This book is the product of intense labor over the past year or two, but in truth I have been working on it much longer. I am therefore deeply grateful not only to those who generously helped me navigate the painstaking writing process, but also to those who have inspired me personally and professionally over the years, whether through friendship or by sheer example. Writing is a lonely endeavor, but in meaningful ways it is still very much a collaborative process, and this book is testimony to that fact.
I want to thank my family for giving me decades of support and patience, especially my mother, Frieda Miller, my sisters Janet Miller and Julie Katz, and my cousin Rivka Polatnick. I grew up surrounded by exceptional women, and I feel their influence daily.
My teacher Ann Ferguson, professor of philosophy and women’s studies at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, provided an early and enduring example of how to combine a passion for knowledge with unflinching political commitment. If she was skeptical about a young man fresh out of a small-town football jockocracy who was inspired by philosophy and women’s studies, she never let on.
Some of my closest friends have been a great source of love, camaraderie, and late-night brainstorming over the years. In particular, I want to thank two soulmates: Miriam Zoll, my feminist fellow traveler since college, and Jeremy Earp, my confidant and intellectual partner with whom I have been connected for nearly thirty years. I also want to thank Gail Dines and David Levy, who have long been a source of personal and political solidarity, and Dode Levenson, who has stood by my side from the time I was a struggling activist with big dreams and bad apartments.
The process of bringing this book to print started with my search for a literary agent, no easy task with a subject as difficult as this one. I am grateful that James Levine was up to the challenge. I thank Rosalind Wiseman not only for recommending Jim, but also for her friendship and support over the years. I also want to thank my publisher, Sourcebooks, for believing in this project from the beginning, and for never doubting that a book by a man about men’s violence against women was worth getting out to as wide an audience as possible. In particular I want to thank my editor, Sarah Tucker, for her brilliant editing work, her patience, and her calm reassurance in the face of my many harried phone calls from airports and taxis. Thanks also to Michelle Schoob, a talented editor at Sourcebooks whose resourcefulness and flexibility made the late-stage editing process much less painful than I had anticipated.
I want to thank my mother-in-law Jan Bue for her love and encouragement, and for being so generous in providing the best conceivable child care at crucial times during the writing process.
I am also indebted to several people who read and commented on portions of the manuscript or contributed useful anecdotes: Daryl Fort, Gail Dines, Diane Rosenfeld, Caroline Heldman, Alan Berkowitz, Rhonda Hammer, Doug Kellner, Lori Strauss, Angie Aaron, Heather Sturm, Marie Brodie, Kristen Houser, Molly Dragiewicz, Laura Vargas, and Zeus Leonardo. Thanks to Giannina Cabral for research assistance. Of course none of them bears any responsibility for any errors or omissions that may have made their way into the final product.
Throughout all phases of the writing process, I had the additional privilege of being able to draw inspiration from the work and friendship of innumerable activists and educators. I wish I could acknowledge them all, but my all-star team begins with Judy Stafford, Cindy Waitt, Alan Heisterkamp, Nancy Beardall, Annette Lynch, Denise Thomson, Dean Peacock, James Lang, Barbara Kasper, Hank Shaw, Patti Giggans, Abby Sims, Mary Atwater, Bob Haynor, Lori Strauss, Carolyn Ramsay, Mark Dubin, Verna Taber, Steve Allen, Ann O’Dell, Gerry Sea, Victor Rivers, Nina Cummings, Al Emerick, Sally Laskey, Marissa Mezzanotte-Zadrozny, Linda Blanshay, Beverly LeMay, Rashmi Luthra, Bob Paret, Kathy Xian, Grace Caligtan, Sally Spencer-Thomas, Joe Kelly, Hollie Ainbinder, Leah Wyman, Steve Sherblom, Amy Levine, Rob Okun, Jerri Lynn Fields, Claire Kaplan, Peter Jaffe, Shelia Hargesheimer, Evelyn Brom, Linda Tangemann, Jeff Share, and Jill Montoya. I have also benefited immensely from work I have done with Mary Dixon, Toby Graff and Meredith Wagner at Lifetime Television, and Maria Kalligeros at PT and Co.
Since first hearing him lecture on masculinity when I was an undergraduate, Don Sabo has remained a steady source of wisdom and guidance. The same is true of Lundy Bancroft, Terry Real, Alan Berkowitz, Nan Stein, Jean Kilbourne, Michael Kimmel, John Stoltenberg, Leah Aldridge, Debby Tucker, Sarah Buel, Mike Messner, Mariah Burton Nelson, Paul Kivel, Sandy Caron, Harry Brod, Sandy Holstein, Michael Kaufman, Rus Ervin Funk, Ann Simonton, David Lisak, Tim Beneke, Marie Fortune, Susan Bailey, Ron Slaby, Connie Sponsler-Garcia, Tom Gardner, Warren Blumenfeld, Jamie Kalven, Sherryl Kleinman, Helan Page, Myriam Miedzian, John Badalament, Craig Norberg-Bohm, Barbara Ellis, Delilah Rumburg, Agnes Maldonado, Michael Flood, Steve Bergman, Nina Huntemann, and bell hooks.
I want to thank my lecture agent, Kevin MacRae, at Lordly and Dame, for his belief in my vision and for our many years of productive collaboration. I also want to thank the lecture agents Kevin and Jayne Moore, who helped me get started in the college lecture world.
I will always be grateful to Rich Lapchick and Art Taylor for working with me to create MVP at Northeastern University’s Center for the Study of Sport in Society in 1993. MVP has been a magnet for many talented people. I especially want to thank Jeff O’Brien for his inspired leadership and friendship, and Don McPherson for his willingness to provide even more leadership off the field than on it. I also have MVP to thank for my long-time collaboration and friendship with the filmmaker Byron Hurt, from whom I have learned a great deal and about whom I brag at every opportunity. Thanks also to Michelle King, Dave Kay, Miles McLean, Craig Alimo, and Tom Penichter for their early and important contributions to the development of MVP.
My deepest appreciation also goes out to Randy Eltringham and Claire Lebling for their roles in initiating my work with the Marine Corps. And I want to thank all of those Marines, too numerous to name, who have supported my prevention program in the Corps. Thanks, too, to Marney Thomas, Brian Leidy, Mary Page, and Ellen Pence for working so productively with my colleagues and me in our years with the Marines, and to all the civilian and military members of the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence in the Military, for all their insights, friendship, and camaraderie.
I have had the additional benefit of working over the years with the gifted staff of the Media Education Foundation (MEF), in particular the producers Ronit Ridberg, Susan Ericsson, Loretta Alper, Sanjay Talreja, Jeremy Smith, and Jeremy Earp. I especially want to thank MEF’s founder and tireless executive director, my friend Sut Jhally, who believed in me enough to make a longtime vision of mine a reality with the film Tough Guise, and has since then enabled me to reach ever-wider audiences with the films Wrestling with Manhood and Spin the Bottle. One of the most encouraging developments in gender violence prevention in recent years has been the emergence of a new generation of anti-sexist men, both college students and young professionals. In the latter category I want especially to thank Chad Sniffen, Brad Perry, Kaili McCray, Ross Wantland, Brian Pahl, Keith Edwards, Kevin Ladaris, Matt Ezzell, and Ben Atherton-Zeman for specific contributions to my work and thinking, and also for the intangible inspiration their dedication has given me.
I want to state clearly that my work and that of many other men would not be possible were it not for the pioneering work of countless feminists past and present, women of color as well as white women, some of them famous but many more who never sought nor received public acclaim for their world-changing activism. Sadly, the woman who perhaps did more than any other individual in history to enlighten both women and men about men’s violence against women died while I was writing this book. I never had the opportunity to thank Andrea Dworkin in person, so I do so here in recognition of her extraordinary grace and courage in the face of ruthless caricatures and dismissals of her work.
Finally, I am grateful to the two people closest to me. My work can be quite dispiriting at times, but when I experience my son Judah’s enthusiasm and joy for life my hope is renewed. And then there is Shelley Eriksen. More than any other single person, Shelley made this book possible. She was the foundation of my intellectual and emotional support system throughout its writing. She nobly endured the burdens it placed on her, and made sure I had the time, space, and encouragement I needed to get it done. Her wise counsel, judicious editing, and love improved not only this book, but also the quality of my life while writing it. From the bottom of my heart, Shelley, I thank you.