Someone sent me this video the other day and in the video the topic of why men don't get involve in social justice movements comes up. What was interesting is that the video is a panel with 5 pretty big leaders in the engaging men movement and it was moderated by Eve Ensler.
No one had a real answer.
This is a little sad but there's parts of this that's a little reassuring because it's part of my own activism and to hear that the pros are struggling with it as well helps to make my own work seem a little less daunting.
It did, however, get me thinking about this and it's been plaguing me all weekend (yes, I watched a video about engaging men to stand up against violence against women on a friday night; yes I think about things like this on a regular basis; yes, I'm weird). When the question was initially asked, and after one guy took a shot at a positive spin to the question (which is totally cool, holding positivity in your heart breeds positive action in the world), I started thinking about male privilege.
Male privilege is barrier for men getting involved in the movement, this I already knew. Men growing up in the patriarchy live their lives never having to think about the kinds of things that women have to think about (how to safely move from place to place, how to safely date, how to safely party, and much MUCH more). White men growing up in a patriarchy that is white don't have to consider how men of color are still marked and experience daily racism; intersectional oppression for the win!
Anyway, the 'privilege' piece for men is that there are considerations they are exempt from thinking about because they are men. So for the most part they don't see the kinds of struggles women face because they happen to be women in a patriarchy. This was definitely something I had to come to terms with and it was definitely something that I'll never fully reconcile because I can't know my privilege is in play until I encounter instances of it.
But specifically with engaging men I think there's a unique relationship going on with male privilege and activism. Hear me out on this, I'm just trying to piece it together:
Think of social awareness on a slider or continuum. On the left, lets say, you have total social awareness for a particular issue; on this end it would be anyone who's lived experience is the issue at hand. If we're talking violence against women, then women would be on the far end of this spectrum because they cannot help but be aware of this issue; it IS their day to day life. (I'll hold off on internalized sexism and oppression for a moment)
On the right, lets put anyone who is deeply invested in maintaining the status quo; they may not be aware of their privilege, but they know that they'll lose power should enough people become aware of the problem.
In the middle there is a tipping point. On either side you can move back and forth within the zone; so an aware person can move from the extreme left to the centre but not cross back into unaware and the unaware side can move freely from the far right to the centre, once the unaware has crossed over they cannot move back into the unaware zone.
Aware people see the whole continuum or slider, while unaware people can only see from the far right to the centre (for them this is the whole continuum). Men in a patriarchy are on the right side of this continuum and it is their male privilege that doesn't allow them to see the whole issue.
If you've lived your whole life on the unaware side, no evidence in the world will convince you that there's more to the continuum. However, personal encounters with the issue in question move you, unwillingly in most cases, over that middle point. Suddenly the continuum you thought existed is now much larger and there's much less stability in your life because you had built it around the original continuum.
There is also an aspect of as we get closer to that tipping point we begin to get hints that there's more to this continuum than we once thought; this is also uncomfortable. This may make some men more prone to double down on the privilege they have because doing so allows them to push themselves back to the far right of the unaware side. Even men who have moved past the tipping point are not immediately magical activists because exploring this new side of the continuum means admitting ignorance and admitting ignorance means admitting powerlessness. We are trained, from birth as men, that we are never to be powerless and we are never to admit ignorance.
So when I think about the question "why don't men get involved in social justice movements?" I wonder if it's simply because they're clinging to this unaware side, unwilling to start from scratch and be vulnerable to learning about things they were exempt from having to think about before.
So I think the question that follows from this usually comes up because there ARE men involved in violence against women as activists and allies. What made them different? Can identifying this provide us with a strategy to engage men who are on the edge of that tipping point or who have crossed it and still cling to it? I don't think so.
When I think about my own journey (for the record I am NOT saying I am better than anyone or that I am special or unique in any way, this is only a recollection of why I think I crossed that tipping point) I think about the fact that philosophy always came fairly easy to me. I wasn't a prodigy or anything but complex concepts always came very easily to me, not that I instantly understood the complex nuances of a concept, rather I accepted the conclusion and looked for the application of that concept. Mostly it was "okay, I get what they're getting at, what's the implication of this, what's the next step if we take this to be true."
These things were stepping stones to understanding the bigger picture and the concepts I found useful stayed with me and the one's that didn't remain as mere curiosities I keep in case they suddenly become relevant. Once I found feminism (real feminism, not fox news based "feminism hates men" feminism) I found a philosophy that made a lot of sense and once I began internalizing the messages it opened up my mind to view the world in a whole different way. Suddenly there was explanations for things, suddenly I could pinpoint patterns in society, suddenly there was more tools to work with when it came to exploring who I was on a personal level. Feminism and awareness around violence against women was a doorway to more knowledge for me; when I compare the version of me on the unaware side to the version of me on the aware side, I know I am more than I was. I crossed that tipping point because feminism offered me more knowledge than what I had before; male privilege was limiting me.
Again, I am unique only in the sense that this was my experience and this particular experience will not be the same for all men. I will also say this journey is not easy, nor should it be. I've had, and still have, wonderful women, wonderful feminists, who are amazing, patient teachers and I learn formal lessons from them (exploring new feminist concepts) and informal lessons from them (just listening to their stories and experiences). My privilege remains with me and still blinds me to other things I've not considered. I've had to, and still do, navigate moments of guilt and shame for having participated in systems of oppression. And I'm still trying to navigate my place in a movement where I have so much privilege as a straight, white, heterosexual, cisgender male.
But again, I am more in tune with who I am being aware than I ever was unaware. I crossed that tipping point for my own reasons, but I think, to the men out there, there's more freedom on this side of the continuum.
