To suggest a male curfew one night a week

@saraclara Personally, I'm happy with class analysis. And I do find it frustrating that we have to smooth men's egos before we can have a discussion! I honestly see very little,if any, public discourse suggesting that men, either as individuals or as a class, are committed to constructive ways of addressing male violence.

If people simply added a word and said "many men need to step up..." we could avoid this. But they don't.

Saying "men are.." "men do..." is inaccurate, and just as annoying as we would find men saying "women are .." and "women do..." to criticise us as a sex.

@Newbutoldfather "The idea that 85% (at least) of good men alone need to take responsibility for the other 15%, and that women have no culpability for the violence of their sons, holds no water"

I agree with you on this point. I have to say I agree with this point in every single bloody conversation either on here or in RL! No it's not all up to men. But men do need to step up and do SOMETHING!! What do you suggest?

erratum: women don’t trust men to reach their children (not parent).

Everyone needs to take responsibility for living in a civilised society. Men and women aren’t two classes in the same way as you might look at educational classes, race or wealth. They will always choose to live together and, by definition, at least one parent will have children of the opposite sex.

The idea that 85% (at least) of good men alone need to take responsibility for the other 15%, and that women have no culpability for the violence of their sons, holds no water. I, and I imagine, most other men posting here, probably don’t know any obviously violent or sexist men, because we choose not to be friendly with them (and, if it is all going on behind closed doors, it is impossible to call out).

However, men are responsible for laws and all the violence cited here is illegal and imprisonable. This is men taking responsibility for other men. There are societies where this doesn’t happen, and 50 years ago, where rape was legal in marriage, possibly this was one of them. It isn’t now.

Given this thread is about stranger violence against women (a curfew wouldn’t help within the home, arguably, as PP have argued, it might make it worse), most violent men will be imprisoned at some point.

One thing that would really help would be better male role models for children. Getting male teachers into primary schools would help but, in the febrile environment characterised by this thread, many women don’t trust males to parent their children and this really discourages men from teaching primary.

(Where I suspect I would agree with most in this thread is we should ban all violent porn, I also think sport needs to be far tougher in terms of setting good male role models, especially premier league football).

@FinalInstructionstotheAudience
"For parents, not just women, ffs. Not that difficult to infer that it applies to both parents"

Good. It usually doesn't! What do you think fathers, in particular, should be doing?

For parents, not just women, ffs. Not that difficult to infer that it applies to both parents.

@FinalInstructionstotheAudience Yep-because this is obviously a problem for women to address.....

@5475878237NC Exactly that. I've seen/started threads on this subject before-the idea of men addressing the issue of male violence seems completely alien.

And don't forget, OP, if you have a male child, you are responsible for making sure he doesn't turn out to be an unsafe adult male

You are getting very frustrated over this, but haven't offered how the logistics would be applied.
Rather than dismissing away the responses you are getting, you are simply screaming 'something must be done'. So, why don't you, rather than passing this monkey, own it yourself? Why not do some research as to how cities/countries with lower levels of male violence have ensured this? Then suggest to your local MP how this may work in this country.
Good luck

OL so forgetting the curfew. How do we make this a problem men engage with? How many threads are there about male violence started by men? Who is looking at this issue? Who is considering the complexity, the complex multifactorial socioeconomic and political factors at play? I can't say I have ever been invited to an event on tackling this hosted by, financed by and facilitated by experts in this from the male sex.

@jacks11 "I fundamentally do not agree that this problem will be effectively altered by vitriolic posturing and saying all boys and men are inherently responsible/ evil/ dangerous/ perpetrators"

Nobody is saying that all men are. However, suggesting that some men are, or even saying that just possibly the issue of male violence is something that men should be thinking about and addressing brings so many people to the barricades to defend men that any useful discussion gets submerged.

No, it really isn’t as simple as that. Even if it was- the reason is not simply being male that has caused them to coming whatever crime has happened. There will be a variety of reasons (reasons are never excuses) as to why they committed that act/acts. Those reasons may well be complex in some cases. If we understand where those driving factors come from, then ways to tackle them can be worked on. It won’t be tackled with one measure or quickly.

Or, you can attempt to turn all women into victims, all men into villains and attempt reductive, unjustifiable measures which won’t work and may make things worse.

I fundamentally do not agree that this problem will be effectively altered by vitriolic posturing and saying all boys and men are inherently responsible/ evil/ dangerous/ perpetrators.

No. I have no real reason to fear men where I live. There are more good people in the world than bad. Half the NHS staff we rely on would be included in this. Dont be ill on a Wednesday as there are half the doctors available! Or whatever essential service you can think of.

Can you imagine if you said this about, say, all white people or anyone with a certain mental illness or all Muslims? It’s simply unacceptable. And intellectually lazy, I think- hugely blunt instrument that us likely to cause so much damage and not even achieve what you set out to do in the first place- leaving us even further away from where we need to be.

Why would people say it about white people or Muslims? Because a minority are violent and aggressive, some to the point of murder? Then surely the next thing people would notice that it's not skin colour or culture or religion but sex that's the common denominator.
So yes of course it would be wrong to say curfew x,y,z groups. Because it's always sodding men.

Well, I cannot see any situation in which mass punishment of a whole group (in this case, men/older boys) to tackle an issue caused by a minority is justifiable. Can you imagine if you said this about, say, all white people or anyone with a certain mental illness or all Muslims? It’s simply unacceptable. And intellectually lazy, I think- hugely blunt instrument that us likely to cause so much damage and not even achieve what you set out to do in the first place- leaving us even further away from where we need to be.

I think putting a curfew on men will alienate many people (not just men), cause significant resentment if not outrage (with justification imho) and possibly actually increase misogyny and violence towards women. It will damage boys growing up- you wonder why the likes of Andrew Tate et al and his hideous views gain traction? It’s never as simple as one simple thing, of course, because it’s complex and based on societal exposure and personal experience etc- but honestly, boys hear this “all men are dangerous/ awful people/ predators” and so on- and then you want them to engage in a conversation where they are demonised simply for being male? How can anyone expect that to work?

I will say, in response to your question that as a starting point I don’t buy into mass victimhood for all women, any more than I buy into mass guilt for all men. I am not a victim, I don’t think my daughters are victims. I don’t feel unsafe at all times/ unsafe whenever I encounter men. I think this is so unhealthy- and in my experience inaccurate- outlook on the world. I don’t view my son as inherently guilty/a perpetrator simply by virtue of being male. It saddens me that this narrative of mass victimhood/mass guilt is gaining traction. I feel it is harmful to both females and males.

At the same time, I know there is a significant problem with misogyny and violence towards women and we do need to address that somehow. I also recognise that we don’t live in an ideal world and we have to deal with the world as it is and engage in it and those less than ideal people (of all genders, ethnicities, religions etc) who inhabit it on that basis. I guess I believe you can chose to be “in the right”- I.e. refusing to have the “victims” engage with the “possible perpetrators” (allowing for my scepticism that all women are victims and all men are perpetrators) or you can try to do the most effective thing- and I believe education is the key. You are not going to change this quickly- matters that are at the societal level never, ever are! But education that comes from a place of accusation, blame and mass guilt will never work. If you tell someone they are awful (or any other negative thing) long enough they will either believe it and internalise it or rebel against it. Is that really what you want for all boys growing up? I don’t want it for my make relatives and friends. I, therefore, chose to engage with my son to educate him about the problems women face- from misogyny, inequality in career/employment, violence and harassment, the importance of consent etc. I could chose to say “not my problem to help you see it”- but if it’s not down to me, whose job is it? Obviously, the state and education systems, as well as the media and legal/justice systems have their own roles to play. I don’t pretend to have all the answers. I just feel very strongly that a curfew is not in any way a part of the answers.

Some decent men might call out some of the problematic men, but no one calls out the really bad men because they are scared of them.

But that could easily be true. As was pointed out upthread, yes the decent men need to step up and call out this behaviour, but how do you measure that ? I’ve seen it being called out in our own circle of friends, and also at work. And I don’t think anyone is leaping to the defence of men here - they’re mostly leaping to the defence of liberty.

I absolutely see your perspective. But looking to women to have to engage the good men in this issue enough to care about it and make it their problem too also doesn't work. Why should victims have the responsibility to engage the potential perpetrators? How do you propose we move forward?

Thank you. That's interesting and as you say, very disturbing.
Many of the survivors I work with come from teetotal homes, so I'm just concious that sobriety is no protection. I'd also say that (anecdotally again) the strongest link with abuse and substance use reported by the women involves cocaine, and/or other drugs that induce paranoia with heavy use. Which are of course illegal already.

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that roughly 55% of domestic abuse perpetrators were drinking alcohol prior to assault.

Many of these men would have hit their wives and kids anyway but that figure does seem chilling.

I don't know is the honest answer, as I don't have any reliable data on the prevalence of DV in 'dry' countries.
If I had to speculate (which I realise is no substitute for evidence) I'd say probably not, because alcohol doesn't create abusers from decent non violent men, it merely heightens the emotions that trigger the episodes.
So perhaps it might reduce the number of incidents of violence within the individual family of an abusive male; but I doubt it would reduce the number of families living with an abusive male.

Totally and utterly unreasonable. The majority of men are not a risk and you cannot restrict their liberty arbitrarily because some men are. This kind of suggestion makes me very angry because it is bullshit like this which causes strife and conflict. It makes good men feel they are being punished for no good reason, which is likely to damage gender relations and will not encourage any engagement with the genuine problems faced. This does not improve the situation for women and girls, it damages feminism and it damages relations between the genders.

it’s also pointless- men who are a risk are hardly going to respect such a measure, nor will it restrict their behaviour on that evening/night or any other. So, you alienate lots of men, send the message to boys growing up that they are viewed with such hostility that they have to have their liberty restricted at random (and then wonder why they won’t engage in any of the issues relating to misogyny/violence towards women and girls etc). Is this really the best solution that you can suggest?!

So then the predators know when to strike!
Great idea!