Sorry if this has been mentioned, only read half this thread. But has anyone read/seen about the David Williams party. The men only one where there were over 100 women only hostess who were groped etc. There is a live thread about it. Quite rightly people are very angry.
It’s been all over the news. But where are all the #notallmen getting angry about it. There were over 100 men at that event and none of them jumped up and said stop harassing these women it’s awful. They all accepted the invitation to attend. I bet I would struggle to find a male dominated forum where they are all debating how awful it is. Would be v happy to be proved wrong.
So no it’s not all men. Lots of men are lovely and try to be lovely. But toxic masculinity is so great that they don’t often recognise their own behaviours or those of friends for what they are.
I have posted about this before. But I went on a domestic abuse alliance course for schools, hospitals, police etc about awareness of domestic abuse and rape culture among the high school and university generations. And we were shown an advert dipicting a baby girl from birth up to mid twenties and all the examples of when she could be at risk from men. Think cat calling, perv on a bus, a flasher, then her jealous boyfriend, a one nightstand making her do more than she wanted etc. And you could immediately tell from the (mostly white female ages 30-50 audience) who had sons. They were sooooo offended and immediately starting on about ‘their sons would NEVER do that’ and my son is 15 and would never watch porn etc. And these were women who were clued up and work with victims everyday. But there was absolute flat out denial/acknowledgement that their sons would ever ever do anything negative towards a girl.
I Also sit in an office with a number of lovely women (good friends) with equally lovely teenage sons. But oh to hear them moaning about the evil clingy girlfriends who don’t let the poor boys off the leash etc. Or ten terrible teenage girls making false accusations against one of their sins friends and ‘ruining his life’. Never occurs to them the girl might be telling the truth. Now whilst I am sure there is an element of truth in it all, I am also witnessed one of these lovely boys push his girlfriend in a pub after a row and then end up snogging the face off someone else in front of her. I Also stayed over at a friends after a night out and slept in her sons room (different boy, he was at his girlfriends house and knew I was staying there) and turned on the tv to find PlayStation on and set to some pretty questionable porn. This is a mum who thinks her son is oh so innocent and his girlfriend pressured him into sex and a relationship and really he is just her little boy who wants to play fifa. Now again there is some truth in that I am sure. But there is a tendnacy for mums of boys (in my small case study ) to be in denial about the power of the negative influences of toxic masculinity in their sons. I think men are taught by other men at a very early age to present differently in front of women they love and respect, to how they would behave on a boys nights of in front of women they see as sexual objects. (Think ‘don’t talk like that in front of your mother’ sort of thing. Where actually it should be ‘don’t talk like that’ )
I find that mothers of girls tend to be a bit more realistic about the negative parts of their teenagers growing up and are more likely to acknowledge them and thus address them. (Appreciate girls can be just as demanding and difficult).