In Seattle earlier this week a 41 year old British-American man killed his 26 year old ex-girlfriend after stalking her. She made Many efforts to protect herself against him.
In Seattle a little over a year ago a young man who had been invited to a party after a rave left the party and came back with multiple guns and killed others at the party.
In Seattle close to 1 1/2 years ago a disturbed Arab-American young man who had lived his entire life in the U.S. forcibly entered the Jewish Federation Office killing one woman and injuring several other women there. He indicated his anger at Israel and clearly tied "Jews" and "Jewish Organization" with Israel.
Across the United States there have been a number of killings by young White Males of multiple fellow students, often directed at young women (only).
I can not in my deepest imagination envision - at any time in my life having heard similar stories told about one or more Female Persons killing others. Commonly where women kill men seems limited to battered women killing their batterers in apparent self-defense efforts and occasionally fights between partners where a man is injured or killed by his partner.
Obviously women tend to turn their anger onto themselves, rather than outward while we men tend often to turn our anger outward.
We are taught in so many ways that we are to be violent. We need to be "on top" of others. Many men may not see and feel "superior" to women and "priviliged" because of their fears of other men - without the violence necessarily.
As young boys we learn to defend ourselves and to be aggressive in many ways. Real life and the media blend nicely in such areas! Older boys fight in gangs, as well as "quarterback kills" in football, "respect" in deliberately brushing back and beaning batters in baseball, as well as many other areas of trying to be "Top Dog".
Our relationship skills seem most troubled! The White Teenage Boys often have been bullied by other boys and are frequently "outcasts" when they kill classmates. The various types of male adult killers are emotionally very alone and isolated. It's not clear how many of them have been abused as children.
As men we need to help raise boys to Not be the kinds of Men we know may Fight Other Men and Abuse and potentially kill Women (and men). How we may do this takes much thought and communication amongst us.
Thanks!
4 comments:
You need to learn how to count months and years on a calendar. I was shot at the Jewish Federation in Seattle just under 9 months ago, not 1 and 1/2 years ago.
Anonymous--
I'm sorry for whatever harm you incurred, but "you need to learn how to count" talk isn't encouraged here, especially when Geo was trying to bring to light violence on men from other men. Noting the violence but getting the timeline wrong doesn't warrant, in my mind, talking to him that way, especially when you do so completely anonymously.
I agree that, in general, many women turn anger inwards and men turn it outwards, or, perhaps in other words, when upset women cry and men yell.
But I wonder if another reason more men kill than women has to do with sheer physical force. Guns aside, more men can kill than women. I could punch a guy 20 times and not leave a mark, but two or three shots to the head by a man with 100 pounds on me might put me in a coma. I know a lot of very outwardly angry women, and it's perhaps just lucky they don't have the physical size or power to do any significant damage.
US - statistics: "Of the murders in 2003 for which law enforcement identified the type of weapon, nearly 71 percent (70.9) involved firearms."
http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel04/crimestat102504.htm
In Canada - with much less tolerance of handguns, things may be different, however in the U.S. guns are what commonly kill others.
I don't think that physical strength - e.g. - larger, more muscular men for example, is what makes killing acceptable.
Many killers and many men who are physically abusing their partners and former partners are not necessarily stronger than other men, nor some women.
Clearly men are on average bigger and stronger than women. We are not, however, given license to be violent because of our strength. The gun is often the "equalizer" where the less powerful Man can "prove he's a man".
Thanks~
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