LEC 10 - Violence and Masculinity

Question 1

What is Masculinity Studies?

Answer 1

• Increasing scholarly attention for masculinity in scholarship on gender and
  violence
• How cultural notions about what it means to be a man shape experiences with
  violence
• Victimhood
• Perpetration

Question 2

What is hegemonic masculinity?

Answer 2

Andrew Tate Alpha beeld

Hegemonic masculinity is a sociological concept that describes the dominant, idealized form of masculinity that men are expected to aspire to within a given society.

We can’t show any emotion except anger. We can’t think too much or seem too intelligent. We can’t back down when someone disrespects us. We have to show we’re tough enough to inflict physical pain and take it in turn.
We’re supposed to be sexually aggressive with women. And then we’re taught that if we step out of this box, we risk being seen as soft, weak,feminine, or gay (Jackson Katz)

Question 3

What is homosociality

Answer 3

Construction of social bonds between persons of the same gender

• Social dynamic that explains the maintenance of hegemonic masculinity and privilege
• Often through fear or hatred of homosexuality

Question 4

What is the relationship between man and violence?

Answer 4

• Men overrepresented as
  victims/perpetrators of violent crime
• Overwhelming majority of sexual violence committed by men (Peretz and Vidmar 2021)

Question 5

What are the Risk factors for perpetrating sexual violence

Answer 5

Cultural norms about sexual violence
* Peer approval and rape myth acceptance (Petty John et al. 2019)
* Socialization into toxic masculinity (Connell & Messerschmidt 2005)
- Socially-constructed attitudes that describe the masculine gender role as violent, unemotional, sexually aggressive, etc.
- Traits promoting dominance

Mental health problems
* PTSD
* Personality psychopathologies

Question 6

What are intervention and prevention strategies on gender bassed violence?

Answer 6

• “Violence against women is a men’s problem” popular slogan among organizations
• Need for cultural change among men central in public debates since #MeToo
  (Macomber 2018; PettyJohn et al. 2019)

Question 7

How efficient are awareness trainings Sexual Violence among men?

Answer 7

Reception and effects
* Effective in countering rape myth acceptance and peer
approval of sexual violence (Fisher 2019; Flood 2019)

• Potential for “educating for gender respect and justice through fostering boys’ and men’s critical understandings about gender inequality, masculinity and gender-based violence” (Keddie et al. 2023, 251).
• Continuum of responses: from engaged to uninterested, resistant or even hostile (Flood 2019, 320)
• Disinterestedness or anger (Rich et al. 2010)
• Commonly perceived as male bashing (Scheel et al. 2001)

Question 8

Why do men respond negatively to gender based violence education efforts?

Answer 8

• Masculine peer norms (Cares et al. 2015; Kleinman, Copp, and Wilson 2021)
• Stereotyped attitudes and beliefs about women and sexual assault
  (Langhinrichsen-Rohling et al. 2011)
• Backlash: men’s vested interest in upholding gender inequality (Ahmed 2017)
  and perception of feminism as a threat (Faludi 1991)
• Boys’ desire to maintain status within a school environment of peer regulated
  hegemonic masculinity may produce negative responses to feminist messages
  (Banyard, Eckstein, and Moynihan 2010; Smith 2007)

Question 9

Where is reception of gender based violence education dependend on?

Answer 9

• More negative responses among racialized youth in underprivileged areas
• More positive responses among mostly white boys in schools in more affluent areas

Racialization and class
- Racialized men: risk of being perceived as reinforcing stigma (Viitanen & Colvin
2015)
- White/upper-middle class men: tendency to deflect responsibility (Dekker 2024)

Trauma and mental health
- Refugee or migrant men (Salter 2016)
- Victims of child abuse

Question 10

What is the role of fostering responsability in gender and sexual violence?

Answer 10

• Fostering responsibility in men for sexual violence crucial for preventing it
  (Sukhu 2013)
• Not all men perpetrators or facilitators of sexual violence (causal responsibility)
• But all men can have an influence on the culture and environment in which
  violence is committed
• Considering sexual violence as one’s “own” problem (political responsibility)
• Necessary condition for mobilization and prevention

Question 11

What is the role of masculinity and othering?

Answer 11

White masculine superiority reaffirmed and naturalized through
- Feminizing narratives about Chinese-American men
- Racist tropes of Black or Muslim men as sexually violent
- “Stranger danger” narratives: associate sexism and gender-based violence with cultural Others
(Ahmed 2017)

Allow White men to deflect responsibility for gender-based oppression and violence

Question 11

What is Deflection of Responsibility in gender and sexual violence?

Answer 11

• Perpetrators of violence commonly blame others
• “the table bashed her head” (Dobash and Dobash 2001, 191)
• Men’s intersectional identities inform how they deflect responsibility
• Deflection may:
• Strengthen negativity
• Enable positive response
• Deflection more likely to occur when:
• Message is insufficiently related to personal experiences and target group culture

Question 12

How to effectively address men relating to gender and sexual violence?

Answer 12

How to effectively address men?
Consider:
* Fostering responsibility
* Intersecting forms of disadvantage and privilege
* Risk factors (trauma, mental health, alcohol)
* Personal experiences and cultural specificities (target group, trainers)
* Policy advice as a “genre”

It is important to address cultural specificities