What is MAV and Why Should I be Involved?Violence Against Women:Men Against Violence at PLU is a group which is part of a growing world wide effort to raise the level of awareness among men, around Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault.The goal is not simply to make men aware, but to empower them to speak out against sexist actions and beliefs that support these issues. Men of all backgrounds need to end our collective silence and stand up to be counted with the majority of men who will not condone or support gendered violence, or the sexist beliefs that sustain it. This area of MAV work is important for a couple reasons: First, we all have women (and men) in our lives that we care for and love. The fact is that since 1 in 4 women is or will be impacted by assault, it impacts the men that love them as well. These issues are clearly not just issues that women have to deal with, we need to be involved. Second, because the issue that too many men allow the “bad apples” to make us all at some time or other feel the need to say “I’m not one of those guys” is one that we need to take on and oppose openly. We allow the very few among us who control or hurt women to feel powerful, control what others see in us when we walk through a dark parking lot. While women have every right and reason to be afraid, we have an obligation to help create a safer society, and in doing so reclaim the respect of women as safe friends in the world. Masculinity Many men in our society have been brought up according to a very traditional ideal of manhood, not much different than it was in the 1950's. Men have certain expectations placed on them such as success without fail, physical and sexual prowess, constant emotional and physical control, etc which can lead to very hollow and confusing lives for men and those who love them. There is so much more beauty and depth in life if one learns to reclaim and experience their emotional world.Men traditionally have been raised in a very competitive world, and taught to hide their emotions unless they can express it as anger or perhaps happiness. As a result, men tend to bottle up their emotional realities so they aren’t seen by others as weaker. The result is however, that men often don’t have tools to deal with their emotions, experience covert or major depression, alcoholism, etc at higher rates, and risk feeling humiliated and losing status if they seek counseling. The risks of being different or speaking about about certain issues are significant. The "Man Box", is a concept pioneered by Paul Kivel (see Resources) to describe how men keep each other in line. When a man stands up to support women, the GLBTQ community, and other underprivileged groups we are all familiar with the terms used by other men to reign him in. They are most often feminizing or question his sexual orientation - which sends a very clear message about what is thought about being a woman and/or homosexual. According to this argument, being female, gay, lesbian or trans makes someone less than the speaker... Language is very powerful, and we hear these comments fairly often... do we really believe this? We are saying it... Though it may not be immediately obvious, the emotionally unhealthy lives that many men live is in many ways tied to the unhealthy relationships that sometimes result in violence. If men were allowed to change and learn how to deal with their feelings, we might have and be happier, more emotionally and physically healthy men, who wouldn’t be afraid to call the minority of other men on their abusive behavior toward those that we care about. If this discussion connects with you, whether you agree or this makes you angry, frustrated, etc please contact Jonathan Grove to talk further about these issues as they are not simple, and much more complicated than a simple website description can fully address. Hate crimes based in racism, homophobia, and classismYou may ask yourself what a Men Against Violence group would have to say about racism, homophobia, and classism other than to say don't be violent, right?That is actually very true, however, the issue goes much deeper and the connections between these issues and the sexist violence against women are very closely linked. The underlying issue is power & privilege, and the violence used to maintain that power. |
MAV meetings! Join us each week in the Women's Center living room for coffee and discussion! Want to learn more? Check out the Resources page and our Facebook Page!
PLU MAV Mission Statement |
