The following article is written by 'The Social Battle' columnist of Ensemble Magazine, Anoushka Dutta.
A step in the right direction to eradicate violence against women
Following the death of 33-year-old Sarah Everard, the phrase ‘educate your sons’ was shared by many on social media, marking the beginning of a new, constructive approach to the issue of gender violence. UN women UK revealed that 97% of women aged 18-24 face sexual harassment. ‘Educate your sons' reverses the victim-shaming culture, which can be argued as the reason why most female victims choose to be silent. It addresses the issue with a level of focus on the male perpetrators, and therefore the ultimate root of this problem.
What do people mean by ‘educate your sons’? One way to look at this is through the way many people on social media took the phrase ‘protect your daughters’ and replaced it with ‘educate your sons.’ Shifting the focus from the ‘faults’ of women, which range from what they wear, what time they go out, and whether they were too friendly with the people around them, this phrase acts as a needed criticism of the ideology with which boys are raised even in today’s society. For much too long the picture of masculinity has been associated with physical strength and the need to prove it with the intention of asserting superiority over others. It would be a safe assumption to say that this kind of inextricable link between physicality and how ‘manly’ you are leads to a misogynistic view of women where men associate the opposite of these attributes with them. Amongst the young boys who see these toxic stereotypes as set in stone, a certain number of them will grow up with the genuine belief that it is okay to then abuse your physical ‘superiority’ over women in order to put them in their place.
Others may grow up with the idea that unwanted advances towards women are at best light teasing, and at worst a bad joke. At no point will it be considered for what it is: harassment.
It becomes quite clear to see how these factors ultimately play into a man’s justification for violence against women – if this is what boys are taught to learn and take advantage of, then imagine what an extremist will do with the information of stereotypes that they are told are the set roles in our society? Given this, how do we move forward in society and ‘educate our sons’ practically? We are moving away from empty words about how men should be and beginning to consider what active decisions they can make in order to make the streets at night no longer an unsafe place for women, no longer a route not taken or taken with immense precaution.
One regressive teaching we can avoid promoting to young men is the romanticisation of approaching women and persisting for their attention. Detrimentally, the line between asking a woman to give you a chance for you to have your hopeless romantic trope being indulged in and actually reaching the point of making her uncomfortable through your determination is distorted. It is perhaps because of this reason many men are dismissive of women when they voice their experiences of harassment, adamant to pin the blame on anyone or any circumstance the victim was in before condemning the perpetrators themselves. Perhaps reiterating the phrase ‘educate your sons’ will remind advocates of the argument ‘not all men’ that what victims need is to be heard. They need to be heard by their local authorities they had the courage to approach in the first place, by friends and family, by their support system, and most of all by men who can play their part in the ultimate goal to bring about justice.
In the light of recent events, and events like this which have frankly occurred for centuries, we will take the opportunity to assess how accountable we are ourselves, through the comments we make, the ideas we promote, and ultimately the society we shape in terms of gender equality.
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