A Call to Men: Changing Norms for Changing Times

Ted Bunch from A Call to Men, Michelle Sterling from Amy Paulin's Office and Jay Genova from Scarsdale Family Counseling ServiceWhen we tell a crying little boy to “act like a man,” or say to another little boy, “you throw like a girl,” what messages are we sending to them about social norms and gender roles? By teaching boys to be dominant, aggressive and tough are we creating the next generation of bullies and sexual offenders?

That was the subject of a revelatory talk by Ted Bunch from “A Call to Men” at Scarsdale High School on December 7. The event was sponsored by Scarsdale Family Counseling Service and the Scarsdale Safe Coalition and underwritten by a grant secured through the office of Assemblymember Amy Paulin.

Bunch and Tony Porter founded “A Call to Men” twenty years ago to promote healthy manhood and an equitable and inclusive culture. Bunch is a frequent guest on television and radio and even served as a consultant for the television series, “Law & Order, Special Victims Unit.” The group works with many of national athletic organizations such as the NBA and NFL and college coaches to bring their message of “healthy manhood” to players in an effort to teach them to value and respect women, girls, LGBQ and trans people and to value themselves. They also counsel companies and organizations to fight discrimination and harassment in the workplace.

The foundation of Bunch’s message was found in “The Man Box,” which illustrates the expectations that men are “expected to be strong, successful, powerful, dominating, fearless, in control and emotionless.” Bunch “unpacked” these ideas and showed how they ultimately lead to the mistreatment of women and create mental illness in men. With limited emotional language skills and an inability to ask for help, many men face mental health challenges. In fact, men are 3.5 times more likely to die from suicide than women. Bunch says we need to give men permission to express fear and sadness and to show them how to ask for help when they need it. He said, “We need to rethink how men are taught to act and behave.”

By educating men, society can decrease violence against women. Bunch said, “The more we increase healthy manhood the more we decrease domestic violence, gun violence, assault, bullying.”

Tony Porter of A Call to Men offers a powerful TED talk on the subject, viewed 3.4 million times here. Watch it to redefine some of your most basic assumptions.