If you’ve been on the internet this week, you may have seen a certain comedian’s comments on SNL – and Dan Levy’s much-needed response to it. But why do the Schitt’s Creek star’s words feel so rare?
When I scrolled through social media on Monday morning, I was unsurprised to find yet another disillusioning story dominating my feed. This time, it was a video of a comedian taking centre stage on one of the biggest shows on American television: Saturday Night Live. During his opening monologue, he jokingly asked the audience, “Since when do women dress like whores now?” His target? Women who wear shorts at the gym. But before I caved and watched the clip in full, I found myself tuning into Dan Levy’s response.
The Schitt’s Creek star had done what I’ve silently willed more men to do amid the devastating news of the past month: express horror and call out offensive misogynistic behaviour. Taking to Instagram, Levy responded: “Women wearing short shorts at the gym does not make them whores. It makes the men calling them whores misogynists. There’s a difference there. By the way, I’ve seen more men’s nipples at the gym than I’ve ever seen women showing their bodies off.”
He continued: “But I’m speechless that something like that can exist on live national television. And to be perfectly honest, more men need to be standing up in opposition to it because it’s complacency that has created the environment in which women are sexually assaulted and it’s a ‘conversation’ as opposed to a ‘crime’.
“This is not a women’s issue; this is an everybody issue. Because the more that men objectify women in the media, the more that other men see them as objects and treat them as objects,” he said. “They are not objects. They are superior human beings to men, OK? And I’m sorry if this gets me in trouble with the internet, but fuck.”
It feels as though men speaking out like Levy remain the exception
In under a minute and a half, Levy proved just how easy it is to call out totally unacceptable, offensive and degrading behaviour. I wish we lived in a world where we didn’t have to ask men to stand up for us, but I commend Levy for doing just that. For recognising harmful behaviour, for being shocked and disgusted at the vile rhetoric that has so easily become the norm and for acting as an ally to women.
What struck me most about his response was how it made me feel seen and heard. Amid the conversations surrounding the ‘Cornell 7’ – seven men accused in a civil lawsuit of allegedly sexually assaulting a fellow Cornell University student – women are reliving their own traumas through headlines and social media posts. Many are sharing the words “I am Jane Doe” in solidarity with the woman at the centre of the case. Yet it feels as though men speaking out like Levy remain the exception.
We shouldn’t live in a world where men get to go on live TV and call women whores, even as a bad joke. We shouldn’t live in a society where women are armed with rape alarms instead of being able to walk home in the dark without fearing for their safety. We shouldn’t live in a world where movements like #MeToo are forgotten. Because this isn’t just a headline, a viral moment experienced online or a news story to be dismissed as fodder a few weeks later. It’s something we feel, at a very real level, every single day.
We feel it in the shadows that lurk on an empty street. We feel it in the news headlines that label perpetrators as monsters instead of men. We feel it embedded in institutions that are designed to protect us. We feel it in world leaders who tell women to smile more. We feel it in throwaway comments and ‘it’s just banter’ excuses. We feel it in the keys we grip between our fingers on the walk home. We feel it all, at every level, every day.
Granted, not every man is Dan Levy, a famous actor with a huge platform who can make a real difference to the public conversation. And we don’t need them to be. We don’t need men to make grand gestures or speak out on social media to show their support. We need them to listen, to acknowledge our very real, lived experiences and to challenge misogyny when they hear it. We need them to ask: “How are you? Are you OK? How can I help? I’m sorry this is happening.”
As Levy said, this is an everybody issue
Because while we feel solidarity in Levy’s words, we feel the absence of support even more keenly elsewhere: in the back corner of the gym, in the group chat of 50 boys, in the social media feed so full of women’s pain and suffering and so little acknowledgement from men.
As Levy said, this is not a women’s issue. It’s an everybody issue. And it’s about time we felt the power behind Levy’s words in the men around us – those we spend time with, work with and marry, those who raise us and those who lead us. Only then can we begin to build a world where women can exist without being called whores on national TV, where sexual assault is treated as a crime instead of a conversation and where women are treated as equals in every respect.
If you have been sexually assaulted, you can find your nearest Sexual Assault Referral Centre here. You can also find support at your local GP, voluntary organisations such as Women’s Aid, and Victim Support, and you can report it to the police (if you choose) here.
Images: Getty