MAV event challenges male roles

Ana Ramos - ramosav@plu.edu

mast news reporter

What would you do if your friends told a sexist joke? This was one of the challenges posed at the keynote address “Tough Guys: Masculinity and Violence,” the start-off event to last week’s two-day Men Against Violence Program Conference.

Sut Jhally, founder and executive director of the Media Foundation and professor of communication at the University of Massachusetts, addressed the portrayal of masculinity through media literacy to a large crowd in Lagerquist Hall.

As Jhally explained, media represents men as lacking emotion, appearing big, beefy, and mean and acting controlling. Such defining images, as shown for example, in the violent portrayal and increasing muscle size of men in professional wrestling, music videos, and action figurines, have great repercussions for society as a whole.

It not only limits the good that can come from males, but it also encourages violence against both women and men, Jhally said.

Jhally pointed to school shooters of the past, all of whom were males who were bullied for lacking the characteristics of the defining masculine role. When they used their guns, Jhally said, they felt normal. He quoted Luke Woodham, the shooter of Pearl High School: “No one’s going to call me a wimp after this.”

He was right, said Jhally.

While 90 percent of violence is committed by males, only a small percentage of males do these types of violent acts. Very little of the male projection is natural, Jhally said. In “genderization,” “We are always, role-playing.”

Combating Sexism
There are ways to address the problems of the present narrow definitions of masculinity.

“Dominance works by remaining unexamined. If it remains unexamined it remains misunderstood,” Jhally saiid. He continued to state that asking questions would help people deconstruct that dominance.

Part of that deconstruction involves making the present defined roles of masculinity uninhabitable.

Men must be allowed to express emotions, Jhally said. He added that broader, alternative definitions of masculinity that are just as “fun and sexy” as those of the present must be created.

Another change must be recognizing men ’s role in violence. It begins by including the possessive form of “men” at the beginning of the phrase “violence against women.” In doing this, violence is turned from strictly a woman’s issue to a male problem, said Jhally.

Jhally continued to talk about using males’ own status as a tool for change.

Men must recognize their privilege and dominance and use it to positive advantage. This includes speaking out against sexism. The reason male violence continues is because the rest of us—“the good guys”—are silent, said Jhally.

“We have to find the courage to speak to our friends...what is friendship worth?” Jhally asked the audience.

The Reality of Speaking Out
Sophomore John Vankat has taken sociology classes that address the origin of conception of masculinity.

“PLU does a good job of addressing [the issue of dominance],” Vankat said.
Sophomore Sarah Curtis also added, though a largely middle class environment, PLU is “very receptive” of the idea of addressing male dominance. Curtis has come across some of the concepts and films presented by Jhally in both her international core and philosophy courses at PLU.

While the courses offered provide a means of understanding and critiquing sexism, they don’t necessarily provide the means of addressing the issue at the grassroots level.

Junior Tim Postlewaite had heard most of what Jhally said before in previous courses. He mostly enjoyed the last part of Jhally’s speech, when he talked about solutions for those within the dominant class.

”[That’s] what I’ve been struggling with, ill-gotten privilege,” Postlewaite said.

Postlewaite referred to Jhally’s mention of football captains telling their teammates in the locker-room to stop using sexist and homophobic jokes and language. While Postlewaite finds this encouraging, he doesn’t see it happening, at least not anytime soon.

“The most we can hope for is slow change,” Postlewaite said.

Sophomore Emily Marks agrees that it will be a struggle. She said that while her mother is a feminist, Marks grew up with a brother who carries the attitude of “boys will be boys.”
Marks recognizes that those like her brother were likely absent from the address.
“[It’s] sad that the people who need to go to this the most didn’t,” Marks said.

Photo by Chris Hunt

University of Michigan professor Sut Jhally addresses the PLU community about the idea of masculinity in American society last week in Lagerquist Hall. The two-day Men Against Violence Program Conference addressed sexism and the strive for gender equality.