Ending violence against women includes saving the long-gun registry

From a December 2009 release by the Public Service Alliance of Canada

No, I do not think it has become necessary at all....

I am not really opposed to the registry. That said, on this point, I would like to see a statistic that suggests that violence against women, including murder has been reduced by the registry, just noting that long guns are less likely to be the weapon of choice, does not in and of itself prove that assailants are not using other weapons.

I am with remind.  Don't see why we need another thread, started by a man, in the FF.  I am a woman and a feminist and a rural voter.  I am not having any trouble seeing both sides of this issue, and find the more inclusive threads interesting and in some cases really educating.

It's important to understand how this issue is viewed in Québec:

Gun victims speak out

My feelings echo Remind and Polly Bee's comments. 

This letter to Jack Layton was signed by 637 women, most identifying as trade unionists, educators, and social advocates of various kinds:

Teamsters Women's Caucus opposes abolition of firearms registry

I usually don't post in ff threads because I think we men should be listening far more to women, not telling them what is right.  And waaay too often that's exactly what happens.  So I just read and learn.

So I opened up this thread to see what some women babblers were thinking because on a personal level that is important to me, let alone the bigger political frame. 

Imagine my surprise, or unfortunetely lack of surprise, that voices of women babblers have been compltetly ignored- as if they hadn't even posted/spoken.  Particularly rural women, who are often invisible in many, many issues already and are often forced to listen to men and urban organizations speak about their lived reality from a place of profound ignorance. 

Oh the irony.

U did?  I thought Unionist did? Or are you and he the same?

I meant I opened it up to read it.   I thought that would have been self-evident, but I guess not.

Geez try to have some fun and no one grabs it

Thank you BA.

My translation - from the Bloc website, dated yesterday:

A decisive vote for maintaining the firearm registry

Unionist is presenting voices of women, they just aren't babblers.

Well, to me, the "Feminism" forum is really about what the women of babble want, so to my mind, even if this thread on womens perspectives on this issue serves a legitimate purpose, I think that unless the women who babble are supportive of the thread being in the Feminism forum, perhaps it should be moved to a more general section.

I support unionist opening this thread. The quote above (see unionist's OP) another poster was horribly sexist and demeaning.

Thanks, Ripple and Stargazer. I will not be presenting my own views in this thread. There are just statements and appeals by Canadian women out there and I thought they needed to be heard here.

Never mind.

Truth and the long-gun registry

Well, then, perhaps someone could answer my question at post three in this thread?

Ad Hoc Coalition for Women's Equality and Human Rights website:

If that's the case then I guess we can expect to see the full spectrum of opinion from Canadian women right?  Including those in favour of changes and even those wishing it to be scrapped. 

I thought not. 

Ignoring the very real statements of rural women, right here in this very thread is tatamount to silencing them, and I am astounded it is being defended.  But I am a man and I feel this space is not one in which I should even be posting so I will bow out with that.

From the Fédération des femmes du Québec - my translation - datelined Sept. 2, 2010:

Is the NDP complicit in the ideological struggle against the firearms registry?

The statement, besides demanding that Layton whip the vote to save the registry, condemns the NDP's announcement of its intent to decriminalize the failure to register firearms:

I am not ignoring anyone's statements.  I am reading both threads and I hope babble women keep posting in whichever thread they they think appropriate.

I have very much appreciated your posts on this topic, Bookish Agrarian.  (Well, maybe not the last one here ...)

BA that was a sexist and condenscending point to make there. Have women not been involved in the many threads on the gun regsitry? Ii'm quite sure they have. You also might want to reconsider framing it as a rural woman versus urban woman divide. All rural women do not think homogeniosly on this issue. I'm sure you thought you were helping women in this thread but you are just as quilty of what you accuse unionist as doing. We are the women, you are the men. The post in which you angrily assert that rural woman have a voice is seen as hostile because you seem to think they have been "left out". Where have they been left out? The anti-gun registry crowd has used women to boost their side, and here you are using us to boost your side. We are not your pawns to be moved about and divided based upon any man's stand. Our concerns either way are the same at the fundamental lelevl. We must think beyond the divisonary crap the Cons have boxed this debate in.

My personal feeling is that we should keep it as much as it behooves me to be on the same side as the police. But I also understand the issue for men and women who support scrapping it.

Either way, I am interested in unionists links. As woman and as a human being. So thanks but no thanks, don't speak for us, or to us. You'll notice unionist refrained from doing either of those. and this is an important thread

A general moderator's note about this forum, and this thread.

Anyone may post here in the FF, and it can be from any perspective (within the babble policy of course). Nobody needs to present all sides of an issue, including a contentious one like this.

That said, if you choose to present one side of a contentious issue, you need to be prepared to hear challenges. Men need to be particularly aware of how they take up space here, and not use this forum as a location to post support for their position on anything, just because it's not working out in another part of babble. That's not what the FF is for. I'm still not clear myself if that's what's going on in this thread though.

Also, no man-on-man pissing matches. I can't ban them elsewhere in babble but I can ban them here. 

As for posting what women babblers want, or respond to, aside from the fact that women babblers are a diverse group, I would heartily disagree with that as a principle. Over the years I've posted tons of anti-racist stuff here that has been ignored or talked around, by women and men babblers alike. That's how it goes. Nobody has to respond to anyone's post in particular. It's a discussion board.

If anyone doesn't want to post here, there's another long-gun registry discussion going on.

Thanks Maysie. \\Clearly I need a spell check

I am, and feel you are being a bit disengenuous.

It was and is quite evident why this thread was started in this forum.

The links could have been posted in the open thread about this, we are being exploited, abused, and marginalized, IMV.

AFEAS (Association féminine d’éducation et d’action sociale) is an organization of 13,000 Québec women, founded in 1966 as a merger of the [translation] Household Economy Circles and the Catholic Union of Rural Women.

It held its 44th annual congress in Ste-Hyacinthe on August 20, 2010, and the 450 delegates approved this communiqué, in which they vigorously condemn the Harper government both for the elimination of the census long form (as well as demanding that question 33, on household work, be reintroduced), and for the attempts to eliminate the long-gun registry.

Bullshit Stargazer.  I am a rural woman, and my voice in this thread was completely fucking ignored.  By the man who started the thread.  As was reminds, and ElizaQ's.  If I am not mistaken, we three are rural women.

I agree with remind re the disingenuous stuff.  Sometimes it is pretty clear why a thread was started, and I looked and looked for the "other" side of the issue here (from women of course) and can't find it.  As for the OP, are we really that sensitive that we can't handle badly worded arguments and we have to run for cover in the FF?  From my pov, the registry is flawed and while I would vote to keep it, it also needs to change or it's a useless piece of red tape.  I get pissed when I hear that we have to support the registry.........because is was started by demands from WOMEN.  Won't somebody think of the women???  We can't argue that perhaps it was started for a good cause - by a woman or by a mother -  but jumped the rails early on and has become an expensive list that does little to combat violence..against anyone?

No women don't think homogenously on this issue.  You wouldn't know that from this thread though, would ya?

Press release issued in June by Patricia Boivin, VP External Affairs for the student association of the École polytechnique, where 14 women were murdered and 13 wounded on Dec. 6, 1989 - my translation:

Polytechnique students ask NDP to take a stand against the abolition of the firearms registry

Unionist, while I think your links are important, I'd like to address your posting style in this thread. I understand your intent as stated @18:

The problem is you are frequently posting your links immediately following women's voices who disagree with the OP or the tenor of the links you provide, and you don't address what is being said. This has the effect of railroading over the voices this forum is meant to protect, and gives the impression that you have an agenda where one might not exist. I think you should attend closer to Maysie's post @27 and think about how you are taking up space in this forum.

I do not want to take up any space here, which is why I haven't addressed what is being said.

In the other multiple threads, I sensed that the voices of women who oppose abolition of the registry were not being heard - and that instead, a very few posters were ridiculing the notion that we should consider saving a flawed registry just because women's organizations and victims and their relatives were asking us to do so.

Things were getting really bad. One woman (writer) announced she wouldn't post there any more because of the atmosphere. Other women (with perhaps one exception) were simply not posting, no matter where they stood on the issue. In response to that situation, I suggested moving the thread to the FF. I believe you replied that perhaps I should open my own thread here. That's what I did.

But your statement puzzles me:

Who disagreed with the OP? Would you like me to debate whether the quoted remark (which by the way was not by Stockholm) is sexist or not? That ain't going to happen.

And who disagreed with the "tenor of the links" I provided? Not one person has done so, unless my reading comprehension has failed. These links are all statements by people, almost all women or victims. If someone disagrees with them, surely they can state their disagreement.

But I don't think that's what they want. They would like this thread closed - and they said so at the very very start. So it really has nothing to do with my taking up space, because I wasn't there yet.

So I'll tell you what. Close the thread. Or not. Whatever you like. But there is a powerful voice being raised by women in this country right now, and it would be a shame if we miss it just because a person of the wrong gender opened this thread. If there's another way to bring that voice forward, please do so.

Unionist, you take up space in this forum everytime you post, everytime you choose to channel the female voices you think need to be heard. The key word in that last sentence is "you"--not "female voices." I think you know exactly what I mean. remind, ElizaQ and polly bee all objected to your view, but instead of addressing their voices, acknowledging that you heard them, you post points of view which counter their own. The impression this gives is that you are ventriloquizing women in order to further your own opinion. Even though you feel you are choosing not to engage by not posting your own opinion, you are engaging simply by posting. Perhaps you don't realize it, but that is the effect your posts are having.

And your last paragraph is a straw man: the only words I have spoken about this thread as a thread are positive. I agree that women's voices are rasing a powerful critique of the registry debate. My comments are not about this thread, they are about you and your posting style. It's a friendly suggestion that you examine how you are taking up space and how you are intereacting with women babblers in this thread.

To be fair, I don't object to the POV that Unionist has been posting.  I am quite firmly on the fence on this issue and I like to learn from both sides.  I do object to what I see as Unionist using the FF in this way, and I find his manner towards some women here, on this site, condescending and patriarchal.

Unionist - I realized after i had replied that the post in the OP was by nope, not Stock.  I was confused, as it was the post by Stock in the earlier thread that had started your taking this to the FF.  And I won't ask you to debate whether or not we can agree if it was sexist, after all you have already decided that one, and my opinion will not be heard.

This is bizarre.

Question: was it more than one male ridiculing? [And/or one male doing it multiple times?] Instances of that kind of ridiculing of women or their concerns are relevant in themselves. And if I missed them, that would be relevant.

You missed them. Could you maybe take this to private messages and work it out between the two of you? Thanks.

Edited to add: I'll have more to say on the subject of this thread very soon!

I didnt know what the answer would be, and thought whatever it was, it was likely to be instructive about men and discussions here. 

i wasnt goint to reply whatever it was 

i probably shouldnt have asked anyway. [For one thing, even if i dont participate, that wont eliminate follow-up roiling]

I wouldnt have thought of PMs, becasue I have general reasons for not using them to discuss what was said by babblers. i'm only reminded conciously of that when I get a PM- i just dont think of initiating their use for that kind of purpose..... if you cant say it in public, whats the liklihood it can be constructive? PMs fine for straight up apologies [if for some reason doing it in public would keep a tiff going or renew it], agreeing with some, possibly while trying to soothe them, etc. But....

100% with you., as there is a false dichotomy represented right at the thread title.

IF the gun registry was so important to ending violence against women, then why has violence against women  gone up 21%?

The gun registry has been in place the whole time violence against women has gone up. And I say this as a supporter of keeping the registry.

Guns are not committing acts of violence against women, MEN are. And I refuse to have men try and shirk that reality, perhaps they appease themselve with false rhetoric, but it  does not mean squat.

agree with your latest post too, but had this typed since yesterday but did not post it, as real life called me away.

Without guns remind women would have one less weapon to be killed with. I hope you at least agree with that, as that is logical.

Tell me why you object so strongly to having someone register a gun above and beyond how women feel about having them registered. In other words what is your priority here? Are you more upset or concerned with registering a gun or with having urban women feel safer?

Or is that a stupid urban versus rural spat which clouds over anything else?

People drive cars. They get insurance. Men and some women buy guns and all they need is a bloody license. Does that seem right to you? A killing machine should not have to be registered because some people find it too intrusive?

Is that more important than the hundreds of thousands of women who would feel a lot safer with registered guns?

Frankly I find the anger directed at me by polly bee fucking bizarre, and even more fucking bizarre is the fact women are behind scrapping the fucking gun registry.

Seriously? FFS.

On reserves I say no registry, if that is what they want - everywhere else - fuck yes they should register their fucking killing machines.

How is this for anger polly bee? right back at you grrl.

KenS, my comments to Unionist were not an invitation for you to resucitate a pissing match. Keep to the thread topic or keep out.

Sorry for jumping in, but I just want to thank remind and Stargazer for these two important (and in my case if not original concepts, then concepts  I had given very little consideration  to) points. Both of which have my mind racing as to the possible implications of how the firearms debate (maybe even other debates) might  be approached.

I hope that doesn't come off as "surprised a women though of this", because that's not how I meant it ... remind's concept connected with me not so much with the  "men kill women, not firearms" part (I knew that), but with the part that in arguing the firearms issue some of us tend to shift the responsibility  of "violence against women" away from the men who commit the violence onto the weapon they use. 

Stargazers concept had me asking myself, yeah, why couldn't we have a requirement for insurance for firearms, maybe even for men themselves? If the insurance you paid was of a punitive value (profits above the actual commensurate values going to the cause of moving society towards the goal of not requiring a punitive value on this insurance ... awareness, compensation for victims, etc) then maybe even the most strident libertarians might see the value (even if for them it was just monetary) of taking measures to address violence against women ... heck, at first brush, I'd have no issue with the government telling me that since I live with 2 women (wife, Daughter) and the facts are the violence against women is a real issue, that I would have to pay into an insurance fund a certain amount of money which would be reduced with the more measures I took to show that I was "skilled" in how to resolve issues without resorting to violence (sensitivity training, conflict resolution strategies, etc.)

Anyway, just brainstorming, feel free to ignore, rip holes in it, or build upon it, or ask me to move it to a different foru,  as you see fit.

I think its worth saying that one issue not discussed here is trust.

People- men and women- opposed to the registry, even if only 'partly opposed'... tend to be quite unconvinced that registering guns does indeed keep women safer, anywhere.

Most of us are not idelogues about that, and none speak here, so it does matter to us that you feel, and feel strongly, that it WILL help women be safer.

But on no issue is their automatic deference to what some other people want. Even less so when waht you want is something that I have to give up something. "I" meaning me personally, or people I identify with... my neighbours for example.

Since we tend to talk in such absolutist terms about inviobale principles- as if we all have the same ones even though we dont- the elephant in the room we dont talk about is that we all have a 'moral calculus' about when we should, and when we should not have to deferr  to what someone else wants.

So this thing about whether women are really any more protected by the registry becomes very central. I know people are aware of that, but I dont think a lot of people realize how much it means.

And here is where trust comes in: it comes into that "moral calculus". If I am to deferr to what you want, I have to trust that you have fully considered whether the registry does make women and safer. Because if I feel that you dont really care about the answer to that and in the final analyis want the registry because you feel its better than nothing.... thats just not going to be enough for me to deferr to you.

Is it understood how I mean this is an issue of trust? I'm not saying the lack of sufficient trust is right. I'm just pointing out its there.

And I may be mistaken, but I see this trust issue cutting across gender lines. And quite solidly.

Whatever.  SG, you expressly said upthread that no-one was ignoring the voices of rural women here.  That rural women have not been left out.  Now go back and read the thread, where three of us (rural women) said that we didn't think Unionist needed to bring this to the FF - and notice where Unionist, the man who started the thread, pretends we aren't posting at all?  Posts over us as if we aren't speaking?  This was what I was having a problem with.  Whether you like my opinion or not, I am entitled to one and I would hope to be able to have it heard here.

Please note SG, that none of us rural women said we wanted to scrap the registry.   In fact, I think we are all on record as supporting the registry (not sure, I know remind is, I don't want to speak for ElizaQ).  For me I  would just like to see some changes to it, changes that would actually benefit women, make them safer, make some steps towards ending gun violence.  Instead of just giving them the "feeling" that they are safer because there is a poorly set up and badly maintained database on who used to own guns in this country.

My fear is that the whole country will either go for or against the registry, so it will either be scrapped completely or left as is.  Neither is acceptible IMV.

(edited for gratuitous profanity).

In fairness to Unionist: what was he supposed to do? He said hes posting information. Thats a little suspect in my books, but I'm not exactly an impartial observer.

Botttom line: he said he was posting a side that has not been heard enough. He could not address your comments without it being him arguing points with you, in the feminist forum.

I'm not posting in this thread any more in case you all hadn't noticed, so I would appreciate if you would all abandon your obsession and stop talking about me. I'm still reading in the (probably vain) hope of learning something.

Meh.

meh...is not strong enough Polly.

 Stargazer I have gone on record, repeatedly, indicating I did not want the registry scraped. so please stop buying into someone else's attempt to portray otherwise.

No yards the solution to violence against women by MEN, is not going to be solved by a capitalist endeavour such as purchasing insurance.

It is going to be solved by MEN realizing they have absolutely no right to exploit, marginalize, abuse in all forms, and yes even murder women.

...may have something to say stronger about this attack upon women babblers in the ff, but am going to wait a bit first to see how our fine moderators step in, given catchfire's  great words above, I think they are up  to the task of indicating just how unacceptable it is.

Agreed. The question is how to make men realize this? ... as "cold and mechanical" as it may sound, that takes "social engineering" (ie: there's no magical fix).... for the most part the world is run by a bunch of men (and women that have bought into the male paradigm) that put "economy" ahead of all else ... short of a major revolt that changes everything about hos society works, I think we need to come up with solutions that work within the framework in which society operates ... society operates in large part on economics, so maybe the first steps need to be "economic steps"?

people already have life insurance that carries riders for injuries etc, has this  insurance access decreased the acts of violence against women?

I state again; violence against women has increased 21%.

the framework society operates in is patriarchy, and just what women need is to deal with a fucking capitalist insurance corporation as well the sexist police departments. Not!

...the violence experienced by women in this thread, is just a micro example of that which  occurs in  real life. Normalizing the violence or ignoring it is NOT acceptable.  Neither here nor in society at large.

To find the solution to ending violence against women, ask women in the violence against women sector who have been doing this work in Canada for over 30 years. This will not be done here, in this thread.

[incorrect comment about remind has been deleted....apologies]

It seems nobody is happy with this thread, so I'm going to close it.