What’s Rebecca Solnit’s Men Explain Things to Me about? How are women silenced by men in personal and professional situations?
Many women have experienced “mansplaining”—when a man condescendingly explains something to a woman that she already knows well. In Men Explain Things to Me, historian, activist, and award-winning author Rebecca Solnit explains that this tendency is the result of men believing they have the right to control women.
Read below for a brief overview of Men Explain Things to Me
Men Explain Things to Me by Rebecca Solnit
Rebecca Solnit’s Men Explain Things to Me explains that society has a longstanding pattern of treating the rights of women as secondary to the rights of men. This pattern is the result of a pervasive underlying belief rooted in authoritarianism: that men have the right to control women. This pattern manifests in different ways, from men confidently speaking over women, to violence such as rape and murder. In her series of essays, Solnit describes the many ways society mistreats women—discussing statistics and instances of violence against women, the ideology behind sexism and misogyny, and how this ideology manifests on an individual, societal, and global level.
Solnit is a historian, activist, and award-winning author of 20 books, including Hope in the Dark, A Paradise Built in Hell, and River of Shadows. She also contributes to the website TomDispatch and is a contributing editor to Harper’s magazine.
The Fight for Women’s Rights
According to Solnit, women have long been fighting for basic human rights, including life, freedom, and the right to take part in culture and politics. Despite great progress in recent decades, this fight for equality continues today.
The general message that society sends to women is that this world isn’t built for them and that women’s right to take up space or be heard is dependent on what men want from them. On an individual level, this societal pattern may manifest as irritating but seemingly innocuous interactions, like when a man patronizingly explains a concept to a woman who already knows the topic well—a tendency commonly known as mansplaining. (Shortform note: While Solnit usually avoids this term because she finds it overly general and simplistic, we’ll use it in this guide for the sake of concision.)
However, societal mistreatment of women can also manifest in dangerous, violent ways, such as sexual assault, rape, and murder. According to Solnit, the practice of “mansplaining” and these much more extreme behaviors exist on the same spectrum: They’re all defined by the underlying authoritarian belief that men have the right to control women—whether they’re controlling when and on what topics women are allowed to speak, how they’re allowed to behave or use their bodies, or even whether they’re allowed to live.
Statistics on the Mistreatment of Women
Solnit cites statistics to illustrate her point about the mistreatment of and violence against women, particularly with regard to domestic violence, sexual assault, and murder. She notes that these statistics are often purposely excluded from the news cycle—because if we confronted these statistics, we’d have to talk about the reasons behind them, such as the patriarchy and gender roles. And if we did that, we’d then have to discuss how to prevent this violence, which would require significant systemic change in societies throughout the world.
Assault and Domestic Violence
Solnit explains that, in America, a woman is assaulted by a partner every nine seconds. This makes domestic violence the single most common cause of injury for women in the United States, with 2 million annual injuries, of which over 25% require medical attention. Additionally, the most common cause of death for pregnant women in America is violence from a spouse—approximately three women are murdered by a spouse or ex-spouse every day. Statistics around the world are similarly grim: One global study suggests that women between the ages of 15 and 44 are more likely to be injured or killed by men than cancer, malaria, war, and traffic accidents together.
Sexual Assault, Sexual Harassment, and Rape
Solnit estimates that tens of millions of women are raped in America every year. A rape is reported every 6.2 minutes—but since most rapes go unreported, she suggests that it’s possible a rape occurs every minute. Sexual harassment and assault are similarly prevalent, and Solnit notes that these in particular often occur in organizations like colleges and universities, workplaces, and the military. In America, 20% of all women are rape survivors; nearly 20% of female college students experience sexual assault; and Leon Panetta—the former Secretary of Defense—estimated that in 2010, nearly 20,000 soldiers were sexually assaulted by other soldiers, with the perpetrators rarely facing punishment. Despite the scale of the problem, rapes are often poorly investigated, if they’re investigated at all—Solnit states that the backlog of untested rape kits in America is nearly half a million.
Rape can also give men continuing power over women, since it can result in pregnancy. Solnit notes that there are 31 states in which rapists have parental rights over the children who result from their violence. This predicament is further compounded by the fact that many politicians have been pushing anti-abortion legislation, including bills that could allow a rapist to sue their victim for having an abortion.
Additionally, the burden for preventing male violence tends to be placed on the victims rather than the perpetrators, explains Solnit. Colleges, for example, often respond to sexual violence by trying to teach women how to avoid being assaulted, rather than trying to teach men not to assault.
Not All Men…But Yes All Women
Solnit explains that her aim is not to villainize men. She notes that an increasing number of men are allies and feminists, who recognize that gender rights are not a competition and that equality for women doesn’t mean men will be more oppressed.
However, she asserts that discussion of the idea that not all men are violent toward women misses the point. It’s certainly true that not all men engage in these violent acts, but enough of them do that all women have to worry about being assaulted.
Where Does This Violence Come From?
Society and the media often blame male violence in the US on factors such as the ease of acquiring firearms, economic difficulties and class struggles, and issues that affect the brain such as head injuries, lead poisoning, and mental illness. However, Solnit notes, these factors affect men and women equally—yet men commit 90% of the nation’s murders.
Solnit explains that the true source of male violence is the authoritarian belief that men have the right to control women. This includes a sense of entitlement—the feeling that a man has the right to harm a woman for any reason he wants. Often, the reason a man chooses to harm a woman is because she rejects him romantically or sexually. A man who subconsciously believes he has more right to a woman’s body than she does will often respond violently when she denies him access to it.
Challenging the Patriarchy: Marriage Equality
According to Solnit, traditional marriage and legal structures also help enable violence against women. Until recently, marriage was a legal contract that essentially made a woman the property of her husband. This unequal power dynamic rendered wives legally powerless against their husbands, facilitating domestic abuse, sexual abuse, and financial abuse (since husbands had control over their wives’ income and possessions). This power structure relies on the difference in status that deems women inferior to men. As such, the idea of a man marrying a man or a woman marrying a woman posed a threat to this type of legally sanctioned violence—hence the opposition from some people against marriage equality.
Solnit argues that the opposition to same-sex marriage illustrates a drive to maintain the power discrepancy between a man and a woman in a traditional marriage. Opponents suggest that it’s a threat to traditional marriage’s objective of procreation. However, Solnit points out that many heterosexual couples choose not to have children or are unable to conceive, yet their marriages are still considered valid. This suggests that the argument that same-sex marriage is a threat to traditional marriage’s procreative purpose is a smokescreen—hiding same-sex marriage opponents’ real fear of the destruction of traditional power imbalances.
Women’s Voices: Silence and Credibility
As we’ve explained, the authoritarian belief that men have the right to control women is what motivates misogyny and the mistreatment of women. According to Solnit, mistreatment and control include silencing women’s voices. For example, when a man talks over a woman to mansplain something to her that she already knows, he asserts that his own voice is more important and authoritative than hers—he is silencing her because he automatically assumes that she has nothing of value to say.
Violence is also a way to silence women. When someone reacts violently to a woman expressing her opinion or asserting her autonomy, it’s an attack on her right to take up space and to participate in the world—which are supposed to be basic human rights granted to everyone. Solnit suggests that denying women these rights reduces them to the status of subhuman beings.
Silencing Victims: Three Stages
Solnit explains that women are often expected to remain silent after experiencing violence—both so the perpetrator can avoid accountability for their actions, and to reinforce the status quo of gender inequality. There are many people involved in this silencing, including the media, the perpetrators, and society in general. Solnit describes three stages of silencing that victims have to overcome in order to make their voices heard.
Stage 1) Psychological and Social Barriers
According to Solnit, the first of these stages relates to existing barriers to women speaking out, and it’s largely internalized. Experiencing violence—particularly sexual violence—often results in strong feelings of shame, as well as confusing feelings like doubting oneself and repressing one’s experiences. There are also negative social consequences for speaking out, so women often fear being socially excluded for sharing what happened to them.
Stage 2) Punishment
The second stage, punishment, is external. Solnit explains that people often deliberately punish women who speak about their sexual assaults—shaming them, harassing them, and sometimes even assaulting or murdering them. Solnit notes that rape victims in high schools and colleges are particularly likely to be subjected to this type of silencing and that many rapists are allowed to graduate without ever being punished for their actions.
Stage 3) Discrediting
According to Solnit, the third stage of silencing—discrediting the woman and her story—occurs when stages 1 and 2 have failed to prevent a woman from speaking up. People who try to silence a woman in this way suggest that her story is a lie and portray her as unreliable and deceptive. They also victim-blame by suggesting that she deserved the violence because of her behavior. Additionally, they argue that, even if her story were true, it’s in the past and there’s no need to dredge it back up now.
Wielding Social and Political Power to Silence Victims
Solnit argues that since authoritarianism (including the authoritarian belief that motivates violence against women) is rooted in a stark power imbalance, men in positions of power can be particularly adept at silencing and discrediting women. As an example of this, she explains how Clarence Thomas was appointed to the US Supreme Court despite allegations of sexual harassment directed at him by his employee, Anita Hill. Hill was harshly interrogated by a room full of men who disbelieved her, and the media publicly smeared her.
The accusations didn’t prevent Thomas from rising to one of the most powerful positions in the nation. However, Solnit suggests that it marked a milestone in the feminist movement that caused the nation to take the (then relatively new) concept of workplace sexual harassment seriously.
Prominent media figures also have a disproportionate influence over the stories of people who accuse them of sexual violence. Solnit describes how filmmaker Woody Allen attacked the credibility of his adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, after she accused him of molesting her. Allen claimed that Farrow was lying and being coached by her mother. Many people leapt to Allen’s defense and contributed to the discrediting and silencing of Farrow. According to Solnit, Allen’s supporters and detractors were largely split by gender, as women recognized and related to what Farrow said happened to her, while many men believed it was a false accusation.
False Rape Accusations
People who defend those accused of rape or sexual assault also silence women by frequently claiming that the accusations are false. Solnit explains that false accusations of rape do happen, and that they’re serious, but they’re a tiny fraction of total rape accusations. Furthermore, a report in 2000 from the US Department of Justice found that only 12% of reported rapes resulted in jail time for the offenders, making the likelihood of serving time for a false accusation extremely small.
The Importance of Language
As we’ve seen, a major aspect of mistreatment and control of women is silencing them. According to Solnit, silencing women is effective because language has a major impact on people’s beliefs and perceptions. In this section, we’ll explore how the weight of language lends itself to silencing women, and then we’ll examine the positive effects it can have.
Weaponizing Language
Solnit explains that, while language can be empowering for women who use it to describe their experiences, it can also be used destructively against them. This is well illustrated not only by the phenomenon of mansplaining—which involves a man supplanting the language of a woman with his own language—but also by the way sexism and misogyny manifest in online communities and on social media.
Women in online communities—such as gaming communities—frequently face threats and harassment from men. According to Solnit, this is particularly common when they share opinions that men disagree with. The threats these women receive are a message that their voices are unwelcome, that there’s no space for them, and that their role is subordinate to men.
For example, when feminist media critic Anita Sarkeesian called out such behavior in these communities, people bombarded her with threats and hacking attempts. One man even made a video game that allowed players to punch an image of Sarkeesian’s face until it became bruised and bloodied.
Online threats are frightening and genuinely dangerous, explains Solnit, because threats are often the precursor to physical acts of violence. Still, law enforcement and social media sites tend to ignore these threats—which are often made under the guise of “free speech,” though they’re really thinly veiled instances of hate speech.
Using Language to Raise Awareness
On the other hand, language can be used to advance women’s rights: People can use the power of language to spread awareness of and change perceptions and beliefs around gender-based violence. When certain words and terms become part of the common vernacular, it can elucidate new concepts and ideas for the general public.
The coining of the term “rape culture,” for example, has helped spread awareness of how everyday behavior and subconscious biases perpetuate the mistreatment of women. Rape culture refers to an environment that normalizes rape and sexual violence through the media, objectification of women, and sexist language. This term helps describe how women have to shape their behavior around the fear of being sexually assaulted—something most men don’t have to do. Solnit explains that the adoption of this term into the general lexicon has helped many men better understand women’s experiences.
Ongoing Progress for the Movement
Despite the widespread violence against women, there’s progress being made. Solnit explains that, while domestic violence is still a widespread problem, it occurs at lower rates than it did in previous decades. Additionally, laws against domestic violence now give women some legal recourse against their abusers, as do laws against sexual harassment in the workplace and previously unrecognized abuses like marital rape and date rape. Just half a century ago, most of these terms didn’t exist. Solnit argues that the more we confront ongoing patterns of misogyny and violence against women, and the more we normalize women’s equality and call out the authoritarian belief that men should control women, the closer we’ll get to a truly equal society.
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Here's what you'll find in our full Men Explain Things to Me summary:
- How "mansplaining" comes from a cultural tendency to devalue women
- The attitude of control that motivates the mistreatment of women
- The role that language plays in the advancement of women’s rights
