Ray L Martin
Editor at Large
10 June 2012, 22:10 GMT

This is going to be short.

As a straight Black male I find myself often saying “just don’t do it” or informing my mother and sister more often than not that “they know better”.

Indeed, petty arguments around why men refuse to pay child support, or why a woman’s sexual history remains so integral in the prosecution of the man who violently assaulted her always leads me back to the same statement: They know better; you do what you get away with.

It’s like racism, where statistics can be invented to suit any whim. Why people like Time Wise go from forum to forum with real statistics on affirmative action and the Black crime rate. It doesn’t matter that the true fact of the matter is – you don’t like Black people so you will make up anything in order to justify that senseless intolerance.

Honestly, I first got into the issue of violent crimes against women through dis-proving faulty statistics around Black men beating, raping and chasing white women. I wasn’t naturally sensitive. And I didn’t think I was a “male feminist” as it shouldn’t be a political ideology to be a decent male person. But that changed when I realised that so many people believe that it is a crime against manhood to defend girls and women against the most basic of human indignities. It’s like DaveD’s Blog, where he became, naturally so, upset that Ched Evan’s victim’s name and history was splayed through the web. He was met with comments like:

“…you also raise cats and probably play dungeons and dragons, the nearest thing you have ever come to a girlfirend needs to be resuscitated by a foot pump.”

Has everyone forgotten the concept that some men don’t need to rape women? Our society is making male insecurity a virtue and that’s crippling the male species.

If men routinely stole women’s cars, there would be more outrage than when it comes to rape. The whole idea of “date rape” just indicates how slack our society takes issues of sexual assault.

I didn’t give you a black eye, I “acquaintance punched you”. Doesn’t make much sense does it?

If I routinely ran through the house and boxed all my roommates in the forehead it would be assault – but if I battered my wife routinely it reduces it to domestic assault. Men knowingly take advantage of the double-standard that exists when it comes to violence against women, which is why they are culpable for their actions.

In closing (I’m grateful to Femficatio for allowing this short rant). People keep saying how much we need to get rid of a gender binary. No more men, no more women – just humans. There’s no need to eliminate gender in order to acknowledge and respect women. Just like I wouldn’t take a pill to stop being Black or seeing ethnic and cultural differences, men shouldn’t have to see women modify their behaviour to suit a prehistoric mind-set. We as men know how to act, and use patriarchy as an excuse to be either hopelessly knuckle-dragging or immune from the law.

Rape is a crime against a woman’s human rights. And yes, men know better.

Ray L Martin is a film editor who writes around International Law and Human Rights.