In this episode of "Partnered with a Survivor" David and Ruth continue their conversation about 'masculinities' and its relationship to power, gender and abuse. In this discussion they pick apart the concept of "toxic masculinity," explore how men's positive (and negative) impact on family functioning is underestimated, and the ways we may be failing in our conversations about gender. In this exploration of how culture has framed masculinity and femininity as dichotomous principles they discuss how to explore attributes considered classically male such as power, courage, progress without infusing a sense of power over or violence and control. Ruth and David also take a look on how men's behaviors and choices are important to their families, to their partners and to the culture at large, and how we operationalize understanding men as a vital part of the fabric of the health of society. They also discuss how we care for men's ability to nurture their internal emotional world in order to create a sense of stability and safety in their own self. Ruth discusses her pet peeve of that masculinity and violence often view, wrongly, as being innately linked and how that impacts us in our habituation of control and violence as the ultimate excuse of violence by sex, gender and bio-chemical reality. The e-course Working With Men as Parents is discussed as a resource.
Now available! Mapping the Perpetrator’s Pattern: A Practitioner’s Tool for Improving Assessment, Intervention, and Outcomes The web-based Perpetrator Pattern Mapping Tool is a virtual practice tool for improving assessment, intervention, and outcomes through a perpetrator pattern-based approach. The tool allows practitioners to apply the Model’s critical concepts and principles to their current case load in real
Check out David Mandel's new book "Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers: How to transform the way we keep children safe from domestic violence."
In this episode of "Partnered with a Survivor" David and Ruth continue their conversation about 'masculinities' and its relationship to power, gender and abuse. In this discussion they pick apart the concept of "toxic masculinity," explore how men's positive (and negative) impact on family functioning is underestimated, and the ways we may be failing in our conversations about gender. In this exploration of how culture has framed masculinity and femininity as dichotomous principles they discuss how to explore attributes considered classically male such as power, courage, progress without infusing a sense of power over or violence and control. Ruth and David also take a look on how men's behaviors and choices are important to their families, to their partners and to the culture at large, and how we operationalize understanding men as a vital part of the fabric of the health of society. They also discuss how we care for men's ability to nurture their internal emotional world in order to create a sense of stability and safety in their own self. Ruth discusses her pet peeve of that masculinity and violence often view, wrongly, as being innately linked and how that impacts us in our habituation of control and violence as the ultimate excuse of violence by sex, gender and bio-chemical reality. The e-course Working With Men as Parents is discussed as a resource.
Now available! Mapping the Perpetrator’s Pattern: A Practitioner’s Tool for Improving Assessment, Intervention, and Outcomes The web-based Perpetrator Pattern Mapping Tool is a virtual practice tool for improving assessment, intervention, and outcomes through a perpetrator pattern-based approach. The tool allows practitioners to apply the Model’s critical concepts and principles to their current case load in real
Check out David Mandel's new book "Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers: How to transform the way we keep children safe from domestic violence."
Speaker 1: [00:00:00] We're back, we're back again. Here we are. [00:00:02][1.9]
Speaker 2: [00:00:03] So welcome to our podcast partnered with Survivor episode six. [00:00:08][4.8]
Speaker 1: [00:00:09] I think so. It's starting to lose track. Yeah, so am I. [00:00:11][2.6]
Speaker 2: [00:00:12] So just a brief explanation of the intent behind this podcast. We are about to launch our new E! Course, partnering with survivors. And that is one of the fundamental principles of the safe and together model and is deeply impactful to so many people when they first hear that language, that being a survivor myself, I wanted to give a space for intimate discussion because these topics are often seen as being personal right as being difficult. Yes. And we talk about them really well in a professional context with workers. But given that the numbers of of how many people experience violence in relationships, how many people experience coercive control and abuse and child abuse? I know very well that there are many of us out there that are working who are survivors. And I wanted to be able to give a little bit more of a personal look to break the silence that we have as professionals surrounding our own trauma and issues surrounding masculinity and femininity and interpersonal inter relational violence, as well as gender based violence and child abuse. And I really hope that this is hitting the mark for a lot of people, both from a professional standpoint, but also from a very personal standpoint and have been really overwhelmed by the response, how many people are reaching out to us and saying they're so grateful to have this and that it's a very impactful look at this topics and they can hook up with it very personally. So it seems to be hitting that place. Do you want to talk about how you? [00:02:07][114.9]
Speaker 1: [00:02:08] Yeah. And well, just to say that, you know, today we even got something from somebody who said, you know, you know, I'm trying to reach out to my solicitors, I'm trying to reach out to my attorneys. And they say they're very domestic violence and form. But they never heard about safe and together. And part of your vision for this is is to find a way to expand how we get our message out to to survivors, [00:02:29][21.0]
Speaker 2: [00:02:30] to victims, [00:02:30][0.1]
Speaker 1: [00:02:31] and then for them to then turn to the professionals they're working with and say, you know, do you do you [00:02:36][5.5]
Speaker 2: [00:02:37] do you use them? Do you [00:02:38][0.9]
Speaker 1: [00:02:38] use this? You know, can we use this to help me be safer to keep my kid safer? And so we're expecting [00:02:43][5.6]
Speaker 2: [00:02:44] navigate the [00:02:44][0.5]
Speaker 1: [00:02:44] system. So that's one of the purposes. I think the other thing, like you said, that's very important to me is breaking down the the some of that hard barrier between the personal and professional around the way we work. And for me, I don't know how I came to it, but since the beginning, I've always really seen the value in sort of bringing the personal into professional space in an appropriate way and understanding the connections between the two. And I've seen often how people's biases aren't examined and how that impacts the work. So I think by creating this space, I think we were trying to give more permission for people to understand they can be professional. Mm hmm. Even as they talk about or disclose or assess or think about their own, their own experiences and what it means for the work, because so much of those experiences adds so much value to the work. Yes. And there are some dark corners. There are, there are dark corners, and I think we have to be able to look at both. And people deserve an environment that they can talk about both or examine both in a non-judgmental way. [00:03:55][71.1]
Speaker 2: [00:03:56] We want you to navigate the dark corners like corners. [00:03:59][2.7]
Speaker 1: [00:03:59] That's right. [00:04:00][0.2]
Speaker 2: [00:04:00] Cool agility, [00:04:01][1.2]
Speaker 1: [00:04:02] right? Yeah. Because I think it's I think that's part of the what's important for me about this is is breaking down those barriers. So so we hope that you, you are listening, that you're making comments, that you're sending us your ideas and that you're sharing this with other people. You know, we're you know, we're we're almost up to a thousand downloads, which is pretty amazing within, you know, I don't know, just a few weeks, few weeks and just publishing two of the podcasts. So this is this is great to keep it coming. [00:04:33][30.8]
Speaker 2: [00:04:34] So I'm going to introduce our topic of the day [00:04:36][2.4]
Speaker 1: [00:04:37] you are this. This is very exciting. Well, you're doing it now six or seven minutes in today. [00:04:42][5.7]
Speaker 2: [00:04:43] We finally got to this topic. Yeah. And we've been promised you we would get [00:04:47][4.2]
Speaker 1: [00:04:47] we're been nibbling around the edge of this for over the last five episodes. And and you'll see as we kind of enter into it, the, you know, the the turns and twists. We have here [00:05:00][12.2]
Speaker 2: [00:05:00] so. So I'm going to be just like, I'm a very honest person. Yes, you are. And I'm going to be very honest. I think that this is a difficult topic. People hear the the topic and they don't quite understand how it links up to concrete impact in the culture in our families. And I really want to create not just a theoretical discussion, and I know we won't, right? But just to assure you that as I announced the topic, that it's this is not going to be a theoretical discussion. It will be, but it won't be. We are going to really talk about how [00:05:36][35.6]
Speaker 1: [00:05:36] cryptic how this will be will be. You know, we will get there. We won't get that [00:05:40][4.5]
Speaker 2: [00:05:41] once, you know, complex, you know, organisms here. But it we're going to be talking about masculinity [00:05:49][8.5]
Speaker 1: [00:05:51] or masculinity is because I think it's masculinity. I think it's sort of, you know, even there, you begin to get that sort of this is for both of us. There's variety and there's but there's also this sense of it's a huge topic. It's a hot button topic. It is. And we'll be talking about some of the values that are embedded in the same together model around this and also the concept of toxic masculinity, which I which I which I don't like the term. This is where it started and I was going to write it. I was going to write an article that sort of I hate the term toxic. [00:06:20][29.5]
Speaker 2: [00:06:20] He'll still write an article, I promise you. [00:06:22][1.7]
Speaker 1: [00:06:23] But it sort of, and we're going to go there and we'll see where else we go along the way. But this is this is the this is the. [00:06:29][6.6]
Speaker 2: [00:06:30] So when everyone explicitly where they want to start off by saying is, is that I don't know how this happened, but even though I grew up in extremely complex abuse with multiple perpetrators, I never latched on to the thought that men are innately violent. And I think that that's because I had so many different masculine expressions. Living in a commune full of people that there were definitely men who were very violent and very coercive and very controlling. And then there were men who were not and they were victims in reality and clutters. They were colluding with this. They were covering up. They were, you know, probably out of fear and self-preservation or whatever else they were feeling. And so walking away from that, I actually never embedded in my way of thinking that men are innately one way, right? And and I will be the first one to really defend men in the sense of our views of how men should be and live in society and be in business and and be leaders often is very damaging to men themselves. Mm-Hmm. And we have two boys. That's right. And we don't want them to be damaged, right? We want them to be connected, right? Loving yet powerful human beings without violence. Right. And use that power for good, for creativity, for construction of a world which is beneficial to everybody. All right. You know, so this is definitely not going to be male bashing. [00:08:12][102.4]
Speaker 1: [00:08:13] It's even, you know, it's even just to start, you know, it's sort of it's interesting that those always or often this kind of like, well, but this is we're not negative towards men or somehow to talk about male violence. And we see this a lot in social media is that and Ruiz's legacy does a lot of our posting on social media and she'll post about men's violence to women. And we're very clear. I mean, in terms of the work, and I say this all the time when I when I'm doing live trainings that both men and women can be violent and both men and women can be controlling. In fact, you grew up, you mean you told me stories about, you know, about violence from women towards kids, particularly, right? And and so really want to be clear, we're always saying, you know, violence occurs. Domestic abuse occurs in both heterosexual and same sex relationships, right? And you know, including, you know, with with folks who are trans. And so there's no monopoly on violence of violence. And in fact, male violence is just, you know, we talk through an intersectionality lens. Male violence against women is just one form of oppression and violence that that exists. You know, you've got racial violence. You've got, you know, violence around ethnicity and, you know, structural violence around poverty and all these things and colonization. So we're always we're really thinking about all those areas. And so but it's always interesting. So if this is not male bashing, but I think even just the idea that we have to sort of frame it that way if I give a qualifier to me annoys me sometimes because I think we should be able to talk about this in a direct and open way without there being an implicit idea that somehow talking about that. That some men use violence and that we may be training males to use violence, and then we may be allowing males to use violence against female partners, against kids, that somehow by just naming it, somehow we are harming men, harming men or bashing men may really it's sort of it to me. Does something offensive? [00:10:15][122.3]
Speaker 2: [00:10:17] Well, you're not that fragile. [00:10:17][0.8]
Speaker 1: [00:10:18] Right? Exactly. But I'm not that fragile and we're not that fragile. But it's sort of if this is a reality, if this is a reality of the world, then we should be able to talk about it kind of clearly with open eyes and directly and and. And so for me, there's been a lot of work I have put into thinking about this from point of view of being a male in a particular culture and context. I mean, that's really important to own and also think about as a man who's been working on violence against women and male violence against women for years. What's my own relationship to my masculinity? What's my own relationship to men? You know, I've been part of our men's group for 30 years. You know, I have good close male friends. And so I think sometimes people think, Well, do you like men? Are you, you know, are you? And you know, and I have relationships with men that are strong and positive and nurturing. Hmm. But I think for me that, you know, when we we talk about this, that one of the foundational things that's important to me is men's behaviors and choices are important to families and to their children and to their partners. And and I, when I say that, I feel like I'm saying the most basic kind of stupidest sort of thing, why should I have to say that? But I think that there's so much where we don't actually live or practice for those who are professionals with this idea that we're talking about men's choices and behaviors and their relevance to the way families function day to day. Mm hmm. I think we think about men still as breadwinners. I think we think about men. We need to get men more involved with their kids lives. We think we need we talk about men should be better nurturers. I mean, there's lots of people have lots of options and some of them serious jump over things. Yeah, go ahead. [00:12:12][114.0]
Speaker 2: [00:12:12] There's a lot of that. But then there's a lot of men are dangerous. Men are innately violent by virtue of their sex, by virtue of testosterone, by virtue of their biochemical nature. And and to me, that other line of thinking is incredibly offensive because there's no way back from that if men are innately violent by virtue of their biochemical nature. Right, then we're just we're just all up the creek. Right. [00:12:41][28.6]
Speaker 1: [00:12:41] And you know, if you if you talk to people in the military, you talk, you look at the history in the military and and and understand that a lot of military training is actually about. Teaching people that it's OK to to be violent under certain circumstances and to kill. Right? And so if you if you start thinking about what the implications of that, as you know, sort of that we actually have to train people to do this and those studies, which is, you know, going back, I think as far as World War one, where they talked about how many soldiers male soldiers would shoot over people's heads, how many people, how many that would shoot down to the ground because they couldn't bring themselves to kill. Right. And I think there's we we sometimes ignore this counter evidence. Mm-Hmm. We sometimes it doesn't fit the narrative, right? The cultural narrative around masculinity that a lot of people, a lot of people carry around. [00:13:38][56.9]
Speaker 2: [00:13:39] Well, it's interesting. I'd love to I'd love to dig down into that cultural narrative because I think there's two places that it comes from. And I think one of those places is is our natural human tendency is to want to categorize things into boxes, you know, and so you look at some of the research that was done, and I'm not quite sure how to pronounce his name because I've only seen it in literature. But that's half studs cultural dimension theory. And this was done by IBM in the 1960s. And it really it broke down male and female and sort of business culture and and was used by IBM as a productivity tool, which basically said that men are ego driven, are aggressive, are assertive and women are more relational focused, which really just severs the male psyche. And so many ways because there are so many men who are really connected and really relational and feel shamed for that at this point, because that aggressiveness, that willingness towards focus on the ego and building up the ego is really seen as a successful male attribute, right? So now they're not successful, right? So I think that's one place. Yeah, that that comes from. Yeah. And then I think the other place that that comes from is just sort of the overwhelm that the culture has surrounding male violence towards women. And the reality of that because it is a statistical reality because women fear daily for their safety. Right? You know, and there's no way to avoid it. And so we really start to say, well, what's going on here? Where is this coming from? Is this coming from an overlaying of the culture and permissiveness that we're giving men to be violent, to be aggressive, to be in their ego and possessive all the time and get, get, get, get, get. And we we laud people for that as being successful businesspeople. Or is it is it something deeply that we need to wrestle with that is in men, but we're not quite sure of the inception of it. Where is it coming from? [00:15:48][129.2]
Speaker 1: [00:15:49] Yeah. You know, I two thoughts come to my mind as I'm listening to you talk. I mean, one is that just to keep reminding listeners that, you know, this is a lot of this is culturally determined and is shaped by culture. And I'm having the voices of a couple of indigenous people that I've listened to speak recently who say in their communities, they're part of the message they're giving to boys and men is that this isn't our way. This isn't the way this this violence against women and girls isn't. Our way isn't our culture. It isn't what we did prior to colonization. And so I think that's just one example of a really making sure that we keep. I keep thinking about this from different cultural vantage points. And, you know, and and and how, you know, for instance, in the United States, you know, masculinity in the African-American community has been shaped a lot by the history of slavery and right and Jim Crow after that and just also economic opportunities and just that. There's really these different, very different experiences around being a man, you know, in different cultures, in places that that's that's one thought and the other thought is really, you know, not. Where does this come from? Hmm. But what is it? What does it look like and how do we change it? And how do we create space for different expressions of of this? And I think for me, that's the one of those sort of foundational things is is let's talk about how men behave that makes the family stronger and weaker, you know, and and in fact, that conversation about domestic abuse and men's violence as women in that context is actually almost a subset of this. This bigger gap, which is that we don't train our social workers, we don't train our human human services professionals, we don't train our judges or our lawyers. And to really think about men's roles in families and men's beyond breadwinner oftentimes. And so we're not asking you, we're not trained in these experiences of. Asking about, well, what is he doing to keep the kids going to the doctor, what does he do to get in the way of that or keep the kids on medication if they needed or or make the house move run more smoothly in the day or disrupt it? And those, almost by default, are things we expect women to do in so many communities. Right? Right, right. And so, you know, there's a question about where all this came from. And then there's this question about how do we operationalize a different way or how do we understand how we're living it today? [00:18:30][161.3]
Speaker 2: [00:18:30] And I just I just want to be clear, because there's a really a functional place that people can land in those questions about how does he keep the house running day to day? You know you you can have a functionally efficient person who's almost like running a train station. Yes. And they can be told total abuser at the same time, they're running a tight ship. [00:18:49][18.9]
Speaker 1: [00:18:49] That's right. But they're abusers, right? So let's just [00:18:52][2.1]
Speaker 2: [00:18:52] be clear, [00:18:52][0.2]
Speaker 1: [00:18:53] though, I get that you're right. I think it's it's it's I understand that level of of of feeling in a household or environment, you know? [00:19:03][10.3]
Speaker 2: [00:19:03] And gosh darn it, I'm going to beat you to get the train out of the state, you [00:19:07][3.5]
Speaker 1: [00:19:07] know, and a kid in one of the families who worked with it said, When my dad comes home at six o'clock, my day ends and you can see the impact and that impact could be. It becomes a machine, you know, based on what he thinks should be happening [00:19:19][11.8]
Speaker 2: [00:19:20] and everybody needs to respond. [00:19:21][1.0]
Speaker 1: [00:19:21] Everybody needs to respond to that sort of that one point of view. Right. I think about when I talk with this topic and this conversation today may be like many of them, sort of all over the place as we allow ourselves to kind of roam. And I hope you like that. But I think about for me that when I got connected to issues of male violence against women and I read books like Susan Brown Miller's Against Our Will, which is really a very painful and very direct look at sexual assault. And it was really clear how it made it absolutely clear to me, man, as a man, that rape is not about sex, it's about power, it's about violence, right? And other books like that that really were eye-opening and also made me uncomfortable, which is a good thing. I mean, I think part of the way we make progress in these areas is we we are able to tolerate our discomfort. You know, and and and in particular, as it relates to our own attitudes and beliefs and behaviors and. And so I really steep myself for years as as you know, is as much as I could, I think in many ways and that was still limited. I mean, I still have to remember all the time they're not living as a woman or not living as a person who may face racial oppression. My understanding is always limited, my experience always limited. So keeping that in mind that I struggled with it and it wasn't till my 30s that I really started wrestling with another side of the coin, which is what does it mean if I believe in unraveling sexism and and and violence? What does it mean to be a powerful human being in a male body? I mean, you could say a lot of different ways, but so what does it mean to be a powerful, impactful? Because that was not part of the exploration. And I think it's a missing piece and we can take with toxic masculinity from this. But like, [00:21:32][131.2]
Speaker 2: [00:21:33] there is another piece of that that, yeah, that's so interesting to me because as I got into the professional world, I realized that a lot of women, particularly in the professional world, believed that success hinged upon their ability to behave like men. Right? And I really directly actually, I was I was a young mom working at the art institute and once had somebody tell me when my child was sick that she sacrificed three marriages to be successful and that I needed to sacrifice more. And I immediately said, This is not the place for me. If there can't be balance in the world between my professional life and my and my being a mother and taking care of another human being. Then then we have lost something fundamental that's just human. And and I really got at that moment that there was this was I've sacrificed it all for my career and this is a very masculine trait. And this was very much I needed to hang with the boys in order for this to happen. And I get that. I get that the world is tough and that there's definitely places where that is still the paradigm. But it very much struck me from the standpoint of. Being a woman who considers herself a feminist that I thought, wow, this is this is not the place that we should land and our feminism as as as women, that we absorb some of the worst qualities that are attributed to masculinity. Yeah. For us to be able to live in this world, not not in my world, sister. [00:23:18][105.0]
Speaker 1: [00:23:18] Well, in its, you know, I used to do this exercise in in training and I used to conflict resolution work and and some people do a version of this and, you know, called the man box. And it's, you know, you know, people are familiar with it that way. And I I don't know where it came from originally. And, you know, sort of all the all the the history behind it. But, you know, it was interesting. You know, so if you do this exercise where you ask people to sort of put the trade stereotypically associated with men? Mm hmm. And then, you know, with women and people would come up with all these things that you all could probably imagine. But but what was interesting to me that maybe I don't know if I got it from somewhere or something I got it in was, excuse me, was about one of the traits associate with being human being. Right? And and I think that when we talk about this, maybe you're listening and you want to do this thought exercises is think about, you know what? What attributes do you associate with being a human being? Right? Because they will look actually different than the other two. Yeah. You know, because the other two are set up as polarities against each other stereotypically. But being a human being, you know, might involve things like kindness and connection and caring for others and and being a productive member of society or, you know, creativity. And you know, and and our spiritual life. I mean, sort of at least this off top of my head things I think about. Mm hmm. And and I think that we were part of the reason I don't like the term toxic masculinity. Oh, yes. I mean, we got I got people who I don't like it. I mean, I could I could say, I hate it because I don't like it because of I just dislike jargon or I'm skeptical of jargon. But that's one reason. But I think it it actually reinforces the dialog in a negative way. Right? I know it's trying to unpack and I know it's trying to name something. I know it's trying to both create space for or create a concept that's about how men are harmful to other people, but also how this constraint, these bonds of masculinity are harmful to men as well. And I think those are those are valid points, right? And I think it can get in the way of some, some deeper diving into these conversations about power and about definitions or experiences of courage and strength. Mm hmm. Because they keep them in the in the realm of they keep them in the realm of of the gender conversation in some ways [00:26:02][164.2]
Speaker 2: [00:26:03] to keep it dichotomous, keep [00:26:04][1.3]
Speaker 1: [00:26:05] it dichotomous. And then we have to move back and forth between these things because it'd be naive to not talk about the importance of gender, obviously. I spend, you know what, much of my time talking about gender double standards, and they're important. So that'd be naive not to talk about it. But I think if we don't create space for men, for instance, to sort of think about these terms courage, strength, power and identify them more widely. [00:26:31][26.3]
Speaker 2: [00:26:32] Right. How are you courageous in a nonviolent situation where you're not being threatened, right? What is that courage? [00:26:37][5.4]
Speaker 1: [00:26:38] Look? That's right. And we would and we would do, you know, you're reminding me would do when we did when I did. Men's behavior change were one of the checking questions we would ask would be. Was there a time you felt afraid or helpless or powerless that you handled it without violence and control? Because we saw if there was an emotional stem to violence and abuse and relationships, it wasn't anger. It was it was the feelings of fear or the feelings of powerlessness that men were trying to avoid feeling by being controlling. Mm hmm. That they were often trying to control their inner world, right by controlling other people's behaviors. [00:27:20][41.6]
Speaker 2: [00:27:21] Right. And I and I actually really, truly got I really, truly get that. And as a person who is a survivor, I learned how to subtly control my world by trying to understand where people's behaviors were and try to avoid the cataclysmic response that was the potential. So we all do it on. On one level, some people do it and they're trying to control their world and they become violent and other people try to control the world and be and and avoid they avoid the behaviors or try to manipulate the world to not have. That end result, which is almost impossible with an abuser, by the way. Yeah. They're going to explode. [00:28:02][40.8]
Speaker 1: [00:28:02] I think what you're talking about is is it's apples and apples, and it's also apples and oranges. Yes, because you're you're talking about trying to protect yourself or manage safety. [00:28:12][10.4]
Speaker 2: [00:28:13] But I think that fundamentally what you're expressing is somebody who is trying to manage safety, right? Somebody who hasn't been taught how to manage the safety of their internal world and are fearful. And then often, as you know, in that cycle when you were working with perpetrators, you have that moment of response where they try to control the world become incredibly violent. Right? And then what happens next? What happens next? Usually not all the time, but if they remain in relationship with that person and they're not a psychopathic perpetrator, right, is that they feel a tremendous amount of shame for having lost control and then that shame and internalizes itself and the cycle really begins again. [00:28:58][44.9]
Speaker 1: [00:28:58] But I want to make, at least in my mind, the distinction this when I'm thinking about. That's important difference, which is that when we're trying to manage a real threat from the outside, then you know that, you know, the distinction is always made is, you know, if you if a bear is really chasing you, right, there's a real danger that you have to respond to. And that's healthy and normal. Yes. But if you're if you're responding situations that don't involve a bear chasing you, like there's a bear chasing you, like you're going to die like your identity is at stake, then there's something going on inside of you that you need to look at. And so I think the difference is if you're managing and trying to influence the environment so that you're actually safe from a real threat, right? And it's an appropriate level of response. Mm-Hmm. That's different than somebody who sees sees you not getting a plate of food to the table fast enough. Right? As an existential threat to them that deserves violence or punishment at a level of harm versus saying, you know, ignoring it or saying, I don't have the right to walk in, stresses are walking. These are the things that we have to be able to talk about. [00:30:23][84.2]
Speaker 2: [00:30:23] And I find and I fundamentally agree. So you're going to get a little bit of our banter. This is really how we talk about it. I fundamentally agree that obviously it's different. You have this external threat and then you have this internal threat. But what I what I do truly believe is that the perception of the difference is not there in the moment and that perhaps the thought of losing control or not being in control is really such a threat to that person because they believe it is wrapped up in their own value in their own mask. [00:30:51][28.0]
Speaker 1: [00:30:51] Oh, I agree with you. I think that's what we need to unpack. But I think it's important to name because I think, you know, survivors come in to counseling or come in, you know, supposedly they've been arrested and say, I'm the abuser. Mm hmm. And they really actually have engaged in in some self-defense from a really clearly identified threat that is real, that is based on somebody else's ongoing pattern of behavior. Right. I think we need to make the distinction between that and somebody who uses violence to protect their internal identity and their sense of self. [00:31:25][33.6]
Speaker 2: [00:31:26] And I think that we did. This is so this is a great this is a great exercise and I think we can operationalize that. Look, we just came up with the new tool and he was scared because he knows I'm going to write it down on my [00:31:38][12.5]
Speaker 1: [00:31:38] list, go right down to it. [00:31:39][0.9]
Speaker 2: [00:31:39] And someday you guys are going to get it going to work on this, go ahead. But I do think that that being able to operationalize that and say, you know, when are people responding to an external threat which is real and that is self-defense right there? And a lot of women or a lot of victims doesn't have to be a woman are blamed for self-defense of actions or acts of resistance towards their abuser. And and it's devastating when that happens. And when is it that we really can draw the line and say, no, this person is really responding to an existential threat, a thought of losing control, of the thought of losing power, a thought of losing this. And that's really where we start to get not just into the violence, but into the coercive control itself. [00:32:23][43.9]
Speaker 1: [00:32:24] And I think the tricky part is lots of tricky parts and there's lots of lots of corners in all this. These conversations, this is my word for today's podcast Corners Corners, which is that, wait, [00:32:37][13.4]
Speaker 2: [00:32:37] is this a dark corner [00:32:38][0.6]
Speaker 1: [00:32:38] or this is not dark corner, OK? You know, it's maybe it's bad how [00:32:43][4.1]
Speaker 2: [00:32:43] well there's a [00:32:43][0.8]
Speaker 1: [00:32:44] space. Maybe it's of. I think it's poorly lit because it's structural. I guess we're done [00:32:51][7.1]
Speaker 2: [00:32:52] with the lighting. [00:32:52][0.2]
Speaker 1: [00:32:53] Well, moving on that. But what what I. What I think about and what we created an operational profile of my former colleagues and I, you know, when we were doing men's behavior change work, we created this operational profile to guide work with men who were abusive. And one things that was clear is that there was this relationship between the sense of entitlement around controlling other people, particularly kids and partners and women in general and the level of attack they felt on their identity, the more entitlement I feel over you. So that's more like a kind of a cold element, you know, of the dynamics of I come in with values and beliefs and attitudes wherever they've come from. Right? That you're supposed to listen to me or you're supposed to do this for me or is [00:33:42][49.6]
Speaker 2: [00:33:42] it the world is supposed to be this way? [00:33:44][2.1]
Speaker 1: [00:33:45] And we had actually, you know, flavors, you know of it. You know, we'd say, well, one version of it was the was the misogynistic attitude, which was women are dangerous or stupid. And therefore, I need to control women because they're dangerous or stupid and need to be controlled. I mean, to be blunt. Another one we framed as chivalry, which is, I will look out for you. But the deal is you have to go along with my understanding of how the world is supposed to work. Yes, right? So it was to be labeled as chivalrous because there was this element of I will be the protector, but there's there's conditioned and submission you need to offer me. [00:34:23][37.8]
Speaker 2: [00:34:24] Yes, right? Very Latin culture. [00:34:25][1.5]
Speaker 1: [00:34:25] Yeah. And then and then the third one was, you know, a never a victim. Hmm. Again, I will never let anybody hurt me. I'll never be a punk. I'll never be hurt again because I've been hurt before. These hurts can be child abuse. They could be culture around racism or violence, but I will never let that happen to me. You know, and and the last one was sort of this cold, logical men are logical. Women are emotional. I've got the right answer all the time. All the time. So, so so when you think about those, those kind of, [00:34:58][32.8]
Speaker 2: [00:34:58] by the way, when when that is leveled at women, I always laugh. I've experienced it very heavily in my life. Yes. And my retort became, but anger is an emotion, my friend. [00:35:11][12.3]
Speaker 1: [00:35:11] That's right. Right, exactly. [00:35:12][1.0]
Speaker 2: [00:35:13] So is resentment right? And so is is a lot of the things that you're engaging in. So I think [00:35:19][5.3]
Speaker 1: [00:35:19] this is, you know, I think it's an emotion breaking down that dichotomy we've been talking about, which is that irrationality is stereotypically associated. Emotional is typically associated with being female, being a woman and somehow all the the logic that women engage in all the time is is ignored in all the emotionality that men actually have. Yes. Not fear. This is why sometimes are going to have trouble with this idea that we want to teach men to be more emotional because we've seen one. Some men run with that and say, Well, I get to talk about my feelings. I get to be, I get to speak, I get to speak my mind as a horrible person, right? You know, and and it also acts like men aren't emotional all the time and aren't emotional beings. And there's just there's lots of things I don't like about some of these conversations. Right, right. But going back to the connection, which is that if I hold some of these entitlement beliefs, which means because of these experiences, these beliefs, I have the right to try to make you do certain things and comply that actually having those beliefs exacerbates my feelings of helplessness and fear. Right. Because I've set up a set of Onix unrealistic expectations of you in the world, right? And so the more my my expectations are realistic, the more I I feel out of control. And it's like people who have obsessive compulsive disorder. They're they're very messy, can be very messy and they're constantly fighting. And they're very much engaged in this whole conversation about trying to make things happen and make things orderly and and often struggle and fail and look very disorganized on the outside. The internal world is a constant struggle to keep things or they're [00:36:54][94.8]
Speaker 2: [00:36:54] in conflict, complete conflict. [00:36:55][1.2]
Speaker 1: [00:36:55] And and so I think that we have to name these these structural attitudes and beliefs, which are cultural very much, and some of them are personal experiences of victimization. And but a lot of them are cultural that to say these are contributory factors are not causal because a lot of people have abuse experiences that don't lead them to feel justified. An abuser [00:37:18][23.1]
Speaker 2: [00:37:19] and a lot of men grow up in this culture, which is very [00:37:22][3.3]
Speaker 1: [00:37:23] most men. [00:37:23][0.3]
Speaker 2: [00:37:24] And, you know, without [00:37:25][0.9]
Speaker 1: [00:37:25] doing [00:37:25][0.0]
Speaker 2: [00:37:25] without, you know, becoming abusive or with being emotionally connected humans who are concerned about the well-being of their their children and their partner in the world and and try to live that with a level of engagement, you know? So, you know, I think that in part part of the urgency around the conversation and the term toxic masculinity, which you really do not like is that. Because people feel like they're not being heard around the urgency of the situation with violence, the urgency of the situation around systems that are broken, that victim blame, that don't focus on the perpetrator but focus on victims, right? Because there's so much urgency there. I think people are trying to be very loud and use terms, which really drove home to those who are in charge. What, what, what the deficit is, what's happening. And I don't I don't like the term toxic masculinity because just like I don't like trauma bias and I don't like trauma bonding, right? Because I think that a hides a lot of behavioral realities and a really large spectrum. And it also links violence directly to masculinity as if it is in a neat thing, right? And I don't believe that to be the case, actually. And I can't believe that to be the case because I'm a person who lives in the world who's had a variety of experiences of men as human beings. And I have children who are boys, and I absolutely know that those children did not come into the world as violent perpetrators. They came into the world and we either teach them or we give them examples. And there are some people that mysteriously we cannot explain their violence. And those are the sociopaths, and those are the the incredibly violent perpetrators, which absolutely must be locked up in jail to protect people in society. Right? You know, so we do have this, this spectrum, which is which is which is flabbergasting and and we don't quite understand it and we're constantly trying to understand it. But I don't want to innately link violence to men. [00:39:43][137.8]
Speaker 1: [00:39:44] No, I don't either. And I think it's it's it's there's so much. I mean, my head is spinning with things that we can talk about and we're eventually going to have to land this. You know, this podcast and you know, a few minutes, I think, you know, one is that, you know, that I think there needs to be a more open discussion in society about we talk a lot about women's empowerment, which is really wonderful and important and critical, and we have a daughter as well. And you know, and I want her to be strong and successful and happy and safe and and and live in a world where she can. She can explore all the things she wants to explore. And, you know, sort of I do think we need to feel more comfortable really looking at what what men need and how we support men and how we support men in a particular way. And I think you know it. It's it's I to me. I feels rock solid when I say to people, you know, we need to be talking about how men's choices and behaviors are important to families. And that's very different in some ways, in a subtle but important way between two of the things, which is some people say we need to get better at involving men in their families. Mm hmm. And and that that is true because in the US context, for instance, we've marginalized poor men, men of color, African-American and Latino men. You know, from family structures and through policy through through. And we need to the judicial. Yeah, an overrepresentation in the criminal justice. We need to fix that. And at the same time, we need to be able to talk about the quality of parenting. Mm hmm. And the quality of of of fathering that helps families be stronger because I've seen those kind of policies were trying to correct for the past actually bring abuse of men back into the lives of families in the name of male involvement. Right. And that's dangerous. And then the other side of it, we have to navigate, you know, what's termed as a men's rights movement, which is, you know, this is this idea that that men are being denied their rights as as as parents and that men need to stand up and. You know, and and I want to say that we we should be looking at all parents really from this perspective of. What good parenting look like, [00:42:10][146.4]
Speaker 2: [00:42:11] right, and there and just going back to the specific gender piece of it is that. There is this human and cultural tendency to believe that when we speak about empowerment, we speak about power over right rather than than personal human. You know, just being able to control the direction of your own world in a sense. That's right. And and and so I'm very aware that, you know, particularly in the United States, feminism is seen as women just wanting to have power over men. [00:42:47][35.9]
Speaker 1: [00:42:47] That's the fear. That's not right. That's right. [00:42:50][2.7]
Speaker 2: [00:42:51] And and it's expressed quite a bit actually here. I know that I don't I'm not sure that it's it's quite as expressed in in other cultures. But but really landing back in that question that you asked about speaking about the the attributes that we consider to be masculine of courage and power. How do those exist in the world within men in a way that's not power over or that's not violence or not a response to violence? You know, I I think about some of the men that I know who our mutual friends of ours, right? And I think about the tremendous amount of courage that they have in making decisions to care for their families. Right. Right. In in ways that that we know culturally are very difficult for men. I know that most of my male friends would actually love to be more engaged and close to their children and not have to spend nine 10 hours outside of the home working, working away from them because they really want to enjoy and connect with their children. But as a culture, we do not really support that. [00:44:13][81.9]
Speaker 1: [00:44:13] We don't reward that, we [00:44:14][0.8]
Speaker 2: [00:44:14] don't reward that or support that. So, you know, there's a lot of layers and I think of the two cultures of our our our agencies and I think of the culture of, for example, safe and together where we really try to to make sure that our workers are capable of being flexible, working from home, being with their families, be they may be they female. They're just a parent who's taking care of children. And that's super important in our cultural context. You know, if they need childcare subsidies or what makes you so these are concrete things. But thinking about, particularly if you're a director of an agency, right? And I think about the story that you told me about and I'm 10 chapters through the trauma, stewardship, stewardship. Yeah. And I think the [00:44:59][44.9]
Speaker 1: [00:44:59] shout out to Laura Vanderkam, [00:44:59][0.7]
Speaker 2: [00:45:01] another one. But but I think about how you talked about this mental health agency realizing that all of their workers and I believe the Met's director was male. [00:45:11][9.9]
Speaker 1: [00:45:12] I don't remember, but it was an X. It was immigration. The it was about immigration. [00:45:16][3.3]
Speaker 2: [00:45:16] Yeah. And realizing that the workers were totally burnt out and saying, we're shutting our doors until we figure out how we can do this. Hopefully for our workers, because the well-being of of our human right is super important, their ability to nurture their families and themselves is part of the way that we change this culture of domination over of of coercive control of violence and abuse. Right. You know, so so I really want to I want to kind of tie it back to just concrete steps inside of ourselves, right? And reflections we can do to really say, you know, how are we courageous and powerful every day? How are we creating a culture which which ascribes to these human values instead of breaking them down into these gendered categories where we're at different ends of the spectrum and just realizing that as humans, we really do have very similar needs, it doesn't. [00:46:14][58.4]
Speaker 1: [00:46:16] Male, female. And I have one last story and then we can wrap up with the closing of the podcast. I remember going to a workshop that I personally participated in where we were looking at male and female and gender roles and and the facilitator asked people and it was a mixed group, men and women and asked the the women to kind of move through this space physically and in a way that they identified as masculine. And actually, I think they asked everybody. It wasn't just butt, but do it and do it in that way and move. It was about movement and and and what you saw was if you're watching, you saw a lot of the women stomping. So there were serious issues to move forward to and they were stomping angrily as [00:47:04][48.4]
Speaker 2: [00:47:05] if there were [00:47:05][0.3]
Speaker 1: [00:47:05] men. Yeah, they were supposed to take it. Nobody's supposed to take on this sort of what they perceived as a male way moving through the world. And there was one gay man who skipped happily through the room. And thank God for him. Yeah, when I think about of and I think everybody kind of woke up in that moment because really the perception I think of everybody, including the men, was sort of the way the, you know, the way the angry stomping forward was was that male way of moving. And then there was this delightful sort of skipping and sort of jumping and Beauford movement. I think that's important. I think because we're I think there's a there's an idea that if we don't act in these aggressive ways or these assertive ways or these power over ways that we're giving up forward motion motion, I don't know if that makes sense, not going to make progress. We're not going to make progress. We're not going to be successful. We're not going to be happy. We're going to stagnate. And for me, one of the ways and there's a long conversation, I observe [00:48:03][57.9]
Speaker 2: [00:48:03] bully and bludgeon to get our way. [00:48:05][1.4]
Speaker 1: [00:48:05] That's right. That's right. But that I really began to sort of associate curiosity exploration. I really began to kind of identify those as things that we might think of in this sort of pantheon of sort of stereotyped male traits. You know, I don't even know the language kind of breaks down, but really a curiosity exploration were forward moving energies. Mm hmm. But there also were more permeable, more engaged, particularly curiosity. And I talked about a lot, which is sort of that's really actually going out and engaging and and being in the world. But it implies and comes with a certain openness. Mm hmm. So I just think there's we need to create more space and office up for people to consider about sort of what do you internalize is your idea of sort of forward motion and masculine formation and masculinity and right and [00:49:03][57.6]
Speaker 2: [00:49:03] progress and power [00:49:03][0.7]
Speaker 1: [00:49:04] and power. And so that's just sort of my my kind of thought here at the end. [00:49:08][4.2]
Speaker 2: [00:49:10] Yeah, I mean, we could keep going because I just had about a million thoughts that came into my head. [00:49:14][4.0]
Speaker 1: [00:49:14] Yeah, but we do have to and we have other work to do today. [00:49:17][2.5]
Speaker 2: [00:49:18] We will be working with those working [00:49:19][1.3]
Speaker 1: [00:49:19] tomorrow and other things and emailing some of you. [00:49:21][2.0]
Speaker 2: [00:49:22] And so what I what I would like to say is, is if you want very concrete understanding of how fathers parenting choices matter, right? You can interface with the safe and together e-learning courses. Working with men as parents, right? I will try to drop a link to that in the podcast notes. I'm not quite sure how to do that. That might be technologically challenging in that way. Or you can contact myself. Ruth Stearns and you can find my email on the Safe and Together website, which [00:49:59][37.6]
Speaker 1: [00:49:59] is safe and the other institute. Dot com, right? Just so you have that right. [00:50:04][4.3]
Speaker 2: [00:50:04] So if you want to look at those E! Courses, a lot of people think of it courses, especially overseas, as being almost like a recorder or webinar. These are very, you know, these are very high quality, very interactive animation videos, multiple choice questions and tests, and you have to really pay attention and move forward. And we really have designed these because we're aware we cannot be everywhere training right. But we want to train everybody [00:50:31][26.6]
Speaker 1: [00:50:31] and they're good for lots of different professionals. And for professionals, particularly, you can check out our conferences, which go on every year and in the United Kingdom, Europe and and Australia for Asia Pacific and North America. And we've got some coming up soon. This is our conference season. It is, and you can check out other trainings that might be for professionals in your area and [00:50:52][21.4]
Speaker 2: [00:50:53] and for those victims and survivors out there who are listening to our podcast because we do have many people listening to this that are not just professionals. If you are looking for a professional who is trained in the safe and together model, where are you looking for an agency or an NGO that's trained in our model? You can also contact us and we will try to direct you to somebody who has done our training. [00:51:16][23.2]
Speaker 1: [00:51:18] All right. I think that's we've talked. We have too much as we have talked, we've talked as much as we can this morning and so [00:51:26][8.0]
Speaker 2: [00:51:26] signing off so the [00:51:27][0.8]
Speaker 1: [00:51:27] next time to the next time. [00:51:27][0.0]
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