Equalitarian62 writes, "October is Domestic violence awareness month in the United States. Last year I created a letter template that could be sent to media outlets across the USA. My own letter was published in the Denver Rocky Mountain News. I am sending an edited (more concise) version to the Denver Post this year (it had to be less than 200 words). Those of you in the United States are urged to contact as many media
outlets as possible (newspaper, radio, TV, magazines, etc.). My
template may be used, or you can modify it or write your own letter
or email." To view the sample letter, view the Read More section below. Making use of a sample letter like this takes only minutes, and can make a big impact in numbers. Please help inform the media that domestic violence is not a gender issue, but a human one.

Glenn Sacks' most recent column, "When Men's Health Doesn't Count", just ran in the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot (10/9/02). To comment on the article, write to the Virginian-Pilot. The piece was co-written by Dianna Thompson, executive director of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children.


The Men's Health Act needs popular support. To write a letter to your Representative, go to this link.

Tom Williamson writes, "The National Coalition of Free Men (NCFM) has just initiated a brand new project at its web site. The new service is an automated news page that scans the internet for relevant headlines from magazines and from other web sites. Headlines will change every week and sometimes every day. Our material is divided up into five categories: Divorce, Civil Rights, Life Style, Health and Fashion. A short list of articles appears on the front page with a brief description. If you want to see a much longer list, simply click on MORE beneath the topic heading. Here is a really neat feature: There is an orange flag next to most of the individual articles. If you want to see a list of related articles click on the orange flag. This is great for anyone doing research; for anyone looking to find material to expand on a topic."

Marc Angelucci writes "The Union Rescue Mission is the most recognized and probably the largest homeless program in Los Angeles. Its programs have a non-denominational Christian basis and serve a huge population of homeless people, mostly men. Ray found the website when searching for organizations that might support a commission for men. That's when we noticed this. If you look under "services," you'll see "Men's Programs," and you'll also see "Women and Family Programs." The women's programs are heavily centered around children and "family" while the men's programs seem to leave parenting and children out almost entirely, with some exceptions. This is probably just reflecting a reality that homeless women are more often with their children than homeless men are, so I'm not making any outright attack here. But wouldn't that still, arguably, create a good reason to create a program that encourages the men to increase their involvement with their children in order to help inspire them to overcome difficulties and to increase father involvement even among homeless men? From what I've read, most homeless men are fathers. And given research we know by Sanford Braver and others, it's likely that a lot of these men are apart from their kids due to judicial and systemic bias against them, perhaps in combination with mental disabilities or other factors (which can even be caused or influenced by the systemic bias). Maybe some of us could contact them and perhaps even praise them their work while also politely sharing some thoughts. I'm curious how others would react to this."

Mark Rosenthal writes, "Ireland's Supreme Court just declared the Interim Barring Order provision of Ireland's Domestic Violence Act to be unconstitutional. Read about it on the AMEN website here. AMEN is an organization in Ireland set up by Mary Cleary in 1997 to provide support for male victims of domestic abuse and their children. On October 19, 2002, Mary Cleary will be emcee at the Battered Men's Helpline 2nd Annual Conference on Male Victims of Domestic Abuse in Portland, Maine."

Anonymous User writes "I found a brochure [on depression in men] at www.lexapro.com. It is a guide for male victims of depression. This is the first time I have seen a brochure geared specifically toward men for this disease. I encourage male victims of depression to write the makers of Lexapro and thank them for this attention." While Lexapro obviously has a financial interest in marketing their product to men, they clearly state that depression "is an equal opportunity illness, affecting all ages, races, and economic groups, and both genders" and they are contributing to awareness about depression in men.

Anonymous User sent us this Boston Globe story and writes "A Suffolk County jury found Tuesday that Elaine Whitfield Sharp knowingly made false accusations that trooper Randy Cipoletta propositioned her for sex and fondled her breasts after arresting her for driving under the influence of alcohol in May 1998." Sharp is a high-profile defense attorney who apparently thought she could get away with this. The ruling will be appealed.

Tom writes "We have some reason to celebrate. Last night my wife yelled to me "You better come watch this." When I made it to the TV she said a lead character on the CBS show JAG had just stated that 50% of Domestic violence is committed by women. How bout that! Network TV has now proclaimed that women are indeed violent in relationships. I hope my man Thundercloud got to watch this. It did my heart good. The tide is certainly turning. You can give them feedback here."

Steve writes "I will host this week's MANN chat, Wednesday night (10/9), starting at 9:30 PM Eastern Time, at the usual location. The topic for this chat will be 'Integrated Men: Healing Ourselves, Healing the World.'"

Dan Scott writes, "If you are a Maryland voter be warned that a serious threat to your basic civil rights has been offered for your approval this election year in November 2002. The referendum is asking to you amend the State of Maryland’s Constitution to allow District Commissioners after normal business hours to remove people from
"their homes" under the guise of domestic violence accusations." See the Read More section below for the rest of Dan's submission.

Continuing the Men's Health America campaign to end the neglect of men in new heart disease programs by the NIH, a sample letter to Claude L'Enfant, medical director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, should be used as a model to help bring attention to this injustice. A letter by David Burroughs of Maryland has also been posted to the MHA mailing list. It only takes a few minutes to write, so please do so. Our tax dollars are paying for this biased program, and we have a right to take issue with this.

Scott Haltzman writes "This article reviews an Austrailian study. Bottom line: men count."

"[T]he extent of a father's involvement in caring for a child between birth to five years old was found to be more influential on a child's ability to cooperate and obey instructions when they started school."

"She said policy debates about child care had placed too much emphasis on a mother's role in parenting at the father's expense."

The latest article by Glenn Sacks and Dianna Thompson is out.

"California Governor Gray Davis had the chance to free thousands of falsely condemned men last week. He chose federal funds instead."

Since I went away this weekend on a trip, the web and mail server of course had to have problems. The hard drive filled up with irrelevant log messages sometime Saturday and ground the system to a halt. Mail has been delayed, but should get through eventually within the next 24 hours. The web site is running cleanly again, so hopefully things are back to normal. Thanks everyone for your patience...

SJones writes "A new study on the effects of marriage by researchers in Australia has found that the 1972 claim (that men benefit from marriage at the expense of women) was false. In fact, both men and women reap similar mental health benefits." This story may be found at yahoo.