Reason #485,000 why most men should not talk about issues of gender

This is a story of men behaving badly in groups.

Excuses, excuses, excuses. In column on espn.com's Page 2, Jason Whitlock says that the Duke lacross rape incident ( Here if you have no idea what I'm talking about.) shouldn't be viewed through a racial filter, rather one of gender. If he would have just stopped there, we might have been okay. After all, rape is a male-on-female crime in a far larger proportion that it is a one-color-on-another-color crime.

However, Jason is a professional columnist and has somewhere around 1,000 words to back this statement up. Which he does, beautifully, with the classic argument that "boys will be boys" and that's why this is a crime of gender-not because men in society are raised to have little respect for women in general, and no respect for women who may happen to strip for a living, but because they just can't help themselves.

Some highlights:

Men behaving badly in groups -- especially under the influence of alcohol -- cuts across all social, economic and racial demographics.

I always have contended, somewhat jokingly, that there should be rules outlawing men from gathering in groups of three or more without a woman as chaperone or serious surveillance equipment. Whitlock's law: A man's intelligence, maturity and decision-making skills decrease as the number of men within earshot of his voice increases.

Whitlock's law is a product of a youth spent sucking on beer bongs and zig zags, hosting and attending bachelor parties, growing up on the barstools inside my father's tavern and planning debauchery and lewd behavior with teammates and friends of all races.

I can honestly say that I don't have a male friend who could avoid saying, "There go I but for the grace of God" when thinking about the Duke lacrosse players.

Disgusting, utter bullshit and excuses, excuses, excuses. You can't treat a woman like a human being because of some societal constructs associated with being male? You can't understand the word "no" because you're around your buddies?

Whitlock isn't all bad here-he does suggest an education program, but what he suggests "...what constitutes sexual harassment, sexual assault, the dangers of alcoholism and drugs, unwanted and unwed pregnancy, how to respectfully socialize with people outside your race, etc." isn't anything the average college freshman hasn't heard a million times before. The problem here lies much, much deeper, mostly with Whitlocks male community excuse and his contention that strippers deserve no respect, just because they happen to take their clothes off for a living. His contention that alcohol and "planning lewd behavior" from an early age in a whacked out form of "male-bonding" is an excuse for the way these snotty Duke brats treated that woman is incredibly misguided.

Bottom line: Teach men how to view a woman as a human being, not as something they can degrade, ridicule and control and then maybe we'll talk. Jason and I agree on one point however-boys aren't raised to become men, they're raised to become idiots and sexists and that's probably where the problem lies.

(Note-I know this does not apply to all men. I know several who are respectful and gracious and lovely. Please hold off on thinking me a crazy man-hater, because I'm not.)