were under coercion by their husbands, therefore if they committed crimes, other than minor crimes payable by a fine and murder or treason, the husband was punished for it. Murder and treason the wife would be punished for, as she would have ot pay a fine, as married property wasn't intermingled. On these grounds the man was given jurisdiction to "chastise" his wife, but specifically forbidden from "using any violence". Presumably the chastisement was therefore of limited use. The cite then goes onto some latin I can't read before saying that the above applied until the "politer" reign of Charlie 2, late seventeenth century, when all forms of jurisdiction which a man had borne over his wife were abolished, although Blackstone points out that poor people often prefer the old law. Unmentioned is that at about that time the law was extended to apply directly to women, rather than through their husbands.

So what I've done here is present to very most anti-female law I could find in England, DV-wise, and it still specifically forbids the use of violence against one's wife. If c_w would like to present evidence of a law in England, or for that matter any English speaking nation, which renders wife-beating legal, I would be interested to see it. The medieval legal position of women is quite fascinating.

It is, but I'm not so sure the law you're citing is meaningfully "medieval."

I mean, I notice that Wikipedia appears to believe that English history remains medieval through the end of the 16th century. But even allowing for the fungibility of historigraphical eras, I can't for the life of me imagine why. It's decidedly post-reformation. Plus in England, post-moot-point from Henry VIII's break-up with Rome in 1533 onward -- even Mary I couldn't reverse the tide on that one, she just swam against it. The Manorial/Feudal system wasn't formally abolished, but it had been in a state of severe decline for over a century and its days as the all-that of military-economic-and-social order were long, long gone even before the ascent of the Tudors. And....Henry VII wasn't very medieval, but he was so incredibly dull that I'm skipping straight to Henry VIII, who was definitely a Renaissance prince (as was Elizabeth I, needless to say) from the very beginning of his reign. That whole Cloth-of-Gold thing with Francois I was practically the Miss America Pageant of early Renaissance Princedom. Language? Early modern and not Middle English. Art? Definitely not medieval. Literature? Ditto. Architecture? Can't think, off the top of my head. But I'm just guessing NOT MEDIEVAL.

In any event. I say the Middle Ages were over in England c. end-of-the-15th century at the absolute latest. That's as generous as I can honestly be. And that is my quarrel with Wikipedia. I mean, Sir Thomas More? Come on. He was a humanist. How much more Renaissance does shit gotta be?

However. Getting back to the issue at hand: As you know, common law, statutory law and the concept of jurisprudence that attaches to both were all Made in England during the Middle Ages. The High Middle Ages, mostly. Meanwhile, elsewhere in Europe -- at, I think, around the same time, 13th-century-ish -- you got your revival of the Code of Justinian going on, some elements of which washed into the English legal system.

Plus, of course, canon law, then in the early stages of the slow war of attrition that it lost to common law. The winning of which was pretty much common law's reason for being, if you were Edward I, Hammer of the Scots. Except for its other reason for being, from the same perspective, which was the subjugation of the baronial class (ie, the beginning of the end of the feudal/manorial system's heyday).

So. This is my point. Early English common and statutory law is (by definition) kind of a historigraphical outlier. Because the entire point of having and enforcing it was political-administrative in nature, and Papacy-autonomous centralized-hierarchically-institutionalized-monarchy-of-a-nation-state-establishing in purpose. In short, it had met all the graduation requirements for Being Medieval and had nothing to do except cool its heels in some non-specific nameless early-modern-era dimension for several hundred years until the rest of the class had caught up.

Medieval medieval English law is pre-Norman. Or, you know: Anglo-Saxon. Would, I suppose, be another way of putting it. And also pre-Christian, afaik. Like the pre-Christian parts of the Salic Code, where -- because murder didn't really become murder until everyone had an immortal soul -- if you killed someone, you paid the equivalent of contemporary civil damages to his family and/or tribe to compensate them for lost income. And payment was called "wergeld"! Which translates to "Man money"!

I learned that during college. But not in college, where I learned nothing that I now remember.

It's also worth bearing in mind that (serfs or no serfs) there was simply no such thing as all people being equal under the law until much, much, much later than the medieval period when you're talking about Wimmin and the law. Because obviously women had considerable independent property and inheritance rights during the middle ages if they were, like, Eleanor of Aquitaine. And some of them were. They had plenty of education, too. And there was actually a lot more sexual license for both genders than you might think. At all class levels, within reason. Episodically. The sexually repressive side of Christianity is an overwhelmingly post-reformation phenomenon, by and large.

Which is not to say that the Roman Catholic Church wasn't in the premiere league wrt sexual repression once that game got under way. Obviously.

[Stephen Morgan]

Put yourself in their shoes for a minute (if thats possible - I dunno if it is for anyone who hasn't been thru something that horrible) having been thru a horrific experience that totally shattered your worldview and faith in humanity you attempt to approach the people who are sposed to protect you and bring you justice and get the case laughed at.

I don't think I'd have the guts to go to the police in the first place, to be honest.

[Stephen Morgan]

Is that a tangled way of saying you overlook contrary evidence?

What the hell are you talking about?

Your text, read it again:

I feel that if I was to lament rape, while devoting most of my words to pointing out how many false accusations there are and how they shouldn't be allowed to abuse the system, without even supporting any sort of legal action against rape it wouldn't be seen as a great feminist statement on my part.

You were trying to justify being unbalanced/ignoring contrary evidence, remember? nice smokescreen, aping a feminist POV and all, but: bzzzzz, fail!

I was trying to point out that c_w's implicit assumption that any father's rights activity would probably be tainted by manipulation by abusers, rather than being an autochthonous reaction to injustice by fathers who have suffered that injustice, was unsound and objectionable. I chose to illustrate this with an analogous statement which I believed c_w would find equally objectionable, the suggestion that rape victims should only be recognised with a caveat about the presence of liars in their midst.

The process of logic in these two statements is similar, therefore I was hoping it would illustrate to her the unjust assumption she was making, and that she would be able to support the cause of fathers rights, feel sympathy for fathers and their children, without being compelled to think, or feel, "but maybe, just maybe, they're secretly child abusers and all this father's rights stuff is just kiddy-fiddling", as I would think, if I encountered a rape victim, that rape is an awful experience and would not dream for moment of considering whether she was lying or not. Well, if I was on a jury I would of course as it would be my duty, but in a purely social situation my first thoughts one encountering a rape victim would not include speculation as to whether she was just abusing the law for her own benefit, statistics be damned.

How the hell you got from that to "is that a tangled way of saying you overlook contrary evidence" I don't know. It's a way of saying, tangled or not is for you to decide, that c_w's approach to men's rights issue with which she has sympathy is overly suspicious, and implying this may be due to an anti-male attitude on her part, perhaps bound up with the cultural imperative placed on women, in part by the feminist movement, to always be afraid of potential male aggression, down dark alleys and so forth, an imperative which doesn't apply half so much to men who are statistically far more likely to be victimised down dark alleys. Or, alternatively, it could be rooted in an attitude like that of Joe Hillshoist, that men shouldn't complain but should "suck it up" and "take it like a man" in any unjust situation, a most unreasonable attitude which will inevitably lead to suspicion of a movement made up of men acting in their own interests which happen to be just interests.

I don't know how you got from that to "trying to justify being unbalanced/ignoring contrary evidence", either. This particular discussion is totally unrelated to any evidence, it's entirely about mental attitudes, as outlined above.

[Stephen Morgan]

It's stupid to make absurd assertions without a basis in fact, but you're doing that.

*cough*lookinamirror*cough*

I've provided facts. If you'd like evidence for any of them just say. Always happy to oblige.

That's funny, when Canadian Watcher asked you for evidence you responded thus:

On the grounds both of extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence and of affirmative statements needing to be proven, as it is impossible to prove a negative, the burden of proof doesn't lie with me.

So I'll second her request, perhaps you're happy to oblige me

By the way, American Statute Law from the 1600's won't do the job.

Well, I'm specialising in England. I mean, I've provided evidence in the form of the expert opinion of the leading authority on the historic laws of England who ever lived, saying that violence against one's wife was verbotten. I think that's pretty strong evidence. To me, although I said the burden lay with c_w, I think I've established the position strongly enough. And you know, as we're talking about the past, I assumed laws from the past might be useful. I could look for a modern law making eighteenth century battery illegal, but I fear I may search in vain. If you have some law legalising battery from after his time, but obviously before now, I'd be quite open to seeing it.

If you find my evidence for the historic ban on the beating of wives inadequate you will have to say what you would find more convincing than the defining text of the historic laws of England.

Actually I just stumble upon this at wiki:

The first attested use of the expression "domestic violence" in a modern context, meaning "spouse abuse, violence in the home" was in 1977.[177] Violence between spouses has long been considered a serious problem. The United States has a lengthy history of legal precedent condemning spousal abuse. In 1879, law scholar Nicholas St. John Green[178] wrote, "The cases in the American courts are uniform against the right of the husband to use any [physical] chastisement, moderate or otherwise, toward the wife, for any purpose." Green also cites the 1641 Body of Liberties of the Massachusetts Bay colonists -— one of the first legal documents in North American history —- as an early de jure condemnation of violence by either spouse.

Editing to provide the bit that Stephen may choose to substantiate. Statements #2 and #3 are clearly assertions, not fact.

The fact is (1)domestic violence against women has never been legal, and has always been grounds for divorce back when divorce needed special grounds. A situation analogous to that (2)prevalent today, where men who are victims of violence can be arrested simply because they are physically larger, for example, has never existed for women. (3)The police were once negligent, but they never formed an actively hostile force to female victims.

I'll move on to two and three, having addressed one. Well, two, because three was a concession, "it is not the policy of the metropolitan police to intervene in domestic disputes" sort of thing, as if I said "Arsenal are a better team but Man U have got a good left back" I wouldn't feel the need to compile a set of clips showing Evra's talents.

So, men who are victims being arrested. Well, this is going to be from America because I can't be arsed putting too much effort into this, so it'll be google. Well, firstly, given that women are as likely to initiate intimate partner violence (Strauss, Gelles and Steinmetz, among others), and that men are more likely to be arrested, the logical conclusion is that male victims are being arrested. Also, it is a consciously decided policy to take size and strength into account when determining who to arrest at the scene of a DV incident, where both parties may well be claiming to be the victim (given the common incidence of mutual violence in domestic settings, both may well be the victim), as set out in this Googledoc, this isn't explicitly aimed at men, but men have a higher average high by a few inches and a significantly higher body weigth and strength.

I also refer you to this link on the subject of "predominant aggressor" arrest policies, and how they disadvantages men in these situations, whether victim or not.

Actually - don't do it for me Stephen, I'm tired of this thread.

That's a pity, I never tire of banging my head against a brick wall and getting called a misogynist, it really lights up my day. If only someone were to call me a child molester I fear I may have to propose marriage.

And c_w's cites raise the question of how one rapes without the use of violence. In other words, although the law allowed sex with ones wife regardless of whether she consented or not (technically her consent was judged to have been granted permanently on marriage, but without proper consent) and therefore rape of a wife was deemed not to be a possibility under the law, the use of violence against one's wife was still forbidden. Therefore an actual rape, which I believe usually involves violence beyond the violence inherent in any sexual violation (and certainly would have done before the possibility of drugging, in an early-modern household) could, in fact, be prosecuted, but not, as your source quite rightly says, as rape within marriage, merely as a common assault.

After all, I never claimed the law was just. We are talking about an era when slavery was legal, after all. However it still didn't allow, by the letter of the law (as my comment about the negligent police was meant to imply, this doesn't always define implementation) violence against one's wife was forbidden.

[Stephen Morgan]

Statistics for rape, and false accusations of rape are seriously skewed by a legal system which makes it very difficult to get convictions, or as one criminal lawyer stated on a BBC prog. very easy to get the accused off.

Well, rape rarely has third-party witnesses as it's an intimate act, and it's more important that the innocent go free than that the guilty are punished, which is the basis of our legal system. Well, it's meant to be, anyway.

According to the lawyer mentioned above, a standard technique is to make the victim out to be a liar

I'm not sure what other defence may be available. In most cases with strong supporting physical evidence a guilty plea will be entered, if a case goes to court with such evidence I would expect a jury to convict, juries are notoriously fond of being "blinded by science", as the saying goes. In any case which comes down to witness testimony some fancy-pants version of "you're a liar" is the only defence generally available.

After all a lawyer's only duty is to his client.

It is, but I'm not so sure the law you're citing is meaningfully "medieval."

No, that's entirely my fault, I was looking at this at the same time. Early modern, this law. Shakespear. Gunpowder. Spanish treasure fleets, that sort of thing. Although the first British gunpowder army was at Crecy, were they used a few cannon, the name of which escapes me, consisting of bundles of musket-like barrels which fired musket-size balls and took forever and a day to reload.

I mean, I notice that Wikipedia appears to believe that English history remains medieval through the end of the 16th century. But even allowing for the fungibility of historigraphical eras, I can't for the life of me imagine why. It's decidedly post-reformation. Plus in England, post-moot-point from Henry VIII's break-up with Rome in 1533 onward -- even Mary I couldn't reverse the tide on that one, she just swam against it.

Well, more burned against it really.

The Manorial/Feudal system wasn't formally abolished, but it had been in a state of severe decline for over a century and its days as the all-that of military-economic-and-social order were long, long gone even before the ascent of the Tudors.

I believe one of the Henry's was in power, sixteenth century I think, when the last villein was freed by the courts. As with slavery, serfdom in this country was ended by judicial fiat, or activist judges if you prefer, rather than by parliament or King.

And....Henry VII wasn't very medieval, but he was so incredibly dull that I'm skipping straight to Henry VIII, who was definitely a Renaissance prince (as was Elizabeth I, needless to say) from the very beginning of his reign. That whole Cloth-of-Gold thing with Francois I was practically the Miss America Pageant of early Renaissance Princedom. Language? Early modern and not Middle English. Art? Definitely not medieval. Literature? Ditto. Architecture? Can't think, off the top of my head. But I'm just guessing NOT MEDIEVAL.

The Tudors built the first neo-Classical country houses, due to the decreasing relevance of fortifications in an era of political stability and great big gunpowder weapons, as well as being very fond of the half-timbered look. Basically there architecture was a stepping stone between medieval and neo-Classical which rose under the Stuarts (St. Pauls, Wren, and so on) with a few remarkable structures, like Hampton court.

In any event. I say the Middle Ages were over in England c. end-of-the-15th century at the absolute latest. That's as generous as I can honestly be. And that is my quarrel with Wikipedia. I mean, Sir Thomas More? Come on. He was a humanist. How much more Renaissance does shit gotta be?

You could always go and edit the wiki page. I mean I'm too lazy, but there's nothing to stop you.

However. Getting back to the issue at hand: As you know, common law, statutory law and the concept of jurisprudence that attaches to both were all Made in England during the Middle Ages. The High Middle Ages, mostly. Meanwhile, elsewhere in Europe -- at, I think, around the same time, 13th-century-ish -- you got your revival of the Code of Justinian going on, some elements of which washed into the English legal system.

Plus, of course, canon law, then in the early stages of the slow war of attrition that it lost to common law. The winning of which was pretty much common law's reason for being, if you were Edward I, Hammer of the Scots. Except for its other reason for being, from the same perspective, which was the subjugation of the baronial class (ie, the beginning of the end of the feudal/manorial system's heyday).

So. This is my point. Early English common and statutory law is (by definition) kind of a historigraphical outlier. Because the entire point of having and enforcing it was political-administrative in nature, and Papacy-autonomous centralized-hierarchically-institutionalized-monarchy-of-a-nation-state-establishing in purpose. In short, it had met all the graduation requirements for Being Medieval and had nothing to do except cool its heels in some non-specific nameless early-modern-era dimension for several hundred years until the rest of the class had caught up.

Well yes, but it spent that time developing equity and all the other mad, bad, and dangerous to know legal systems which define the modern financial system. Not sure where I'm going with that, but it did.

Medieval medieval English law is pre-Norman. Or, you know: Anglo-Saxon.

Special area of interest for me.

Would, I suppose, be another way of putting it. And also pre-Christian, afaik. Like the pre-Christian parts of the Salic Code, where -- because murder didn't really become murder until everyone had an immortal soul -- if you killed someone, you paid the equivalent of contemporary civil damages to his family and/or tribe to compensate them for lost income. And payment was called "wergeld"! Which translates to "Man money"!

Yes, a geld was any form of payment, "the geld" was the land tax paid by farmers, the here-geld was the tax to support a mercenery army, the Dane-geld was very unfortunate and the were geld was the man-money, the blood price. Differed from one place to another, as the Danish, Wessex and Kent codes prevalent in different parts of the country had different amounts set for the same people. Also, you could sometimes be "worth" the amount of your master, if acting as a messenger for example you could be killed and your master would collect his own weregild rather than yours, or your family might collect it, and it could sometimes be paid by the owner of the land where it happened, and so forth.

I learned that during college. But not in college, where I learned nothing that I now remember.

Good on yer.

It's also worth bearing in mind that (serfs or no serfs) there was simply no such thing as all people being equal under the law until much, much, much later than the medieval period when you're talking about Wimmin and the law.

Yes, the were gild does make that quite clear. I refer you to Njal's saga, where a slave is worth 4.333'% of a free man. By the early modern period it was a bit different.

Because obviously women had considerable independent property and inheritance rights during the middle ages if they were, like, Eleanor of Aquitaine.

I refer you to Stenton's Anglo-Saxon England, or to Michael Wood's "In Search of England", which refers to Anglo-Saxon female property developers/speculators in London. There's all sorts of implications to that.

And some of them were. They had plenty of education, too. And there was actually a lot more sexual license for both genders than you might think. At all class levels, within reason.

More for the poor, I expect, where family alliances and inheritance didn't mean so much.

Episodically. The sexually repressive side of Christianity is an overwhelmingly post-reformation phenomenon, by and large.

Anglo-Saxon priests generally had wives, although reformers railed against it.

Which is not to say that the Roman Catholic Church wasn't in the premiere league wrt sexual repression once that game got under way. Obviously.

Yes, they're a naughty bunch.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Put yourself in their shoes for a minute (if thats possible - I dunno if it is for anyone who hasn't been thru something that horrible) having been thru a horrific experience that totally shattered your worldview and faith in humanity you attempt to approach the people who are sposed to protect you and bring you justice and get the case laughed at.

I don't think I'd have the guts to go to the police in the first place, to be honest.

I'm glad you recognise that.