When men are silent after being confronted with violence against women and hyper-masculine gender roles, they are more than just ignorant — they actively work to promote injustices; speaking up might make a difference.

On Thursday evening in the Anderson Center Chamber Hall, Michael Kaufman, a public speaker and writer, lectured on gender equality. The talk entitled, “Men With Passion, Taking Action to Promote Gender Equality and Good Relationships,” was the second part of the series “Passion to Action,” hosted by the Center for Civic Engagement (CCE). Kaufman is a consultant to the UN and co-founder of the White Ribbon Campaign, which encourages men worldwide to stand up to violence against women.

Indy Li, a graduate assistant in the CCE and a second-year graduate student studying biomedical anthropology, helped organize the event. She said that the first part of the series, which was a panel event held this past Monday, was to show students the issue of gender equality under the lens of masculinity, and this lecture was meant to present a plan to take action.

“We wanted to take a different approach to the typical gender equality conversation,” Li said. “My biggest hope is that students will at the very least be able to step in when people need help.”

Kaufman’s speech was aimed toward men and explained how the super-masculinized ideal of how men are supposed to act leads to violence, specifically against women. Kaufman began his lecture by clarifying that he was not vilifying all men, but rather making the claim that while most men do not commit violence against women, virtually all men remain silent.

“When I say critical things about the behaviors of some men, it’s not to say men are a bunch of monsters,” Kaufman said. “I think that there are some monstrous things that some men do, and I know that there’s been a lot of silence among many men in response to some monstrous actions.”

Kaufman said that the key to reforming society is for men to take action against microaggressions. According to Kaufman, an important and necessary aspect of the fight for gender equality is for men to stand up for women, since it helps form positive and solid relationships and foundations for change.

“For too long it’s been posed as issues that only women are passionate about, so it’s important that men are speaking out because we want good relationships, we want to be happy and sexually fulfilled, and that can’t happen if some men are abusive,” Kaufman said. “It brings distrust for all men and discredit for all men even if it’s the last thing that one would do.”

Nur-al-Din Harper, a junior majoring in chemistry, said that the lecture was important for students to expand their views on gender roles.

“In school, there was never really a class I could take to talk about gender roles and how to view yourself as a man,” Harper said. “I grew up in a Muslim household and that perspective has shaped what I view as the roles of men and women. It’s good to learn about how those roles can lead to abusive relationships and violence against women because those are big problems in Muslim countries.”

Gabrielle Samaniego, an undeclared sophomore, said that the topic influenced how she understood masculinity, even within the scope of her family.

“He was so real, he talked like he was our age, and I personally had a connection to it,” Samaniego said. “It really reminded me about my dad and my brother and how my dad would tell my brother not to show emotions, and I’m realizing how much it must have affected him.”