by Rob Okun
More than a thousand men are gathering over the next two months in Rio de Janeiro, Washington, and New York to say yes to a new day for masculinity, yes to new possibilities for men. Activists, educators, policy makers, researchers — a veritable peace corps of committed men (augmented by equally committed women allies) are doing much more than sharing ideas, information and best practices to prevent men’s violence against women and promote healthy masculinity (as vitally important as those efforts are). They are also sharing a vision: a vision of men reaching deep within ourselves to uncover ways to grow personally and to play a part in directing a societal shift in how we comport ourselves out in the world, in our families, workplaces, communities and governments. Central to that vision is listening to, and learning from, women.
And that means acting responsibly and being accountable for our actions. Since visionaries in the modern-day women’s movement first pushed open the portal to personal growth and social transformation for themselves, their mothers, sisters and daughters, tens of millions have streamed through on a quest for justice. There was no sign at the entrance saying men weren’t allowed. It has only been our fear, our resistance, our unwillingness to acknowledge our privilege — and our vulnerability — that held some of us back.
And now our time has come. Over the past quarter century more men have stepped from the sidelines of silence onto the playing field of change. This spring’s conferences and symposia in Rio de Janeiro, Washington and New York — as well as other vital gatherings elsewhere around the world — are the culmination of years of work building a movement that not only rejects men’s violence against women but simultaneously supports men’s roles in crafting peaceful alternatives.
In Rio, the conference is called “Engaging Men and Boys in Achieving Gender Equality” (www.engagingmen2009.org); in Washington, it’s “Men and Women as Allies in the Primary Prevention of Men’s Violence Against Women” (www.mencanstoprape.org); and in New York, it’s “Stand Up and Speak Out to End Violence Against Women” (www.acalltomen.org). Whatever the name, the goal is the same — preventing violence against women and promoting healthy masculinity. I will be at the three conferences representing Voice Male, at the “Global Village” in Rio, providing magazines for participants, and sharing ideas on the future of new masculinity in Washington and New York.
As men have organized among ourselves, particularly these last two decades, developing programs and organizations to address the twin aims of challenging our violence and supporting our growth, women allies have welcomed us.
Today, new strategies for reaching men are being successfully tested in the marketplace of social change. Even in these economically treacherous times our “market share” is growing. Men from around the world have created and are creating powerful programs to engage men and boys. Mexico, Canada, Brazil, the United States, Norway, South Africa, India, and Sweden are among the countries where men are promoting gender equality and working to prevent violence against women and girls and supporting boys’ healthy development. Out of their endeavors have come calls to action for this year and beyond, calls that are centered around ratcheting up men’s efforts to prevent violence and that encourage forging new alliances with women’s and men’s groups working worldwide. We have a lot to teach one another.
The overarching theme of the four-day Engaging Men Symposium in Brazil offers a helpful framework for the week in, week out work men are doing around the world. “Men and Violence” includes addressing men’s use of physical violence against women, sexual violence, and the gendered dimensions of violence between men; “Men and Health” involves paying attention to sexual and reproductive health, HIV/AIDS, substance use, maternal and child health, and mental health; and “Men, Caregiving and Fatherhood” suggests focusing on the critical need for work-life balance and engaging men to more equally participate in caregiving. All those involved in men’s work today will be well served by exploring these themes.
Meanwhile, for anyone interested in seeing healthy masculinity promoted in the United States, the trio of major gatherings offers a connection to the changing culture in Washington. As President Obama charts a new course for the U.S. in its relations with the rest of the world—recasting the country as collaborative, thoughtful, and sensitive, and choosing negotiating over bullying — there is an opportunity for men of conscience to move our agenda of positive masculinity more squarely onto the international stage. The Obama-Biden brand of manhood seems more open to our message than any other administration in U.S. history.
Among those with a significant global reach who are promoting that message of positive masculinity is MenEngage (www.menengage.org), the umbrella organization for the global network to involve men and boys in gender equality. Its mission — to reduce gender inequalities and promote the health and well-being of women, men and children — is the foundation of the collective work of all the organizations and all the projects that VOICE MALE is committed to regularly chronicling.
As more men articulate a desire to balance inner growth and outer (social) action, new opportunities to connect will present themselves. Gatherings in places such as Rio, Washington, and New York remind us how far we’ve come from the old male buzz words of isolation and individualism. The watchwords for men today are collaboration and connection. Creating a new masculinity in this brave new world means letting go of flying solo in favor of taking the hand of another man. Look around. He may be right beside you ready to join in taking the next step.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
My Father Is Still with Me
by Rob Okun
Were he still alive, my father would have turned 101 on New Year’s Day. At least that’s when we would have celebrated his birthday. Accurate record-keeping was rare in the village he came from in Pinsk, Russia. Growing up, Dad said his birthday may have been in mid-November since he was named Joseph, after the biblical figure whose Torah portion is chanted in synagogues at that time of year.
You may recall from Sunday school — or the hit musical Joseph and His Technicolor Dreamcoat — that Joseph was sold to a neighboring tribe by his brothers, jealous that he was their father’s favorite. His brothers also didn’t like the dreams Joseph had suggesting, that he, their much younger brother, was destined to lead them. When he went to find his shepherd-brothers tending their flock, they stripped him of his rainbow-colored tunic, threw him in a pit and prepared to slaughter him. Persuaded by another brother not to kill him, they settled on selling him to the Ishmaelites for 20 pieces of silver. The betrayal Joseph experienced may have been more dramatic than many of us have experienced — or have heard of — but his story still serves as a cautionary tale. Indeed, during his lifetime, my father and his family were betrayed by one of his brothers.
Biblical Joseph, although he arrived in Egypt as a slave, landed on his feet, eventually becoming an indispensable advisor to the Pharoah, especially valued for his ability to interpret dreams. My father, who arrived in the U.S. as boy, had a similar gift, not so much for dream work but for what’s essential to that work — understanding people and human nature. He knew that peoples’ fears and uncertainties about the future sometimes clouded their best thinking. He understood that sometimes longtime friends and allies harbor secret agendas. Nevertheless, he always did his utmost to find the best in everyone, along the way reaching for his highest self and standing for that possibilty in others. That’s one of the lessons I’ve learned from his life.
My father was patient, rarely raised his voice, and spoke so lovingly and respectfully to and about his wife, my mother, that without expressly lecturing about it, he modeled for his children both how to act toward women and how to be a man. He was unusually gentle — quiet, steady, calm under pressure, an effective leader. He was a devoted father, operated a successful business, and was honorary life president of our temple. He paid tribute to the dead by overseeing burials and maintaining the cemetery grounds. Growing up I got used to hearing the funeral director’s voice on the other end of the phone asking, “Is your father there?” Today, a hundred years after his birth and 20 years after his death, he remains my role model. I feel his presence in my life, stronger than ever.
In my work with men over the years, both at the Men’s Resource Center for Change and in my private counseling practice, I’ve always carried his quiet, steady love. I’ve witnessed the tearful yearning adult sons have for the soothing love a healthy relationship with their fathers can bring. Our work, which encourages men to cultivate their softer, gentler sides — to push past their resistance to maintaining the tough guise of conventional masculinity — invites men to open to healing the wounds of the past. MRC tries to show men how to not let those wounds obscure their vision in the present. Yet for some, it remains and arduous, perilous journey. They may appear to authentically express a gentler, humanized masculinity but are too bound up in their old hurts and the old ways to fully get there. But since a key characteristic of men’s work is that it’s an ongoing, lifelong process, a journey worth continuing.
We don’t know what Joseph’s brothers talked about on their way home after selling him into slavery. While one of his brothers went back (too late) to free him, the rest were too blind to revisit what they had done. Undoubtedly they didn’t ask themselves: “How can we uncover a more collaborative brand of masculinity when the old ways of competitive, manipulative masculinity still holds sway over us?” Today, all these generations later, conventional manhood’s grip still seeks to control our lives.
In our efforts to recognize, to understand, and to cultivate humanized masculinity, it’s important to learn to discern when that part of us is authentic and when it is pretense. This is critically important to any men’s work, essential to the process. We all need role models, our Josephs, to offer us a handhold in life. For the Biblical Joseph and for my father, it didn’t matter how heavy or how many colors adorned their coats since nothing could obscure their understanding of an open heart. May that someday be true for the rest of us.
Were he still alive, my father would have turned 101 on New Year’s Day. At least that’s when we would have celebrated his birthday. Accurate record-keeping was rare in the village he came from in Pinsk, Russia. Growing up, Dad said his birthday may have been in mid-November since he was named Joseph, after the biblical figure whose Torah portion is chanted in synagogues at that time of year.
You may recall from Sunday school — or the hit musical Joseph and His Technicolor Dreamcoat — that Joseph was sold to a neighboring tribe by his brothers, jealous that he was their father’s favorite. His brothers also didn’t like the dreams Joseph had suggesting, that he, their much younger brother, was destined to lead them. When he went to find his shepherd-brothers tending their flock, they stripped him of his rainbow-colored tunic, threw him in a pit and prepared to slaughter him. Persuaded by another brother not to kill him, they settled on selling him to the Ishmaelites for 20 pieces of silver. The betrayal Joseph experienced may have been more dramatic than many of us have experienced — or have heard of — but his story still serves as a cautionary tale. Indeed, during his lifetime, my father and his family were betrayed by one of his brothers.
Biblical Joseph, although he arrived in Egypt as a slave, landed on his feet, eventually becoming an indispensable advisor to the Pharoah, especially valued for his ability to interpret dreams. My father, who arrived in the U.S. as boy, had a similar gift, not so much for dream work but for what’s essential to that work — understanding people and human nature. He knew that peoples’ fears and uncertainties about the future sometimes clouded their best thinking. He understood that sometimes longtime friends and allies harbor secret agendas. Nevertheless, he always did his utmost to find the best in everyone, along the way reaching for his highest self and standing for that possibilty in others. That’s one of the lessons I’ve learned from his life.
My father was patient, rarely raised his voice, and spoke so lovingly and respectfully to and about his wife, my mother, that without expressly lecturing about it, he modeled for his children both how to act toward women and how to be a man. He was unusually gentle — quiet, steady, calm under pressure, an effective leader. He was a devoted father, operated a successful business, and was honorary life president of our temple. He paid tribute to the dead by overseeing burials and maintaining the cemetery grounds. Growing up I got used to hearing the funeral director’s voice on the other end of the phone asking, “Is your father there?” Today, a hundred years after his birth and 20 years after his death, he remains my role model. I feel his presence in my life, stronger than ever.
In my work with men over the years, both at the Men’s Resource Center for Change and in my private counseling practice, I’ve always carried his quiet, steady love. I’ve witnessed the tearful yearning adult sons have for the soothing love a healthy relationship with their fathers can bring. Our work, which encourages men to cultivate their softer, gentler sides — to push past their resistance to maintaining the tough guise of conventional masculinity — invites men to open to healing the wounds of the past. MRC tries to show men how to not let those wounds obscure their vision in the present. Yet for some, it remains and arduous, perilous journey. They may appear to authentically express a gentler, humanized masculinity but are too bound up in their old hurts and the old ways to fully get there. But since a key characteristic of men’s work is that it’s an ongoing, lifelong process, a journey worth continuing.
We don’t know what Joseph’s brothers talked about on their way home after selling him into slavery. While one of his brothers went back (too late) to free him, the rest were too blind to revisit what they had done. Undoubtedly they didn’t ask themselves: “How can we uncover a more collaborative brand of masculinity when the old ways of competitive, manipulative masculinity still holds sway over us?” Today, all these generations later, conventional manhood’s grip still seeks to control our lives.
In our efforts to recognize, to understand, and to cultivate humanized masculinity, it’s important to learn to discern when that part of us is authentic and when it is pretense. This is critically important to any men’s work, essential to the process. We all need role models, our Josephs, to offer us a handhold in life. For the Biblical Joseph and for my father, it didn’t matter how heavy or how many colors adorned their coats since nothing could obscure their understanding of an open heart. May that someday be true for the rest of us.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Time for A National Teach-in on Men and Masculinity
by Rob Okun
This opinion piece from a year ago Valentine’s Day speaks about the need to organize a national teach-in on men and masculinity. While it was prompted by the senseless killings of five people by a troubled man perpetrated on a college campus near Chicago, the urgent need for a frank discussion of men—and not just those who are isolated, angry, and alone—can, perhaps, begin. With an administration in Washington more sensitive to these issues than ever before, to coin a phrase, this is our time.. Truth be told, at one time or another many men in our society feel isolated, angry and alone. I am no exception.
Even though it was again a man who went on another campus shooting spree, the national conversation has so far failed to focus on the root causes of this latest lethal outburst: men’s depression and how men are socialized. Until we acknowledge those issues, we can only expect more tragic bloodlettings.
The Valentine’s Day 2008 massacre at Northern Illinois University ended with five dead and 16 wounded before Steven Kazmierczak fatally turned one of his guns on himself. The multiple murders are the latest example of an expression of masculinity society continues to ignore at its peril. While a horrifying tragedy was unfolding on a campus 65 miles from Chicago, troubled men in tiny hamlets and big cities across the U.S. also were experiencing painful emotional episodes that few were paying attention to, including themselves. At organizations like the Men’s Resource Center for Change in Amherst, Massachusetts staff say they meet some of them and wish they could help more.
Men’s violence of the magnitude Kazmierczak perpetuated needs more than news shows inviting the likes of Dr. Phil on for analysis. We need a national teach-in on masculinity attended by doctors, social workers, teachers, clergy, the judiciary, legislators and parents. And the facilitators need to come from the ranks of those of us who have been examining male behavior and working with men and boys for the past 30 years.
The profile of the 27 year-old Kazmierczak follows a familiar pattern — a hospitalization for mental illness, a reticence to talk about his problems, a fascination with guns and, most tellingly, recently ceasing to take his depression medication. That he was in a two-year relationship with a young woman who said she was shocked to discover he had committed such a horrific act only adds to the tragedy of men hiding the secret of their mental anguish, especially from those they love.
The story isn’t about Kazmierczak opening fire at innocent students, as tragic as the loss of lives is. It’s about a society that still doesn’t acknowledge maleness as the singular characteristic tying together virtually every similar act of violence over the past decade. We’ve known it was masculinity since the shootings in Pearl, Mississippi in October, 1997; Jonesboro, Arkansas in March, 1998; Littleton, Colorado in April, 1999; Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in October, 2006; and, 10 months ago, by the slaughter at Virginia Tech. The inconvenient truth is not just that all the assailants have been male but that until we make that fact predominant all the observations the forensic psychologists the news programs trot out are pointless.
The conspiracy of silence about men and depression, men’s reticence to seek counseling, the health care community’s underreporting of the relationship between men’s mental health and a host of related problems — from alcoholism to heart disease—all have to be challenged. This is a campaign the Surgeon General needs to mount with all the resources of the one that changed social attitudes about smoking. The current social agreement about masculinity assumes a minority of men like Kazmierczak are an unavoidable part of male behavior.
Certainly society doesn’t sanction horrific mass killings, but we have compartmentalized these particular aberrant acts as a kind of “boys will be boys gone wild” — not as an endorsement but as an explanation of the inevitable. We can no longer ignore the fact that too many men live lives of quiet desperation—it isn’t just the loner who doesn’t talk with anyone about life’s struggle. Most of us men, at one time or another go underground with our feelings as part of a misguided strategy to better negotiate our lives. In Kazmierczak’s case, his silence—to himself and his girlfriend—proved deadly.
It’s time to draw a new social agreement about masculinity proclaiming we will intervene with moody, shut down, angry males and not just those found on our campuses or in offices and factories. Sadly, they are also on our elementary school playgrounds and walking the corridors of our middle schools.
How many more men must lash out before we acknowledge men’s mental health is as serious a health issue as prostate cancer? Mental health treatment for troubled men must rise to the top of the national agenda if there’s to be any hope of preventing future tragedies. The killings in Illinois may have ended, but the national campaign about the crisis in masculinity has barely begun.
This opinion piece from a year ago Valentine’s Day speaks about the need to organize a national teach-in on men and masculinity. While it was prompted by the senseless killings of five people by a troubled man perpetrated on a college campus near Chicago, the urgent need for a frank discussion of men—and not just those who are isolated, angry, and alone—can, perhaps, begin. With an administration in Washington more sensitive to these issues than ever before, to coin a phrase, this is our time.. Truth be told, at one time or another many men in our society feel isolated, angry and alone. I am no exception.
Even though it was again a man who went on another campus shooting spree, the national conversation has so far failed to focus on the root causes of this latest lethal outburst: men’s depression and how men are socialized. Until we acknowledge those issues, we can only expect more tragic bloodlettings.
The Valentine’s Day 2008 massacre at Northern Illinois University ended with five dead and 16 wounded before Steven Kazmierczak fatally turned one of his guns on himself. The multiple murders are the latest example of an expression of masculinity society continues to ignore at its peril. While a horrifying tragedy was unfolding on a campus 65 miles from Chicago, troubled men in tiny hamlets and big cities across the U.S. also were experiencing painful emotional episodes that few were paying attention to, including themselves. At organizations like the Men’s Resource Center for Change in Amherst, Massachusetts staff say they meet some of them and wish they could help more.
Men’s violence of the magnitude Kazmierczak perpetuated needs more than news shows inviting the likes of Dr. Phil on for analysis. We need a national teach-in on masculinity attended by doctors, social workers, teachers, clergy, the judiciary, legislators and parents. And the facilitators need to come from the ranks of those of us who have been examining male behavior and working with men and boys for the past 30 years.
The profile of the 27 year-old Kazmierczak follows a familiar pattern — a hospitalization for mental illness, a reticence to talk about his problems, a fascination with guns and, most tellingly, recently ceasing to take his depression medication. That he was in a two-year relationship with a young woman who said she was shocked to discover he had committed such a horrific act only adds to the tragedy of men hiding the secret of their mental anguish, especially from those they love.
The story isn’t about Kazmierczak opening fire at innocent students, as tragic as the loss of lives is. It’s about a society that still doesn’t acknowledge maleness as the singular characteristic tying together virtually every similar act of violence over the past decade. We’ve known it was masculinity since the shootings in Pearl, Mississippi in October, 1997; Jonesboro, Arkansas in March, 1998; Littleton, Colorado in April, 1999; Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in October, 2006; and, 10 months ago, by the slaughter at Virginia Tech. The inconvenient truth is not just that all the assailants have been male but that until we make that fact predominant all the observations the forensic psychologists the news programs trot out are pointless.
The conspiracy of silence about men and depression, men’s reticence to seek counseling, the health care community’s underreporting of the relationship between men’s mental health and a host of related problems — from alcoholism to heart disease—all have to be challenged. This is a campaign the Surgeon General needs to mount with all the resources of the one that changed social attitudes about smoking. The current social agreement about masculinity assumes a minority of men like Kazmierczak are an unavoidable part of male behavior.
Certainly society doesn’t sanction horrific mass killings, but we have compartmentalized these particular aberrant acts as a kind of “boys will be boys gone wild” — not as an endorsement but as an explanation of the inevitable. We can no longer ignore the fact that too many men live lives of quiet desperation—it isn’t just the loner who doesn’t talk with anyone about life’s struggle. Most of us men, at one time or another go underground with our feelings as part of a misguided strategy to better negotiate our lives. In Kazmierczak’s case, his silence—to himself and his girlfriend—proved deadly.
It’s time to draw a new social agreement about masculinity proclaiming we will intervene with moody, shut down, angry males and not just those found on our campuses or in offices and factories. Sadly, they are also on our elementary school playgrounds and walking the corridors of our middle schools.
How many more men must lash out before we acknowledge men’s mental health is as serious a health issue as prostate cancer? Mental health treatment for troubled men must rise to the top of the national agenda if there’s to be any hope of preventing future tragedies. The killings in Illinois may have ended, but the national campaign about the crisis in masculinity has barely begun.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Generation Next's Egalitarian Monologues
by Rob Okun
In addition to productions of the play at colleges and universities, some high schools have begun producing the play, including the one in my hometown, Amherst, Massachusetts.
Performances of The Vagina Monologues, presented around the world to raise consciousness and money for the movement to end violence against women have rarely included high school productions. At Amherst High School in Massachusetts the local performance was organized by members of the Women’s Rights Club, a student group that blends activism and education about gender violence into an inspirational mix. The group is a powerful beacon spotlighting a generous vision of healing and hope of what young people are capable of achieving.
While working to end domestic and sexual violence remains a daunting task, there is cause for hope thanks to students like these, members of Generation Next. Despite coming of age amid a perpetual onslaught of violence-laden and sexualized pop culture imagery, these emerging young adults are challenging a society reluctant to admit it still sees male dominance as essential to a functioning social order.
The 2004 production of the play at Amherst High drew national media attention, including an appearance by the play’s student director on the Today show along with playwright Eve Ensler. A small firestorm of protest questioning the production being performed at a high school long ago died down. Consciousness about the topics the play explores — the reality of the dangers women face—continues to rise. Also increasing is the number of students advocating for an ongoing examination of women’s equality and safety and men’s roles in challenging violence as legitimate topics to learn about.
As a symbol for other young people to follow, the Women’s Rights Club is impressive. It has 85 members, a quarter of whom are males. In fact, one of the group’s co-presidents is a young man who speaks eloquently about why men and boys should act respectfully toward women and girls.
Among males, both in high schools and colleges, consciousness about confronting violence against women continues to grow. It is good news that more male students are getting involved. From Amherst College to Pomona College in California, in increasing numbers young men are establishing groups to educate and support themselves as they challenge one another to drop the old dominating ways they’ve been socialized to believe in. On many campuses, programs exploring a range of issues young women and men face as they grow into adulthood are seeing an increase in enrollment. Through them men get a window into the world their mothers and sisters inhabit—a world where sexual harassment and sexual assault are a fact of daily life. A world where a woman’s safety requires her to look in the backseat of her car every time she gets in it. A world where before going out at night means carrying a whistle, or making sure you know how to reach campus security. A world men don’t inhabit.
Many men chafe at acknowledging how prevalent violence against women is, minimizing the real and present danger women cope with every day. But a growing number of younger men, new leaders emerging from Generation Next, are finding their voices. To stay on pitch they must listen too; in their enthusiasm they mustn’t drown out their female counterparts in the chorus of change. It is appropriate for men to practice playing offstage roles in supporting women, and not just in obvious circumstances such as productions of The Vagina Monologues.
While men have much to learn from each other, we have much to learn from women as we work to create a safe, egalitarian society. Among the most difficult lessons is admitting we have to give up some of the privilege we enjoy. Learning that lesson in high school or college, rather than decades later, would be a welcome sign of hope for gender reconciliation for all of us.
In addition to productions of the play at colleges and universities, some high schools have begun producing the play, including the one in my hometown, Amherst, Massachusetts.
Performances of The Vagina Monologues, presented around the world to raise consciousness and money for the movement to end violence against women have rarely included high school productions. At Amherst High School in Massachusetts the local performance was organized by members of the Women’s Rights Club, a student group that blends activism and education about gender violence into an inspirational mix. The group is a powerful beacon spotlighting a generous vision of healing and hope of what young people are capable of achieving.
While working to end domestic and sexual violence remains a daunting task, there is cause for hope thanks to students like these, members of Generation Next. Despite coming of age amid a perpetual onslaught of violence-laden and sexualized pop culture imagery, these emerging young adults are challenging a society reluctant to admit it still sees male dominance as essential to a functioning social order.
The 2004 production of the play at Amherst High drew national media attention, including an appearance by the play’s student director on the Today show along with playwright Eve Ensler. A small firestorm of protest questioning the production being performed at a high school long ago died down. Consciousness about the topics the play explores — the reality of the dangers women face—continues to rise. Also increasing is the number of students advocating for an ongoing examination of women’s equality and safety and men’s roles in challenging violence as legitimate topics to learn about.
As a symbol for other young people to follow, the Women’s Rights Club is impressive. It has 85 members, a quarter of whom are males. In fact, one of the group’s co-presidents is a young man who speaks eloquently about why men and boys should act respectfully toward women and girls.
Among males, both in high schools and colleges, consciousness about confronting violence against women continues to grow. It is good news that more male students are getting involved. From Amherst College to Pomona College in California, in increasing numbers young men are establishing groups to educate and support themselves as they challenge one another to drop the old dominating ways they’ve been socialized to believe in. On many campuses, programs exploring a range of issues young women and men face as they grow into adulthood are seeing an increase in enrollment. Through them men get a window into the world their mothers and sisters inhabit—a world where sexual harassment and sexual assault are a fact of daily life. A world where a woman’s safety requires her to look in the backseat of her car every time she gets in it. A world where before going out at night means carrying a whistle, or making sure you know how to reach campus security. A world men don’t inhabit.
Many men chafe at acknowledging how prevalent violence against women is, minimizing the real and present danger women cope with every day. But a growing number of younger men, new leaders emerging from Generation Next, are finding their voices. To stay on pitch they must listen too; in their enthusiasm they mustn’t drown out their female counterparts in the chorus of change. It is appropriate for men to practice playing offstage roles in supporting women, and not just in obvious circumstances such as productions of The Vagina Monologues.
While men have much to learn from each other, we have much to learn from women as we work to create a safe, egalitarian society. Among the most difficult lessons is admitting we have to give up some of the privilege we enjoy. Learning that lesson in high school or college, rather than decades later, would be a welcome sign of hope for gender reconciliation for all of us.
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