This is one of the hardest conversations we rarely have. Violence is not sustained by physically violent people alone. It isn't sustained by escalati
This is one of the hardest conversations we rarely have.
Violence is not sustained by physically violent people alone. It isn’t sustained by escalating and physically violent men alone.
It is also sustained by people who normalize it, excuse it, minimize it, defend it, or demand that everyone else adapt to it. Submit to it. Coddle it.
Women are not exempt from this. No, not just white women…WOMEN. We’re unpacking truths that will unshackle the women and girls in communities today.
The mother who insists her daughter hug the uncle who frightens her.
The female teacher who tells girls to “ignore him; that’s just how boys like him are.” “He’s doing his best. Life is so hard for him.”
- The female teacher who yells at girls for not changing in front of boys because the boys said that “no harm was intended.”
The female supervisor who protects the male colleague because “he’s valuable” but he’s a creep to the rest of his female colleagues.
The church leader’s wife who pressures women to forgive without accountability.
The female friend who tells another woman she’s “too sensitive.”
- The female lawmaker who scolds women and girls for “hurting his feelings” no matter how much coercion, slurs, or violent behavior he deploys against women and girls.
The coach’s wife who attacks the girls instead of asking why several girls have the same story.
- The female coach who looks at the silenced girls as “good girls” and the girl who speaks up as a “trouble maker.”
The woman who says, “Well, he never did that to me.”
- The women who scold other women and girls for “trying to take a good man down.”
- The women who scold other women for having the nerve to demand respect, especially respect for boundaries that protect them from the ravages of male violence.
- The female coach who tells women and girls to “stop creating drama” while the women and girls are talking about safety, opportunity, and authentic equality based on facts, not feelings.
These are acts that protect the environment in which violence flourishes.
Sometimes we become the ones teaching girls to ignore their instincts by the behavior choices we make.
Sometimes we become the ones asking women to be quieter, kinder, more forgiving, and less disruptive. While the males continue to trespass and threaten. We teach women and girls not to stand up for themselves.
Sometimes we become the ones protecting the comfort of the community instead of the safety of the vulnerable.
Not because we intend to cause harm…maybe? Hard to know without further investigation.
But sometimes because we have learned to protect the system before we protect the person.
That is how structures survive.
And, when you give them facts and receipts, these women will tell you that you are telling lies.
Structures survive because people keep choosing the same behaviors that keep them alive.
Many of Tyler Perry’s movies have explored and spotlighted this dynamic within families. The mother who blames the daughter for “being dramatic” about her abusive father, stepfather, or boyfriend. Great lessons of reflection. These issues are repeatedly discussed within and among the Black community.
I think that these times are teaching and challenging us to grow and evolve. Look up and level up.
At another rung on the ladder…….to look at the women, who choose the same type of behavior in schools, professional sports, our neighborhoods, online, in law, and in policy. To recognize that it is not just enough to demand more women in leadership but to demand that women in leadership will not uphold lack of safety, silencing, and minimizing. That these women are not creating environments that lead to stop signs for women and girls. These behaviors are safety, protection, healing, and advancement for anti-women and -girls.
History shows that systems of violence don’t continue simply because violent people exist. They continue because ordinary people enforce the stifling and oppressive rules of the system. Sometimes those people are women. Wherever women and girls are, we have an opportunity to demand that women who support manipulation, coercion, and emotional abuse tactics either grow or get behind the rest of us who are moving in that direction.
None of this is about demonizing women; this is how you dismantle violence, harm, and abuse that impedes the growth and advancement of people. Like the process of healing, the work is HARD and sometimes it hurts like hell.
You want interrogation? Women can be REALLY good at interrogation.
Unlearning Loyalty to Those Who Ask You to Lie – WE Survive Abuse
The Empty Chair: When Solidarity Does Not Require Self-Abandonment (audio) – WE Survive Abuse