On Modern-Day Misogyny Part 1: It Starts with ‘Assumed Familiarity’
by Jeff Perera for The 44 North, Guest Writer
This essay is the first in a three-part project on modern-day misogyny. You can read our introduction and the other two essays by Cole Martin and Asante Haughton in our October-November 2026 issue, or follow our newsletter to receive them directly in your inbox.
A man makes his way through a crowded bar. He sees a small space and a two-second window to squeeze through it. He places a hand on a man’s shoulder to pass behind him, and soon after, a hand on the small of a woman’s back to pass by her.
An intimate act, taken quietly in front of many, he assumed a familiarity that was never earned. This is where it starts. Moments like these are where it starts to show its face.
You may have witnessed this exact moment, or moments like it, and assumed it wasn’t a big deal—dismissed it as just another of many awkward ‘inconveniences’ that women should learn to accept in everyday interactions.
At a social gathering or networking event, a photographer might approach a group and ask to take a publicity picture. The group, let’s say, is composed of five people who just met: Three men and two women.
One man poses for the photo, placing his arm casually around the other man’s shoulder. The other man drops an arm to his side and gives a warm thumbs-up with the other hand.
The third man, vaguely familiar with the woman next to him, places an arm and hand around her side and hip, pulling her closer. This is the norm, though it’s an intimate gesture one might do with a loved one or romantic partner, mutually agreed on because familiarity is established.
Safety is assumed. “I know her like that.”
An intimate act, taken quietly in front of many, he assumed a familiarity that was never earned.
This gesture is often sprung on women or non-binary people in public settings where the burden of pushing through awkwardness is forced onto them. They’re expected to respond with graceful words or a subtle gesture—moving a hand off, away, or onto her shoulder—which, whether gently or firmly, says: “You don’t know me like that. You don’t have that level of safety or familiarity established with me.”
The assumption of familiarity, mostly by men, can be seen openly in daily life. It seems to say: “I can do this, you know I’m a good guy, this gesture is harmless.”
Simultaneously, if a man (a stranger, let’s say) were to suddenly hold them in a similarly intimate way, their reaction might be defensive or defiant. A physical act might unfold, where a hand is aggressively removed or a whole body is pushed back to establish boundaries and protect a heteronormative persona. Somehow, in this instance, these aren’t neutral gestures.
What we’re really talking about here, of course, are forms of entitlement.
The quick leap from boyhood into manhood can transpire at an early age. A part of this passage usually includes some form of indoctrination into the idea that men are entitled to status, power, and control—even if unintentional. It begins in early childhood, as soon as you’re your parents’ ‘little man.’ How many boys of single mothers have either been told they’re ‘the man of the house’—or heard themselves referred to as such—before they understand or have even seen examples of what that can look like?
Unfortunately, part of the trajectory into manhood often includes absorbing the perspective that they’re entitled to not only status, but that power and control come at the expense of women, over their voices, bodies, and lives. As a result, too many men enter adult life assuming or expecting access to women’s bodies and lives before stepping into the lifelong process of developing trust, safety and familiarity.
It takes immense work to build a connection to the point where complete safety and trust feel found and assured. Imagine someone assuming they’ve earned that trust, or are owed it without earning it. And imagine them violating it—violently.
Sadly, the truth is, well after the most intimate levels of trust and familiarity are offered or established, they can be horrifically violated.
That’s where it starts. Here’s where it can go…
***
For many of us, our escape from the challenges of our day, the struggles in our lives, and the hardships and potential harm we face in the outside world, is the familiar soft fortress of our bed: The one place where we can exhale and feel safe.
But a warm space and refuge for many can too easily be the place where women are actually the least safe.
***
In 2010, a man in France felt allowed, enabled, and entitled to record footage—using a camera hidden in a pen—up women’s skirts. The incidents were initially dismissed as ‘just another naughty older man.’ It was then discovered that the same man had attempted to assault a real estate agent in 1999, a decade prior. But the police let him go.
Another decade passed, and that same man was caught once again recording footage up women’s skirts. This time, the police uncovered details more thoroughly, piecing together what had occurred during the decade that passed.
This time, they looked at his computer.
This time, they told his wife, a woman named Gisele Pelicot.
What they soon discovered, and eventually shared with Gisele, was that her husband, Dominique Pelicot, had not only been drugging and sexually assaulting his wife.
He was recording it. Many, many times.
Not only had Dominique felt entitled to record it non-consensually. He also invited men to sexually assault his wife as he recorded.
And not only did he invite men to join him and sexually assault his wife, he also initiated the process of grooming them to continue the horror on their own.
This wasn’t unique or uncommon: Online, communities in the dingy, dark sewers of the internet share notes on how to commit unspeakable horror.
The above video is of the W5 investigation that Avery Haines undertook, where she infiltrated an “[O]rganized online community of rapists who share and sell videos of their crimes” by sexually assaulting their wives and partners through drugging.
This includes men right here in Canada.
“I’ve spent months infiltrating their global network, pretending to be one of them, learning how they buy drugs, how they carry out their crimes, and how they work together to get away with it. I created a fake profile on two porn sites, set up an account on the messaging app Telegram, and just like that, I’m in. This isn’t the dark web. It’s public porn sites, forums, messaging apps, all of it hiding in plain sight.”
Via interactions with an online alias that Haines used to establish trust with other men in the virtual space, she bore witness to arrestingly horrific conversations. She describes brutal details of unspeakable acts shared back and forth, the way colleagues might exchange work tips.
At one point, Haines describes a Telegram discussion where:
“[D]ifferent men give advice on the best drugs to use. I was sent an entire menu with prices. Anesthetic gases with masks, portable anesthesia liquid vaporizers, drugs to knock women out, drugs to erase their memory in liquid and pills. They share how products on Amazon can be turned into homemade date rape drugs. They mention this website in Malaysia that sells obedience and coma drugs.”
“The obedience drug promises that they won’t know how to resist, cannot think, will have no memory, can act but no power. They say it’s discreetly packaged as hair serum.”
Forced ‘obedience’ while unconscious. Assumed familiarity that became full access, unearned and forced. This is the most extreme violation of a relationship by men who were entrusted with the most intimate and private moments a woman can share, including who they sleep beside and who they trust to bring them a cup of tea night after night.
Haines further describes an ongoing conversation with one man who “[G]ives disturbing and painstaking details about how he knocks his wife out. He calls her his doll, his toy.”
His wife. His Doll. His Toy. His property.
When women become disposable property—possessions to toy with like a doll—we’ve crossed a line and left our humanity behind.
That line, however—as available to cross in the first place—starts long before the acts of violence and harm. It starts with the belief that men are entitled to status, power, and control, at the expense of others; particularly women, girls, and gender-expansive people.
On July 10th, Haines updated us on Bryan Hayward, who faces 60 charges for drugging more than a dozen women. His 11-year-old daughter was returned to her Mom, drugged.
This violence continues worldwide within online spaces and networks where men assume the freedom to conspire together—to commit the most haunting violations of trust and familiarity.
This story is far too familiar. What are we, as men, going to do about it? How can we redirect and rewrite what happens now?
We can begin by understanding ourselves—who we are, what world we live in, and what pressures and behaviours those foster. There are deeper layers at play here, and sometimes, our homework is to take a few steps back to step forward. I invite you to read the next essay in this series, by Cole Martin, diving into the philosophical side of this discussion. Martin spotlights the words of artists, poets, essayists, and philosophers on men’s entitlement and assumption of familiarity and domination.
Where the story goes from here will depend on our continued silence and indifference, or, I hope, what we as men collectively work to understand and change.
Jeff Perera builds bridges between people of all genders and has spoken to tens of thousands of people across North America since 2008 about gender, masculinity, empathy-building, and men helping end gender-based violence. Whether in the boardroom, on campus, or the locker room, we need more positive and mindful examples of ways to be a man today. Jeff is a storyteller inspiring new models of possibility for men and young men, as well as healthier versus harmful ideas of manhood where we work, live, play, worship or study. He has delivered two TEDx talks: ‘Words Speak Louder Than Actions,’ looking at the power of gendered words, and ‘The Ladder of Manhood, ’ which explores the male pursuit of identity and how too many men are fluent in a language of violence.
As a man of colour having helped audiences get comfortable unpacking uncomfortable issues in an engaging, inviting space with an upbeat presentation style, Jeff regularly contributes thought leadership through writing and appearances on podcasts and interviews exploring how limiting ideas of gender impact us all in everyday life. A way forward starts with us, within us.
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