Failing to speak up

I had an interesting little interaction with my placement mentors today. They were going in on the 'men should be expected to fight for women' trope and kind of just promoting it, like the idea of men becoming randomly violent (the instance they were talking about involved police, so things got bad.) It was really bizzare to listen to, especialy to hear it spoken about so positivley and I kind of... hated it?

But, for context, one of these mentors just had a younger family member come home after being abused by a guy at work and they were kind of... fantasising? About stepping in? I can understand that, but it turned into lauding guys who "would never let another man lay a hand on women", I'm trying to find the right phrase, it was *very* paternalistic and glorified the violence, it *wasn't* just about breaking up a fight calmly and there were some... subtle shots at "weak men" who 'ignore it' (or... you know, don't immedietly resort to violence.)

All I could do was try to steer the conversation towards a less... physical response and to try to promote communication (and procedural action against the offender, ie. *you aren't welcome in here again*) but, they weren't picking up what I was putting down and... I kinda feel bad that I didn't do more? Like, I let us down with that. I didn't feel like I could, these guys have been really accomodating to me, they are my superiors right now and I've only just started... But I'm not jazzed about letting this one through to the keeper, but I think the reality is that this would be risking my entire course and furure career speaking up...

Did I get one wrong here? I'm never sure where the bar is for standing up for this stuff, I've been good with it in the past, but there is a power dynamic here I can't ignore.

Also, has anyone else had moments like this? Either with the glorifying paternalistic violence or the *do I say something* question?