The importance of gender equitable attitudes

Raising boys to have a “gender equitable” (equal) attitude to men and women’s value and rights will help produce a generation more likely to prevent violence. Mr Linossier has this year reiterated the importance of the following messages:
* Men’s violence against women is the responsibility of men.
* Girls and women have the right to live in safety.
* Victim-blaming underpins the idea that it’s women’s responsibility, not male perpetrators’, to prevent violence against women.
* Challenging gender inequality is “crucial to preventing violence against women”.
In White Ribbon Week, perhaps his most important messages for parents of boys, like me, is to remind us and our men in the making that “we must eradicate aggression from the story of what it means to be a boy/man, NOT teach girls/women to be tougher so they can handle it”.
If we succeed in this, life for our children of both genders will be a richer, more stable, safer place.