Tag: rape culture

#YesAllWomen

The conversation about misogyny, masculine entitlement, and rape culture has been going on for a while now, one of many prejudices embedded in our collective worldview burbling to the surface and into the light. Elliot Rodger’s homicidal rampage and the frustration of sexual entitlement that motivated it has brought that conversation to the forefront of our collective attention, perhaps the only good thing to have come of his altogether despicable acts.

I wrote a little bit about this yesterday, and I wanted to follow up.

The conversation is going to be uncomfortable for men. I said yesterday and continue to maintain that the more uncomfortable it makes you, the more you need to hear it, and I stand by that. That discomfort is going to provoke the urge to interject (it doesn’t matter on what grounds, honestly), to alter the course of the conversation in some way. You’re likely to feel as if you are the target, as if you’re being lumped in with the bad apples. It may strike you as exceedingly unfair. The urge to speak your truth may be virtually irresistible. Continue reading “#YesAllWomen” →

A Note to My Fellow Men in the Wake of the UCSB Rampage

I will not do Elliot Rodger the service of reprising his misogynist ranting. Those who doubt that his motivation was rage caused by a frustrated sense of entitlement to women’s bodies need only click here for a sampling of his manifesto. I encourage you to read it. I found it quite educational, myself. Go ahead. I’ll still be here when you get back.

There are a few conversations we need to have as a society in the wake of this abominable act. Sensible gun regulations, how privilege played into the police not stopping him beforehand, what to do when people exhibit the signs Elliot Rodger exhibited that he might do something like this. They’re important conversations, and we all have a part to play in them.

But before we have those conversations, we have to have the conversation about misogyny, rape culture, and the culture of masculine entitlement. And while that conversation is happening, we, as men, need to STFU and just listen. Continue reading “A Note to My Fellow Men in the Wake of the UCSB Rampage” →