Due to a hair-pulling deadline I have this week (yes, yet another!), I will be unable to post new stories to Mensactivism.org until the weekend. However, Adam, my lead co-administrator, will be taking over for the week and the site will still be updated with news. I'll be forwarding any e-mail news submissions to Adam, and if I seem a bit sluggish in responding to e-mail, please bear with me. Thanks to everyone who visits this site and especially thanks to Adam for filling in for me!


- Scott

Regular readers will love this commentary by Debbie Schlussel on how fatherlessness makes men like Eminem. As this quote puts it, "It should be no surprise, in this world where Hillary Clinton tells us, "It Takes a Village [to raise your children]," that the child becomes a village idiot." The commentary is one of the most enjoyably vicious articles I've ever read in defense of fathers and to a lesser degree men in general. By the way can you give Debbie an Email of thanks and ask her for more articles like this? It's a small thing to do to encourage her to writ more articles like this.

Dave Burroughs writes, "Check this out: www.psychoexgirlfriend.com. They had this guy on Fox News the other night. His ex
girlfriend kept calling him with her threats and pleadings - sometimes several times a day for months. He got sick of it and set up this website. He has .mp3 files recorded from his phone message machine and has posted them unedited on his site. No doubt the feminists have some explanation for her behavior that lays the blame squarely on him." The audio files of her phone messages are extremely disturbing, hateful, hurtful, and manipulative. Don't listen to them if you have a weak stomach.

Last fall, we reported on the appalling actions of Columbia University's administration to pass a new Sex Discipline Policy that removes several fundamental rights of the accused in rape trials. Since then, a great deal of pressure has been put on Columbia, particularly by FIRE (The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education). After failing to participate in a public discussion or Fox television interview on the policy, the directors of SAFER (an anti-rape program on campus) have called for a reform of the policy in the school's newspaper. Nothing has been done yet, but it looks like an opportunity for change. Read the latest update on the story here.

Bill Kuhl wrote up a review of last Friday's episode of 20/20 on the ABC television network. It covered an issue you won't find much talk about these days - gynecomastia. Assuming you haven't heard of the term before (I hadn't), gynecomastia is the medical condition of having enlarged male breasts. It is obviously a very embarrassing problem for men, and if you click "Read More" below you can view Bill's comments on the program and an overview of gynecomastia. And kudos to 20/20 for their informative and sensitive coverage of the topic.

A group of pro-male activists led by the New Hampshire chapter of NCFC has been making extensive progress in the NH legislature. Earlier we reported that a report was written up on the Status of Men in NH, and as of late the group has been pushing for a full-fledged Commission on the Status of Men. They have just reached a major success, having Bill HB587 passed in the House by a vote of 182 to 145. Read the text of the bill by clicking "Read More" below.

An Anonymous User writes "While attending a meeting of the Massachusetts Joint Committee on the Judiciary which was addressing, among other things, the issue of child support and child custody, I was given a link to this page. Being a divorced Dad in Massachusetts, I was very interested in the section on how Massachusetts stacked up against other states. As one would expect, not very well."

Not PC sent me a link to this story from The Scotsman, which follows up to the earlier news we had reported on about a man who legally tried to stop his girlfriend from getting an abortion. The court apparently granted him an injunction to keep her from doing so, but she aborted the fetus anyway. The article didn't make it sound like Stephen Hone had any further legal right to sue for damages, or that he was planning on doing so. As I had said before, while the case brought up the fact that men have no reproductive rights currently, the issue we need to address is ending the ability for men or women to force their partner into parenthood.

An Anonymous User sent in this link to an article by Jim Peron. It is an overview of feminism's relationship with pornography, and the controversies it has caused within the women's movement. Peron's analysis of two major anti-porn figures, Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon, is well researched and excellently written. Regardless of your own views on pornography, this article gives some interesting background and information about current arguments over porn and free speech.

The Sydney Morning Herald printed a story with a lot of statistics about Ritalin use among children in Australia. "For the first time, the data breaks down the use of Ritalin and dexamphetamine by age group - and reveals a ninefold increase in their use between 1990 and 2000. The prescription rate is four times higher for boys, but is growing for girls, and any NSW [New South Wales] primary classroom has a one-in-two chance of including a child taking drugs for the condition." This alarming trend is out of control and has got to be challenged.

frank h submitted this link to Kathleen Parker's latest editorial in Town Hall. In it, she discusses the policy of British Airways to seat men away from children who are flying alone, and an incident at a Target store where a single dad was hassled for helping his 8 year-old daughter try on clothes in a dressing room. Parker puts it well when she says, "In our hypervigilant world of zero tolerance, pedophiliac paranoia and incest sensitivity, everyone's a pervert until proven innocent. If you've had the extremely bad judgment to be born a male, you're automatically suspicious."

Ed Bartlett from Men's Health America writes, "Next Wednesday, April 4, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Health will be holding a hearing for the National Institutes of Health. The topic of the hearing will be "Special Populations." This will be a critical hearing in our battle to overcome the exclusion of men from NIH research studies. In the next few days, I will be asking you to (you guessed it!) make a phone call, write a letter, and fax your letter to one of the members of the House Appropriations Committee." Update: click here for the MHA announcement of what you can do to help! A little bit of effort now will go a long way at this point in the activism campaign.

My second article in a series for the UNH school newspaper was printed last Friday, and you can read it at this link. It covers the issue of male bashing, and the differences between how we view female bashing and male bashing. It acknowledges the wrongness of misogyny, and asks for people to recognize the unfairness of misandry. Finally, it offers a plea to both men and women to take the issue seriously and work together to end the "gender war". Enjoy!

Dr. Charles Corry from dvmen.org also submitted news about Clayton Giles, whose case we have covered in the past (story 1, 2, 3, 4). He writes: "Clayton Giles is a 14-year old boy who wanted to be with his
father. Only the courts in Calgary, Alberta, Canada wouldn't let him. So first he ran away to his father's home. When the courts still wouldn't acknowledge his father's rights, Clayton went on a hunger strike and picketed the courthouse to international attention gained through his web site. After 19 days the court caved in. He now lives legally with his father. On April 28th he will be starting a bicycle and walking trek from Calgary to Ottawa, and then to Washington, D.C. to promote children's right to have both parents. He deserves and has earned all our support. Details are on his web site at Legalkids.com."

A woman has filed a lawsuit against the Independence House battered women's shelter in Barnstable, MA, claiming that she was illegally forced to attend the program by DSS. When she initially refused, DSS put her children into foster care, a tactic which she claimed has been used to force her and other women to "accept the message" that the shelter teaches. "I complained in the Independence House meetings that I did not want to be there and was being forced to attend through intimidation, threats, and coercion. Independence House did everything to me that they claim would be control and emotional abuse if a man did it. I felt so violated. Our little girl suffered terribly. Independence House, of all places, should understand that when a woman says 'no' - it means 'no.'" The Massachusetts News has the article here - and thanks to Dr. Charles Corry for the submission.