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Area newspaper: Yeah, our headline on a story about sexual attacks was a bit much
By adamg on Wed, 05/06/2015 - 8:40pm
This morning's Boston Metro cover story was about the series of groping attacks reported around Boston University over the past few days, with a "BU Babes" headline superimposed on a photo of a woman from the waist down in a pink dress and heels.
Today, the paper apologized:
While our intention was to raise awareness of sexual assault and harassment within our community, it's clear that that is not what was conveyed with our cover and headline.
Via Safe Hub Collective, which was not amused.
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Comments
That's not an apology.
That's a (pardon my upcoming French) shitty, spineless non-apology that doesn't even acknowledge or address the reasons why that cover is so inappropriate.
Holy Bud Light, Batman.
"By presenting an image of a
"By presenting an image of a headless woman, you dehumanize all women."
oh, tumblrs.
the subject of the subject
Well, the groper wasn't groping their ears, was he?
Their "intent" to raise awareness is "not what was conveyed"
Oh, really? Ya think? How many "journalists" looked at that cover before it went to press? Were they the same people who thought those "remove 'no' from your vocabulary" beer labels were such a great idea?
Honestly, where do they find these people? Are they really walking among us?
Slight edit to yer question...
"How many 'journalists' actually work at The Metro?"
How many men
call their Gf's "babes" ? and the women who allow them too.
So?
What I may or may not call my wife when it's just the two of us doesn't mean I go around calling random women "babe" - especially not women who may have to worry about being sexually attacked.
My girlfriend is a babe,
and I'm a hunk.
Them's the breaks.
And you must be so proud
But don't apply for any copy editing jobs.
Wow
Just, wow.
Why, just wow?
My cousin's hubby calls her "baby" in private (and, actually, on FB). There is nothing wrong with that, anon, if she is down with it.
I "allow" my boyfriend to do worse things than call be "babe"
He calls me hon, honey, sweetheart and all kinds of very sweet and lovely things that are so cute they make my heart melt.
I guess I should hand in my feminist card because I think those terms of endearment are adorbs.
No, you should hand in your
No, you should hand in your feminist card because you apparently don't understand the concept of "consent" or the difference between the names your boyfriend calls you and the names a stranger calls you.
But you get to choose
You allow him to use those terms but I bet he would stop if it bothered you.
Are you ok with all strangers using those terms? Is it ok if the paper refers to robbery victims as "babes". Victims of hate crimes?
Yeesh - way to extrapolate
I wasn't taking on the larger issue. I was simply remarking on this one comment
I took that post to mean that women devalue themselves when they let their significant others call them pet names such as babe. When it's someone with whom I'm in a relationship, I don't believe that's true.
That's all. There was no comment on the larger issue of The Metro calling butt grabbing victims "babes."
Muh Triggers
But what about the verbal harassment I am subjected to when the lady who runs the bakery down the way calls me "sugar" or "sweetie" after I pay? #patriarchy
I, for one....
... find the use of those terms "endearing" -- but perhaps that is because I grew up in what is now the South (Oklahoma was only partly "southern" in my youth).
Babes in Journalism Land
Had they omitted "babes" (and not replaced it with something equally inappropriate like "chics") this wouldn't have been so outrageous. These guys need to re-read that story from the Herald headline writer. (I guess when The Herald starts to seem classy by comparison, then you know you have a problem.)
Enough
With the hypersensitivity crap already!
Enough
With the indecent assault and battery on women already!
I know, right? If women don't
I know, right? If women don't want to be objectified, they shouldn't leave the house!
hypersensitive crap?
spoken like a true perv!
Enough!
With the knee jerk hypersensitivity to actual valid sensitivity crap!
You're welcome.
Wait, the Metro is a newspaper?
I thought it was an advertising circular.
No
It's the place I go to get ideas for Mothers' Day.
This year, it's all dairy, all the time.
Oh, and they have Sudoku and a crossword puzzle.
I would keep upping this
I would keep upping this comment if it would let me.
Wait, the Metro
actually printed an article that they didn't
steal fromattribute to somebody else?Boston Metro is out of touch
Boston Metro is out of touch and irrelevant.
oh boy
sorry I missed that article, which was surely as in-depth as its headline promises. whatever did the "local sex psychiatrist" have to say? please, I'm all agog.
semi-related, but check out the commentary on the BU Today article. I'll translate the first comment and the first reply to it:
Woman: It's so shitty that women have to change their behavior and live their lives in constant fear of being attacked/raped. Wouldn't it be SO MUCH BETTER if we just taught men not to attack and rape women, if we taught them NOT to feel that they're entitled to go after whatever they want just because they want it?
Man: I feel uncomfortable when we are not talk about me????
Even Worse
We are talking about young men of an age that should have been taught better by their mothers and fathers.
Then again, boomers were all about theories of talking to their kids, not actually raising them.
Men of all ages do it
It's not a generational thing.
They might have different ways of expressing that women alone in public are public property: some yell, some touch, some grab, some run away faster than others, but they still do it and it cuts across all age groups.
Malcolm...
men are not born rapists. There is not some innate "rape gene" that only men have. And most men do not, indeed, leave their homes and say "Gosh, I think I am an entitled bastard and I am gonna rape a woman today."
So they do not have to be "taught" anything, in regards to not raping women.
Why someone chooses to commit the awful act of rape on another (whether it be a man raping a woman or vice versa) can't be boiled down to "all men are rapists" and they just need to a good talking to and/or they were poorly raised by mom and dad.
ohhhhhhhhhhh boy
Here we go.
No one said men are born rapists. HOWEVER. Men are socialized to think that women exist as objects for their consumption: visual, physical, intellectual, whatever. Men are socialized to continue to take seriously their former status as hunters, and to pursue women regardless of whether they've received any indication that the woman is interested. And women are socialized either to accept this as the status quo, or essentially stop existing: i.e., don't go out at night, don't wear provocative clothing, don't leave your house without letting someone know where you're going, don't do any of the things that men mostly take for granted as basic freedoms. Are there cases where anyone should apply common sense and be on their guard, whether male or female? Absolutely! But for women, those cases are basically just "being alive."
Before you throw one at me, I know, I know: #notallmen. It is incumbent on all of us, men and women, to question the more destructive socialized behaviors out there - and to change them.
Did somebody send up the Man Signal?
Not-All-Man to the rescue!
bless you
It had been a while since I'd seen that one, back in the heyday of #yesallwomen. I missed it. I laughed really loud and then felt a sharp pang again. Thank you.
BU BABES BEWARE! BUMS BOPPED
BU BABES BEWARE! BUMS BOPPED BY BARBAROUS BASTARD!
would
would
Are there no women on the editorial staff?
This is assault. Not a chance to minimize and a chance to write puns. FOOLS.
"This is assault"
"This is assault"
What? I don't get it...
What don't you get?
The assault part? A man put his hands where they don't belong. That's assault (and battery, too, to get legally picky).
In understand assault, all
In understand assault, all too well. I wasn't sure what the poster was calling assault, that is all.
Yes assault
That's what it is when someone lifts up another person's clothes and grabs her without permission. Not really the time to make bad puns. Now people are focusing on the photo/headline and not about the fact that some guy is going around grabbing women.
It is possible...
...for at least some of us, to hold more than one idea in our heads simultaneously. Sexual assault and battery? Bad thing. Trivializing of same? Bad thing. Both.
Yes I know
Unfortunately your are not the ones often showing up in forums or discussion groups (here being one exception).
Babes?
Did they go for extra credit and use the term "gams" as well?
I think some clue-free writer missed the part where this has little or nothing to do with sexuality, and much to do with abusive power thrills from intimidation of women.
Gams
Now there's a word you don't see nearly enough in modern journalism.
Ah, I see the error
BU
BROADS
BEWARE!
Ah, much better.
so many questions.
What the hell is a "sex" psychiatrist? And what the hell would a "sex psychiatrist" have to say about a crime like this? It's violence, not sex, and this implies that the perpetrators are just run-of-the-mill guys looking for sex. No, those guys don't attack random women. They should maybe think to speak to a criminologist instead.
I love that the onus is of course on the victims to protect themselves - if you wear heels and go out at night, you might be asking for it! - instead of on the perpetrators.
Lastly, the use of "babes" implies that only women who'd be classified by the douchetard in their editorial room as "hot" would be at risk of being attacked. Because we all know rape isn't about power and control, it's about attractiveness. It's only the hot girls in skirts and heels who get attacked.
The editor of this paper really needs a lesson on rape culture, misogyny, victim-blaming, and...well, tact.
The headline
Insinuates that only attractive women "babes" get assaulted while in fact all females including children, the elderly are sexually molested (not just females, men are also molested).
Babe in itself is not an offensive term. And neither are sweet cheeks sugar pie honey bun etc... But if you lived in England "fanny" would be. And "Fanny Farmer" would mean a different type of treat over there.
Yeah, 'babe' in itself is an offensive term ...
If you're using it to refer to women in general or to women you don't know.
I'm tempted to suggest you to go stand in Copley Square and go "hey babe!" to random women and see how they react, but all that would do is wind up annoying a lot of women, who probably already have enough problems in their lives without some random jerk seeming to come onto them.
As for England, yeah, so? You might want to look up what George Bernard Shaw said about English, the US and the UK.