Men are not "naturally violent"

Just as racism must be eradicated to realize the vision of a just society, male violence against women, an abuse of power based on brute force, must be eradicated.
Unfortunately, just as whites may experience unease among people of color who condemn racism (even the whites who aren't racists), men may feel unease when male violence against women is discussed (even the men who aren't violent toward women). However, male violence against women must be exposed to be eradicated.
Modern global societies are patriarchal, (male-supremacist). Patriarchy, a worldview based on abuse of power and contempt of women was created approximately 6,000 years ago by violent men who destroyed peaceful Goddess worshipping cultures in Asia and the Mid-East (The Chalice and the Blade by Riane Eisler; Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe by Marija Gimbutas).

Key facts to realize are:
• Patriarchy is an artificial human creation, a dysfunctional form of society created by some violent men. Thus, it can be uncreated. Male domination is NOT "human nature."
• Humans, especially men, are NOT "naturally violent." Humans are naturally altruistic. This fact was proven both by men in ancient peaceful Goddess worshiping societies (archaeological evidence of1,500 years of peace in ancient Crete!). It is also proven today by the many non-violent men we know about or share our lives with. Toddlers tried to "help" adults by handing them objects the adults pretended to lose in scientific studies.
• Patriarchal societies (like ours) must condition men to become violent.
• Historians unearthed many Civil War rifles filled with unfired ammunition. Many soldiers of the North and South pretended to shoot at each other to avoid punishment by their military "superiors."
• Condemning male violence against women is NOT condemning and blaming the men in our lives who we love and who aren't violent.
• It takes a lifetime of conditioning and trauma to make men violent. "Military training camps, police academies and even some self-defense pros are constantly searching for more effective methods of suppressing the human revulsion to taking human life -- virtually rewiring the brain to react first in certain situations with an automatic response to kill" "The Science of Creating Killers" http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/08/13/INGKFKDJHC1.DTL

Naming the Agent
To eradicate male violence against women, it must be exposed. Naming male violence against women exposes and specifically focuses on the men who are violent toward women —which separates them from men who are not. Although men and boys are also raped, Mary Daly in her book Quintessence points out the obvious fact that the agents of rape are men. ""Naming the agent is required for an adequate analysis of atrocities. As linguist Julia Penelope has shown in her book, Speaking Freely: Unlearning the Lies of the Fathers' Tongues , "agent deletion is a dangerous and common mind-muddying flaw." Agent deletion is common when addressing male violence against women.

For example, In Democracy Now's August 25 broadcast about men raping women in Darfur, men aren't named as the agents of rape. The terms "sexual violence," "gender-based violence," "perpetrators " and "violence," were used. Also "Domestic Violence" does NOT specifically name male violence against women. It's a general term that includes elder abuse, child abuse and abuse in dysfunctional gay and lesbian relationships that mimic dysfunctional heterosexual relationships.


A Global Scourge

Even Amnesty international, which calls male violence against women "a global scourge," calls it violence and not male violence (http://web.amnesty.org/actforwomen/index-eng). Globally, patriarchal societies condone and encourage male violence against women.
• In the U.S, Being battered by men is the number one "health" problem of U.S. women. (U.S. surgeon general).
•Men batter twelve percent of pregnant woman, causing seventeen percent of birth defects (March of Dimes).
•Seventy-five percent of women murdered during domestic violence are killed by men after they leave them.
•Men commit 88% percent of murder and 98% of incest and child molestation. (U.S Dept. of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics).
•In Pennsylvania, a gunman entered a one-room Amish school house on Monday and shot 11 girls in the head. Five of the girls died, the six others are in critical condition. The man ordered all of the boys and adults to leave. He then ordered the girls to line up facing the blackboard. After he tied them up, he shot them all in the head.
•Recently, a gunman took six girl students hostage at a high school in Colorado. He sexually assaulted the girls and killed one of them.
• ActionAid International is convening a conference on Violence Against Girls in Schools In Harare, Zimbabwe.
• Men in Afghanistan kill women who teach girls to read (Feminist Majority Foundation http://www.feminist.org).
• In Juarez, Mexico, men raped and killed more then 700 women, ambushing them as the women walked to work in sweatshops.

Men can end male violence against women
Just as it is the responsibility of non-racist whites to help people of color end racism in the U.S. it is the responsibility of non violent men to work toward helping women end male violence against women. There are as many ways to do this as there are non-violent men. Each man must look into his heart and ask himself what he can do to help end the global scourge of male violence aganist women. The answers will come.