12/7: Additional data analysis

This screencap contains the 15 most "top-voted" discussion threads on MR as of 9:10am AKST on December 5th. As this changes based on participation and votes, this will likely change within a few hours.

Of these threads, 3 are images, 6 are links to mainstream news sources (like CNN), 2 link to alternative news sites, and 4 are local discussions (meaning they don't link off-site, discussions are locally-contained and/or consist of discussion regarding the Reddit community.) I will be highlighting the images, as I feel they contain the essence of the community, their behavior, and major issues they discuss.

The three images are as follows:

The first image is a screencap from the poster's Facebook friends list. The expanded discussion for this particular image had over 130 comments, and provide a much-needed male perspective on this topic. The Facebook poster implies that the man had committed something so terrible against the woman to deserve being stabbed, which suggests that the poster may be unaware or uneducated over the possibilities of females being the antagonist. This is summed up succinctly by spagma:

Woman attacks man, must be his fault.

Spagma makes a good point, sarcastically echoing what was implied by the Facebook poster. One of the community's biggest issues is the lack of understanding by the general population regarding female-on-male violence and sexual assault. Understandably, images like this Facebook status can be infuriating. These reactions and thoughts are consistent in the other discussions with the other two images.

With the second image, it shows a dictionary definition for rape that obviously states that men can only be rapists, not the raped. It does not consider a woman can rape. However, instead of advocating for petitioning the dictionary to change the definition, or anything particularly constructive to remove such an offensive summary, the top discussion is presented:

The first line from aethoralloy presents a similar remark like spagma, but then takes the discussion one step further by immediately aligning this as an "accomplishment" for feminism. GamerLioness (which is likely a female, due to the alias) angrily calls out this behavior, which is rampant through the community as it is, which is responded with even more aggression and utilizing a strawman-like argument in retaliation.

However, other posters do offer constructive arguments:

devestatingwoundchan:

I'm curious about the source and context of that definition. It is not consistent with the definition of "rape" in many state criminal statutes. Certainly it reflects a common societal thinking that is inappropriately gender-based, but I think it's useful to specify whether we are talking "rape in a legal context" or "rape as defined by social construct." Which is this intending to be, and should that intent change our discussion?

TheRadBaron:

That's just weird. A lot of dictionaries have something along the lines of "normally male" in there (which is fairly reasonable, as the role of dictionaries is to catalogue word usage), but this is just inaccurate.

feratian:

Honestly, I wouldn't call this an unfair definition, but there needs to be a more technical word available that describes a unisex, violent and forceful sexual abuse. I think the main problem with how rape is defined legally is that it can be used on just about anyone and made into "he said, she said," instead of being a violent crime with a definite victim and perpetrator.

These, and a surprising amount of other posters, argue unlike the usual, "radical" MR reactionaries.

The last image was initially posted in the /r/TwoXChromosomes subreddit, and it was a graphic designed by one of the female participants of TXC. This is a rare occurrence where a cross-post from that particular subreddit was welcomed by MR. The top voted comment in this thread was by robswims:

I am a guy who was date raped by a girl I had just met that day. If a guy had given a girl drugs and taken advantage of her the way the girl took advantage of me he would have surely been convicted of rape. At the time I thought it was kind of funny/cool (I was 18 and she wasn't bad looking). I actually had consensual sex with her the next day and then never saw her again, but now 6 years later I feel very strange and violated looking back at the situation.

What is worse about this situation is that robswims didn't even initially consider it rape, likely due to his society making the act of woman-on-man violence impossible. In retrospect, he identifies that he was raped, and makes a comparison if it was the other way around, surely the man would be punished. But, since his understanding of rape at the time was not accurate, he was unaware of the implications of the girl's assault, and likely did not have resources to turn to.

While many of the top 15 posts incite inflammatory response, misconstrue information, or otherwise mislead the discussion to align with MR community's beliefs, there are some strangely level-headed discussions by some participants. Whether these are MR subscribers or male participants, there's no way to actually determine that (unless they are asked, and respond honestly), but it does reveal another facade of the community that may not be in unison with the majority. The fewer the trolls and angry responses, the more likely that the community could make some effective changes, and also be taken as a more serious subreddit within the Reddit community as a whole.