A moral panic takes to the air
The furore today over Air NZ and Qantas’ practice of not allowing men to sit next to unaccompanied children brings the Right’s definition of ‘political correctness’ into question.
National’s PC Eradicator Wayne Mapp has said that the move is “political correctness that had got out of hand” (BTW, should we assume that when PC hasn’t ‘got out of hand’ or ‘gone mad’, its okay by Wayne? 
).
But I thought that PC is said to be occurring when there is an over-emphasis on equal rights. In this case the opposite is true, it is a discriminatory practice that Dr Mapp is opposing.
IMHO, excessive paranoia about paedophiles leading to limits being placed on the entire male population is a form of moral panic, not political correctness. Do we really want to see this ‘get out of hand’ and have men and children totally segregated in society?
Keith has said this morning that the airlines need to be more down to earth on the issue.
“This is clearly a breach of the Human Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex.
“I will be writing to the Human Rights Commission asking them to intervene to bring the two airlines to their senses.
Given that he thinks the HRC is too PC, will Dr Mapp be happy if it supports Keith’s call and asks for the airlines’ practice to stop?
November 29th, 2005 at 12:47 pm
So far as I can see the policy is far from PC. It is the opposite, sexually discriminatory. I also think there may be some good reasons for it, which are probably mostly around controlling the child more than the man.
November 29th, 2005 at 1:16 pm
Forget that PC stuff. That just clouds the actual issue. In fact ignore Wayne Mapp’s silly game and any other use of the PC cliche. On the face of it, this event is discrimination against a man because he sat next to a boy. Presumably the steward belived the boy to be at risk. She is an idiot. Simple. Having said that, the man should have stood up for himself straight away - rather than feel embarrassed. MEN! Don’t let those over the top panic mongers make you/us feel guilty. Assert your/our right to be fully human - if you/we want to sit next to a child, say hi affectionately or even cuddle a kid who wants it - go ahead. I think this is the only way we can cut through all of the half-arsed pseudo-fear/chatter/opinion/moral panic or ‘PC’ bullshit.
November 29th, 2005 at 1:24 pm
I wouldn’t try that on an airplane these days. They’ve got a habit of enforcing their rules in some pretty direct ways. And I’d actually like to hear the reason for the rules - they may be quite sound.
November 29th, 2005 at 2:18 pm
There is some stunning paranoia and inventive being bandied about in NZ against men at the moment.
The one which has my blood boiling at present is this ’stopping violence’ site, whose patron is allegedly the governer general: http://www.dvc.org.nz.
It contains such gems as “most men are raised to believe they are superior to women”.
Fear and misdirected anger can never effect positive change.. it is time for a little more public recognition and appreciation of the positive contribution the vast majority of men make every day to daily life in NZ.
November 29th, 2005 at 2:26 pm
I’m with Cindy Kiro (commissioner for children, who supports the policy) on this one. Some years ago I routinely sent my daughter (pre/early teens) on ‘unaccompanied’ flights and was pleased that the airlines had a policy of seating her next to a woman. A simple and long-standing precaution against the very small minority of men who might try to take advantage of close proximity to a child. The publicity that has suddenly sprung up is just a beat up - why has this guy ’stewed’ for over a year before doing anything about it if he was really offended? He might well change his view if confronted with the reality of sending his own children on flights in years to come…
November 29th, 2005 at 2:59 pm
Huskynut
Don’t be naughty - quoting phrases out of context doesn’t advance the debate.
The dvc site says (clipped for space not content)
” Understanding domestic violence is key to making safe changes … it is a social problem of men’s violence against women and sometimes children. It is based in deep-seated beliefs in male superiority. …
Not all men believe in male superiority. Men have a strong role in modelling non- violent behaviour. “
November 29th, 2005 at 3:20 pm
i agree with Keith–this is discriminatory, plain and simple.
but as for defying crew instructions on an aircraft–fugedaboudit.
you’ll be tied down and dragged off to the cells as soon as you land.
when you check into an international flight, all your rights to human dignity are waived, as far as i can tell.
November 29th, 2005 at 4:30 pm
Mapp’s comment “What do they think men are going to do that women won’t?” makes him sound like a complete drongo, isn’t it obvious?
I suppose this is discriminatory in a sense, in the same way as keeping women out of mens’ toilets (or vice versa) is, and could be an over-reaction. But who cares? Is anybody actually suffering from not getting seated next to a child?
It interests me, however, that the National Party are trying to tell companies how to run their own businesses. This seems an example of how nanny capitalism demands even stricter regulation and the right to interfere more in people’s lives than the state.
November 29th, 2005 at 6:03 pm
To answer Sam’s post, it does a great deal of harm when men are stigmatised and ostracised. On a personal level, it is never nice to be told one is a potential pervert and therefore told to move on, like some drunk loitering at a street corner. I agree with Paurinse that the man should have stood up to himself, but perhaps he had been so browbeaten by feminists and by male quislings (the worst sort of men) that he had simply lost all confidence.
The logic of the airline seems to be that because P(passenger will molest child/passenger is male) > P(passenger will molest child/pasenger is not male), that they should take a precautionary approach. But this can apply to a number of groups. For example
It is known that Maori are more represented in prisons than non-Maori. So ato be consistent, airline staff should move Maori (how well would that go down with the local iwi?)
It is knowen that most child molesters are friends or relatives of the family. So the children should not be seated next to anyone who knows them. In fact, P(passenger will molest child in some way/passenger is a parent of the child) is probably greater than P(passenger will molest child in some way/passenger does not know child & passenger is male)
It is known that Muslims are more likely to be airline terrorists than non-Muslims. So they should be subjected to a more thorough search and refused admission to the plane if there is any doubt
It is known that ex-criminals are more likely to re-offend than non-ex-criminals. But the Green Party introduced the Clean Slate Act to protect the rights of the majority of ex-criminals who would never offend again. Similarly, the chance of a passenger molesting a child he is next to given he is male, is miniscule. The rights of passengers, and the rights of men as a whole should certainly take priority, just as the rights of ex-criminals was respected in the Clean Slate Act.
November 29th, 2005 at 6:25 pm
faskbike: I think the point is that the site assumes that domestic violence must be a man beating a woman. That isn’t the complete picture. It reminds me of this domestic violence article:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=87&ObjectID=10351464
A Justice Ministry survey of 5300 people aged 15 and over in 2001 found that, of those who had had partners, 26 per cent of women and 18 per cent of men had at some stage been hit, threatened or frightened by a partner.
Yet the article then goes on an only talks about men beating women. Domestic violence is a problem on both sides of the fence. There are men that have been abused by their (female) partners. There might be fewer but that doesn’t mean we should forget about it. Perhaps once we start tackling the issue without bias we can get closer to solving the problem.
November 29th, 2005 at 6:32 pm
I actually think that this is a good policy. However, to work to airline has to take the responsiblity to seat the children correctly. Berating men who haven’t done anything is counterproductive to the kind of atmosphere we need to deal with this problem properly. It’s a question of power, and having angry men marching round doesn’t help
Frog said “PC is said to be occurring when there is an over-emphasis on equal rights. In this case the opposite is true, it is a discriminatory practice that Dr Mapp is opposing”. Well of course that’s complete rubbish; PC simply means anything that challenges the priviledged position of white men. This offends people in that group…
November 29th, 2005 at 6:53 pm
Fastbike - bollox the context. The sentence is verbatim off the website. Now you try replacing the word “men” (in the full context, quoted below) with any other social group. Try women. Or jews. Or muslims. Find me one single social group of whom you think it would be acceptable to make that generalised and inflamatory statement. With any other social group, it’d be considered borderline hate speech.
It’s a measure of how far things have swung that a statement like can be made and people are not outraged by it.
“The vast majority of domestic violence in western industrial societies is perpetrated by men. This doesn’t mean men are bad - rather that most men are raised to believe they are superior to women. These men believe they have the right to use violence and abuse to maintain that position.”
November 29th, 2005 at 7:14 pm
kiroe1 - nicely said! And since males have more traffic accidents than women, let’s stop them driving..
Without discounting the very real problem of child abuse, societally we have a huge reservior of sexual shame that causes many people to feel ‘creepy’ around all manner of things sexual. We’re averse to touching other people (in healthy ways), we’re repressed in bed, and we’re loath to openly discuss sexual issues.
In answer to your question Sam (Is anybody actually suffering from not getting seated next to a child?), umm, yes, quite frankly. I’m losing and they’re losing, and all because of a creepy societal paranoia.
It’s easy to gloss this one over.. it’s not much. But where actually is the line? It’s like terrorism - how many of your social liberties are your prepared to give up in an effort to keep everybody perfectly safe, all of the time.
When I have children, then yes, I expect I will feel protective. But I also expect I’ll try to be rational with my feelings and not expect the world to change so I feel perfectly comfortable.
November 29th, 2005 at 7:27 pm
Whether or not men are suffering from this policy is irrelevant. It is blatantly sexist and contravenes everything any liberal-minded humanist has every thought. It is a deeply offensive policy to me as I am sure it is to the vast majority of men. When I was frequently an unaccompanied minor on airplanes as a child I always had an air host(ess) look after me for the entire flight. Is this no longer the case?
November 29th, 2005 at 7:44 pm
Huskynut,
Instead of getting flumoxed by the language, look at the numbers:
- Women’s Refuge assisted about 22,500 women and children in 2004
- NZ police attend 1 DV incident per hour
- 95% of family violence carried out by men
- “One person dies every 12 and a half days at the hands of a family member. Most of them are women and children. “
You say …”generalised”, “inflamatory”, “hate speech” etc
Get a grip man !
November 29th, 2005 at 7:47 pm
And while I’m at it … These people don’t generally make things up.
November 29th, 2005 at 8:20 pm
As a child I also flew as an unaccompanied child passenger, with my younger sister. We were seated together, without other adults in our seating space (if it was a 3-seat section) and usually in the closest seating to the air hostesses, who kept a very close eye on us.
The argument in Court that lost my ex-husband custody of our children was his insistance that a 14 year-old could adequately supervise her two younger siblings, without an accompanying adult, from Auckland, transitting LA, through to St Louis, Missouri, a journey that could take up to 24 hours, depending on how long the transit time was from International to domestic flights.
The Judge presiding was amazed that the father of these 3 children could not see the possibility of harm coming to them during such a long trip, without any family member to help them with luggage, etc. Having seen the literature on children being kidnapped via air travel in the USA, I was very relieved by the grilling he gave my ex-husband; neither of them were very impressed with the other’s responses.
Did anyone think to ask how the child concerned felt about it?
Some children really do not want to be seated next to a stranger of one gender or another, but don’t have the percieved power to question or demand a change; the subject here is a very vulnerable group of our society, generally disempowered by the old-fashioned “obey your elders” axiom.
As a mother I would prefer that they err on the side of caution, rather than allowing any stranger who chooses to be seated next to a child the opportunity to groom that child for the next however many hours; the rape of one child is too high a price to pay, in my mind, for the offence to the dignity of a hundred innocent men.
Guys, your injured egos will mend in a week.
A raped child needs therapy for most of his/her life, and is generally dysfuctional to some degree in all relationships, because of the effects of the rape on an immature psyche.
But go ahead - risk your own children if you like. It’s your choice.
Just don’t complain to me if you get an outcome you weren’t bargaining for.
And have the grace to explain to your child yourself why the bad man was able to hurt him/her.
November 29th, 2005 at 10:17 pm
I don’t actually care about the answer to this question, but does anyone know exactly what the scenario is the airlines envisage? ie how does a potential train of events lead from “unaccompanied child sits next to man” to “bad thing happens”? And what are the safeguards which have to fail for this to happen - for instance, don’t hostessess always accompany the kids off the flight afterwards? Can’t they watch the kids from as soon as the plane touches down to when their parent picks them up? What REALLY is the risk? And might there be much easier ways of mitigating it?
Huskynut, I agree that this is like the “give me your nail file, you evil terrorist” scenario. How exactly was I going to hijack the plane with it? And isn’t the risk a little overstated compared with the risk I could hijack the plane some other way if I wanted, eg be a very good fighter, strangle with string - whatever. Comparing these risks makes airlines (and us) look like naive idiots. Finally the most painful comparison is between the reduction in risk from taking my nail file with the massive cost, inconvenience, and frustration of it getting taken off me.
As was pointed out, the word is moral panic. Useless, useless, moral panic. Who exactly is reassured by such actions? Or is this kind of thing actually encouraging paranoia?
Like most of the commenters, I’m offended that the airlines (and society, if “society” likes the policy) thinks our (males) embarressment is a better option than installing some simple safeguard to mitigate whatever elevated probability of bad things results from letting a male sit there. But perhaps thats my problem, we easily offended males should all just “get over it”. But I don’t think people get over things that easily unless they get given good reasons for doing so, in my opinion they’re lacking here.
November 29th, 2005 at 10:19 pm
Sam Buchanan Says:
Mapp’s comment “What do they think men are going to do that women won’t?� makes him sound like a complete drongo, isn’t it obvious?
I reply:
No Sam, you sound like the complete drongo. Why don’t you join the rest of us in the 21st century where women are enitrely capable of sexual and physical abuse of children?
Katie:
Have you actually bothered reading the Herald article Frog linked to? If Air NZ and Qantas maintained a ‘clear air’ policy around unaccompanied minors - which I understand other airlines do - in which nobody sat next to them, regardless of gender, I wouldn’t have a problem. To be honest, I was midly surprised that airlines would still carry unaccompanied minors in this paranoid, hyper-litigious world.
But what does offend me is the assumption - and one made with no better rationale than “the airline believed it was what customers wanted” - that I’m some horrible risk to children merely because I’m a man. Wow, and I guess the fact I’m an openly gay man means I shouldn’t be allowed on a plane at all in some people’s opinions - after all, there are millions who think I’m not fit to be a parent, or be a teacher or childcare worker.
My modus operandi is that the ingorance and prejudice of other is their problem. Try and make it mine, and I become your problem too. I guess I could say “well, welcome to my world breeder - suck it up and smile” but I’m not going to tolerate corporate pandering to ill-informed and irrational misandry any more than corporate homophobia.
BTW, Katie, I notice Qantas and Air New Zealand love presenting themselves to the gay market as tolerant, gay-friendly employers - especially when they’re touting packages around Madi Gras. Well, I’d like to know whether the same policy regarding men sitting next to unaccompanied minors applies to male cabin staff. After all, how can we be sure that one of those male trolly dollies isn’t a covert paedophile?
With all due respect Katie, I really wish you’d get the patronising sneers about “wounded male egos” out of your voice. I’ve lived my life in a society where the equation of male homosexuality with paedophilia has destroyed lives and careers. I have a t-shirt that reads “this fag bashes back” and I don’t wear it just because it makes my man-tits look big. Have a problem with that? Deal with it.
November 29th, 2005 at 10:27 pm
BTW, I’ve got a whacky notion - Qantas and Air New Zealand should not only stop accepting bookings on behalf of unaccompanied minors. They should also refuse to carry men, full stop. My rationale? The perpetrators of terrorism/highjackings, threats to the integrity of the aircraft and incidents of so-called “air rage” are overwhelmingly and disproportionately folks with penises. (*sarcasm on* At least don’t make me share a pressurised tin can with swarthy chaps with names like Achmed and Mohammed, and teatowels on their heads. They make me uncomfortable *sarcasm off*) Such incidents are much more common, I suspect, that an opportunistic paedophile happening to be seated next to an unaccompanied minor and deciding to do the dirty deed.
November 29th, 2005 at 11:05 pm
I’d just like to reinforce Kiore’s response to Sam, that demonizing all men as potential sex offenders is hugely damaging to men and society. See my post, A Climate of Fear, which discusses this general issue more thoroughly.
On the “PC” question, Resistantsoy seems right in saying that PC is more associated with special treatment than equal treatment. Anti-male bigotry in general might be perceived as “PC” by some, which I assume is why they apply the term to this case.
Regardless, I’m proud to see the Greens standing up for what’s right in this case (as they also did in relation to our sexist rape laws). Keep up the good work!
November 29th, 2005 at 11:09 pm
I wonder if Air NZ and Qantas would also oblige people that don’t want to sit next to Muslims and/or Arabs? After all, most terrorists these days are Muslims and/or Arabs, so what more justification do you need?
A number of people seem to be arguing something like: “most child abuse is caused by men, therefore men are potentially dangerous and should be treated differently.” That is the same as saying “most terrorists are muslims, therefore muslims are dangerous and should be treated differently”. That is to say, it is bigoted and wrong. There is no sanity in judging individuals by averages of the group they belong to. You must judge individuals by their own actions, rather than the actions of others and innocence must be presumed until guilt is proven. This is a basic human rights issue.
November 29th, 2005 at 11:13 pm
Katie: Would you condone Air NZ separating Muslims from non-Muslims in their planes? And if not, then why not? I can see scant difference between this scenario and their current policy on separating men and unaccompanied children.
November 29th, 2005 at 11:53 pm
“But I thought that PC is said to be occurring when there is an over-emphasis on equal rights. In this case the opposite is true, it is a discriminatory practice that Dr Mapp is opposing.”
Oh well-caught sir!
“Mapp’s comment “What do they think men are going to do that women won’t?â€? makes him sound like a complete drongo, isn’t it obvious?”
Well actually, Mapp’s comment is political correctness gone mad!!! and he deserved to be crucified for it.
The whole thesis of political-correctness-bashing, is that PC is about protecting or promoting those who are discriminated against, even when this runs counter to “common sense”. Well. A quick look at the statistics on paedophilia will supply an easy response to Dr Mapp. (what’s the percentage of female perpetrators?)
November 30th, 2005 at 12:00 am
alex : there’s a perfectly obvious, non-trivial difference. Children are not adults.
Airline staff are in loco parentis during a flight. They are entitled to make whatever decisions they feel necessary for the security of children in their care : their parents explicitly delegate authority to them. A statistical probability of a greater number of incidents, however minor, concerning men and children, is ample reason for them to apply such a policy.
November 30th, 2005 at 12:12 am
Oh what a load of touchy male egos. Get over yourselves guys!
Lots of boiling blood. “Fear and misdirected anger can never effect positive change.” Thanks for the unintended irony, Huskynuts.
You need to evacuate the hurt feelings before rational debate is possible. Also, you perhaps need to get in touch with your masculinity, and understand and own it.
This reminds me of the “All men rape” controversy from my university days. I instinctively recognised the underlying truth behind the provocation. Men who believe that rapists, paedophiles and wife-beaters are fundamentally different from themselves, need therapy.
Sorry to patronise, guys.
November 30th, 2005 at 12:42 am
Alistair:
Really? Funny how statistics have a long history of being used (and abused) to justify any prejudice you can imagine but that’s a very very big can of worms to open another time.
Just as a matter of interest, if you’re going to make a comment like “A quick look at the statistics on paedophilia will supply an easy response to Dr Mapp. (what’s the percentage of female perpetrators?)” Well, Alistair, I think you might like to talk to Sue Bradford about that. In Wellington a few years back, there was a case where a swimming instructor at a Council-owned pool was fired for initiating a sexual relationship with an underage male client AFTER making sure she couldn’t be charged with statutory rape. You see, the law as then stood was not gender-neutral; only men could commit the offence. And as far as I’m aware, the legal definition of rape still excludes men as victims and women as perpetrators.
I guess sometimes patriarchal-defined gender-roles can work for women.
As I said above, its a simple fact that the perpetrators of terrorism, hijackings and so-called ‘air rage’ incidents are overwhelmingly and disproportionately men. Perhaps New Zealand’s flag carrier should seek an exemption from the Human Rights Act so it can fire all it’s male pilots and cabin staff, and refuse to carry adult male passengers? Yeah right… I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but airlines also have statutory obligations to protect the health and safety of their adult employees and customers, that doesn’t give them carte blanche to ignore employment and
human rights laws because “we felt it was what our customers wanted.”
November 30th, 2005 at 12:45 am
Looking at the thing operationally, from the airline’s point of view :
* first priority : the child is in a position where they can be easily supervised, beside an empty seat.
* If the plane is full : someone will have to be seated next to the child. The airline would be entitled to interview candidates, and select one in particular. This would not be discriminatory in any way : they are acting in loco parentis. But in general, they don’t have time to do that. As a general rule, a woman is likely to be more considerate and nurturing of an unknown child than a man is (don’t get your knickers in a twist guys, I’m sure I could find scientific back-up if I had to). That’s an amply sufficient reason to prefer to seat a woman, rather than a man, in the special seat beside an unaccompanied minor.
On international flights, the problem of moving someone doesn’t arise because it’s handled at ticketing. I’m assuming that seating is open slather on CH-AK flights, hence the incident. No doubt the situation should have been pre-empted by the steward, but he has no grounds whatever to contest whatever arbitrary decision made by airline staff concerning the child’s welfare or comfort, acting as they are (once more with feeling!) IN LOCO PARENTIS!
Full disclosure : I have two young children. The question has not yet arisen, but it will.
November 30th, 2005 at 12:49 am
“In Wellington a few years back, …”
Sorry Craig, that’s an anecdote, not a statistic.
You really don’t get “in loco parentis”, do you?
Children are not adults. That completely invalidates all the analogies about muslims, maoris, homosexuals etc. And terrorism is not the issue here, it’s a red herring.
November 30th, 2005 at 12:51 am
Just once more. For those who are wilfully mis-framing the debate.
It’s not a human rights issue. Nobody has a “right” to sit next to an unaccompanied minor on an aeroplane.
November 30th, 2005 at 1:26 am
Alistair:
*sigh* I do understand what in loco parentis means, but it doesn’t become a magical trump card that allows any organisation to arbitrarily trump every other law in creation. I guess you don’t really get that, which is a shame.
And, Al, it’s a shame you really had to dismiss the serious point I was trying to make by sniffing “that’s just an anecdote” - especially when you’re busy making a string of assertions (some of which I find incredibly offensive) without any logical argument or supporting evidence. If women aren’t legally considered capable of committing an offence, how the hell can they be included in statistics? And if so, what did your assertion about paedophilia statistics really prove? Nothing?
Anyway, as I think there’s really no point in talking past each other without any kind of reasoned engagement. If you “instinctively” don’t see any fundamental differnce between a rapist, a paedophile, a wife-beater and, well, someone who has consensual intercourse with an adult they don’t beat… Well, I really think someone needs to get in touch with his own internalised misandry, understand and own it.
November 30th, 2005 at 1:47 am
Words in my mouth Craig… rape, paedophilia and wife-beating are behaviours. Rapists, paedophiles, wife-beaters are not of a different species from the good guys like you and me.
Rape, paedophilia and wife-beating are, overwhelmingly, male behaviours. You and I are intrinsically capable of those behaviours BECAUSE we are male (well I might let you off the third rap:) ). A man who has consensual intercourse with an adult they don’t beat is not exhibiting (at that time) the reprehensible behaviours enumerated repetitively above :). If he never does so, it’s either because he has a strong moral compass, like you and me, or because he is surrounded by sufficiently strong mechanisms of social control.
Not letting strange men sit next to one’s children is one of those mechanisms. Sad, isn’t it?
There it is folks : the tragic truth about men.
November 30th, 2005 at 1:53 am
Sorry Craig, I misunderstood your swimming pool anecdote. You’re actually asserting that, if only we had the statistics, it would turn out that women commit as many acts of paedophilia as men.
At first look, it doesn’t pass the laugh test. But I’m sure the subject has been studied, if not in NZ then elsewhere. Judicial statistics are not the only or best way of assessing it. If you’ve got some numbers, we could have a look.
November 30th, 2005 at 3:07 am
regardless of who this offends, it is the airline’s choice as to how it allocates its seats. The airline has possession of the aircraft, and should be able to put children beside women, men beside men, Arabs beside Albanians or anything else that it decides is appropriate - this is not a matter for government.
The fear that strange men are likely to molest children is just that - a fear - largely irrational, based on regarding the event (molestation) as catastrophic, and the risk (tiny), but because the event is seen as catastrophic “you can never be too safe”. The same mentality that causes people to fear large aggressive looking men vs small frail looking old women - and a similar mentality regarding race - there are plenty of people of different races who fear those from other races, because of the perceived risk of being attacked or intimidated.
November 30th, 2005 at 7:06 am
Alastair - you have nailed the paranoia perfectly. “You and I are intrinsically capable of those behaviours BECAUSE we are male”. That is untrue and it is an abusive statement to make.
The child porn ring that was busted in Belgium a year or two back included women amongst the ringleaders. Yes, men are disproportionaty offenders. No, their gender is not the *cause* of their offending.
Until this lie is firmly laid to rest we’ll bring up new generations of men with a sense of shame and fear about their masculinity. Do you think this will help make the problem of male violence go away? - well my experience is that self-shame helps nobody behave better.
Thank you Alastair and Fastbike but I have spent a long time getting a good grip on my masculinity. Having grown up surrounded by messages that the problems in the world were somehow at heart the fault of men, I had to. And having had to struggle through weeding through all the cr*p I was fed, then yes, I do get angry to think that other boys are going to be taught through actions like this that they have inherited some abusive gene by virtue simply of being borne a man.
It’s completely possible to teach people what acceptable and unacceptable behaviour is without resorting to abusive blanket attacks.
Fastbike - the statistics are horrific. Women’s refuge are a wonderful organisation. But I’m going to defend my gender in the face of slander in the same way I wouldmy family or nation.. this is what *healthy* anger looks like.
November 30th, 2005 at 10:25 am
Alistair - I agree that there is a difference because they are kids. So how about this for a comparison: Maybe Air NZ should not allow (1) men, (2) muslims, (3) catholic preachers, (4) casino operators, (5) right wing people (etc etc) near unaccompanied minors. The reason they shouldn’t do ANY of this is that ALL of it is discrimination. I can’t understand why you can not see the blatant bigotry in their new policy. Just because the airline doesn’t want to commit extra staff to ensuring the safety of unaccompanied minors, does not give them the right to trample over the human rights of males.
November 30th, 2005 at 10:38 am
“You really don’t get “in loco parentisâ€?, do you?”
I do get it. It means that they have the same rights and responsibilities as parents regarding the childrens’ welfare. But parents do not have any right to rearrange seating at will either.
Nobody has yet given a reasonable refutation of the point raised by me and others on this blog that there exist any number of easily recognisable demographic characteristics x, such that P(passenger will molest child/passenger is a member of x) > P(passenger will molest child/passenger is not a member of x), but the characterisitc x=male is the only one we are allowed to pick on in a discriminatory fashion. What would the reaction be if a cabin crew member asked a Maori, Samoan, Muslim or parent of the child to move away from an unaccompanied child on the same basis?
BTW the paranoia over paedophilia is out of all proportion to its actual chance of happening. The probability that a male stranger sitting next to a child will abuse them in any way is virtually zero. Has anyone actually got any evidence for sexual or physical abuse happening on an aeroplane? It usually occurs either in deserted places (by strangers), or, far more commonly by somebody who knows the child.
Children are far more likely to be killed or injured by a motorist than a paedophile. It is a pity the same degree of safety consciouness is not found in our transport policy. If it was, then we would already have laws in place that cars must be accompanied by someone in front waving a flag!
November 30th, 2005 at 11:20 am
Speaking of hysteria:
Kiore1 says: it does a great deal of harm when men are stigmatised and ostracised… the man should have stood up to himself, but perhaps he had been so browbeaten by feminists and by male quislings (the worst sort of men) that he had simply lost all confidence.
Alexei says: Whether or not men are suffering from this policy is irrelevant.
Craig says: No Sam, you sound like the complete drongo. Why don’t you join the rest of us in the 21st century where women are enitrely capable of sexual and physical abuse of children?
In reverse order, did I ever say women weren’t capable of abuse? Nope.
It’s irrelevent whether men are suffering? Really? Opposition to discrimination is based on the fact that people suffer from it, not (I hope) some meaningless philisophical principle.
Kiore1 uses the standard idiot’s tactic of equating your opponent (in this case pro-feminist men) with Nazis. Sheer thoughtless stupidity.
And is asking someone to sit elsewhere really ostracising and stigmatising their gender? Personally, my reaction would be “OK, I know I’m not a threat, but I can see the reasons for it, so … whatever”. Much the same as if I was told not to take a potential weapon onto a plane. I wouldn’t feel the need to get up and start ranting about how I’m being dubbed a potential criminal.
The reality is that grooming for paedophilia is a disproportionately male behaviour. This doesn’t imply that all men are at fault. I suppose airlines could demand references and police checks of all passengers, but, that being ridiculous, have simply decided on a course of action that somewhat mitigates a small, but real, risk. No big deal.
November 30th, 2005 at 12:53 pm
Sam:
Well, if you’re confortable with that fine. Being a gay man in a society where a foundation of homophobia is the casual equation of gayness with sexual abuse of children and other forms of paraphilia, I’m not going to be that tolerant.
And I note both you and Alistair use the justification for this policy that, well, just look at the statistics for sexual offence convictions. Aha! Overwhelmingly male!
I notice neither of you have rebutted (though Alistair manfully tried to change the subject0 my point that if *in law* women aren’t considered capable of perpetrating sex crimes or violence within the family unit - which, in large part reflects the dominant patriarchal idealisation of women, female sexuality and the family unit when they were written - then citing statistics doesn’t prove what you think it does. As Sue Bradford eloquently pointed out earlier this year, the way we define rape in law still is not gender-neutral - only men can perpetrate rape, and only women can be victims.
And while we’re on the topic Alistair wrote:
QUOTE
Sorry Craig, I misunderstood your swimming pool anecdote. You’re actually asserting that, if only we had the statistics, it would turn out that women commit as many acts of paedophilia as men.
END QUOTE
Um, no - you see, that’s a conclusion that I couldn’t draw from the data either. Why don’t we just leave tendentious distortion of statistics to the Maxim Institute?
November 30th, 2005 at 2:05 pm
I don’t see the relevance this case has to the homophobic equation of homosexuality with paedophilia. Sure, if the airline was moving gay men away from children and not heterosexual men, that’d be ridiculous.
And I didn’t ever refer to statistics for sexual abuse convictions. Anyway, so far as I know, laws aginst child porn, which is probably the closest you are going to get to a proxy for likely grooming behaviour, are gender neutral.
November 30th, 2005 at 2:14 pm
Sam. Please find one place in my posting where I mentioned Nazis. Also please do not respond to logical arguments with personal abuse; it only shows you have run out of arguments. You do’t know me, how can you make judgements on my intelligence.
Besides which, why does equating behaviour with Nazism show a lack of intelligence. The argument goes like this:
Nazism is wrong;
x shows behaviour consistent with Nazism
Therefore x’s behaviour is wrong.
Please, oh great enlightened guru of logic and all-knowing one, tell me what is stupid about that?
I actually agree with Craig, in spite of being a heterosexual male. “Homphobia” seems to have been augmented by “heterophobia” when the heterosexual in question is male.
The point I was making before is that the harm resulting through discrimination and stigmatisation (is that a word?) of men, and the harm to the individual is far in excess of the risk from a child on an aeroplane being abused by a stranger. But if you can provide reputable evidence on the numbers of sexual abuse cases conducted on aeroplanes (ie EVIDENCE, not ABUSE) then I will revise my view.
The case of someone bringing a nail file, while similar in one respect (it shows paranoia out of all proportion to the risk), is dissimilar in one other relevant way. Can you spot what it is? I’ll give you a clue. Is a nail file detachable?
November 30th, 2005 at 2:35 pm
I’m still utterly baffled why everyone assumes this policy is about paedophilia in the first place. I know it’s great fun to get outraged about it and carry on, but I am perfectly willing to believe this policy has very little to do with paedophiles.
For an airline carrying children, the main priority has got to be keeping them quiet and in their seats. An extremely difficult job for busy staff. I think this policy is aimed at that, not at protecting them from something that would never be the airline’s fault anyway.
But carry on this whole paedophile thing, I’m sure it’s going to lead to plenty of really fruitful fact free rants and polarization of positions, and plenty of pet peeve stories.
November 30th, 2005 at 2:36 pm
I still think that my main point is being ignored. Let us suppose that National party supporters were found to be more likely to abuse children than non-National party supporters. Of course we are talking about the tiny fraction of people that are child-abusers, but let us suppose that they happen to be relatively more likely to be National party supporters (just as an example!). In this situation would all of you human-rights-trampling empiricists be totally happy to see Air New Zealand adopt a policy that National party supporters were not to be seated next to unaccompanied minors? Now, lets exercise a little bit of abstract thought and replace “National party supporters” with ANY diverse group that you might happen to be a member of: men, women, Labour party supporters, smokers, city-dwellers, people with European ancestry, people in their 50s. Bear in mind that paedofiles will certainly have other statistically significant features than just being male. Basically this is the first step toward detailed profiling of individuals.
November 30th, 2005 at 3:24 pm
Not all profiling is bad. My parents were recently upgraded to business class on a long haul. They asked ‘why us?’ and the answer was that they look for people who are relaxed and happy looking. Sure, that discriminates against the sour pusses, but too damn bad, there’s more than enough of that going around. Someone’s got to put a stop to it, that’s my little piece of social engineering.
Airlines are businesses and have every right to their rules. Vote with your dollar if you’re really bitter about it. I bet that doesn’t happen, that Qantas will still be popular, and if it isn’t, I’ll fly it just to get away from the whingers. If I don’t get to sit next to kiddies, I really don’t mind. So long as they don’t keep me up all night with their crying, anything that quiets them is a godsend.
November 30th, 2005 at 4:54 pm
Kiore 1 said: “Nazism is wrong;
x shows behaviour consistent with Nazism
Therefore x’s behaviour is wrong.
Please, oh great enlightened guru of logic and all-knowing one, tell me what is stupid about that?”
OK - Nazis encouraged outdoor sports, does that mean anyone who goes tramping is wrong? Nazi’s hated Soviet communism, therefore hating Soviet Communism is consistent with Nazism. Doesn’t mean it’s wrong. Nazis also oppose free trade agreements and tend to be quite environmentally conscious.
As for not mentioning Nazis, yopu said “perhaps he had been so browbeaten by feminists and by male quislings”, who do you think Quisling was?
November 30th, 2005 at 6:18 pm
We need to be consistent at least. It’s hypocritical to claim to be standing for anti-discrimination one way and promote it the other way. Therefore, we need to eliminate one of them. Either discrimination is thoroughly banned, or not/barely at all. If we follow logic religiously, we’d end up going down a very dangerous stereotypical road. On this logic, Maori should also be segregrated, they’re more likely to be violent. Then eventually, your actual merits are irrelevant: your selection for anything is based on a bunch of quick stereotypes. “You’re a Maori Male born in the “Laziest Town in New Zealand” and went to the “Worst School in New Zealand.” Why bother checking further?” This already happens anyway (see Insurance, for example).
However, trying to just rid of discrimination results in equally disturbing futures. About to get married? Hmm, to someone your own race huh? Are you too racist to marry anyone else? That’s it, I’m taking you to court over unfair marriage discrimination! And then you have employment. Currently you’re not supposed to discriminate but it’s completely impossible: people will always discriminate, even unconciously. They’ll hire the more attractive person without knowing it. Are we going to try to track down all of this?
November 30th, 2005 at 6:42 pm
I don’t see it as and all or nothing thing. You can discriminate against people in some contexts for things you couldn’t in another. For instance, whether you are male or female should rightfully affect your insurance premiums.
November 30th, 2005 at 10:08 pm
Ben: In my humble opinion you should have some guiding principles in these matters. You can’t just assume that for every situation you can reliably come up with an ad hoc solution that is fair. That assumes you always know what is best for other people. I think that a good guiding principle is that you should not judge an individual by the behaviour of the group that they belong to. You should instead judge them on their individual behaviour and actions. That is, avoid prejudice at all costs. As a statitician I am all to painfully aware of how much variation around the average usually exists. As much as possible I try to live by this guiding principle.
In this particular situation there is no reason why Air NZ can’t just have a “clear air” policy to keep all people away from unaccompanied children. This would be totally acceptable to everyone as it treats everyone equally. I see no reason why they can’t implement this option apart from stupidity.
December 1st, 2005 at 12:49 am
Nich:
“Why bother checking further?â€? This already happens anyway (see Insurance, for example).”
Yes, commercial enterprises make commercial decisions based on statistical data. In my opinion, that’s a good reason for using mutualist (or even, gulp, government-provided) insurance. viz. Accident compo.
Ben:
“For instance, whether you are male or female should rightfully affect your insurance premiums.”
Absolutely not. Insurance premiums should be affected by risky behaviour that the person can do something about (e.g. nothing wrong with a higher premium for a smoker or a skier) but there should be solidarity for the rest. Are you alleging that women should, as a class, carry the cost of their generally higher health risks? That’s a lovely little can of worms!
December 1st, 2005 at 1:03 am
Alexei : “clear air” policy.
That doesn’t work, because planes are often full. Airlines want to avoid trouble, but not to the extent of renouncing a full fare for every unaccompanied minor.
I just thought of something else. When seating is allocated in advance, then a random male may end up sitting next to our U.M. The “risk” of that man having paedophile tendencies can be assumed (for the sake of argument) to be pretty low.
But if seating is not pre-allocated, and any man can then cruise up and install himself next to the U.M (which, I’m guessing, was the case on the Ch-Ak flight), then this self-selecting sample is a greater risk. i.e. if there happens to be a paedophile on the flight (and if there are 100 men on the plane, we can’t discount that), then he may well seek out that U.M.
But, as Ben says, there’s no indication that paedophilia was even a consideration in the airline’s policy. The whole outburst of male hypersensitivity has been pretty revealing : the immediate assumption that sexuality is the issue, and that their sexuality is being insulted…
get over yourselves guys!
December 1st, 2005 at 8:16 am
It’s not about sexuality…
It’s about the fact that we want to be trusted around children as much as women are. Men can be loving and parental just as women can. And we both have the potential for neglect or abuse, too. We have human rights. One of those is the right to freedom from discrimination. It is discrimination in essence to suggest that a man of the same personality under the same circumstances will react differently to a woman of the same personality under the same circumstances. It may be statistics that suggest we have a less empathic personality, but profiling through statistics is not generally a good idea ;p
Personally, the only special seating arrangements I would see as appropriate would either be having UMs sit next to the aisles so that they can be seen more easily by attendants, or to have a dedicated club or group of volenteers who are checked out for such abusive behaviours/caring natures and are willing to help UMs on flights :p
December 1st, 2005 at 9:00 am
Alistair wrote:
But if seating is not pre-allocated, and any man can then cruise up and install himself next to the U.M (which, I’m guessing, was the case on the Ch-Ak flight), then this self-selecting sample is a greater risk.
I reply:
Um, no. I take your point but in this particular case Mark Worsley was in his assigned seat on a fully booked (probably over-booked, knowing airlines) flight.
December 1st, 2005 at 9:18 am
While Mark Worsley was, obviously, very badly treated, as someone involved with sending children unaccompanied, I appreciate the airlines caution and their general policy of not seating them by men.
December 1st, 2005 at 10:01 am
DG:
I decided to e-mail a friend of the family who used to be a trolly dolly and get her perspective, and her reply was rather interesting. She said that when she was in the industry (quit about ten years ago) her main concern wasn’t male passengers, but under-staffing and lack of training.
The airline I really hope things have changed, because I don’t think I’d want an inquisitive child going walkabout while all the cabin crew are otherwise occupied doing meal service or having to deal with a problem elsewhere in the plane.
December 1st, 2005 at 10:12 am
I am concerned that the idea that most abuse of pre-pubescent children is done by men is being supported by statistics on domestic violence. While it may suit some people’s ideology to conflate the two of these, they are quite separate phenomena. People who sexually abuse children (as opposed to physically attack them) are rarely overtly violent to adults, for example.
The evidence that most pre-pubescent sexual abuse is perpetrated by men is far less clear cut than is commonly thought - see for example http://movingforward.org/v2n6-cover.html
I chose this paper because the author is female. Similar discussions can be found in the US and UK literature in a number of places.
If we are to have a discussion about child safety then we need to recognise that (i) “stranger danger” is very very rare; most abuse is done by relatives/friends; and (ii) that certain assumptions about male versus female sexual abuse need careful consideration against facts.
The phenomenon of new male partners killing other men’s children, male violence towards women and the phenomenon of adolescent sexual abuse, may not be a good basis for developing policies for protecting younger children in public situations. Both these have distinct cultural and anthropological antecedents.
I would also note that sexual abuse is only one form of abuse of children. Parents can damage children through emotional abuse in a variety of ways - many of which are every bit as damaging as sexual abuse in the long run.
To chose one example - “I love you so much I am staying with your father/mother even though it makes me unhappy” is an almost perfect mindfuck for a small child. The message is “my misery is your fault”.
We desparately need to recognise that children need love, consitency and stimulation in their lives. Sexual abuse is just one of may ways in which adults betray children.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:06 am
Alistair, you say insurance premiums should not take sex into account. But they do. It’s that simple. Are you saying this is wrong?
For instance, a young man has to pay a lot more to get full insurance on a car. This is because young men cost insurance companies the most. I don’t think that’s unfair. It’s just a reflection of the reality.
I don’t know if racial profiling happens in insurance - that’s much more of a can of worms. Certainly it is that case that some races have far worse health cost statistics than others. But I can see problems with allowing discrimination in this way.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:20 am
jgg:
Thank you - it’s a pleasure to agree with a thoughtful, nuanced and well-expressed comment.
December 1st, 2005 at 1:42 pm
a hypothetical question to all of those who agree that the airlines’ policy is a good idea on safety grounds:
do you also advocate a total ban on male school teachers in New Zealand?
after all, teachers–with both authority and ample opportunity–must surely be far more of a threat to small children than passengers on an aircraft with not a single spare seat.
December 1st, 2005 at 5:40 pm
Sam: Uh no. Indoor sports etc. are not necessary or sufficient for Nazi philosophy. Nazis used them, just as they used language, but it is not part of where they are coming from.
The term Quisling, while coined in WW2 is now used to mean any traitor or collaborator. According to your logic I must avoid any WW2 terms, so to talk of “taking the flack” or a “blitz” on drunken driving would lead to arrogant assumptions of my lack of intelligence.
And that gets me back to my point which is certain men that have been so brow beaten by feminist propaganda that they have become self-loathing jellyfish, willing to denounce members of their own sex as paedophiles to score kudos with the feminist N –oops almost used the “N” word … Mafia.
I can actually see where the feminist men haters are coming from and have a certain sympathy for them even though I can’t agree with any policy based on hate. But collaborationists and traitors are the lowest form of pond-scum.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:02 pm
But collaborationists and traitors are the lowest form of pond-scum.
I’ll take that as a compliment … considering that you see yourself engaged in a war of the sexes.
My point of view is that we’re all in this together.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:07 pm
Ben : “Alistair, you say insurance premiums should not take sex into account. But they do. It’s that simple. Are you saying this is wrong?”
Yes, I am. Is the differential sending a useful message to someone? Do young men think “hey it costs a bomb to insure my car, that’s because I’m part of a high-risk group, makes ya think eh, I’ll try to be rilly careful”…?
More likely, it provokes a “well, I might as well get my money’s worth” attitude. Or makes absolutely no difference at all to behaviour.
The fact is, the young male can’t actually change his young maleness, so it’s purely a commercial matter of the insurer covering its risk. This is an exceedingly slippery slope.
A higher premium for powerful motor bikes, or sports cars, is justifiable, because the higher risk is voluntary.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:10 pm
Craig : “In this particular case Mark Worsley was in his assigned seat on a fully booked (probably over-booked, knowing airlines) flight.”
That’s interesting… not apparent from the original article. In that case, it’s purely a ticketing blunder : the airline should have applied their rule at that stage, and the whole issue would never have arisen.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:18 pm
jgg : “I am concerned that the idea that most abuse of pre-pubescent children is done by men is being supported by statistics on domestic violence.”
Sorry if my posts gave that impression, jgg. In fact, in bracketing together three behaviours — rape, domestic violence and paedophilia — that I characterised (perhaps incorrectly, concerning paedophilia) as predominantly male behaviours — I was trying to make a point about “political correctness”.
I believe that the PC tendency to pretend that men and women are functionally identical (other than the direct physical sexual attributes) is profoundly dangerous, and that differential treatment of men and women in order to reduce risk, is justified in some cases.
December 1st, 2005 at 11:46 pm
Yup airlines put undue pressure on themselves, for all the wrong reasons. In my recent trip to Europe, I had a ticket that flew Barcelona-Amsterdam-Sing-NZ. But I was already in Amsterdam. They would not let me just pick up the flight half way. I was required to fly back to Barcelona, and then back to Amsterdam. I already had the ticket, but I appealed to the airline, for their own good and for mine, to just pick me up in Amsterdam. I couldn’t see that being forced to put my 95kg body and 20kg of luggage on a flight to Barcelona and back that I didn’t want or need and had already paid for was in anyone’s interests. I didn’t want a refund - I just didn’t really relish the 40-odd hours of travel this craziness entailed.
Ultimately, reason prevailed, but only by the dodgiest backdoor method ever, and for reasons that luckily fell in my favour. The flight to Barcelona that I was on was overbooked. I appealed again to the checkin lady to let me just stay in Amsterdam, I didn’t want to waste the next 6 hours of my life in planes and airports just to get back to Amsterdam. She said I should jump on the chance to be stood down on the flight. I said why do I even have to go through with this charade, wasting at least 2 hours of my life getting through passport control to get to the gate lounge to wait for the inevitable stand down, and all the mucking around involved? She thought about it for a bit, saw that I had a point, that the strictness of the rules hurt the airline and me, and came up with a truly dutch solution.
She suggested I check my bags in on the flight to Singapore right then, and then do whatever I liked until it the flight got here. And if anyone ever asked about the flight to Barcelona to just say I had been on it. And to never let anyone know I had been told to do this, and to forget her name and she would deny ever having seen me. She then showed me how to manually check my bags in, got me a boarding pass and disappeared into the crowd.
It worked, I had a nice day in Amsterdam instead of a horrible 6 hours of arsing around in planes and airports. Sometimes it does take someone who realizes the rules suck to do the right thing, even if it’s the wrong way.
That’s what the hostess on this AirNZ flight should have done - she should have let the guy sit there, and told the airline about the problem with their software. C’mon the odds of that particular guy being a molester are miniscule (if that’s what the rule is about, which I’m STILL NOT CONVINCED ABOUT IN CASE ANYONE HASN’T HEARD), the reputational damage potentially large. But I think kiwis are either less imaginative or more blindly honest than the dutch, so here we are, 20,000 outraged posts later, and still none the wiser about what really happened and why.
Grist for the bitterness mill, that’s all this story is. The lame NZ bitterness mill that grinds on relentlessly, getting us nowhere, acheiving us nothing.
I suppose the only good thing about this, is that we might end up on Clive James getting mocked again for treating the story of a guy having to change seats on a plane as national news. If that’s all that gets NZ’s (or shoud I call it the Shire’s?) dander up, then we mustn’t really have that many problems.
December 2nd, 2005 at 10:23 am
Frankly, Kiore1, I just think you are talking rubbish. Suggesting that dubbing people with terms with Nazi connotations is no different to using any other metaphor connected with WWII seems to demonstrate either a lack of undestanding of history, or an inability to make simple distinctions. Calling men who agree with chunks of feminist philosophy traitors, collaborateurs, quislings, men-haters and self loathing jelly-fish is just shooting the messenger in a particularly unpleasant way.
I’m happy to consider any thoughts that provide a useful explanation of the world, regardless of whether or not it comes from my own gender, race, political viewpoint, nationality or any other category. If you want to abuse me for not sticking up for my own kind, right or wrong, who cares?
December 2nd, 2005 at 11:39 am
Actually Sam it was you who started abusing the messenger by calling me names because I used a word that originated from WW2. The modern meaning of quisling is ANY collaborator, not just a Nazi one, just as the modern meaning of blitz is ANY concerted attack on a target, not just one conducted by Nazis. So the analogy was not a Nazi one.
And I am quite willing to consider LOGICAL reasons why men should not be allowed near children on aeroplanes. So far I have not read any that would not apply equally to many other groups. The context of my original comment was a quite reasonable question from Paulense about why the man in question did not make a fuss. I was not aiming my comment at you in particular, but I have certainly met the types of self-loathing jellyfish I have described, and this seems to be a common feature of anti-men rhetoric.
With regard to the plane being overbooked, when I have booked a seat on a domestic flight on the terminal at the airport, it gives me a choice of seat based on which ones are empty, but it does not describe the passengers in the other seats. It would therefore not be possible to deliberately choose to sit next to a child, or to avoid sitting next to a child.
But perhaps a different ticketing method was used?
December 2nd, 2005 at 4:18 pm
I said it was an “idiot’s tactic”, I was referring to the particular argument, not you in general, and I do consider ‘quisling’ to have Nazi connotations, not just “a word that originated from WWII’.