A platform for voices supporting women's rights
The way we think about violence against women is inherently flawed. Instead of focusing on the perpetrators as well as the institutions, societies and environments that create violent men, much of the focus is placed on the victim. This leads to the wrong questions being asked, argues Katz. “Why was she walking alone at night?”, “why was she wearing that?” all of these questions lead to a culture of victim-blaming, instead of focusing on the person who had control over the situation, the person who could have decided not to beat a women, but did. The questions we should be asking are; “what made that man decide to beat that woman?”, “what has he experienced or learned to think that this is acceptable?” It is for this reason that Katz believes gendered violence is a men’s issue.
Leadership is they key. Instead of pushing for greater “sensitivity” of gender Katz promotes a programme that encourages community, sports and military leaders, to lead by example. He believes that by leaders ingraining equality, rather than sexism into the minds of those they educate or train, men will begin to view women as equals.
Katz also encourages men to check and balance one another in situations where a sexist comment is made amongst a group of male friends or peers. Much as we would expect a white person to correct another white person for making a racist comment, or a heterosexual person to question homophobic comments, we need to create a culture of dishonour in sexism.
By focusing on men, Katz hopes to create a critical shift in understandings about gendered violence that concentrate on the actions of the perpetrator, rather than the victim.
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