“It’s Our Job To Stand Beside Women”: Chebbo And Tarang Chawla Share How To Be Better Allies To Women

BFOZ: What are ways that men, particularly young men on the internet, can speak up against gendered violence?

Tarang: One of the most powerful things when someone makes a disrespectful or sexist joke is just asking, “Hey, what do you mean?”, or “Why was that funny?” Just pretending to be ignorant can sometimes be really, really powerful.

Reframe what’s cool. Respecting women is cool, respecting gender diverse people is cool, and it’s not uncool to care about other people.

Start to think outside the square a little bit around how women exist independent of men, that women’s ambitions matter independent of man, that a woman’s life function doesn’t exist in relation to a man. They might, right? But it’s not their sole thing. It’s an important consideration and part of the foundational work of figuring out how we can call out disrespect.