JANUARY
1. We don’t spend equal amounts of money trying to cure male cancer
We’ve long known that we spend less time, money and energy trying to improve men’s health. In January the Prostate Cancer charity revealed that we are still spending 3x less money on male cancer research than female cancer research, in spite of the gap being closed in recent years by the huge fundraising success of Movember. In the same month, new data revealed that men remain at significantly greater risk of developing cancer and dying from cancer.
2. Working class white boys are less likely to get to university
Also in January the Universities Minister, David Willetts, called on Universities to do more to help working-class white boys access further education after university applications from men fell by 22,000 and the university entry rate for men fell four times faster than the entry rate for women. Mary Curnock Cook, the head of the admissions service, Ucas, warned that men are becoming a disadvantaged group who are a third less likely to get to university. According to Cook the university gender gap will continue to grow and will be wider for boys and men from poorer backgrounds.
3. Beat up your boyfriend phone app causes outrage
‘Boyfriend Trainer’, a new free app which encouraged girls to domestically abuse their boyfriends caused outrage in January for encouraging women to electrocute, hit and mace a virtual boyfriend after he does annoying things – such as leaving his clothes lying about on the floor. It was made available through Apple, whom The Telegraph said had previously had “a good track record at disallowing apps which in any promote violence against women”. Louise McCudden in The Independent said “sexism against both genders feeds off itself. Sexism against men is facilitated by sexism against women; sexism against women is justified by sexism against men.”
FEBRUARY
4. Welsh nurses call for men’s health strategy to tackle health inequality
In February the Royal College of Nursing in Wales (RCN) said that the principality needed a strategy to reduce men’s high level of preventable, premature death. According to the RCN, 40% of men die before the age of 75, but many of these premature male deaths could be avoided if systems were put in place that would help them access the treatment that they need.
5. Top judge admits to House of Lords she unfairly demonized campaigning dads
In February the former High Court Judge and cross-bench peer confessed to the House the Lords she’d lied to them about the campaign group Fathers 4 Justice. In December 2012, Baroness Elizabeth Butler-Sloss told the House that she’s received death threats from the group, a claim that was repeated in the national media. She put the record straight saying that while she had received threats, they weren’t made by the group. Nadine O’Connor of Fathers 4 Justice said:
“The making of false allegations within the family courts is something that our fathers have to deal with on a daily basis, so as an organisation we were extremely upset about the allegations that were made against us.”
6. A new political party launches for men and boys
February saw the launch of a new political party that aims to focus entirely on men’s issues. Justice For Men and Boys (and the women who love them) is a right-wing, anti-feminist party that aims to contest the 30 most marginal Conservative seats in the 2015. The party, run by Mike Buchanan, has published a draft manifesto with proposals in 20 areas including paternal access to children, education, employment, paternity fraud, domestic abuse and abortion law reform. You can offer your feedback on the proposals, and suggestions for other proposals to be included election manifesto for the 2015 general election at the J4MB website.
7. Young Men are less optimistic than young women
According to researchers at Durham University, men aged 16 to 24 are unhappy, unhopeful and deeply pessimistic about their future prospects. They have more negative expectations than their counterparts in the 1970s and 1980s and a bleaker outlook than young women from the same background. I reference the research in an article I wrote in Telegraph about the inequalities faced by young men later in the year.
8. Negative stereotypes are causing boys to underperform at school
In February, Bonny Hartley from the University of Kent released her latest findings on the impact that negative stereotypes have on boys performance at school. Her study found that girls from age 4 and boys from age 7 believe (and think adults believe) that boys are academically inferior to girls. She further found that when children aged 7-8 are told that boys tend to do worse than girls at school then boys’ test scores fall. She further found that this “stereotype threat” can be counteracted. When children aged 6-9 were told that boys and girls were expected to perform similarly, the performance of boys improved. Hartley’s earlier research warned teachers against fueling the gender gap in education by reinforcing negative stereotypes about boys.
To be continued…
Editor’s note: People who’ve read the book “Equality For Men” are saying it’s a “skillfully produced,” “compelling,” “really great,” “truly excellent” book that “focuses on the main point brilliantly” and should be “mandatory reading.” The best way to find out why is click here to buy Equality For Men by Glen Poole. –DE
