I’ve got some questions for you, so let’s get down to business.
What, exactly is wrong with being an advocate of change to help men and boys? I mean what, specifically, is so offensive or hostile about bringing attention to thus far ignored social issues such as parental rights for men, or reproductive rights for that matter?
It’s an undisputed fact that men have no inherent rights in these areas, and in most cases have no rights of any kind unless conferred by the mother. Our society prides itself on removing oppression, on equality, on tolerance. And yet, in the rare cases that extending these rights to include men are even considered, they are subject to a cost/benefit analysis and dismissed on those grounds.
It is if men only deserve equality if and when it doesn’t cost too much. Otherwise, the individual men involved get stuck with the bill for the political capital the politicians used to screw them with. Even the judges involved in such areas as Family Law openly mock the idea that men have Human Rights.
But show concern for this, and you are a misogynist?
We mutilate the genitals of baby boys routinely, selling off the foreskins to make face cream, and point to whatever bogus reason the medical establishment is justifying their inhuman avarice with this week as a reason, all while avoiding the reality that we are permanently altering his sexual function, years before he is even sexually mature, and he has no say in the matter. How is this not hypocrisy given the stance on FGM? And how quick would their tone change if selling foreskins were illegal, do you think?
Do you really think comparing male and female circumcision is Oppression Olympics? How much harm has to come to these defenseless babies before we allow the exact same reasoning used to ban FGM to apply to baby boys? Do you really think the only possible objection to this barbaric practice is anti-Semitism? Really? Why don’t boys deserve the same right to bodily autonomy we so cherish for our girls?
Throughout nearly all of my years, the concept of affirmative action has held sway throughout the west as official policy. Multiple campaigns on both national and provincial (or state) levels have been mounted to “correct a gender imbalance,” as well as a racial one. This has resulted in the success women (usually white) enjoy today in fields like medicine and law, and resulted in more women entering “non-traditional” careers. All of this, by and large, is seen as a desirable goal throughout society.
That changes, it seems, when men are the ones that are “under-represented,” as is the case in fields like HR, nursing, and education. In those cases the lack of male participation is seen as natural, the fault of men themselves, or even a good thing. In areas such as child care, for example, men are openly regarded as threats, or creepy, for even wanting to be there.
The equality rhetoric disappears when men are disadvantaged. Even, it seems, in education, where anti-male prejudice is openly treated as a positive. As are overly-broad interpretations of already vague law, and other anti-male practices. Do you think the government has any intention of enforcing its own laws, and living up to its own rhetoric, when men stand to benefit? Or do you think they will finally see the folly in this form of discrimination when men begin to gain?
And apparently, to question the judgment of those leaders, to be suspicious of their motives after watching the respective constitutions of several countries shredded to enable their policies, is dangerous and scary.
So we best avoid that. Right?
Simple concern for the health of men also seems to be a no-no. Men die quite a bit younger than women do, this shouldn’t surprise anyone. The fact that suicide is the second or third leading cause of death for males in all but the oldest age group, on the other hand, might make a person sit up and take notice. A word of caution to the unwary: failure to have more concern for the higher number of female attempts usually results in a charge of (you guessed it) misogyny. And don’t EVER point out that suicide isn’t even in the top ten causes of death for women. Just don’t, trust me on this. God help you if you suggest cultural attitudes might be responsible for the difference. I’m just saying…
I would like to insert the obligatory paean to call such and such hotline if you’re feeling suicidal, but truthfully most of those lines are staffed by people whose personal beliefs usually agree with the very forces causing so much pain. In my hometown, the suicide hotline is run by a battered women’s shelter, for example. Given the spike in suicide rates for men following divorce, and how common false accusations are as a tactic in divorce, whoever OK’d this was a lunatic…yet it seems to be common. Shouldn’t I be concerned that men in a fragile state are served properly? Is pointing out a conflict of interest a bad thing now?
Wanting to change this situation, to improve the chances that men will survive until retirement, usually gets you an accusation of hating women. Why? I don’t know. Any thoughts?
I also don’t know why people seem so complacent with the structural failure of our society. It’s hard to imagine anyone could be unconcerned, for example, with an underclass in the UK so large that Single Motherhood has become a career choice. It’s equally hard to imagine people can ignore the role education (or more succinctly, the lack thereof) has played in a fifth of young British men being not only unemployed, but officially considered unemployable. It’s beyond comprehension that people would buy this as being “natural”, isn’t it? They don’t even seem to blink when they find out it’s specifically men and boys permanently relegated to the underclass. Some pablum about “colored folk” dragging down the average (how progressive…and don’t “those people” have daughters?), and it seems people go back to sleep. Do you think people are this complacent without being conditioned to be so?
It is of the utmost importance, by all accounts, to regard the destruction of generations of men, the shredding of rights and the vanishing of futures (and children, sometimes) as most tragic. After all, aren’t women complaining they can’t find a good provider to marry? Don’t their children need replacement father figures?
Failure to regard the state the male sex has been reduced to as nothing more than a bummer for marriage-minded women will result most often in accusations of misogyny.
Should I “man up” or is it OK to point out the denial of “person” status to men inherent in such a viewpoint? Is it bad form to point out the frequency of such a viewpoint in popular culture? How about the disapproval alternative viewpoints receive?
Concern for the health and welfare of men, without equal or greater concern for the health and welfare of women (even though women receive far greater care and attention, politically and medically) is also forbidden in polite company. Cynical manipulation of the regard men have for women is to remain unremarked upon, on pain of banishment, and no further outbursts about women having rights and men having responsibilities will be tolerated without reprisal in forums across the land. As our national leaders have scolded: we need to “man up”. At least, so the media tells us. Because of patriarchy, apparently.
Do I have it right so far? Does this mesh with what you’ve been taught? Am I confirming that men’s activists have nothing to complain about? That we’re really just mad at losing privilege?
Like the privilege to see your own kids? Like the privilege of presumption of innocence? Like the privilege of property rights and legal protection? Like the privilege of being regarded as a human being? Yeah, I suppose some are mad at losing that sort of stuff.
Let me ask a couple more things while I have you here.
What would you do if you took these concerns to people who have entire organizations dedicated to fighting these battles, people who could have tackled the problem in months, or even weeks…and had them deny those problems exist? And then had similar groups block attempts to find out if they really were issues, or worse, hide information confirming them?
What would you do if these people who insist on being the last word in equality issues flat out refused to hear a word of it? Would you give up, or would you try other avenues? What if politicians followed suit, and flat out refused to even investigate? Or even denied their own data if it suggests men might need help?
Would you heed these same people’s later demand for use of a “proper tone” when addressing them, once they couldn’t continue to deny the reality? Would you care at all how those people felt about you? Would you need their approval to have legitimate concerns, do you think?
What would you do if no one would lift a finger to even find out if there might be something wrong? Would you yell until they wake up, or would you let them sleep?
Are you not even a little bit curious how things can have reversed this much for men in 50 years? Are you honestly buying the idea that men can’t adapt? And when are we going to get around to making someone actually prove all this social engineering was a good thing. Heck, don’t you think someone should have actually analyzed patriarchy theory before we started tearing down society?
Why are some people so afraid of having their ideology questioned, and why are alternative viewpoints considered borderline illegal? When did Western governments become secular theocracies? What does our society more resemble, a Democracy or a Police State? Has any of this made you curious? Do you care at all? Can you honestly say you didn’t know this stuff already? And most importantly, why aren’t you mad as hell?
