The AM Show newsreader Ingrid Hipkiss has given sportsreader Mark Richardson a lesson on what it's like to feel insecure as a woman after he said he feels like he always needs to defend men.

Richardson said on The AM Show he feels frustrated at the anger directed towards men following the murder of Grace Millane.

Many women have spoken out about their own experiences following her death and called for men to work together to stamp out toxic behaviour.

But Richardson says it's not all men.

"I continually feel now I'm getting backed into a corner where I have to defend men," Richardson said.

But Hipkiss was quick to respond and said the issue was not about defending or vilifying men at all, rather about the constant fear a lot of women live with.

"You don't have to defend men, it's acknowledging that women live with that sort of almost primal state of vulnerability every day, all day," she said.

"I'm not asking you to solve it, and I'm not blaming you in particular."

Addressing host Duncan Garner, Hipkiss recalled an example of when the difference between men and women becomes clear and people often don't notice.

"Remember when we lived in Wellington, and you [Garner] used to ring me sometimes and I would go over the day and you would say 'I've just been down to Oriental Parade and gone for a run' when [it was] dark at night," she said.

"I would not ever do that, because I just wouldn't do it, and it's not something you or I consciously think about, it's an unspoken vulnerability.

"I'm not saying men are to blame, this is just all about saying 'oh really, is that how it is? That must suck.' That's all it needs to be."

Richardson and Garner finished the conversation by saying they needed to champion good behaviour from men.

"What we do on this one, we become ambassadors or role models in our society to our boys, to our boys' friends," Garner said.

"If they're not getting the right advice at home, we grab 10 people and we embrace and we work on them.

"So that's our project as dads, and if every New Zealand dad, good dad or good man, grabs 10 people in their life, works on them, just subconsciously in 20 years we'll have a better New Zealand."

Newshub.