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Rights vs. Interests
Submitted by Matt on Sat, 2010-10-30 19:17
Normally I don't pen my own essays but for this topic, especially as we here in the US are heading now into a major political election season that underscores such matters, I felt this was a good time.
'MRA' stands for "Men's Rights Activist", while "FRA" stands for "Fathers' Rights Activist". It is hard to be one without being the other and for all intents and purposes they mean the same thing. The word "Rights" is represented in both acronyms. (And likewise, "Women's Rights Activist" also has the same word in it.) This word is thrown around all the time not just by activists in this realm but in many others. Indeed, the word "rights" seems to be a very common word when people seek to appeal to an innate sense of or a defined scope of justice.
But consider that, especially when talking of adults, all of us have the same rights. Consider that parents of both sexes have equal rights regarding the children they have. Consider that to bodily and other forms of human integrity and dignity, we all have the same rights. The playing field then, from a philosophical standpoint, is equal. We all have equal rights. Once that is accepted then, what is there left to make adjudications over? Will not one set of rights cancel out the other set of rights? Yes, that is exactly what happens. So the only thing left to consider then is the *interests* of the parties involved.
As men, what we don't have is an equal representation of our interests in practical ways because institutions and people within our societies are not recognizing this fact, or they simply believe we are not entitled to equal consideration because we are men, which is bigotry/misandry in action. This is where (and why) our activism comes into play. To say we are pursuing our rights isn't correct since we have them already. What we want is our interests to be fairly considered when weighed against the interests of another person/people who also have the same rights as we do. We have as full and complete claim to insisting that we have our interests fairly and judiciously considered as weighed against another person's because indeed, we do have the exact same rights as they do.
Having clarified this point, then, I believe it is entirely acceptable for male voters specifically to lobby candidates on matters that directly impact the support of our interests as men and fathers in the same way that women have been doing now for almost 50 years. Men it seems to me just don't view themselves as a voting block, while women do. The press also sees them as a voting block and reports on them as such. If men's interests are going to get defended and fairly represented in institutions of all kinds as well as in the court of public opinion, men need to start making men's issues political issues and vote accordingly. Otherwise, we'll never get anywhere with this stuff.
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Comments
Personal vs. country's interests
I would disagree on that. I think that voters should vote for the candidates who are best for the country, not only for their personal interests. Women and feminists are stupid. Which is why they as a single voting block for 30 years have been voting for their personal interests, not country's ones, and as a consequence have ruined America.
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Single men is the only social group benefited from feminism.
I respect your opinion
I was hoping among other things my post would generate commentary. Glad to see the first one is a divergence from my own opinion. Feels like America! :) But I'll ask you then, what do you believe are the country's interests that should guide a voter's decisions? If we (ie, any given person or collection thereof) do not comprise the substance thereof, then what does? If you don't vote in line with your own interests but instead in line with someone else's, then are you not devaluing yourself as a member of the country (ie, the body politic)?
I suppose ultimately the question is this: when do you stop and "the country" begins? And if your interests and those of the country's (as you see them, or as they are told to exist to you by someone else), then just when do you see your own well-being served? Never?
Contrary to a lot of feminist replies to men's concerns about what feminism has done to us, it is not true that when there is a conflict of interest, both parties to that conflict can "win". Political power issues are a zero-sum game. There is not an infinite amount of political power in any given political system, just as there is not an infinite amount of energy in any given physical system. When one party's (ie, person's, group's, etc.) interests are served in the face of another, by necessity the other group's interests are under-served. I think years of "family court" and workplace pro-female "affirmative action" policies have shown us this.
But...We don't have the same rights.
The new Canadian Constitution specifically forbids discrimination against women while allowing discrimination against men.
Maybe at least in the US, one could perhaps try to make an argument that men have as many rights as women.
My condolences
Then in the case of Canada, yes, you go not have the same rights. If any group of men needs to get organized to actually get equal *rights*, then, it'd be Canadian men.
My View
I look at it like this.
I'm not a father, but I'm still a Father's Rights Activist. So it has nothing to do with "self-interests." I'm an FRA because it's the right thing to do. It's about fairness. It's about the best interest of all parties, not just the woman. I'm also a Men's Rights Activist for the same reasons.
So I support MRA/FRA policies not because they are focused on men/fathers, but because they are focused on justice and what truly is in the best interests of the country.
If political candidates ran on MRA/FRA platforms, I would almost definitely support them regardless of political affiliation. I would take them as people of integrity who are interested in doing what is right. So even with noncontroversial issues, such as the construction of a bridge across a river, I would trust their decisions to be based on what is best for the general population, and not focused on a particular interest group.
Sadly, there are few if any MRA/FRA candidates. But I still vote the same way. I vote against candidates that spout the feminist view that women are the centers of the universe. These are those candidates that talk about what they will do for women's health or violence against women. These people are about ideology. I wouldn't trust them on gender issues and I wouldn't trust them to make a sound decision about building a bridge across a river.
That said, I do wish men were considered a voting block and I wish they considered themselves a voting block. Men are particular interested in fairness and consistency. They tend not to be focused on emotional issues or what "feels good."
Voting As An MRA
I specifically told a candidate for my district's state house seat that I am voting and campaigning for him just on a single issue. This guy was arrested 10 years ago on a bogus domestic violence charge by a vindictive ex girlfriend who claimed he threatened to strangle her. His opponent is making the most of this non issue sending out campaign fliers showing his mug shot and implying that he is a violent criminal who hates women. The DV charges were dropped soon after his arrest and the ex vanished out of his life. I no longer care hearing about tax cuts, education or the same old same old campaign promises from candidates. I want to know their stand on protecting men as an oppressed social class.
Good points
I am also both an MRA and FRA but have no kids. Still, I see the two as very hard to separate since paternity and being a man (adult male) are so inextricably intertwined. Still, I do realize after reviewing my own OP that indeed there can be a distinction between an MRA and an FRA. For example, let's say I am from a religious background that supports circumcision and I support it, too. And maybe also I may have a traditional viewpoint re men's roles in society, so as for the draft, I might be fine with it, and may also believe that women shouldn't be drafted. As for education, I may believe also that there isn't a problem with how boys are doing in schools. And so on. But I may believe that as a father, I have rights vis-a-vis my kids that have been undermined by feminism and feminist jurisprudence. Thus I would be an FRA but not necessarily an MRA.
Ultimately I support MRA and FRA ideas because even though I have no kids, I sill see how dads get treated in courts as being inextricably intertwined with all other MRA issues since they are a huge if not the hugest single plank on the MRA platform. Not to support FRA issues is in essence to under-support MRA issues, and let it never be said I did that. No issue more thoroughly affects the well-being of men grandly than this one, with the possible exception of the male self-image (reinforced by the rest of society, at times by force) as being a "disposable warrior" who needs to place his own interests aside for the good of everyone else's (ie, women's). And that is one reason why I feel men need to start voting with *their* interests in mind rather than some nebulously-defined other set of reasons, many times few of which seem to contribute measurably to the welfare of men.
HOORAY!
Outstanding. :)
Definitions
The three elements rendered to members of a society are rights, privileges, and responsibilities. Rights are the simple justice conferred by a society to all its members. In gender terms, the rights of men and women ideally intersect 99% of the time and are different maybe 1% of the time due to biological difference—like an out of focus Venn diagram. These would constitute the "natural" rights, not impinged by law or practice. These are the rights MRAs are fighting for.
Then there are responsibilities, generally the flipside of the rights coin in that equal rights without corresponding equal obligations is virtually an oxymoron. It is the inequality of condition.
Which leads us to "privilege." Privilege is the eater of rights. Privilege, by definition, is inequality. Equal rights cannot be enforced in the presence of privilege, since privilege is its negation. Where there is privilege, someone's rights are diminished. Any activism for rights is necessarily an activism against privilege.
In the past, both men and women surrendered certain gender rights (or took on extra responsibilities) for certain privileges—trading steak for cotton candy, so to speak—and their roles were as much described by those privileges as by their duties....
Then along came feminism...
which sought to ratify the rights of women (ok), absolve them of responsibilities (not ok), and increase their privileges (pretty bad); while it also sought to diminish the privileges of men (ok), increase our responsibilities (bad), and chuck our rights with yesterday's garbage (really f-ked up). They never wanted an adult world of rights and responsibilities. They want a world of unconditional female privilege and codified male disenfranchisement.
Well-said
EOM