Marianne Merten
Men are mobilising for women’s rights and condemning violence against women.
“It’s about changing men’s attitudes and belief systems,” says project co-ordinator of the Five in Six Project, Charles Maisel. The name is based on a 1993 research finding – when it was launched – that one man in six is abusive or violent towards women.
Maisel says that statistic may no longer be accurate.
The project’s national awareness programme runs until November and then it will organise men’s groups at community level. They have a database of 50 000 sympathetic men across the country.
Campaigns to date include a poster campaign featuring one rotten apple among six and a newspaper, Daily Male, which probes issues of what it means to be a man.
Maisel says there are plenty of decent, caring men across South Africa. Some 10 000 have been nominated by their wives, daughters, sons or friends as Everyday Heroes as part of an ongoing campaign targeting men and their behaviour towards women.
The support of public figures who speak out against women’s abuse is crucial to help change attitudes. Leaders are a key to the building of a social movement against abuse.
“If you shift the leadership, you change the masses. If a leader starts wearing pink pyjamas, a lot of others will follow,” Maisel smiles. “Men are like sheep. They will listen to their designated leader.”
Maisel says men who have abused must be challenged, but also supported. The Five in Six Project has been holding awareness and prevention workshops since 1995.
Most of the men attending the workshops have never been praised before, Maisel said. “They’ve never heard something like: `You’re a nice person.’ In a positive bombardment exercise (each of the group is being told something positive by everyone else) they just crack up. They cry.”