every woman over-- what? 25? has been sexually harassed and intimidated, even made afraid b/c of comments made by men. we have been condescended to and belittled, ridiculed and verbally beaten up...and excuses are made, rationale is given...none of it acceptable. we all know women who say a raped woman was 'asking for it' as she has (like this gerry woman?)been indoctrinated to believe everything is her own weak and flighty gender's fault; we are the silly ones,fluff pieces, fluff-ers, and if you want a man, stfu and deal with it baby. i am saddened to watch young women self-objectify, sad to see men disrespect women so much- we seem to have gone backward in respect of women, feminism often used as the excuse. being called a feminist is meant as a slur from some. not feminine (read: obedient), ugly(read:not feminine).
i think it stems from insecurity and failure w/ the opposite sex, on both sides. but we HAVE to make known the violent act rape is,it is emotional murder. not funny. never funny, no matter how many years have passed, let me tell ya: it never gets funny.

@acommentor

Somewhat tellingly, the Facebook pages in question make it very clear they are only referring to women (raping your girlfriend as she sleeps; seeing if your friend's girlfriend can put up a fight; chasing a woman; kicking a slut in her vagina) and as such, I only referred to women.

I wonder if male rape had been the target of these groups, Facebook might have seen it as "violence" that needed curbing - maybe you'd find your double standards there.

But your xenophobia is going down a treat.

I remember when I was raping Gerry's arse to see if he was playing hard to get. The noises he made were almost like words! When I was raping his mums face she couldn't say anything, which made a change. I find that hilarious! How dare he or anyone else tell me I'm being offensive, it's my freedom of speech! You promised you wouldn't censor me when I was pushing your face into the floor Gerry, but now you've 'changed your mind.' No means yes, remember, now back on your knees. Hahahaha, no offense intended.

How dare anyone claim a firewall on what is funny and anything that has the word rape or women is on the blacklist.

For example I was a long standing victim of child abuse (nothing life threatening but felt like torture for eighteen years) and child abuse jokes are often HILARIOUS and a great way of dealing with our societal problems we've had (btw I'm one of the Irish eigits). BTW I just turned twenty two so its hardly something miles in the past.

Yes I found it hard to deal with if I saw Tommy Tiernans jokes on TV. Some I found funny and some grated. But the difference is I kne, even as a very young child that those gratings were him teaching me that I had something to deal with and tried not to fight it as much.And that has worked for me.

Don't give me your indignant bullshit (not the author, I disagreed a lot but she did not viciously attack the only coherent thinker on this comment thread) and tell me to crawl back in my hole but please god try to tell me where I'm wrong on this issue.

Yours respectfully and FULLY THOUGHT OUT

I've said half a dozen times now that I don't find it funny.

As for "men - like you - " nice weasel words!

There are cogent arguments to be made, mcquade touched on one and Daniele made good, sensible points.

The rest of you are arguing from emotion and with about eighty billion logical fallacies per word.

I don't particularly find logical fallacies amusing. Anyone who does probably needs mental help.

In fact, and I do apologise for spamming this comment function now, it's only you, between the two of us, who has joked about rape. Only you have had merry japes and stories to hand about it.

Perhaps time to rethink your debating strategy, funny girl, when you're doing precisely what you despise.

I mean you absolutely no ill will; I think we have a major difference of opinion when it comes to freedom of speech, but I won't make up little rape fantasies about you, like you have done about me and those around me.

Have a nice night.

Rape fantasies: That's. The. Point.

It's fine for all those women you don't know but not so fine when it's happened to someone you know and love.

Do you also back a lack of censorship around paedophile jokes on tshirts and FB pages? What's the difference?

Whether you know it or not, you do wish me ill will, because you think rape jokes are fine. Again, whether you believe it or not, normalising rape (guess what?) makes it normal.

Sweet dreams

Rape Is No Joke
http://www.facebook.com/rape.is.no.joke

We strongly believe that facebook should include an option to report pages and comments condoning sexual violence and remove such groups for being in breach of the user Terms and Conditions (Section 3: Safety, point 7), which specify that no hateful or threatening comments should be made.

Allowing such groups to congregate serves only to further normalise rape culture and the high instance of sexual violence that exists in society.

The following are some direct quotes - "should rape all the feminists that post pictures", "What's black and blue and hides in the corner? A rape victim", "I'm pro rape. As in, really good at it", "If your tie her up and gag her, she can't run or say no", " I joined this page to support rape", "Only I can rape my mum", "i love raping bitches out in the cool night air, dont complain sluts or your next" ...

Social media has been such a great cause for good in many parts of the world but this abuse has gone too far.

Community Goals and Aspirations
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
1) Our short term goal is to have Facebook change its policies to end allowing pro-rape groups and end allowing pro-violence toward woman and children groups.

2) In the long term we all want to see an end to the prolific rape of women by the human species. Sexual assault of any type is not tolerable and should be left to the past.

3) The past is something we cannot change but we can make certain the truth of it is told and not forgotten.

4) We can also be kind, tolerant, understanding, comforting and a resource for victims of sexual assault.

Some of the big companies that pay Facebook to advertise on the social networking site have asked for their adverts to be removed from one of the pro-rape groups. Sony, American Express and BlackBerry have had their demands answered and in the last few days all advertising has been removed on the group.

There are more groups to go. Congratulations to Sony, American Express and Blackberry. I like those products a lot now.

Sony, American Express and Blackberry have a social conscience. Thank you.

I boycott products advertised on pro-rape content pages of Facebook.

We ask your help.

Effective immediately we are going to begin a boycott and widely promote this boycott of any product advertised on a pro-rape Facebook content page.

When you identify an advertiser on any such page, post the full name of the advertiser and the product here at http://www.facebook.com/rape.is.no.joke Also, if you can post a wall image of a screen capture of the advert and page, that would be awesome.

On the List to Boycott:
IKEA
Samsung

Oh grow a f*cking sense of humour already.

Who are you to draw lines in the sand when it comes to what people think is acceptable joke material or not?

Comedy is entirely subjective, and it's not your business to tell people what not to laugh at.

Also, you're reading far too much into it, in a typical scowling feminazi way. Most of the members of these groups are female, by the way.

"You promised you wouldn't censor me when I was pushing your face into the floor Gerry, but now you've 'changed your mind.'"

No I haven't.

Your little joke story is rubbish, but it's still fine to spout it.

Gerry?

Shut. THE FUCK. Up.

well said. i agree with every word of this article.

Gerry, if you can't see the difference between inciting violence and hate, and a joke, then i worry for you.

One thing I don't get is why some people are so enraged about rape jokes yet have no opinion on murder jokes. I personally find any funny joke funny, regardless of its content.

@ Gerry crawl back under your fucking rock where you you belong. There is no humour in rape & the brutalisation of woman end of story!!!!!!!

Swagga, there is humour to be found in literally anything, it's actually a very potent way of dealing with terrible occurrences.

Also; "I am all for freedom of speech but I wonder where do you draw the line Gerry?" No, you're obviously not.

"freedom of speech" is not what it is cracked up to be.
There is no where on earth where total freedom of speech would be tolerated.Such freedom is unworkable in a functioning society.
See, there is FREEDOM TO.. and FREEDOM FROM... and this is where the ideological clash occurs.
Personally I think freedom from..is more important than freedom to..
For example in the case being discussed I think women's right to be free from abuse and threat is much much more important than one individual man's freedom to say horrendously offensive and dangerous stuff.
In other words the rights of the group are more important than the rights of individuals.
The Anglo-Saxons' idea of freedom is individual freedom. Other cultures favour the protection of the rights of minority groups at the expense of individual freedom.
That is why the French liberals and French feminists are in favour of the banning of the burka, which is clearly suppressing the rights of some individual Muslim women,in order to protect the image of women in general as free citizens which they feel is more important.
Facebook should definitely ban this stuff.

It's a small step from saying you dislike something to saying something should be done about.

And therein is the death of liberty.

-paraphrase of i forget who said it.

Gerry, I'm interested if you would accept that Facebook should also allow 'humourous' sites making light of racially motivated or homophobic attacks on the grounds of freedom of speech? As an 'equalist' I'm sure you would be as quick to defend the free expression of racists and homophobes as much as you do misogynists? And if so, then why do you suppose Facebook holds such double standards? Rather than taking cheap swipes at 'feminazis'(you have more in common with the Daily Mail than Marx as far as I can tell) you'd do well to remember that people can find it hard to laugh at things they genuinely fear or have experienced - sorry it that's too 'emotive' for you.

Gerry, you clearly have a limited understanding of the full responsibilities that comes with the freedoms we enjoy. As the great libertarian and defender of free speech, J S Mill put it, one man's freedom to swing his fists stops before the end of another man's nose. But heck, why should I expect an Irish eejit to know that?