Exclusive: Patrick Stewart Calls on Men to End Violence Against Women

[ismnotwasm]

This an excellent interview. I love it when men become part of the solution

PS: A lot of this, I think, is learned behavior. It comes about from their experience of their home life as a child. I have no doubt - and I'm blessed as somebody - I think it was Michael Bolton who said at the meeting, Patrick chose the right profession, to deal with these matters internally, because as an actor you have to process all of the different aspects of yourself and translate them into something creative. It had also been, for a long, long time, a sort of acceptable aspect of male/female relationships, whether married or not. Women get beaten up. Women get slapped.

Now, last night my partner and I went to see a stupendous semi-staged performance of Andre Previn's opera, based on A Streetcar Named Desire with the glorious Reneé Fleming at Carnegie Hall. And I haven't seen Streetcar for some years, although actually I was at Reneé's world premiere performance of it, back in San Francisco in the 90's. I had forgotten that there are scenes of violence in that. I had always somehow remembered that they were implied or referred to, but no, Stanley Kowalski hits his pregnant wife, knocks her over, threatens her, and every time that he is challenged, his immediate response is to raise his hand. And I had forgotten all of that! This play was written, what, in the 50's, I guess? And as far as I'm aware, nobody in the play says, 'Hey, don't do that!' Instead, what happens is that no one steps in, and the wife, having been knocked to the ground, then seems to get sort of turned on and excited and passionate and very sexy with Stanley. Well, were it not that I was sitting next to the composer, Sir Andre Previn, I wanted to yell out, and say this isn't right - stop right there! But I only cite this as an example of behavior that was criminal, illegal and yet, was somehow tolerated, because beating up women, dominating them - I mean, there's a moment when Kowalski says in the play, 'I am king around here!' he says. Well, he was a pretty stupid man, this Stanley Kowalski, but the implication there is that I can do whatever I want and get away with it. Well, organizations like Refuge and what the million men event is about is letting men know that they cannot.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marianne-schnall/exclusive-interview-with-_11_b_2900041.html

[seabeyond]

1. he is a good man. i love his voice. nt