Guys, When We Say “Men”, It’s Not Always You
Don’t center yourselves.
I can’t believe I still need to explain what women mean when discussing “men”. I know trolls and some men want to derail conversations with their #NotAllMen, so we’ll leave them out of this. But for guys who are genuinely upset at being lumped together with the worst of the bunch — Get over yourselves.
And I mean this in the nicest possible way. This is literally not about you. If you’re not doing it, you’re not one of the “men”.
When women talk about male violence against women and girls (MVAWG), for example, we’re not saying every man on the planet hurts us; we’re saying that the people who hurt us are usually men. It’s a bit like saying animals carry rabies. Obviously, that’s not the same as saying all animals are rabid.
If I ask, “Why do men think yelling at women and making lewd gestures in the street is going to attract them?” there’s no suggestion that I’m talking about you — if you don’t behave like that.
When you take offense and admonish us, you’re putting yourself first. You’re saying, “I know it’s a big problem, and I’d like to support you, but I’ll need to clear something up first” Before we know it, the thread devolves into what we meant or how you feel, and the actual issue goes by the wayside.
Perhaps by design?
Your response also suggests that support for us is conditional. You know that (some) men do awful things to us, but before you lift a finger, you want us to make you feel good. Women frequently hear that men are more often the victims of male violence, so I wonder if you do this when your mates get beaten up? “I’ll help you find out who it was, but first, I’m gonna have to confirm that you know I would never do that to a guy.”
The “don’t blame me” response also happens in non-violent situations. You might well be one of the few men who don’t interrupt women in meetings or take credit for their ideas, but it doesn’t mean men don’t do it with annoying frequency. Instead of telling us you’re the good guy, why not show us by redirecting the conversation? You can do this without sabotaging your own career or denting the other guy’s ego with — “I didn’t catch the tail end of what Rachel said. Can we go back to that for a second?”
Similarly, you may not dictate the policy with pay and salary increases, but you can still be part of the problem. If you know you’re making a boatload more than a female colleague for the same work, your silence makes you complicit. You may loudly support pay equity, but if you stand back when you know it’s not happening, that verbal support isn’t much help and in this case, you are who we’re talking about. Unless it’s in your contract, there’s limited risk to sharing salary information and any company that issues consequences should be one you steer clear of.
Contrary to what studies* like this might suggest, women are not “blaming men who have never committed violence towards women”, nor are we saying “all men are guilty of gender inequality and violence.”
We are saying, “Our collective experience suggests you could all be capable of the above.”
Telling women (who already know, by the way) that you’re not like that, or that it’s a few bad apples is no help to us. We know it’s #NotAllMen, we just haven’t figured out who it might be. Stalkers, abusers and rapists come in all shapes and sizes. They’re often pillars of the community and offend in plain sight because they spend years cultivating their reputations and avoiding suspicion.
And if we were lucky enough to have an identikit, a profile of potential offenders, if you will, apparently, then we’d be profiling. We upset you when we’re wary of all men, but we’d also upset you if we named a ‘type’ to look out for. This sounds awfully like gaslighting to me.
In the words of Morgan St. Jean —
We all know that it’s not all men We all know that it’s not all men But it’s some of them So we hold our breath, baby nonetheless
If none of this persuades you, consider the downsides to #NotAllMen-ing. According to Harvard scholar Evelyn @herspective, this response has three sources.
- It’s male “pick-me” behavior — “I’m not like the other guys”. To borrow from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, this can look like you “doth protest too much, methinks”. I’m reminded of one of my kids as a toddler who answered, “Nothing!” when you called his name. In other words, it could raise eyebrows if you jump in and vehemently insist you’re not like the men we’re criticising.
- It’s a guy’s need to control women’s voices. I’ve written about this elsewhere, but unless you’re trying to stop someone from getting physically hurt, interrupting a conversation to talk about yourself is not only self-centered, it attempts to dictate what women are allowed to be angry/upset about.
- It’s a superiority complex — “I’m better than those other guys”. Much like the pick-me guy above, you’re putting yourself forward as a superior man. We often don’t know you well enough, so my suggestion here is to prove it with your actions rather than mere words.
Do you really want to come across as any of those?
Guys, we know it’s embarrassing to be in a club with unsavoury members. As I said, we know it’s #NotAllMen, but it’s exhausting saying this all the time, and it’s unfair to expect it. If you’re so keen to distance yourself from the sexists, here’s a suggestion — Since protesting your innocence with “I don’t do that” means you’re not denying the problems, why not step out of your comfort zone and accept that women aren’t directly blaming you? If this is difficult, ask yourself why?
Don’t you trust women when we tell you what we mean? Or do you not think we know what we really mean? (FYI — The second is more problematic than the first.)
Once you’ve taken this step, perhaps you’ll progress to not worrying about how you look so that you can help us with those other guys — who hurt us.
*Schubert, T., Aguilar, C., Kim, K. H., & Gómez, A. (2021). Stop Blaming me for What Others Did to you: New Alternative Masculinity’s Communicative Acts Against Blaming Discourses. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.673900