Article here. Excerpt:

'In fact, I started playing around with different ways that you can be critical of feminism, and came up with Six Different Levels of Feminist Critics

1.At this level you have no criticism towards feminism and believe that feminism is spot-on. You are a feminist yourself and possibly self-identify with a particular branch of the movement.

2.Some mild criticism starts appearing. You find it important that masculinity studies within the feminist framework are carried out, since you believe that patriarchy hurts men too. Many liberal men and cultural creatives can be found in this category.

Article here. If Obama is so concerned with men's health, why is there no federal office dedicated to men's health? Excerpt:

'President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama speak candidly about health and fitness priorities for the country and their family in exclusive interviews that will appear in the October 2009 issues of Men`s Health and Women`s Health, respectively. The October issues hit newsstands on Tuesday, September 15.

President Obama, who appears on the cover of Men`s Health for a second time, turned to the publication to speak directly to the 12 million Men`s Health readers at a critical juncture in the health care debate. The President, himself a prototypical Men`s Health guy, explains how health care changes will affect American men and their families. President Obama previously appeared on the cover of the November 2008 issue of Men`s Health, which was on newsstands when he was elected.'

Story here. No boys allowed! Excerpt:

The Women Presidents' Organization (WPO) knows the importance of financial security and is coordinating its third annual Financial Literacy Event for young women. The financial literacy program, Thrive Time, gives highly successful women CEOs, who own and operate multimillion dollar businesses, the opportunity to teach future leaders the importance of financial education and how it can impact their personal and professional lives. The participating WPO members are entrepreneurs who have grown their businesses to the multimillion dollar level and have a vested interest in the growth and success of women in business.

Article here. Excerpt:

'First of all, it is exceedingly rare to find two people who are doing precisely the same work. Perhaps only two workers doing the same job at the same rate on the same assembly line would qualify. Two secretaries in an office, who in theory probably have the same duties, might still find that one of them ends up typing twice as many letters as the other. And this second secretary may in turn do three times as much filing as the first. One might take half again as many phone calls as the other yet do so in the same amount of time because she is able to get to the nub of the conversation more quickly. Even in the plumbing example I cited at the outset, the two toilets were different models, so plumber number two may have had an easier time of it or found cheaper parts than plumber number one. Productivity, proficiency, and even a certain amount of chance play huge roles in determining exactly what, and how much, work each person does. It is next to impossible to say that any two people have done “equal” work.

Article here. I suspect absurd violence statistics are used to demonize the school boys. Excerpt:

'The Bonsall Women's Group is planning to start a dating and domestic abuse awareness program at Fallbrook Union High School.

The program, called Love is Not Abuse, would teach students about domestic and dating abuse. The program was developed by Liz Claiborne Inc., a clothing design and distribution company.
...
Fallbrook Union High School District Assistant Superintendent Jim Yahr said Thursday he has spoken with La Barge and that he's interested in looking over the materials to see if the program can be integrated into ninth-grade health classes, which currently include some discussion of date rape issues and how to maintain a healthy, respectful relationship.'

I wanted to point out a male-positive commercial by Honda called "Mr. Opportunity". This has been running for the past few years, but I find it's a much better portrayal of a man than a lot of commercials out there.

You may or may not remember the Super Bowl commercials back in 2004, one of which was a Honda Pilot commercial "Run With the Wolves" in which a woman is married to a man who was "raised by wolves." It showed the husband looking all disheveled while licking a plate like a dog, drinking straight from the water cooler at work, and chasing a Frisbee (thrown by his son) into a stream. The commercial is here.

I posted about it at Mensactivism.org shortly after it aired. There was a letter writing campaign that followed this ad, and it would be nice to think that Honda's new Mr. Opportunity ads came about as a result of this protest.

Just to show that activism sometimes can work for us.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Two fathers fighting for child custody rights got the thumbs up from the Supreme Court last week. On Friday, a mother had to withdraw a petition trying to thwart a father’s legal quest for more time with his daughter. The apex court had weighed in on his side, directing the divorced couple to settle it out of court.

On the same day, in another case, where a father has been estranged from his son for two years, the Supreme Court directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to step in. The CBI has been given six weeks to find the mother who has gone absconding with her son. The apex court felt compelled to take this step since its repeated directions to state police departments on the matter had come to naught.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'It's time to leave the male bashers, or female abuse deniers out of the picture. Not all men are abusers, and not all women are innocent, or unlikely to commit abuse.

Jan Brown spent years researching domestic violence and interviewing men who fit the definition of abuse. She discovered that there were very few options for male victims.

So she set out to make it right. In October of 2002, she founded the Domestic Abuse Helpline for Men and Women (DAHMW), a non-profit organization created to help men who have been victims of domestic violence. The unique aspect is that this organization is not only for abused men, but abused women as well.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'This article by Peter Tromp who is a Dutch child and educational psychologist, is, for my money, the best, most comprehensive argument for equally shared parenting in existence. In one piece, he lays out the overwhelming case for equally shared parenting along with a good bibliography in support.

As an exercise, first read Tromp's piece and then read the paper by NAWL, the Canadian women's law association which opposes equally shared parenting. Compare the two. Tromp's evidence is voluminous, comprehensive and compelling. The NAWL paper relies on misinformation and anti-father bias to see it through. Comparing the two is like comparing Tolstoy to a comic book.

Via Jeremy S.: Page is here. Note the posters only seem to show males as perpetrators. Two other posters show what could be women doing the abusing but they are not clearly shown as being women or men. In any case, the bias and ignorance is quite apparent. Contact info is here.

Via email: I came across this video. It's of a man who proposes at a baseball game on live TV and the woman slaps him in the face in front of everyone and storms off.

Even though I don't know the context of this video or the couple's relationship, I feel this is an example of the growing callousness and feelings of entitlement among young women toward men today. Obviously for some reason, she was not pleased and because of that, decided to hit him. Have a good day and thank you for all the work you are doing. Dan.

Article here. We're reaching a new low in domestic abuse rhetoric. The new culprit? You guessed it -- toddlers! The VAWA has abused the constitution to alienate fathers from their families. It pains me to wonder whats in store for our nation's boys. Excerpt:

'A first-of-its-kind-study in Perth has shed a new light on domestic violence and its shocking culprits - children.

Boys and girls starting as young as two have been reported as being verbally abusive towards their mothers before graduating to psychological, emotional and physical abuse at a later age.

Ashleigh Haw, who co-ordinates the Parenting Over Violence Project, has found that teenage boys make up the majority of those committing more serious abuses.'

Article here. Excerpt:

Article here. Excerpt:

'Harriet Harman, minister for women and equality, said the report shone a spotlight on discrimination against women in the financial sector. "We cannot tackle discrimination if it is hidden, which is why I asked the commission to produce this report."

She added it was "unlikely men-only boards and management would ever deliver the change in working culture, such as family-friendly flexible working and childcare, that would allow women to flourish in the workplace".

Tough new measures in the forthcoming equality bill will include gender pay reporting and proposals to ban secrecy clauses that are "particularly prevalent in financial services", she said.

John Cridland, deputy director of the CBI said: "No sector is immune from tackling the gender pay gap, and this report highlights that in parts of the financial services sector there is some further distance to go. But, as in many other areas of business, women applying for the top jobs need more flexibility with hours and childcare responsibilities."

Article here. Excerpt:

'The sleek headquarters of Britain’s equality watchdog is the model of inclusiveness. There’s a breastfeeding room for nursing mothers, subtitles on the television at reception for the hard of hearing, electronic door-opening devices for wheelchair users and an area for saying prayers. The latter was presumably useful this summer as the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) descended into civil war over Trevor Phillips, its leader.
...
“I would say that we have a culture that does produce bias, even if people don’t mean it to ... The simple fact is that most offices, no matter how progressive and enlightened, still work on the basis that the average ‘normal’ worker is a white male, whose children are looked after by someone else, who can work 9-5. That doesn’t work for many women.”