This is a good piece (Helium, 9/12/09).  At least in my case, it gives me some education about misandry in kids' television programming.  The writer, Donald Jeffries, has children and watches their programs.  What he reports is what we've all seen in some measure - depicitions of female-on-male violence, even in programming aimed at little kids, is considered OK by whoever controls the content.  Actually, it's not just OK, it's portrayed as an affirmative good.

According to the article, and what's also familiar, is that female-on-male violence is not only acceptable in some circumstances, but apparently in all of them.  In other words, there doesn't have to be a clear justification of the female character's violence toward a male character.  He doesn't have to be an ogre, a lawbreaker or even a danger; violence directed at him by a woman is in all cases appropriate.

Not long ago, I posted a piece about a man in the U.K. on whom it had recently dawned that the books he was reading to his daughter were astonishingly misandric.  He'd belatedly realized that virtually all the male characters were presented as either stupid, incompetent, unreliable, dangerous or some combination thereof.  His piece was not specifically about anti-male violence, but it, along with the piece linked to here, helps to show just what our children are being taught from the earliest of ages.

Back to the Jeffries piece, though.  What he notices, and what I've noticed many times myself, is that women's violence against men is presented, not only as appropriate, but as easy.  Time and again, in all sorts of media, we see small women and girls knocking the lights out of big, burly men.  It's so obvious and so obviously at odds with reality, that there must be a reason for it, so I've tried to figure out what motivates it.  Clearly, messages are being sent, but what are they?

First, feminism has always deemed male power to be illegitimate, i.e. not deserved or earned.  So when a tiny woman or girl is portrayed as able to physically overcome a big, strong man, the message is "See, he looks powerful, but really isn't."  His power is an illusion.  He's a straw man and indeed always had been if we'd but seen past his appearance.  This is a political message.

The second message I see is that power comes, not from size or strength, but from virtue.  The lesson is that women, because they are per se virtuous, are strong.  Men, because we lack virtue are easily defeated by women who have no such shortcoming.  This is simply the misandric version of old cartoons like Mighty Mouse, who was small but could defeat the bad guys because his heart and his cause were pure. 

Of course Mighty Mouse defeated those who were wrong because of what they did, i.e. they were literally 'wrongdoers.'  Now, men are wrong because of their sex alone.  No actual bad act need be shown.  Therefore, the programs Jeffries discusses discard any ethical point of view.  They don't promote ethical behavior (the punishment of wrongdoing) because men, in their worldview, are incapable of conforming to ethical norms.  Born with a penis, you deserve to be beaten up, killed, whatever.  End of story.

Third, I think the programs serve a pedagogical function.  They teach children how things should be in the estimation of those producing the programs.  Thus, if a man happens to be big and strong, it becomes his duty to submit to physical abuse by women.  Even when, in reality, she proves incapable of levelling him with a single punch, he is not supposed to defend himself, much less fight back. 

The male victims of female violence in these productions are presented as passive.  They make little or no effort to defend themselves and are immediately dispatched without so much as mussing the woman's hair.  It is that passivity in the face of female violence that is being taught.  Men are being taught to "take it."  That pedagogy of course, accords nicely with the macho, stiff upper lip notion of masculine virtue that's so familiar.

Coincidentally, that's also the lesson being taught by DV laws and by media depictions of DV.  By predominantly arresting men, irrespective of who is injured or who initiated an incident of DV, police practice teaches men that a woman's physical abuse of them will not be punished. 

Likewise, the almost universal refusal by the news media to even acknowledge, much less condemn, female-on-male violence, sends an unmistakable message - that men's injury at the hands of women is not even worth the time to report.  In short, when women attack men, male passivity is the correct response.  Society won't support your claim to being a victim and if you fight back, you'll be jailed.  So passivity is the only reasonable response.

Those are just my thoughts.  The Jeffries piece is a good one.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 18th, 2009 at 9:50 am and is filed under Men and the Media. You can trackback from your own site.