Recent revelations about how women have been harassed, or worse, by men, have been brought to the fore by the Harvey Weinstein scandal. But they are the tiniest tip of the iceberg. I’m talking not just about the entertainment industry, but about the earliest raping and pillaging of our barbaric beginnings, to the violent and sophisticated forms of it today.

Generations of women have shown immense courage in both enduring and sharing such traumatic episodes. Alongside empathy for women, and challenging men’s complicity and denial, something deeper needs to be talked about. We need to look further than the knee-jerk condemnation of men. It may be an important stage but it won’t stop the toxic pattern.

It’s not just because men are ‘bad’. I do think, though, that we may be addicted. Nothing I write is to excuse or condone any harassment of women anywhere by any man, ever. But to fully deal with the issue, we need to consider how heterosexual men are addicted to women and femininity in a way that women are not addicted to men and to masculinity.

The news might all seem bad, but good things are happening too.

Stay inspired – subscribe to Positive News magazine

It’s clear that among the three or so billion men in the world, there is a wide spectrum; from those who would never harass a woman, all the way through to those who are weak, ignorant and would even boast with a proud sense of entitlement about grabbing women’s genitals.

But looking at us humans as an alien might see our species, I would have to conclude that on this planet, the men as a whole seem significantly more affected, moved, spellbound, touched, even driven madly into addiction by women’s sensuality, form, and sexuality than women are, generally, by men’s. Is that too far-out to say?

Evidently, a huge number of the men of this planet are untrained and ill-equipped for this degree of all-consuming attraction or desire. Many men need to gorge on pornography or fantasy to temporarily tame that desperate feeling of needing and wanting sensual, sexual and intimate contact with the feminine.

Evidently, a huge number of the men of this planet are untrained and ill-equipped for this degree of all-consuming attraction or desire

This is exacerbated by consumer culture, which backs up the belief that women’s sexuality is a commodity. It promotes an attitude that all a woman really is is something to be bought, sold or simply taken. Look how much of the mainstream media and advertising is blatantly and unapologetically exploiting this same ‘weakness’ or ‘tendency’ in men to be so hooked in and captivated, even bewitched, by women. Not to mention the staggering percentage of daily internet traffic that is to porn sites.

If men are subject to a bigger challenge to keep their addictive compulsion under control, then let’s break the taboo and educate the men to deal with this properly, without shame, as they are growing up. Is our culture ready to do this?

I see a new wave of men who are not so blinkered when it comes to respecting who a woman really is, in her entirety. Men less disempowered by the traumatised impotency of their fathers and grandfathers. But they seem, to me, to be far from the majority.

When a man feels powerless – and especially disempowered, as so many men do – his ego can react by compensating elsewhere to readdress that felt imbalance. He may begin to abuse and disempower someone or something else. Women have been dehumanised for centuries.

If we want a culture where men have any hope of getting this Niagara of desire and disrespect under control for themselves (and for women) then let’s begin by stopping feeding it so much. Let’s stop using the power of it to sell things to men. Let’s stop using it to manipulate men or women, either in our media and culture, or in person. Let’s never use it to get what we want from men. Let’s not, through repeating this toxic abuse of men’s ‘addiction’, educate men that they’ll get more of their fix if they part with their money, buy this product, or do what you want.

If men are subject to a bigger challenge to keep their addictive compulsion under control, then let’s break the taboo

How can men and women forgive the past and step forward with our whole hearts together? Do we need to do a reparations-type process like at the end of apartheid in South Africa, or as seen post-genocide in Rwanda? What would be enough for men and women to move forward as partners and team-mates in this ultra-challenging subject area of attraction and desire?

It’s time for a new chapter of compassion and collaboration. We can all teach each other and our children to understand and work with ‘what is’; being open and non-judgemental about the unique predicament that both men and women have to deal with. I’d love us to melt the taboo and start now.

Featured image: Tim Gouw

ADDICTION SPECIAL

This article is part of a special focus on addiction, which also features in Positive News magazine. Subscribe now to get the magazine delivered to your door each quarter.

The post ‘To end sexual harassment, we need to face up to men’s addiction to women’ appeared first on Positive News.

There’s a scent of reunion in the air. The women want their men back, and I have a foolish and lyrical notion that we can be the Pied Pipers, leading the men back to the women. Our task as men is to re-awaken each other’s maleness and leadership again, but this time expressed through our compassion and service, not our control and dominion.

Over the last 100 or more years, women have understandably lost their trust in men in general. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone. Fragile-ego’d, self-seeking, solely cock-driven, permanently adolescent men have abused the planet on every level. The air, water, and soil are polluted, the animals violently killed, the children uneducated and the old people uncared for.

And it may sound radical to say this, but there has emerged a masculine edge in women, which has crept in during the past half a century. It is an edge that has, I believe, been born of a lack of trust in the males to deliver leadership and protection through service and wisdom. Women have been over-masculinising like mad to compensate for the essence of true maleness that’s so badly lacking in at least the last two generations of men, who have been addicted to profit and status.

“Women have been over-masculinising like mad to compensate for the essence of true maleness that’s so badly lacking in at least the last two generations of men”

Is it any wonder women have lost trust in men’s expression of their core male values?

But what excites me is that over the last 50 years, a radical shift in maleness has been emerging. There has been a whole new wave of softer men, relating to their wives and lovers more, connecting more presently with their kids, and actively trying to cultivate this by attending deepening workshops, for example.

This has awakened the vital feminine-in-the-male quality. But it has only brought us so far. It is a long way from the re-emergence of the powerful, unwavering male that the planet and the human species so badly needs today. Cultivating the feminine qualities in the modern man is just a stepping stone to a deeper re-awakening, and that’s the male-in-the-male.

My recent conversations and workshop sessions with numerous women have left me in no doubt that the women want their men back in their true maleness. This means being strong, steadfast and genuine; unswayed by the grasping, needy, untrustworthy and superficial values that have often been driving them in this last century.

In my experience, there seems to be a huge yearning among these women to relax more into their feminine selves, melt and soften and just be.

But to trust that when they melt, the man will be a clear and strong container for that melting, feels like too big an expectation for them to have these days. The kind of man I speak of can hold his woman in her all diverse and changeable forms. He is a heart mountain.

“Women want their men back in their true maleness”

I’ve purposely experimented when spending time with women recently. My intention has been to hold the masculine core in how we relate, being strong and present for them, just for 20 focused minutes, to represent and embody that pure, steadfast maleness.

The visible permission that 20 minutes gives the women to feminise is vividly noticeable within moments. She softens. She opens, she glows, she sometimes sobs with relief and the uncomfortable maleness she was holding melts just a little.

Could it be that the women of the planet are hungry and eager for the men to step into this trustworthy, loyal, devoted, dependable space? Are the men ready for this? I say yes, we are.

So as men, it should be our mission to beckon and invite each other to step back into our strength and power, but this time renewed in constant, reliable, unfaltering attendance to the true principles of authentic support, leadership through service, and humble devotion to women.

The Order of the Sacred Woodsman is a group established by Jamie Catto, where men can gather and uphold their male strengths and share their insights and vulnerabilities.

A 5-day Sacred Woodsman retreat, titled Fool – Warrior – Magician, will take place in Tarifa, Spain from 1 April 2013, co-hosted by Jamie Catto and Neil Hill. For information phone Neil on +34 674 531 518

More information about Jamie Catto: www.jamiecatto.com

The post Leading the men back to the women appeared first on Positive News.