Lovers and Fighters | Section 22

Not all of people can tell you interesting stories about their schools how much they enjoyed it who their first best friend name was or  talk about their first childish love.Instead they have terrible memories they avoid to talk about so they forget many bad memorize that happened to them.
There are many different reasons that causes people to have bad experiences in school, but of course bullying is the biggest cause of psychological, emotional and physical pain.
From the documentary (the mask you live in) they showed us how 1 in 4 boys reports being bullied at school and how only 30% of those who are bullied notify adults.
I once discussed  about this issue with my friend I asked him:in your opinion  what is the reason that makes boys violent at a certain young age. He said to me: When I was young I translated love with violence. If one of my friends did something I felt it was wrong I would beat him because in my subconscious mind its okay to do that my parents loves me so much and they do that when I do something wrong.
In this semester we have learned about the nature of men and how they construct their personality to be stronger, stubborn, and angry, in order to suit the requirements for the ideal man based on society needs.
And the school itself is a small society and in it boys begin to learn more about what is required of them to become men and from here the pressure begins for them.From a young age,boys have learned that they cannot cry and cannot reveal their feelings scared of the fact that other kids will bully them for being soft and sensitive ,so The only way to remove these dark and negative feelings is by violence and anger.we saw from the documentary (the mask you live in) how Ashanti Branch did an activity with his student were they take a mask and they write in front of it what represent them what they let people see and in the back he told them to write  what they don’t let people see.most students wrote in front happy, fun, power ,goofy ,and back side were love, sadness, anger, fear.They are scared of showing their emotions because they will show weakness and this is will lead them to being not men enough or not being real men.
All  of the reasons I talked about above showed how boys didn’t  knew the right way to translate their feelings and express their pain and how does the word real man start its stress from a small age for a man.
In conclusion, what should happen is teachers or people who are authorized in behaving the boys should focus more about what causing the problem rather than the problem itself, they need to spend more time talking to the bully try to let them talk to know what is happening inside their mind that causing all this negative reflections.Because in the end there is no bad person. All people have their circumstances and experiences that forced them to make a mistake. And of course having  people who can be listen and help them will successfully transform the lives of many young men.

Fighting is unarguably a central aspect of the game of hockey. It has been an integral part of the game essentially since its invention. One reason for the popularity of fighting in hockey can be explained by one of the features of Christopher Kimmel’s man-box: aggressiveness (Kimmel 6). Kimmel argues that masculinity is “characterized by a willingness to take physical risks and become violent if necessary”. In the CBC’s documentary, “The Code” (2010), several former National Hockey League Players including Nick Kypreos and Georges Laraque, explain the code among players with respect to the merits of fighting, known simply as “The Code”. The Code explains that on a given National Hockey League team, there are star players, the celebrities of the team, and there are enforcers. The enforcers, players who are stronger and tougher than their colleagues, have a role to protect their teammates. This means that if the enforcers feel that one of their teammates, especially one of the stars, has been treated disrespectfully, it is their role to instigate a fight with the player who disrespected their teammate. This behaviour is exactly in line with the above man-box characteristic of aggressiveness in that the enforcers feel that if their teammates are disrespected, violence is necessary.

One ritual of hockey fights is the removal of the helmet prior to fighting. This is supposedly done to minimize the risk of hand injury, but it simultaneously increases the risk of head injury. One such example of head injury is Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy or CTE. CTE is linked with repeated traumatic brain injury (such as concussions), and symptoms include “cognitive decline, emotional or behavioural changes, and motor impairment” (Ventresca 73-98). Wade Belak played with the National Hockey League as an enforcer for many years, fighting many fights. At one point, his behaviour started to change and he became depressed. He ended up committing suicide in August of 2011. The most important piece of information from this not uncommon tragic story is that the player’s depression was a result of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. People die as a result of hockey fights. Is the respect of an opponent really worth a life?

1. The Code – Episodes – The Fifth Estate. CBCnews, CBC/Radio Canada, http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/episodes/2009-2010/the-code.
2. Ventresca, M. (2019). The Tangled Multiplicities of CTE: Scientific Uncertainty and the Infrastructures of Traumatic Brain Injury. Sports, Society, And Technology, 73-98. doi: 10.1007/978-981-32-9127-0_4
3. Hockey fight: Wives reveal the cost of concussions – Episodes – The Fifth Estate. (2020). Retrieved 4 May 2020, from https://www.cbc.ca/fifth/episodes/2019-2020/hockey-fight-wives-reveal-the-cost-of-concussions

         Traditionally, masculinity was associated with tough tasks. That is shown in the history of fathers at home where women would stay at home taking care of children, men worked away from home in farms and industries. However, this has changed over time due to gender equality. This resulted in women working in jobs that were considered masculine. Although, masculinity is still present in different games such as hockey, that is only played by men. Due to its lack of written laws to make the sport safe, hockey is a rough sport resulting in concussions and mental conditions that force players to commit suicide.

           Hockey may be considered the modern means of presenting the traditional masculinity where men engage in rough and dangerous play. It has some unwritten laws regulating the game. The lack of defined rules exposes players to the risk of physical harm. The fifth estate (2010) confirms that the unwritten law, also referred to as “The Code”, is about pride, solidarity, and sportsmanship  by the biggest and toughest player whose focus and talent is not scoring, but protecting the teammates and revenging on the opponents. Hockey shows traditional masculinity. Like in the past where men engaged others to protect their families, the enforcer’s job is to protect his team’s star player and getting revenge on the opponents. The game has a strong association with masculinity. This, sadly, has lasting psychological, physical, and health issues on the players and their families.

           Concussions are one of the primary impacts of the hockey game on the players. During the fights, hockey players sustain head injuries that have lasting impacts on the players. In an investigation of concussions among hockey players, the CMAJ reported 559 concussions during regular-season games and approximately 1.8 concussions per 1000 player-hours. However, despite the apparent connection between the fights and head injuries, the NHL does not see the link. This continues to make the game leave lasting impacts on the players and their families. Jennifer Belak Liang explains that before committing suicide, her husband had shown signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative mental disease (Smart, & Ellenwood, 2019, November 23). Head injuries result in concussions and brain injuries that further results in mental conditions that are responsible for suicidal thoughts among hockey players.

        From statistics, suicide among hockey players is common. In their article, Virginia Smart and Lisa Ellenwood explore the suicide of Wade Belak’s, an NHL enforcer. Belak’s suicide was the third death in a row of tragic as well as sudden deaths of the NHL enforcers. The report shows that like most enforcers such as Steve Montador and Todd Ewen, Belak suffered multiple injuries to the head when fighting on ice (Smart, & Ellenwood, 2019, November 23). That resulted in the regenerative mental condition. Lack of care from the league makes players struggle with feelings of guilt as well as isolation. With their mental conditions, retired hockey players have minimal to do with their lives. They often feel like their time was wasted because, despite the commitment to keep their hockey career, the league does not care for them after retirement. Critically, masculinity associated with hockey game denies players the necessary care, exposing them to physical and mental dangers, aspects that contribute to their increased cases of suicide.  

References

Benson, B. W., Meeuwisse, W. H., Rizos, J., Kang, J., & Burke, C. J. (2011). A prospective study of concussions among National Hockey League players during regular season games: the NHL-NHLPA Concussion Program. CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l’Association medicale canadienne, 183(8), 905–911. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.092190

“Pain, Agony and ‘Years of Duress’: How Hockey Wives Are Fighting Back over Players’ Chronic Brain Injuries | CBC News.” CBCnews, CBC/Radio Canada, 24 Nov. 2019, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hockey-players-enforcers-brain-injuries-1.5370444.

“The Code – Episodes – The Fifth Estate.” CBCnews, CBC/Radio Canada, http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/episodes/2009-2010/the-code.

Although the cases of school violence have dropped to a big round zero in the last month and a half, it remains a serious reality all over Canada. Forgive my joke but I feel it is appropriate considering the issues discussed in this final blog post are heavier than usual. Here is my insight on the subject.

The first thing I want to consider on the theme of violence in schools are all the articles in the series “School Violence” by CBC and the short movie by “marketplace” that accompanied them. Of course, they mainly targeted the school boards for not taking sufficient measures to stop the violence in their schools, failing to report lots of incidents, or even failing to do anything at all when faced with a case of school violence. Due to the lack of information and political knowledge, I cannot begin to explain nor even understand why such a thing happens. I found it interesting though, that one of the articles called “I thought he was dead […]” had a small statement where it said that students in Quebec reported the lowest incidence of experiencing violence at the hands of another student. And it got me thinking. Why?

When I was a student, it somehow happened that I changed a few high schools (due to family reasons) but it gave me the chance to see some of the measures that Quebec schools have put in place in order to stop, or lower, school violence. In one of my schools, there was a rule which was reinforced directly by the principle and was reminded to all the students at the beginning of the school year. The rule was that if you get in a fight with another student on school grounds, the parents of everyone involved would be charged with a fee and the police will be called immediately. I remember when they put that rule in place, they had send a survey to all the parents asking them if they approved of the rule. And I can say for a fact that the number of incidents lowered visibly. Another one of my schools separated the girls lockers from the boys lockers, they were on two different sides of the school, and they were heavily guarded at all times to make sure students don’t go to the opposite sex’s lockers. And this was due to a tragic incident that had happened some years ago: a girl got sexually assaulted by a group of students next to her locker. Back in the day, of course we weren’t happy the boys weren’t allowed in the girls lockers and vice versa because we couldn’t see our boyfriends. But now I am grateful that I went to schools that did everything possible to make sure we were safe.

Some schools are working hard on staying safe, and others are more preoccupied with their reputation. Whatever the case is, the reality is that school violence still exists. Studying masculinities has opened our eyes to a lot of issues men face every single day. Statistics like the ones presented in the CBC series mentioned previously, or in the documentary “The mask you live in” are scary. Realizing that 4 out of 10 boys have experienced violence at school, that more than 70% of students have reported violence by the hand of other students, that one in every 6 men has experienced unwanted sexual harassement or agression is hard. It is even harder trying to explain it, or even understand it. The studies presented to us in class reflect some of the aggressive nature of masculinity and perhaps where it comes from. Lots of modern men are taught from a young age never to cry, never to show weakness, to prove themselves physically and so on. Kilmartin and Smiler’s multiple chapters on masculinity and its different aspects all turn around the same subject. They all explain how men are oppressed to be competitive and strong and of course, this could explain why some men are violent, but I don’t think this is the entire explanation, it cannot be, and I don’t want to blame any man nor the struggles he has been through for the school violence happening around us. I think there is something else.

In this last paragraph I will provide my personal, a bit philosophical, opinion on the subject of school violence. I noticed that all the statistics they provided to us said that most students experience the most physical or sexual violence at the hands of other students between the grades 7 and 10. This is the time of a child’s life when their hormones are completely untameable and their brains and bodies are still developing. I have always thought there is a sadistic side of the human nature, and maybe this is the time when this side is, also, the most untameable. We often hear the phrase “acting like an animal” when someone is too violent physically or even verbally and I think that this is always part of the problem, no matter how much we try to contain it or ignore it. Earlier today, i asked a friend how he thinks we can stop or lower school violence, and he answered “we just can’t”.

It gives me pain to say these things, I am certainly not saying it is inevitable, but I am trying to take the attention off of masculinity. I don’t think masculinity should be blamed for, or associated with, violence. I don’t think we should blame our society for not doing enough to stop violence, or for somehow raising violent men or women. This is my reflection on the subject of school violence, a fairly sensitive topic. It is hard to find a straight forward answer or explanation to why violence in schools happens. I think that the best thing we can do, is encourage more school boards to take the necessary security precautions to try to minimalise the violence in their schools, and be grateful if we never lived it.

First day of 9^th grade, Jayden 15-years-old, will be leaving school property in a critical situation. His injuries, including a fracture to the skull, a brain bleed and a fracture to the internal ear, are nothing compared to the psychological trauma caused by this event. Attacked in his blindside by one of his classmates, the 9^thgrader will not be returning to the same school after his convalescence. Jayden is not the only one facing this type of situation. Throughout the country, hundreds of teens spoke up about their experience with violence and aggression in schools. Being much more common than previously imagined, the results of a survey created by Mission Research studying the subject of school violence, reveal an eye-opening issue, denouncing school-related gender-based violence at a very serious level.

Canadian teens are more familiar than most with the subject of violence in our schools. for many of them, violence has made its way into their personal, daily lives. School-related gender-based violence can be noticed from a very young age and is an issue that touches both sides of the gender spectrum. Situations similar to the one Jayden faced are not uncommon. Actually, it is 40% of boys that face violence at least once throughout their academic journey. Often put under the umbrella of bullying, these violent behaviours are, in many cases, traumatising for teens, but no one really knows how to deal with them. After all, throughout the totality of school violence victims, only a mere 50% denunciate their aggressor to adults or trusted members of the school’s staff, and from this half, only a few are left satisfied by the measures taken. For young women, this culture of violence is primarily portrayed through unwanted sexual touches and sexual assaults. Cases of sexual assault related to school, mostly occurs between 7^th and 10^th grade confirms CBC news. For Brook, she was only 14 when an older student from her high school brought her to a parking lot, choked and sexually assaulted her. When Brook reported the situation and tried to get help, the school did not take the measure wanted and left her, as most girls going through similar situations, unsatisfied. 3 girls out of 5 did not get help needed after an incident of sexual assault. Only 1 out of 4 girls are satisfied with the measures taken by the school. Schools are facing these violent situations every day. In Ontario, the province faces in average more than 2100 cases a year, for a total that surpasses 10 incidents a day. Considering the statistics found in the Mission Research survey, we can, without a doubt, say that schools have a part of the blame to carry in this national shame that is school violence. 

What makes violence so popular amongst teens? Tracy Vaillancourt, professor studying violence prevention, acknowledges the possibility that, in our own cultural era, the smartphones along with the media could be negatively contributing to this nation-wide issue. In the documentary the mask you live in, we are confronted with the reality that boys will likely spend, in average, more than 40 hours a week watching television and more than 15 hours a week playing video games. Most of the heroes and characters portrayed in those movies, shows and games are not, in most cases, a correct or even passable representation of what a role model should be for the targeted age of these entertainments. Often surrounding the themes of misogyny, alcohol, drugs and violence, the entertainment industry is setting awful examples for our youth, not only in Canada, but around the globe. Furthermore, the hyper-sexualised world in which we live could be partially to blame for the rising cases of sexual assault seen in teens. the average age to which teens are first exposed to pornographic content reducing more and more every year, the hyper-sexualization of our teens could be resulting in these incredibly high numbers of sexual assaults. Being an issue on everyone’s lips in the last few years, directors and producers are welcoming this opportunity to open up and denunciate these problems through movies and tv shows. In HBO’s own Euphoria, director Sam Levinson denunciate many cultural issues faced by teens, including violence in a hyper-sexualised society. A prime example of the denunciation of said subject is the characterisation of Nate Jacobs, a violent, aggressive character of his show. Nate is focused on being the ultimate portrayal of masculinity, pressured by his family and the hyper-masculine football culture in which he flourishes, he will go to all ends to violently rejects everything that ties him to femininity.

Portraying staples of masculinity often being not enough to be proven a real man, boys will often recreate what they see in their heroes and role models, to engage violently against one another.  

            “I was told to toughen up”. This is how the school system have helped many boys in need over the years, not with a humane and comforting response to their situation but by playing with stereotypes. Being “tough”, is found in the same list (Kilmartin 2) as being, aggressive, unemotional, physical, dominant and above all, placed on the same page of initiate sex. When schools chose to solve boys’ issues through the use of stereotypical norms that are found at the same level as the actions they strive so much to eliminate, do we really expect other results than for boys to follow those stereotypical expectations set by society? School play a crucial role in the education of our youth; they shouldn’t be encouraging such behaviors. Furthermore, school being where most interactions between children, we could say it is the part of their environment that is most pressured by societal norms. Growing up, boys surrender their freedom to follow the stereotypical guidelines of what a man should be in society. Their ability to change and to be less or more influenced by those norms or guidelines, does not only reside in their age, it depends also of their environment. And what environment is more competitive than school? The competition between boys is often what is making them act violently, and that, just for the hope of not ending up at the bottom of the social ranking. After all, “A boy who fares poorly when competing with his male peers may find himself with low (social) status among this group as a result of his poor skills. In some sense he may be failing to prove his masculinity.”(Kilmartin 165) Masculinity is an endless competition like any other, but boys will often go to the extremes to prove their worth resulting in violent acts towards each other and towards women.

            In conclusion, the societal context that pressures our children, the hyper-sexualized world in which teens grow up and the culture of mass media and entertainment all play a part in this nation-wide problem. This violence was not formed out of thin air, the stereotypes of masculinity and societal norms that we enforce upon our teens are what created the situation as we know it today. In the light of what has been discussed in this text, Tracy Vaillancourt assures that it is only by acknowledging the presence of this problem that we will be able to provide a safe, less violent future for our youth.

Bibliography:

• https://gem.cbc.ca/media/marketplace/season-47/episode-4/38e815a-011d8f47088
• https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/school-violence-editors-note-1.5331402
• https://en.unesco.org/themes/school-violence-and-bullying/school-related-gender-based-violence
• https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/marketplace-school-violence-sexual-violence-1.5329520
• https://www.netnanny.com/blog/the-detrimental-effects-of-pornography-on-small-children/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuGoLCZ03eo&t=12s
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyi4ZrphRUw
• Kilmartin, Christopher, and Andrew P. Smiler. “Defining Men’s Studies.” The MasculineSelf, Cornwall On Hudson, NY, Sloan Publishing, 2019, pp. 1–7. 
• Kimmel, Michael.“Masculinity.” International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Ed. William A. Darity, Jr. 2nd ed. Vol. 5. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. 1-5. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 9 June 2014. 1-5. Print. 
• Christopher Kilmartin and Andrew P. Smiler. “No Man Is an Island: Men in Relationships.” The Masculine Self, Cornwall On Hudson, NY, Sloan Publishing, 2019,pp.161–171. 
• http://therepresentationproject.org/film/the-mask-you-live-in-film/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fh_ZPc29ks

Living in a society where conformity is synonymous for our comfort zone, it can be hard for one not to abide by what society expects of them, often by fear of humiliation or exclusion. As perfectly explained by Kilamrtin, “Boys and men are taught to be competitive with one another, but the establishment of intimacy rests partly on revealing one’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities to another.” (Kilmartin 165). The establishment of intimacy is done with people of trust ranging from family, to longtime friends. This being said, when dealing with large groups of strangers or acquaintances such as the hockey community or schools, the feeling of wanting to “fit in” is often a lot more present and so consequently, individuals will discourage their initial perceptions in correlation to the group’s reaction. This often leads to ever growing issues protected by social interpretation. The process by which institutions such as the education system or the NHL overlook the impact of specific issues such as school violence or fighting in hockey will be thoroughly examined. Precisely, why such powerful institutions gravitate away from the ideal of transparency at the expense of their reputation. 

As described in the CBC documentary on school violence, students and their parents are kept clueless as to what happens when incidents occur within school boundaries. During the documentary, a mother explains her daughter’s incident on a school bus. When asked whether parents of the other children had received a notice of potential danger on the bus, she answered that no notices had been sent out, that “They just didn’t want to deal with it. They just wanted to sweep it under the rug.” (School Violence, CBC, 5:35). This lack of transparency is what causes the suspicion and curiosity into what these institutions might want to hide and ultimately makes people fear for their children’s safety. Independent research conducted by the CBC revealed that “students experience gender-based violence from a young age”. Evidence also proves that sexual harassment and assault are more often experienced by girls as opposed to boys which centers around bullying (Common, & Singh, CBC). For the education system to hide behind the redundant belief that “boys will be boys”, it’s reputation must be at great risk. How and why can they believe that transparency may harm their image? Another study was conducted in 2019 by the CBC on a sample of 4000 canadian students regarding experiences of assault in school. Results showed that 41% of boys claimed to have been sexually assaulted at high school, 26 percent of girls said yes to unwanted sexual contact and finally, 25% of students first experienced such kinds of assaults before grade 7 (Common, & Singh, 2019). These results are without a doubt shocking to anyone, but shouldn’t this information be well known by all of us who attend or send our children to school? The fact that this information is being kept secret is really no coincidence. If these statistics were commonly known, people would think twice about choosing the right school for their children, which to say the least, would not be very beneficial to the education system as a whole.

The issue of transparency is also present in the controversy surrounding the impact of hockey fights on athletes involved. For decades, the NHL community rose out of excitement to the fighting that takes place on the ice. Although this issue is similar in many ways to violence in schools, fighting in the NHL is surprisingly defended by thousands as being “necessary” in preventing more dramatic incidents to occur. Many well known advocates of the game such as Don Cherry call it “the code”, a code that supposedly makes the league “safer”. As Don Cherry explained in a CBC documentary, “…you don’t hit a guy when he’s down. No sucker punch. You fight with honour.” (McKeown, 2010). It seems as though the belief that men must be stoic and strong has evolved to new heights within the decades of hockey growth. But why must these athletes continue to risk their lives for the enjoyment of others? In his essay on masculinity, Micheal Kimmel explains this phenomenon as “Doing Gender” and states, “institutions accomplish the creation of gender differences and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes.”(Kimmel 3). Gender order refers to the socially constructed expectations between men and women in society which ultimately assigns roles or responsibilities to both in a gender biased manner. This suggests that while roughness and fighting is present in hockey, it is present because of how institutions have created and shaped our expectations of how men should behave. This doesn’t prove the point that fighting should remain in hockey, but allows us to understand why it is there, and why discussing the issue now is fundamental for possible change in the future. In the end, trying to overlook the serious impact that fighting has on athletes for the well being of a sport’s reputation is only a sign of guilt.

When looking at the institutional transparency problem through a substantially larger perspective, it becomes more and more obvious that this issue is everywhere and anywhere we look. This is because all social institutions’ foundations are largely based upon gender bias which assigns specific positions and responsibilities to both men and women in a very calculated way. For example, as Michael Kimmel explained in regards to the field of medicine, it is much easier for a male student to pursue his education with no interruption than it is for a woman and the burden that is to carry and raise a child whilst pursuing her education. Thus, it is fair to say that “such programs are designed for male doctors” (Kimmel, 3). Understanding the fundamentals of Kimmel’s example makes it much easier for one to understand how and why the expectations and responsibilities for the enforcers of the NHL are what they have become. For this same reason, the violence in schools is recurring because of how institutions choose to deal with the issues at hand, and because becoming transparent as to what really happens will only prove guilt. Finally, a boy with recurring acts of violence in school cannot be viewed as a lost cause because once given a label by society, similar to older offenders, individuals will live up to this label as an identity.

In the end, being transparent as to what really happens as well as its true consequences is needed when dealing with such a dilemma.. Yes “boys will be boys”, but why not act on the issue at hand as opposed to denying its existence? Not acknowledging their mistakes acts as a barrier to change. As Bruce Lee once said, “Mistakes are always forgivable if only one has the courage to admit them”.

Works Cited

Kimmel, M. (2000). Masculinity. Class readings. 

Kilmartin, C. (1994) No man is an island: Men in relationships. Class readings.

McKeown, B. (2010). The Code. CBC News/MarketPlace. Retrieved from https://www.cbc.ca/ fifth/episodes/2009-2010/the-code

Common, D., Singh, A., & Taylor, C. (2019) ‘I thought he was dead’: CBC survey reveals 4 in 10 boys are physically assaulted at school. CBC News/MarketPlace. Retrieved from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/school-violence-marketplace-1.5224865

SchoolViolence. (2019). School Violence: How to fight for safer schools. CBC MarketPlace. 

https://gem.cbc.ca/media/marketplace/season-47/episode-4/38e815a-011d8f47088

From my personal experience, Highschool is survival of the fittest. As boys hit puberty there testosterone, as well as there, drive to show dominance over there peers skyrockets. In schools, “The fear of being seen as a sissy dominates the cultural definitions of manhood” ( Kimmel 147), and what is the best way to prove you’re not a sissy? Well, for teenage boys the answer is simple, sexual harassment or physical violence.

As most boys start to have there first real interest in women, more often then not there urge for domination or pride leads them to sexual assault or harassment. “26 per cent of girls say they experienced unwanted sexual contact at school” (McGuire 2019). Bullying, one of the main factors contributing to violence inside schools can also lead to sexual assault towards the opposite sex. Men, especially younger ones have this need to fit into the “Man Box” (defined by)(Kilmartin 6) which causes them to be more aggressive towards anyone who dares challenge there ability or requirements to be considered a “man” in the eyes of there surrounding peers which can even go as far as men forcing themselves onto the opposite sex to assert dominance or to gain some sort of “manly” requirement. Men also tend to have buildups of emotions because relationships between men “focus on doing things together and tend to be emotionally shallow.” (Kilmartin 161) stopping men from emotionally expressing themselves among each other.

Bullying between one man to another is the most common and this is because of the need to be masculine. “Masculinity refers most commonly to socially constructed expectations of appropriate behaviors, beliefs, expressions, and styles of social interaction for men in a culture or subculture at a given time.” (Kimmel 5) and sadly, the “appropriate” behavior between men would be to show everyone how much more of a man you are compared to your peers through physical violence. “41 percent of boys say they were physically assaulted at high school” (McGuire 2019) but why is this? It’s because being “different” is seen as a threat between schoolboys.

Being “different” can mean anything along the lines of having different colored hair or being less muscular or liking “feminine” things compared to your fellow brotherhood and These “different” schoolkids are the prime target for bullying and physical violence because they “challenge” the norms of other more “manly” males. “If all the other guys like playing with dolls and I don’t am I the none-manly one?”. Thoughts like these create even more of a need to show dominance through the form of bullying.

This information and knowledge of violence in schools combined with the knowledge we have collected and explored regarding masculinity creates a lot of insight into this topic. Men act the way they act in schools to prove they’re worth to each other. “I’m the strongest so I’m the manliest and because I bully the rest of you you’re less of a man for letting me beat you up”. Thoughts like these are the problem with violence in schools. As a teenager, you’ll do anything you can to fit in and that’s including physical violence.

References;

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/school-violence-editors-note-1.5331402

“Masculinity as Homophobia” by: MICHAEL S. KIMMEL

“Masculinity” by: MICHEAL S. KIMMEL

“No man is an island, Men n Relationships” by: KILLMARTIN

“Defining Men’s Studies” by: KILLMARTIN

Although violence in the hockey sphere is an important issue, I have decided to write about the Issue of the violence in school and the lack of actions taken to stop it. Coming from a high school that some could consider as ‘’dangerous’’, I was thinking that those types of behaviours are rare and represented an extreme minority in schools all around the country. In the first minutes of the documentary only, they proved me that I was wrong with numbers and testimonials that are more than shocking. 1 in 4 girls have experienced unwanted sexual touching, 1 in 7 girls said that they were sexually assaulted, 40 % of boys reported that they have been physically assaulted, etc. Marketplace’s documentary seems to have highlighted some of the problems and relations can be made with masculinity and some of its concepts to try to explain the causes of all this brutality.

The first thing that comes to mind with this documentary is the lack documentation or actions taken, more generally the lack of information on the subject for practically everyone. For example, in the case of boys being attacked. Students do not know what to do, Parents don’t know that such things happen, and Schools seems to voluntarily omit to document incidents. From the students’ perspective, I think that they refuse to talk to adults because it’s often seen as ‘’snitching’’ and getting labelled as a snitch could seriously harm their reputation and make them look like weak. For example, only half of them talks about what happens to them and some of them were told to ‘’toughen up’’ and this is concurring with the concept of the manbox ‘’ Inexpressiveness and Independence’’: Boys are expected to be strong and to be capable of enduring violence or insults without asking for help because boys are supposed to be tough and not suffer from such attacks. It is really a destructive belief as it gives aggressors impunity and the victims are doubly hurt.

But in the case of sexual aggressions, the problem seems to be a little different. When there are cases of sexual assault, not only the victims, mostly women, do not receive the help needed but they are also shamed for something over they had no control and where they were the victims. I personally think that Masculinity and its believes has something to do with it. In Brook’s case, the boy that assaulted her was also reported by two other girls came back to school after only a few days later. Victims feel abandoned by those supposed to defend them to a point where 3 out of 5 girls did not report sexual violence to their school. From what we read in this class It is possible to link it some biased notions. As Kimmel states in his writing ‘’ Masculinity’’: ‘’ The gendered identity of individuals shapes those gendered institutions express and reproduce the inequalities that compose gender identity’’. It is directly seen with the people working in the school where the incident happened. It is a good thing for a man to ‘’conquer’’ women, to get them. The example of Brook illustrates perfectly how even institutions are biased by this notion and are, consciously or not, accomplices of the wrongs done to the victims by not helping them and they reproduce the same demeaning behaviours towards women; unfortunately it is not a isolated case. It is also seen in boys altercation; for example, Jason stated that the principal hears and see things in the hallways but never does anything. It reflects how the assumption that boys will be boys and that fighting, or insulting is a normal and common thing is also anchored in formal institutions. At the end, it only results again in an aggressor’s impunity and a discreditation of the sufferers leading to a feeling of being let down and loneliness.

 The aggressors, whether the victim is a boy or a girl, are also following social constructs where they are questioned about their masculinity. In his writing ‘’Defining Men studies’’,   Kimmel wrote that ‘’ The combination of Antifemininity and Status and Achievement support the notion that men are inherently superior to women, and thus can be seen as justifications to sexism’’. Boys are taught that being a man means to be unlike a woman and rejects everything feminine. All of those assumption tend to make them think that aggression towards women are justified since they are superior. Those wrongs are also seen in male-male altercations where boys that have been attacked are seen as weak and are often the ones suffering from social repercussion. If a man is seen as weak, he will be compared to a woman and will be suffering from the same prejudices.

In conclusion, Violence in schools is not something rare nor isolated but institutions tend to hide it and do not take the right action in order to stop it. Masculinity and the concepts that revolves around sure have their implications in the problem. Boys have to be strong and not reports violence, Girls do not receive the adequate help after traumatising aggression and are sometimes held responsible as the institutions allows all this unfairness because of their own biases. Acknowledging the problem is already part of the solution but a lot still has to be made and, one step at a time, we will succeed.  

Sources:

Kimmel, Michael. “Masculinity.” International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Ed. William A. Darity, Jr. 2nd ed. Vol. 5. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. 1-5. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 9 June 2014. 1-5. Print.

Kilmartin and Smiler. “Defining Men’s Studies.” The Masculine Self, Sloan Publishing, 2019, pp. 1-7, Cornwall On Hudson, Accessed 25 Apr. 2020 

“How To Fight For Safer Schools.” School Violence. CBC, 24 October 2019.

School violence is constantly on the rise and is not being taken as serious despite its severity. With the evolution of technology, it is becoming easier for people to speak ill of one another and can go as far as bullying through social media. Although both sexes suffer from school violence, it tends to be men who usually instigate this behavior. After studying Kilmartin’s reports throughout the semester, it is quite clear as to why males typically have these manners. Having witnessed multiple fights growing up, it is clear that men have a bigger tendency of fighting to harden their pride. In the documentary we also learn that school boards tend to hide the incidents which occurred by labeling it as something else or not making people aware that it has happened.

As mentioned in Kilmartin’s “Defining Men’s Studies”, men are usually associated with characteristics given to fighters, such as “[s]trong, [t]ough, [a]ggressive, [p]hysical, …” which manipulates their tendencies to fit this ideology. (2) We learn that being a “real man” in most societies often refers to being the toughest and most fearless individual. Due to these stereotypes, men often try and live up to the traits they “should” have and resort to violence in order to prove that they are “real men.” In most cases, fights break out from verbal disputes and are used as defense mechanisms when one feels threatened or is not capable of responding verbally. A study in “Men at Work: Jobs, Careers, and Masculinity” explained that men try to obtain the most power possible to feel superior. (Kilmartin 229) This is correlated to fighting as men try to prove they are the “Alpha Male”, untouchable by others. By doing so, they are not only perceived as more dominant but make the other males seem weaker further improving their reputation of being a “real man.”

Growing up, I have been apart and witnessed many physical fights. Most cases were slight disputes taken out of hand and resulted in someone getting hurt unnecessarily. Often times, these fights broke out over people having a crush on the same girl and would use violence to try and win them over. It was their way of demonstrating that they are “real men” and would defend as well as provide for her if they were together. Stereotypes affect the way that men perceive certain traits. In most movies, we see the attractive cheerleader falling for the tough jock which tricks men into believing that they are able to win over a female’s heart by being aggressive. In one of Deborah David and Robert Brannon’s books, they explain that “American masculinity ha[s] four primary characteristics”, one being “[s]tatus and [a]chievement” (“Defining Men’s Studies” Kilmartin 4,5). A victory from a physical fight builds up a man’s status and as a result, they continue these acts of violence in order to strengthen their reputation.

In the documentary, we learn that many school boards shy away from sharing incident reports which have occurred in order to preserve their reputation. Some schools have even gone to the extent where they do not address the number of annual incidents to students and do not approach victims of school violence. Instead, students feel as though they have no one to talk to and are scared to express situations they might have experienced. Despite awareness being brought to this topic, not many schools have taken too much action to reduces the chances of violence occurring and continue their days as though it is not an issue.

Schools need to take more action in order to reduce the ongoing violence. Measures need to be put in place to better monitor bullying and verbal offenses to prevent fights from being instigated. Although we cannot fully eliminate stereotypes, men need to find ways of not believing everything they hear. If the education system becomes more severe about punishments, violence should decrease instead and students will be able to focus more on their education rather than worrying about being harmed by others.

Works Cited

Kilmartin, Christopher, and Andrew P. Smiler. “Defining Men’s Studies.” The Masculine Self, Cornwall On Hudson, NY, Sloan Publishing, 2019, pp. 1–7.

Christopher Kilmartin and Andrew P. Smiler “Men at Work: Jobs, Careers and Masculinity.” The Masculine Self, Cornwall On Hudson, NY, Sloan Publishing, 2019, pp. 221-226,228–235.

“With great power come great responsibilities.” Of course, everyone knows it come from Uncle Ben, but I feel not a lot of people understand the meaning behind this great sentence. This is shown through the absurd violence in school.

            CBC survey reveals 40% of boys are physically assaulted at school. Why is that? Well, when you are in high school you are also your teenage years, also know as the years of “who even am I?” School as a concept is a mini society, and everyone tries to find their place. But since they do not know how, they revert to the most primal behavior, the stronger is the alpha. To prove themselves, they need to beat someone else, and it is natural to go for the weak one. In those situations, everyone like to blame the adults. But I strongly believe it is the role of the students to do something. They need to be able to fix their own problem, that is what it means to be a functional human being.

One of the ways, to put it blunt, is to become strong. If you are not weak, you will not be the victim anymore. When I say to be stronger I do not specifically mean become a bodybuilder, even if it can be one way, but to develop a redeeming quality. Preferably you want something to go with your passion, if you like music learn an instrument, if you love writing develop a book. It can be anything, but what is important after that, is to make friends who have the same interests. Once you have done those two things, I am not saying it will be easy, you will not see the bullies the same ways. You become over them. You have people that love you for what you are, which develop a presence of confidence around you that stop most bullies.

You probably think I do not know what I am talking about. There is this kid who got bullied because he was smart and small, it was not going well for him. Then he started karate and eventually stop being a victim. The story is simplified but the elements are there. He found something that he was good at and find a place where he belongs. It took that victim persona out of him.

            The second way is for the strong to deal with the strong. There is no doubt that a hierarchy exist between students. The higher you go the more power you gain, but more responsibilities come with it. Kilmartin describes that one of the aspects of being a man is status and achievement. I believe we can take it further; a man is defined by what he does with the status and achievement that he gains. Personally, a lot of my school friends while I was in high school never got into problems because they knew me. I have a strong personality in general and luckily I have what it takes to back it up. If someone harmed one of my friends, they would have to answer to me. And in my school everyone knew me. In the high school hierarchy, I was high, I did not bully but helped people. The best way to go higher in life is not by crushing others, but by helping everyone climb.

            In his chapter on relationships, Kilmartin stated this: “Friendship is probably the most common form of relationship.” Being the most common, it is important to carefully choose our friends. Even more important in school since we will see them almost every day. Good friends can help develop in the beautiful butterfly you can become, just like bad friends can bring out the worst demon that sleep inside you. I am sure that a lot of bullies do not want to act mean, but feel pressure to do so. They also need our help.

            In conclusion, people often criticism he adults for not believing them or not acting. Since we, the students, are the closest to the situations we need to act for us. There is no one better to act that one who saw the crime with his own eyes.