Men's Rights

That the Men's Rights Organizations that have surfaced to date are largely (insert pejorative adjective) doesn't mean there are no men's rights issues meriting attention. You can't polish a turd. There is discrimination directed against men. 

When I was a grad student at Carleton University decades ago, the campus women's center published plans to debate censoring a piece of painstakingly executed folk art in the tunnels, one that I saw as clever and important social commentary on police duplicity. I attended at the Women's Center and was told I could hang around but I must remain silent during the discussion because I'd "just try to influence the outcome" if I were to speak.

I demanded and was given the part of my fees that supported the women's center back from student council. It was, as I recall, a buck thirty-five.

I am (as often as I have wished I were not) a heterosexual white male; one who has never intentionally discriminated against anyone on the basis of inherent or village of origin rooted personal characteristics. Although admitting the cringe-worthy, clumsy and idiotic vagaries of youth (and my heart excluded,) I am far from young. I say there is discrimination and that it amounts to gender based shaming regardless of which gender it concerns.

I do not blame women for rape.  I do not embrace any of the ideas that so easily provide valid bases for criticizing most extant men's rights groups and the silly-to-dangerous points they bring to the fore.  I am not ashamed because some men are wrong. But, I shall not be moved. There are men's rights issues. What can we do about this in a culture where the term "men's rights" has been demonized? Seriously, what can we do?

Screw gender roles.