Story by Adrian Black
Photography provided by Be That Guy campaign
It was the Fourth of July. Max Wolfard and his then girlfriend were driving across Eugene to watch last summer’s holiday fireworks when they encountered an unsettling scene.
A lone car was idling in an empty lot near the industrial sprawl of downtown. A woman leaned motionless against the car while a man delivered a staggering tirade.
Though nervous, Wolfard recalled his bystander intervention training.
“Part of our training was to just do something, even if you don’t know what. The smallest thing can make a difference,” says Wolfard, who fixed his headlights on the looming character and shifted his car into park.
“He didn’t like that, so he came at me,” Wolfard says.
The man charged toward Wolfard’s car, and in the bedlam of the moment, the woman, like Wolfard, sped off. Wolfard then filed a police report, unsure what real danger the woman was in, but certain that passing her by would have been a negligent choice.
Wolford, a Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity member, became interested in raising awareness about bystander intervention against sexual assault while working with the University of Oregon’s Health Centers, which perform victim advocacy.
“We were talking about stuff that goes on at the U of O in terms of what happens to survivors [of sexual assault] and what happens to perpetrators. We were talking about the discrepancy of responsibility on each gender,” Wolfard says.
His response was to form “Be That Guy,” an information campaign and march designed to encourage male interest in preventing sexual violence. Be That Guy was promoted with the aid of the university’s Men’s Center.
“This was our way of taking a stand by admitting that sexual assault is a men’s issue,” says Alex Fall, the center’s outreach coordinator.
“It’s something we have to deal with internally, so to speak.”
In previous years, only women’s groups have addressed the issue. Be that Guy is part of what Dean of Students Paul Shang calls “stepping up to the plate” with regard to a perpetrator focus.
This fall, the U of O will introduce a new training module called Sexual Assault EDU, which will be mandatory for all incoming students less than 21 years old.
“I believe there is a notion in our society that being a sexual predator is okay,” Shang says.
“More so, certain groups actually romanticize the notion. They have more interest in a ‘body count’ than in having meaningful relationships with women.”
That notion is the very essence of what Women’s Center staff refers to unabashedly as rape culture.
Typically characterized with feminist academia, but growing in mainstream rhetoric, the term rape culture generally refers to the use of misogynistic language, objectification of women’s bodies, and glorification of sexual violence—either explicit or implicit.
Associate Dean of Students Sheryl Eyster is a UO sexual assault first responder (not a formal title, but an assigned duty) and oversees the ASUO Women’s Center, which dedicates much of its time to prevention education and victim advocacy. Eyster believes that youth culture perpetuates sexual violence by failing to have a systemic perspective.
“If you’re trying to shift the culture with a social norms approach to changing behavior,” Eyster says, “you’re not going to change it when everybody believes it’s only a minute piece of the population that bears responsibility”.
She wants to raise awareness, but finds labeling people an awkward starting point in dealing with the issue.
“I think that using ‘rape culture’ language with your typical student is not something they identify themselves with being a part of,” Eyster says.
Sigma Pi fraternity member and Be That Guy participant Brendan Head believes there needs to be more engagement of men and dialogue in male communities about how to reduce destructively aggressive sexual behavior.
“You wouldn’t want to look up to one of these guys who brags like ‘Oh, I just banged four or five girls this week’ and tries to high-five you.”
Head says that macho culture is just something certain people enter college identifying with, and that it doesn’t promote mutual respect.
Men’s Center director John Phan sees confirming the presence of male privilege to be his biggest challenge.
“It’s a really tough job because oftentimes men are on the defensive. Yes men have a lot of privileges, but when you talk to someone they’ll say ‘What privileges?”
Head considers that most women are worried about being raped and that most men are not, and that to him is a serious privilege.
“The struggle of focusing on the perpetrator comes in validating the male experience and not casting blanket guilt—trying to educate men on how to best employ their unique entitlements for positive social causes,” Phan says.
He believes that most people want to do right, but says it’s a delicate balance between wanting to believe and holding people accountable for their actions.
“There are certain levels of apathy in the Greek system,” Wolfard says. “People have certain cultural backgrounds where they just find the idea of getting involved with something like Be That Guy to be unimportant.”
A 2007 study commissioned by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) found that “fraternity men have been identified as being more likely to perpetrate sexual assault or sexual aggression than non-fraternity men.” The study employed unpublished data from the DOJ’s National Crime Victimization Survey, which includes questions about fraternity membership in screening victims.
As Head explains, “It’s hard when each individual man hears that,” Head says. “They say ‘Well, hey. I’m not the one committing these acts. I’m not a rapist.’”
Sigma Pi has been the Men’s Center’s test case in promoting the virtues of bystander intervention and they hope to get other fraternities involved, though Phan admits it’s a slow process.
“There shouldn’t be any presumptions,” Shang says. “People should be discussing their responsibilities either as partners or participants, or as bystanders even, and monitoring things that they may be concerned about.”
The purpose of Be That Guy, Wolfard says, is to “change the status quo” by normalizing the experience of stepping up and intervening in potential sexual assault situations. Wolfard feels that the stigma of being a “cockblocker” is a big issue among men conducting intervention training.
The myth in society is that a rapist is some stranger in the bushes. In reality, 73 percent of assaults are perpetrated by a known individual. To Wolfard, that seems like a valuable area of focus.
Though Be That Guy is only in its second year and has seen less than 100 participants, the event has received a lot of positive attention from female activists who feel overwhelmed by gender inequality in addressing sexual violence.
“I really love the campaign. The gentlemen who started Be that Guy are amazing,” Sexual Wellness Advocacy Team (SWAT) member Heaven-Leigh Carey says of Wolford and co-founder Ross Meinhart. “This is only the second year for it. I wish [the campaign] were larger.”
As discouraging as it may sound for men to “handle it internally,” Carey reminds us that no one is passing the buck.
“In response to Be That Guy, a lot of men get upset because they think we’re saying, ‘Rape is a men’s issue, so you take care of it.’ What we’re really saying is, ‘Rape isn’t just a women’s issue, it’s everyone’s issue.’”
Carey emphasizes only two to four percent of men commit about 90 percent of rapes. This means that a small number of repeat offenders are responsible.
“I feel like sometimes people throw out that one in five women will be raped and leave it at that. People logically conclude that must mean you’re saying one in five men are raping,” Carey says.“I feel like those statistics should go together. That’s where I think a lot of hostility comes from.”
Carey refers to what she feels was the hostile tone of a Greek Life blog published by the Oregon Daily Emerald, in which substantial content addressed false claims of rape.
Carey believes the post was a misguided effort to defend male students from perpetrator focus produced by her group. She adds that many men on campus don’t realize there are several male members of SWAT, who certainly aren’t on a witch hunt against their own gender.
Whether pushback against accusation, apathy, or other factors, university men remain in a crawl phase.
“We ask ourselves why people wouldn’t want to get involved,” Phan says, who worries that he, Wolford, and others are preaching to the choir with Be That Guy.
“We just keep hitting this roadblock where attendance and participation is really tough.”
This year, a great number of participants in Be That Guy were nontraditional students, many significantly older than the majority of the student body.
“Our goal was to create programs where we could actually reach out to the average Joe,” says Phan, who has yet to see the common involvement that he believes is necessary to make a difference.
Each year, the last week of April is Sexual Assault Awareness Week at the U of O. The week has long consisted of a local embodiment of the national event “Take Back the Night”, a flagship women-centered rally and march in protest of sexual violence.
Be That Guy now joins it in solidarity. Phan says he looks forward to working more closely with the Office of the Dean of Students and creating year round events because he believes “April is not enough.”
Phan says that the Men’s Center’s bystander intervention education “is in its developmental stages,” but is seeking additional outlets to promote Be That Guy and its broader imperative.
