A Call to Men -Tony Porter and Ted Bunch —Men Leading the Struggle against Rape
On a cold, winter day last year in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, it was the soft voice of a 9-year-old boy that reaffirmed his life’s mission.
“I was working in a very small charter school made up predominantly of African- American boys,” Porter said. “We were talking about all the things that define being a man and I asked what would happen if we could step outside that man box.
“This boy looks at me and says: ‘Then I would be free.’
The admission stopped Porter dead in his tracks.
“It made me think: ‘If he’s not free then what is he?” Porter said. “What is his day-to-day experience from school to home, or going outside to play? What is this man box he adheres to, not just to get through the day but to survive? And where are we, as men, falling short in giving him his freedom?”
Porter and Ted Bunch co-founded the national organization, A Call To Men, to address and end domestic and sexual violence against women and girls by challenging men to reconsider their long held and long taught gender beliefs — then take those lessons back to disseminate within their respective communities.
While the field of work that focuses on violence against women is about 40 years old, Porter and Bunch found it troubling that most of the dialogue was coming from women.
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