The problem is men!

[DollyDayScream]

Please forgive me if you've covered this before, I just need to get this off my chest.

I've noticed that the media are reluctant to name men as the problem in widespread harassment against women.

For example, Moira was reading the news on bbc Radio 2 this morning. She reported that an astonishing number of school girls has reported being sexually harassed. At no point were men mentioned. The problem was reported as being harassment, whereas I would say that the problem is the men, the behaviour is symptomatic.

Why is this? It's seems as if there is a very conscious effort to distance the perpetrators (men) from the violence and harassment they commit. Is the media therefore shielding men?

I agree OP.

It’s almost as if sexual assault is just an unfortunate consequence of being a girl, there’s no one to blame. Like rain being a consequence of living in Britain. That’s how it feels when hearing sexual assault being discussed. Like people are just so used to it, resigned to it, it’s part and parcel of being female, no-one is surprised so no-one cars enough to think about what’s causing it.

Funny, I was thinking about that recently. I wasn’t sure if I’d just become more aware, or if there has been a sly shifting in language, in order to ‘protect’ the male ego. I think the MRA/TRA have been very influential in a lot of areas, in order to play down the risk of male violence. If they can do that, it makes access to female areas seem more ‘acceptable’.

the problem was men who attacked women, and if they would stop attacking women it wouldn’t matter how dark it got.

This is the crux of the issue isn't it? How often are women and girls told that they need to keep themselves safe, not walk home alone at night, not attract the wrong sort of attention etc. Yet how often are boys and men told that they need to take steps to make sure they don't hurt women/boys/vulnerable men and that they should call out anyone who does?

The subtle message that girls receive from a young age is that it is our responsibility to shape our behaviour to avoid becoming a victim and if we don't, we are to blame for the consequences. As a pp said, the perpetrator very quickly gets removed from the discussion- news reports refer to 'a woman was raped' not ' a man raped someone'.

It's similar to looking at the paper and seeing a whole load of articles about rape, men killing wives and children, domestic abuse etc. but the are all reported as separate unrelated incidents, not linked as a result of male violence.

Quentin spot on. TV and media people know if you say it straight out then the whole conversation immediately derails because of men complaining about hurt feelings, false accusations, women do it too, no one ever cares about the menz, hairy feminist man-haters, and you then get all the male-focused good girls piling in to defend them too.

I am trying to write another email to my MP as the consultation closes, and I keep stopping and re writing because I know if I say what I want to say a man is very likely to switch off and bin the letter into the 'man hater/hysterical woman' box. I have to use my female socialisation, be nice, be tactful and keep him on side and then maybe I can sneak a few of my key messages into his head while he's listening.

Patriarchy. The only way women get anywhere is to play the patriarchy game, which is why the biggest betrayers to women are the ones in senior government positions. They weren't allowed to get there by making woman-focused noises.

I think some men must think there’s a couple of bad men who do all the raping/ abusing/ assaulting and murdering because of how these types of crime are reported.

If 1000s of girls are being sexually assaulted in schools it stands to reason it can’t be 10 bad apples going from school to school doing it. It tells us they are in every school and they assault girls and other boys and they get away with it because no one wants to tackle it and it’s hand waived away as ‘peer on peer’ or ‘child on child’ as if it’s something to be grown out of.

I believe it’s been asked before but in terms of risk assessing, I’m aware that 80,000 women are raped every year but I’d like to know how many rapists there are knocking around so I can make a proper judgement of my safety and I don’t know that that estimate is released publically or if it’s done at all. I know for example, the police estimate at least 80,000 people (mostly men) view child abuse images online so I know I can trust very, very few people with my children. So estimates of number of perpetrators is done for some crimes and it would be massively helpful to have them for other crimes too.

Have you ever heard abusers talk about crimes they've committed? They constantly use the passive voice: "We were arguing and she ended up getting hit", "He shouted at me and then a gun was fired and he was shot" "Well it was all chaos and then there was a stabbing". It's a refusal to acknowledge any responsibility for actions as though these things were just scripted rather than a conscious decision.

I do wonder whether the abuser narrative has influenced how media talks about male violence, or whether the overwhelming focus on the actions of victims rather than perpetrators in the media has led to the same language being adopted by abusers.

GoldenWonderWall wrote: So estimates of number of perpetrators is done for some crimes and it would be massively helpful to have them for other crimes too

Wow - that's a powerful suggestion. My gut reaction is that it would never be done because the results would be terrifying and not released or cause endless haggling over the terms of definition and scope. I'd would be so happy to be wrong on both counts.

We crowdfunded a YouGov survey - maybe we can crowd fund useful research like this. Or, even approach a relevant organisation to learn if it's possible to do this sort of analysis from existing data sources?

Crowdfunding research from reputable organisations or institutions would be a really brilliant thing for lots of reasons. Imagine being a research student and actually being able to look into things that make a material difference to women.

There are various Quantified Self sites where people funded, or talked about funding, specific physiological research.

I know that in medical research, PROMIS (Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System) is big and is seeking to shift the focus of health care towards what matters to patients.

There is another initiative that explicitly asks what is important - and the information is gathered from patients, carers, people with an interest, related HCPs, researchers etc. Then the topics are sorted through, people are asked to vote to prioritise them. There are workshops - and the final outcome is a deliverable that suggest various topics for research.

Research funders look kindly on those topics that have a lot of this sort of input. I'll look it up and post later.

I've been noticing this for over 10 years. I first started noticing it when I became a single parent and started being blamed for everything my ex did, even by my own family. I've been unable to ignore it ever since.

So now a small number of us are naming the problem, what do we do about it?

I am annoyed by the trans debate because it is a potential future problem, not a problem we have at present. Whereas male violence is and always been a problem women face daily. It gets ignored because the feminists (I am one) are too concerned with the trans issue. If men want to attack women they don't need to change their identity, they just carry on as they always have. They don't need to dress up to go into a toilet to attack someone, they just go into the toilet and attack them.

I think some men must think there’s a couple of bad men who do all the raping/ abusing/ assaulting and murdering because of how these types of crime are reported.
Definitely. If they think about it at all. I think most men give it very little thought. They don't understand womens perspectives and they don't want to. It's enough for them to say "well I'm not like that so what more can I do" and metaphorically shrug their shoulders.
Whereas we have to live with the risk men pose to us every single day.

“Just wait - any moment now there will be a man, telling us namalt.
Every single thread on this gets derailed with it.

The depressing thing is that the derailer is often a woman. “I fear for my sons” is a common response.

Men are given such an easy ride that anyone who tries to call them to account at all becomes a “man hater”. Happens all the time on here.

feminists (I am one) are too concerned with the trans issue.

We are concerned because we fear that, if self ID becomes a thing, future generations will no longer have the statistics or even the language to discuss male violence.

It's not a side debate, as far as I'm concerned, It cuts to the very heart of the issue.

Yep.

Although the men are the perpetrators it’s very much a woman’s problem to deal with.

I was out with two women and a man the other day. The three of us told him our stories of various degrees of harassment and assaults.

He genuinely had no idea.

Most me don’t. If it doesn’t come into their direct line of vision. This is where the change needs to happen.

Maybe they are beginning to get it.

In the meantime, make sure the fathers, sons, brothers, husbands are aware that some of their sex do this. They may do it, or have done it, themselves such is the normalisation of their behaviour. ‘Boys will be boys’. It needs to stop right now. They need to take responsibility for their sex and call it out.

Toxic men won’t listen to women, but they do listen to other men.

I had this conversation with DH the other day and was surprised by how clueless he was about what women have to do to feel/be safe. I did see some defensiveness while I was talking so barely scratched the surface really but have left the cogs to turn and will revisit the topic soon. I feel a bit frustrated that I have to explain this stuff to him (we have DD’s ffs) but agree it’s worth doing if it means more men walking around who get it. It’s all on us again though isn’t it, why is it women who have to point this stuff out and make men think about their own behaviour?

Agree. Oddly, I've posted a couple of posts in different threads over the last few days saying exactly the same thing.

Also, can I add that we're talking about underage girls here. We are talking about children. Therefore the men that harass them are pedophiles, is that right?

Actually, I just looked up Pedophile on google to check spelling and Wikipedia said that it concerns pre pubescent children. Therefore offering teenage girls open!

My blood boils.

Jeremy Vine was/is covering the harassment of schoolgirls statistics today. I’m not listening to his show but I heard the trail he did during Ken Bruce - “is the problem school uniform?” was what he said.

No, no it’s bloody not.

I'm fascinated by forensics and often watch series like Forensic Files on YouTube.

It's very striking that so often, with no DNA evidence, the police immediately work on the basis that the perpetrator is male because of the nature of the crime. They recognise male pattern violence.

All but a handful of serial killers are men. Their crimes are nearly all sexually motivated and most of their victims are female. OK, serial killers are extreme outliers but the fact that they're nearly all male is very striking.

So the police assume the killer of a woman found in a wood is male, just as we all do when we hear about it.

I wonder how often the police discuss male violence as a phenomenon. I also wonder whether if you're a loving DF and DH who has dedicated his life to law enforcement there's a cognitive dissonance about the truth of male violence. Would you spend a lot of time reassuring yourself that NAMALT?

Just occasionally you'll get comments under the episodes on YouTube from people (mostly women) drawing attention to the phenomenon of male violence. I do my small bit.

According to one bus driver and a woman whose husband didn't like to have to look, it is definitely cos the girls wear their skirts too short!

Pshaw!

Sorry not read the full thread as short of time I’ll come back!

But was talking to my husband last night about the trans issue and he said that both sides are so entrenched that it’s nigh on impossible to resolve and actually the root issue is toxic masculinity and that needs to be tackled first.

I think he has a point.

Because "not all men".

There are men's rights activists pushing this stuff, and they're doing it quietly behind the scenes.

Because "Follow the money" Maybe it is Big Pharma, as some say it is