[ianamartin]

If we're using a system that puts catcalling in the same bucket as actual rape, that's a little bit of a problem. Catcalling is offensive, tasteless, and disgusting, but it's not the same as forcing someone to have sex with you.

I support laws against catcalling, or enforcing existing harassment laws to include catcalling. But you really lose me when you try to put saying anything--no matter how offensive or even illegal--in the same bucket as doing physical violence to another person.

I think this is where the #metoo movement and other groups that promote women's safety and well-being lose a lot of support from people who would otherwise be in agreement with them. I can go really far supporting laws to protect women from all kinds of awful things. But I can't really stretch reality far enough to say that saying something is the same as raping someone.

[neom]

I wasn't suggesting catcalling is the same as rape; I was suggesting they're both in the same category. To use an analogy, a Ford Fiesta and a Ferrari FXX aren't going to compete in a race together but they're both cars.

[onion2k]

If we're using a system that puts catcalling in the same bucket as actual rape, that's a little bit of a problem. Catcalling is offensive, tasteless, and disgusting, but it's not the same as forcing someone to have sex with you.

No one is suggesting catcalling is the same as rape; people are suggesting they're both in the same category. To use an analogy, a Ford Fiesta and a Ferrari FXX aren't going to compete in a race together but they're both cars.

[stcredzero]

To use an analogy, a Ford Fiesta and a Ferrari FXX aren't going to compete in a race together but they're both cars.

To use an analogy, public urination and murder aren't doing to result in the same penalties but they're both crimes.

[neom]

Sure, but in the context of workplace harassment catcalling and rape would be in the same category, fireable offenses, no?

[stcredzero]

Sure, but in the context of criminal law, public urination and murder would be in the same category, offenses that can get you arrested, no?

There is an unsavory political/propaganda purpose to putting catcalling and rape in the same category. The eliding of crimes of vastly differing degrees of severity is another warping of law enforcement and the judiciary which totalitarian states have used to oppress individuals. To do the constant work against this, we need to be careful about distinctions.

[dragonwriter]

> There is an unsavory political/propaganda purpose to putting catcalling and rape in the same category

Unless one views combatting unwanted sexual conduct to which people are subjected without consent as an unsavory purposes, no, there isn't.

> The eliding of crimes of vastly differing degrees of severity is another warping of law enforcement and the judiciary which totalitarian states have used to oppress individuals.

True, but irrelevant, for several reasons: first, this isn't a law enforcement issue; second, while the category of discussion overlaps with criminal conduct, it is not a discussion of crime as such, but of a category united by shared features not incliding criminality; third, no one is suggesting equivalency or arguing for ignoring the distinctions between acts within the category while discussing the broad category.

[stcredzero]

Unless one views combatting unwanted sexual conduct to which people are subjected without consent as an unsavory purposes, no, there isn't.

But if one views the efforts towards combating unwanted sexual conduct as a pretext used by certain people who want power as an end, then it becomes an especially unsavory purpose, no?

True, but irrelevant, for several reasons: first, this isn't a law enforcement issue

The classic strategy of non-governmental authoritarians, since they do not have a monopoly on violence, is to do what they can with the same effect. If you don't have the state monopoly on violence, then dress in uniformed hoods and do violence and vandalism under the cover of anonymous crowds. If you don't have the state function of the judiciary, then use kangaroo courts, "trial in the media," and extralegal means to make accusations with the presumption of guilt. All of the above is very relevant today.

third, no one is suggesting equivalency or arguing for ignoring the distinctions between acts within the category while discussing the broad category.

False. Exactly that is happening in order to turn the tables on current power structures, and to let one group intimidate another.

[neom]

That's a fine perspective. While I do think catcalling should be illegal, I don't think it should carry the same punishment. Never the less, we're still talking about workspace harassment here.

[stcredzero]

If we lose such distinctions in the workplace, then there will just be context-specific oppression in the workplace. Livelihood is a major part of life. The spirit of such principles should be in force everywhere of importance in a free society. A free, liberal society accomplishes by convincing and by choice what an oppressive society accomplishes by heavy-handed imposition and coercion. Pay attention to what you're really asking for. It may well be around long enough to be used against you.