to think that ALL men must engage with male VAWAG

[StellaGreen]

These last weeks the papers are full of horrific stories of men's violence towards women. I have always believed it is a tiny minority of men who commit these crimes but I'm not so sure any more.

1. Gisele Pelicot case where at least 80 men were involved in rape and now an associate of the husband (Dominique Pelicot) has admitted to similar abuse.
2. Puffy daddy accused of sex trafficking I believe, I've not fully read this one.
3. The Olympian Rebecca Cheptegei allegedly killed by her partner after he doused her in petrol and set her on fire. It's not as though this was unique Olympian murder, Agnes Tirop was fatally stabbed by her husband in 2021 and Demaris Mutua (a runner) also killed within six months of Agnes.
4. Kristina Joksimovic from Switzerland where the press crudely wrote about her being strangled and her body being pureed in a blender.
5. Moumita Bebnath, the trainee doctor brutally raped and murdered in Kolkata in August.
6. Steven Van de Velde competing in the Olympics for Netherlands after he was convict of rape I believe.
7. Huw Edwards
8. And three weeks ago it was reported that women have been banned by the Taliban from speaking or showing their faces outside the house.

AIBU that, as well as women speaking up, all men must engage with this problem. It is not women's responsibility to solve the problem of male VAWAG

so why am I being unreasonable?

I didn't vote YABU, but...

It's clearly a minority of men, and a very tiny minority when you're talking about the most absolutely horrific cases given in your examples.

Also It's not clear what men can do to engage and what that would achieve? The vast majority of men in e.g. the UK are entirely against the examples you have given in 1-8 and condemn them.

(Also I don't know how Huw Edwards is relevant to VAWAG as such, but that's by the by)

i don’t think it is a tiny minority if you look at the Gisele case.
plus these are only examples they don’t include the weekly deaths which are not in the news.

I think all men need to engage because VAWAG doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
A solution needs to be found and all men need to be a part of that.

I agree with you completely. Many men don't listen to women; they listen to other men.

Too many men treat physical and sexual violence against women as distasteful and embarrassing to talk about OR vaguely funny, something to enjoy discussing like locker room 'banter'. Men and women together need to be more Gisele and hand the shame back where it belongs - with violent men.

I disagree it's a tiny minority. I mean sure, 80 men out of a village of 6000 or whatever it is might seem like a statistically low number, but I think we can all agree that 80 men all willing to engage with this man to rape his wife is huge. You also have to ask yourself, what's the percentage of men he approached who took him up on the offer? It has to be pretty high? Plus the men who didn't... did any of them report him? I think he was advertising this on a website or something.

Increasingly, I'm of the view that if men aren't actively calling out and reporting predatory behaviour, in any form whatsoever, then yes, they ARE part of the problem. I have zero tolerance for "banter". I'm not interested in men laughing and rolling their eyes about "Freddy on the trading desk who'll hit on anything in a skirt". If a man sees another man speak down to a woman or patronise her or call her by a demeaning name and doesn't speak out, he's part of the problem as far as I'm concerned.

And yes, if this makes me some kind of rabid feminist with no sense of humour and makes people think I'm crazy, so be it because I am tired tired tired.

Someone shared this on another post recently but worth resharing here

I don't believe it is a tiny minority of men. 1 in 4 women in the UK will experience abuse and rape and sexual assault is unknown because it's so rarely reported.

We live in a patriarchal society awash in violent and degrading pornography and rape culture.

Prolific abusers like P Diddy get away with their crimes because no one speaks out. There were plenty of celebrities of equal status who knew what he was doing and no one said anything.

We just shrug and accept it as something that happens. There's been no street protest or particular consternation at the plight of Afghan women.

It seems as though the more power women have, the more abuse ramps up. Some Nordic countries which are meant to be high on the Gender Equality Index, have above average rates of domestic violence.

Women don't matter. Women make up half of society but are marginalised. We have some of the lowest rates of conviction for rape and trials can take years.

The police force is chock full of women haters. Yesterday it was announced that domestic abusers were promoted in the force. They aren't trained properly to deal with violence against women.

VAWAG continues within a structure of misogyny which ranges from street harassment to homicide. It includes systemic discrimination against women who are so little respected, that they keep society running due to free labour.

If you were born a man what would you do OP?

Why must they?

Obviously if they have half a brain or have any imagination at all, then they should, but there is no reason why they must?

Most don't see that violence. Most think all of their mates are nice blokes. That it's some other community, maybe deprived, inner city, different ethnic group, not them.

My brother is a lovely man, decent, kind, a family man etc. but he finds discussions around this 'distasteful'. Meadow finch on her soap box again. He'll convince himself it isn't really a problem with 'normal people' ie middle class, until something happens to a woman close to him - dd or wife.

A lot of men are like that. An extraordinary ability to stick their heads in the sand and their fingers in their ears because it doesn't affect them.

Just getting on my soapbox here for a moment...

I'm taking this further actually. I'm completely and totally not going to stop going on about this from the "silly and surface level" to the truly serious and horrifying.

I'm not ever going to stop shouting about the ridiculous of men (mostly white men) continuing to dominate leadership roles across business, government and finance. I'm not goign to stop calling out the ridiculous way women are judged and spoken about when they DO make it to these positions or the fact that so often, in business in particular, they're set up to fail.

I'm increasingly less interested in respecting "cultural" or "religious" norms when it means women are being mistreated, ignored or penalised. From th eclothes they wear, to the education they can access to child marriage and female genital mutilation.

I absolutely, definitely, 100% will not be laughing, or accepting the laughter, of jokes at women's expense.

I will be that women who will ask a man at work, on the school run, at the pub why he thinks it's okay to be a second-tier parent and partner. Don't even begin to tell me that you have to work so your wife should do all the childcare and mental load. If you want to play golf, you better believe I'll be asking you about when your wife gets a whole day out a week to do her own thing.

At this point, I'm not sure I'd give a man a job or vote for one if I have even a vague choice to cast my vote for a woman.

And yes, I'm increasingly THAT parent at school - the one who is up in arms if there's even a WHIF of the girls being treated differently or if there's even a suggestion of the "default" being for boys. I used to be embarrassed about it. I'm not anymore.

@MaybeSmaller

Please stop saying 'not all men'.

It may not be absolutely 100% of men, but it's always men.

There's something about the male sex that needs sorting out. Bas men do bad things and good men shrug their shoulders.

There's your problem.

The problem is, I don't know what to do.

I vote for female candidates who promise to take this seriously. I don't tolerate misogynistic banter. I challenge those who victim blame and make excuses for rapists.

What else can I do?

I think one problem with calls like this is that you make enemies out of the people who support you, by blaming non-violent men for the violence of other men.

NO one is blaming you. We're saying all men should be doign what you're doing.

You're getting defensive and no one has even said you're to blame. it's the men who DO tolerate the misogynist behaviour. Who allow victim blaming. Who don't vote for female candidates that are the problem. Not you. But men like you are the minority. HOw do we know this? because every single woman has seen this shit happening and men sitting aroudn not doing anything. And we've heard men talking. And if we do have men who call it out, we know they've been penalised for it. DH nearly lost one of his oldest friends because he dared to challenge this man's assertion that he wouldn't hire a woman of a certain age in case she got pregnant.

There's criminology research that shows that it is women on juries who are most likely to acquit rapists, because by blaming the woman they can believe that they personally will be safe.

The problem is so much bigger and more difficult than saying that men have to stop violent men. We know - but how?

Yes, the misogyn of women is a thing too. Absolutely. Part of a bigger societal problem that stems from the patriachy. I'll challenge those women too, obviously.

If you genuinely do challenge these things, can you honestly tell me you've never received some friendly "banter" from other men telling you to chill out or take a joke or calling you a feminazi or pussy whipped or some other thing? Because DH has. A few times. And we both know perfectly well that some of his friends now avoid certain topics around him....

You have to remember that you're a "good" man to those who know you.

The women who don't know you don't know that do they? 1 in 7 men are going to sexually assault a woman, it's easier to assume all men and take appropriate risk management than jump straight in and hope for the best

It's not personal, it's keeping safe

I think the case in France is really shocking. Of course, there have been lots of shocking cases of violence against women, but in this case there were simply so many men involved and even the small number of men who got cold feet and didn't go through with the rape, didn't contact the police.

I don't shrug my shoulders, but I do despair.

People should try to be good people, but I don't think it's right to expect any given individual to somehow change the world, particularly when the problem is something that's not only cultural, but on some level down to genetics.

What should an individual man do, aside from being a decent person, being willing to help people he may happen to see in urgent need, voting for the lesser of the evils on the ballot, and not associating with violent or disgusting people of either sex?

The government and law enforcement need to do a better job of protecting the vulnerable and enforcing laws designed for that purpose. It might necessitate some actions that society finds distasteful, however, and it will never be perfect, because you can't always predict who will be violent. Once someone's proven themselves a danger, we could try harder to keep them away from the rest of us for the remainder of their lives, but again, some people don't like that idea, because it's too harsh. Expense is also a problem.

I don't get invited to things because I'm not one of the lads.

There's a new group of men I'll be meeting soon connected to a male-dominated hobby and the potential for "banter" is one of the things I'm dreading.

It's absolutely exhausting. It's harder to have this argument with other women than it is for men.

Many women refuse to see the danger of men and many women will side with men, uphold their views and minimise their wrongdoings. How can you expect men to challenge other mens behaviour when they see women refusing to do it?

I'm starting to realise that many women are picking the strongest side, even if it's the wrong side.

Over time, as there are more of you and men like DH who aren't "one of the lads" being "one of the lads" will change. So you're doing the work.

Good luck on the banter. I feel you. I might be starting a new job soon and one of the things i'm nervous about is I've promised myself I won't be quiet. So far, the culture appears to be anything BUT obnoxious, but I'm sure there will be the odd man about...

The same as many white people do re racism. The protests in India against sexual violence is mainly women. The anti fascist marches here are all white people.
@StellaGreen in one week there was murder after murder because the woman dared to end the relationship. It was the time of Carol, Hannah and Louise Hunt. How did this not justify a custodial sentence?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz9ppq5gzjzo

We can't change the world unless everyone does their bit. As others on this thread have already pointed out, men calling out misogyny, not engaging with it, not laughing at it etc is a huge step in the right direction. Not everyone has to be changing the world in a blaze of glory and publicity. We just need to reach a tipping point of men telling other men that this sort of low level shit isn't acceptable.

Let's not forget that every time we see one of these cases with a man who has raped/murdered a woman, there are always early signs that were ignored. Wayne Couzens and his flashing being an excellent example.

@knittingdad

An example for you. When I was about 6months pregnant I attended a party with friends, in a rural venue. As we passed through reception, a man and woman came out of another party next door. He was big, drunk and angry, she was about 17 & maybe 8st ringing wet.

He threw a punch. She ducked, he missed. He was lining up a second punch when, in the absence of either of my friends doing anything, I stepped in.

Asked her if she was ok, stared him down, and when he swung the second fist, pulled him off balance and helped him out into the fresh air. He bit me on my thumb (charming!).

I went back in, asked her to join us in our party, offered to call her a cab.

Afterwards I was told off by my male friend for 'getting involved'.

I was left feeling that my friends were just bloody spineless. And yes, I know it probably wasn't wise but I was so fed up with all the looking the other way. It made me really cross, I was probably a bit hormonal, and I couldn't help it.

His mates could have pre-empted it, bought him - or served him - one less drink. Stepped in and taken him home when he got lairy. There are so many people who shrug and say you can't interfere it makes me want to spit.