According to this ZDNet story (found on Slashdot), " Members of Congress are inundated with so many e-mail messages from constituents and special interest groups--80 million last year alone--that lawmakers routinely ignore most of them, according to a new study." A disturbing part of the report claims that citizen's expectations should be lowered, and that people have no right to expect a response to electronic communications with Congressmen and women.

Not PC informed me that the BBC is reporting that a man is legally challenging a woman's right to abortion against his will. While the article aptly points out that men currently have no rights in the decision of whether or not to abort, it is pretty obvious (to me, at least) that this legal challenge will not be successful. There are too many other ways a woman could thwart a lover's demand to bring a child to term, and now that the possibility to obtain an abortion is viewed as a woman's right over her own body, I can't imagine that these "rights" can be taken away. But the struggle continues, for good reason. Men deserve some reproductive rights, the question is, which rights would be most fair?

A trial is currently underway in the UK in which a wife tried to kill her wealthy husband by poisoning his breakfast cereal with antihistamine tablets and then suffocating him when he was sedated. He barely escaped, and she claimed that she did it to draw attention to their marital problems and that they needed outside help to deal with them. The way in which the woman behaved seemed disturbingly apathetic to the consequences. The UK Times article can be read at this link.

frank h submitted this CNN story and writes "This is one story that got by Ted Turner: a woman, now deceased, had falsely accused her family of abusing her as a result of memories "recovered" through therapy. The award is substantial, but I'm sure it does nothing to compensate for the dishonor falsely visited upon her family." No doubt this is a very positive step by holding the psychiatric industry accountable for such damaging actions. It also warns other experts who practice unethical forms of memory recovery that their day may be coming as well.

British Airways, a major international airline company, admitted that is has a policy which has been in effect for several years which requires flight attendants to move, if possible, men away from children who fly alone. "A spokeswoman for British Airways said flight crew and ticket staff were under instructions to keep men away from unaccompanied children wherever possible because of the dangers of paedophiles." Thanks to AngryHarry for submitting this link from the UK Times. This is a perfect example of how society views men as sexual predators - and no one should tolerate this kind of biased treatment of men.

Here's a small preview of Warren Farrell's latest book Father and Child Reunion. It has brief excerpts from several chapters so you can get a feel of what the book is about. And there's also another book review by J. Steven Svoboda, who outlines some of the main points to made in the book when it comes to men's parenting rights. If you like what you read, don't delay and order the book now!

Jim Castelli submitted this Boston Globe story and writes, "Mark Scialdone is a boy, but was chosen for this season's Globe's girls' All-Scholastic squad as a gymnast. In 1978, 136 NCAA colleges had men's gymnastics, now only 24 do. In MA, only 8 high schools have boy's gymnastics teams. This year when he accompanied his Beverly, MA team as captain to the New England Girls Gymnastics Championship, he was told that his scores would not be allowed."'Technically he was a non scoring participant,' said Haig Varadian, executive director of the Council of New England Secondary Schools Principals Association....'The Council feels its an invasion of the girl's tournament...The playing field isn't level when you have a boy competing against girls.'" But in the wake of Title IX, the girls' teams may be the only playing field left for male gymnasts.

I consider this very relevant news because of the way gender was portrayed in the article. Basically, it acknowledged that men are more willing to destroy their lives in a stressful, all-consuming job and that the high turnover rate of women in the industry is a signal that the job standards need to be changed. "Stress and lack of work/life balance in the IT workplace is taking [a toll on women]...Women in IT are the "canary in the coal mine" warning that the New Economy workplace is destructive for employees...IT managers should realize that what women are experiencing in the IT workplace is very likely a reflection of men's experience and that unreasonable stress and lack of work/life balance have the power to destroy productivity in the long run." Read the article from Computerworld at this link.

There has been lots of interesting activity going on in New Hampshire in support of men's issues (particularly father's rights). The NH chapter of the National Congress for Fathers & Children has been active at the state level, speaking out on legislation and even having legislation for men passed as well. Their recent major undertaking was to draft a report on the status of men in New Hampshire, and their results include a great deal of useful information for men's activists in the state and elsewhere. Go to this link to download the report, and please distribute it wide and far!

China has taken a significant step toward the toleration of homosexuality by removing it from the list of mental illnesses created by the country's main Psychological Association. "China is to remove homosexuality from the official list of mental illness. Up to now homosexuality has been automatically included by the Chinese Psychiatric Association (CPA) in its diagnostic manual." The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality as a mental illness in 1973. The Irish Times article can be read here.

In another story of a false accusation, a Michigan police chief, Ronald Deziel, was accused of sexually assaulting a woman working in a hair salon. There were inconsistencies in the woman's story and also no DNA evidence was found where it was expected in the woman's clothing fibers. The case has been very high-profile and damaging to Deziel's reputation. "County prosecutors are now considering whether to charge the Taylor woman with making false statements to police and the filing of a false police report, which is a misdemeanor punishable by up to 90 days in jail." I guess when the consequences of making a false accusation are so insignificant, it's questionable whether to even bother pressing charges! Click here for the Detroit News story.

AngryHarry sent in this story from the UK Times. It's about a man who was falsely accused of sexually abusing his (then) three year-old daughter by his wife. The wife was determined to have Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, and the way the child was interviewed by social services and police was irresponsible (leading questions, etc.). He will be suing the police dept. and social services unit that handled the case negligently.

Salon.com recently interviewed Christina Hoff Sommers about Jane Fonda's recent donation of 12.5 million to Harvard University for the creation of a Gender Studies Center, and Carol Gilligan's recent leaving of Harvard. The article discusses Sommers' views on the future of gender studies and covers a number of important issues, including the problems that college aged men are facing. She ends with: "I'm sorry to report the good news that little boys are healthy. They are neglected academically. Boys could be doing a lot better, especially in reading and writing and simply caring about educational achievement. But they are not pathological. Being a boy is not a disorder; it's not something you need to recover from."

In more than a twist of irony, a UK police public relations manager who authored a guide on political correctness for the department was fired after four women accused him of sexually harassing them at a party. "During his 18 months in the job, Mr. Williamson was part of the team which produced a guide called The Power of Language, which advised the force's 7,000 officers to avoid sexually overt terms of endearment such as 'love,' 'pet' and 'dear' because people might find them offensive." Read the article here.

An Anonymous Reader sent me this link to an ABC Good Morning America story that William Stowell, 19, is suing the hospital that circumcised him as an infant. He claims that his mother, who signed the waiver form, was under the influence of painkillers when she signed the form. "Stowell's attorney, David Llwellyn, has considerable experience with men who lament the loss of their foreskins. He has filed similar lawsuits in the past, winning as much as $65,000 in one settlement...the hospital claims there is a 10-year statute of limitations on medical malpractice suits. However, Llewellyn responds that in the state of New York, the clock doesn't start ticking until a person turns 18." While it might not be productive to open the floodgates of litigation for people who were circumcised, I'd like to see cases like this bring about the end of the practice on infant males who can't give consent.