Should all men suffer for the actions of men like Alexander Fleming?

[Matt Dillon]

More and more voices are calling to hold all men responsible for crimes of some men. One example of millions is here:


The terrible tragedy caused by men like Alexander Fleming breaks my heart, but what can other men do about the actions of men like him?

How about no?

[Calypso Jones]

I respect that you have a cause and that you're passionate about it, but the realities of being male or female are different. I will be the first to admit that as a female, I do not understand the male experience and I probably never could. However, the rates of violence against women are disturbing both in terms of the number of incidents and the types of incidents. Not only that, but it speaks to attempts to control women through violence (mainly in areas like the Middle East/Asia and Africa) or to exploit women somehow ("developed" world).

The actual rates of violence do not differ much from region to region, which is kind of startling, but there are different kinds of violence and different statistics that seem to speak to patterns of behavior. For example, there is more institutionalized and ritualized violence (due to a lack of laws and/or the culture) in places that use female genital mutilation, but much greater gender equality in areas where domestic violence and sexual assault are the predominant issues. Of course, it's impossible to get actual numbers but you notice the patterns. Interestingly, an author/researcher found that once Iraq had been occupied by the United States and took on more democratic features, they actually saw a massive spike in domestic violence. The writer went back and began looking at transitional democracies and they seem to take on the types of violence you would find in first world democracies, while shedding the more lawless, institutional forms bought about by dictatorships (particularly those with religious aspects).

Not every man is violent or abusive. Absolutely, we should not be treating all men as though they are guilty of something. But an issue that arises is that either every man is basically "in on it" in an institutionalized/ritualized setting (actively or passively), or you simply cannot predict who is violent in areas like the US or Europe where intimate partner violence is more the norm. It could be anyone and we're taught to believe that it could be anyone - including and especially our date, our boyfriend, our husband...

Let's not forget that women do this too. More often than we know because what man wants to admit his girl beat him up.

Seems to me that people more now than ever have trouble controlling themselves. They resort to violence. You can't do that and these folk don't seem to get that. YOU CANNOT put your hands on another person. I believe personally that we've seen a definite uptick in this since this forced house arrest happened and now the violence in places like these blue state cities. There's a seething going on just under the surface. Somehow it needs to be cooled down but i don't know how that can happen at this point.

[donttread]

More and more voices are calling to hold all men responsible for crimes of some men. One example of millions is here:



The terrible tragedy caused by men like Alexander Fleming breaks my heart, but what can other men do about the actions of men like him?

It is horrible and there are things that can be done. But testosterone is messy stuff and still required. Which is why women aren't $#@!ing about male dominated fields like sanitation, combat, warehouse work, over the road trucking etc.