Primary prevention of men’s violence and the sexist joke
Can we really prevent men’s violence against women by calling out sexist jokes? No, of course not. But also, yes.
It’s not about “disrespecting women”. It’s about structures and understanding the dynamics of men’s violence against women.
The easiest way to explain it is with an example, which is loosely based on something I watched happen on Saturday afternoon many years ago.
Imagine five average Australian men having a BBQ. Let’s call them Andrew, Peter, Samal, Hassan, and Dave.
Andrew tells the other men about his wife burning last night’s dinner and makes a joke about hitting her to teach her to not do it again. He only makes the joke because he thinks the idea of hurting his wife is so ludicrously far-fetched that it’s funny. He’s being ironic, but certainly doesn’t intend any harm, and he feels a bit uncomfortable as soon as he said it.
Peter and Samal are deeply uncomfortable when he makes the joke, but they don’t want to make it a big deal or embarrass Andrew, so they laugh perfunctorily and look away.
Hassan was thinking about a problem at the office and barely noticed the joke but takes advantage of the silence to start talking about work. Peter, Samal, and Andrew are relieved the awkward moment has passed and lean into giving Hassan the advice he needs.
None of these men are violent and listening to the joke, even making the joke, will not change that. They all have positive attitudes toward women, despite Andrew’s questionable choices in jokes. Even if one of them had called out the joke, it wouldn’t have done anything to change male violence because nothing needed to change.
Dave laughs at the joke too, but he has a different story.
Dave is violent and controlling to his wife. He is the only man at the BBQ who ever has hurt a woman. He never talks about it and never does it in front of other people, which is why none of his friend know about it. They assume, as most of us do, that their friend’s internal worlds are very similar to their own. None of them would abuse a woman, Dave is their friend, ergo, Dave would never abuse a woman. They don’t know enough about the way men who abuse women operate, so they don’t know to question that assumption.
Dave also makes assumptions about his friends and their hidden worlds.
Like most violent men, Dave believes that all men are violent. (This is the bitter hilarity of the NotAllMen defence – there is only one group of people who genuinely believe that all men are violent, and it’s not women or even feminists. It’s violent men.)
Dave tells himself – and his wife – that she is the cause of all his behaviour. He believes he is the victim of her disrespect and deception and that his response is not really violence, it’s just what men do when women shame them. He keeps it secret and assumes all other men share the same shameful secret. It doesn’t matter what women say about domestic violence because they’re not part of the shared secret, and in his mind, the more they go on about it the more they reinforce that women don’t understand the reality of being a man.
So, what happens for Dave when Andrew makes that joke, Peter and Samal laugh, and Hassan jumps in to hurriedly changes the subject? In his reality all the other men are laughing for the same reason he laughed - it’s funny because it’s true. Sometimes you do slap your wife and it’s not that big a deal because she’s the one who causes all the problems. Dave would never come right out and say this, but joking about it is how he tells other men that this is what he does and seeks reassurance that they’re doing it too. So, for him, not for any of the others but for him, the joke and the laughter are reinforcing that abusing women is normal male behaviour. He doesn’t need to change his beliefs or his behaviour because he thinks the other men in his life are telling him it’s a normal way for men to act.
So, Dave chuckles along with Peter and Samal, then turns his attention to Hassan’s problems at work and no one notices a thing. None of the others have any idea why he laughed. They’d be horrified if they did. He has no idea that they might be laughing because the very idea of slapping a woman is so alien to them that it’s ludicrous to even consider it.
All five men are chuckling away in their own reality, comfortably believing they all think the same thing.
The entire interaction took less than 30 seconds. In a normal day, as Dave watches the news, streams his favourite tv shows, listens to a football game, has a beer with colleagues after work, and scrolls through social media, Dave has dozens, even hundreds of those 30-second interactions. This is how he can continue to believe his violence is normal and he doesn’t need to do anything to change his behaviour.
What if we could change this scenario?
What if Andrew had learned enough about violent men to know that they will clutch at any straw to shore up their belief that the way they behave is fine and normal, so he knows not to make those jokes?
Or…
What if he did make the joke but Peter and Samal know to not laugh or look away, they are angry and disgusted by the joke and they know how to say so?
Or…
What if Hassan tunes in to what Andrew said and instantly tells him how revolted he is that anyone would make a joke about such a thing?
Again, nothing much changes for Andrew, Hassan, Peter, and Samal’s chances of being violent. They were never going to do it anyway.
But what happens to Dave?
How does he continue to hold onto his belief that what he does is normal, understandable, and justifiable? Does it get more difficult to keep believing his wife is the problem, not his behaviour? What if this happens in every, or even most of those daily interactions he uses to shore up his belief that all men are violent?
How prevention works in this scenario
Andrew, Peter, Samal, and Hassan started out with positive attitudes to gender equality and violence against women. This might because of their family life and education (both of which are prevention activities) or it might be because they chose to have and live those attitudes (again, prevention activities). In the first scenario, however, none of them had the skills to intervene when Andrew made the joke. More intensive primary prevention education might have taught them why intervening is important and given them the skills and confidence to do so. This, as a single incident, would not have been enough to convince Dave that his assumption that all men are violent is incorrect. But if most men did it most of the time, it would get more difficult to maintain that delusion.
How prevention should work for Dave
If, as is common, Dave is violent because this is the behaviour modelled by his father as he was a child, it’s quite likely that, back then, he promised himself he would never grow up to be like his father. Maybe it happened without him even knowing. Or maybe he embraced violent and controlling behaviour as a means of feeling powerful and masculine in a family or community that made him feel small, afraid, and ashamed.
Dave needed a lot more support when he was a child than he was given. He needed the adults in his life to see what was happening, understand how to help him, and have the skills, knowledge, and resources to do so. He needed teachers, family, sports coaches, faith leaders, and mentors who could show him how to be proudly masculine without violence. All those adults who could have helped Dave when he was little needed training to recognise the warning signs of a child in trouble and be able respond kindly and consistently, without judgement or preaching. Without that help, all little Dave could learn was that his father, who he perceived as powerful and in control, was the only model for manhood that is worthy of respect.
Prevention is the work we do to give the adults in Dave’s life the skills they need to support him to want to be a man who is not violent.
How prevention supports response
When police and/or domestic violence services intervene in Dave’s violence against his wife, he can maintain his belief that this is the result of feminist and anti-men takeover of institutions if he still believes that all “normal” men are violent and controlling. This is how most violent men maintain the belief that they are the victims not the perpetrators of violence. Implicit endorsement of this belief comes from police who accept that his wife “brought it on herself”. It also comes from courts that issue negligible responses to ongoing violence or do not enforce intervention orders or accept that there is “mutual violence” if Dave’s wife ever tries to defend herself.
If Dave’s belief that all men are like him is challenged by men he knows and respects, and those beliefs are challenged in the same way by police and courts, intervention programs become more effective. They do not have to waste as much time convincing Dave that his behaviour is the problem because everyone around him has already taught him this. Response and intervention can then concentrate on supporting Dave to change his behaviour.
Structural change
Primary prevention, when it’s being done well and thoroughly, embeds knowledge and active bystander behaviour across communities. It is vigorous involvement of all members of the community – families, friends, colleagues, and strangers, but most of all it must rely on structures that can properly implement and fund the teaching and resourcing of knowledge and skills. It requires active investment and involvement by parliaments, schools, businesses, sports, arts, courts, and police.
At every stage of Dave’s life, his community had the opportunity to help him find alternatives to repeating his father’s behaviour. Local communities are the most powerful prevention workforce we have. Like any workforce, they need training, education, and ongoing support to do their jobs well. Providing this is the role of primary prevention and it needs structural support and funding, it cannot be shrugged off to individual parents and teachers.
Sexist jokes don’t cause violence. Disrespect doesn’t cause violence. Widespread knowledge and skills can reduce it. This is how primary prevention works - or could work, if we did it properly.
I’ve been using variations on this scenario to demonstrate how primary prevention works for a long time. But I’ve never had the time or opportunity to write it out thoroughly and explore all the angles. The reason you’re reading it here is because Respect Victoria approached me and asked me to write this (and other) narrative examples of how primary prevention works. And then they paid me. Well.
Recognising the value of women’s work - and paying for it - shouldn’t be so unusual that it needs a notation.