Women's studies needs men's input
How many people have seen nine life-sized
silhouettes on campus, all women, some the size of children?
Mika Wantanabe
If you were curious enough to go up to
them, you would notice that seven of them had writing on them, which include
their names and ages. They were victims of domestic violence and child
abuse.
October is National Domestic Violence
Awareness Month. As a student currently taking a women's studies class,
I knew this.
How can we turn our heads and say, "it
is not my problem" when a woman is battered every 15 seconds in this country?
Domestic violence can work both ways.
Men can be the victims of domestic violence,
but the fact is that the majority of the adult domestic violence victims
are women.
Men are always the accused, many times
for what they have not personally done.
However, it is true that when we talk
about domestic violence or women's issues in general, men's participation
in the discussion is rare. Women's issues are gender issues, yet
is usually only women who are discussing them and not enough men.
Alyce La Violette who spoke on campus
last week, said domestic violence is an act of violence, but it needs special
attention because the issue involves more than anger management for abusers.
Domestic violence also involves the issues of gender, non-physical violence
and power control.
Men can't be left out of these discussions.
Masculinity and femininity need to be discussed from both sides.
Mika Watanabe is a public relations
major at Cal State Long Beach. |
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