1. Why does speaker Jackson Katz believe gender violence is a men’s issue?

What
does Katz mean when he says “men have been largely erased from….the
conversation about a subject….centrally about men”?
2. How does language influence the way gender violence is considered? Use
examples to illustrate. In what ways does language inform our understanding of
masculinity and femininity?

There are multiple reasons as to why Jackson Katz believes that gender violence is a
men’s issue. He first describes the problem with this gender violence being historically
referred to as women's issues where a few men help out. He believes that this is where
the problem stems from. I agree with that. I think that pushing a gender issue onto
either side is only promoting the seperation and distance between the two. He believes
that calling it a women’s problem gives men an excuse not to pay attention to it when
they see it in the news. If it isn’t a mens issue then why would men pay attention? Is
what he asks. He explains how that in each catogorizing term such as race, gender,
sexual-orientation, the dominent group does not get any attention and people associate
those words with the subordinate or underrepresented side. He talks about how this is
one of the problems. Dominant groups arent put in the spotlight and thats what makes
them powerful and continued to be dominant. I agree fully with what he is saying. I think
that because the light is shed on women men are allowed to ignore the issue that
affects them more. If we switch the focus onto men and call it a mens issue then more
people will pay attention and try to understand the situation at hand. Another question is
how language conspires to keep attention off of men and adds to the issue. This part is
interesting to me. Language is the way we communicate but also the way we think. We
as humans are restricted to think through whatever languages we possess. And in the
english language and in how we speak today, typically the dominant subject can escape
the sentence all together removing them front he equation. The examples he uses are
“John beats mary”, “Marry is beaten by John”, “Marry is beaten”, and “Marry is battered”.
Only in the first sentence does the subject include john; however, with the rest of the
other ones all the focus is on Marry. This leads us to believe that this is an issue for
marry and not for john or the men in this instance. Language also shapes our
masculinity and femininity. Because we have gendered words like “he” or “she” language
shapes how we describe certain situations and certain people. This can reinforce
traditional gender roles and expectations, as well as contribute to gender discrimination.
Another way that language can influence gender is through language creating
assumptions. For example, using words like “strong” or “dominent” or “assertive” to
describe men and words like “soft” and “sensitive” to describe women can reinforce
stereotypes and limit the perception of people when it comes to the respective genders.
Another example of this is how language limits what we can say and understand. For
people who are non-binary for example, there are limited words that are inclusive of the
way they are. There is still lots of new terminology and language that needs to be
created in order for everyone to understand the gender.