A roomful of what? ICMI, London, 2018, day 1

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Paul’s video was followed by a talk from Save Indian Family Foundation’s founder Anil Kumar on “Focusing on innovation for growth of organizations for the movement: Experiences in India.”

SIFF is a men’s rights organization centered in Bangalore, India. The organization was formed in 2005 as an advocacy group against misuse of Indian laws related to dowry harassment, and has had successes in drawing attention to the need for legal reform to stem the tide of such abuse. The group operates a helpline, and has used life coaching to assist men in dealing with the trauma of being the target of a false intimate partner or sexual violence case.

Anil gave his observations on lessons learned as the organization has grown and expanded, pointing out that the movement as a whole has a lot of knowledge on the issues, but our knowledge of organized dynamics is limited.

He went on to explain that in order for an organization to thrive, its members must understand its value system and organizational culture, and recognize the difference between tools the organization can use, like social media groups and commentator platforms, and the actual organization. He warned that as an organization grows, people management can become a full-time job, complete with expectation management and dealing with people’s tendency to resist change, to stagnate in their values, or to experience degradation of values over time.

He emphasized the importance of a “no free lunch” attitude, in which no dead weight is tolerated in the organization. Participants must be there to participate, to contribute to the organization.

He also cited a need for training within the organization, particularly on the values and culture of the organization, with leadership mentoring participants to ensure a continually working, growing organization. Activism, he explained, “must be based on values. Men need clearly defined roles, structure, values, and culture.” The organization should operate like a machine, with different parts organized around that value system, the related training, and participants’ performance.

This formula has resulted in successes for SIFF, which has published a 498A (dowry abuse law) survival guide, operates a helpline, counsels men facing false accusations, has countered feminist arguments on 498A in the Indian supreme court, and plans to have 5 candidates in Delhi elections next year.

Ms. Whyte, the supposed only woman in a room full of white men, declined to include any mention of Anil Kumar or anything about the Indian men’s movement in her article

Nor did she mention Nick Langford‘s speech, “An exercise in futility: Generation iPhone and the ‘Democratisation’ of the family.”

Mr. Langford opened with the point on the damage the feminist rape culture narrative has done, informing the separation of kids from their fathers, inciting the day care panic, and raising an anti-male cult. He went on to describe a rapid decline in adolescent mental health, with few getting needed support, a problem more prevalent in boys. Fatherlessness is a major cause of this, he explained, as intact families show better emotional and mental health, with statistics showing married parents achieve the best results for their kids, and cohabitating but unmarried having the worst. The U.S. and the UK have the worst rates of fatherlessness, with extramarital births having skyrocketed since the 70s. The government, he noted, assumes men are the problem, and child support is the answer, leading widespread parental alienation, as society no longer honors fatherhood.

Contributing to this: Family Justice review sought to simply and reduce expense of family court but failed to consider pro-father evidence and concluded that paternal rights are expensive and not good for kids. Women’s aid opposed due-process for men accused of domestic violence or subject to no contact orders, making such accusations tools for mothers to obtain custody.

Along with known impact of fatherlessness, he cited 4 potential factors contributing to this mental health crisis:

• Changing of youth to compulsive consumers.
• Extensive time spent by youth using social media on devices like smart phones, spending 8 hours a day on them.
• Institutionalization of childhood (kids spending all of their time in organized, institutional settings like classrooms.)
• Reduction in childhood play, which in turn reduces synaptic development and associated psychological development.

The detrimental role of father absence is also accompanied by the breakdown of the family via cohabitation, and the state’s attack on co-parenting. The system needs to be fair,” he explained, “and recognize that the best parent is both.”

This is not happening, however. Mr. Langford described the family court’s bias against fathers, informed by well-funded anti-father politics connected to domestic violence activism, and feminist efforts to eliminate paternal contact with kids. Feminist organizations have opposed fathers’ rights and due process.

Mr. Langford concluded by reminding the audience that the 21st century had begun with a witch hunt seeking pedophile rings, an attack targeting mostly men who are innocent, leading to a modern child protection movement that has warped itself into a secular anti-male church.

The variety among the first day’s speakers alone could have been enough to inspire a series of articles requiring a journalist to engage in research and careful consideration of the facts. It’s a shame that Ms. Whyte didn’t take that opportunity to understand either the issues the conference exists to address, or the people involved in discussing them. As always, the far left leaves that up to us, and we in the men’s movement will continue to rise to the challenge.

This article will be followed by two more, one for each of the remaining two days of the conference, over the next several days.

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