Vile Verdict In The U.K., And What It Portends
Brendan O'Neill writes at Spiked about a sick miscarriage of justice in the U.K.:
There is something sinister in the Sally Challen story. The way in which this woman who battered her husband to death with a hammer has been turned into an iconic figure, virtually into a heroine of justice, leaves a sour taste. Her photograph has been sympathetically emblazoned on the front page of the Guardian. Labour MP Jess Phillips said she cried with joy when she heard the news a few months ago that Challen's murder conviction had been quashed. Many feminists are cheering yesterday's news that Challen won't face a retrial after the court accepted her manslaughter plea....There are many concerning things here. The first is the way in which the opinion of an expert, in this case a forensic psychiatrist, effectively overrode the verdict of a jury. This strikes me as an implicit attack on the wisdom of the jury system. Does one expert's view carry more weight than the deliberations of 12 ordinary men and women? Secondly there is the suggestion, in the broader public discussion around the case, that killing is an understandable response to being insulted or demeaned by one's partner. This is what campaigners are actually saying. That the courts should be more lenient with women who have killed partners who exercised 'coercive control' over them. Bear in mind that coercive control can include such behaviour as 'repeatedly putting you down' and 'monitoring you via online communication tools'. Only nasty blokes do things like this, but that is no justification for killing them. There is a serious danger that the Challen phenomenon will contribute to a view of extreme violence as a proportionate response to husbands who are toerags.
...The implication is that women enjoy less moral autonomy than men, that they are given to rash behaviour, that they cannot be held fully responsible for what they do. This case threatens to infantilise women who commit crimes.
It is entirely reasonable to say about the Challen case that she should have walked away. She should have left him. She should have told everyone what a piece of trash he was. She didn't have to hit him on the head with a hammer 20 times. It is illegitimate, in my view, to speak about her use of a hammer to kill her husband in the same breath as her husband's allegedly awful behaviour, as campaigners have done, because that implies her actions were proportionate to his. They weren't. And it speaks to a colossal loss of moral perspective to suggest they were. For feminists to turn a killer into a hero suggests they have become seriously and perhaps irreversibly unanchored from moral reason.
The "women are victims" ethos promoted by gender studies departments around the globe has consequences, and I think this is one of them: a world in which men can be victimized, by women, in the most horrible ways, without the punishment men would get if the tables were turned.
This strikes me as an implicit attack on the wisdom of the jury system. Does one expert's view carry more weight than the deliberations of 12 ordinary men and women? [Emphasis added]
Well, they're ordinary, you see. They couldn't possibly know, could they?
Old RPM Daddy (OldRPMDaddy at GMail dot com) at June 9, 2019 6:11 AM
Feminists in the US (and around the world) cheered Lorena Bobbit. Why should their reaction to "Hammerin' Sally" be any different? Their philosophy is not about empowering women, but denigrating and emasculating men (literally, if necessary).
That the emasculated man is a less-than-stellar exemplar of manhood is a rationalization. It's all part of leftist collectivism. All men are Sally's husband; all deserve some form of chastisement and Sally's example should serve as a warning to them.
By the way, the article says an undiagnosed mental condition (discovered by a forensic psychiatrist) was the grounds for the appeals court awarding her a new trial, not her husband's "coercive control." However, that "coercive control" narrative is at the heart of feminists cheering her husband's murder.
"A guy is a lump like a doughnut. So, first you gotta get rid of all the stuff his mom did to him. And then you gotta get rid of all that macho crap that they pick up from beer commercials. And then there's my personal favorite, the male ego." ~ Roseanne Barr
Conan the Grammarian at June 9, 2019 6:39 AM
If you go down this road, feminists, be careful. "Coercive control", demeaning, putdowns, stalking, insults are heavily used by women against their men. oh, hahahaa what am I thinking? Women have a pass for such behavior.
cc at June 9, 2019 7:24 AM
"For feminists to turn a killer into a hero suggests they have become seriously and perhaps irreversibly unanchored from moral reason."
As Conan points out, you are quite a few decades late. At least 30 as Bobbit shows but even 50 isn't a stretch.
Ben at June 9, 2019 7:27 AM
30 decades? That's 300 years.
Just givin' you a hard time. We all know what you meant.
Conan the Grammarian at June 9, 2019 7:48 AM
If I were a woman in the UK I would have justification to murder someone right now. I wouldn't anyway, but it would make me briefly consider it. I wonder if this means there will be a lot more husband murders in the coming months.
Kent McManigal at June 9, 2019 8:27 AM
Lest anyone accuse me of not admitting when I am wrong, yep that's poorly worded. Thanks for the gentle correction Conan. After all mixing units like that and being unclear is how NASA face planted a probe into Mars. Meters, feet, what's the difference? Decades and years are close enough, right?
Ben at June 9, 2019 9:30 AM
Well, the UK isn't a free country, so. *shrugs*
On the other hand, when the UK becomes a Muslim majority country, this sort of thinking will go straight out the window when the institute Sharia.
Still not a free country, but the feminists will get stoned.
I R A Darth Aggie at June 9, 2019 10:04 AM
In my mind, there are two places worth visiting in the U.K. I want to see Bath, and I want to see Oxford. Once I do that, I am done with my ancestral homeland.
Isab at June 9, 2019 10:16 AM
I feel like I'm constantly reading about batshit insane verdicts in the UK.
NicoleK at June 9, 2019 10:21 AM
Police in the UK already have a grossly wrong set of priorities, evidenced by the fact that they have no time to shut down grooming gangs but all the time in the world to harass people for posting tweets that give the lie to the bogus ideas of intersectionalism.
With outrages like this, it's high time for the people to take up arms and overthrow them. Too bad they handed in all their weapons decades ago, but Kipling did warn them.
jdgalt at June 9, 2019 10:28 AM
Related:
https://pluralist.com/aurelia-vera-feminist-socialist/?
Narrator: It turns out that the fastest way to The Handmaid's Tale is trying to impose a matriarchy.
I R A Darth Aggie at June 9, 2019 10:32 AM
I'm a believer in old-fashioned feminism: the stuff that involved women getting the vote, being able to access a rewarding career, and, when unmarried, to be able to have sex (or not) with anybody they please.
However, this is modern feminism at work. MODERN FEMINISM RUINS EVERYTHING!
mpetrie98 at June 9, 2019 2:21 PM
I'm coming to believe more and more that if women wanted to have real power back, they should simply stop using birth control and stop having abortions for casual reasons. The awesome power to get pregnant and have children, if actually exercised rather than shunned or repressed, would make a lot of men more circumspect about bedding women for casual sex, IMO.
Abortion-on-demand and birth control have, sadly, made sexual relations a veritable playground for young men. So who really has the power here?
mpetrie98 at June 9, 2019 2:26 PM
I am 96% in alignment with all the statements above, but to nitpick,
> Back in February, the appeal court accepted the opinion of a forensic psychiatrist, who said that at the time of the killing Ms Challen was suffering from two mental disorders, and this wasn’t known during her original trial. So ‘coercive control’ wasn’t central to the success of the appeal, but it is central to the public debate around this case and feminist campaigners hope that other women in jail for killing controlling partners might now have their convictions reconsidered.
> There are many concerning things here. The first is the way in which the opinion of an expert, in this case a forensic psychiatrist, effectively overrode the verdict of a jury.
O'Neill and everyone is right to complain about how the portrayal of this verdict is vile, but a medical professional at the time of appeal discovering a mental illness originally not seen isn't really "the opinion of an expert overriding the verdict of a jury" unless you are ready to disbelieve medical professionals, expert witnesses, science in general.
I'm not saying expert witnesses and their opinions aren't bought and sold for court room purposes and sketchy as hell, but unless there is more proof of such in any particular case, it seems claiming an expert witness' scientific and medical opinion shouldn't be considered at time of appeal is a dangerous road to trod and rife with causing many other different miscarriages of justice.
jerry at June 9, 2019 5:17 PM
This attitude isn't new and isn't reserved for male victims. The same tendency has been documented in criminal child abuse cases. Child Welfare agencies have a bad habit of being too lenient with violent women even in the face of glaring evidence of abuse.
In fact, one of the risk factors in these cases is that if there is a teen or adult male involved with the family they often become the target of agency interventions. It's not uncommon for that to be the precipitating factor in escalating the abuse a level that the police get involved. Because once that male is removed, the remaining children are totally defenseless.
norah at June 9, 2019 5:36 PM
> Once I do that, I am done
This kerbstone would also be on my list.
Crid at June 9, 2019 9:03 PM
I'm coming to believe more and more that if women wanted to have real power back, they should simply stop using birth control and stop having abortions for casual reasons. The awesome power to get pregnant and have children, if actually exercised rather than shunned or repressed, would make a lot of men more circumspect about bedding women for casual sex, IMO.
_______________________________________
Good lord. Leaving aside the issue of EMOTIONAL exploitation via casual sex, even today, 20-plus years after the child support laws finally grew some teeth, there's no shortage of men who don't seem to care how many out-of-wedlock babies they have. That includes rich men as well as poor men. What makes you think men used to be a lot more cautious back in the days when men, single or married, could just disappear when faced with unwanted fatherhood?
As the late Ellen Willis put it, in 1985 (she was referring to the pre-Roe v. Wade days):
"To begin with, in the past people assumed that by having heterosexual relations the WOMAN acquired obligations if pregnancy resulted. For the most part, the man was held responsible only if he was married to the woman, willing to marry her, or forced by family and community pressure to marry her. (Such pressure was of course exerted on behalf of 'respectable' women only: if she was the 'wrong' class or race or had a 'bad reputation' she was on her own.) Nor have idealistic scruples about the connection between sex and procreation ever deterred men from sleeping with women they had no intention of marrying."
lenona at June 10, 2019 6:29 AM
When I was explaining the history and utility of mapping as an analytical and presentation tool to justify purchasing mapping software to an employer, I used John Snow and the Broad Street Pump as an example of using maps in analysis.
We were in retail and not epidemiology, but they got the message.
For that alone, that kerbstone would be on my list.
Conan the Grammarian at June 10, 2019 7:07 AM
“Good lord. Leaving aside the issue of EMOTIONAL exploitation via casual sex, even today, 20-plus years after the child support laws finally grew some teeth, there's no shortage of men who don't seem to care how many out-of-wedlock babies they have. That includes rich men as well as poor men. What makes you think men used to be a lot more cautious back in the days when men, single or married, could just disappear when faced with unwanted fatherhood?”
Established men with businesses or good jobs, and bank accounts have never been able to just disappear. Most of them are very responsible which is why the majority of out of wedlock births are perpetrated of miscreants of both sexes. Same for abortions.
I have been watching Sex and the City on HBO, not really of my own choice, but to have something to do with a younger family member.
That show is the prime example of the lifestyle and values, you do not want your young family members, especially the female ones, adopting as role models.
It, and similar shows, has probably done more damage to American women and families than no fault divorce.
Isab at June 10, 2019 8:25 AM
Established men with businesses or good jobs, and bank accounts have never been able to just disappear.
____________________________________
No? What about Peter Chadwick, of California?
(He's accused of murdering his wife. I saw the case on "48 Hours.")
https://www.google.com/search?ei=J7n_XMbWOePU5gKIwbMI&q=peter+chadwick+murder&oq=peter+chadwick+murder&gs_l=psy-ab.3...227690.228876..229067...0.0..0.88.460.7......0....1..gws-wiz.......0i67j0.6ShkYl7TfTo
Seems to me the more money you have, the easier it would be, these days, to disappear COMPLETELY if you want to, compared to someone of the middle class. At any rate, I was referring to the days when child support laws weren't taken seriously by the authorities because out-of-wedlock births were considered to be strictly the mother's fault. If she got abandoned, that was practically considered poetic justice. Also (I think Miss Manners pointed this out, but I can't check right now), even abandoned wives didn't get much sympathy, because if a husband disappeared, the uncivil attitude used to be "she must have driven him to it." (Even - or especially? - in the days when decent wives weren't supposed to be the ones to buy condoms, but they couldn't necessarily get diaphragms either, which led to unwanted children.)
So, even if a man couldn't quite "disappear" back then, chances are he still wouldn't have to pay much child support, if any.
lenona at June 11, 2019 7:40 AM
So, even if a man couldn't quite "disappear" back then, chances are he still wouldn't have to pay much child support, if any.
lenona at June 11, 2019 7:40 AM
Most of the people “skating out” on child support are in prison or unemployed.
The are not decamping to countries with no extradition treaties with the U.S.
Try not to use anecdotal evidence to try and prove your points.
“According to another study, 76% of the $14.4 billion in child support arrears in California was by parents who lacked the ability to pay. The "deadbeat" parents had a median annual income of $6,349, arrears of $9,447 and an ongoing support of $300 per month because 71% of the orders were set by default.”
Isab at June 11, 2019 12:16 PM
You're still dodging the question. Namely: why should anyone believe that men used to be a lot more cautious in the pre-Pill days, when it was easier to skip town and not get punished for it?
Besides, women who don't WANT to get pregnant can't be blamed for having sex with birth control after age 25 or so. Who blames men for doing that, whether they're married or not?
Found the Miss Manners column, btw - it's from June 28th, 1995. At the WaPo, the headline is "Immorality and the Place of Social Disapproval."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/06/28/immorality-and-the-place-of-social-disapproval/df79a2c7-3e76-40e2-a44f-2577a8503c1d/?utm_term=.beaf92b93400
(with a paywall, apparently)
One can also read it on pp 211-212 of "Miss Manners Rescues Civilization."
(It's about an unhappy - and possibly impoverished - divorcee, who was abandoned for a younger woman by her circuit court judge husband, after a 25-year marriage. She argued that we should return to the days when divorce was automatically considered a moral and social disgrace. MM gently pointed out that most of that stigma, back then, was placed on the ex-wife. Not to mention that it was never fair for outsiders to judge marriages they didn't really know about that well, if at all, so of course things had to change.)
lenona at June 14, 2019 1:35 PM
These days it may be still be possible for a man with nothing - no bank account, no career, no credit rating, no professional certifications, and no education, to simply disappear and be a homeless unemployable bum somewhere else under a false name (and with no ID that would stand up to a check with the issuing agency - not that lacking or having lost all ID is unusual among homeless bums). He probably does not lose much, although if he wants to work for even minimum wage, he'll need a fake ID that matches a real SSN - but guys like this wouldn't be much concerned about that. And unless he murdered a cop or VIP, it's unlikely that anyone is going to put in much effort to find him.
For a man who has those things, it is difficult to disappear and give them up - but if one doesn't give up everything but whatever wealth one can carry without attracting attention, you have left a trail that a detective doesn't even have to leave the office to follow. And the more wealth or income you had, the better the chances that someone will be trying to find you.
The wealth you can carry without also leaving a trail is limited these days. Cash transactions of $10,000 or more require a report to the government, and you cannot live on $9,999 for long. In a homeless encampment, that much cash will get you robbed; almost anywhere else in the USA, it's only enough to live on for a few weeks or months. And that's ignoring how motels want to see a credit card, and someone renting an apartment will want ID and a credit history. A million dollars might overcome these problems with enough left to retire on (if living simply in a rural area disfavored by tourists is to your taste), but then you're carrying suitcases of currency around, and spending it is apt to look like "structuring". Or you might carry a few pounds of gem stones - but you'll take a heavy loss both in buying them and selling them, so you need to start with several million. And when you deal in large quantities of such items, the people you deal with will remember you.
The rich guys who try to disappear this way usually either failed to do the math, or figure that they only have to stay out of sight for a few months. Or perhaps they find a coyote to smuggle them the other way across the border, to somewhere where the living is cheap and a few dollars a month keeps the local cops incurious - and I assume that not _everyone_ that goes this route winds up buried in the desert, while the coyote buys his mother a new house and his sons and nephews a college education.
markm at June 15, 2019 9:54 PM
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