No equality movement should be based on denying reality and the painful experiences of another.
And yet we’ve seen it time and time again from feminist voices in certain feminist spaces; minimising, or flat out denying the existence of male survivors of domestic and sexual violence.
Katherine Spiller, Editor of Ms magazine, said domestic violence is just a ‘clean-up word for wife-beating, because that's really what it is.’
And Dr Mary Koss, one of the most influential researchers in sexual violence in America, stated it is ‘inappropriate’ to see men as survivors of rape.
Both are untrue, but also, how is this *women’s* rights?
Why is feminism not just about child brides, FGM, reproductive autonomy or educating girls in Africa?
If it were, I’d sign up today.
Why is it so often about denying the trauma of men and boys, muddling the data and manipulating the narrative?
This is not advocacy.
And it’s disappointing to see Spiller and Dr Koss, and the many, many others, not being reminded of such.
Because these are not just words of bigotry, they have been highly effective in influencing our policies and laws to exclude male survivors rape from data collection, to deny them refuge in shelters and exclude them from domestic violence strategies and interventions.
So when will the beady eye of accountability be turned inward, on itself?
When will the ideological dogma be reined in and reinvented, to remind us all of where and why feminism began?
When will we see change?
Sources
Sexual Violence
2010 https://tinyurl.com/27ecrssm
2011 https://tinyurl.com/fwnwfrre
2012 https://tinyurl.com/2sm5695r
2015 https://tinyurl.com/3buf8tks
Domestic Violence
[1] https://tinyurl.com/2p886ucy
[2] tinyurl.com/2sv2bj5q
[3] tinyurl.com/3hnsz64e