Anybody heard of Teresa Lewis? She was the first woman to be given capital punishment in Virginia in the last 100 years, and was executed on Thursday night at 9pm. But Teresa herself is not really what I want to talk about. The other day, in one of my classes, we were discussing the legitimacy of capital punishment and our professor had used the case to lead in to the discussion. While everyone was chiming in on whether people who committed particularly heinous crimes (did I just inadvertently quote Law and Order SVU…?) deserved execution, it occurred to me that there was something missing about the whole discussion. Teresa Lewis had been the first woman in 100 years to be executed in Virginia! Virginia just happens to have the second highest rate for executions in the entire country.
What exactly does that say about our society? Well, we have an imbalanced ratio of men committing seriously violent crimes, often against women. But why was it that no one really thought about this issue in class? I did end up raising my hand and pointing this out (not because I am smarter than everyone but because a week before I had watched a film on this phenomenon), and the response I got pretty much went like this: awkward silence, crickets, change of subject. Can’t say I didn’t try. I guess we are so jaded by the media that no one really sees it as an issue.
This “degenderization,” when people failed to acknowledge the real gender issue at hand and instead made it a “people” issue, in our class discussion is a direct reflection of what we see every single day in the media and in movies. When shootings, stabbings, bombings, etc. are carried out by men (particularly white men), their sex and race goes unmentioned in media reports. But, when a woman commits a similar crime you can be sure that her sex will be mentioned in the media.
Now what point am I getting at with all this? That women should be allowed to commit disgusting acts of random violence just as freely as men? Not at all. What I am trying to highlight is this “masculinity crisis” (defining a man on their “toughness,” read “violence”) in our society that goes wholly unacknowledged due to its invisibility in the media. When a woman is gang-raped by ten “people,” never would we see a media headline that reads Woman Gang-Raped by Ten Caucasian Males. The way in which patriarchy manipulates the media had a trickle down effect right into my classroom. How can we expect anything to change if our media, movies, and culture in general not only advocate male violence but at the same time cover it up and make it invisible?
Now, do I think all men are violent creeps? Certainly not. But it is clear that this masculinity crisis has taken a toll on our society, and that we’re all victims of it whether we even know it or not.
The film that I referred to is a movie called “Tough Guise.” It’s pretty awesome and here’s a clip from it where the narrator, Jackson Katz, is talking about male violence and it’s invisibility in the media. I really suggest watching it if you were confused by my blabbing (or even if you weren’t!):
ShoutOut! James Madison University 
I know this blog is about men and violence, but I am stuck on Teresa Lewis’ case. The death penalty makes my stomach hurt when discussing it. I don’t know how I feel about it to be honest. Question, why did Teresa Lewis receive the death penalty while the other two men received life in prison? This doesn’t make real sense, even if she was the “serpent’s head.”
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Good Post carlyq362! Its a good starting point for conversations about how white men are presented as neutral in the media, because their crimes are often treated as isolated instances. Of course, this and the culture of violence in our culture and who is actuall;y commiting violent crimes are conversations that are difficult to have in a classroom, but never-the-less, keep bringing those conversations up.
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It’s great that you brought this up! I find the media’s representation of violent crimes absolutely deplorable, and they never really manage to hit at the underlying causes of issues. Also, so many people never think critically about media bias, and how race, gender, sexuality and class (among other things) affect which stories the press actually find “important”, and which stories get swept under the metaphorical rug.
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ihavemythings, I was thinking about touching on that as well but that’s a whole different story. There was a lot of controversy in Teresa’s case and a lot of people were petitioning to get her a pardon. The controversy is with the 2 men who carried out the murder, it’s said that one of them confessed to other inmates that he was the one who planned the murder to get the money and took advantage of Teresa. She only had an IQ of 72 (70 is legally mentally retarded), was struggling with a drug addiction, and “paid” the hitmen in sex. So, many argue that this case was clearly exploitation, yet she was coined the “mastermind.” Kinda makes you think that the courts were trying to set a precedent or prove a point in Teresa’s execution that women are not exempt even if they hadn’t executed a woman in 100 years. It may be far-fetched but who knows…
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That may be true, maybe it is backlash. I looked through the article you posted on the execution and my stomach kept turning. If she was close to being legally mentally retarded, there should have been further examination. Of course, one can’t go off of hear say, but questioning the men further would have been better. Still thinking about it is eery, and honestly, it may be so because she is a mentally handicapped, woman. I agree, if there is a law, men and women should both be punished under it depending on their individual cases. If we want equality, it has to be in all areas, unfortunately. I don’t think I agree with the death penalty, it is something I take case by case. To hold a prisoner for 1 year equals a students 4 year education in college. A lot of money. I don’t know…
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