Really, I should be totally behind men’s rights supporters. After all, I really love rights, and more than rights I love everybody having rights together like a great big happy family of equality. There are not many rights-having-themed groups I don’t instantly love for that reason.
And yet, men’s rights groups often irk me. To me, they usually seem to be more about maintaining unfair privileges, rather than focusing on actual rights. Why is the gradual change towards equality in the context of a very long history of comparative over-privilege in law, authorship, and authority a type of victimization? Especially when there is so much evidence to demonstrate (some already wonderfully laid out in Humphrey’s post) that if anything, men are often not being victimized at all but actually continue to be unfairly privileged for their ‘gender-specific’ rights, whereas women’s groups are still struggling to get their very basic human rights to not be abused by known abusers.
The agenda of men’s rights groups is typically absurd. The feminist agenda is about equality between the genders, and requests that both genders should share housework, caregiving, fiscal responsibilities, and the like is ultimately not about over-privileging women, but about giving equal opportunity to both genders to the advantages and disadvantages of each responsibility. It has certainly been articulated as being about women’s rights, and continues to be so articulated (perhaps to its detriment, but also because women bear the brunt of the inequality) but it is ultimately about human rights.
Indeed, the ways in which men are disadvantaged in our culture typically tie right into the ways women are disadvantaged, but because women’s disadvantages have historically been so much greater (and in my opinion, still tend to be) women’s rights groups have been fighting these causes for decades already. As a feminist, I want both parents to be equally involved in the caregiving duties for their children. I want violent abusers of either gender to be punished and prevented from continuing promptly and efficiently. Ideally this would be replicated in the unfortunate cases of divorce by a relatively equitable split that allows the children to continue on with their lives with little disruption but still be raised by both parents relatively equally, and parents with violent histories prevented from the contact with their children which they clearly do not deserve.
However, in a world where women are still the dominant caregivers, are still highly unlikely to be violent towards their children in comparison to men, and are still considerably less likely to have demanding jobs which allow them little time to devote to childraising then the pattern of plenty of women getting custody of children in family court is hardly a surprise. And ultimately, these days, how many women do get full custody of the children when the father is equally competent? I’d like to see those stats, and compare them to the number of children who are abused by somebody who got custody when they shouldn’t have. Custody shouldn’t be a pissing contest between the genders, but if it must be as the men’s rights groups seem to demand, I would bet that many of the men unable to see their children may be so prevented because they have violent histories. Just as the man from the Parramatta siege shouldn’t, for very obvious reasons.
As already covered by Humphrey, women aren’t exactly being privileged right now, even as they supposedly do better legally in the one arena which has traditionally been female: the family. Men demand greater control over an arena they once considered wholly feminine and the legal system jumps, but women ask to not be abused and the legal system does nothing. I am all for rights, but men’s rights groups still seem to have problems distinguishing between their rights and their unfair privileges.
I guess I should not be overly surprised that anything arguing for men’s rights on, well actually what I thought was a gender rather than a feminist blog, would be argued against pretty vehemently. For my money if you get a reaction at least someone has listened and if you get a debate then all the better. At least people are thinking about it right?
But to the matter at hand. You and Humphrey (and I am sure you are not alone in the feminist community), seem to think that men’s groups are all about keeping women repressed. I asked her then, and will ask you now to quote someone who actually represents a men’s rights group saying anything of the sort. Out of curiosity I went to look at the Men’s Rights Agency’s (MRA) aims and objectives, as I am a sucker for absurdist writing (I love Carroll and Heller) and thought it might be interesting.
Literally the first point of their agenda is “To promote equal rights and a level playing field for all men. We acknowledge the right of all women to equality”. Your words: “The feminist agenda is about equality between the genders”. You state that you want “violent abusers of either gender to be punished and prevented from continuing promptly and efficiently.” The MRA’s 6th agenda item is “To provide aid to victims of domestic violence and encourage initiatives to reduce the incidence of domestic violence.” I guess they, like everyone after B. F. Skinner, believe that punishment serves as little more than catharsis (an eye for an eye anyone?), but the point stands. One more, their last, and my favourite on their agenda:
“To achieve an equal balance between men and women through acceptance that both genders are different and have different needs, but are complementary to each other.”
And statistics, I did find some that I thought were relevant. Pre 1995, after a separation a women having care of a child 80% of the time was “the most common outcome” (Fehlberg & Behrens, 2008, p.233), and 88% of children who lived with only one parent lived with their mother (p.230).
As bad as you think men’s rights groups are, many want the same things as you. No rational person wants family violence particularly around children, not you or them. Both you and they believe children should be “raised by both parents relatively equally”, they don’t think it was historically the case and made their point successfully enough to get a minor reform in the law. They, you and Humphrey want further reviews of the family law system (their 9th item) and want a say in how it happens. Some even want as close to equality as possible in all things, just like you. As for me, nothing would make me happier than sitting on a picknic rug with a great big happy family of equality. However, assuming all men’s rights advocates are the same is stereotyping; assuming they are all misogynistic is quite literally gender prejudice.
References
Fehlberg & Behrens (2008). Australian Family Law: The Contemporary Context. Oxford University Press, Victoria.
http://www.mensrights.com.au/About_Us-Mens_Rights_Agency-Australia.aspx
Hi Missparentease!
Firstly thanks for reading!
I do however continue to disagree with you. Both Humphrey and I were responding to the article by David Pentherby, and so were more or less both responding to the vitriolic men’s rights supporters he listed as Man 1, 2 & 3, which might be why we were both a little harsh in our criticisms, as those men were rather harsh, and the Parramatta siege was obviously ludicrous. I guess it is always the least representative voices which are heard loudest, but this article was brought up for discussion between the writers and we thought it raised some good points, so it was this article we responded to rather than a more general topic. As much as I would love to do more research on these posts, I did not have any time to research men’s rights groups outside of the context of this article. I have now just had a quick scan of the MRA website, and mostly just felt like they were disagreeing with fairly mainstream statistical results on domestic violence which are echoed the world over, without really giving any explanation as to why their results were actually more valid. I cannot see any reason to change my mind about men’s rights groups trying to reclaim privileges rather than create equality. I would love to see a men’s rights group that talked about unfair hypermasculinised images of men in popular culture, how it is okay to cry if you’re sad, how it is shockingly common that young men get abused or raped and
As for that statistic, I can’t disagree. Many, if not most women do get custody, and I know this through my own family history quite poignantly and personally. However, the mothers who got custody in my family generally worked jobs which allowed them to parent effectively and were already the primary if not only capable caregiver. Parenthood is not about just providing sperm or an egg, it is about actually parenting, and the court has every right to award custody to the parent actually doing the parenting. Certainly things in this regard have changed, which is fantastic to see, and I’m sure more recent statistics would show a gradual change. However, our gut response has been that the official response to men’s rights groups re:custody was much swifter than any progress on actually limiting domestic violence, which is clearly just as valid an issue.
I think for my mind to change, I would need to see statistics of how custody is played out today rather than pre 1995 to compare, and also how the instances of children abused by parents who got custody when they shouldn’t have have changed. I think the latter really hasn’t changed, because very little has been done recently to affect that (as outlined by Humphrey) and certainly having worked with children quite a lot I can assure you abuse is still thriving in my town at least. Unfortunately I did a cheeky search during the writing phase, and another one just now, and couldn’t find anything recent or comprehensive enough to satisfy my requirements.
I do realize that most men’s rights supporters are not rapists or abusers, nor do I assume that they are all misogynists. I cannot see where you thought I claimed or implied they were. I am not trying to claim that men don’t want happiness and equality, I just don’t think men’s rights groups try to affect change in that regard particularly effectively or equitably. I feel like if they are fighting for the same cause as feminists, maybe they could have provided a bit more support for stopping domestic violence, rather than trying to discredit reputable statistics on the same. It is obviously a fundamental difference in the way both groups think, and one worth discussing on our blog. We originally had a counterpoint non-feminist voice intended to join the discussion (Doctor Butts), but he hasn’t been able to get a post done, so I’m sorry that both of the writers so far have happened to be feminists. Not so many hetero football-loving men start or write for gender blogs these days. It’s obviously a real shame.
Nodaddyissues, it has been my pleasure and my thanks for the well thought out response in what is no doubt a busy time.
The statistics from post 1995 seemed, from what I read, to say that there has been a small but gradual change but that it was still too short to get proper statistics. That said I was reading a book from 2008 so maybe there is been progress since then. Here’s hoping anyway, as we seem in agreement that inequality in process is something to be avoided.
Loved your comment on the least representative voices being heard loudest, I think that is a truism for many groups who happen to encompass the wings (the greens being an easy example). I believe that this is close to the core of the matter for me, and perhaps my overarching point. That David implied that those voices were representative, and that his opinion seemed to be supported was exasperating as I (obviously) do not believe it to be true. I am sure I do not need to provide examples of his prejudice here, simply to point out that I found it offensive.
I have to admit I smiled at your last comment. I agree there is a definite irony to the fact that men, particularly straight men, are underrepresented in the gender studies community. Some of the reason may life in the belief that in the course of the discussion their opinions will be perverted.
Or perhaps that hetero beer-swilling football-loving men don’t have as many issues with gender? After all, they are probably very comfortable with hypermasculinised physical ideals, hypermasculinised pursuits like aggressive sports, etc? Perhaps they are mostly content with their lot gender-wise? Because I have never found a lack of men to emphatically tell me I’m wrong when it comes to gender issues, so I would hesitate to be too concerned that their opinions are being perverted by my feminist voice. I often feel drowned out by groups of men, just as much as you think men feel drowned out by groups of feminists. Except of course, outside of academia & the arts, to be feminist is not considered positive, otherwise we wouldn’t hear so many “I’m-not-a-feminist-but-”, whereas arguably to be very masculine and into football etc is very acceptable anywhere but in academia & the arts. Political correctness has certainly become a force, but it’s only changed the words not the opinions, which remain as strongly held and potentially misogynist/racist/homophobic just with softer language. I often feel like everybody thinks feminists voices are now the dominant ones which drown out all of the rest, simply because of PC language, but I still think if you take any random sampling of the community many women won’t want to say they’re feminist, which says a lot about the true perception of how the feminist voice is valued today. If women feel the need to say they’re not a feminist before making a feminist statement, then clearly feminist voices are not powerful enough to exclude male voices, otherwise such a modifier to make oneself heard would hardly be necessary.
Although there is also the point that in academics and feminism there is a knee-jerk reaction to dominance of men in discussion, because it is very much felt that men’s voices are already very loud generally in the media, academics and literature, and only the very occasional female voice is heard as loudly (Germaine Greer for example). Similarly to the knee-jerk reaction I would expect from the indigenous community were I to start talking about race relations in Australia, as somebody in possession of the (white upper middle class) voice most likely to be heard on this issue, it can be difficult to sympathise with views that may be entirely misinterpretations of an issue that has nothing to do with me really. Although I think feminism used to be very much like this with good cause, as the media was entirely men for a very long time, I would like to see more hetero male voices in the mix genuinely concerned with gender issues, because as clearly as they cannot honestly know the experience of being female in today’s society I cannot know the experience of being male in today’s society. I have to live with rape-fear every time I go for a walk or run, they have to deal with me looking back at them as I walk and knowing I don’t trust them. It is difficult because hetero male voices are heard very clearly and are the voice of media, academics and literature (because of their very invisibility, feminist voices only seem so loud because they are notable), but hetero male voices on gender issues are hard to hear, perhaps because of the association with feminism? Perhaps hetero men have the same problem of wanting to express they’re not a feminist but they care about men not being allowed to cry? I feel like feminism can be very loud but also it has very little power culturally, and discussion of gender ties into feminism in everybody’s perception, and so there is a lack of power to challenging the heteronormative status quo for anybody. I guess women feel they have more to gain, like not being raped, etc, whereas men don’t have that sort of gender-specific fear every day?
I personally find that there are two types of people in the world: those who understand the human condition, and those who like to stereotype and place people in overly simplified sub-groups. Jokes aside, I love your discussion of the language that surrounds gender issues and thought I might follow that train of thought, as I have always been a sucker for semantics.
I wondered for a long time what the term is for the antithesis of a feminist. From what I understand, feminism was originally around creating equal opportunity for women in whatever domain, and was largely tied up in terms of the formal processes in the 60’s and 70’s. It seems logical to me in a current context that the starting point for a definition is the status quo, which from what I can see around me is equality. I have assumed that what would have been called a feminist in the 60’s is now just a person, and that anyone believing that women should have less rights is a misogynist. The more normal gender equality becomes, the more radical feminism will have to be to differentiate itself. Obviously a point we differ on, although I would love to see a random poll of Australian’s asked if they believed in equal rights for all genders. Assuming an equality rather than affirmative action perspective, feminists can then be considered to argue for issues that are more pertinent to women based on numbers alone. As Humphrey so elegantly put it; domestic violence “IS a gendered point because the overwhelming majority of perpetrators of domestic violence are men”. These points, specifically domestic violence and rape, are relatively easy to argue especially within a gender studies context. Slightly more difficult within this is to argue men’s rights, and not simply because masculinist is not a term.
The feminist ideology is at least accepted enough into the cultural zeitgeist to make using misogynistic statements inappropriate in most contexts. However, the assumption is that within the academia and the arts that arguing men’s rights carries no stigma. Although I never said that I feel drowned out by feminists, political correctness is a definite factor and there is very little in the way of supporting terminology for those who wish to identify as supporting men’s rights. Of course the easy explanation is that (and I have never debated this), women have historically come from a background of disadvantage and the terminology was created out of a necessity for social change. However, I do believe that many men have felt unheard in some forums due to their gender. An example, I was listening to a presentation on trauma care by two people from MIEACT. They were summarising their experiences of a large conference they had been to in Sydney, and the gentleman pointed out that in 3 days of conference, with 4 independent stages running all about trauma that only one presentation had been on men’s who had been abused. Despite numerous men in the crowd, the rest were spoken by women, about men as the perpetrators. He was so appalled that he wrote a letter to the organisers, who replied with a list of counsellors he could see.
As to women in the media and academia, I think you may be confusing women and feminists. Yes, there are not a lot of feminists in the media today, and although I assume there is a handful of dying journals covering the territory somewhere, little in academia on feminism. The male voices in this domain are similarly quiet (perhaps even a little quieter, barring obnoxious fuckwits on the internet), again because of the lack of prevenance of gender issues that do not just represent a difference in statistics. However, there is a great deal of very strong women across the board in both academia and the media who I am surprised you feel are not being heard. I do wonder if confirmation bias has something to do with your perception.
I was thinking about your last question over the weekend and I am not sure as to the conclusion. There are certainly gender specific fears (if you claim them on numbers alone, e.g. rape) for males. Suicide relating to a cultural expectation of stoicism is one you have mentioned, as is the bias against men in the family courts (again just the numbers). Being arrested is one that I had thought of, and after having a look it appears men are around 3 times more likely to be arrested and charged than women (1). Of course, if you go to prison as a man you get raped and everyone thinks it is hilarious. Sexual harassment claims are another I have heard mentioned. As to who stands to gain the most benefit, the only conclusion I could comfortably come to is that neither group is anywhere near the bottom of the pile. If you were arguing magnitude of effects then there are 10 subgroups in Canberra today in which support is more necessary than either women or men.
1) http://aic.gov.au/publications/current%20series/rpp/100-120/rpp107/04.aspx
Hmmm…
“in a world where women are still the dominant caregivers, are still highly unlikely to be violent towards their children in comparison to men”
I’ll just leave this here…
“A mother is 1.45 times more likely than the father to victimize her child. She is also 1.2 times more likely to kill them too.”
http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/l50yf/a_mother_is_145_times_more_likely_than_the_father/
The problem is, that feminism is largely based on what women want to believe rather than actual facts.
The problem with “men’s rights groups” is that every statistic that makes men look bad is either a product of judicial bias, or under-reporting.
From ACF:
“The majority of neglected children (86%) had female perpetrators. This finding is consistent with the fact that mothers tend to be the primary caregivers and are typically held accountable for any omissions and/or failings in the child’s care. In contrast, children typically had male abusers (62%). The predominance of males as the perpetrators of abuse holds true for each specific abuse category and is most pronounced for sexual abuse, where 87% of sexually abused children had male perpetrators.”
And then, the interpretation on reddit:
“There are narrower categories that look into sexual, physical, emotional abuse, and different forms of neglect. However, there are a number of problems with them. Firstly, the courts have a clear bias for convicting fathers as the active agent of maltreatment, largely in part because of the clear bias of treating men as the primary source of domestic abuse [which, like child maltreatment, is also untrue]. Secondly, male victim related crimes are far more likely to be under-reported, which would further skew the results towards making fathers look worse, especially in the sexual category”
Don’t accuse someone of ignoring the facts and believing what they want, and then do the exact same thing yourself.
Truly excellent. Short and to the point (a quality I cannot claim) with statistics and quotes (even if one was from 4chan’s marginally less scummy younger brother). And all for the purpose of calling out a hypocrite (who’s side I have been defending vociferously). If only you could have included just one little quote from the men’s groups I would have considered my extended romp in the land of devil’s advocates entirely forfeit (re the legitimacy of men’s rights groups agenas, HTB & NDI’s arguments). Surely not too hard to find one as an example of “every statistic that makes men look bad is either a product of judicial bias, or under-reporting”?
Female pedophilia is considered to be of vastly under-ported and the overwhelming majority of their victims simply don’t tell or aren’t believed. 25%female is only the current estimate.
Women are known to dominate all other forms of child abuse abuse, [1] as well as domestic [2]
[1] The data shows that parents were the perpetrators in almost 39 per cent of the 1505 substantiated cases of child abuse in 2007-08. Of the 582 cases of abuse by parents, mothers were responsible for 73 per cent, while fathers committed 27 per cent.
Mothers were more than 17 times more likely than fathers to neglect their children, while fathers were responsible for 85 per cent of sex abuse cases against children.
Mothers carried out almost 68 per cent of cases of emotional and psychological abuse committed by parents, about 53 per cent of physical abuse and more than 94 per cent of neglect cases.
Cases of substantiated abuse jumped from 960 in 2005-06 to 1505 in 2007-08. In 2005-06, mothers committed 312 cases, while fathers were responsible for 165.
In 2005-06, mothers were responsible for 161 neglect, 72 emotional and psychological, 76 physical and three sexual abuse cases against their children. In the same financial year, fathers were responsible for 37 neglect, 41 emotional and psychological, 65 physical and 22 sexual abuse cases against their children.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/6089613/mum-not-dad-more-likely-to-neglect-kids/
[2]Methods. We analyzed data on young US adults aged 18 to 28 years from the 2001 National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, which contained information about partner violence and injury reported by 11 370 respondents on 18761 heterosexual relationships.
Results. Almost 24% of all relationships had some violence, and half (49.7%) of those were reciprocally violent. In nonreciprocally violent relationships, women were the perpetrators in more than 70% of the cases. Reciprocity was associated with more frequent violence among women (adjusted odds ratio [AOR]=2.3; 95% confidence interval [CI]=1.9, 2.8), but not men (AOR=1.26; 95% CI=0.9, 1.7). Regarding injury, men were more likely to inflict injury than were women (AOR=1.3; 95% CI=1.1, 1.5), and reciprocal intimate partner violence was associated with greater injury than was nonreciprocal intimate partner violence regardless of the gender of the perpetrator (AOR=4.4; 95% CI=3.6, 5.5).
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/97/5/941
We need professional abuse experts dealing with abuse, not feminist ideologues that brush half of it under the carpet and use the rest to slander men and manipulate the legal system.
What I like about feminism is that it tends to care about human rights as a whole. I see feminists discussing human rights outside of their own realm; they talk about LGBT issues, race/ethnicity issues, body image issues, gender roles of both females and males, etc. However, on the Men’s Rights subreddit on Reddit, I’ve noticed that when an LGBT issue is mentioned, some members will start whining about how it’s irrelevant and should only be discussed in the LGBT section (even though I’m sure there are gay men and transgender men who would benefit from having discussions and support). Not all MRAs are like this, but a lot are.
Many MRAs don’t seem interested in equal rights; they are only interested in themselves. They blame feminism and “feminization” of the government, schools, etc. for all the problems in the world. They whine about men being unfairly picked on and then say horrible things about women, as if it’s somehow fair and just. Their view is very narrow, and some of them are outright misogynistic and hateful.
Personally, I would like a Gender Issues/Rights group as a whole, but I just despise MRAs and could never align myself with them. Despite the name, feminists actually cover more than their own spectrum (including issues involving boys and men). MRAs, on the other hand, cannot grasp the fact that feminism isn’t out to destroy the world.
Arielle – I completely agree with your statements. In fact, Ms. Dalloway of Gentendre just posted an article which deals with this somewhat – see what you think: http://doublegentendre.wordpress.com/category/ms-dalloway/