Article here. If a man wrote this same piece saying he left his wife etc. to enjoy retirement in Italy, he'd be castigated. Just pointing out the double-standard. Excerpt:

'So I quit my job, retired, and divorced my husband. We had 30 years together and raised our amazing kids. But I didn't want just to walk the dog, play pickleball, and tend a garden. I wanted a bigger life.

After the divorce, I moved into a small apartment in Colorado with a monthly rent of $1,700. I still have it and rent it out to traveling nurses abroad.

In the beginning, I thought I'd travel the majority of the year, come back to the States, and live a "normal" life there for one month a year.

For some time, I did that. I've visited nearly 50 countries, including Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Madagascar, Turkey, Cyprus, and the more popular spots, like France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Greece.'

Video here. She asks an interesting question: Can a man "be a man" and also be a Democrat these days? Of course this appeals to some standard of manhood which IMO isn't well-defined, but the issues she brings up are food for thought.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Unanimously approved in Italy, the bill introducing the crime of femicide. The senators gave their first-reading approval to the measure, which now moves to the Chamber of Deputies. The bill establishes femicide as a new, autonomous crime, punishable by life imprisonment when the murder is committed for reasons of discrimination, control, possession, domination, rejection, or hatred specifically and exclusively toward a woman.

The law introduces a serious legal asymmetry: it recognizes a specific criminal offense only if the victim is female. In doing so, the legal system moves away from the universality of criminal law, which should punish the act, not the identity of the person involved. The same action, killing a partner out of jealousy or a need for control, would be punished more severely if the victim is a woman, and not if the victim is a man. This results in a form of reverse discrimination.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'This is a response to a recent New York Times article by Jean Garnett titled “The Trouble With Wanting Men.” The subtitle says it all: “Women are so fed up with dating men that the phenomenon even has a name — heterofatalism. So what do we do with our desire?”

Sometimes, the best response is a little humor while flipping the script. See what you think.

Ah, “heterofatalism” — the brand-new term coined for the collective exasperation of women who, after navigating the complex world of dating, come to the conclusion that men are the root of all relationship woes. You see, the issue isn't just that men are occasionally anxious, emotionally distant, or a little too obsessed with their sports teams; no, the real problem is that these poor souls — with all their confusing desires, communication issues, and tendency to occasionally ghost you after a couple of drinks — are making it impossible for women to live happily ever after.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Uber is rolling out a new program for women in the U.S. that allows them to choose female riders or drivers, the company said Wednesday.

“Across the U.S., women riders and drivers have told us they want the option to be matched with other women on trips,” Uber said in a statement.

Women customers will see an option called “women drivers” and choose a different driver based on the pick-up time. Female riders will also be able to pre-book trips with women drivers. Only 1 in 5 Uber drivers are women, according to the company.'

Video here. At least one news/commentary source (The Hill) has commentators broaching the topics. It's a start anyway.

Video here. It seems the existentialist Soren Kierkegaard had things to say about life today, particularly in the realm of "romance".

Article here. Excerpt:

'Months before Przemyslaw Jeziorski, a marketing professor from the University of California, Berkeley, was killed in Greece, he filed a request for a restraining order against his ex-wife, saying he was fearful for his life due to alleged previous instances of blackmail, financial abuse and physical assault by his ex-wife's boyfriend, according to court documents obtained by ABC News.

The request was denied by a California court.

Jeziorski, a 43-year-old associate marketing professor at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business, was allegedly shot and killed in Athens on July 4 near the home where his two children -- Zoe and Angelo -- live, his younger brother said in a statement. The children, who are 10-year-old twins, had been living with the Jeziorski's ex-wife in Athens since 2020, according to court documents.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'A man who served 17 years in prison after being wrongly convicted of rape has hit out at an 'insulting' increase in compensation for victims of miscarriages of justice.

The Ministry of Justice has announced that the compensation cap will rise by 30 per cent for those who were convicted of a crime they did not commit.

Those wrongfully imprisoned for more than 10 years will receive £1.3 million instead of £1 million, while those with sentences of less than 10 years will receive £650,000 rather than £500,000, in the first increase to the payment since the scheme’s introduction in 2008.'

Good video here.

'This video explores The Psychology of Men Who Walk Away from Society’s Script — a silent rebellion many men are living today, not with protests or noise, but with quiet withdrawals from a life that feels fake.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'When a group of legislatures in Washington State decided to forgo a hearing about a commission on the status of boys and men (HB 1266 and SB 5446) in February and made the same decision in years past, it became clear that there was something much more ill-natured at work.

After-all, a hearing is only one step in the process of adding a new law or changing an existing law. Hearings allow legislators to sit back and listen to expert testimony, ask questions, and hear public statements about those impacted by a potential bill. The process also allows voters to see how a policymaker votes—something many policymakers fear when it comes to the political backlash that happens when it comes to supporting boys and supporting men.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'The Boy Scouts of America has a Chief Diversity Officer & Vice President of Diversity and Inclusion. The organization requires all Eagle Scouts to earn a badge in diversity, equity, and inclusion. It admitted girls to its program for 11- to 17-year-old boys in 2019 and changed the name of that program from the Boy Scouts to Scouts BSA. The word “boy” has been routed from the organization’s promotional materials and replaced with “youth,” as in: “For more than 100 years, Scouting programs have instilled in youth the values found in the Scout Oath.”

Article here. Excerpt:

'Women consistently show strong in-group bias. They support each other socially, emotionally, and politically. They instinctively identify with the struggles of other women. This solidarity forms the backbone of movements, activism, academic departments, and public policy. When a woman sees another woman being mistreated, her response is often immediate: “That could’ve been me.”

Video here. Nick Freitas takes feminism to task in this talk. He puts the matter in the context of Christianity and evokes traditional notions of masculinity, which may put off some people, but at least he is addressing the issue.

Article here. And in Australia they're trying to prohibit men from being daycare workers. Excerpt:

'A 22-year-old nursery worker has been convicted of abusing 21 babies, including kicking one little boy in the face and stepping on his shoulder.

Roksana Lecka, from Hounslow, west London, admitted seven counts of cruelty to a person under the age of 16 and was found guilty of another 14 by a jury at Kingston Crown Court, the Metropolitan Police said.

Her crimes were discovered in June last year after she was sent home for pinching a number of children and appearing "flustered" at the Riverside Nursery in Twickenham, south-west London, the Crown Prosecution Service said.

Solicitor Jemma Till from Irwin Mitchell said the families involved had been "traumatised".

Lecka will be sentenced at Kingston Crown Court on 26 September.

Detectives from the Met Police went through CCTV from the nursery that showed her pinching and scratching children under their clothes on their arms, legs and stomachs.'