Boys Will Be Good Men

In 2014, extended a formal invitation to all men to join the fight for gender equality as part of the campaign. She invited men to step forward, to be seen to speak up, to be the “he” for “she”.

The pursuit of in the past few years has often focused on women: programs have been built to empower, educate and remove barriers for women. Women have repetitively been told to speak up, -in, leave their abusive husbands and have marched on the streets to protest against violent gender-based crimes.

Whilst we believe that this women’s movement is extremely important to achieve gender equality, we need to also engage boys and men to act as allies and encourage them to understand the part they can play in achieving .
Raising feminist consciousness in boys encourages them to recognize patriarchal privilege as wrong and ultimately work to change it. We must teach boys to challenge gender norms, create a culture of mutual respect and transform their views of women and of masculinity.

Raising is not a movement done in isolation, but it includes women’s voices and the current movement of empowerment of girls and women to achieve gender equality for all.
Raising will help them grow up to be good men.

We can’t achieve gender equality with only women working towards it. Men need to be a part of the movement too.

Illustration credit: Sera Sezer

How many times have we heard the phrase to free boys and men from all accountability for their reckless and hurtful behaviour?

The first time we heard it was at a family gathering where a young boy chased after a young girl and pulled at her plaits causing her to fall over. The boy’s mother quickly pulled her child away and shrugged, “boys will be boys, right?”

More recently, , who r***d a woman at a prestigious American university, received a mere 6 month jail sentence for his crime. The judge felt that anything more would be too severe since the ra**st was a Stanford athlete who was just trying to have a little fun and took things too far due to being drunk. The judge might as well have said it: .

It’s time we hold boys accountable for what they’re responsible for and not excuse their hurtful behaviour! if we stop giving boys a get-out-of-jail-free card.

Welcome.

Our hope is to share our thoughts on things that matter to us most. Gender equality. Treatment of women and girls. Gendercide. Patriarchy. Toxic masculinity. Violence against women. Big words, we know, but our message is this: gender equality is a societal responsibility that concerns and should fully engage both women and men to create a culture of mutual respect and drive generational change.

Whilst there are an abundance of organizations globally doing fantastic work with women to tackle gender equality, we need to work together with the other half of society, the men, to transform their views of women and of masculinity and showing them that they are an agent for change.

We need to start with our boys. We should no longer tolerate “Boys will be boys” as an excuse for the harmful actions and attitudes of boys. Rather, we should raise them to be good men. Our boys will be good men.