'Men are Changing' seeks to strengthen and broaden the evidence base on working with men and boys. It describes and analyzes 12 programmes from around the world that sought to alter the attitudes and behaviours of men in relation to sexuality, sexual and reproductive health, violence and relationships.
The report discusses challenges in this field, provides an overview of emerging good practice, and makes recommendations for improving existing policy work, programmes and services.
Articles
Work with men has demonstrated significant potential in contributing to building gender equality and improving the health of women and men. However, most work with men has tended to be local in scale and limited in scope. To be more widely effective, that is to transform the pervasive gender inequalities which characterize many societies globally – efforts to transform men’s behaviour require to be significantly scaled up. Policy processes and mechanisms are key elements in any effort to engage men and boys in achieving gender equality.
This Policy Brief:
When Edmonton Capitals Manager Brent Bowers went on a homophobic tirade against a gay umpire, the sports world hardly took notice. It took the courage of the umpire's heterosexual colleagues to denounce Bowers's hate speech by threatening a league boycott before North American Golden Baseball League management took significant action and ultimately suspended Bowers for the remainder of the season. Bowers reportedly resigned, before being fired by Edmonton Capitals management.
Most of us are prepared to accept that men perpetrate most sexual violence (the lunatics in the men’s rights movement, notwithstanding). However, the majority of prison treatment programs for sex offenders neither take account of the issues of gender and masculinity nor their potential positive role in the rehabilitation process. By omitting these essential considerations, these programs stymie any possible, worthwhile ‘behavioural and attitudinal change’. Cowburn (2010) argues, and I would concur, that we need to understand how and why men behave ‘as men’ when it comes to sexual violence. ‘We’ here, I would think, should as much refer to sexual offenders as it does to everyone else in the community.
I recall when I worked for the Catholic Church, how the powers that be there decided that they did not like a particular female colleague, presumably on the basis that she was not appropriately ‘conservative’. One Christmas time, during the odiously fake Kris Kringle sharing of presents, that cruelly targeted employee opened her present to reveal a tawdry g-string.
Anti-rape educators around the world have Mel Gibson to thank for providing them with a truly global teachable moment in the wake of his violent, misogynist, racist tirade against his ex-girlfriend, Oksana Grigorieva.
A recent article called "5 Stupid, Unfair and Sexist Things Expected of Men" by Greta Christina raises the important questions of how "sexism hurts men" and why feminists and pro-feminists should care, and goes on to discuss five key examples.
... an important priority for such a book is to get people to start reading and keep reading, and to be able to provoke constructive reactions. The point is not to implant some sort of exact copy of a perfect platform in readers' brains -- that's not how people work -- but to get people talking... At the same time, the difference between certain real people's real struggles getting seen and illuminated by that content versus them being erased and further marginalized is a big deal... There are times when these two goals -- being broadly inviting, particularly to people with privilege, and exhibiting radical clarity -- are in tension with one another.
... the participation of men in ‘anti-violence strategies’ is seldom matched by that necessary critical self-reflection, where we as men who have actively and/or through our passivity engaged in violence against women, do not ask the tough questions of ourselves, and of each other