I'm happy to find there are men, like Dr. Katz, so passionately addressing the issue of male violence and gender imbalance (to use a nice term for a great worldwide injustice).
Sociology 101, First Night of Class
I wanted to like him
This twenty-something ex-Marine
Young enough to be my son
Too young for the things he's seen.
His cragged smile creased his face
Reflecting back the horror
Buried deep in his eyes
His giggle belying his past.
What broken scene makes a man
glorify murder? Causes him to gloat
As he recounts his fun--shooting turtles
On a friend's twenty acre ranch.
What makes him wish he was an infantryman
Because they get away with
Bursting through doors
And killing whatever moves?
What mother ever raised her son
To be this monster?
Laughing as he talks of killing,
As though it's a picnic in the park.
And I, his Jewish sociology teacher
Who takes her sacred obligation
"Thou shalt not murder" seriously,
Pray for a resocialization miracle.
Debra L. Winegarten
1-14-2014
All rights reserved
Tough Guise: Violence, Media and the Crisis in Masculinity
While the social construction of femininity has been widely examined, the dominant role of masculinity has until recently remained largely invisible. Tough Guise is the first educational video geared toward college and high school students to systematically examine the relationship between pop-cultural imagery and the social construction of masculine identities in the U.S. Jackson Katz argues that widespread violence in American society needs to be understood as part of an ongoing crisis in masculinity. http://youtu.be/KTvSfeCRxe8
http://youtu.be/3exzMPT4nGI
** For a powerful interview with Amy Goodman on Domestic Violence - the subject is an HBO Film "Private Violence: Survivors & Advocates Confront Victim Blaming & the Epidemic of Domestic Abuse" currently at the Sundance Film Festival.
***
Another statistic: Since the December 2012 shooting in Newtown, CT, there have been at least 35 school shootings in America - here they are. Every one was instigated by a (young) male.
(source: http://www.demandaction.org/schoolshootings?source=FB00036)
# |
Date |
City |
State |
School Name |
1. | 1/08/2013 | Fort Myers | FL | Apostolic Revival Center Christian School |
2. | 1/10/2013 | Taft | CA | Taft Union High School |
3. | 1/15/2013 | St. Louis | MO | Stevens Institute of Business & Arts |
4. | 1/15/2013 | Hazard | KY | Hazard Community and Technical College |
5. | 1/16/2013 | Chicago | IL | Chicago State University |
6. | 1/22/2013 |
Houston | TX | Lone Star College North Harris Campus |
7. | 1/31/2013 | Atlanta | GA | Price Middle School |
8. | 2/13/2013 | San Leandro | CA | Hillside Elementary School |
9. | 2/27/2013 | Atlanta | GA | Henry W. Grady HS |
10. | 3/18/2013 | Orlando | FL | University of Central Florida |
11. | 3/21/2013 | Southgate | MI | Davidson Middle School |
12. | 4/19/2013 | Cambridge | MA | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
13. | 4/29/2013 | Cincinnati | OH | La Salle High School |
14. | 6/7/2013 | Santa Monica | CA | Santa Monica College |
15. | 6/19/2013 | W. Palm Beach | FL | Alexander W. Dreyfoos School of the Arts |
16. | 8/15/2013 | Clarksville | TN | Northwest High School |
17. | 8/20/2013 | Decatur | GA | Ronald E. McNair Discovery Learning Academy |
18. | 8/23/2013 | Sardis | MS | North Panola High School |
19. | 8/30/2013 | Winston-Salem | NC | Carver High School |
20. | 9/28/2013 | Gray | ME | New Gloucester High School |
21. | 10/4/2013 | Pine Hills | FL | Agape Christian Academy |
22. | 10/15/2013 | Austin | TX | Lanier High School |
23. | 10/21/2013 | Sparks | NV | Sparks Middle School |
24. | 11/1/2013 | Algona | IA | Algona High/Middle School |
25. | 11/2/2013 | Greensboro | NC | North Carolina A&T State University |
26. | 11/3/2013 | Stone Mountain | GA | Stephenson High School |
27. | 11/21/2013 | Rapid City | SD | South Dakota School of Mines & Technology |
28. | 12/4/2013 | Winter Garden | FL | West Orange High School |
29. | 12/13/2013 | Arapahoe County | CO | Arapahoe High School |
30. | 1/9/2014 | Jackson | TN | Liberty Technology Magnet HS |
31. | 1/14/2014 | Roswell | NM | Berrendo Middle School |
32. | 1/15/2014 | Lancaster | PA | Martin Luther King Jr. ES |
33. | 1/17/2014 | Philadelphia | PA | Delaware Valley Charter HS |
34. | 1/20/2014 | Chester | PA | Widener University |
35. | 1/21/2014 | West Lafayette | IN | Purdue University |
Data: These are incidents in which a firearm was fired or brandished on school property, including colleges and universities. Incidents were identified through media reports, so this is likely an undercount of the true total.
Last updated: 01/21/2014
7 comments:
What's interesting about all this is that women are still blamed - for whatever. It's been that way since- when? Medieval times? Salem?
I think it goes back considerably farther. "Eve" is blamed in the Bible for the "beginning of sin" and the fall from grace. That's a lot of blame and "religious justification" for the enslavement of half the human race, not to mention the complete absence of a female voice in the Bible, perceived by millions and millions of people as the "word of God".
But then, "God" in that view is an old man without a wife, sister, or daughter, so I guess he's biased.
I enjoyed this informative article . You really are a great writer and I so appreciate your blog.
I almost have my voice back . I will give you a shout in another day or two. I have an appointment with the lama in San Fran on Valentines Day.. At Noon. I love it. My valentine is a Buddhist Lama.. Well that does sort of sound normal for a girl like me I guess.. LOL Be well dear Lauren.
Cheers,
Mana
You know, there's a sculpture in a front yard here in Houston of a wee little man shooting a big GIANT man. It is quite obvious that the artist was exploring the correlation and possible causal link between the proliferation of male-on-male gun violence and the Biblical story of David and Goliath. It's interesting to note that many of these school boys who resort to gun violence are wee little ones generally not very well integrated into things . . .
Back during the run-up to the Iraq War I was living under an abandoned railroad bridge not far from that sculpture and the homeowner put this terribly gaudy, "patriotic" (isn't it interesting how patriotic seems a merging of patriarchic and idiotic?) rosette over the gun in the wee man's hand, concealing it. Obviously, in the case of the Iraq War, Iraq was the wee one and the U.S. the Goliath. Every time I went by there, pushing my grocery basket of scrap metal, I would take the rosette off and lay it on the ground. Of course I also had a sign on my back, "Regrets, I've had a few, but then again, I did it my way . . . George Dumbya is a Punk!" which wasn't well received in Houston, Texas. The homeowner kept putting the rosette back on the gun so I finally climbed it high up into the oak tree in his front yard and tied it to a branch. Heh, heh, I won that little argument.
Quite a story, Wes. Thanks for sharing it!
Like the Quakers and many others, I'd like to think that humanity still could evolve to a world that despises, instead of celebrates, violence, where boys are truly socialized to be "gentlemen", and a sensitive, creative, gentle boy does not have to suffer, but rather is encouraged for his compassion.
5 out of the states you list occurred in florida, One of them was practically in our backyard - Dreyfuss. I had hoped that newtown wold spell change. It hasn't. What's it going to take?
To be honest my friends, I'm not sure it could change unless there was a huge, huge massacre. Gun control, like the perpetration of violence, is deeply embedded in patriarchal culture, mythos and values. Just witness the endless stories about guns, and the rape/murder of (mostly) young women on TV - our "entertainment".
Still we have to keep raising our voices, and educating the young.
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