Regarding the response to Dylan Farrow's letter:

[BlancheSplanchnik]

49. females are also "expendable"

We die and are mourned by those who knew us.

If victimized, the same.

but also, there is a sense of inevitability when a girl or woman is harmed; you shrug your shoulders and say, "how sad". But the world hasn't stopped turning. Our sense of reality, as individual people making up the public, remains intact.

Compare that to the general sense of outrage at the shock of conventions upturned when a male is egregiously victimized, against his will. I firmly believe that had the scandal of the priesthood been mostly molestation of girls, the sense of disgust, urgency and shock shared by the public would have been very different.


And I just want to mention a cultural artifact that I think is important as an example of the normalization of violence against women---
Women being murdered, used, thrown away is a typical theme in many musical traditions. Blues, rock and Appalachian music have a long history of such themes. Maybe other genres do too.

I'm just listening to early 90's alt rock right now as I'm typing, and Led Zeppelin's "Gallows Pole" came on a few minutes ago.

In it, a man is sentenced to hang, but tries to avoid his fate with the hangman by bribes offered from his brothers. And then through the offer of sex with his sister.

There is much disagreement over the following lyrics; in my searches, they're given as follows in italics, but my ears tell me that the lyrics are actually "But now I laugh and pull so hard, see her swinging from the Gallows Pole

But now I laugh and pull so hard, she's swinging from the Gallows Pole
She's Swingin' on the gallows pole!" And this is repeated several times, being the end of the tune. I've been listening to this tune since 1972 or whatever it was when it came out, and I've always shuddered at those lyrics.

I don't think men can viscerally appreciate what it feels like to identify with the ravaged victims in song and story that are such an accepted part of our culture.


Hangman, hangman, turn your head awhile,
I think I see my sister coming, riding many mile, mile, mile.
Sister, I implore you, take him by the hand,
Take him to some shady bower, save me from the wrath of this man,
Please take him, save me from the wrath of this mad, man.

Hangman, hangman, upon your face a smile,
Tell me that I'm free to ride,
Ride for many mile, mile, mile.

Oh yes, you got a fine sister, She warmed my blood from cold,
She warmed my blood to boiling hot to keep you from the Gallows Pole,
Your brother brought me silver, Your sister warmed my soul,
But now I laugh and pull so hard, see you swinging from the Gallows Pole

But now I laugh and pull so hard, see you swinging from the Gallows Pole
Swingin' on the gallows pole!

Ah-ha-ha
Swingin'
Swingin' on the gallows pole!
See-saw marjory daw
See-saw knock at my door


But we are NOT honored. We may be tut-tutted over. We may provide a thrill, or we may even be a proxy (dieing for the sake of another, as in the song above). But honored as heroic or a loss to humanity by those who didn't know us personally, because of who we were or what we did? Rarely. Very rarely.