There are several men I have loved in my life: my father, my husband, my son, and my brother. There are also many men whom I have liked and admired; school friends, colleagues, partners of my girlfriends.
Most of these I would wish to describe as ‘good men’. Most of them would offer you their coat on a cold day. They love their children, they play with them and hug them, they go to work, they don’t drink too much, they don’t cheat or fight. They are educated, and they separate their recycling and go to the supermarket on the weekend, and know how to clean their homes. Perhaps they drive their wives crazy sometimes when they leave their underpants on the floor, they don’t remember to close cupboard doors, they claim they can’t fold the laundry because they don’t remember whose things belong to whom. Maybe their wives carry the bulk of the mental load in these houses, and sometimes dream about single life. But, all in all, these are good men.
Here’s the problem that we don’t like to speak about. Good is not enough. Not when good actually means accepting, content, satisfied.
I have yet to meet one of these men who really understands the challenges of women, and more importantly, who really wishes to understand.
A man who looks honestly at the world, listens to what women are saying, and hears it with an open mind. Every man I meet is held back by his own fear of culpability, which binds him to the status quo, no matter how decent he wishes to be. Men continue to benefit from the systems in place, and therefore have little incentive to seek change, or simply do not see the change that needs to come.
You can see it in policy, even here in Austria. In Vienna, where childcare is government funded from a younger age and politically prioritised, women return to work earlier and in greater numbers. Step just outside the city, into more conservatively governed regions, and the picture shifts. Funding is not available until children are older and the expectation, though not explicitly stated, is that women will stay home longer. It is not a law that tells women to step back. It is structures and financial penalties which make it seem like the best possible option, and which shape family dynamics and women’s freedoms.
As policy fails to support women’s advancement, so do the underlying beliefs which even the best of men seem unable to let go of. My father, who can build a wall, cook dinner, clean the house, and care for my mother, can still not be part of a conversation about violence against women and girls, without having to retaliate with the stereotype of women as gold diggers. My brother, who has always put women on pedestals and who speaks of his wife in worshipful tones, once told me he couldn’t agree with the word feminism, that it was too confrontational and aggressive. He preferred ‘humanist’, his own discomfort more important than the erasure of decades of female struggle for emancipation. My colleague, who works in a liberal international school where the UN Declaration on Human Rights is written right into our own mission statement, still does not understand why having to even debate abortion rights feels like an affront to my own bodily autonomy.
These are not bad men. But they have never had to live in a world where their presence, their freedoms, their existence as equal members has ever been up for debate.
As straight, white males, my husband, my father, my brother, and my colleague have never been confronted with a debate about their humanity and equality. They have never listened to discussions about whether they should have control over their own bodies. They are not exposed to content daily, which makes it clear how little the world values people in bodies like theirs. They simply are. And therefore they do not need to consider the struggle for people who are still fighting to be.
It’s Not Just The Andrew Tates
It is tempting to look for outside forces to blame, for these are our family and friends, and we do not want to judge them too harshly. We want to understand them, exonerate them, so they can continue to be the good men in our lives. It is easy to point fingers at the Andrew Tates in the world, the Donald Trumps, the lawmakers, and influencers who spew their hatred and disdain for women out across the internet and into our homes. They play their part for sure, but their seeds can only find purchase on fertile ground, and the real problem is that too much ground is plowed and ready. The danger lies less in these obvious enemies, who rant and rage and provide a clear target to rally around, but the good men who stand back and allow them to speak.
Good men do not support the Andrew Tates, but too often, they also do not silence them.
Many see them as a fringe, a joke, or not to be taken seriously. Which is easier to do when it is not your humanity that has been put up for discussion? Good men do not go online, abusing women, threatening, hating. But they don’t need to. In not saying or doing anything, they condone and allow. And more than this. Good men silence the women they love in quieter, less obvious ways they might not even be aware of. They laugh at the joke. They read the news and say nothing. Worst of all, they say ‘not all men’. Of course, not all men. I work with men, I live with men, I walk down a street full of men, and most of them will not try to hurt me. But some will. And the problem lies in what happens to those who do, that society offers no belief in women, and no censure of men. One man in a room may hate women, make a comment, or a joke. How many of his friends or colleagues in that room will tell him to stop? Even if they are good men, who love the women in their lives and who are loved in return? Not many, and certainly not enough.
I have loved and liked many good men in my life so far, and I have felt silenced and censured by all of them at times. I have been told that feminism is boring to listen to, is spoiling the mood, and I have had to defend my beliefs and my rights. And their most powerful weapon, that they wield so carelessly, is the painting of the feminist as the harridan, the shrew; she is boring, she is whinging, she is sexless, humourless and dull. It is dull for men to hear these things, even if they are good men and they love their women. They do not want to hear, they do not want to be confronted with the reality of the world in which their wives are living.
Good Intentions Are Not Action
Good men want to do the right thing, but they are mired in their own unwillingness to face reality. It is truly uncomfortable to confront and accept one’s own privilege. To acknowledge that others live in a different world than you do, and that you play a part, even unwittingly, in supporting the oppression of the other group. It is easy to understand why good men would want to say, look at me – I am one of the good guys, I play an equal part in the home, I share money, work, responsibility with my wife. And that may be true. But you do not share the burden of walking through the world in a female body.
Women are tired. I am tired. As I write, laws are being written across the US that unravel women’s rights to their own bodies, through attempts to grant ‘fetal personhood’, further restrict access to abortion pills, and enforce ‘cross-border’ interstate laws. I read an article that a new study shows one-third of Gen Z boys believe a woman should obey her husband. Olympic champions are made the butt of a paedophile’s locker room jokes. When I carry this outrage and hurt back, to share and seek solace in my home, I am met with male silence and disdain. It is too much. I am always too much.
It is time for men, good men, to come and pick up the weight. To step over your own guilt and discomfort. We do not want to blame you; we want to lean on you. We want to join voices with the men we love, not speak into the void. Many men are not good men. There are men who hurt and abuse, who scream hatred and misogyny. But there are so many more who do not, and who could not, and those voices together would have the power to drown out those who are not good men. So please, it is time to listen. To put your ego and discomfort aside and truly listen. Without your own fear of fingers pointing, to hear the women you love, with empathy, trust, and curiosity. And then, when you have listened, to act, to speak. Good men have the power to change the world with us.
Written by Nicola Beckel.
Nicola is an aspiring feminist writer living and working in Vienna, Austria. She is a Primary School teacher in an International setting, committed to educating good humans. Nicola is a mother of three whose passions include running, triathlon, and reading everything she can get her hands on.
Illustration by Dorottya Juhász.
