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Nancy Pelosi seems to be a friend of NOW and that does not bode well for her sense of fairness in gender issues. Just take a look at her home page. and you will notice that a good deal of the content is related to.....WOMEN! Surprise surprise! Not a thing I could find about men.
Now let's consider the possibility that a male congressman had a web site that was primarily about men. Would he be skewered??! Hey! Half his constituents are women and he is neglecting them. Bet you won't hear that about our dear Nancy.
She is a radfem. The democrats are now led by the enemy. This is sad.
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The democrats are now led by the enemy.
I've always registered as an independent, and there's much about the Republican Party that troubles me. I have to say, though, each day the Democratic Party seems more entrenched in the anti-male path.
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Thomas - We need a way to rate our congressmen and senators on their awareness and interest in mens' issues. I live close to Washington DC and am going to see what it takes to create a questionaire to send to all the reps or have it on the web for them to complete online. I hope to have an online database that will hold their responses and give us all a way to compare their stances. What I need is a group who can put together the group of questions that would comprise the questionaire and help us gauge how "man friendly" they are. Maybe someone from NCFM, someone from Mensactivism (yourself?, Scott?) and others who might be interested from this site or elsewhere. What do you think?
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What I need is a group who can put together the group of questions
I like this idea. I've co-formed a Denver-area, men's issues group that meets every other Saturday. It includes equalitarian62, who is a somewhat regular contributor here and runs men's issues online. It may also soon include the illustrious, if controversial, El Dildo Bandito. I'll run this idea by them at our next meeting, Saturday, December 21, and get back to you after that.
Perhaps, once we have it roughed out, we can post the questionnaire here for suggestions. I'll ask Scott at that point. Do you, or anyone else, know of a similar sort of questionnaire that we can look at while brainstorming?
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No I have no idea. I am thinking we will have to start from scratch. Here's a couple that are possibilities:
Does your state have a mens'commision?
If not, do you support it's creation?
Does your state have emergency services for men who are victims of domestic violence?
Do you see the VAWA as sexist?
Etc.
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by Anonymous User on Tuesday December 10, @10:07PM EST (#10)
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No I have no idea. I am thinking we will have to start from scratch. Here's a couple that are possibilities:
Does your state have a mens'commision?
If not, do you support it's creation?
Does your state have emergency services for men who are victims of domestic violence?
Do you see the VAWA as sexist?
Etc.
All good questions. I would leave out the "men's commission" one, though, unless you very narrowly define its purpose and whether it will be taxpayer funded. Even man-friendly pols probably are not going to support one just to have one.
Make the questions as specific as possible, IOW.
Nice idea, though.
Jack Implant
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Hi Jack, actually we could leave out the men's commission question because we already know there is only one in the US! I would want to know if they would support a men's commission though. Good point to be specific about what that would mean.
Actually I would like to have some of the questions be yes and no and some be numerically rated so we could easily rate them on their answers.
Jack said: "Even man-friendly pols probably are not going to support one just to have one."
Let them go on record to NOT support it. That's the kind of data we can use in alerting people about their reps. Who's with us and who is against us. Right now the reps don't have to take a stand either way. It's time to ask the questions.
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How about "Do you support the creation of an Office of Men's Health to complement the existing Office of Women's Health?" It seems absurd to have one and not the other, particularly when there is a gap in life expectancy of about 6 years between men and women.
Steve
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Just tossin' out ideas:
Check out this example of the Sierra Club's rating method for a couple of candidates. I think we can learn a lot from the folks at the Sierra Club. In addition, the Feminist Majority probably has some sort of system that might be worth studying.
Also, take a look at this Sierra Club questionnaire, complete with responses.
Here's another example of a Sierra Club questionnaire, and the responses given by a political candidate.
Here's another questionnaire.
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I think my men's issues group can put together a good questionnaire. Like I say, I'll get back to you on it.
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Great Thomas. Maybe I should start a forum for those of us who are interested to continue to share ideas and data?
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Great Thomas. Maybe I should start a forum for those of us who are interested to continue to share ideas and data?
This sounds like a good idea. A number of people have already given some excellent feedback. The questionnaire does need to be professional and caring. In addition, it's probably true that we should stick to the major points, especially the ones that are easiest to understand, and a few questions.
Here are a few examples to be kicked around and refined. For one thing they'll have to be tightened up. It's a rough draft -- suggestions are welcome:
1. Do you believe that domestic violence by women against men, as well as by men against women, is a serious problem that needs correcting through means such as shelters that house victims regardless of their gender?
2. Do you believe that, provided both parents want custody, joint child custody should be the default arrangement, to be used in the absence of serious wrongdoing by mother or father, when parents divorce?
3. Are you concerned by the fact that females now outperform males in every academic field? That the student bodies of our nation's colleges and universities are now nearly 50% more women than men, while the Department of Education expects that gap to increase?
4. Are you concerned with the fact that male suicide exceeds female suicide by a factor of about four? That there is an FDA Office of Women's Health but not an FDA Office of Men's Health?
Any suggestions? Refinements? Additions?
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It strikes me right away that the questions I wrote offer a lot of room for hemming and hawing, rather than responding with a yes or no. With yes or no answers, a statistical analysis would be more straightforward and convincing. (I, too, have done a lot of work with statistics, but I'm very rusty, so I'd gladly defer to Willj in analyzing the responses.)
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by Anonymous User on Wednesday December 11, @12:27PM EST (#22)
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Violence
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1. Is death or serious injury due to domestic violence more important than death or serious injury from some other form of assault?
2. When police respond to a call involving domestic violence, should the man be arrested and removed from his home as a standard operating procedure?
3. Is domestic violence of women against men an insignificant problem?
4. Should shelters for adult male victims of domestic violence be provided?
Child Custody
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5. Should joint child custody be the standard arrangement when parents divorce?
6. Should gender of parent be a factor when considering primary custodianship?
Education
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7. Do you think women are inherently smarter than men?
8. Do you think women are have greater inherent academic potential than men?
9. When one gender outperforms the other by more than 5% in public schools, should the government convene a commission to study and resolve the difference?
10. When one gender attends public college at a rate more 10% of the other gender, should the government convene a commission to study and resolve the difference?
Health
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11. Are male suicides more acceptable than female suicides?
12. When one gender commits suicide at a rate more than double the other gender, should the government convene a commission to study and resolve the difference?
13. Are male work-related fatalities more acceptable than female work-related fatalities?
14. When one gender suffers work related fatalities at a rate more than double the other gender, should the government convene a commission to study and resolve the difference?
15. Is women's health more important than men's health?
16. If the average age at death due to illness of one gender is more than two years earlier than the other gender, should the government convene a commission to study and resolve the difference?
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Great ideas for questions Thomas. I started a forum where we can continue talking about this stuff when this rolls off of the page. Feel free to paste in these questions if you wish. You can find it here:
Rating Our Representatives
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Thanks, Tom. I've bookmarked the page.
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by Anonymous User on Tuesday December 10, @10:47PM EST (#12)
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That's a good idea Tom, although it might be hard to get them to fill it out. You might consider contacting the NCFM chapter in DC about it. Their website is at
http://ncfm-dc.org/
Marc
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This is a FANTASTIC idea. I think it deserves a good bit of discussion. This could catch national attention and become widely known - so it should come across as very well-thought-out and professional. The tone is very important - we want people to answer it, and we want the results to be taken seriously. If it promotes us as being reasonable and rational, along with advancing our agenda, that will be a big bonus.
Would a lot of voters be interested in this info? Here's one possible indicator: there seems to be a building perception among men that the Democratic party is anti-male and some men (and married women) are moving away from it. This MAY indicate that people are quietly interested in such issues and MAY vote based on them (I have not seen a survey on this, so I'm just hypothesizing). I DON'T mean to suggest by this that we support one party or another, I'm just suggesting that this may indicate some potential interest.
I would be interested in working on this. I am a professional statistician and have done some work with surveys though it is not my usual area. I am going to bring it up with other statisticians and mens rights activists in my area.
Will
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Will - Glad you like the idea. I agree completely with your first paragraph. It needs to come across as highly professional, clear, and even caring in a way. We will shoot ourselves in the foot if it smells at all like anti-woman or bitter etc.
I love that you are a statistician. That's great!
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Somewhere in this thread, someone alluded to the notion that it might be hard to get the politicians to fill out the questionaire, and I agree. I suggest that you call their offices with the questions, identify yourself as with (whatever group is sponsoring ->INSERT NAME HERE -), tell them what you are going to do with the data once finished (You need to be putting it in a prominent place; the web will do, I suspect), and then ask for their positions on whatever issues you compile. Keep it concise, though. Fifty questions on DV won't do. I think if you go much beyond six or seven to start with, you're reaching too far, regardless of what groups like the Sierra Club do, because THEY have some standing right now while we do not, not as a political power base anyway. Finally, it would help to get it noticed by media types. For example, if you can get Rush Limbauh to mention on his show ONCE, you'll be able to count the hits within a half an hour. Also, once you've got a report, send printed copies with a press release to all newspapers and news magazines. Few will publish it, of course, but you might make a small splash with the conservative ones, for example, in the Washington Times. Even if it makes the "Oddly Enough" column on Yahoo News, it will be worthwhile. I would select topics that are hard to argue with, like joint physical custody or paternity fraud. Choice For Men, as important as it is, is hard for the general public to swallow because they really don't understand it; it requires too much thought.
Here's one I would put on it:
Does the [Congressman/Senator] believe that men and women ought to be treated equally under the law?
Followed immediately by:
Did the [Congressman/Senator] vote in favor of or against the Violence Against Women Act?
I'm willing to make calls/send letters to all New Jersey U.S. Congressmen and Senators.
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Frank - Thanks for the feedback. Agree that it may be a struggle to get them to respond. If we can come across as a coalition of national groups it may improve out chances of getting a response. Also if we can show them that a non-response will cost them...we may do better too.
I would much prefer to use the web over the phone. Keeping track of close to 600 phone calls and all the data that is accumulated is beyond me. A simple database and entry program can be easily built on the web using php and mysql. Giving each rep a username and password and having them enter their own data on a secure database would make things much simpler. We can then give web browsers access to the data they entered. Much of the communication between us and them can be accomplished via email which makes it even simpler. Any programmers out there who might be interested in helping me write something?
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Or you could get individuals to call up their rep or a few of them, give them the questions, names and passwords - that way you wouldn't have to deal with 600 and the reps won't have to do more than answer questions.
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((("She is a radfem. The democrats are now led by the enemy. This is sad.")))
You got that right, Tom.
And BECAUSE of the fact Nancy (the palooka) Pelosi is the democratic leader, I, once a staunch democrat, dumped the party the second I'd heared she was elected to that position!!
I am now an independant.
I can not, WILL not support ANY party that is led by a bigot.
Whether it be racial bigotry or GENDER bigotry.
TC.
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For anyone wanting to take part in this project and interested in continuing the discussion there is now a discussions board set up specifically for this topic. As this rolls off of the mensactivism.org page we can continue our discussions.
Thanks
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