Male Sexual Violence: Thoughts on Engagement

The feminist call to make sexual violence culpable is the lone voice articulating such a demand in an overall culture which is repeatedly telling men that being manly means being ready to be violent; it means forcibly putting women "in their place". The male gender role generates violence by castigating men if they are not violent, and rewarding them with honour when they are. The existence of laws which criminalise men's sexual assault on women have not deterred male violence because it has become merely another ground on which men can prove their masculinity.