All Men Are Dangerous
The Gender Question, Pt 1.
A recent billboard in the UK claimed that “All men are dangerous.” The common responses to this, I would think, would be either to agree and move on, or to be offended and complain. The right response, always, is to ask what this gives us opportunity to learn, and how we might be better than we are.
It’s true. All men are dangerous. Men are over-represented in every category of violent and destructive behaviour: murder, rape, war, terrorism, genocide, the list goes on. Sexual harassment and assault are especially wide-spread. The statistics suggest that somewhere around 1 in 3 women will experience sexual assault. The statistics are misleading. Many cases go unreported, and statistics don’t include the more mundane forms of abuse: flashing, groping, inuendo, predatory behaviour that keeps its distance… Of women over the age of twenty, personally known to me, women I know well enough to speak for, every single one has been sexually harassed or sexually assaulted. This was the force of the #metoo movement. It was an attempt to show that the problem is real, that it’s out of control, that it must be addressed. The #notallmen movement was an attempt to show that the problem is a personal problem and not a gender problem. I have some reservations about the #notallmen movement, but I’ll come back to this.
