Right then guys, it’s time to take a stand and say “No more!!”
It has been 2 years since I first started my business as a dating and relationship coach. In the beginning I believed that I had all the skills and knowledge needed to be a success in this field, I had large amounts of dating and relationship experience and had been working in the L&D sector for a number of years both as a facilitator and a coach. I had been interested in feminine and masculine energy for some time and had researched as much as possible as to how the balance effected relationships. Being an advocate for chivalry in this modern age and hearing from my clients how “Chivalry was dead!” I decided to do some digging to see if they right. At first I started to agree with them. It was dead, men had lost interest in masculinity because they had been punished for so long by the feminist movement. I believed that if women helped to empower men and allowed themselves to settle into their feminine energy, everything could improve (how naive) men would feel more masculine and be open to once again being more gentlemanly.
What I have discovered is so much more complicated than what I originally believed.
Six weeks ago I read a book called 11 minutes by Paulo Coehlo, The book is based around one woman’s journey through prostitution. Whilst I have always loved women, as with most men, I had never really tried to understand what life as a woman was all about. Coming away from the book I wanted and needed to find out more, researching amazing women like Mata Hari, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Cleopatra. Two weeks before my summer holiday with the family, I was walking around a book store looking for something to read by the pool when I came across a book:
A Call To Action, women, religion, violence and power.
President Jimmy Carter
Up until this point, I considered myself pretty well educated in women’s rights, being raised by three women and being married to a highly professional woman, I thought gave me a rare perspective. This book taught me very quickly that I knew very little. It absolutely blew me away and I have to say, made me ashamed to be a man. The statistics were gut wrenchingly awful, for example: In 2011 95% of all women in the US military had been sexually abused!! 95%!!! that’s ridiculous “how can they let this happen” I think to myself.
In 2015 1 in 1700 women had reported being raped ( and that just the ones reported) again how could the United States government, the largest power in the world be letting this happen??
We would not stand for this in the UK!!…..or would we??
Well, you will be sad to hear that we are not too far behind.
In 2014/15 1 in 2040 women reported being raped.
It is reported that in the UK on average 10-15 girls under 16 are sold into sexual slavery every month, whilst they might not be huge numbers, it is still not acceptable.
The book is relentless and throws painful punch after punch of hard hitting facts about sexual equality and the abuse of women. I finished the book sickened to my stomach about what I had learned and decided to do something about it. I did not want my daughter/grand daughters growing up in a world where they were punished because of their sexuality. Jimmy Carter was right when he said that the only way forward in stopping these horrific crimes is for men to take a stand, stand up for your daughters and put a stop to this behaviour.
I used to pride myself on my knowledge of how to treat the opposite sex and I was a champion of old world chivalry. I now realise that chivalry needs to go through a much needed change, let us stop focusing on the petty stuff, who should open the door and who should pay the bill. Let’s focus on bigger fish, equal pay for equal work, getting more women into government and putting a stop to violence against women. Women have done a fantastic job of standing up and saying “No More!” it is now our turn as men, to reclaim our masculinity and stand up for what is right. Make a stand when you learn that a female employee is getting paid less than her mail counterpart, stand up when you here a woman being bullied because of her sex, but most importantly, raise you son’s to be aware of sexual equality and that all human kind should be treated equally regardless of gender or race. Raise your son’s to understand chivalry, educate them, help them to understand that the way women are treated on TV and in Movies, is not how you should treat them in real life.
