A Poem
What are the right questions?
My first question is always, "What are the right questions?"
Let's ask some:
Why did the men quit, walk away, and give up their children?
Why are they all strung out?
Why do the women I come from fear their men?
Why were all the women I love raped as little girls?
Why is it that I do not want to be like any of the men I come from?
Have we found a right question yet?
An Emerging Movement
A growing movement calling for critical reflection on manhood and masculinities is emerging through online resources, networks and organizations. Groups such as A Call to Men “work to create a world where all men and boys are loving and respectful and all women and girls are valued and safe.” Other examples include: The Good Men Project-The Conversation No One Else is Having; XY- Men, Masculinities and Gender Politics; and Higher Unlearning-A Discussion About Men and Masculinity. In addition, culturally responsive efforts by the National Compadres Network program “El Joven Noble” or the Noble Young Man use an Indigenous epistemology to frame manhood as a response to violence and substance abuse among urban Latino men. (See Resources) Ultimately, this work is an examination of and a response to our culture of male domination.
As described by Tony Porter of A Call to Men, the “cult of masculinity” prescribes rules for "acting like a man” which he terms the “man box.” The tenets of the man box are both symptoms and enablers of a culture of domination that restricts the mentality, sentimentality and behaviors of men and boys. The man box leads men to disrespect, mistreat, and abuse women and each other through demonstrations of power, aggression, toughness, repression of emotions (except for anger), homophobia, and the objectification and commodification of women’s bodies (Porter). The man box leaves men emotionally ill-equipped to cope with the trauma inflicted by other men’s violence as well as their own.
Creating social conditions and capacities for men to unlearn male supremacy and entitlement, by challenging the rigid gender binary of the man box, offers a path to liberation and dignity for both men and women. Answering a call for gender equity pushes back on the cultural expectations of the man box which adheres to a series of don’ts: don’t cry, don’t show weakness (emotion), don’t be a punk. Similarly, a series of dictated standards also applies: be strong, be tough, be a hard worker, be a provider. To put it another way, the man box or man creed serves as the dominant culture’s measure of manhood by his capacity for strength and violence. In contrast, a call for emotional intelligence establishes a measure of manliness as one’s capacity for safety. A real man is a safe man.
Since schools are among the most important and complex social systems in our culture, it is critical that we leverage the growing equity awareness and further our research and programs to implement feminist, life-giving perspectives to our youth. Dr. Michael Kimmel is the founder and director of the Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities at Stony Brook University, which will soon start the first master’s degree program in “masculinities studies”. Dr. Kimmel opens his class by defining the archetype of a good man versus a real man. He asks students to describe the attributes and attitudes of a “good” man. Then he invites students to describe a “real” man. Answers to these questions clearly expose the mixed messages and biases boys and men receive from our dominant culture.
The Challenge: A History of Domination
A culture of male supremacy is woven into the fabric of civilization. The 5000-year-old history of civilization is essentially the history of the enslavement of women (Öcalan). As a class, civilized men created systems of power rooted in patriarchal hierarchy that naturalized the exploitation of women’s bodies, labor, time and children. Patriarchy can be identified as male entitlement, male inheritance, male ownership, male privilege, male supremacy, hegemonic masculinity, hyper-masculinity, toxic masculinity, maladaptive manhood, and misogyny. Patriarchy consists of interlocking systems of domination and control in the cultural, economic, legal, political, religious, social, and sexual structures developed throughout civilized history to oppress women for the benefit of men (DGR).
Women have endured more systematic subjugation than any race, class or nation. The dominant power of the political, social, and economic systems created by men are exemplified by historical practices such as the Women’s Holocaust (300 years of men burning European women alive as “witches”) and other practices that continue such as female genital mutilation, foot binding, honor killings, and intimate partner violence. Modern online industries such as pornography and sex trafficking, including child sex slavery, are among the poignant manifestations of the commodification of women’s bodies. The International Labour Office estimates that women and girls make up 98% of victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation. In 2015, the CNN Freedom Project calculated that, “human trafficking is the third largest international crime industry (behind illegal drugs and arms trafficking). It reportedly generates a profit of $32 billion every year. Of that number, $15.5 billion is made in industrialized countries.” Although there are currently 20 to 30 million slaves in the human trafficking industries (Bales), a child is far more likely to be molested by her own relatives than by anyone she meets on the Internet (Jensen).
In his article, “Liberating Life: Woman's Revolution,” Abdullah Öcalan writes that, “women’s biology is used as justification for her enslavement.” Men’s violence or threat of violence is used to enforce this enslavement. Dubbed as the “weak sex” and targeted for her vaginal orifice, there is always a threat of rape to impose compliance. Elaine Charkowski writes that “everyday” rape during peace time, rape of “enemy” women as a weapon of war, rape camps (concentration camps for women who are used as soldier’s sex slaves), rape on campus, as well as, the use of pornography are evidence that men are the primary source and originators of the horrors we see in the world today. It is no wonder then, that one out of four women in our culture are raped within their lifetimes, and that another 19 percent have to fend off rape attempts (Jensen). Gender serves the purpose of arranging power between human beings based on their sex, categorizing them as feminine or masculine (Cutbank). Feminist writer and activist Lierre Keith notes, “men become ‘real men’ by breaking boundaries, whether it’s the sexual boundaries of women, the cultural boundaries of other peoples, the political boundaries of other nations, the genetic boundaries of species, the biological boundaries of living communities, or the physical boundaries of the atom itself.”
Masculinity’s destructiveness manifests in men’s violence against women and men’s violence against the world (Cutbank). These include, but are not limited to: slavery, war, racism, sexism, homophobia, torture, concentration camps, factory farms (concentration camps for animals), genocide, the Jewish Holocaust, the Spanish Inquisition, modern terrorism, ISIS, sport hunting, deforestation, mountain top removal, fracking, global warming, ocean acidification, Fukushima, Chernobyl, automatic weapons, land mines, traumatizing children to employ as “child soldiers,” napalm, nuclear weapons, computer operated drones that can kill “enemies” from thousands of miles away, dropping bombs from aircraft, and cluster bombs.
The history of the women’s rights movement over the last two centuries has cracked the rigidity of strict gender binary roles in America. The 19th amendment guaranteed all American women the right to vote in 1920. Therefore, the United States of America has not yet been a true democracy for a century, since half of its citizenry could not vote. Furthermore, women’s advancement at Harvard and other Ivy League schools only began accepting female students in 1970s (Dempsey). In her book, Trauma & Recovery, Judith Herman maintains that “In order to escape accountability for his crimes, the perpetrator does everything in his power to promote forgetting. Secrecy and silence are the perpetrator's first line of defense. If secrecy fails, the perpetrator attacks the credibility of his victim. If he cannot silence her absolutely, he tries to make sure that no one listens.” To resist domination, men are called to break the silence, to listen in solidarity. However, it is not enough for individual men to be "good guys,” to personally refrain from exploiting women, or abstain personally from outright oppressive behavior as this does not challenge patriarchy as a system of power. Human dignity commands that men work alongside women to uproot and dismantle patriarchy.
Feminism & Men’s Rights: It All Points to Trauma
A contemporary backlash to feminist thought is articulated in the men’s rights movement, whereby subscribers contest claims that men have greater power, privilege or advantage than women do and argue that the women's movement has harmed men (Messner). An emphasis on male conditions and circumstantial suffering such as shorter life-span, health issues, combat losses, divorce bias and other costs of traditional masculinity are examined in the men’s rights movement and the larger men’s liberation movement. Men’s rights activists have rejected feminist principles and focused on areas in which they believe men are disadvantaged, oppressed, or discriminated against (Newton) and so oppose societal changes sought by feminists, defend the traditional gender order, and believe that society and men have been "feminized" by the women's movement (Beasley). It is worth noting that our culture uses language to “un-man” a male by “emasculating” or taking away his control, or simply referring to him as “effeminate,” which is to say, “women-like.” However, the reverse is not true when one attempts to find language to “un-woman” a female. How does one take away a woman’s woman-ness? Her woman-ness is not undone, but rather, it is violated, exploited, and controlled (Jansen).
Control and domination lead to trauma. Whether examining the pressure and stress placed on men or women, oppression and violence often results in wounded bodies and spirits. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has conducted research in the past few decades into the detrimental effects of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) on health and wellbeing in adulthood. The ACE study findings suggest a strong correlation between a high amount of ACEs and a multitude of health issues including heart disease, depression, addiction, liver disease, suicide, and miscarriage. It has also been established that the affects of trauma on adults can wreak havoc in the form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTSD acts like a terrorist in the brain, setting off full-blown fear-based reactions to everyday occurrences, turning regular exposure to the outside world into a minefield of triggers. Although symptoms of mental health issues manifest differently for men and women (due to our gender binary whereby men are “angry” and women are “crazy”) the experience is very human. Healing occurs in relationship. It is critical to build connections between rape survivors and combat veterans, between battered women and political prisoners, between the survivors of vast concentration camps created by tyrants who rule nations and the survivors of small, hidden concentration camps created by tyrants who rule their homes (Herman).
However, male supremacy and toxic masculinity have left men emotionally stunted. As men perceive others as objects to conquer, they must repress their own feelings of empathy toward anyone or anything, even themselves. In “Rethinking Masculinity,” editors May, Strikwerda and Hopkins explain, “Men have been socialized to display callousness in those situations where their feelings might otherwise manifest themselves. Callousness is a lack of emotional response, or a diminished emotional responsiveness, to certain stimuli. Over time, callousness may lead to the elimination of a certain kind of emotional response. In our culture, men may disclose fewer feelings than do women simply because they have been socialized to be less aware of the few feelings they do have.”
As noted by the men’s rights movement and the ACE study, men die at an earlier age than women. The man box limits the capacities and practices for men to cope with the effects of trauma. In “The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma,” Bessel Van Der Kolk writes, “Nobody can “treat” a war, or abuse, rape, molestation, or any other horrendous event, for that matter; what has happened cannot be undone. But what can be dealt with are the imprints of the trauma on body, mind, and soul: the crushing sensations in your chest that you may label as anxiety or depression; the fear of losing control; always being on alert for danger or rejection; the self-loathing; the nightmares and flashbacks; the fog that keeps you from staying on task and from engaging fully in what you are doing; being unable to fully open your heart to another human being.” The questions becomes, “Where can we learn this?”
Besides our homes, schools are among the most influential places that shape our thinking and relationships. It follows that we must invest in research, curriculum, and programs that respond to our culture’s patriarchal roots. It is imperative that boys and men learn to take steps toward courageous humility when acknowledging the history and day-to-day impact of male domination. It is critical that boys and men learn and teach healing practices in response to male violence and trauma. Boys and men are called to ally with, listen to and follow the lead of girls and women. This paper is intended to serve as a call to men and institutions to seek further exploration of feminist-based, trauma-informed education for our boys and young men.
- Vincent Perez
References
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