because honestly not much is. As far as discrimination of all sorts is concerned being white, heterosexual and male is pretty much the jackpot. Being a person of color comes with it's own set of discrimination, being anything other then heterosexual, whether that's gay, lesbian, transgendered etc, comes with it's own set of discrimination, and being female has it's own set discrimination (pay, reproductive rights, etc).
So here's the one thing. As a man, if you are being abused by a woman, resorting to any sort of physical means to protect yourself is pretty much out. As soon as you involve any physical interaction you lose, and anyone in the vicinity sides with the woman. I saw this happen to someone else on Sunday. A group of us were gathered at a park on Sunday hanging out. A guy got into a (verbal) fight with his girlfriend so she stormed off. As she's leaving she takes his backpack which contains his keys, wallet, cell-phone, etc. Concerned for his stuff he starts calling after her. He asked her repeatedly not to leave with his belongings. She says she doesn't care and doesn't slow down or stop leaving. He runs after her, asking her again multiple times to first give him back his stuff before she leaves. She tells him to go fuck himself, at which point he grabs a hold of the backpack. When he does this she falls down.
This is the point where the rest of the group intercedes. 4 of us walk over (I am one of those 4). I've been watching the whole thing unfold as soon as they started to get angry at each other on the field since I've seen them fight in the past. The rest of the group (as far as I can tell) has only just watched this unfold from the part where the guy ran up to the girl. As a person looking in without any of the context from what lead up to this moment it looks pretty bad I'm sure. From the perspective of a person not paying attention you only see a guy shouting at his girlfriend, then running after her and knocking her down, which, as I've already explained is not what actually happened.
The other 3 people in the group immediately take the side of the girl, condemning the guy for knocking down the girl. One of the people standing there immediately threatens to call the cops if necessary to stop any further 'violence'. The guy explains again that the girl was attempting to steal his possessions and that he's not out to hurt her or start a fight, he just wants his backpack back and he'll leave now. He's pretty angry so there's some swearing involved but after that he gets up and walks off. The girl after also saying some heated words to the guy lets him leave.
To make matters more complicated, the guy was the girls ride. She doesn't drive or have a way to get home on her own. A few people from the group offer to give her a lift and take care of her. The rest of the night is uneventful. The guy eventually returns to hang out with some of us and the girl finds her way home (fortunately they do not live together). Neither of them have to interact with each other any further that evening.
But today is a new day. As a result of yesterday the guy has been banned from that social group/gathering for a month. Nothing bad that I'm aware of has happened to the girl, but, to be fair, I don't normally talk with her. More information will follow.
So, to recap. Guy and girl get into verbal argument. Girl attempts to leave with guys stuff after being asked not to. Guy stops her by grabbing his bag at which point she falls down. The two are separated by a group of us. Guy gets banned for a month, girl has nothing bad happen to her.
That to me seems messed up. It's not to say that either of them here have the moral high ground. The girl shouldn't have attempted to make off with the guy's stuff... but the guy could have had someone else intervene or found a way other then using physical force. So that's all a wash. The question is, if you had reversed the gender of the girl, so that the altercation was between two guys, would the outcome have been the same? What if you had reversed the genders entirely? I suspect that in an altercation between two men where one man stopped another from leaving by grabbing his stuff back there wouldn't have been blow back on either party. I think in the case where genders are reversed (woman grabs bag, man attempts to leave/steal things) that the woman's actions are seen as defending herself and even though she caused the other person to fall to the ground, hell, I think even if she'd pushed him to the ground the most likely result of that altercation is blow back on the guy still for his attempt to steal her things.
My wish... is that in all the different scenario's where you mess with the genders involved the outcome is the same. That the resulting punishment applies based on the actions of the parties involved and not based on their genders. I wish we lived in a more gender-blind world even though I know that's not possible. We are trapped in an unfortunate situation where there's tons of (unreported) domestic violence (in both directions) but because of how common and how bad we consider male on female violence we're blind when it's going the opposite direction. I've heard plenty of stories where a man calls the police because he's being attacked by his wife or girlfriend and when the police arrive they arrest him even though he was the one calling for help.
I don't know that, at present anyways, there's anything to be done on any kind of a global level. I feel like, largely because of the rape culture that exists, at least here in the US, it's better to give the benefit of the doubt to the woman in cases of rape and domestic abuse. However, this trend has also lead to certain female bad actors claiming rape when it's clear no such thing has happened in a vindictive attempt to ruin the man's life. (When they were together it was just sex. 2 months after they've broken up and the man refuses to get back with the woman, all the sex was now rape).
So it's frustrating for me. I've been on the other end of being abused by a woman. Been in a relationship where my significant other threatened suicide if I left her and would actually try to physically attack me sometimes. And I don't know that there's much I can do about all of that stuff... EXCEPT that in this particular circumstance I can go to bat for the guy. I can explain to the relevant parties exactly what happened to see if I can't stop this particular instance of badness. See if I can't get the ban lifted or to at least make the punishment fit the crime.
I hope that anyone that happens to read this takes the time to do the same if they every have the chance to be a champion for the victimized party whether that person is male or female when the rest of the world turns against them. I only ask that rather then blindly making assumptions time is taken to understand the context of any given situation.
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