“There’s nothing better than excelling at a game you love. There’s nothing worse than thinking your accomplishments as a player outweigh your responsibilities as a person.”
—Doug Flutie
“If a marine is a great warrior on the battlefield and he comes home and beats his wife, he is not a good marine.”
—Lt. General George Christmas, United States Marine Corps (Ret.)
It was while in graduate school in the early 1990s that I developed the beginnings of MVP, a program to work with high school and college male student athletes on the issues of rape, battering, sexual harassment, and all forms of men’s violence against women. I was not interested in working with “jocks” simply because of their particular problems. There is no question that men’s violence against women is a serious problem in the male sports culture—at all levels. Anyone who has paid the slightest attention to the sports pages over the past couple of decades knows how sadly common it is to read about alleged assaults by male athletes. There is a widespread public perception that male college student athletes are disproportionately responsible for acts of sexual aggression against women, although to date no full-scale national studies have conclusively proven this point. But my interest in the male sports culture had less to do with athlete perpetration and more to do with the leadership platform afforded male athletes. The rationale was simple. Male athletes, as exemplars of traditional masculine success, already have status with their fellow men. If they could be persuaded to speak out about sexual and domestic violence, they could have influence not only in the athletic subculture, but in the larger male culture that continues to look to athletics for definitions of what it means to be a “real man.” In particular, leadership from men in athletics could make it safer for other men to “come out” against sexism. Eventually, this would result in a growing intolerance in male culture for some men’s sexist violence.
Striking examples of this strategy can be found in politics. Political scientists and historians frequently observe that President Richard Nixon, a renowned anti-communist, was the first U.S. president to open relations to communist China. Because of his anti-communist credentials, no one could credibly accuse Nixon of being a weak-kneed liberal who was ready to sell out American interests to the Chinese. And surely it is more than historical coincidence that Lyndon Johnson, a white southerner from Texas who talked like a good ol’ boy, was able to champion civil rights and was critical to the enactment of historic federal civil rights legislation.
Another interesting illustration of this leadership concept comes from the world of beer marketing. Consider this mini-history of Miller Lite beer: In 1972, Miller Brewing Company bought the rights to Meister Brau Light, a “diet” beer the small Chicago brewery had been attempting to market to women. Miller’s market research had determined that men wanted a beer that would not fill them up, but they did not want to drink a “feminine” beer. So Miller had a problem, because in 1972 men made up approximately 85 percent of the beer market in the U.S. Miller’s strategy was to run an advertising campaign that showed famous football players drinking Miller Lite beer. The most popular featured Dick Butkus, an iconic white linebacker for the Chicago Bears, and Bubba Smith, an iconic African American defensive lineman for the Baltimore Colts. They placed Butkus and Smith in a bar room scene surrounded by their friends, with a Miller Lite beer in their hands. The unspoken message of the campaign was: Dick Butkus and Bubba Smith can drink Lite beer and no one is going to accuse them of being wimps. You can, too. As a result, the Miller Lite campaign became one of the most successful advertising campaigns in TV history. It won Clio awards for advertising excellence in 1977 and 1978, and throughout the 1980s and 1990s Miller Lite was the official beer of the National Football League.
How did a beer travel the distance in just a few short years from being considered a “wimpy diet beer” to becoming the official beer of the NFL? First, a smart marketing person identified the problem. Millions of men are hypersensitive about appearing unmanly, so the challenge is to make it manly to buy the product. The best way is to create an association between the Lite beer and recognizably masculine figures. In other words, if Dick Butkus and Bubba Smith take a “risk” and publicly identify themselves with Lite beer, it is easier for men with less status in the masculine hierarchy to do likewise. The same principle applied in recent years when Mike Ditka, the tough-as-nails football coach, appeared on television commercials and exhorted men to take the “Levitra challenge” and use a male sexual-enhancement drug, or when Rafael Palmiero, the home-run-hitting major league baseball star, made a similar pitch for Viagra.
Why not utilize this approach to get more men to speak out about gender violence? As we have seen, a set of unexamined beliefs in male-peer culture has historically kept men silent. It is wimpy to confront other men’s sexism. It is wimpy to question men’s enjoyment of women as sex objects. Men who treat women with dignity and respect cannot be real men. What could be more effective to counteract the silencing power of these beliefs than to enlist the support of recognizably masculine men? And where better to find them than the sports culture?
In 1992 I approached Dr. Richard Lapchick, the civil rights activist and director of Northeastern University’s Center for the Study of Sport in Society, and proposed the idea of a program to train high school and college male student athletes to be leaders in gender-violence prevention. With initial funding from the U.S. Department of Education, I, Lapchick, and the center’s associate director, Art Taylor, started the Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) program in 1993. The program was designed to train student athletes and other student leaders to use their status to speak out against rape, battering, sexual harassment, gay-bashing, and all forms of sexist abuse and violence. A female component was added in the second year with the complementary principle of training female student athletes and others to be leaders on these issues. Today, when MVP is implemented in the sports culture and other educational settings it is a mixed-gender initiative, although a key feature of the model is small-group, single-sex discussions of the issues.
MVP is the most widely utilized gender violence prevention model in college athletics—for both men and women. Numerous Division I athletic programs such as Kentucky, Wisconsin, Notre Dame, and the University of Florida regularly participate in MVP trainings conducted by members of the MVP staff, who are all former college and professional athletes. In 2005, the Southeastern Conference (SEC) became the first major college athletic conference to fund MVP training for schools conference-wide. The National Collegiate Athletic Association uses MVP materials in their Life Skills program. Since 1998, the 2002, 2004, and 2005 Super Bowl champion New England Patriots football club have held MVP trainings each year with the players in rookie camp, along with the coaching staff and front office personnel. The 2004 World Series champion Boston Red Sox implemented the program for the first time in spring training of 2005, along with other sports organizations such as the New York Jets and Major League Lacrosse.
MVP has also been implemented in the United States military. In fact, the MVP program is the first system-wide gender-violence prevention program in the history of the U.S. Marine Corps. MVP trainers have been working all over the world with marines since 1997. MVP trainings and workshops have also been held with officers and enlisted personnel from the army, navy, and air force, as well as personnel from the service academies.
Although MVP began in the sports culture and is increasingly utilized there, the MVP model is equally effective with the general population of college and high school students, and in other institutional settings. When a high school implements MVP, for example, student athletes and coaches are typically part of the program, but so are band members, kids in the drama club, and student government leaders—as well as skater kids, smoker kids, and kids who have nothing to do with traditional student leadership groups. On college campuses, athletic programs can implement MVP, but so can the housing department, Greek affairs, health education, and new student orientation.
The MVP model is one of the first educational initiatives to utilize the concept of “bystanders” in an approach to gender-violence and bullying prevention. It focuses on men not as perpetrators or potential perpetrators, but as empowered bystanders who can confront abusive peers—and support abused ones. It focuses on women not as victims or potential targets of harassment, rape, and abuse, but as empowered bystanders who can also take leadership roles. In this model, a “bystander” is defined as a family member, friend, classmate, teammate, coworker—anyone who is imbedded in a family, social, or professional relationship with someone who might be abusive, or experiencing abuse.
The heart of the MVP model is interactive discussion, with both singlesex and mixed-gender applications. One of its goals is better inter-gender dialogue about issues like sexual violence, relationship abuse, and sexual harassment. But single-sex sessions provide young men and women with a comfortable space within which to explore some of the more charged aspects of these difficult subjects. In all-male sessions, men will sometimes say things they simply would not say with women present (and vice versa).
As noted by one of the pioneers of sexual assault prevention education with men, the psychologist Alan Berkowitz, all-male workshops on rape and other forms of gender violence allow men “to speak openly without fear of judgment or criticism by women.” This is by no means intended to disparage coeducational learning, or the contributions women make to men’s education on this or any other issue. But I and many of my colleagues have cofacilitated countless single-sex discussions where men have said things we know they would not have said if women were present.
Sometimes I wish my female friends and colleagues could eavesdrop on these conversations, because they would be fascinated by the dialogue and impressed by the insightful—and sometimes courageous—comments men make. For example, one night in the mid-1990s Byron Hurt and I were conducting a workshop with an entire Division I college football team in the South. The group of a hundred was too big for an intimate conversation, and a lot of guys were joking and making snide remarks. Then a young man in the back rose and addressed his teammates. “You guys laughing and talking better listen to what these guys are saying. My mom went through something like this, and it wasn’t pretty,” he said. “This shit is serious.” The mood in the room instantly changed, and the rest of the session was animated but respectful.
Other times I am thankful there are no women in the room, because some men’s misogynistic attitudes and victim-blaming propensities can come pouring out in an all-male setting. In those settings, for example, I have heard more than a few high school boys and college men claim that it is okay to make aggressive sexual comments about girls’ bodies to girls in school hallways, in malls, or out on the streets. “Girls like that,” some of them will say. “Especially if they dress sexy.” When someone points out that regardless of how they dress, girls do not appreciate this sort of male commentary, some guys are dismissive. “What’s the big deal anyway? They should get over it.” If a young man had the chutzpah to say that in a mixed-gender setting (in my experience, most do not), one of his female peers would more than likely confront him—sometimes angrily. I have seen this happen: A guy makes a victim-blaming comment like “She should have known what to expect,” about a woman who was raped at a party. “I can’t believe how ignorant some guys are!” one of his female classmates exclaims. “Do guys actually believe that girls like to be treated as if they’re in a porn video? You guys are so immature.” Her female friends nod or shout out their agreement. Meanwhile, the guy who made the controversial comment desperately tries to defend himself. His friends jump in to support him. The conversation then quickly turns into a “battle between the sexes” with everyone feeling pressured to take the side of their sex. The whole scene sends a strong message to other guys who either agree with the original speaker, have a more complex view of the issue at hand, or completely disagree with him. The message is to stay silent, because they could easily be accused by the girls of being insensitive or sexist, or attacked by the boys for not maintaining male solidarity. The result is that the dialogue is less productive than it could be if people were comfortable being honest.
Chances are a conversation about the same subject in an all-male setting would play out differently. MVP sessions are typically led by people who are slightly older than the target group. They are not authority figures laying down the law, but more like older brothers and sisters there to provide guidance on difficult issues. In many settings, high school juniors and seniors work with incoming ninth graders, or with middle school students. In college, upperclassmen (and upperclasswomen) work with first-year students, etc. A male MVP trainer might respond to the victim-blaming comment by saying, “Are you sure you want to say that? Doesn’t a girl have the right to say no to sex whenever she wants? Wouldn’t you want that right for yourself?” This gives the guy a chance to hear another young man’s perspective, and while it might challenge his beliefs, it does so in a way that allows him to reconsider, rather than retreat into defensiveness and hostility.
Many all-male (or all-female) MVP sessions begin with an interactive exercise. The exercise is designed to highlight the role of the bystander by asking people to visualize a powerful and clear-cut bystander scenario. MVP trainers explain to participants that they will be asked to visualize a woman (or man) close to them who is being assaulted—physically or sexually—by a man. In most cases, this exercise takes place in single-sex groups, although it has been used in mixed-gender settings (it was originally designed for men only). In either case, MVP trainers are instructed to tell people not to participate if they feel uncomfortable in any way. As the exercise begins, participants are asked to close their eyes (unless they choose not to) and think about a woman (or man) close to them—such as a mother, sister, wife, girlfriend. Then they are asked to imagine that she/he is being assaulted by a man. After they let that sit for a moment, the MVP trainers ask the group to imagine there is another man in the room who is in a position to stop the assault, but he does not. He either stands there and watches, or gets up and leaves. Once people think about this for a few moments, they are asked to open their eyes. As you might expect, men often react strongly to this exercise. They are upset about the assault, and angry at the bystander who failed to act. They often say the bystander is “just as guilty” as the perpetrator. One marine said, “He gets the second bullet.”
Then the MVP trainers ask the following questions: how did you feel when you imagined a woman (or man) close to you being assaulted, and how did you feel about the bystander? In answer to the first question, it sometimes takes a while for men to say they felt any emotions aside from the socially approved “masculine” ones of anger and rage. There is no doubt that many men experience a range of feelings, such as powerlessness and sadness. One goal of this exercise is to validate publicly in a roomful of men that it is okay and common for men to have such feelings. But the chief goal of the exercise, and the reason it was created, is to get people to contemplate the role and responsibility of the bystander. The imagined scenario is deliberately clearcut, and people usually express anger at the bystander for failing to intervene. Anger at the perp, sadness, and helplessness about the victim are also common reactions. Many people—men and women—say they choose not to visualize the scenario because it is too painful or difficult to experience.
But here is the catch. When MVP sessions get into discussions about different real-life bystander scenarios, people often give all sorts of nuanced reasons why they or other bystanders do not or would not get involved. Real life quite often turns out to be a lot more complex than that exercise. By referring back to the clarity of people’s perceptions and expectations of the imagined bystander, this comparison makes a powerful point about those nuances and complexities and how they can obscure the central moral question: what can a responsible person do when faced with the opportunity to prevent an act of violence?
MVP uses real-life situations that speak to the experiences of young men and women in college, high school, and other areas of social life. The chief curricular innovation of MVP is a training tool called the Playbook, which consists of a series of realistic scenarios depicting abusive male (and sometimes female) behavior. The scenarios have names that are taken from sports. The Playbook—with separate versions for men and women—transports participants into scenarios as witnesses to actual or potential abuse, and then challenges them to consider a number of concrete options for intervention before, during, or after an incident. Consider the following scenario from the MVP Playbook for high school males, which goes by the name “Slapshot”:
You’re in the hallway between classes. You see a couple you know arguing, then you see the guy push his girlfriend into her locker. The guy isn’t a close friend of yours, and neither is the young woman, but you do hang around with the same group of people. Nobody else is doing anything.
Many people mistakenly believe that they have only two options in instances of actual or potential violence: intervene physically and possibly expose themselves to personal harm, or do nothing. As a result, in MVP sessions when we initially introduce the idea that bystanders have a responsibility to act, people often voice fears about their safety, and say that they would not want to get involved because the price of intervention is too high. However, physical force and passive acceptance are only two of countless possible options. There are numerous ways that bystanders can prevent, interrupt, or intervene in abusive behaviors, and the majority carry little or no risk of physical confrontation. Since this variety of possible interventions is not always self-evident, part of the process of working with men as bystanders is to introduce them to as many nonviolent, non-threatening options as possible. But first, the MVP model helps men to develop a train of thought about the costs and benefits of intervention:
This is an ugly situation . . . This guy is being real rough with this girl . . . I wonder what’s going on? Should I say something? But if nobody else is stepping in, why should I? If I say something, he might come after me. Am I ready to get into a fight, if it comes to that? What if he’s got a weapon? Besides, if he treats her like that and she stays with him, who am I to get involved? Is it any of my business? But if I don’t do something, I’m saying it’s okay for a guy to abuse a young woman. What should I do in this situation?
Although they focus on specific cases of abuse, MVP scenarios are designed to stimulate wide-ranging discussions about the dynamics of male-peer culture, masculinity, sex, violence, abuses of power, and conformist behavior. In all-male sessions, boys and men discuss such questions as: Why do men hit women? Why do men sexually assault women? How do cultural definitions of manhood contribute to sexual and domestic violence and other sexist behaviors? Why do some men make it clear that they won’t accept that sort of behavior from their peers, while others remain silent? How is the silence of peers understood by abusers? What message is conveyed to victims when the abuser’s friends don’t confront him? Why do some heterosexually identified men harass and beat up gay men? Does the accompanying silence on the part of some of their heterosexual peers legitimize the abuse? Why or why not?
After they read the “train of thought,” the facilitators spark discussion with a series of questions designed to explore the role of the bystander:
• Why would a guy who is a bystander in this scenario not say something?
• What are the risks of saying or doing something to interrupt or confront the abusive behavior?
• What is the message to the victim when no one speaks up or acts on her behalf?
• What is the message to the perpetrator when no one confronts him or expresses disapproval of his abusive behavior?
• What, if anything, is the responsibility of the bystander to the victim?
• What, if anything, is the responsibility of the bystander to the perpetrator or potential perpetrator? (Note: in the scenario the bystander is usually positioned as a friend, teammate, or coworker of the boy or man who is being abusive.)
The answers typically reveal a great deal about the dynamics of male-peer cultures and the pressures on young men to conform. For example, many guys admit that they would not be happy to see a guy treat his girlfriend this way, but they would not say anything. The guy who is abusing his girlfriend might be older than him, or bigger. He might be more popular. People might think he is not “cool” if he tries to get involved. It is much easier to intervene in theory than it is when the pressure is on, your palms are sweaty and your heart is pounding.
Once the participants have had time to discuss these questions, the conversation shifts to the options:
1. Nothing. It’s none of my business.
2. Attempt to distract the couple somehow, maybe by talking loudly, in order to defuse the situation.
3. Shout out something so that everyone in the hallway hears, like, “Hey, what are you doing? Leave her alone!” and stick around to make sure the situation has “cooled” down.
4. Talk to the girl at some point and let her know I saw what was going on and am willing to help her.
5. Don’t do anything immediately. But as soon as possible, that day or later, I should make a point of talking to the guy and suggesting he get some counseling to deal with his abusive behavior.
6. Talk to a group of his friends, and/or talk to a group of her friends. Tell them what I saw and urge the group to make a decision about how to proceed.
7. Talk to my parents, a guidance counselor, the school social worker, a teacher, or the school nurse, and ask their advice on what to do.
8. Personal option.
When he was a member of the original MVP program in the 1990s, the documentary filmmaker Byron Hurt used to recount an incident he witnessed in college. He was in the cafeteria at lunchtime with a group of men and women friends who were seated around a large table. Another male student whom they all knew came into the room, walked over to one of the women and leaned over to tell her something. She kissed him on the cheek. It all seemed innocent enough, until he abruptly reacted to the kiss with anger. He grabbed her by the shirt, lifted her out of her seat, and pushed her up against a concrete post next to the table. She started to cry. Everyone saw what happened, but no one said anything. Not even “hey, what do you think you’re doing?” No one asked her if she was all right. Hurt sat there in shocked silence. At the time, he was the quarterback of his college Division I AA football team. He was well-known and well-respected. He was built more like a linebacker than a quarterback. Why didn’t he speak up? “The dude was kind of cool,” he said. “I was scared and paralyzed by the thought of what might happen if I said something.” If the quarterback of the football team is intimidated into silence, imagine the pressure on average guys.
The overall goal of the MVP model is to stimulate dialogue and critical thinking about the ethical choices bystanders face when they witness abusive behaviors, and to help people think through the costs and benefits of action or inaction. It is also to reposition the bystander—the one who speaks out and confronts his abusive peer—as strong and courageous, not “weak,” “uncool,” or a “narc.” It is not appropriate to tell people how they should act in every situation; there are too many unknown variables to be prescriptive. It is likewise not realistic to expect a group of guys to agree about the best course of action to consider in any given scenario, especially since there are no “right” or “wrong” answers. The idea is to provide people with a greater menu of options in the hope that if at some point they are in a position to act, they will have more good options to choose from. The only option discouraged in MVP is to “do nothing.”
The following scenario from the college men’s playbook, called “Illegal Motion,” describes a disturbingly common event:
At a party, you see a friend trying to get an obviously drunk woman to leave with him. She’s not just buzzed; she’s stumbling over her own feet. You know the woman, and she seems reluctant.
This scenario always sparks lively dialogue, in part because it involves two of the central preoccupations of contemporary college social life: getting drunk and having sex. The MVP trainers ask the men if they would intervene in this situation, and if not, why not. Most college and high school men say they would not. It’s not their business, they say. It happens all the time. How do you know it is going to end badly? Many of them have been in these situations—and not only as bystanders. The train of thought gives them more to think about:
Men and women who are drinking hook up all the time . . . Then again, she looks really drunk. Maybe she’s not in a position to make a good decision . . . I know a lot of “date rape” involves alcohol. Could this be one of those situations? . . . But what if I’m overreacting? Won’t my friend be mad at me? Will he even listen to me? . . . But if I don’t do something, I might be letting her down. What should I do?
After they read the “train of thought,” the facilitators spark discussion with a series of questions:
• What, if anything, is the responsibility of the bystander to the drunk woman?
• Does it matter how well you know her, or if you know her at all? How would you feel if a woman you loved found herself in this situation, and no one intervened on her behalf?
• Does it matter how she ended up drunk? Is that relevant? What if you have seen her drunk before? Does that matter? What if someone slipped a roofie in her drink? Is it possible to tell?
• What, if anything, is the responsibility of the bystander to the guy who is trying to “hit it” with her? Does it matter how well you know him? What if he is your teammate or fraternity brother? Do you have a special responsibility to stop him from doing something that could get him in trouble?
• How many people here know the state law on the matter of sexual consent involving alcohol? Under the law in every state a person is considered unable to give consent if they are inebriated, which means that if a man sexually penetrates a drunk woman (or man) he can be prosecuted for rape.
I ask the men whom they feel they have a responsibility toward: the woman who is drunk, the man, or both. Their answers are sometimes encouraging, like when they say they care about both of them: her because she is vulnerable, and him because he might get in trouble. But on several occasions I have heard college-aged men state matter-of-factly that if the woman got herself in that predicament and she’s eighteen or older, they are not responsible to her because “she knew what she was doing.” Those coldly presented sentiments confirm what some feminists have maintained for decades: that in our sexist and increasingly pornographic culture, boys and men are socialized to objectify and dehumanize women—especially young sexually active women.
This is disturbing, but not as revealing as some of the responses by men who say they would do something. Some guys say they would “get their friend out of there,” because he might do something stupid, or face a false accusation of rape the next day. In other words, help him before he puts himself in a compromising situation, be his friend by looking out for his interests—not the woman’s—in a potential rape scenario. Just as often, guys assert that they would urge the drunk woman’s friends to look out for her interests by getting her out of there. Many men want to avoid the possibility of a direct confrontation with their friend even when they know he might be trying to take sexual advantage of a drunk and vulnerable young woman. Perhaps they are anxious about the possibility of violence. They might realistically be concerned that the guy could get belligerent and take a swing at them. But their reticence is also undoubtedly rooted in social anxiety, their fear based on an unconscious awareness that if they come to the defense of a vulnerable woman they might be seen as soft or sensitive, and hence lose standing among their peers.
The “Illegal Motion” scenario also provides the context for a discussion about false accusations of rape. Many men in college—athletes, fraternity members, and others—believe they or their friends are at significant risk of being falsely accused of rape by a woman. This phenomenon is what Alan Berkowitz refers to as men’s “false fear of false accusation.” I do not immediately tell the men how I feel about this fear, but I do share with them the FBI statistic about the number of rapes that are not reported: between 80 and 90 percent. In other words, the vast majority of women (and men) who are raped never report it to the officials. I ask them why they think this is. With help they usually come up with many of the key reasons: the rape itself was traumatic, and they don’t want to put themselves through the trauma of the legal process; doing a “rape kit” to collect evidence is painful, invasive, and can be highly embarrassing, as medical professionals need to extract pubic hairs and swabs from a woman’s genitals or anus; the woman’s sexual behavior and character are often attacked by people who take the side of the alleged rapist; perhaps the woman knows the man who raped her and is furious with him, but even so does not want to see him to go to prison. Once the men have gone through this list, I pose the question: if these disincentives are powerful enough to keep the vast majority of actual rape victims from reporting the crime, how realistic is it to believe that large numbers of women are falsely doing so? Why would they want to invite the heartache and social stigma? I always make sure to acknowledge that false reports of rape do occur—in anywhere from 2 to 8 percent of cases, depending on how one defines “false” and whose research they rely on. (See endnotes for further discussion.) There is no doubt that being falsely accused of rape is a horrendous and potentially traumatizing experience. It is also important to recognize that men of color have a slightly more justified fear of false accusation, even though it is, as Berkowitz says, primarily a “false fear.”
The conversation in an MVP session—whether it is with a group of high school students or in a roomful of marines—really picks up when someone confesses that he would not say anything if he saw one of his boys in a situation like the “Illegal Motion” scenario because “I wouldn’t want to be a blocker.” A “cock-blocker,” or “CB,” is a widely used term in the hip-hop generation, but most people over thirty have never heard it, unless they work closely with kids or have kids of their own who speak openly with them. A “CB” refers to a man who gets in the way of another man’s “game,” or attempt to hook up with a woman. Needless to say it is not a term of endearment. If a guy develops a reputation as a cock-blocker, he risks a possible loss of status in the male hierarchy, which amazingly for many men is too high a price to pay for preventing a possible rape.
Once there is some discussion about these questions, the facilitators move to the options:
1. Do nothing. It’s really none of my business.
2. Try to get my friend to leave her alone. Tell him he has to be real careful dealing sexually with a drunk woman.
3. Find some of her friends and try to convince them to get her home safely.
4. Approach the woman and ask her how she feels, and if she wants help getting home.
5. Try to find the person whose apartment or house it is, or someone who seems responsible, and ask them to assist me in defusing this situation.
6. Get a group of my friends together, male and female, and confront my friend, firmly telling him to stop pursuing this drunk woman.
7. Personal option.
Not all of the MVP scenarios involve incidents of physical or sexual abuse. For example, one scenario in the high school boys’ playbook is called “Offsides”:
You’re riding in the back seat of your friend’s car late one afternoon with two other male friends. Someone spots a young woman jogging a few hundred yards ahead and the driver starts to slow down. Your friend in the passenger’s side of the front seat starts to roll down his window to yell something at her.
This scenario provides an opportunity for young men to imagine how young women’s experience of the public world differs from their own. How is it possible for one person (or three) to regard this as harmless fun and another to experience it as harassing and threatening behavior? Although they live together and go to school together, boys’ and girls’ lives are very different, especially because one sex learns early in life to fear the other. As amazing as this sounds to many of my women friends, young men in MVP sessions—high school and college students—often report that they had never even thought about girls’ feelings in situations like this. (White people in antiracist workshops often report similar feelings when they are asked to put themselves in the shoes of people of color.) When this scenario is discussed in mixed-gender settings, some young men begin to realize for the first time how easily they can scare girls and women and limit their ability to move freely in the world. After all, how do the girls know that guys in the car are not rapists who are going to lie in wait around the corner? Numerous men I have talked to over the years describe one of their first “aha” moments about male privilege as the time they realized women feared them as they walked or drove by on the streets—even when the men themselves felt non-threatening.
Of course not all young men are quite as empathetic. Some express impatience with the entire premise of this scenario. I have heard more than a few men say they know girls who look for that sort of attention from men, so what’s the big deal? They react defensively to the suggestion that behavior which they consider normal “guy behavior” is being defined as problematic. Young men also frequently maintain that it is totally unrealistic to expect one of them to say something to his friends in this scenario—even if he knows that what they are about to do is wrong.
The train of thought provides further material for discussion:
What’s my friend going to say? Will it be something sexual, or is he just going to yell out something stupid? Does it matter?…How will this girl feel to hear a group of guys in a car shouting at her? Will she be scared? We’re just a harmless group of guys, but how could she know that?…I know girls who jog. I wonder if they ever get harassed by guys in cars…Can I say something to stop my friends from saying something? Won’t they get ticked off at me? What should I do in this situation?
After someone reads aloud the “train of thought,” the MVP trainers ask questions like:
• Does anyone have a sister or girlfriend who jogs? Have you ever talked to her about how she feels when guys in cars yell things at her? What did she say?
• When guys shout at girls out of a car window, what are they trying to accomplish? Who are they trying to impress? The girl? Their friends?
• Does a young man have a responsibility to support or defend a girl he does not know and might never meet?
The scenario ends with a discussion of the options:
1. Don’t say anything. It’s just harmless fun and speaking up would do more harm than good.
2. Try to change the subject in order to distract my friends and get their attention off of the female jogger.
3. Tell the driver to speed up and say, “Come on, guys, let’s leave her alone.”
4. Don’t say anything right then, but later, tell my friends that I don’t think we should be harassing girls like that.
5. Talk to a female friend of mine who runs and find out how she feels when guys drive by and say things.
6. Personal option.
One of the enduring lessons of MVP is that when you approach men with the intent of enlisting them as allies in the fight against gender violence— rather than as potential perpetrators—many of them rise to the challenge. Men who have participated in MVP sessions often say the experience was nothing like what they expected. Whether from personal history or paranoia, a lot of men expect to be lectured at in a gender-violence prevention workshop. Many of them are impressed when they find out instead that it’s not a lecture but a dialogue, and that rather than being blamed for men’s violence against women they are being challenged to do something about it. Jeff O’Brien, who has directed MVP since 1999, tells this story about a session with a professional football team:
The guys were predictably reluctant as we began our first of three trainings with the group. We had good discussions on the first day, and when we began day two, a big linebacker just bluntly stated “You guys are some cool motherfuckers…when you first showed up I thought this was going to be bullshit, but y’all are keepin’ it real.” That’s a compliment in “guyspeak,” and the best way he could express his appreciation for the value of the discussions we were having and still be a “man.”
On another occasion, when O’Brien and some colleagues finished a training with an elite college football team, they were given the “doubleclap,” a gesture reserved for their inner-team activities, and a sign of solidarity and respect. This is notable because MVP trainers do not pander to pampered male athletes—they confront sexist beliefs and victim-blaming statements when they arise and challenge the men to resist peer pressure and become leaders—off the field. One indication that the MVP approach resonates with a lot of men is that many of them stay after sessions to talk with the trainers. O’Brien, a former All-American college football player who has conducted hundreds of MVP trainings across the U.S. with high school, college, and professional athletes, explains it this way: “We do gender-violence prevention, but for us this means having honest conversations with guys about how we’ve all been socialized as men. I believe that most men are longing for male relationships that have some depth and genuineness. Outside of a ninety-minute training, we are complete strangers, yet guys ask us for advice on all sorts of life issues.”
There is no doubt that a violence prevention program with marines sounds like an oxymoron at first glance. After all, marines have a well-deserved reputation for being hypermasculine warriors, not advocates for non-violence and gender equity. When people hear that I run a version of the Mentors in Violence Prevention program for the United States Marine Corps, they ask: aren’t marines trained to commit—rather than prevent—acts of violence? I certainly understand people’s skepticism, in part because I was once a skeptic myself. But today, after many years and dozens of trainings on Marine Corps bases around the world, I have a much different perspective on the Corps, especially the individuals that it comprises.
This shift in perspective came about when I first met and started working with the Marines in 1997. I quickly came to see that beneath the façade created by their hard bodies and crisp uniforms, marines were complicated people just like everybody else. In fact, one thing I make sure to tell civilian MVP trainers before they work with marines for the first time is that they should not be fooled by the combat fatigues and short haircuts. Marines—and other military members—have professional commitments that differentiate them from civilians—especially in a time of war. But male marines have more in common with civilian men than either group might think. After all, before they are marines they are fathers, brothers, sons, and lovers of women and girls. As such, gender-violence issues are as personal for them as they are for any civilian. In addition, most Marines are only in the service for four years, after which they return to their families and communities, largely in small towns in rural America and poor and working-class sections of big cities. What they learn in the Marine Corps thus affects not only them but all of the people they come in contact with throughout their lives.
In my experience—and contrary to the expectations of many of my civilian colleagues—working with Marines on domestic violence and sexual assault prevention is no more difficult than working with other groups of men. In fact, there are some characteristics of the Marine Corps that make our trainings with them run more smoothly than in other places. This is because MVP adopts a positive approach to working with Marines that is similar to the approach used by the Duluth Domestic Abuse Intervention Project in their groundbreaking work with the Corps during the 1990s. In a fascinating article entitled “Strange Bedfellows: Feminist Advocates and U.S. Marines Working to End Violence,” Valli Kanuha, Patricia Erwin, and Ellen Pence explain that D.A.I.P. tried to use key aspects of Marine Corps ideology to argue that domestic violence was not only illegal but “un-Marine-like.” In their words, “Instead of resisting the hyper-patriotic and paternalistic aspects of [Marine Corps core values], we embraced them as tools to build buy-in.” The D.A.I.P.’s attempt to institute a comprehensive coordinated community response to domestic violence in the Marine Corps ultimately failed when marine leaders in the late 1990s discontinued the ambitious program, but not before this group of self-described “feminist outsiders” had successfully made allies of countless marines who agreed there was a need to bolster a warrior identity that did not include abusing women and children.
The language of leadership that is so important to the success of the MVP approach resonates especially strongly in the Marine Corps. When MVP trainers say that our culture desperately needs more male leadership in the gender-violence area, many Marines hear and respond to this as a positive challenge; and they are used to challenges. It is deeply imbedded in the ethic of the Marine Corps that Marines are not average or ordinary people. They proudly stand apart from the rest of society, and do things that others are not able or willing to do: they endure spartan living conditions, they work long hours for low wages, and they take significant risks with their lives in the service of helping others. There is much to discuss and criticize about the tasks to which marines are assigned by their political leaders. And there are many aspects of Marine Corps culture that offend progressive sensibilities— especially issues of gender and sexual equality. Not surprisingly, the Marine Corps has the lowest percentage of women in the U.S. military, approximately 6 percent. But in spite of all this, individual Marines are characteristically highly motivated, they have the courage of their convictions, and they are ready to sacrifice for the common good. Their credo is Honor, Courage, Commitment. This is perfectly consistent with the MVP philosophy of empowering men—and women—to speak up when they see a person mistreat another—even if doing so entails some personal risk.
The MVP model is basically the same in the Marine Corps as it is any place else. The language in the playbooks is slightly different; instead of “teammate,” the Marine Corps playbooks say “squad member.” But the key concepts are the same, especially the idea that silence in the face of abusive behavior is consent to that behavior. Consider the following scenario from the Marine Corps playbook, called “Barracks Heroes”:
In the barracks or gym one afternoon, some of your squad members are making sexist and degrading comments and jokes about a female Marine who is a friend of yours. They say she’s a “bitch in heat” who can’t lay off anyone, and several state they’d like to $#@% her.
Some guys—inside and outside the Marine Corps—think this is taking things too far. They might say, “Rape and abuse is wrong, but this is getting so I can’t even tell jokes or look at women without people jumping down my throat.” But this scenario raises some important questions about the relationship between attitudes and behaviors. For example, is it ever just “harmless fun” when a group of guys tell each other sexist jokes with no women around? Once in the late 1990s when a colleague and I were doing this scenario at an MVP-MC training in Quantico, Virginia, the Marines in the room could not see why this would be a problem. There was laughter and commotion in the room and we seemed to be losing control of the session. “Okay,” I said. “Let me ask you this. Would it be okay if a group of white Marines was making racist comments and telling racist jokes about black or Latino Marines, even if there were no black or Latino Marines present? Would that be okay behavior in the United States Marine Corps?” One Marine, a charismatic African American gunnery sergeant, turned to his fellow Marines and said sincerely, “That’s it. It’s a slam dunk. There’s no way I’m gonna argue with that,” as the mood in the room noticeably shifted.
For more than five years, MVP-MC has been part of the curriculum at the Staff Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) academies throughout the Marine Corps. The academies employ Marine Corps instructors who provide courses to Marines as they are promoted through the ranks of enlisted leadership, from corporal to sergeant major. This is one way to institutionalize genderviolence prevention as a leadership issue. The message to Marines is that they need to be educated about what they can do, not because they are “good guys” who care, but because they are leaders and it is their responsibility. MVP-MC is far from a comprehensive program, and there is much more that the Marine Corps and all the other services can do to prevent gender violence. Large-scale reforms in this area are in the works throughout the Department of Defense, largely in response to congressional pressure following numerous domestic-violence and sexual-assault scandals in the military over the past decade. Whether or not these reforms will successfully reduce men’s violence against women in the U.S. military is far from certain. But in an authoritarian institution like the military, responsibility for what the troops do resides at the top. Command sets the tone. So while programs like MVP-MC and others that target junior level leaders and young service members are important, ultimately the buck stops with senior leadership. If the male leadership in the Department of Defense—starting with the president of the United States— began to treat gender violence prevention not as a distraction or a public relations challenge but as an absolute institutional priority, the rates of domestic violence, sexual assault, and sexual harassment perpetrated by members of the armed forces would begin to decline precipitously.