Advice Goddess Blog: 'Um, What About The Men And Boys?'

Article here. Excerpt:

'I've heard horrific stories of men being denied access to their children after a divorce, of boys getting harsh punishments that are not applied by schools or the legal system to girls, and I've seen scholarship and fellowship programs for women and minorities where guys, especially white guys, can't get in.

We don't fight discrimination with discrimination -- and while I am not for "councils" of this kind to begin with, I'm disgusted that the president thinks it's a good thing to come out with a council for women and girls when there are vast problems men and boys are dealing with.
...
Then again, if you really want to change things, to really improve life for a great number of people (especially children), how about coming up with a Council Against Single Motherhood, including rich, largely white women, who are selfish, me-first/children's needs second "single mothers by choice"?'

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Sharma Howard: Lack of positive male role models is very disturbing

Article here. Excerpt:

'Ninety-five percent of crimes are committed by men, that’s a fact every man has to confront — that violence is mainly male, but at the same time, 95 percent of men aren’t violent. So, yes, men commit violence, but it’s a small percent, your son has to know both those things,” Thompson said to me.

And while men and boys get more air time in movies and on TV — 70 percent more than girls — they also are frequently cast as the instigator or troublemaker.

Couple that with the lack of nurturing adult males depicted in TV and movies and you begin to wonder what that impact has on these boys who will one day be fathers themselves.

“There’s a serious dearth of both sympathetic and competent fathers in TV and movies, the best we can do is ‘Two and a Half Men,’ and these are well-meaning bumbler dads,” Thompson notes.
...
Female teachers need to avoid approaching boys with a “reformist” mindset, he said, which is woven into our culture of parenting boys.'

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Behind that familiar face, the crisis of men and boys

Article here. Excerpt:

'By coincidence, on the same day this week’s shootings occurred, President Obama signed an executive order creating the White House Council on Women and Girls to ensure they are “treated fairly all matters of public policy.” There are still many reasons why special care should be taken to ensure that women aren’t discriminated against in the workplace, that domestic violence is treated as a serious problem and that girls get the same educational opportunies as boys.

'But this is not our only gender-specific problem. Sometime this year, for the first time in history, the number of American women drawing a paycheck will exceed that of men. This doesn’t mean that women suddenly are doing a lot better. It means that men are being disproportionally affected by the economic downturn and are doing a lot worse.

Whether the current economy bothered McClendon at all is uncertain; he seems to have quit a couple of jobs by choice. Like most of his brethren, however, there’s a familiar dead-end quality to the outlines of his story.

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Pilot project aims to let boys be boys – and excel

Story here. Excerpt:

'St. Thomas School in Waterdown wants to get its boys excited about reading. By doing so, school and Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board officials hope they can boost the primary boys’ literacy scores and assist in closing the 20 per cent reading gap identified between genders.

But while the test scores ranked above the board and provincial averages, broken down, the results indicate a reading gap between the school’s boys and girls. “All my girls are at an A level in reading and most of my boys are at a B level,” explained principal Michael Goffredo. “They are doing well, but there is a gap, a 20 per cent gap.”
...

“We decided that we have to change the way we teach,” said Goffredo. Implementing two strategies in each Junior Kindergarten to Grade 3 classroom, teachers have restructured their lessons to target boys and further engage them.

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World Net Daily: 'Barack against the boys'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Barack, however, has it backward: It is boys, not girls, who lag behind – and have for decades.

The 1972 federal law Title IX saw billions funneled into sex-based affirmative action programs. Schools – primary, secondary, tertiary – were feminized and boys demonized. The very system Obama has just reinvigorated has already instituted what Dr. Bruce Perry, a Houston neurologist, calls a "biologically disrespectful model of education." Disrespectful to boys. "Girl behavior [has] become the gold standard," seconds psychologist Michael Thompson, Ph.D., coauthor of "Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Lives of Boys": "Boys are treated like defective girls.

And when the defective "suffer" bouts of boyness – competitiveness, aggression, hyperactivity – they are punished, or medicated.'

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Insemination fight ends in wife's arrest

Bizarre. Wonder where this fits into "The Duluth Model". It's probably all the brother's fault. Anyway, story here. Excerpt:

'PITTSFIELD — A woman who allegedly intended to artificially inseminate her wife with her brother's semen has been charged with domestic assault and battery.
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Jennifer A. Lighten, 33, told police that Stephanie Lighten, her wife, was "all liquored up" when she returned to their Lincoln Street apartment, where the defendant then allegedly tried to use a syringe to inseminate her, according to a police report.

According to a report by Pittsfield Police Officer Kipp D. Steinman: "Jennifer said that Stephanie had a 'turkey baster and her brother's semen in a sealed container.' Jennifer said she told Stephanie that she didn't want to get pregnant." The device was actually a large syringe with a catheter tip, police said, and it was still in its original package when officers confiscated the item.

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"We are now what I like to call 'a woman's nation."'

Story here. Excerpt:

'WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama invoked his grandmother, his single mother and his two young daughters on Wednesday in creating a White House panel to advise him on issues facing women and girls.
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Obama cited statistic to back up his case: Women earn just 78 cents for every dollar men make; 1 in 4 women still experiences domestic violence; women are 49 percent of the work force but only 3 percent of Fortune 500 chiefs.
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Advocates praised the new panel. The National Women's Law Center applauded the move but added that more needed to be done. California first lady Maria Shriver, who is working with the Center for American Progress on a report on women's issues, said the move was a reminder that "we are now what I like to call 'a woman's nation."'

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Obama’s New ‘Council on Women’ Seen As Vehicle to Promote Feminist Agenda

Article here. Excerpt:

'President Barack Obama on Wednesday created a new bureaucracy to deal with women’s health, domestic violence and economic security. But some conservatives fear the new council will actively promote the feminist agenda in the government.
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“It’s a political payback for feminists,” Crouse told CNSNews.com. “There is no question what is coming down the pike. Women voted for him, 56 percent to 44 percent.”
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According to the White House, the council will work directly with the departments of State, Treasury, Defense, Justice, Interior, Agriculture, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy, Education, Veterans Affairs, Homeland Security, the ambassador to the United Nations, the Office of Management and Budget, the Council of Economic Advisors, the National Economic Council, and the Domestic Policy Council.'

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Mayor Bloomberg Launches the New York City Commission On Women's Issues

Article here. Excerpt:

'Mayor Bloomberg Launches the New York City Women's Resource Network as Part of Women's History Month Celebration!

On Thursday, March 5, 2009, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced the launch of the NYC Women's Resource Network, a free, online, searchable database of over one thousand nonprofit organizations and government agencies that provide a variety of services to women and families in New York City.'

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Robert Bly events at the University of Minnesota

Via email:

Dear MensActivism,

It is with great pleasure that I announce two exciting events sponsored by the University of Minnesota Libraries.

First, there is an exhibit showcasing materials from the Robert Bly Papers held by the University of Minnesota. The exhibit is running now through May 9, 2009. You may view this dynamic exhibit at the Elmer L. Andersen Library on the West Bank of the University of Minnesota. For directions and more information on the exhibit, please go to: http://blog.lib.umn.edu/lib-web/events/2009/01/the_pen_still_moves_freely_rob_1.html.

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"Shooter deliberately targeted women" - or did he?

Article here. Excerpt:

'Smiling happily for the camera, these are three of the teenage girls shot dead by a crazed gunman at a German school.
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Authorities believe he deliberately targeted women as 11 of his 16 victims were female.
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All three teachers were women and eight of the children were girls. More than a dozen other teachers and pupils were injured.'

I commented to the article as follows. Doubt it'll get published, but here it is:

'Before a claim that he was targeting females over males can be made, you have to ask yourself what the male:female ratio of students is in the school. Here in the US our last couple of birth cohorts have been markedly female. As many as 70% of our college students are female. In some counties especially in northern states in the US, the M:F ratio is 1:3 in high schools. So jumping to conclusions about the shooter's gender-based murder preferences here is a bad idea.

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Obama signs exective order creating Council on Women and Girls

Article here. Excerpt:

'A little while ago the President signed an Executive Order to ensure there is always an eye kept on how every government agency is addressing the challenges confronted by women of all ages. The White House Council on Women and Girls will be chaired by Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett, with Director of Public Liaison Tina Tchen serving as Executive Director, and will made up of Cabinet Secretaries and other top White House staff. It will begin its work immediately by asking each agency to analyze their current status and ensure that they are focused internally and externally on women.'

N.O.W. couldn't be happier. Their press release is here.

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Obama's first cover-up: the gender wage gap myth

Article here. Excerpt:

'It was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi who engineered the recent passage of the Lilly Ledbetter Act. And just a few weeks ago Rep. George Miller of California made the red-meat assertion that women earn "78 cents for every dollar that is earned by a man doing the same job with the same responsibilities."

Democrats call it as the "gender wage gap," but I prefer to think of it as the "scare-the-female-electorate-into-submission" ploy.
...
In its foreword, the Department of Labor concluded, "this study leads to the unambiguous conclusion that the differences in compensation of men and women are the result of a multitude of factors." The DoL added this parting comment: "the raw wage gap continues to be used in misleading ways to advance public policy agendas:"
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The report was finalized on January 12, 2009 and then posted on the Department of Labor website. But within a few days the document disappeared without a trace.'

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False rape accuser gets 45 days for not following probation order

Story here. Excerpt:

'A 19-year-old woman recently placed on probation for misleading Owen Sound police into investigating her bogus rape allegations was sentenced to 45 days in jail for twice failing to comply with her probation order.

April Ibbotson, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty Thursday in the Ontario Court of Justice to failing to report to her probation officer between Jan. 8 and Jan. 23, then to breaching the order again Jan. 15 to Jan. 23 by living somewhere without first obtaining approval from her probation officer.

Ibbotson also spent 14 days in presentence custody.

In January she pleaded guilty to mischief by making false allegations that she'd twice been raped by a black man. She also pleaded guilty to failing to attend court.

A few weeks after her false accusations, a black man was beaten and stabbed downtown after being falsely accused of rape hours earlier.

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Two Women Charged With Falsely Reporting Rape on East End

Article here. Excerpt:

'After finding money missing from her wallet, a Shirley woman accused a man of rape and her friend from Mastic who was with her corroborated the allegedly false accusation, an investigation revealed on Friday, Feb. 20, Southampton Town Police say.

Caitlin Bolte, 23, called in the rape from outside the Speonk home where she was visiting friends and upon the officers' arrival, she was found sitting in a car parked out front with Kelly Kling, 22. Bolte told investigators that one of the men in the house took her to his bedroom, raped and sexually assaulted her and she then identified the man she accused, according to Southampton detectives. Kling told investigators the same account and Bolte was evaluated at Peconic Bay Medical Center, authorities add.'

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