Straight Men Can Never Say No to Forced Sex…
Próspero M, & Fawson P (2010). Sexual coercion and mental health symptoms among heterosexual men: the pressure to say “yes”. American journal of men’s health, 4 (2), 98-103 PMID: 19477760
In their study on the mental health impact of female to male sexual coercion, Prospero and Fawson (2010) conclude that ‘gender socialization does not allow men to refuse sex from an intimate partner’ (p.98). By referring to their own survey of the behaviours and attitudes among 370 heterosexual male university students as well as to other research, they paint a bleak picture of the private lives of university students, lives which they suggest are typically pockmarked by verbal, physical and sexual aggression (2010, p.98). Moreover, despite the best intentions of the gay pathology army to claim otherwise, most of these ‘male victims are in a relationship with a female partner’ (2010, p.98).
What worries me about any research that talks about female violence toward men is that it really needs to be couched in relativist terms. Otherwise, we might easily be fooled into believing that men are just as likely to be the victims of female violence as women are likely to be the victims of male violence. Nothing, as the evidence starkly tells it, could be further from the truth. That necessity to look at this sensitive issue in relativist terms is not to seek to discount or diminish the impact of female violence against men. On the contrary, the minority status of male victims creates specific challenges that require nuanced responses.
Rather than nuanced responses, Prospero and Fawson (2010) alternatively petition for a large-scale, primary prevention strategy, to ‘resocialize and teach men and women that it is socially acceptable for men to refuse sex from a woman, even from his intimate partner’ (p.102) [italics in original]. The authors contend that masculinity traps men into believing that they can never refuse sexual advances from their female partners (2010, pp.101-102). This can leave such men feeling distressed, anxious and suffering from associated somatic symptoms (2010, pp.101-102). That is, a textbook, traumatic response to sexual violence.
Sadly missing from Prospero and Fawson’s (2010) article is any mention of the fact that gender socialisation does not merely affect how men and women construct their intimate relationships. It also affects how health professionals respond or not to the therapeutic and other support needs of the male victims of sexual violence. Psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and general practitioners are just likely as anyone else to hold to the view that a woman can never sexually abuse a man. When that jaundiced view is actualised in the consulting room, it can only cause further harm to already traumatised men…
if men never say no how are women to know they dont want sex.
Precisely. It would seem that many men feel that they cannot say ‘no’, lest their masculinity be up for grabs!
We do want sex. Saying no means there is a (social) reason we shouldn’t.
wow…
this is really a problem made invisible by pre-defined gender-roles. The BS story about how Manly Men always want to have sex, and it’s women’s job to play gatekeeper assumes consent from men. That means that not only do men feel like they can’t say no, it doesn’t occur to women that they might, so they don’t really ask for it in any recognizable way.
The whole ‘manly men’ thing gets many men into deep shite. Like, for example, how so many men top themselves so perfectly because they want to make sure that they get it ‘right’. Right…
Actually, it does as it attempts to disregard the results of the study. The study suggests that females engage in more coercive sexual violence than people generally assume. In order to conclude that the rate of sexual violence against male and female victims is vastly different one would have to compare the rates. Likewise, one would also have to factor in that males are far less likely to report experiencing any abuse.
If you wish to acknowledge male victims, stating that men are not as likely to be abused as women, a notion based purely on assumption and the lack of male victims coming forward, undermines that effort. Telling male victims that they are a minority group simply silences them and reinforces the notion that their experiences do not count as abuse, that their experiences ought not be equally recognized, and that women never abuse men.
Sexual violence remains, predominantly, an act perpetrated by men against women. However, where women do indeed sexually abuse men, either directly or through coercion or intimidation, then my view is that we need greater understanding of that problem, as a means to prevent it. That masculine ideals dictate that a man might rather be forced into sex he does not want than simply say ‘no’ and that any such man who later approaches a sexual assault service would be fundamentally told to fuck off, tells me that addressing this problem will be difficult.