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Whenever I read stuff like this written by another man it makes my skin crawl. It's like the kind of crap you get in 'Achilles Heel', if you've ever had the misfortune of encountering that. Robert Okun is one of those 'feminist' men who toes the line that portrays men purely in terms of how they may harm or help women and children, rather than seeing men as people in themselves. His article is full of unsubstantiated and unenumerated claims. He states that "in a dangerously high number of cases, many [sic] of these fathers have a documented history of abuse", but offers no support for this claim. The image of domestic abuse he portrays is the standard feminist cant. The abuse of children by women is not mentioned at all. The description of the 'good' father he offers sounds like a negative image of the one women are encouraged to have of themselves. He doesn't go after the big promotion (what the hell's that got to do with being a good dad?), he arranges his life around the kids, and he doesn't make the big decisions. I wonder if he's allowed to assert himself in any way at all.
As is typical of this kind of feminism, men are not allowed to have any feelings that might inconvenience anyone. The reasons for this are clear. If we acknowledge his feelings the onus would be on women, feminism and society to change themselves so as to be considerate towards those feelings. Instead we talk of these men as being 'confused' , 'uncertain' and 'angry', as if they're just some kind of dumb animal which lacks the sophistication to live in the 'modern' world. The notion that mothers may be malicious, selfish or abusive, or that the legal system may encourage such divisiveness, is simply never entertained. It's all silly old dad's fault, and if only he'd roll over and take it like a good doormat everything would be fine.
Okun's attitude towards father's rights groups is typical NOW bullshit. I checked out the NOW site recently and found it referring to father's rights groups as 'extreme right-wing organisations'. I notice the article is preceded by a disclaimer on behalf of Women's Enews and the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund. Big surprise.
I wonder what the meek and mild men who get Okun's approval would do if they found themselves ejected from their children's lives and their homes, perhaps wrongly accused of menacing behaviour , stripped of a significant part of their income (which wouldn't be that great anyway because they didn't take that big promotion), and unable to stand up for themselves because to do so gets them labelled as abusers.
Finally, if you want to know where Okun is coming from, check out the website of the Men's Resource Center of Western Massachusetts, of which Okun is associate director. The text on the homepage sums it up:
"The mission of the Men's Resource Center of Western Massachusetts is to support men, challenge men's violence, and develop men's leadership in ending oppression in ourselves, our families, and our communities."
I feel sick.
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Rob Okun makes two assumptions that have no basis in reality—one, that women somehow ‘give permission’ to men to take an active role as fathers, which is pure horse hockey.
Two, that there are father’s groups actively demonstrating in the US, at courthouses across the country. At this moment I am not aware of any father’s groups doing the kind of demonstrations he talks about. This doesn’t mean they don’t exist, of course, but mostly father’s groups are working in other, less visible ways to protest their treatment by the court system. They are engaging in things like working with legislators, filing lawsuits, and promoting the election of father-friendly officials. The sign-carrying, in-person demonstrations that I know of are mostly in the UK and New Zealand right now.
He should get his facts straight before he goes spouting off in public. This commentary was nothing more than yet another example of NOWs basic stupidity that will eventually do them in.
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Whenever I read stuff like this written by another man it makes my skin crawl...
This might seem a little off-topic, but, regarding feminists, I've long felt that the male of the species is more deadly (words-wise) than the female. And there's a reason for this - the male feminist is free of a need to censor himself in a way that non-feminist males and even feminist females generally don't seem to experience.
Think about it - if you're a man and you're not a feminist or you are into men's issues (or, frankly, if you're a male of any persuasion), you often feel the need to censor or civilize your words somewhat to avoid coming across as too radical (or simply to avoid getting physically attacked) or unsympathetic to women. If you're a woman and you're a feminist, you might still feel the need to censor yourself a little bit, since being female makes you an easier suspect for all-out misandry, which can lessen your credibility in many circles (although, obviously, not all female feminists feel so restricted).
But a male who is toeing the feminist line is a male who is blissfully free of all need to censor himself. Not only is what he saying in smooth accordance with the prevalent social dogma, but being male makes it almost completely safe (even queerly admirable) for him to express anti-male sentiments. It is the ultimate verbal freedom!
Few men or women who speak or write to the masses have that sense of freedom today. And that's why male feminists are the deadliest of them all.
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by Anonymous User on Thursday November 01, @05:29PM EST (#5)
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Here's the quote from the article
"They don't go after the big promotion at work. They arrange their schedules so they can take the kids to the dentist. They rarely miss a soccer game or school play. At home, they cook and clean and recognize that they don't have to make the big decisions unilaterally in order to feel good about themselves. They are getting support from dads' groups when their kids are small and from parenting classes that involve fathers early and often."
I don't understand what's so bad about this particular excerpt. Basically what it's saying is that the guy puts his kids first, before all other things in life.
Yes, the big promotion might mean a lot more money. It may also mean spending three out of every four weeks on the road. It may mean working 12 to 18 hour days, 6 to 7 days a week, and seeing your kids LESS OFTEN than a divorced father who, at least, gets weekend visitations.
That's going to hurt the kid. It deprives them of the father they need involved in their life.
I can totally understand someone saying that they want to put their career first, they want to spend their money on themselves, and they don't want to have to attend stupid school plays and soccer games. I also think someone who feels like that has a moral obligation NOT to have children. I'm not a hypocrite. I think this way, which is one big reason why I have chosen to be childfree.
You cannot have this both ways. No one can. There are only two choices. You can have children and live your life for them, or you can choose to be childfree and live your life for yourself. It's not right to do otherwise, to pop out a kid and then ignore it.
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This thread really isn't about choosing whether to be a part of your child's life or not. It's about the fact that this author believes men's rights organizations and activists are advocating and inciting violence against women and children, and that he believes that court biases AGAINST men are not a bad thing because HE believes that a majority of men fighting for custody of their children are abusers.
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by Anonymous User on Thursday November 01, @06:02PM EST (#7)
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I realize this, but one of the particular excerpts Uber singled out, dealing with "giving up the big promotion" and other such things to spend more time with your kid, is an excerpt that I don't think was objectionable. My post was addressing that specific excerpt, not the entire article.
I can understand objecting to some of the other things the article said, but I don't understand objecting to that part.
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The point I was trying to make is that guys like Okun pat men on the head when they behave in ways that are considered 'sexist' when applied to women. These days, the idea that a woman should put children before career, always be there for them and not make the big decisions is considered by many to be very old-fashioned, but for a man to do it is 'modern' precisely because it frees the woman to pursue self-advancement. It's that attitude that I think stinks, not fathers spending more time with their children. Being a hands-on dad doesn't have to mean being a doormat. The way Okun describes it he makes it sound as if the man should be eternally grateful for being allowed anywhere near his own children, and should continually humble himself before the mother. The way he describes fathers groups only seems to underline a general attitude which, while superficially being positive towards at least some fathers, is actually very hostile towards men and male influence within the family. It's the same kind of attiude that could have a man stripped of all his possessions under Canada's Bill 117 just for raising his voice. It is an attitude which sees men as essentially alien to the women/children axis, not an integral part of it. As one nasty-mided women's campaigner, speaking about a group called 'Families Need Fathers' here in England, put it a few years ago: "Families may need fathers, women and children don't."
Yes, you can't have it both ways. Either fathers are essential to family life - in which case we should support them in that, in juggling their careers and home life, not create laws which treat them as enemies of their wives and children - or fathers are not essential to family life, in which case we shouldn't be encouraging men to waste their best years on something from which they can be excluded at a moment's notice, with no explanation, great personal loss and a legal and social system which automatically views them with suspicion.
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