Days after the viral #MeToo movement began following a tweet from actress Alyssa Milano, men are sharing how they will do better with #HowIWillChange.
On Monday Charmed star Milano tweeted out an idea suggested to her by a friend: "If all the woman who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote 'me too,' as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem," she wrote.
On Tuesday, Australian writer and journalist Benjamin Law wrote a message to his followers on Twitter. He wanted to respond to the woman online who had been posting #MeToo. "Guys, it's our turn," he said. "After yesterday's endless #MeToo stories of women being abused, assaulted and harassed, today we say #HowIWillChange."
Law outlined multiple ways men could help change and take responsibility for their role in rape culture, complicit or otherwise. Some of his suggestions included regular donations to a women's shelter in your area, confronting other men you know on sexism and assault, and recognising that "anything we offer to do using this hashtag is already done by women every day."
Law's tweets — which went viral in Australia and later, globally — sparked other men into tweeting with the #HowIWillChange hashtag.
Reaction to the #HowIWillChange campaign has been mostly positive, but a few men have messaged Law to say they are "not part of the problem."
Law told BuzzFeed News that while it was great the #HowIWillChange hashtag had gone viral, it was also a shame that he was getting any attention when women "do this stuff literally every day and just get yelled at."
"Guess all I can say is it's been nuts and heartening to see the response, but also deeply annoying how many men they are who think they're utter pillars of virtue, and that everyday sexism just isn't significant when you compare it to rape. (Spoiler: it's still fucking shit)," he said.