Feminism was going to liberate both sexes, but instead it destroyed a generation of men

By ROSIE BOYCOTT
Once upon a time it used to be relatively simple to be a man: your role, as indeed it was my father's role, was to look after your wife and children, provide for them, make major decisions around the house and bring home the bacon.

When I was young and my father was temporarily unemployed after leaving the Army in the Fifties, there was no question that my mother might step into the breach and go out to work. We just went short of money.

I remember my father being depressed and angry during this brief period; later, when we talked about such issues, he told me that much of his unhappiness stemmed from feeling that he was letting down his family.

Thankfully, for him (and for us), the situation was soon resolved and Dad was able to reassert his sense of order and masculinity; he went out to work, Mum stayed at home, he dealt with the bills, Mum dealt with the cooking. It was all very ordered.

Nothing is so straightforward any more. My mother needed my father to keep a roof over her head and food on the table for her children.

Women don't need that now.

Last week, a survey revealed that 39 per cent of women who work full-time believe they earn more than their men.

The word "believe" is important here; work, this last bastion, where men still hold on to the reins of power, is now so fraught with tension and drama that people are unwilling to go on the record about actual earnings.

Translated into numbers, that means 1.8 million women in full-time work across the country now earn more than their partners.

These figures are both important and potentially critical: they indicate a very real change sweeping through the professional ranks of twentysomething men and women.

The one area where men continued to rule the roost - the workplace - where they consistently out-earned women and claimed the lion's share of places at the boardroom table, even that apparently secure male domain has been turned on its head.

So what exactly do women need men for these days?

Evidently, they don't need them to pay bills, to put up shelves, to fix the car, mow the lawn or provide a socially acceptable set-up in which to rear children.

Remember, a munificent benefits system means that single women, with or without children, no longer need a man to provide for them - the state has taken on that role.

Since the Divorce Act of 1969, which made it possible for women to leave a marriage, keep the kids and receive alimony, an increasing number of women are choosing to bring up children alone.

Even the provision of sperm is now something that women can sort out alone, without actually having sex with a man. The internet now boasts several companies which will deliver fertile semen through the mail.

My father's generation defined their wives: nowadays, the role has completely reversed and men are defined by women. As a result, their definition of themselves has faltered and society has been cruel towards their attempts to redefine themselves.

And yet, when the women's movement started in Britain, we all believed it would mean a liberation for men as well as for women.

What could be worse, we argued, than - like most men - working every day from when you left education till you retired at 65, solely financially responsible for your wife and kids, long office hours denying you the chance to spend meaningful time with your children.

That life was as much of a prison as being a full-time wife and mother.

When I co-founded the magazine Spare Rib in 1972, the lot of women was very distant from today's reality.

In those days, a woman couldn't get a mortgage without her husband's or her father's signature. Universities were predominantly for men, as were medical schools and colleges of law.

Women were still meant to be their father's daughters until they became their husband's wives.

But if we started out hoping to bring an improvement to the lives of men as well as women, by the time the Seventies came round, the idea of the women's movement being of possible benefit to men had withered on the vine.

Women's rights became just too urgent and too immediate, and though everyone knew that whenever women change there must be a reciprocal change for men, it was somehow assumed it would all work itself out in the great melting pot of life.

To ensure that women did better at school, committees were formed and studies undertaken and the style of teaching changed.

Thus, in recent years, it has no longer been just the single, terrifying three- hour exam that determined your success, a winner-takes-all mentality generally thought to be more applicable to the male brain.

Continual assessment worked better for women, who, it is thought, respond better to a more considered approach to work.

Meanwhile, the nature of the workplace itself changed. As Western countries shifted from land-based to factory-based and then to knowledge-based economies, so the need for brawn and physical strength diminished.

Physically, men no longer have any advantage over women in professional life; their place has now been taken by machines, and the multitasking skills of human interaction which women do better at are precisely those prized by employers.

So what are men to do? While we applaud a woman who takes on a man's world and succeeds, woe betide a man who strays too far into women's territory.

A man who keeps house, brings up the children and does the shopping is more likely to be considered a weedy loser than an individual who has made a considered stance.

Working at home, we all believe, is something men do only because they've been fired or can't get a good enough job to allow them to afford childcare.

In short, men are being squeezed at every turn. Somewhere along the line towards the liberation of women we have stripped them of all their primary functions and made them miserable.

Their subservient position starts in school. Girls have now overtaken boys in public exams to such an extent that educators now question whether the system hasn't swung too far in their favour by using continuous assessment in preference to one-off exams.

Then there is the fact that the whole notion of learning a trade has been abolished in favour of purely academic studies.

Jobs which give satisfaction, especially for poorer white males - who are now the worst-performing group in our education system - have become almost impossible to come by.

Women, meanwhile, are groomed relentlessly to succeed. How did we get into such a predicament? No feminist I ever knew wanted to see a world in which men were beaten by women: a world in which one dominant group was just replaced by another.

Our problem is, I think, largely to do with the fact that our ideas of success are still derived from making money and being top-dog in the office.

Sadly, women's liberation, which ought to have made it easy for both sexes to choose their roles in life, has actually managed to denigrate the role of motherhood and caring.

So when men dip into our pond, we see them as failures, not as individuals who might have made a skilful and necessary adaptation to a new set of rules.

As long as society continues to rate making money so far above running the home, both men and women will think they have failed if they do not succeed in the workplace.

We are already seeing the consequences of this erosion of men's social position. Our jails are overflowing, predominantly with young men who've lost their way. Male suicide rates are up. Alcoholism rates are up. Not only are boys doing less well at school, they're also dropping out with greater frequency than girls.

While their traditional role in society is being ripped from them, young men are losing the social compass which once came naturally. Women now demand that their men not only succeed in business and maintain a fat bank balance: now they're expected to be emotional, open, caring-and-sharing types, too. That may be fine for some, but for others it is clearly not.

The current crop of teenage men's magazines - most of which are openly hostile to women, regarding them as nothing more than sex objects - seem to me to be a confused cry for help.

Unable to find a place in this new world order, the magazines are taking their readers back to a time when men did rule the roost and women were merely chattels. Their message is angry: a brutal and simple-minded response of many men to the alienation they feel from mainstream society.

For many men, the realisation that twentysomething women now outearn them will only add to their bitterness.

Money, the talisman around which all our ideas of success and failure revolve, causes more marital discord than any other issue: studies at Arkansas State University by Randall Kesslering, who examined 112,740 women, show that for every £10,000 a wife's earnings rise relative to the family's overall income, the chances of marital break-up rise by 1pc.

So who's driving those divorces? Disappointed women who can't bear to be married to a weaker man, or men who cannot abide being in thrall to a more powerful woman? No doubt we will know in time.

The truth is that women - from a position of being able to do very little some 30-odd years ago - can now, literally, do it all.

Even many books for toddlers, with the exception of titles like Bob The Builder and Postman Pat, no longer have men in them.

But the fact is that if women choose to have a baby on their own or walk out on their marriage, the state is there to pick up the pieces. Of course, children's books reflect this.

Everyone needs to feel they have a purpose in life, to be challenged and to be useful. Society has bent over backwards to liberate women and to give them equal opportunities - from taking out a mortgage to a woman's legal right to terminate a pregnancy.

But the agenda of women's rights was based on the premise that you can fix equality for women with no reference at all to men.

And so, in the process, we have unwittingly undermined men, making their role very hard to define. Because ultimately if women can look after themselves, we are forced to ask the question: "What are men for?"

We need, urgently, to start reassessing our priorities. We need to start to rate homemaking as highly as money-making. We need to stop believing - erroneously - that happiness derives solely from money. We need to learn to respect and value the crucial role that parents (women and men) play in their children's upbringing.

As someone who has watched the position of women change so dramatically, I cannot help but be thrilled to see just how well we have done. But our success must never be at the expense of men and their own sense of fulfilment. Otherwise, it will not be any sort of success at all. via

DC Fathers Day March and Demonstration

DC Father's Day Demonstration and March

US Capitol - west side overlooking The Mall
June 18 + 19, 2005

Join us as we hold a weekend long demonstration
on the grounds of the US Capitol. Followed by a
march to the White House on Fathers Day as we
await the return of President Bush on Monday.

For more information:
Info
Web site

Alabama D-Con Demonstration

The Alabama Coalition for Fathers and Children's (ALCFC) elite Family Court D-Contamination Unit will return to action Friday June 17, 2005 from 11:00 am until 1:00 pm at the Jefferson County Family Court located at 120 2nd Court North in Birmingham. The D-Con Unit in full biohazard costumes will symbolize the clean up and neutralization of the terribly flawed court system.

Alan Rusmisel vice-president of ALCFC added,

"This is an on going campaign to provide awareness and educate the public to the abuse by a judicial system that seems to be dedicated to the destruction of families and the separation of children from their parents. We are spreading a message through PEACEFUL direct actions mixed with a bit of fun and humor."

Contact Info:

Web site
Alabama Coalition for Fathers and Children - 205-663-9984
John Kral - President - 205-368-3871
Alan Rusmisel - Vice president - 205-999-7211

Pennsylvania's Annual Fatherless Day Rally

Pennsylvania's Annual Fatherless Day Rally

WHO: Equal Custody and Equal Rights Advocates / Everyone welcome!

WHAT: Fatherlessness

WHEN: 12 Noon, June 17, 2005 Friday

WHERE: Family Division (Divorce) Courthouse,
440 Ross Street, Pittsburgh (Downtown Area)

HOW: Wear regular clothes or wear purple because it is the international color of equality. Wear anything purple: purple wigs, purple capes, purple clothes, purple face paint, purple streamer flags, canister spray can horns, whistles, bells, drums, Santa, Detox, Elvis, Bunny, or superhero outfits, aluminum glitter wigs, purple balloons, giant balloons, bull horns, horns, large pictures of your kids, graduation gowns = judges gowns. Bring posters saying: "We want to see our kids!"

WHY: To support joint custody legislation

INFO: Mens Custody Shelter Network

Wisconsin Fathers Rally

Wisconsin Fathers Rights Rally 2005
in support of equal rights and responsibilities.

Join us on June 11th, 2005
State Capital, Madison, Wisconsin
from 11am to 1pm.

Speakers

Steve Blake
WFCF President

James Novak
Author of
"The Wisconsin Father's Guide to Divorce and Custody"
and past president and founding father of WFCF

Dick Woods
Fathers for Equal Rights, Iowa

Albert M. Holmes (invited)
Milwaukee Fatherhood Collaborative

Dr. Brian Palevac
Chiropractic Clinical Neurologist

Steve Walrath
Motivational speaker and author of
"A Divorced Parent's Guide to Seeing Your Kids"

Tamara North and Jodi Roberts
Wisconsin Women for Equality in Family Law
Wisconsin Fathers

Healing our Families - Time for a Change

If at all possible, don't miss this conference. This is sure to be the most exciting and productive family rights conference of the year!

Michigan's Families and Fathers Conference
~Healing our Families - Time for a Change~
June 17th and 18th, 2005

With key emphasis on the integrity of the parent-child relationship, Healing our Families participants will learn about the specifics of the American family crisis as well as solutions from nationally recognized speakers.

Through presentations, question and answer sessions, networking and conferencing, participants will share their collective knowledge to grasp the dynamics of the current family crisis and substantively contribute to a rigorous national dialogue on reform of our family law system as well as federal and state policies governing our families.

This conference will be a unique, informative and excitng gathering for all who attend.

For information, or to register click here.

Justice is coming

A father's love

"I remember the birth of my first born son in September 1986. I remember the pacing of the halls as I anxiously awaited the moment. I remember comforting my wife as best I could through the experience......

I was the proudest papa in the world with the birth of my little boy and cried as he appeared. I was only 21 at the time. Ten fingers, ten toes, his mothers radiance and his father's good looks, what could possibly go wrong?

My son was born two months premature with many complications and so it began. He was immediately moved to the intensive care unit.............

16 days later I finally was able to hold him for the first time. I held him close to my heart, my tears falling upon his face, I kissed his forehead and told him I would forever love him as he breathed his last breath............"

This is a note I received from my friend Burnaby Batman. I'm sharing it, with his permission, because it clearly shows that fathers love their children deeply, and even when they are separated, in this case by death, they do not forget about them.

B.Bat can be found here Fathers4Justice-Canada

Justice is coming

"If you can carry an M-16, then you can also carry your own child on your shoulders with the same dignity and responsibility."

Fathers rights groups in Israel pray that Israeli society will one day in the very near future recognize that if you can carry an M-16, then you can also carry your own child on your shoulders with the same dignity and responsibility.

"We have learned much from the nonviolent, highly visible and friendly campaigns of Fathers4Justice* in England, the US and Canada," said Joel Leyden.

"We are here to gather support, not alienate anyone. Having Superheros such as Batman, Spiderman and Superman representing us offers a warm touch to both the children for which we have been separated from and the public which needs to learn that most dads are loving, caring and responsible fathers who love their children no less than the mothers do.

When the courts and child welfare departments in Israel separate father from child they are inflicting a devastating blow to that child's emotional and mental development.", said Michael Krongauz, a spokesperson of the Israel Children's Rights organization Children Need Both Parents.

For more information go here.
* There is no Fathers4Justice in Israel.

Justice is coming!

Incomplete

When I tell people about my work on behalf of family rights, many people just don't "get it". They understand the injustice, but they don't understand the suffering, the devastation, the heartbreak.

I want people to know that this is happening in America, as it is all around the world. We need to solve this serious problem. If we don't respect and honor family, then what do we have? What are we teaching the next generation?

Please listen to this song called Incomplete by The Backstreet Boys. Even though a few words don't fit, (I have never heard any parent say they are trying to forget their child), the overall message is there.

This is how my friends, Superheroes and others, feel when they've been removed from their children's lives.

http://music.channel.aol.com/artist/main.adp?artistid=199819

"Incomplete"
by The Backstreet Boys

Empty spaces fill me up with holes
Distant faces with no place left to go
Without you within me I can’t find no rest
Where I’m going is anybody’s guess

I’ve tried to go on like I never knew you
I’m awake but my world is half asleep
I pray for this heart to be unbroken
But without you all I’m going to be is incomplete

Voices tell me I should carry on
But I am swimming in an ocean all alone
Baby, my baby
It’s written on your face
You still wonder if we made a big mistake

I’ve tried to go on like I never knew you
I’m awake but my world is half asleep
I pray for this heart to be unbroken
But without you all I’m going to be is incomplete

I don’t mean to drag it on, but I can’t seem to let you go
I don’t wanna make you face this world alone
I wanna let you go (alone)

I’ve tried to go on like I never knew you
I’m awake but my world is half asleep
I pray for this heart to be unbroken
But without you all I’m going to be is incomplete

Incomplete