No Woman Signs Up for This

Abstract

Nobody starts off in a dating relationship knowing they are going to be verbally or psychologically abused, hit or punched. No woman willingly agrees to this. Recent media coverage by Newshubb (2017) revealed sexist comments made by some young college students over social media that were disrespectful toward women.After posting comments about rape, apologies were issued, and the young men said it was meant to be a joke. The young men involved have been suspended and counselled. Agencies like Rape Crisis were called in to talk to these young men about respect and consent in an intimate relationship. I wondered what part of any comments - when made about rape - could be construed as a joke. I also began to wonder if young men are made to think about how the sexualized language they use objectifies women and how much of this language conveys their values and beliefs about women, and how this contributes to the high rates of intimate partner violence (IPV) in our society.So what is it that we teach our sons about the values of a 'good man' and how is this related to the masculinities of the present-day New Zealand male? The ideal aspects of a New Zealand male, as defined by his peers, is one based on early pioneering values of toughness and the repression of tenderness in order to be a good soldier and rugby player (Abdinor, 2000). Bray and Hutchinson (2007) claimed that the developments of boys' masculinities are socially shaped to conform to an image of hardness, and the suppression of tender emotions, which leads to the acceptability of anger. Murphy (2009) found that although men would like to be caring and loving toward their partners, there is pressure to conform to the dominant masculine view held by New Zealand society. Perhaps a dissonance occurs when men are socialized to be physically strong, good providers, and allowed to display anger by society yet expected to be caring, loving, and respectful partners.The way that violence began for women, in my PhD study, was through power and control. Power and control came through initially as ownership practices that could be construed as caring. The violence was hidden and dressed as care and protection until it was slowly revealed as control. Amanda's narrative is a prime example of how power and control proceeds gradually and is often mistaken for the intensity of love and protection before it descends into violence.Well no one says hi my name is so and so and punches you in the nose because that's no sort of opening line.The way it unfolds is interesting and unusual... ...[he was] very protective, very caring, very sort of, "I'll come here with you to do this, go with you and I'll take care of this," like a bear type and it was 'oh that's so nice that he's caring for me', but it was actually that he needed to control this for himself in case I caused some disruption. But interestingly to start with I saw it as very caring and not as control or a loss of freedom. Just saw it as, 'someone wants to be with me that much that everything has to be engineered that way'.There is a level of maturity needed to work out one's identity without conforming to peer pressure. Perhaps if we had a college curriculum that asked boys what they think masculinity is in New Zealand society, and what their ideal aspects are of a New Zealand male in the 21st century we may begin to understand gender-based violence and the imbalance of power relations in which IPV is found. …