A conversation of men on advocacy of ending violence against women

CULTURAL NOTES

Richard Kinnud

I was on my way to work when I chanced upon two men colleagues who apparently just alighted from their vehicles at the parking lot and were talking about a parade that has passed by on the adjacent highway.  I myself was earlier on the path of those marching who were holding banners indicating the advocacy to end violence against women and their children.
    “VAWC! VAWC!” one of the men said aiming at no one.
    “Why, padli? Are they against that advocacy?” the other man remarked.  I hanged around close enough to hear them.  It seemed their conversation will spill to something interesting.
    “Not really!” the first man replied.  “It is just that the advocacy was overemphasizing something such that it tends to undermine certain realities and neglects other aspects of the true essence of their activism which is respect to human dignity.”
    “That makes my nose bleed,” the second man said half-laughing.  “Could you further explain your thoughts?”
    “Check on websites on the advocacy and you will read between the lines that this is premised on a supposed circumstance that men in societies are powerful that they often misuse this power to abuse women.  Abuse as used would include the preconception that men are understanding women as a subordinate gender to them.      Don’t you think this is a bias against men as it pictures them to be the only gender that is power hungry?  Yet women have the capability to be so too as every human being can actually abuse power.”
    “Maybe, you just need a seminar on gender inequality.”
    “Gender equity, you might mean.  I have attended a lot.  And what they preach there is that women have always been victims, martyrs, or the miserable, while men are the aggressors, the attackers, the victors!  Even the differences in statistics on number of women and men in certain job areas are sometimes presented as a result of men being antagonistic to women.”
    “Wasn’t that the case?”
    “I forgot all those stats cited by speakers but allow me to give an analogy.  In a farming community I have grown up, men do the work which requires greater physical endurance like plowing while those that requires lesser fortitude such as weeding are for women.  Now would you consider that gender bias?”
    “Certainly not because it recognizes a biological difference of men and women.  But it would be f women are absolutely prevented from doing what men can do.  And besides, it could be cultural too.”
    “There it is.  There are biological differences.  And there’s freedom of choice.  Plus, you have mentioned particularity of culture.  So not everything is all about gender inequality, is it?”
    “Maybe we have veered too much away.  We are talking here of the violence against women and children?”
    “It is not actually away from that.  The point is if we view men always as the violator and the women as the violated, then we are having a gender-bias where there could be none.”
    “The numbers don’t lie my friend.  I do not know if you have seen the latest statistics that one in every four Filipino women are either experiencing physical, sexual, and emotional violence.  It is a problem that really needs attention.”
    “You must be referring to the National Demographic and Health Survey of 2017.  It is the data currently available on the web.  I can’t argue you on the numbers you just mentioned.  Maybe I can just point out that the numbers differ for the different regions of the country.  The report says here in the Cordillera, the number is better than the national situation.  The data says something over 12 % experienced violence as compared to the over 26 % that you have just mentioned.”
“    That does not mean the campaign is invalid where the incidence is low.  Besides, there could be cases where women won’t admit violence even in a confidential survey such as the NDHS.”
    “I am not saying it is invalid.  Maybe it just needs to be refined to be clear that violence against women is not only by men.  There is also violence against women by women.  Note for instance that in the survey, there’s violence from mothers-in-law.  Also, even the type of violence committed should be underscored.  Violence is often understood as something physical but if we look at the stats, the number that suffers emotional violence is double the number than those who experienced physical violence.”
    “The numbers have really to be studied and different approaches applied if we’re serious about ending violence against women.”
    “And should be, violence against men too.  That’s where my fuming is actually coming from.  The survey we are talking about also said of admittance by women that they do commit violence against men.  But it seemed this is not being seen as a problem.”
    At this point, there was a lull between the two.  Maybe it was because they are looking for a ripe time to end their conversation.  Like me, they have yet to punch in for the morning work attendance. 
    Then the first man continued with his speaking to break the pause, “I would appreciate if one of the banners those marchers held stated something like, ‘Adam pasaktan nan  asawam, ta inayan.’  That would be more gender-fair I guess.”
    “Do people really know inayan?”
    “That’s a point.  The advocacy against violence should be fortified by other kinds of awareness and activisms.      Wouldn’t you agree that if here in this higland, people put to heart inayan or paniyew, or paniyo, violence can be minimized or even end?”
    “Inayan – maybe let’s put that in later discussion.”  They said their goodbyes and parted to their work areas.