A mother declared that she was done pretending that any men are safe to be around, including her own sons, in an op-ed released last week.
Jody Allard, a mother of two sons and a feminist writer, said she came to the realization that men in general are dangerous because of how men “subconsciously absorb” sexism.
“I know I’m not supposed to cast an entire sex with a single paint brush — not all men, I’m sure some readers are thinking and preparing to type or tweet,” Allard wrote. “But if it’s impossible for a white person to grow up without adopting racist ideas, simply because of the environment in which they live, how can I expect men not to subconsciously absorb at least some degree of sexism? White people aren’t safe, and men aren’t safe, no matter how much I’d like to assure myself that these things aren’t true.”
Allard said believing that men are unsafe doesn’t mean that something is wrong with her; rather, it just points to a larger system that negatively influences men.
“I love my sons, and I love some individual men. It pains me to say that I don’t feel emotionally safe with them, and perhaps never have with a man, but it needs to be said because far too often we are afraid to say it,” Allard wrote. “This is not a reflection of something broken or damaged in me; it is a reflection of the systems we build and our boys absorb.
Allard previously wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post in which she accused her sons of being “blind to rape culture.” The op-ed pushed her son away from her because he feels that she characterized him unfairly in her write-up.
“He doesn’t understand that even quiet misogyny is misogyny, and that not all sexists sound like Twitter trolls. He is angry at me now, although he won’t admit that either, and his anger led him to conservative websites and YouTube channels; places where he can surround himself with righteous indignation against feminists, and tell himself it’s ungrateful women like me who are the problem,” Allard wrote.
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