There is something reassuring about calling an abusive man a monster. It gives us someone to condemn, someone to distance ourselves from and someone we can convince ourselves is nothing like the men we know.
But there is a danger in doing so.
The conviction of Russell Brand and the emerging headlines and allegations involving David Walliams should prompt us to look beyond the individuals and the immediate news cycle. We should be asking ourselves a much bigger question: Are we so busy looking for monsters that we fail to recognise harmful behaviour in ordinary men?
This is called the myth of the monster.
It is a lens through which we can examine how society understands abuse, how harmful behaviour becomes normalised and, importantly, how active bystandership can help prevent harm before it reaches the headlines.
Monsters make us feel comfortable. When we hear about men who have abused their positions of power, we often reach for language that separates them from the rest of society. They are monsters. Predators. Deviants. People who are fundamentally different from ordinary men.
But what if that distinction is precisely part of the problem?
Abusive men are not necessarily lurking on the fringes of society. They can be charming, successful, funny, popular, respected and influential. They can be colleagues, friends, husbands, fathers and people who hold positions of considerable power. Their public persona can be very different from their private behaviour.
Calling someone a monster might express our disgust, but it can also create psychological distance. It allows us to believe that we would recognise such a person, that we would never associate with them and that this sort of behaviour would never happen within our own social circles. It reassures us that the problem belongs somewhere else. Psychologist Phillip Zimbardo discusses this in his book ‘The Lucifer Effect’. He suggests that our focus on the character of the offender is a way of distancing ourselves from the behaviour when the reality is that we might be part of it.
When we laugh at a comment, what do we say?
When we fail to challenge a harmful comment, what do we say?
When we create a funny meme, do we minimise the behaviour?
But abuse doesn’t belong somewhere else. It happens in ordinary environments, within ordinary relationships and often in places where people believe they know and trust each other.
Abusive men aren’t monsters. They are men who abuse.
When behaviour becomes normalised
One of the questions worth asking about high-profile cases is how behaviour is perceived before it becomes a criminal matter or a major media story.
Russell Brand’s public persona was built, in part, around sexual bravado, promiscuity and provocative humour. Much of this was presented as entertainment. Audiences laughed, media outlets provided platforms and his celebrity status helped create a particular public identity.
None of that establishes criminal behaviour, and humour or promiscuity should not be confused with abuse. But it does raise an important question about the boundaries we are prepared to accept, the behaviour we excuse and the attitudes we allow to become normal.
When does provocative become degrading? When does confidence become entitlement? When does humour become a way of testing boundaries or making others uncomfortable?
These are questions that should be asked long before criminal investigations or newspaper headlines.
The same applies to workplaces, sporting environments, military organisations and friendship groups.
A senior colleague who regularly makes sexualised comments. A friend who repeatedly ignores someone’s boundaries. A manager who uses their position to intimidate others. A group that laughs along when someone is humiliated.
Individually, these incidents might be dismissed as minor, awkward or simply part of someone’s personality.
But collectively, they can help create an environment in which harmful behaviour becomes increasingly difficult to challenge.
The people standing closest
This brings me to the part of the conversation that matters most to my work: active bystandership.
We often ask, after a high-profile case emerges, why nobody did anything.
Why didn’t someone speak up?
Why didn’t a colleague intervene?
Why didn’t a friend challenge the behaviour?
These are reasonable questions, but they can also oversimplify the reality.
People might have been frightened. They might have been uncertain about what they witnessed. They might have worried about their careers, friendships or reputations. They might have assumed somebody else would act.
Sometimes , they simply didn’t recognise the significance of what was happening.
This is why active bystandership is so important.
It is about developing the confidence, skills and permission to intervene when we see something that doesn’t feel right.
It isn’t about expecting everyone to become a police officer, investigator or moral crusader. It is about recognising that we all have opportunities to influence the behaviour of people around us.
Sometimes intervention is a difficult conversation.
Sometimes it is interrupting an inappropriate comment.
Sometimes it is checking in with someone who appears uncomfortable.
Sometimes it is challenging a friend privately and asking them to think about their behaviour.
And sometimes it means making a formal report.
The important thing is that we don’t wait until the behaviour becomes so serious that intervention is no longer a choice.
Friendship isn’t blind loyalty
I think we particularly need to have a conversation about male friendships.
For too long, aspects of male culture have confused loyalty with unconditional support.
Having someone’s back can become an excuse for ignoring their behaviour. Challenging a mate can be interpreted as disloyalty. Speaking up can risk exclusion from the group.
But what if we redefined what being a good mate actually means? What if we recognised that sometimes the most important thing a friend can do is tell us something we don’t want to hear?
A good friend doesn’t simply support us when we are right. They help us recognise when we are wrong.
They challenge us when our behaviour hurts someone else. They don’t laugh along with inappropriate comments simply to maintain the friendship and they create relationships in which accepting a challenge is seen as a sign of maturity rather than weakness.
We don’t need more men who are prepared to condemn abusive behaviour once it makes the headlines. We need more men who are prepared to challenge it before it gets there.
From headlines to prevention
There is a danger that we become caught up in the latest headlines, focus all our attention on the individual and then move on when the next story emerges.
Of course, individuals must be held accountable for their actions. Victims and survivors must be listened to, supported and believed. Criminal behaviour must be investigated through proper processes. But accountability after the event is not the same as prevention.
If we genuinely want to reduce abuse, we need to look at the environments in which it occurs. We need to challenge the attitudes, behaviours and social norms that allow people to exercise power over others without consequence.
We need workplaces where colleagues feel supported to intervene. Friendship groups where challenging behaviour is normal. Leaders who understand that their responsibility extends beyond dealing with formal complaints and we need men who understand that they don’t need authority, status or a particular job title to make a difference.
The headlines will eventually move on however the opportunity to prevent harm exists every day, in ordinary conversations and ordinary relationships.
Perhaps the most uncomfortable truth about the myth of the monster is this:
The problem with calling abusive men monsters is that it allows the rest of us to believe we wouldn’t know one.
We need to stop looking exclusively for monsters and start paying much closer attention to the behaviour of ordinary men. Because creating a safer society won’t simply come from identifying the men who abuse after the event.
It will come from more of us being prepared to challenge behaviour before someone becomes another victim.
And that starts much closer to home than we might think.
