Thomas Fiffer asks for a new, label-free language to resolve the gender equality deadlock.
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Ten years ago, I attended an event at my alma mater, Yale University. It was called “In the Company of Scholars: Yale Women in a Changing World,” and it was the first—and long overdue—University-sponsored alumni assembly for a specific alumni group—women—as opposed to on a topic, such as financial aid. I was seated at lunch with a group of middle-aged academics, and as I looked around the table, I noticed that I was the only man. I’ve always had good relationships with older women, perhaps from growing up around an older mother (she was 40 when she had me) and her contemporaries, and perhaps because growing up without a father (he died when I was nine), ingrained me with a healthy respect for female authority. So I was neither uncomfortable nor fazed by being the sole representative of my gender. I was actually looking forward to the conversation.
We introduced ourselves, promptly forgot each other’s names (thank God for nametags), and one of the women asked if I was married, which I was at the time to my first wife. Another asked what my wife did. I said, “She’s not currently working.” The women said, pretty much in unison, “Yes, she is. She works in your home.” I said, with genuine contrition, “I’m sorry. I meant, she’s not currently employed.” They said, “Yes she is. She’s just not being paid.” I swallowed a bite of my chicken along with a few other responses I was considering and said, “OK. I understand.”
I really didn’t know what to say to them, so I just nodded and got quiet.
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These women went on to complain in bitter tones how male professors had it all. They could teach and serve on committees and publish and advance their careers and professional interests and achieve all the success and enjoy all the fun because they didn’t have to stay home and take care of their children, while women in academia had to choose: derail their careers to have children or remain childless if they wanted to reach their full potential. I was sympathetic, but I really didn’t know what to say to them, so I just nodded and got quiet. They had no idea that while married to my first wife I did all the laundry, much of the cooking (and all of the ordering out) after the first few years, most of the grocery shopping, and my full share of child-care, (including diaper-changing and night feedings), while working full-time, paying for a housekeeper, and handling all the daily details of our life. Or that I did all this while being taken to task for not being a good enough husband. They had, simply, no idea who I was or what my experience in marriage as a man had been.
Pre-judging is exactly what happens when a man writes publicly or even espouses among friends the idea that a woman might consider assuming some personal responsibility for her safety.
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My experience wasn’t typical of most marriages, but I know from speaking with enough male friends that I’m not an outlier either, that many men suffer silently in similar situations. And what upset me most was the way the women pre-judged me as a typical oppressor, unsupportive and insensitive to the plight of women—based on my remark that my wife wasn’t working—simply because I was male and didn’t use the correct language. I doubt they would have been more forgiving if I had called my wife a stay-at-home mother. If I had, I’m sure they would have found another way to shame me, such as, “Why aren’t you the one staying home?” Now, one could say, that’s what men used to do to women, pre-judge them as stupid, incapable, over-emotional, or whatever else, and granted, some men still do. But that doesn’t make it right for women to pre-judge men now. And I think that kind of pre-judging is exactly what happens when a man writes publicly or even espouses among friends the idea that a woman might consider assuming some personal responsibility for her safety. Men who take this position are immediately called out and vilified as victim blamers and slut-shamers, regardless of how carefully they tread, and regardless of whether the advice they are giving is sound for both women and men. Fortunately, we’ve come a long way in 10 years, and many women today—including those I work with here at The Good Men Project—are committed to advancing the conversation about equality with men, and to deepening men’s and women’s understanding of each other.
Suggesting, for example, that women should not go to frat parties pre-inebriated, is not, in and of itself, blaming the (potential) victim.
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One issue where more of this good work needs to be done is women’s safety. As men, we’re responsible for our own safety. If we walk down a dark alley in a bad neighborhood at night and get mugged, no one will hesitate to say, including our mothers, that choosing to be in that place at that time was a bad idea. I would argue I was mugged—intellectually—by the women at that table, though I didn’t have a black eye to prove it, only my bruised male identity. I understand that most women do take measures to protect themselves, and I agree wholeheartedly that in an ideal world, they shouldn’t have to. But suggesting, for example, that women should not go to frat parties pre-inebriated, is not, in and of itself, blaming the (potential) victim. And if the man who makes that suggestion adds that he and his fraternity brothers are trying to do their part, by escorting visibly drunk women—and men—to the door and sending them home in cabs, he’s not trying to avoid responsibility or put it on women. He’s saying, “Hey, ladies, let’s all try to cooperate on this issue to make sure no one gets hurt.” The problem is, the moment that man suggests that women consider taking any action whatsoever to protect themselves, he is called out as a misogynist pig, shamed as a slut-shamer, and any productive dialogue that might have resulted from his suggestion, or from a male perspective on women’s safety, is shut down. And that’s a shame. Because men can and want to contribute to the dialogue. Part of the problem is that men who make such suggestions and want to contribute don’t have access to a language that doesn’t offend women. They use phrases such as “poor choices,” or “bad judgment,” or “careless risk-taking” that make women feel blamed. The other part of the problem is that women who chafe at these suggestions automatically label and villianize men. The sad result of this failure to find a mutually acceptable terminology is that the men and women who are actually trying to find common ground on women’s safety are driven farther apart.
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Consent is another issue where this disconnect occurs. Consent should be something both men and women ask for before moving on to sex. But right now, it’s not, and the onus—both culturally and legally—is on the man, not both people as sexual partners. When it comes to sexual engagement, particularly on college campuses, men are held responsible for women’s rights and safety, as well as their own. I don’t mean by being upstanders and stopping sexual assault. I mean that men are the ones who must ask for and obtain consent and make sure a woman is not too drunk to give it. Affirmative consent is designed to protect, first and foremost, women from men, and also men from men, but not so much men from women. Possibly in theory, but realistically not in practice. Bear with me, please, and imagine the following scenario:
In the bathroom at a frat party, an attractive college girl is smiling and unzipping a drunk college boy’s pants. He may be asking God what he did to get so lucky, but it’s doubtful that she’s asking him, “Hey, dude, are you absolutely sure you want this blow job?” But what if he does have mixed feelings about it and is sober enough to feel them? What if he starts hesitantly to push her away, and she says, “Oh, come on, you know you want this,” and keeps unzipping? What if it’s his first real sexual experience? What if he’s been conditioned, like most young men, to think he’s so fortunate to be in this position, to think that a guy never refuses sex (unless the girl is really, really ugly)? And what if he ends up stifling his mixed feelings and burying his confusion, even though he feels weird about it? What if … he isn’t even sure he likes women? Even with an affirmative consent policy in place, do you think this guy would have the guts either to refuse the act or to come forward, afterwards, and say, to a friend much less an authority figure, “You know, I was drunk at this party, and this girl didn’t ask me if I wanted, um, you know, and I kind of didn’t really want it and, um, I’m not even sure if I like girls?” And if he actually did find the courage to say all that, would anyone call it sexual assault or rape?
There is an aura of automatic innocence that surrounds women when it comes to unwanted sexual encounters and an aura of automatic predatory guilt that surrounds men.
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My point here is not to say that if a college boy did the equivalent to a college girl, it wouldn’t be sexual assault. By the standards of affirmative consent, as well as basic morality, it clearly would. My point is that most college boys are so desperate for sex, more to prove their manhood and worthiness than for any intimacy it might offer, that they are primed to accept experiences they might not really want. And yes, not all men want sex with any woman all the time. The larger point of reversing genders in the example is to shine light on two powerful unspoken judgments that I believe form the core of the gender equality deadlock: there is an aura of automatic innocence that surrounds women when it comes to unwanted sexual encounters and an aura of automatic predatory guilt that surrounds men. And as long as those judgments remain and get invoked whenever men try to talk about women’s safety and consent in any way other than to self-shame and apologize for the sins of our gender, there cannot be any effective, cooperative dialogue on the issue.
I honestly believe that most men, a silent majority of men, are longing for a standard of fairness that does not demonize them, recognizes their rights as equal, and does not hand out summary judgment on their feelings and opinions.
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Going back to the women who judged me at the alumni event, I think a lot of the deadlock is caused by embitterment. If you’re a woman, and you gave up your career to raise children, or you got passed over for a promotion, or you are paid less than your male counterparts, or you were sexually assaulted by a man, you are likely to feel some bitterness. That bitterness often gets expressed as anger towards men—all men (and #notallmen, too)—which blocks women’s ability to hear what some reasonable men are saying. Those reasonable men don’t want gender equality on their terms. They want it on mutually acceptable terms and terms that allow men to embrace it without taking on all the fault, all the shame, and all the hurtful acts of their predecessors. Put men in a box, demand new rules that give us no power whatsoever, instead of equal power, that burden us with full responsibility instead of equal responsibility, and what are men going to do? They’re going to get angry and resentful and yes, potentially violent. Because a lot of men don’t know any other way to respond when we feel outrage. When we feel cornered and stepped on and squashed, as I felt a decade ago. I was angry with those women. But I have responses in my emotional toolbox that don’t involve aggression and violence. I tried to understand their perspective and learn from what they said, while chafing at the incorrect assumptions they made about me.
Women are the default gatekeepers of the sexual experience, and now men not only have to expose themselves to rejection and ask for the date (in many cases, each date) that might lead to sex, but also expose themselves again by asking, when sex seems likely to happen.
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There’s another aspect of affirmative consent that many men find problematic (though they aren’t likely to admit it). Women are the default gatekeepers of the sexual experience, and now men not only have to expose themselves to rejection and ask for the date (in many cases, each date) that might lead to sex, but also expose themselves again by asking, when sex seems likely to happen, “Do you really, absolutely, positively, brownie-promise, pinky-swear, won’t-charge-me-with-rape-
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So here’s my request to women who care about gender equality and women’s safety: If you want to see real change, please work with men and include us as full partners in the dialogue. Please stop making us the enemy every time we try to say something that doesn’t align perfectly with your agenda. Please welcome us as part of the solution instead of continuing to define us as the biggest part of the problem. Please allow us to express our feelings, even if those feelings may be uncomfortable for you. And please, above all, help us all find a new language in which both men and women can express our feelings on these difficult issues without inciting conflict. A language without labels such as slut and whore and victim-blamer and slut-shamer. You don’t want to be called sluts. And we don’t want to be called pigs. You don’t want to be told or made to feel it’s your fault when it’s not. Well, neither do we. I’m asking you to take another step forward, this time with us. I believe men will finally start taking more responsibility for our choices and our actions when women accept that it’s acceptable for us to say you should also take responsibility for yours.
Photo—rochelle hartman/Flickr
This is in response to John Anderson: You’re wrong to empirically state that male rape is worse than female rape. You have no idea what’s it’s like to be raped as a woman, just as I have no idea what it’s like to be raped as a man. We only have our own personal experiences. Being raped is horrific enough whether you’re male or female without someone claiming they suffered more than you. This article is about changing the general attitude of “Us vs. Them,” and working together to promote the equality of both sexes. Not about trying to one-up… Read more »
@ V I disagree with almost everything you said. Men raped by women do have it worse than women raped by men because they have fewer controls over the aftermath and the fact that your comment wasn’t also directed at Cam shows exactly why it is important to point this out. Too much of society believes that distinctions in victimization are important, but only when women are victimized more. You don’t just see that in instances of rape. You see that in instances of domestic violence and suicide too and the people making these distinctions are almost exclusively liberal /… Read more »
1. He felt “mugged” because women corrected something stupid he said? That’s not what being mugged means, and instead of being angry, consider why they’re telling him not to phrase his response that way. I understand why he responded defensively, but consider why. When I slip up and use non-inclusive language about women or men, and someone points it out (only feminists actually since they’re the only people I know who care about equality between men and women) even if my immediate impulse is self-righteousness I strive to pause and consider their perspective, which more often than not has some… Read more »
Well, Cam, Thank you for dismissing everything I’ve tried to say here in such a condescending way. No, it’s not my place to tell feminists what to think, nor did I think I was doing that here, but as a man, I have a voice in gender equality (which I see as larger than just feminism) because my rights are at stake, too. And I can support both women’s and men’s rights at the same time. And I do.
“Take note from male allies that women actually like to work with. There’s lots of them.” Ones without opinions of their own, who toe the line and do not speak their mind, just become an echo chamber? /snark “(It is important to note that he won’t get pregnant or internally damaged from this girl raping him. It is still sexual assault, still horrible and wrong, but these examples paralleled as done in the article is false equivocation. You probably think this means I am underplaying sexual assault of men, but try to think about and understand the differences of experience… Read more »
@ Cam 1. In my early / mid 20s, I was weight lifting and had just stopped kick boxing. I was pretty confident that I could defend myself and didn’t need to worry about being victimized. I went out with some friends and met two women. I struck up an extremely sexual conversation with one and she bought me drinks and food which we ordered from the waitress. I was extremely lucid when she suggested another drink I had never heard of. I waited while she retrieved it from the bar. I have basically no memory of that night from… Read more »
I agree with what you said. To be fair, it goes both ways. There are articles that talk about the sexual abuse of women and sometimes depending on how it’s phrased, you’ll see push back. Sometimes the author’s intent is misinterpreted. Sometimes the author spreads disinformation. Sometimes the disinformation is ignorance. Sometimes it’s intentional based on interpretation and in some cases it isn’t even a disagreement with what the author says, but the realization that the framing itself is damaging. We have a lot of articles here which talk about female victimization. Sometimes there’s push back because the article also… Read more »
These women went on to complain in bitter tones how male professors had it all. They could teach and serve on committees and publish and advance their careers and professional interests and achieve all the success and enjoy all the fun because they didn’t have to stay home and take care of their children, while women in academia had to choose: derail their careers to have children or remain childless if they wanted to reach their full potential. and there’s another option, the women could have chosen a partner, that would have been the primary carer, whether stayathome or not.… Read more »
Jamesq, You make a good point that is relevant now. Those women likely did not have that option or see it as one.
or perhaps, want to see it as one, the option was known.
i think of a couple of the boomer guys on here. one was a stayathome parent in the 70s, the other gave up his career and moved with his wife because of her much higher earning career.
There was a recent survey “Unemployed Men Undesirable To Women, “It’s Just Lunch” Survey Finds” “Of the 925 single women surveyed, 75 percent said they’d have a problem with dating someone without a job. Only 4 percent of respondents asked whether they would go out with an unemployed man answered “of course.” ” I believe there is another survey where far far far more men would date an unemployed woman, than women would date an unemployed man. Gender roles are at play here but this possibly will harm women’s chances of finding a stay at home father type man if… Read more »
It sounds like me that you’re placing the responsibility of solving these problems onto women. Instead of reaching out, starting conversations and trying to understand it seems as if you want to sit back, have women come to you and explain themselves? I agree that the double standards need to be fixed, but they’re not as simple as saying, “Hey, take responsibility for your actions.” There’s a lot of history around things like “men can’t get raped” that stem from issues of traditional masculinity as well as the current rape culture. Don’t tell women to start the conversation with men.… Read more »
No, we’re simply saying that if you want us to talk about gender issues and equality, then whatever standard you demand for yourselves – be consistent with it.
Byron, I am starting a conversation with this article. I am speaking, and doing so in a way for which I will undoubtedly take flak.I am asking women to work with men to find a common language. Both men and women are responsible for solving this problem.
It sounds like me that you’re placing the responsibility of solving these problems onto women. Instead of reaching out, starting conversations and trying to understand it seems as if you want to sit back, have women come to you and explain themselves? I agree that the double standards need to be fixed, but they’re not as simple as saying, “Hey, take responsibility for your actions.” There’s a lot of history around things like “men can’t get raped” that stem from issues of traditional masculinity as well as the current rape culture. Don’t tell women to start the conversation with men.… Read more »
I love your article. You are speaking truth to power!!! Men have every right to fight for a just and balanced society and challenge unfounded stereotypes against themselves as much as women!!!
Amy, Thank you. That means a lot.
Thanks Tom for a great contribution to ending double standards against men that show men have vulnerabilities, too, and are not just sex crazed as a form of insensitivity to women.
Thanks, Paul. I don’t believe anyone should be allowed a double standard. I am trying to find a way to express that and to open channels that will actually move real gender equality forward.
Wow. Nice one Thomas – you could probably start an entirely new website with what you could unpack from this one.
I found your point about a new terminology/language excellent – I find the language used in this debate to be absolutely laden with implied value judgements. Privilege for men, vs. benevolent sexism for women would be a prime example of this. I find it absolutely laughable that anyone could ever think that men as a group “have it all”.
Oirish, There is a lot in this post, and I hope readers will take the time to absorb it. I think we need to start from a place of, we care about this problem and we are not enemies, and move from there to a dialogue that allows for the free expression of differing opinions with the aim of finding common ground.