I don’t want no menfolk near my daughters, you hear?

“The English noun bigot is a term used to describe a prejudiced or closed-minded person, especially one who is intolerant or hostile towards different social groups (e.g. racial or religious groups), and especially one whose own beliefs are perceived as unreasonable or excessively narrow-minded, superstitious, or hypocritical.” (Source)

Thanks largely to the pervasive influence of feminism, anti-male bigotry has been accorded a level of acceptance well in excess of that applicable to other significant segments within the community. This has been reflected in an increasing number of rather biased articles in the mainstream media, examples of which can be found in the following posts:

New Zealand journalist labels men as the ultimate predators
A few observations in relation to yet another article critical of men
How tragic that feminists ignore their role in demonising men
On the issue of traveler safety
Persistent pro-feminist and anti-male bias in the mainstream media
How men are portrayed … Haw Haw Haw! The jokes on us

Today I wanted to address an article by Jane Gilmore entitled ‘Be outraged at the abuse of children, not at one mother’s efforts to protect her daughters‘ (2 March 2017). Jane’s piece focuses on an earlier article by Kasey Edwards,  ‘Why I won’t let any male babysit my children‘, and the public reaction to it.

After Kasey’s piece appeared I read three well-intended, but somewhat insipid, rebuttals. These were penned by Ben Pobjie, Melissa Hoyer, and Louise Roberts. Still, the fact that any rebuttals were published is indicative of feminism’s gradual slide from the pedestal of public opinion. A considerable amount of material also appeared on social media, most of which was critical of Kasey’s position.

Jo Abi, on the other hand, wrote an article in Mamamia supporting Kasey’s stance. Interestingly, even in that feminist forum many readers held a different view.

From an MRA perspective this was pleasing to note, the only negative being an unfortunate tendency by some to personalise the issue via referencing the potential danger posed by Kasey’s family.

Jane stepped in at that point to address those taking umbrage at what they perceived as the gender bigotry inherent in Kasey’s position. What follows now is Jane’s article (shown in italics) with my comments inserted in relevant places (and shown in blue font).

A wave of outrage broke and splattered across social media this week over an article by Daily Life columnist Kasey Edwards about the choice she and her husband have made to keep their children safe from sexual abuse. In it, Edwards pointed out the following statistics:

“…the ‘best case’ scenario is that 1 in 20 boys are sexually abused. The worst case is that 1 in three girls are.”

“Evidence overwhelmingly indicates that the majority of child sexual abuse is perpetrated by males.”

These disturbing facts should indeed provoke outrage. But they didn’t.

This is the page in the Australian Institute of Family Studies web site where Kasey sourced the statistics noted in her article (scroll down to ‘How many Australian children are sexually abused‘). The author describes the difficulties compiling these statistics and their consequent limitations. Note too the basis for the “1 in three girls” statistic mentioned in both Kasey and Jane’s articles.

Kasey’s chosen strategy does not “keep their children safe from sexual abuse”. This is because a) men aren’t responsible for every instance of sexual abuse, and b) her daughters would still have contact with men at other times. Remember that the definition of abuse used here does not require actual physical contact. Kasey’s approach only theoretically reduces the likelihood of sexual abuse occurring. Not all personal threats and dangers. Not even all child abuse. Sexual abuse only.

You see, sexual abuse is just one of the four types of child abuse (and in fact it’s the least common variety). Sexual abuse is the only form of child abuse wherein surveys consistently identify more male than female perpetrators (although there are still plenty of those).

No surprise then that this is the form of child abuse that feminists keep the media’s focus on. A similar thing happens in the realm of the domestic violence debate, whereby all those forms of DV other than heterosexual male-on-female violence are air-brushed out of the picture. 

Instead, the backlash was in response to Edwards’ acknowledgment that men are the most likely perpetrators, and the resulting decision she and her husband made to not have men care for their children without a woman present.

Cue articles and endless anger about how hurtful and offensive this is for men. Followed by strawman arguments about Edwards’ husband caring for their children without supervision, despite her article clearly stating this was a decision they reached together.

Likewise, suggestions that her children would miss out on male role models and have a warped view of men. (Edwards clarified on The Project this week that her daughter has a wonderful male teacher).

Writer Amy Gray, who skilfully moderated a long and mostly respectful debate on this topic, said, “The uproar over this article hasn’t been about how to combat rape culture, community enablement, lack of law or police reform, or suitable therapy or support for victims. The uproar was about protecting men from hurt feelings over being excluded from unpaid labour they rarely do. The uproar should be tackling the overwhelming male presence in sexual assault of children.

It’s hardly surprising that the focus of feedback provided by readers mirrored the narrow scope of the article. Kasey did not address the issues above, nor did she indicate that she would welcome dialogue on those issues. If Kasey expected more holistic feedback then she should have written a broader and less injudicious article.

And it’s curious that no link was provided to that “long and mostly respectful debate”. Don’t tell me it reflected poorly on team feminism?

“I want men to examine their role in this culture,” she added. “I want them to actively combat it and question men who refuse to participate in that.”

On the contrary, the volume of feedback generated by Kasey’s article clearly demonstrated men’s *insistence* in participating in the discussion whilst rejecting the demonisation of an entire gender based on the actions of a very small minority.

The real difficulty with Edwards’ article was that she outlined a single approach to preventing child abuse in her own family. But if we are talking about preventing child abuse at a community level then we need to talk about a community-wide response.

Which comes back to the perpetrators. Again, they are mostly men, and yet men are so rarely part of the discussion about prevention, other than to object to the facts being discussed.

Why is it that men are so much more likely to commit violence and abuse? What happened to those men, where did they learn this behaviour? How can they change?

Clearly there is a problem with violence in our community, and a lot of that is due to men. A very, very small minority of men. A point that seems perpetually lost on feminists. And where are all these men objecting to the “facts”? Alternatively, where are all the feminists discussing prevention with regards to issues like circumcision, the sexual assault of men & boys, male suicide, etc?

What positive outcome/s are borne from the incessant criticism of men and the manner in which they are portrayed in the mainstream media? The consistent lack of recognition for the contributions made by men in terms of the well-being of the community? The paucity of government funding support for addressing men’s health and other men’s/boys issues? The bias of the legal and justice system against men?

The active support of the feminist lobby sure wouldn’t hurt, but their pointed indifference to date is hardly encouraging.

Turning our attention now to women, which occurs all too rarely other than in relation to some issue of perceived victimhood, why are there so many violent and abusive women? (NB: trending upwards). Why is this not being acknowledged and addressed? esp. bearing in mind that they are producing the next generation of not just child abusers, but perpetrators of domestic violence generally.

Exploring this, without defensiveness and with a genuine desire to find solutions, is the most valuable way men can participate in protecting children. It’s disturbing that many men are so aggressively unwilling to do this, leaving the burden of finding solutions to everyone else.

Seriously Jane, imagine if an article appeared wherein the husband set out his strategy to prevent his sons being killed by only having male carers. The reaction from your ilk would not have been merely “defensive” – they would be livid.

And Jane, what of the many instances where people do demonstrate “a genuine desire to find solutions”, and are attacked for doing so simply because they dare propose solutions that are contrary to leftist/feminist dogma? Want examples? 

On the censorship and erasure of non-feminist perspectives and opinions
A feminist laments: “Why do so few men turn up to hear women speak?”
White Ribbon campaign to men: Stand up! Speak up! Shut up!
Domestic Violence NSW censors dissenting views (before lapsing into paranoid delusion)
Sallee McLaren must write on the blackboard “I must not challenge the feminist narrative”
Australian feminist attacks integrity of advocacy group for male victims of domestic violence (Here Jane Gilmore sabotages Australia’s only advocacy group for male victims of domestic violence, only to then criticize the men’s rights movement on the basis that it doesn’t do anything but criticize feminists)

This is why mothers are so often vilified when they do something as simple as wait outside while their children go to the toilet, and conversely, vilified again if they acknowledge the facts of child abuse and act to protect their children from possible perpetrators.

The author was not criticized for wanting to protect her children, but for making a decision of dubious efficacy in the absence of an objective and unbiased consideration of all relevant factors. 

It’s not surprising given how fraught it can be to navigate the issue that parents like Kasey Edwards and her husband look for solutions that don’t depend on community-wide protection. Their choice is not right for everyone – indeed for some, it’s very much the wrong choice. But for them, it’s the best way to keep their children safe. And given the deep, lifelong trauma caused by child abuse, it is both justifiable and understandable.

Their solution, however, only works for their circumstances. It relies on them always having options for childcare that fit within their parameters, which is not readily available to many parents.

There is no proof that this approach “works” for anyone, full stop. As to whether it’s practical for parents to even attempt, your point is taken.

It also assumes that they, their family, and their children’s friends are always in partnered, heterosexual relationships. In the Edwards’ policy, children of single fathers, or in families that do not include people who identify as women, already suffering exclusion and stigma, are excluded even further.

Even for families who do have the option to have women always present, it places an extra burden on those women, who are already taking on the majority of (unpaid) emotional and domestic caring labour. This is particularly difficult in the context of the systemic economic disadvantage women suffer, which requires men to take on an equal share of parenting. It’s a quandary that can’t be solved by making women the “abuse police”. Men have to take responsibility for prevention and commit to unambiguous action on the causes and realities of abuse.

Please, jettison the male-shaming and #HeForShe nonsense. Both men and women parent children. Both men and women abuse children. Everyone has an equal role to play in reducing the incidence of abuse.

While there are undeniable problems with the Edwards’ choice, the outraged criticisms of it are equally problematic, and frankly blind to the realities of how abuse occurs and its effect on victims.

Pot-Kettle-Black (big time)

The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse released a paper this week describing the grooming practices of abusers. Grooming is not something abusers only do to victims. They also deliberately create relationships with parents and caregivers that involves trust, friendship and dependence. And they make sure their victims know about it.

Was this specific to male abusers? The paragraph that follows implies it was.

As feminist writer Cecilia Winterfox told Fairfax Media, “Every time we say, ‘but my male friends are so lovely’ we make it harder for victims to speak out. It reinforces and demonstrates clearly to them the reflexive disbelief they will almost certainly face. It’s a kind of cultural gaslighting to victims, and a signal of protection to abusers”.

And every time feminists say ‘men can’t be raped (by women)’, ‘domestic violence is men’s abuse of women’, ‘women are only violent in self-defence’, ‘men don’t suffer negative effects from domestic violence as much as women do’, etc etc etc. That also makes it more difficult for “victims to speak out” right? But that doesn’t seem to deter feminists from making these statements. More equality-when-it-suits?

The royal commission paper was specifically about institutional responses to child abuse, so the recommendations were focused on cultural change to identifying and reporting grooming techniques. Which may work in well-monitored organisations, but it’s not something any individual parent can enforce in their social group.

Deanne Carson, co-founder of Body Safety Australia says a blanket ban on men caring for children is not the solution. “We need to empower adults to be a champion for children. This means debunking myths around childhood sexual abuse, teaching them to spot grooming techniques and supporting them in being able to address concerns about any individual’s concerning behaviour.”

It also means broadening the debate beyond child sexual abuse, firstly by considering all other forms of abuse. We also need to consider related issues such as the sexualisation of children, and again, both men and women play a role in this process.

The problem with these strategies, as Carson acknowledges, is that they don’t keep all children safe, they just protect the children whose parents can implement them. And not all parents feel able to do this.

Which is why the solution needs to go back to the community and the abusers, not victims or their carers. And we can’t do that while men are still refusing to discuss the source of the problem.

As Edwards told Daily Life: “Of all the people who have told me how ridiculous and offensive I’ve been, not one of them has come up with a feasible alternative to keep children safe”. <end of article>

Jane expands her views on the matter in an item in her personal blog, asserting that Kasey’s response was understandable and should be respected:

… often the responses are emotional because there is no other way to respond to such trauma. Those emotions are real, valid, complex and demand respect.”

Jane says this even though there is no suggestion in Kasey’s article that her children had previously been subject to abuse (and I sincerely hope that is not the case). Jane then adds:

“That respect is not present when men who have never been forced to feel those emotions are simply offended by the facts.”

Cheap shot. Because men have never been subjected to abuse as children, or fathered children who have been abused by others, right? And because I didn’t notice any reader feedback wherein the “facts” (presumably the quoted abuse statistics) formed any part of that individual’s objection to the article. Seemed to me people were upset about inference, opinion, and plain old bias.

And wait a minute. The feedback on Kasey’s article that Jane found so objectionable was contributed by men and women in roughly equal measures. It’s just as valid or invalid therefore to suggest that women are also “still refusing to discuss the source of the problem“. Unless Team Feminism has bestowed honorary bloke status on the largely silent majority of women who choose to hold a non-feminist-compliant opinion.

Earlier we noted Amy Gray’s haughty dismissal of the negative reaction to Kasey’s article: “The uproar was about protecting men from hurt feelings over being excluded from unpaid labour they rarely do.”

Let’s not detour to talk about single dads, yard work and the like. Let’s pretend Amy is right and proceed on the basis that men’s feelings count for nought. As presumably then, in the interests of gender equality, so too for feminists’ feelings.

Because rest assured, men certainly do want to be a part of the solution to the scourge of child abuse, but it seems most unlikely that it will be on feminists’ terms.

See also:

1IN3 responds to latest attack upon male victims by Daily Life (8 February 2018) Concerning another article by Jane Gilmore

Safety around dogs: Half of all kids get bitten by dogs, so don’t let one near your daughters.

Reddit discussion threads in relation to the Kasey Edwards article:(r/mensrights thread #1) (r/mensrights thread #2) & (r/australia). The latter thread also provides links to several other threads on this topic

Feminism: The demonization of males, by Stacy McCain (2 March 2017)

On bigotry as art (#KillAllMen at NIDA)

NIDA →Productions & Events →#KillAllBlacks

#KillAllBlacks

Date/Time: 19 Oct 2016 – 25 Oct 2016

Eight men create an internet utopia where they discuss the most intimate details of their lives, the most righteous, and the most hilarious. Drinking, sports, work, activism, and how to be an out and proud Klansman. But when one of them disappears after being attacked everything changes. #KillAllBlacks suddenly moves from joke to reality.

OK, relax. I’m just pulling your leg. Australia’s prestigious Institute of Dramatic Arts didn’t really fund and host a production called #KillAllBlacks. That would be bigoted beyond belief. Can you imagine the uproar? Chortle, chortle. As if!

No, in fact they funded and hosted a production called #KillAllMen. It’s still bigoted of course, but the essential difference is that men are a social group that one may now denigrate without fear of repercussion. The #KillAllMen hashtag has quite a history, as discussed in this further blog post.

Oh, I can hear some of you chorus “but there is no comparison at all – men have all that privilege. Look at all those male politicians and CEO’s!“.

Ignoring all those men of colour for a moment, just what percentage of men are politicians or CEO’s? One per cent? Even that?

The writer, Nakkiah Lui, identifies as an aboriginal. One might have thought she would possess an abundance of empathy regarding bigotry. Or at least enough to avoid such a grotesque mis-step. But clearly her feminism trumps her empathy.

Hypocrisy is the short answer, but those preferring the challenge of a TL:DR version can chew on ‘cognitive dissonance‘.

Bigotry dressed up as art is still bigotry. Shame on NIDA

killallmen

Addendum: Ms. Lui was aware of this post as of the day it was uploaded, and was invited to offer a rebuttal. Subsequent feedback consisted of witless ad hominem delivered in a manner reminiscent of terriers yapping behind a screen door. The one criticism that contained even an ounce of substance, was that I had not seen the play.

How ironic then that feminists have just succeeded in having the Australian screening of a film about mens rights cancelled. A film that, ahem, not one of them had seen.

redpill

So on the one hand we have an individual castigated for saying bad words about a feminist production in a personal blog, but with no serious intent of having the play cancelled. On the other hand we have 2,000+ feminists and white knights deliberately setting out to deny everyone the opportunity to experience a production. The former production finished its run, the latter never got started.

Again, this patriarchy of ours sure does work in mysterious ways.

See also:

Hateful Clementine Ford (6 January 2024) Scroll to the last two paragraphs to read about her proposed publicly-funded theatre production

Why it’s not OK to say ‘Kill all men’ (2 December 2021)

New Zealand journalist labels men as the ultimate predators

I had the misfortune to read an article in the NZ Herald entitled ‘No predator more dangerous than the human male‘ by Rachel Stewart.

This is the self-same journo who last year informed us that There’s no doubt that New Zealand’s epidemic of domestic violence lies firmly at the feet of men. As does the solution.Oh dear, someone hasn’t bothered to even dip their toe into that extensive body of domestic violence research that didn’t pass through the feminist filter.

But back to yesterday’s article about men as predators. You can probably guess the bulk of its contents. Comparisons between men and different wild animals. The writer alleging the receipt of abuse and death threats for speaking out for women. (Presumably these threats came from male predators, because feminists don’t do stuff like that) And then some more about men being horrible. Oh, and a bit of Trump-bashing to freshen up those other tired feminist cliques.

The final paragraph read:

“Before I hear you shriek “not ALL men”, how about you good guys start calling out the bad guys, as well as sexual predators. Because you know who they are.”

Yes that’s right all bad guys show a secret sign that only other men can see, and which signals that they are bad. If only the good men then did their duty, presumably by way of citizens arrests or possibly even summary execution, allowing the womenfolk to remain safe whilst going about their business.

Thankfully there are no bad women, thus the issue of good women having responsibility for calling them out is moot. We can disregard the countless rare aberrations detailed in the following blog posts as but rambling inventions of an unhinged MRA and his vast army of similarly brain-washed academics, journalists, public servants, etc:

On violence perpetrated, or instigated, by women and girls
Regarding female perpetration of paedophilia and underage sex
On deaths related to domestic violence
On recognising and supporting male victims of domestic violence
Mostly female perpetrators, so child abuse is a gendered crime then?
The often contrasting media reaction when mums and dads kill their children

Rachel went on to tweet:

stew5To which I responded:

stew3

The article to which I linked was this fabulous offering from Janet Bloomfield (aka ‘Judgy Bitch’). Please take a moment to read it now if you are not familiar with this work.

Heavy lifting” by feminists … what a joke! If there’s any lifting to be done they just start a hashtag and recruit some gullible white knights to get down and dirty.

And after that, quelle surprise!

stew1

stew2

Hmm. Well given the choice between being a vile gender bigot clinging to a tainted ideology that will without doubt soon find itself on the wrong side of history … and being thick … I think I’ll settle for the latter.

Finally, here is a link to the page that tells people how to lodge complaints regarding material published in the NZ Herald. That is, of course, if you can spare a few moments away from all that predation.

Australian feminist attacks integrity of advocacy group for male victims of domestic violence

gilmore1

In her article entitled The ‘One in Three’ claim about male domestic violence victims is a myth, Jane Gilmore launched a full-frontal attack on the integrity of Australia’s key advocacy group for male victims of domestic violence, and of the men’s rights movement (MRM) generally.

But more than that, Jane did exactly what feminists have long accused the MRM of doing, she sought to discredit the reality of substantial numbers of victims of domestic abuse on the basis of their gender. She sought to elevate the importance of the feminist-driven domestic violence industry by climbing on the backs of male victims.

Jane claimed that her action was necessary because “there’s a serious risk it [acknowledging significant numbers of male victims of DV] will alter the way governments approach the issue“. This is certainly one of the more absurd claims I have heard emerge from Australian feminists in recent times. And that’s saying something.

And the evidence in support of Jane’s fear is what exactly? None of the recent inquiries into domestic violence stepped outside the strict parameters of the DV debate as determined by the feminist lobby. Male victims of domestic violence are scarcely a faint blip on the political radar screen either federally, or in any of the state or territories. In fact, sadly, I see little evidence of politicians paying any attention to the ‘One in Three‘ organisation, or to the data it disseminates, or indeed to the MRM generally.

The relevant post in the Facebook page of publisher ‘Daily Life attracted a substantial number of responses from readers, fairly evenly balanced between supporters and critics of Ms Gilmore’s article. This surprised me given that Daily Life is generally avoided by those who aren’t ardent feminists, thanks to a combination of biased content and hostile moderation. Many of those writing in support of Jane’s article came across as extremely ill-informed and sexist, but don’t take my word for it – click on the link above and see for yourself.

Ms. Gilmore herself added a comment on 1 May 2015 stating:

“I’m not going to get into any pointless arguments here, but I’d like to remind everyone that I said more than once in the article that anyone who needs help should get it, and quoted Karen Willis on the topic as well. This is not about denying services for men or the fact that male victims exist, it’s about understanding the facts and directing services where they are genuinely needed. And most importantly, gender is relevant in prevention and must be considered if primary prevention programs are going to be effective in keeping both men and women safer.”

bigotbigot2

But of course Jane’s article does, and can only, undermine efforts to address the ongoing denial of recognition and support for male victims of domestic violence. Such efforts are underway not only in Australia but also, for example, in Canada, the U.K and the United States.

bigot3And indeed, within days of Jane’s article being published, the One in Three organisation was uninvited from presenting at a Forum on Family Violence hosted by Strathfield Council, and there will now be no voice for male victims of domestic violence. Although they do not provide front-line services to victims, the reason given for excluding One in Three, the pro-feminist White Ribbon Campaign will still be presenting. This course of events can only be seen as a further sad indictment of the misguided priorities of the feminist lobby.

gilmore

The degree of impartiality of Strathfield Council was further called into question when they removed a comment I made on 8 May from the timeline of their Facebook page (before and after screen-saves provided below)

strathfieldstrathfield2

One in Three published a rebuttal to Jane Gilmore’s article here, and which I recommend that you read. Jim Muldoon, an Australian MRA, also published a critique of the Daily Life article here. (Jim also wrote an earlier article about Gilmore’s biased position on domestic violence, entitled ‘Jane Gilmore should stop with the rubbish domestic violence games, in December 2014)

One in Three subsequently published a disturbing account of the bias and antagonism that they encountered whilst contributing to the Senate Inquiry into Domestic Violence.

Later, on 29 November 2015, the misandrists at ‘Daily Lifelaunched another disgraceful attack on the ‘One in Three’ organisation and male victims of domestic violence. Not yet sated, on 3 December 2015 they went and took another swipe.

In closing, here are a couple of more recent examples of feminists seeking to undermine ‘One in Three’ and/or male victims generally:

  1. Poorly-regarded male feminist, Michael Flood, felt the need to lash out at ‘One in Three’ in his submission to the Victorian Royal Commission on Family Violence (refer top page 8)
  2. Director of the Gold Coast Domestic Violence Prevention Centre Amy Compton-Keen, victim-blames and advances the myth that women are only ever violent in self-defence/after sustained abuse. See the reader reaction to that article.

clementine_DV

This August 2016 article describes how Clementine Ford attacked Erin Pizzey, the founder of the Women’s Shelter movement (but now campaigns for better recognition/support for male victims of DV. See related Reddit discussion thread here.

And yet another example of feminist hypocrisy – Jane Gilmore derides mens rights activists for devoting too much energy to addressing issues raised by feminists rather than rendering practical assistance to men. Maybe if she could resist the urge to attack/undermine then more help could be provided to those in need. With another cookie-cutter version of earlier articles here.

This Australian feminist group has lobbied to have trans-women excluded from DV shelters, so clearly CIS men have zero chance of being offered support. Discussion thread and linked article here.

This MRA exposes a feminist pretending to be a male victim of domestic violence (1 December 2016) Video with related Reddit discussion thread here

Groups pressure BMO Vancouver Marathon to remove men’s charity from annual run (6 April 2017)

Feminists against men’s domestic violence shelters (24 May 2017) Video

Beware the dubious claims of this men’s rights group, by Sherele Moody (24 June 2017)

To end on a bright note, one hopes this Irish feminist group learnt a lesson.

Postscript January 2018: The organisation helping the male victims of domestic violence

Mildred Daley Pagelow is a feminist who claims that male victims of domestic violence violence are essentially an overstated farce that erodes finding available for female victims of domestic violence (Source 1) (Source 2) (Source 3)

Update 31 May 2024: Twitter thread regarding feminists protesting about billboards in Italy regarding male victims of domestic violence and Reddit discussion thread here.

Image

Elsewhere in this blog you might also be interested in:

On recognising and supporting male victims of domestic violence

Fudging the figures to support the feminist narrative

How tragic that feminists ignore their role in demonising men

What follows is just one example of feminist hypocrisy. Not the worst example by any means. But just one that happened to come across my desk the other day. The author is a feminist journalist working for an Australian pro-feminist media group, an organisation that has been mentioned in one or two of my other blog posts due to it’s routine anti-male bias.

The title of the article is ‘How tragic that men are afraid to help kids‘ (29 October 2014), and it begins:

“THIS story finding more than two thirds of Australian men would be afraid to go to the aid of a child in need for fear of being thought a potential “pervert” is so sad for men and kids.”

Well that’s reasonable isn’t it? Of course it is sad that men are all too aware that they are viewed as potential predators. Very sad. But let’s think about how this situation came about.

Firstly, and undeniably, it is partly due to actual perpetration of sex crimes by a very small number of men, against a small minority of children. The actions of these people are obviously inexcusable, and clearly such offenders need to be dealt with to the full extent of the law.

But then the media, advocacy groups and public agencies take over, building that kernel of evil wrong-doing into a mountain of fear and foreboding. They do this not only in relation to their handling  of the specific issue of child sexual abuse by men, but also with regards to how they address the topics of (for example) domestic violence, sexual violence/‘rape culture‘, and workplace discrimination and harassment.

I need to digress here for a moment because feminists are wont to respond to what they imagine men are saying, rather than to what is actually said:

Men are not saying:

  • That the issues mentioned above are not real and/or do not warrant remedial action being taken
  • That all men are innocent of wrongdoing in relation to these issues
  • That the misrepresentation of men’s culpability is indicative of a global conspiracy against men (as is the case for example with feminists and their belief in the existence of a patriarchy)

Men are saying:

  • That media coverage of the issues listed above generally asserts (or at least implies) that men are almost always the perpetrators and that women are victims, when this is often not the case
  • That even in those situations where rates of male perpetration are substantially greater than female perpetration, this is not a valid justification for failing to acknowledge and address female perpetrators and male victims
  • That this biased misrepresentation of the actual situation appears to be a deliberate attempt of the part of many writers to damage the credibility of men and/or support and further the cause of feminist ideology
  • That this ongoing misrepresentation is unfair and unhelpful in addressing the issues under consideration

Let’s think about the broader picture of how men are presented in the media generally, and that is anything but a positive portrayal. It is no coincidence that the Australian media is overwhelmingly influenced and shaped by feminists and their white-knight cohorts. Should you doubt this fact then start reading almost any of the posts in this blog.

Let’s think about why women are not similarly viewed as potential predators despite the fact that they are responsible for most (non-sexual) child abuse and neglect, much elder abuse, and given that there are now almost daily incidents involve adult women preying on underage boys and girls.

A major factor here is, yet again, pro-feminist and anti-male bias in the media. This pervasive sexist bigotry sees men’s transgressions amplified, whilst women’s are minimised or ignored entirely. The general public then comes away with the idea that men’s perpetration is commonplace, deliberate, and severe, whilst women’s crimes are rare aberrations for which there are usually extenuating circumstances.

Let’s think about what feminists in general, and feminist journalists in particular, are doing to address this issue of men being portrayed as evil.  I mean apart from shedding crocodile tears by way of superficial space-filler articles like the one introduced earlier.

Are feminists, for example, lobbying for airlines to stop their discriminatory policy of not allowing men to sit next to unaccompanied minors? Are they lobbying for the imposition of gender quotas for male primary school teachers? Are they doing anything at all to help? Please prove me wrong, but I think you will find that the answer is no. No, they are much too busy pushing in the opposite direction.

PS: By the way, I did try to share my views about the article in the Herald-Sun web site via submitting a readers comment, but alas it was not posted. I’m hardly surprised … such censorship moderation is  absolutely par for the course when it comes to feminists seeking to avoid having their precious ideology critiqued derailed. Oh, and then the author of the article blocked me from her Twitter page – presumably in retaliation – rather than providing a mature and lucid rebuttal. This is what a feminist looks like.

See also:

Can we discuss gender issues rationally? Yes, if we can stop gamma bias (4 December 2018)

Male teachers fear student contact for false abuse claims: experts (4 August 2017)

Men won’t volunteer to help the Scouts for one depressing reason: they’ll be labelled paedophiles (13 April 2017) Reddit discussion thread and linked article

Wendy Tuohy: Too right, women do more work. And we’re so tired (17 March 2017)

Feminism: The demonization of males, by Stacy McCain (2 March 2017)

An open letter to men, who can help female runners feel safe (6 December 2016)

Rachel Stewart: No predator more dangerous than the human male (12 October 2016) New Zealand

‘Hysterical’ feminism isn’t helping our fight against domestic violence, by Corrine Barraclough (22 July 2016) Australia

The damage being done when people insist ‘boys will be boys’, by Clementine Ford (3 June 2016)

Congratulations creeps: You’ve scared women off the streets, by Wendy Tuohy (13 May 2016) Australia

Australian teacher warns young men not to become teachers as a result of the experience he has had (7 May 2016) The investigation into an accusation of inappropriate touching last two years – then found to be unsubstantiated.

Men won’t volunteer to help the Scouts for one depressing reason: they’ll be labelled paedophiles (3 May 2016) UK

Demonising men creates a culture of fear that is bad for everyone, by Karen Brooks (18 April 2016) Australia

Men are way creepier than women, according to science (14 April 2016)

Introducing the most derided ethnic group in Britain: young white men (14 December 2015) UK

When a women-only community is the answer to male violence, by Clementine Ford (18 August 2015)

A similar article from another feminist journalist at the same newspaper. This one is entitled ‘Why is being a male a crime these days?‘ (12 May 2015)

Women’s studies prof calls for ‘men control’ (23 June 2015) More on that here

The ongoing erosion of research and publication standards – aka fudging the figures to support the feminist narrative

Firstly, what do I mean by the term “fudging” in the context of this blog post?

    • to present or deal with (something) in a vague or inadequate way, especially so as to conceal the truth or mislead and/or
    • to adjust or manipulate (facts or figures) so as to present a desired picture.

So how do feminists and their allies, go about fudging statistics? Well the most common technique used, so prevalent that it’s virtually a hallmark of feminist literature, is to report statistics in relation to female victimhood in the absence of comparative figures for men and boys. Such information is (or at least, was) generated in surveys but usually went unreported, unless doing so would support the feminist perspective.

Thus subsequently, and in a worrying trend, more and more research projects undertaken by pro-feminist organisations don’t include male subjects in surveys. Here is an example from the Australian Human Rights Commission (July 2023):

Image

Nor does contemporary research typically investigate impacts on males and/or attitudes towards men (examples herehere, here, here, here, and here).

Clearly with corresponding data in relation to males unavailable then rapporteurs can easily deflect requests for contextual information. Information which would, in many cases, otherwise weaken their claims of gendered victimhood.

Thus biased researchers can represent a social problem as being gendered when it is not. And so the next researcher builds on existing incomplete research and concludes and/or implies in their report … this problem rarely affects men, or affects men in different & lesser ways, etc (but we can’t be sure because no data). And the cycle of gender bias in research, and subsequently in policy formulation, rolls on.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation believe the reverse to be true, and that there is a ‘gender data gap’ with “male-biased surveys that fail to capture women’s perspectives, their needs and their economic value”. They provide a 3rd world example upon which I am not qualified to comment, but with regards to 1st world countries their proposition is laughable. This Australian feminist writer, Kristine Ziwica, is pushing the same line (12 March 2019).

A paper by Dr. Murray Straus addressed the issue of feminists distorting domestic violence data. He identified the seven primary methods they used as being:

  1. To suppress Evidence
  2. To avoid obtaining data inconsistent with the Patriarchal Dominance Theory
  3. To cite only studies that show Male Perpetration
  4. To conclude that results support Feminist beliefs when they do not
  5. To create “evidence” by citation
  6. To obstruct publication of articles and obstruct funding research that might contradict the idea that male dominance is the cause of PV (see this post)
  7. To harass, threaten, and penalize researchers who produce evidence that contradicts feminist beliefs (see this post)

I was studying the readers comments in relation to a rather biased article about domestic violence. One comment was from a respected spokesperson on men’s health issues, Adam Blanch. Adam was talking about the latest ‘Personal Safety Survey‘ undertaken by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This is what Adam had to say:

“Domestic violence is about people who are angry, jealous, distressed and mentally ill acting out their frustration. The motive for ‘control’ and ‘power’ is only present in a very small percentage of DV, and both sexes do it to the same extent.

The partner abuse state of knowledge Project, the largest and most comprehensive meta study of DV ever conducted, makes this information freely available at http://domesticviolenceresearch.org/pdf/FindingsAt-a-Glance.Nov.23.pdf

The entire Duluth model, which asserts that domestic violence is about ‘Gender power relations’, has been so extensively disproven by legitimate researchers that no fair minded person without a ‘gender agenda’ could possibly subscribe to it.

PS. the ABS personal safety survey has some serious methodological issues that appear to have been built in, twice, to bias the outcome in favour of a ‘Gendered’ view of DV.

The 2012 report sampled less than 20% the number of women than men, down from 25% in the 2005 survey. though overall they increased the numbers for both genders for 2012, the male sample size is so small that many of the findings are unreliable again.

They were criticised for only using female interviewers in 2005, so in 2012 they trained a few male interviewers to be available on request. However, they don’t appear to have told the interviewees that they were available. This was based don ‘expert advice’ that both men and women would be more comfortable with female interviewers, these experts are unnamed. Who are they. Are they male? have they worked with male victims of abuse? What qualifies them as experts. I’ve worked with thousands of men, and I can assure you that most men will not reveal the same information to a woman that they will to a man.

This lack of transparency and sample balance is unacceptable for research conducted at this level.”

The Bureau shrugged-off this criticism and in September 2016 successfully obtained AHRC approval to only employ female interviewers in relation to a survey that encompasses the issue of domestic violence.

In ‘Australian Bureau of Statistics to discriminate against hiring men‘ it stated:

“Professor Triggs granted the ABS the exemption, accepting their submission, which included studies from not-for-profit groups, stating men were more likely to be perpetrators of DV and women were more likely to tell their stories to other women” And so disregarding the flipside … that male victims would be more likely to tell THEIR story to other men.

Please also read the related media release from the ‘One in Three’ organisation.

This is hardly the first time I have encountered concerns raised by authoritative sources regarding the credibility of domestic violence research, and in fact it appears to be an ongoing issue.

Australia’s ABC has a reputation for pushing the feminist agenda, with one example being the article ‘Domestic violence of epidemic proportions a ‘national emergency’: campaign groups‘ by Ursula Malone and Juanita Phillips. Nothing like turning up the rhetoric to keep that government funding flowing through to feminists and their organisations during these difficult economic times. And all based on fudged statistics, in particular that “Domestic violence is the leading cause of death and injury in women under 45“.

That statistic was sourced from this 2004 report by VicHealth. Indeed, that report was essentially 44 pages of taxpayer-funded feminist bias wherein violence towards men was dismissed in one sentence in the preamble: “Although men are among the victims of intimate partner violence, evidence suggests that the vast majority of victims are women and that women are more vulnerable to its health impacts”. That statistic was discussed in this 2014 article by Greg Canning and in this scorching rebuttal of the Malone/Phillips article by Men’s Rights Sydney (also available on the AVfM web site).

Now let’s look at three examples of misrepresentation from Australian feminist advocacy group ‘Our Watch‘:

1. This well-written 2013 letter from Dr Greg Canning to Natasha Stott Despoja concerns serious omissions and misrepresentations in a speech that she gave on DV (see also the reader’s comments). I am advised that a reply was never received from Ms Despoja.

2. This February 2015 article is laughably disingenuous and quite likely signals a new tactic by players in the Domestic Violence Industry: ‘Natasha Stott Despoja: ‘people are sick and tired of the statistics‘. Or in other words, ‘we are getting called-out for using false or misleading statistics too often now, so let’s publicly discredit all statistics and continue the argument on the basis of subjective and anecdotal evidence alone’.

3. In 2015 ‘Our Watch‘ launched a public education program called ‘The Line‘. The relevant web site features a section entitled ‘Myth-buster – Violence against women’. Myth #7 is that ‘Women often make false claims about domestic violence or sexual assault‘, wherein they state:

“The vast majority of sexual assaults are not reported to the police. Given for example that only 17 percent of women who experienced sexual assault by a male perpetrator (in their most recent incident of violence) reported it to the police (ABS 2012), the actual percentage of false cases is likely to be tiny. By one estimate, the actual percentage of false cases as a proportion of all rapes (reported and unreported) may be closer to 0.005 percent.” (Flood, M, 2014)

An Australian MRA by the name of Paul Rogers brought this error to their attention stating (in part) that:

“Even Wikipedia doesn’t suggest that false rape allegations are as low as you claim,  which is saying something. I have provided an excerpt below from Wikipedia to highlight that your claim is many orders of magnitude lower than even the lowest value claimed by most authorities … I urge you to state the truth rather than continue to cherry-pick outlier claims because they support your misandry.”

I should also point out that it’s not only feminist groups that engage is this sort of misrepresentation. In this media release, the advocacy group SAVE denounces the use of misleading information on domestic violence by none other than (then) President Obama himself.

Demonstrating the remarkably one-sided manner in which feminists view the world, in the following article a feminist journo criticizes a men’s rights group on their use of statistics:

Beware the dubious claims of this men’s rights group, by Sherele Moody (24 June 2017)

To counter that article let me introduce you to a linked paper by Hannah Wallen, USA. It’s recommended reading – including the readers comments:

The feminist advocacy “research” scam (20 June 2013)  

In a further blog post I look at the feminist predilection towards ‘tweaking’ the definition of terms such ‘domestic violence’ and ‘sexual assault’ in order to better support their claims of female victimhood and generally bolster public support: See Finessing definitions to preserve the image of female victimhood

(I note that the Australian government-funded company ANROWS has blocked me on Twitter)

The references listed below alternately discuss or exemplify bias against men, as perpetrated by journalists and others (often working in the sphere of domestic violence, sexual violence and related fields):

Landmark research study finds clear evidence of pro-women/anti-men bias (28 September 2024)

Exclusive: Health department suppressed gendered violence research (27 July 2024) Here’s one for the books … feminists claim that Australian Government agency has fudged its research to undermine the feminist narrative – not the opposite.

1IN3’s submission to the Inquiry into capturing data on family violence perpetrators in Victoria (1 July 2024) See submission #60. Recommended reading

Fighting academia’s feminist tentacles, by Bettina Arndt (February 2024)

Interesting Twitter discussion thread related to the subject of this post (10 February 2024)

Coitus interruptus, by Bettina Arndt (1 February 2024)

The harm hypothesis: How perceived harm to women shapes reactions to research on sex differences (3 January 2024)

Feminism’s latest weapon is a fraud, by Bettina Arndt (8 December 2023)

Ending political interference in the Australian Research Council (29 November 2023)

Narrow escape for Lisa Wilkinson (25 November 2023) Scroll down to the section dealing with an ABS suicide chart

Government to track and publicly release quarterly information on intimate partner homicides (25 November 2023)

The shocking number of Australian men sexually attracted to children and teens (20 November 2023) “Salter said the study focused on men because female perpetrators were less common, and usually co-offenders”. Classic line

Helping young men to have healthy, respectful relationships (25 October 2023) Australian Federal Government media release. Another $3.5 million down the feminist toilet

The Woke are now claiming that 2+2 equals something other than 4 (23 October 2023) Twitter thread and linked article

The Misogyny Myth (Summer 2023)

Inflating campus sexual assault statistics, by Bettina Arndt (30 August 2023)

Scope creep and the sexual assault industry, by Bettina Arndt (26 June 2023)

Demonizing Men with False Data on Sexual Abuse (20 June 2023)

How research is used to promote male hatred (11 June 2023)

New Report Exposes Feminist Misinformation about Parental Alienation (18 April 2023)

Pro-female and anti-male biases are more influential than race and other factors in Implicit Association Tests (26 March 2023)

How would you know if you are discriminating against men? (21 March 2023)

Gender equity when it suits (13 March 2023) Recommended reading

One of the most egregious, shameless statistical falsehoods I’ve seen in a long time, one that thoroughly shames @MayorofLondon @TenderUK in the recently published Teachers Toolkit on addressing gender-based violence & abuse (22 February 2023) UK Twitter thread by Ally Fogg. But on the positive side, and following lobbying by men’s rights activists, some statistical corrections were implemented

Jobs for the Girls, by Bettina Arndt (14 December 2022)

Women encouraged to cheat by research (21 November 2022) Video

People are more sceptical of sex difference research when findings favour men (28 September 2022)

The ABS fails to clearly identify the extent of male victimisation in relation to emotional abuse (25 August 2022) Displaying feminist bias again?

Justice warriors in the dock, by Bettina Arndt (30 July 2022)

Majority Of Fake Twitter Accounts Support Amber Heard, Not Johnny Depp, New Research Shows (25 April 2022)

1 in 3 Uni students have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime. They demand action on their vision of a safer society (23 March 2022) Note readers comments & concerns below the article and in the Twitter thread.

The push for ‘researcher entrepreneurs’ could be a step backward for gender equity (11 February 2022) Because government research funding favors men. Well, at least it does in some feminist mind-hive somewhere. #FacePalm

Bettina Arndt: The rape conviction rate – a scandalous deceit of parliament and the public (19 January 2022) Recommended reading

Is our attitude to men based on substandard research? (6 January 2022)

Bettina Arndt: “The great purge rolls on” (3 December 2021)

How feminists misrepresent the incidence of false allegations (27 October 2021) (Twitter thread)

Half-Truths, Falsehoods, and Lies: New Report Documents Long-Running Domestic Violence Misinformation Campaign (USA) (20 September 2021)

One in Three Campaign – News Articles About Family Violence – How gender bias in research and the use of misleading language harms male victims of family violence – a case study (9 September 2021)

Our uni teachers were already among the world’s most stressed. COVID and student feedback have just made things worse (19 July 2021) Some student respondents in a survey said some mildly critical things about some teachers, a bit more in the case of female teachers. In the old days you would take about the factors that may have contributed to these perceived weaknesses in teaching practice. Not now though. Now the snowflake patrol moves into action to spend the rest of the paper talking about why the survey respondents were wrong. Sexist and wrong. Damn them.

Elite journal under fire over racism (13 April 2021) Article by Stephen Rice which is behind a paywall at ‘The Australian’. Not directly related to misandry, but an example of how social problems are massaged to satisfy the fears or preferences of woke folk.

Not the full story (30 March 2021) Media Watch video. Yet another example of what happen when you start with a pre-determined narrative and then have to make everything fit around it.

Poll results: 21 per cent of women sexually assaulted at work (24 March 2021). Men weren’t included in the survey, but by jingo *they need to listen*!

Domestic violence on the rise during pandemic (13 July 2020) “The survey of 15,000 Australian women in May provides the most detailed information in the world about the prevalence and nature of domestic violence experienced by women during the pandemic.” How many men did they say were surveyed? That would be *none*. Here is a link to the web page of the agency that produced this research.

New AIC paper appears to cherry-pick data to fit “gendered violence” narrative (30 October 2019)

Feminists always lie #190689 (30 September 2019)

Domestic Abuse: The latest lie (19 July 2019) Most men who are victims of partner violence are in homosexual relationships, right? Wrong. But it doesn’t stop feminists from claiming it is true.

Whose research got us a picture of a ‘black hole’ in 2019? It was a girl right? See this tweet from Tom Golden with linked video that tells the story that the media didn’t.

Articles like the linked one now tell us how horrible the “trolls” are for “targeting” the female scientist, but funny how they don’t address the facts of the case – did she only produce 6% of the coding or not? See also this paper from ‘A Voice for Men’.

Lies, damn lies and STEM statistics (2 March 2019)

Girls more likely to face loneliness (6 December 2018) UK with related Twitter posts by Martin Daubney (first post/second post)

Australia’s disturbing attitude to domestic violence revealed (30 November 2018) Feminist as an be, and paid for by you, the taxpayer (ANROWS)

‘Blatant spin’: SBS accused of sifting data to show ‘sexist’ Australia, and SBS’s ‘sexism’ doco is just blatant propaganda (21 November 2018) Both of these articles appeared in The Australian newspaper, and are behind a ‘paywall’. Watch this Bettina Arndt video for some good background on this issue.

And of course there were various flow-on articles, such as ‘Are men victims of sexism?‘ (3 December 2018) which conceded that the male gender had some problems, that none of these were due to women, but that men were using feminism as a “scapegoat”. Then ‘Here’s how audiences reacted to ‘Is Australia Sexist?‘ (4 December 2018)

Social Justice and Far Left Ideology Is Corrupting Science (17 November 2018) This video broadens the field out beyond feminism but is still worth watching for its broader perspective.

USC Library Censors Article on ‘Female Privilege in Prison Sentencing’ (14 November 2018) USA. Hmm, don’t like what an academic paper states, and don’t want students exposed to it? Easy, just lose it

Journals publish hoaxers’ absurd gender studies (4 October 2018) with more here on that issue

A Mathematician Says Activists Made His Paper Disappear Because Its Findings Offended Them (10 September 2018) and Academic Activists Send a Published Paper Down the Memory Hole, by Theodore P. Hill (7 September 2018) Note too the readers comments here.

La Trobe bans my talk on the fake rape crisis, by Bettina Arndt (2 August 2018) This article concerns the exaggeration of the incidence of sexual assault in Australian universities by the Australian Human Rights Commission and others.

1IN3 responds to latest attack upon male victims by Daily Life (8 February 2018)

ABC News and Washington Post intentionally excluded male victims from their already flawed sexual harassment survey (12 November 2017)

Gender bias in Australian Institute of Family Studies Experiences of Separated Parents Study (2 November 2017)

This is how NFHS made wives’ mood changes as marital rape (18 September 2017)

UW Researcher Claims The ‘Experiences Of Women’ Invalidate Peer-Reviewed Research (14 August 2017) USA

Flawed sexual harassment report undermines the change it seeks (12 August 2017) Australia

Female violence, society’s blind spot (4 August 2017)

Biased Incompetence in CAFCASS and Women’s Aid Report (4 August 2017) UK

Why these professors are warning against promoting the work of straight, white men (16 July 2017)

Study finds ‘sexism’ in sexual assault research, but this time men are the target (10 July 2017)

Gender Bias in Science or Biased Claims of Gender Bias? (8 July 2017)

Peer Review: A (not so much) gender perspective (18 May 2017)

How to make anything a gendered issue, by Blaise Wilson (30 April 2017) Video

Irony Alert: Gender Bias Study by Women Researchers Suffers From Gender Bias, Peer Reviewers Say (18 April 2017)

Teacher advises student to “look for feminist sources” regarding wage gap (7 March 2017)

When care becomes control – financial abuse cuts across cultures (17 January 2017) As I state in this post, most papers on financial abuse ignore the reality of male victimisation, and this is yet another example. In the absence of conclusive proof that only women were victimised one would expect a researcher to survey men and women. Failure to do so, as in this and many other cases, is evidence of gender bias to support a particular ideological narrative.

BBC admits its viral “women write better code” story was fake news (28 December 2016)

New study making the rounds in the media claims patients taken care of by female physicians have reduced mortality

The US Department of Justice refuses to fund research into intimate partner violence against men, or the stalking of men (November 2016)

Girls feelings are far more important than the truth, by Mark Dent (12 October 2016)

Why feminists are so cagey about class (13 September 2016) UK

Why does the CPS report on violence against women include men in the stats? by Ally Fogg  (7 September 2016) UK

Always beating up on men, by Bettina Arndt (20 August 2016)

Cutting to numb the pain of sex abuse: interviews with young women in drug treatment (12 August 2016) Australia. Although this article focuses on the needs of young women, the underlying research surveyed both genders. Whilst I have yet to review the findings in detail, my default position is one of disquiet regarding the merit of applying different fixes to men and women. Without a very thorough understanding of all contributing factors, esp. in relation to cause/effect, there is a real danger that we may misinterpret the true situation. Also, from what has happened in the field of domestic violence for example, there is a real danger of a monopolisation of all available resources for the treatment of women.

Half of women in UK have been sexually harassed at work, study finds (10 August 2016) They didn’t bother surveying men so the readers believe, by implication, that this problem only affects women. I wonder why would the authors they do that? See also ‘Report Claiming Half Of Women Harassed At Work Involved Hardline Feminist Group

Confirmation bias in research survey into men’s mental health which includes questions based on toxic masculinity and Duluth power and control wheel (24 July 2016) Australia. Post in Reddit mensrights forum concerning research undertaken by Melbourne University

There’s no hiring bias against women in tech, they just suck at interviews (1 July 2016) Oh dear this feminist research didn’t run according to the script

Washington Post: Men lie on surveys, women don’t (30 June 2016) USA

Female politicians (sometimes) receive more abuse than male counterparts, apart from when they don’t… (29 June 2016)

6 Feminist Myths that will not Die, by Christina Hoff Sommers (17 June 2016)

Jess Phillips MP and her alleged 600 rape threats (6 June 2016)

Feds Spend $548,459 Studying Male Students’ ‘Microaggressions’ towards Women (6 April 2016) This example from USA may or may not involve fudging, so sure does looks like a huge waste of public money. Related Reddit discussion thread here.

Australia’s most shocking statistic: Sexual abuse and domestic violence against women with disabilities (20 March 2016) Australia. Makes zero mention of the existence of abuse of disabled boys, implies perpetrators are male. More about this article in this other blog post.

When Passionate Advocates Meet Research on Diversity, Does the Honest Broker Stand a Chance? (9 March 2016)

Happy IWD, Now Remember, You’re A Victim (8 March 2016) Video

Radio NZ Careless about Domestic Violence Figures (8 March 2016)

Anti-abuse campaign targets university students (22 February 2016) Australia. Typical of Our Watch research this survey appears designed to deliver a pre-determined finding of gendered female victimhood. The article reports one part of the picture, but where are the responses to (for example) how many boys were pressured “to do sexual things”? Whether girls respect the ability to consent in relation to boys who are drunk, etc.

Action Opportunity: Please Seek The Truth About Male Victims of Domestic Violence, and Defend the Honesty and Integrity of Australian Scientific Research (8 February 2016) Petition to the Australian Research Council

(I believe there to be a question mark over the extent to which the Australian Research Council is itself free of gender bias. I say this not in terms of funds provided to male versus female researchers, but in terms of social research projects with a feminist orientation being strongly favoured. Consider the examples provided of feminist research mentioned in this other blog post, as well as this article which will be discussed in a future post. The author of this article presenting a feminist-concordant perspective on the gender pay gap was also ARC-funded. These spreadsheets look at the nature of projects funded by the ARC)

Q&A: Australian of the Year David Morrison fires up over claim domestic violence data shows decline (2 February 2016) David really must be a feminist, with his ‘who needs statistics anyway’ line (when those statistics don’t support the feminist narrative)

‘Destroy the Joint’ feminist web site inflates the number of Australian women killed in situations of domestic violence (2 February 2016)

How feminists and a Police Commissioner’s Office conspired against male victims of domestic violence on Twitter (5 January 2016) UK. The second part of this investigation is here.

Domestic Violence is not on the rise (16 December 2015)

Clementine Ford is a Fraud (11 December 2015) See also this blog post

Children’s Rights Commissioner urges national focus on children affected by domestic violence (7 December 2015)

“The Children’s Rights Report being released today found one in every 28 people had also experienced sexual abuse as a child, while a further 23 per cent of children have witnessed violence against their mother”. This conveniently neglects to mention that various studies have found that as many kids have seen their mum hit their dad, as per vice versa. Here is one Australian source.

‘The Hunting Ground’s’ laughable response to me (30 November 2015) USA

Victim-blaming rampant in Australians’ attitudes towards violence against women – study (25 November 2015) And what of victim-blaming when men are the victims? And of community attitudes regarding violence towards males? Guess we’ll never know because the last thing feminist researchers want to do is provide context for their claims of female victimisation.

Comments from the One-in-Three organisation regarding errors contained in information submitted by (male feminist) Dr Michael Flood (November 2015)

Wikipedia is anti-feminist because its editorial policy doesn’t allow you to just make things up …. “conventions exclude and silence feminist ways of knowing and writing” (September 2015) Reddit discussion thread and linked article.

Female researchers outraged when asked to include men (9 September 2015)

Mary Koss doesn’t think women can rape men and boys (5 September 2015)

Open letter to the Victorian Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence, by the One in Three organisation (17 August 2015) On exaggerating the extent to which female violence is attributable to self-defence

Campus Rape Expert Can’t Answer Basic Questions About His Sources (28 July 2015) USA

In this June 2015 paper the One in Three advocacy group recounts the bias and antagonism they faced whilst contributing to the Australian Senate Inquiry into Domestic Violence

The Guardian Australia corrects domestic violence article (17 April 2015)

ABC misleads. No, it’s not more dangerous to be a woman, by Andrew Bolt (14 April 2015) One of the precious few examples of an Australian journalist pointing out the distortion of data by feminists. And here and here are examples of the types of pro-feminist articles that Andrew was railing against.

What about the men? White Ribbon, men and violence: A response to Dr Michael Flood by Men’s Health Australia (undated) Very detailed rebuttal of an ‘expert’ whose work is often trumpeted by Australian feminists in support of their cause

Why do we believe such terrible things about men that can’t be true? (24 March 2015)

How To Lie And Mislead With Rape Statistics: Part 1 (25 January 2015) and Part 2 (27 January 2015) Recommended reading

Feminists love statistics – the real sexual assault and violence statistics in Australia (13 January 2015)

NSW Police fail victims of domestic violence with flippant social media post (20 January 2015) Australian feminist journalist attacks NSW Police for recognising male victims of domestic violence. Somebody fetch me a sick bucket

Jane Gilmore should stop with the rubbish domestic violence games by Jim Muldoon (25 November 2014). Jane Gilmore is an Australian feminist writer, and in April 2015 she wrote another article, this time attacking the ‘One in Three’ advocacy group and their findings in relation to the extent of male victimisation.

Domestic violence Woozles (factoids) in Australia (25 November 2014) Concerns the feminist claim that DV is the leading cause of death and injury for women aged under 45, and on the same theme:

Criminal suspicion: Domestic violence leading cause of injury to women (undated) and Response to The Conversation Fact Check from 1IN3 (30 April 2018)

False claims undermine good causes by Claire Lehmann (24 November 2014)

1 in 4 women admit to violence in relationships (7 November 2014) Video by Tom Golden

The truth about a viral graphic on rape statistics (9 December 2014) Recommended reading

The following collection of reddit discussion threads detail moderator bias and censorship in relation to threads/posts concerning domestic violence and child abuse – See example 1example 2example 3example 4, example 5 and example 6 (27 October 2014) Includes the following quote from a moderator responding to a query as to why a post was removed: “It needs to be the right information from the right people. Here’s a shorthand guide: if you are an MRA or TRP, you need not bother posting. If your information may tend to make women look bad, same.”

New Anglicare WA Report finds over half of DV victims are male for some forms of abuse (28 October 2014) Yet despite this the report’s recommendations ignore male victims and female perpetrators

National Domestic Violence Statistics” page only has one statistic where males are a part of the victims. Can you find it? (27 October 2014) Reddit discussion thread and linked ‘fact’ sheet

The top 5 feminist myths of all time (8 September 2014) USA

Acid attacks: telling only half the story (26 June 2014)

Press regulator: Criado-Perez abuse claim was misleading (11 October 2014)

Domestic Violence Lies from Ottawa (22 January 2014) Video

You Tube video showing talk by Donald Dutton discussed fudging of statistics by feminist workers in the domestic violence industry (2008) Highly recommended viewing.

Commissioner Ken Lay’s professional misconduct (8 December 2013) Australia

Dishonesty in the Domestic Violence Industry, 2006 (Australia)

Do we ignore violence against men? G. Andresen and M. Woods (21 November 2007) This paper makes mention of the use of biased statistics by the ‘White Ribbon Campaign’, which is also mentioned in this 2008 discussion thread

Government deception won’t reduce family violence (June 2011)

Thirty Years of Denying the Evidence on Gender Symmetry in Partner Violence: Implications for Prevention and Treatment (July 2010)

Image

How Government’s lie about domestic violence – Australia (17 August 2009)

Feminists deny truth on domestic violence (30 May 2006)

This is a good submission prepared by the Mens Rights Agency addressing the issue of the anti-male bias within domestic violence agencies – absolutely recommended reading

Harvard publishes a study showing women perpetrate more DV, and then the study mysteriously disappeared (A reddit discussion thread from 7 June 2014) and here is a link to an article about that Harvard study that includes a link to a saved copy of the actual study itself (and here is a link to study summary)

How feminists corrupt DV research, by Dr Murray Straus (8 June 2012) Recommended reading

Refuting 40 years of lies about domestic violence by Dean Esmay (19 December 2012)

Male domestic violence victims suffer from wrongful gender bias

Are domestic violence figures bogus? (22 February 2014) Includes discussion of the notorious ‘intimate partner homicide is the leading cause of death for African-American women ages 15 to 45’ statistic myth

Processes explaining the concealment and distortion of evidence on gender symmetry in partner violence by Murray Strauss (14 July 2007)

http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/V71-Straus_Thirty-Years-Denying-Evidence-PV_10.pdf

http://reason.com/archives/2014/02/22/are-domestic-violence-statistics-bogus

Domestic violence study suspended by UNSW for breach of ethics (14 April 2014) Further background to this matter can be found here

I spoke to hundreds of men about rape and domestic violence (24 September 2014) Note that this is a different survey to that discussed by Adam Blanch earlier. It is certainly feasible that interviewers might influence survey respondents. It hardly fills one with confidence about the reliability of the results when interviewers are prepared to go on record with such strong views on the matter being investigated.

Article about repeated anti-male bias by a judge hearing domestic violence cases

If manipulating and misrepresenting statistics to suit an agenda was a crime then the feminist authors of this “fact-sheet” should be in jail. Many of these so-called facts are debunked in papers listed in this other post about domestic violence, whilst others demand the smallest measure of common-sense to confirm just how misleading they are.

Womens Aid UK actively tries to discredit statistics of male victims of domestic violence (reddit discussion thread and linked article dated 15 June 2014)

“A third of family murders involved a female as the killer. In sibling murders, females were 15% of killers, and in murders of parents, 18%. But in spouse murders, women represented 41% of killers. In murders of their offspring, women predominated, accounting for 55% of killers” (Source)

The paragraph above was extracted from a 1994 publication, not because patterns of gender perpetration have changed greatly but because the feminist filter has been imposed so completely now, that we only see articles like this one that present statistics in a manner suggesting that women are the perpetual victims of oppressive male malevolence. (Refer to Reddit discussion thread here)

Misrepresentation of Gender Bias in the 1989 Report of the Gender Bias Committee of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, by Mark B Rosenthal (23 November 2005)

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(Source of the quoted statement above)

These final linked articles address the predominant influence asserted by feminists in conducting research, and in the subsequent formulation of DV policy:

Practical Implications of Current Domestic Violence Research (undated) USA

How feminists shaped Australian government policy on domestic violence (A doctorate thesis from December 2004)

A brilliant funding strategy” – How and why feminists took over the domestic violence movement Interviews with Erin Pizzey, Senator Anne Cools, Warren Farrell and others (Youtube video)

Domestic violence, predetermination, and the feminised bureaucracy (Peter Zohrab, 2008) The same author has written many other papers about domestic violence in New Zealand.

Regarding the table below … hardly an ‘epidemic’. The only increase is in male victimisation. It’s no wonder that, in pushing its ‘epidemic’ barrow, the Domestic Violence Industry increasingly relies on statistics generated by help-line call centres instead. And of course we can trust the integrity of those sources.

epidemic

“Advocacy research consists of collating available evidence or producing new information to support a pre-determined policy position. Advocacy research is commonly carried out by pressure groups, lobby groups and interest groups (such as trade unions) and, occasionally, by political parties, journalists and academics – especially those working in the social policy field.”

Catherine Hakim (2000). Research Design: Successful Designs for Social and Economic Research. pp. 8–9.

“It is difficult to criticize advocacy research without giving an impression of caring less about the problem under consideration than do those who are engaged in magnifying its size. But one may be deeply concerned about problems such as rape, child abuse, and homelessness yet still wish to see a rigorous and objective analysis of their dimensions. Advocacy research that uncovers a problem, measures it with reasonable accuracy, and brings it to public attention performs a valuable service by raising public consciousness. The current trend in advocacy research is to inflate problems and redefine them in line with the advocates’ ideological preferences. The few impose their definition of social ills on the many – seeking to incite moral panics. This type of advocacy research invites social policies that are likely to be neither effective nor fair.”

Gilbert, N. (1997). Advocacy Research and Social Policy. Crime and Justice, 22, 101-148

With regards to the Latrobe Uni study noted above, why not include people of any gender who are concerned about any form of harassment or assault on public transport? In other words get the big picture of what’s occurring. Ditto for all the studies/article regarding workplace harassment that restrict themselves to considering ‘sexual harassment’, knowing full well that this is likely to focus attention on the female perspective.

My initial post about domestic violence within this blog can be found here, whilst other DV-related posts can be located by clicking on the ‘domestic violence’ tag at the bottom of this page. It is suggested that this post also be read in conjunction with:

Has there been a surge in domestic violence during the Covid-19 pandemic?

Public events & domestic violence myth

How feminists misrepresent the gender ‘wage gap’

On the censorship of non-feminist perspectives and opinions

Finessing definitions to preserve the image of female victimhood

Gendered, gendered, gendered: The word that fuels the feminist machine

Achieving personal financial security is important for everyone, but dodgy research helps no-one

Regarding the granting of gender-specific scholarships in Australia

woozles

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Australian taxpayer funded organisations that do little/nothing for men (other than demonising them)

Firstly, and by way of background, the concept of institutional misandry has been described as:

“The collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their status as male. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and misandric stereotyping which disadvantage males.”

It persists because of the failure of the organisation openly and adequately to recognise and address its existence and causes by policy, example and leadership. Without recognition and action to eliminate such misandry it can prevail as part of the ethos or culture of the organisation. It is a corrosive disease.

— After section 6.34, page 49, Cm 4262-I, Lawrence. The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Report of an Inquiry by Sir William Macpherson of Cluny. February 1999. (Source)

You might also be interested in viewing these videos about institutional misandry in the UK.

I frequently encounter the online footprints of Australian organisations whose interests encompass one or more gender-related issues, and who appear to demonstrate a significant degree of anti-male bias. Many of these organisations:

  • provide minimal or no services or support for men, and often only reference men in the context of (for example) perpetrators of sexual assault or domestic violence
  • are strongly biased towards, or influenced by, feminist ideology
  • have weak oversight or disclosure mechanisms in place, for example annual reports, financial statements/independent auditing, and measures of performance which (if they exist) are not publicly available, and
  • have either no men working within them, or only very few (gender quotas anyone?)

I find this situation to be of considerable concern bearing in mind the hundreds of millions of dollars flowing into just the domestic violence sector alone each year. What’s more, that amount continues to increase and in July 2014 it was announced that millions more were to be poured into agencies to protect “women and their children (whilst still assiduously ignoring male victims and violent women).

One should consider the current situation in the context of the relative paucity of funding to organisations that support men and boys, all whilst the government trumpets on about gender equality.

It also worries me that this list is not restricted to private lobby groups or not-for-profits that benefit from substantial government funding or contracts. Indeed, there are many government agencies and groups within the tertiary education sector that display almost as much gender bias.

I have already allocated blog posts to several such organisations:

The Australian Human Rights Commission (Annual budget = just over $33 million)

Australian Department of Social Services (Annual budget = $4.2 billion)

Australian Institute of Family Studies (Annual budget = $17.75 million)

WA Department of Child Protection and Family Support (Annual budget = just under $625 million)

Workplace Gender Equality Agency (Annual budget $5 million) $5 million a year to propagate a feminist myth and to shake a finger at companies that won’t buy into their delusion. Their contribution to the Australian community consists of burning public money on the altar of feminism. (Postscript November 2018: Budget doubled)

‘Our Watch’ (formerly known as the Foundation to Prevent Violence against Women and their Children) (Receives government grants totalling between $1 million and $2 million per annum)

White Ribbon Campaign (Received government grants totalling $280,000 during 2013/14 financial year, but in 2019 it went broke & was closed down)

Domestic Violence NSW (Received more than $6 million in government funds in 2013-14)

DV Connect (Around $3 million during 2013/14 financial year, mainly from the Queensland Department of Communities)

The Australian Gender Equality Council (Budget unknown)

Safe and Equal Inc. lists annual receipt of government grants totaling $7,135,582

‘No to Violence’ (Income and expenditure of approx. $4.9 million in the 2017/18 financial year)

Diversity Council Australia (Total income in 2015 of approx. $1.5 million, mainly from membership fees. Many public agencies are listed as members, but the extent of public funding is not identified. All staff bar one are female … diversity … seriously?

Men’s Referral Service (Government funding was around $2million/annum but they are now to be the recipient of a further allocation of $13 million over four years)

The E-Safety Office (Annual government funding is currently around $100 million)

In this blog post my intention is to eventually corral and list basic details of other similar organisations, and then subsequently do further research on each.

Who’ll be the next cab off the rank? Oh, we have oh so many contenders …

Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre – Hmm, where to start here. Well firstly check out how many men they have on board with regards to Advisory Board members/key researchers/HDR researchers/visiting scholars. Think, one or none tokenism. But more to report here folks – back soon.

Women’s Safety NSW – This group came to my attention due to their lobbying against a proposed Family Law Inquiry. You can review their tweets (@womenssafetynsw) in relation to that issue distributed around mid-late September 2019. Their ACNC register entry is here – you will note that they received $253,869 in government grants in 2019/20 whilst spending $192,710 on “Employee Expenses” (with only one fulltime employee). The CEO and Board are wholly female. (Newsflash: Their Twitter account states “Women’s Safety NSW is no longer in operation” as at 27 July 2021. Their former CEO, Hayley Foster, is now CEO of another organisation called ‘Rape and Domestic Violence Services Australia’).

Full Stop Foundation is registered as a charity with annual income approaching $2 million. Their patron is feminist Tara Moss, and all seven board members are women. Looking at their web site and ACNC register entry, it’s uncertain though to what extent they receive government funding. What exactly is “contract income”? (See note 4). Also, whilst they list the Australian Human Rights Commission as supporters they don’t seem to clarify what form this support takes (?)

Or another … this one is called ‘Safe Steps Family Violence Response Centre’, but don’t let “family” fool you. Safe Steps “is committed to assisting all women and children in the community experiencing family violence. We are an organisation that values inclusivity, diversity and intersectionality”. All female board and staff. Income of $12 million in financial year 2017/18 according to latest annual report on their web site, but which doesn’t specify the extent of grant funding. Safe Steps is listed in the ACNC register but no information seems to be held for them. (?)

Or maybe a group known as ‘Emerge’? “Emerge supports women and children who have experienced family violence, empowering them to rebuild their lives“. There would appear to be no male directors or staff. Their entry in the ACNC register, here, provides various details concerning the organisation. The most recent financial statement lists more than $1.2 million received in the financial year ending 30 June 2018 (from the Dept. of Health and Human Services), and approx. $620k in salary expenses.

Just out of curiosity I typed “male victims” into their web site search facility, and got “Oops, we are really sorry but no results were found“.

Or how about Women’s Community Shelters Ltd who came to my attention via their daily paid placement in my Twitter feed? Their ACNC register entry mentions a total annual income of almost $3.5m, of which just over 1/3 arrives by way of government funding. This mostly comes from the NSW Dept. of FaCS, who explain here the “facts” about domestic and family violence (no need to complicate things by mentioning male victims).

Or perhaps Relationships Australia? I understand that they don’t have many male counsellors nowadays, and one less after the departure of Rob Tiller.

Or perhaps the International Women’s Development Agency? It would appear that there are no male directors or staff. Indeed in October 2018 IWDA advertised for a non-executive director, but lads don’t get your hopes up:

“International Women’s Development Agency (IWDA) has an EEO exemption (H298/2018) and requests applications from women only. IWDA has a Child Rights and Protection Policy and directors are required to undertake a National Police Check and endorse IWDA’s Child Rights and Protection Code of Conduct.”

I wonder why IWDA were granted an EEO exemption and whether an application from a MRA organisation would be treated similarly? See here and here. Oh and IWDA seem to get plenty of government financial support too:

“Grant income represents 81% of our total income and grew by 43% in 2016/17. This is based on a combined Grants total of $8.59mil, of which 29.81% is sourced directly from the Australian Government’s Aid Program.” (Source, p27)

Or how about ‘The Australian Centre for the Study of Sexual Assault‘? This is the page that I came across first. It reads like a grant application for a feminist spend-fest doesn’t it? I had a very quick look at their site and found nothing along the lines of guidelines to help female perpetrators, or anything about male victims. I searched on “sexual assault of men” and did come across a page entitled ‘Engaging men in sexual assault prevention‘ though. You know the sort of advice that helps us men curb the frothing rapist lurking within each and every one of us.

The ‘About us‘ page tells us that there are no male staff at the Centre, as well as providing the following information:

The Australian Centre for the Study of Sexual Assault (ACSSA) was established in 2003 by the Commonwealth Office for Women. It is funded by the Department of Social Services and is hosted by the Australian Institute of Family Studies.

ACSSA is a central collection point for research, information and resources about sexual assault in Australia. Our key role is to facilitate access to the growing evidence-base on sexual assault and to support organisations, agencies and others use research and evidence in shaping policy, practice and research directions in responding to, and reducing, sexual assault.

We collect, synthesise and summarise developments in:

  • research and evaluation;
  • practice knowledge and resources;
  • law reform and legislation; and
  • policy initiatives.

OK, well there is no mention there of the agency being restricted to only dealing with the sexual assault of women by men. Given, however, that it’s an offshoot of the ‘Commonwealth Office for Women’, I think it would be a safe bet that that is in fact the case. Of course if there was a corresponding ‘Office for Men’, then I guess that they would deal with male victims and female perpetrators. But there isn’t, because … men can deal with it (?)

With regards to their budget, all I’ve found at the moment is this somewhat dated page for the Government’ entire ‘Womens Safety Agenda‘, which mentions a total budget of $75.7 million over four years. The 2014/15 budget shows an allocation of $3.5 million for the Office of Women this year (refer page 31), but there may well be further allocations under the Social Services budget (and elsewhere?). On 23 June 2014 I sent an email to Treasury seeking this information:

“I am aware that a womens budget statement is regularly prepared to identify expenditure that is expressly designed to support Australian women. I would like to know if there is a similar statement identifying expenditure designed to support men.
Alternatively, and assuming there is not … is there any source that you can either provide me with – or point me towards – that enables a side-by-side comparison of expenditure for men and women? I look forward to receiving your advice on this matter. Thank you”

… but no reply since. Hmm.

Postscript: Sarah Game MLC has provided the following information regarding the Office for Women in a Twitter discussion thread (February 2024)Image

See also: The Australian government hands out hundreds of millions per year in grants to businesses. We find much of it is wasted (18 July 2024)

What’s happening overseas?

Meanwhile over in the USA Barack Obama introduced one (1) federal program to assist men and boys (as against the dozens that assist women and girls), only to have the feminist backlash begin immediately (and see related reddit discussion here). Somehow, sadly, I can’t see Malcolm Turnbull stepping into the breech with anything similar here in Australia. Ooh, please don’t call me a misogynist, please, please! (See this blog post re: lack of political support for men/boys)

See the article at http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/women-are-the-biggest-budget-losers-20140523-zrl4n.html (22 May 2014) It seems quite extraordinary to me that the journalist who wrote this piece felt justified in claiming that “women are the biggest losers” without providing any information whatsoever about what men received/lost in the budget. It’s moments like these I feel like a member of the forgotten gender!

In Wales (U.K) someone did the maths and found that women’s groups/causes were handed 77 times as much funding as were men’s groups/causes (August 2016).

Further organisations slated for review

Rape & Domestic Violence Services Australia Senior staff and Board members are all women. In the year ending 30 June 2015 the organisation was the recipient of $8,194,146 in government grant funding, out of a total annual income of $8,795,650. Their main expense was ‘Salaries and On-costs’ at $7,502,877 (Source)

Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety Limited (ANROWS). Oh, and look, 80% of Board members are women as are all of the staff listed in their web site. I guess that’s to be expected given that I read that men bash women, lack the capacity for empathy, and are thus are clearly unconcerned about women’s safety … so why oh why would they want men working there? Oh, but wait, wouldn’t that be sexist stereotyping? And what of equal employment opportunity?

The latest annual report and financial statement provided in the ANROWS web site as of July 2022 is for the financial year 2020-21. ANROWS receives substantial government funding support and in 2020/21 “grants income” was listed as being $6,628,189. In 2019/20 it amounted to $10,410,025, and the year earlier it received $4,995,793.

Now I wonder how much the federal government budgeted for researching men’s issues in recent years? Absolutely nothing? But I shouldn’t ask naughty questions like that – it’s probably why ANROWS blocked me on social media.

Domestic Violence Prevention Centre Gold Coast Inc.

The Centre is listed in the ACNC register here. That’s just as well as there does not appear to be any financial details provided in their web site, and only vague information about who is running the organisation – and how. The Centre employs 12 f/t employees, 20 p/t employees, and three casuals.

The Centre is wholly supported by government funding, with no donations or bequests received in 2014/15. The consolidated income statement shows receipts of around $2.8 million per annum in goverment grants (refer page 5). The main costs for the Centre are “salaries and on costs” ($1.9 million per annum), “office and centre expenses” ($407,167), rent ($227,841), and superannuation ($174,128).

An article from May 2016 citing disparaging comments about male victims of DV made by Centre director Amy Compton-Keen can be accessed here (NB: Reader reaction to that article was illuminating).

Y-Gap/Polished man campaign (level of government support currently unknown). Y-Gap’s ACNC register entry is here. Related Reddit mensrights discussion thread here.

Queensland Centre for Domestic and Family Violence Research based at CQ University, Mackay Campus. All female staff? tick Only consult with female-focussed groups with just a token male for appearance sake? tick Statistics within web site ignores male victimisation and resources for men assume they are perpetrators of violence? tick (see ‘Working with Men’).

“The Queensland Centre for Domestic and Family Violence Research receives defined term funding from the Queensland Department of Communities, Child Safety and Disability Services to undertake research and develop educational resources pertaining to domestic and family violence in Queensland. In addition, CDFVR is supported by CQUniversity and receives grants from a range of other sources to conduct research and professional development activities.”

Queensland University of Technology, Crime and Justice Research Centre Perform research and teach in subject areas including sexual assault and domestic violence. They appear to have a strong pro-feminist bias and from what I have read of their work thus far, they routinely follow and promote the men perpetrators/women victims model. (More details here)

Domestic Violence Victoria All female staff? tick

The 2013 Annual Report here tells us that DVV’s total income in 2013 was $677,211 of which $609,361 arrived in the form of grants. Some of their major expenses included wages $489,783, super contributions $42,618, media awards $35,251, provision for holiday and long service leave $32,789, consultants $10,675, board fees $4,500 and staff training/welfare/amenities $3,261 (these items totalling $618,877)

Victoria_DV1

Canberra Men’s Centre Outwardly compassionate about men’s welfare but it’s been suggested that CMC are a feminist ‘Trojan horse’ that dances to the men bad/woman victim tune. Their annual report for the year ending 30 June 2013 (the most recent in their web site as of March 2015) informs us that they received around $2 million from the ACT Dept. of Disability, Housing and Community Services in both 2011/12 and 2012/13. Their main expenses were lease payments ($340,118 in 2012/13) and salaries ($277,799 in 2012/13).

Safe Steps Family Violence Resource Centre (web site and Facebook page)

This Victorian organisation first came to my attention when I heard about a function they were planning for 6 May 2015 at which they will be lighting candles for women and children. On 27 April 2015 I submitted a cordial post to their Facebook page just querying why men killed through domestic violence would not be similarly remembered. Well, that post was deleted faster than you can say ‘feminist censorship’.

One hundred per cent female directors and staff (Source, see p9)

Total income in both 2012/13 and 2013/14 exceeded $3 million – nature of source not disclosed. Salary costs and director remuneration not disclosed (p10)

Fast forward to 28 January 2020 and Safe Steps issued this tweet:

“Women, children and young people are not the only ones affected by #familyviolence. Often, women need to leave but are reluctant to leave their beloved pet behind. We assist where possible to enable women and their children to leave safely with their pets.”

That’s right, no men in the families that this group deals with. Funny thing that.

(Other groups in the queue for consideration include: Science in Australia Gender Equity, OWN NSW … )

Elsewhere in this blog you might be interested in reading:

So what exactly is the ‘Domestic Violence Industry’?

Re-instatement of the Women’s Budget Statement in Australia? Bring it on, but consider men too

Profound gender bias at the Australian Human Rights Commission (Part 1)

The Australian Human Rights Commission (previously the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission) is a statutory body funded by, but operating independently of, the Australian Government.

The Commission falls under the portfolio of the Attorney-General of Australia. The Commission works within the legal framework of Australian law. The most relevant legislation in the context of this post is the Sex Discrimination Act 1984, the most recent version of which can be accessed here (as at August 2016).

As at 30 June 2022 the gender ratio for ongoing full-time staff was 74% female and 26% male. For all staff however the ratio of men to women is 20% and 80% respectively (Annual report 2021-2022, p124).

The Commission has a number of specialist commissioners, with gender issues being primarily addressed by a ‘Sex Discrimination Commissioner’. The most recent Commissioner was Kate Jenkins who undertook her duties from April 2016 to April 2023. “She ends her term with the sincere thanks of the Albanese Labor Government for improving the lives of Australian women.” Kate is to be replaced by Dr Anna Cody, whose appointment will commence on 4 September 2023.

Elizabeth Broderick served as Commissioner from 2007 to September 2015. This blog post addresses that earlier period, whilst a further post deals with the subsequent period (up until September 2023).

Thus far all eight people selected to fill the role of ‘Sex Discrimination Commissioner’ have been female.

According to the AHRC web site:

“Human rights recognise the inherent value of each person, regardless of background, where we live, what we look like, what we think or what we believe.

They are based on principles of dignity, equality and mutual respect, which are shared across cultures, religions and philosophies. They are about being treated fairly, treating others fairly and having the ability to make genuine choices in our daily lives.

Respect for human rights is the cornerstone of strong communities in which everyone can make a contribution and feel included.”

See also ‘Equal rights of men and women

A review of their literature, however, suggests that the AHRC is infinitely more concerned about the welfare and rights of those humans that are female, than they are about the other half of the population.

A word search on “men” within the AHRC web site turned up 912 results, which was promising. Or at least it was until I looked at the first few results. Two of the top three results were papers about domestic violence and harassment, in which men were portrayed (only) as the aggressors and women (only) as the victims:

The first paper ‘Men breaking the silence’, by Elizabeth Broderick, began as follows:

“Gender-based violence is a form of discrimination that seriously inhibits women’s ability to enjoy rights and freedoms on a basis of equality with men.  Attitudes by which women are regarded as subordinate to men or as having negative stereotyped roles perpetuate widespread practices involving violence or coercion, such as domestic and family violence and abuse, sexual assault and sexual harassment. In Australia, too many women live in fear of violence every day.”

In my blog post entitled Domestic violence is not a gendered issue – Why the pervasive sexist bias against men? I provide many references supporting the assertion that there are as many women guilty of intimate partner violence as there are men, or close to it. But Ms Broderick’s paper gives no hint of there being substantial numbers of male victims and female perpetrators of domestic violence … why?

What useful purpose, with regards to the goal of protecting human rights, is served by demonising men and giving violent women a free pass?

The second paper in the AHRC web site, ‘Sexual harassment. Know where the line is‘, begins thus:

“Sexual harassment is prevalent in Australian workplaces. One in four women have experienced harassment at work, and mens harassment of other men is also on the rise. Nearly one in five complaints received by the Australian Human Rights Commission under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) relate to sexual harassment.”

Even given the often compromised standards of feminism, that’s a fairly disingenuous opening gambit. Consider:

One in four women have experienced harassment at work”

How many of these complaints related to the harassment of women by men? How many of these complaints were upheld?

“and mens harassment of other men is also on the rise”

That seems to imply that only men harass men, and that is simply untrue. And what about womens harassment of women, is that also on the rise? One would expect that, in the case of a professional agency like this, adequate context would be provided to evaluate statements like this.

“Nearly one in five complaints received by the Australian Human Rights Commission under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) relate to sexual harassment.”

And again, how many of these complaints concerned the harassment of women by men, and how many fell into the other categories? i.e. men harassing men, women harassing women, and women harassing men.

I then looked at other papers either written by Elizabeth Broderick, or in which she was quoted, to see the extent to which her views favoured one gender over another. What I found was of considerable concern.

In my blog post entitled Harassment and discrimination in the workplace: Surprise, surprise, it goes both ways I mentioned an article co-authored by Ms Broderick. That article is called Know where the line is: Melissa Hoyer and Elizabeth Broderick address sexual harassment. I would recommend that you read the article and especially the readers comments that follow – most of which expressed outrage at the extent of feminist bias on display.

In another article entitled ‘Gender on Agenda‘ (Courier Mail, 4 June 2014), Ms Broderick “expressed dismay” at the small number of women on company boards and suggested the imposition of gender quotas to be an appropriate response.  As I have noted here, here and here, the justification for imposing gender quotas is dubious.

Ms Broderick has on many occasions expressed concern at the treatment of sexual harassment of women in the workplace. As far as I am aware, however, she has consistently failed to address the extent to which men are also affected by harassment and discrimination at work.

Further browsing in the AHRC web site and google searching on ‘Elizabeth Broderick’ turned up many further articles and speeches in a similar vein. This recent speech entitled ‘Towards a Gender Equal Australia‘ (18 November 2014) only makes mention of men due to their potential utility in achieving further gains for women. Men apparently have no issues of their own to deal with or, alternatively, Ms Broderick considers any such needs to be inconsequential.

Would someone please correct me if I am wrong, but I could not find a single instance where Ms Broderick expressed concern for the welfare of men, for example as victims of harassment, sexual assault, or domestic violence. Instead men were consistently cited as perpetrators of inappropriate behaviour (or at least complicit in such behaviour) and/or as the group to be held responsible for making changes or implementing initiatives to address problems experienced by women.

As far as I am aware Ms. Broderick has offered no corresponding statements in relation to the need for women to modify their own behaviour, or concerning women’s responsibility towards addressing problems experienced by men.

Further, I have seen very little acknowledgement being given to the contributions made by men in achieving progress on issues of inequality or disadvantage affecting women. The one exception was her own Male Champions of Change project, a program fitting safely within the confines of feminist dogma. Again, if this is incorrect then I would certainly appreciate a reader directing me towards any such statements of support.

In Ms Broderick’s eyes, it would seem that the life of men is all blue skies. Yet when it comes to womens dealings with men, well, ‘all rights and no fault/responsibility’ seems to pretty much sum things up.

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick concedes that the Australian Human Rights Commission has no initiatives targeting men. “We have very limited resources, so our work is necessarily directed at identifying the greatest areas of gender inequality,” Broderick says. “So, while we actively engage with men and some of the men’s groups, we have not directly worked on men’s rights issues.” (Source)

One facet of the degree of bias displayed by Ms Broderick is the inaccuracy evident in some of the statements attributed to her. For example, in this 2014 interview with Jackie Frank she stated:

“About 1.2 million women [in Australia] currently live in an intimate relationship characterised by physical violence”

In actual fact the most recent nationally representative survey found that 114,600 Australian women report having experienced violence from a current or previous partner during the preceding twelve months (Source). A tenfold exaggeration? Really?

The ‘Misinformation’ page within the website of the ‘One in Three’ organisation also attributes the following errors to Ms. Broderick:

“One in three women will live in an intimate relationship characterised by violence over her lifetime”. Correction by ‘One in Three’: “the Personal Safety Survey 2005 found that 160,100 women have experienced violence from a current partner since the age of 15. This is 2.08% of Australian women. This equates to one in forty eight women.”

“Almost 90% of the victims of domestic violence are female”. Correction by ‘One in Three’: “Up to two-thirds of domestic violence victims are female, and at least one third are male.”

From ‘Tackling sexual harassment’ a resource for secondary school students produced by the AHRC:

“Girls can sexually harass boys. Although this doesn’t happen as often as boys harassing girls.” (p9) Based on what data source? How/why is this even relevant to note in this document?

“Complaints received by the Commission show that 95% of people who are harassed are female.” No, what this actually says is that 95% of people who lodged complaints were female – not the same thing.

Such a degree of unashamed bias is completely unacceptable. This is the ‘Human Rights Commission’ we are talking about, not a private lobby group or women’s studies centre. Australian men, and the women who care about their welfare, deserve an advocate who is willing and able to competently and energetically champion the interests of both women/girls and men/boys. The Australian community as a whole deserves better.

Given Ms Broderick’s failure to maintain even a modicum of impartiality, one hopes that the termination of her contract in September 2015 will see the appointment of someone better qualified to fulfil the responsibilities of this important role.

humanrights

Gender equality‘ does not imply that women and men are the same, but that they have equal value and should be accorded equal treatment (Source). Is the approach taken by the AHRC in accord with that definition? Or alternatively, is it more consistent with this one?

broderick2

Scroll through the Commissioner’s Twitter stream and look for tweets in which she champions the interests of men and boys … are there any? Even one?

This raises the issue of whether members of the public are able to lodge a complaint regarding discrimination with the Commission, against the Commission itself. If any readers can answer that then please leave a comment below. An alternative course of action might be via the federal Attorney-General’s Department.

Developments at the AHRC subsequent to the departure of Ms Broderick, and which are related to gender issues, are discussed in this blog post. For those of you wondering about the next step in Ms. Broderick’s career, read this article by Miranda Devine.

Readers might find the references listed below to be of interest … Where applicable I would suggest that it’s worthwhile to also review readers comments appended to each source

Equal Rights of Men and Women, from the AHRC website. No mention of any specific rights for men and boys (undated)

Wikipedia entry on domestic violence against men

Elizabeth Broderick nets $10k per speaking gig (4 February 2016)

Government seeks advice on new sex discrimination commissioner (11 December 2015)

Finalists for the 2015 Human Rights Community Award announced (9 November 2015) See how many of the finalists work to advance/protect the rights of men/boys. Apparently none!? The winner, by the way, was Ludo McFerran

Who will replace Elizabeth Broderick as Sex Discrimination Commissioner? by Jenna Price (6 November 2015) “We must all call on the government to do the right thing and appoint the best woman to the job”

Men are not regarded as ‘Human’ thanks to Feminist legislation in Australia (17 September 2015)

Ms. Broderick’s swansong … true to type right to the end … no support for men/boys, just criticism (2 September 2015) More of the same here and here. I predict that her next gig will be a well-remunerated slot within the Domestic Violence Industry, helping to spend Malcolm Turnbull’s recent generous hand-out.

Men and women must work as partners to defeat domestic violence, outgoing Sex Discrimination Commissioner says (2 September 2015)

Profile of the work of Elizabeth Broderick over the past eight years, by Anne Summers (May 2015) Word search on ‘women’ = 61 hits Word search on ‘men’ = 6 hits (two of which were negative, one neutral and four about the ‘Champions of Change’ program)

To attain gender equality, we need to focus on men (13 May 2015) But this “focus on men”, is wholly limited to their potential utility to help women. Features a reader’s comment by J.D.Troughton:

“I still see a total focus on women here. We need to also incorporate respect and protection for men, and elevating them in instances of their being discriminated against. It’s a judgement call, a subjective assessment, but women look to have it better than men, to me. A feminist will say the opposite. We can’t honour one over the other on sexist grounds (eg. gynocentrism, our culture’s inherent tendency to give more weight to female suffering of the same burdens, etc.), so we need to hear both out and help both sexes. And not just make jokes about penis size, or accuse someone of bitterness and personal issues when they say that dominant gender discussion is very skewed and prejudiced. I mean, you can do that, but you just add to my case. And look like a heartless curmudgeon. And perpetuate the pain that ends up hurting the women you hold solely so dear.”

‘Let’s talk: The shocking new tricks that men use to control wives’ (31 March 2015) Ms. Broderick is interviewed by the Australian Womens Weekly magazine

Gary Johns and Judith Sloane won’t limit Broderick’s plans (11 August 2014)

Calls to change laws to fix women’s superannuation (13 November 2014) Not content to ignore men’s welfare and overstate the culpability of men for social issues like domestic violence, the Discrimination Commissioner now seeks to grant exceptions to discrimination laws to favour women at a time when traditional gender roles (with regards to parenting for example) are disappearing:

“Rice Warner got an exemption from Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick to contribute an extra two per cent of salary in superannuation contributions for their female employees over and above what they contribute for their male employees.”

Elizabeth Broderick on men’s violence towards women (3 December 2014) More of the same one-eyed assessment of the nature of domestic violence. And women never smash their partners phones? And as is so typically the case, my response to this blog post was not published

Bravehearts: The women bruised and battered in the name of ‘love’ (28 December 2014) Here Ms Broderick provides debunked statistics in her quest to demonise men and misrepresent the nature of domestic violence.

On 8 December 2014 Ms Broderick tweeted about the alarming suicide rate for “young people” but no mention of the situation with men. I imagine it slipped her mind. And isn’t it interesting how gender is specified when doing so supports the feminist narrative, but not when it doesn’t?

Does the Human Rights Commission treat some groups more equally than others? (9 July 2013)

Superiority in the name of equality (29 June 2013)

Open Letter to Elizabeth Broderick Australia’s Sex Discrimination Commissioner (10 April 2012)

Sex discrimination commissioner ignores men and boys (3 May 2012)

The Commissioner for discrimination against men (21 July 2012) It was suggested that the AHRC provide some information in their web site to mark International Men’s Day (as they do every year for International Women’s Day). The response was this was not possible due to resourcing constraints. Four years later there is still no mention of International Men’s Day within the AHRC web site. It is a disgrace for the AHRC to suggest that it is committed to “true gender equality”.

It’s hard to be a trailblazing woman (11 August 2012)

Elizabeth Broderick Sex Discrimination Commissioner, 50 (4 February 2012) Again, men as perpetrators and enablers of the victimisation of women, and otherwise only notable for their potential utility in assisting in the continued advancement of women

Discrimination is fine, says Commissioner Two-Legs-Good, by Andrew Bolt (23 June 2010)

“We need to put in place what some might call affirmative action strategies, where we treat men and women differently for the purpose of achieving better gender balance at a senior level.”

AHRC1

Elsewhere within this blog readers might find the following post to be of interest: 

Since when did it become acceptable for public servants to block people on social media in the absence of threats or abuse? Since now it would seem – Prawn of the Patriarchy (fighting4fair.com)

Australian taxpayer-funded organisations that do little/nothing for men (other than demonising them)

Not all feminists are like that (NAFALT)

In this post I want to address two related issues. The first is the standard feminist cop-out when publicly confronted with some truly egregious comment or action by a self-identified feminist. That default response is to assert that the feminist in question is some sort of outlier or crank, and not representative of feminists generally, viz. “yes, but, not all feminists are like that!”.

Of course it is damning of feminism as a movement that the ‘real’ feminists never seem to criticize the ‘bad’ ones. In fact it seems to me that the only women or girls that feminists ever criticize are the ones who are openly critical of some or all aspects of feminism.

A related feminist concoction arises in the form of the term ‘straw feminist‘,  as used to describe (what feminists claim to be) an evil and inaccurate caricature of a feminist invented and used by MRA to denigrate the feminist cause. What an insult to our intelligence … why would we need to invent such a person when we can see and hear them with our very own eyes?! Denial on a grand scale or simply ignorant of reality?

See also:

Suzanne Moore: Why I was wrong about men (5 September 2016) Another hater. Related Reddit discussion thread here.

I’m Sick of Having to Reassure Men That Feminism Isn’t About Hating Them (9 August 2016)

“Nice” feminism: How a hate movement uses its grassroots against men, by Hannah Wallen (4 June 2016) Recommended reading

Everybody Hates @PennyRed (And Really, How Can You Blame Them?) (22 March 2016)

Why Do People Hate #Feminism? #8 – Yes All Feminists, by Sargon of Akkad (8 March 2016) Video

Feminists don’t hate men? (5 March 2016) Video response to a male feminist

Conservative Feminism, by Nina Silander (19 August 2015)

Guardian Columnist Julie Bindel Says Put All Males ‘In Some Kind of Camp’ (6 September 2015)

5 Feminists Who Will Completely Amaze You (14 May 2015)

Not all feminists are like that‘, a video by John the Other

An open letter to feminists: “What are you doing about it?”(25 January 2015)

Sex trouble: Radical feminism and the long shadow of the ‘Lavender Menace’ (14 July 2014)

“Nice” feminists: How a hate movement uses its grassroots against men, by Hannah Wallen (10 February 2014)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQWoNhrY_fM (by GirlWritesWhat)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6qg8Up3PnU (by A Voice for Men/John the Other)

http://www.genderratic.com/p/3300/misandry-nalt-and-nafalt-and-how-feminists-can-rebut-the-charge-that-they-are-all-man-haters/

http://reyekomra.wordpress.com/2013/06/23/the-national-organization-for-women/

http://breakingtheglasses.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/yes-all-feminists-are-like-that.html#.U0oDOlWSySo

http://www.reasonobeysitself.com/blog/feminism/on-not-all-feminists-are-like-that/

http://www.reasonobeysitself.com/blog/?page_id=1531

http://it-goes-both-ways.tumblr.com/post/56899376763/not-all-feminists-are-like-that-johntheother

http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/not-all-feminists-are-like-that-3/

http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/22w99g/feminism_is_a_popular_institution_for_which_all/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

See also this reddit discussion: http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/23a4p2/an_example_of_feminism_done_right/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

The flip side: Not all men are like that Once again, some great insights amongst the readers comments at the end of the article

Take the test: Feminist shenanigans or satire? (30 April 2014)

The second thing I want to do in this post is to profile some feminists who really ARE not like that. These are people who do support equality, and are on the same page with many of the issues of concern to MHRA. It must also be recognised that many of those now active in the Mens Human Rights movement were formerly feminists but crossed over upon realising the flaws and hypocrisy of both feminist doctrine and feminist activism. An excellent example of such a person is Warren Farrell, the author of the seminal work ‘The Myth of Male Power‘. 

Another example of a feminist who saw value in the message of the Mens Human Rights Movement is provided in this video interview

Doris Lessing (See also http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/aug/14/edinburghfestival2001.edinburghbookfestival2001)

doris_lessing

Christina Hoff Sommers is an American author and former philosophy professor who is known for her critique of late 20th century feminism, and her writings about feminism in contemporary American culture. Her most widely discussed books are Who Stole Feminism? How Women Have Betrayed Women and The War Against Boys: How Misguided Feminism Is Harming Our Young Men. Although her critics refer to her as anti-feminist, Sommers thinks of herself as an equity feminist who faults contemporary feminism for “its irrational hostility to men, its recklessness with facts and statistics, and its inability to take seriously the possibility that the sexes are equal – but different.”

“The orthodox feminists are so carried away with victimology, with a rhetoric of male-bashing that it’s full of female chauvinists, if you will. Also, women are quite eager to censor, to silence. And what concerns me most as a philosopher is it’s become very anti-intellectual, and I think it poses a serious risk to young women in the universities. Women’s studies classes are increasingly a kind of initiation into the most radical wing, the most intolerant wing, of the feminist movement.”

Christina Hoff Sommers is mentioned in this article: http://masculistfeminist.hubpages.com/hub/Is-Antifeminism-Useful-For-Mens-Rights-Mostly-Yes-Sometimes-No

http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/why-still-a-feminist-a-question-for-christina-hoff-sommers/ (16 June 2014)

And here is Christina is in an interview and profiled in a more recent article (13 April 2015)

Camille Paglia, who was recently asked “what’s wrong with American feminism today, and what can it do to improve?“, to which she replied:

“After the great victory won by my insurgent, pro-sex, pro-fashion wing of feminism in the 1990s, American and British feminism has amazingly collapsed backward again into whining, narcissistic victimology. As in the hoary old days of Gloria Steinem and her Stalinist cohorts, we are endlessly subjected to the hackneyed scenario of history as a toxic wasteland of vicious male oppression and gruesome female suffering.

College campuses are hysterically portrayed as rape extravaganzas where women are helpless fluffs with no control over their own choices and behavior. I am an equal opportunity feminist: that is, I call for the removal of all barriers to women’s advance in the professional and political realms. However, I oppose special protections for women, which I reject as demeaning and infantilizing.

My principal demand (as I have been repeating for nearly 25 years) is for colleges to confine themselves to education and to cease their tyrannical surveillance of students’ social lives. If a real crime is committed, it must be reported to the police. College officials and committees have neither the expertise nor the legal right to be conducting investigations into he said/she said campus dating fiascos. Too many of today’s young feminists seem to want hovering, paternalistic authority figures to protect and soothe them, an attitude I regard as servile, reactionary and glaringly bourgeois. The world can never be made totally safe for anyone, male or female: there will always be sociopaths and psychotics impervious to social controls. I call my system “street-smart feminism”:  there is no substitute for wary vigilance and personal responsibility.” (Source)

Karen DeCrow (1937-2014)

http://www.avoiceformen.com/mens-rights/a-karen-decrow-appreciation/

http://m.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/06/the-now-president-who-became-a-mens-rights-activist/372742/

toolateSome other relevant posts within this blog:

About feminism & how it’s not about hating men
On the censorship of non-feminist perspectives and opinions
Beware the ire of an angry feminist
If feminists have a genuine case then what’s with all the distortion, lies and exaggeration?

How men are portrayed … Haw Haw Haw! The jokes on us

The last few decades have seen men increasingly portrayed in a negative light, basically it’s now a choice between lazy, inept, evil, stupid, or creepy. Concerns raised about this trend are generally dismissed along the lines of “relax, it’s just a joke!”. Funny thing though, ‘jokes’ made about women elicit a very different reaction.

“Men have always made fun of themselves,” said New York Times best-selling author and social philosopher Michael Gurian. “The kind of things that are done with men in the media would never be done with women, and that’s just sort of a given. But men don’t mind. They live by joking and putting each other down and lifting each other up. But the negative is that they can only be OK if the rest of society has a basic understanding and respect for boys and men.” (Source)

I’m tired of Hollywood trying to sell me on the concept of “loveable idiots”, and I am disheartened by the ubiquitous content that tears men down. I love filling my life with laughter, however why are my current content choices trying to get me to laugh at a reduced version of men? Why is Hollywood trying to get me to focus on the broken-down, allegorical version of who they think my husband is? Obviously they don’t know my husband. (Source)

Now take a look at this article that appeared in that dreadful magazine ‘Cosmopolitan‘. It’s all about the ways that women are said to be better than men. Stomach-turning sexist tosh. Ah, but then treat yourself to this excellent rebuttal by Janet Bloomfield.

One wonders whether this ongoing negative portrayal of men reinforces hostility towards men, which may in turn influence the rate of partner violence towards men as addressed in this other blog post.

The various sources listed below discuss this issue in depth and/or provide specific examples of negative ways in which men are presented in the media and/or are subsequently perceived in the community-at-large:

Landmark research study finds clear evidence of pro-women/anti-men bias (28 September 2024)

Stop Calling Suspected Killers “Nice Guys”: The Media Has To Do Better In Its Reporting Of Violence Against Women (12 July 2024) and ‘Can we once and for all dispense with this tedious “But he always took the bins out and said hello” commentary, as if there was a contradiction here that needed explaining‘ (12 July 2024) These two items ignore pertinent facts like (1) women kill too, and (2) women are more likely to be described as a ‘good mum’ (or similar) than are men described in the media as a ‘good bloke’ (or similar)

Runner whose kids nearly stopped her winning half-marathon defends husband (28 May 2024)

Regarding a meme about women going to the woods with a bear versus a man (April 2024) This Twitter thread is just one mention of this topic

A February 2024 Twitter stream of relevance to this blog post

Men, if you’re guilty of this, your wife will probably leave you (4 December 2023) Gee, wouldn’t it be interesting to read the husband’s version of events? But you never will, of course.

Men deserve care and compassion too (17 September 2023) UK

Are we implicitly biased against men? New study finds a “positive” bias towards women (8 April 2023)

Why Men don’t write about Sex and Dating (31 March 2023)

The war on ‘toxic masculinity’ makes struggling boys, men prey for Andrew Tate (5 April 2023)

The hen-pecked hero (24 January 2023)

Of Marx and Men, by Damien Coory (14 January 2023)

Misandry in Ads (a video from 2015)

Trashing men in the movies, by Bettina Arndt (28 September 2022)

Buy a real shaver – Jeremy’s razors (22 March 2022) Video satire

Ukraine’s disposable men (9 March 2022)

Why must every man on TV today be a monster? As a tidal wave of male-hating shows depicts women as victims (17 November 2021)

The dangerous pleasure of hating men (13 November 2021)

Of Bond, villains, and the average boy  (15 October 2021)

Should we be concerned about the messages that men and boys are exposed to? (2 September 2021)

Sarah Everard missing: Why a curfew for men isn’t a bad idea (12 March 2021) Can you imagine a similar story saying women should be subject to a curfew? Err .. no

Oh but this US game show is so funny. Now swap genders and listen to the laughs drying up (18 May 2020) Video, and here is a link to a Twitter discussion stream.

The team working for McDonalds fast-food chain (Mumbrella) seem destined to produce a Gillette-style campaign, but targeting boys (3 February 2020) “Just a bit a fun say the advertisers, while boys get demonised for slamming doors in girls’ faces” observes Bettina Arndt.

The marketing team at Lee Jeans thinks it’s ok to disparage men on the basis that only men spread over seats on public transport (July 2019) Tedious sexism. Video

A new German commercial takes man-hating to the next level (9 May 2019) Edeka takes up where Gillette left off

ABC’s The Drum – We’re all misogynists now (14 April 2019) Another great Scott Crowe video

The Victorian Government (Australia) has issued a video highlighting the horror of women receiving unwanted attention on public transport, and – surprise surprise – calling on men to step in and deal with other men (9 April 2019). ‘Independent Man’ responds to this rather well with his own video.

Ten things not to say to/about your husband (9 February 2010) Video. How rarely is this type of message encountered? Women have corresponding obligations to their spouse? What?

What is a man? A response to Gillette (January 2019) Video

Happy International Men’s Day, by Tom Golden (19 November 2018) Video

National Trust covers up male busts (6 November 2018) UK

White men are now the Democratic Party’s punching bag, by Saritha Prabhu (29 October 2018)

Rethinking Gender, Sexuality, and Violence, by Gideon Scopes (25 October 2017)

The mysterious invisibility of men’s good deeds, by Mark Dent (14 July 2018)

The beginning of the end, by Mark Dent (25 June 2018)

Men, you want to treat women better? Here’s a list to start with (17 October 2017) See the readers comments plus a related Reddit discussion thread here.

Sexual Assault Survivors Aren’t Just Daughters. They’re Actually Humans (12 October 2017) Stuff like this does my head in. Men shamed for speaking about the female experience (men can’t possibly understand!) Men shamed for not condemning sexual harassment (enough). Mainstream media runs many articles claiming that men only begin to understand women when they have a daughter (example1). Men feel unqualified to express a view so use justification of having daughter (etc) to qualify themselves as having a right to express a view. Men shamed for being seen to need to justify their views on the basis of having a daughter. Back to start and repeat.

Amanda Platell on the misandrous makers of TV drama (7 October 2017)

Does the NRL have a culture problem? (13 September 2017) Video

The Violent Sex (9 July 2017)

Complaint regarding BBC program that presented domestic violence against men as humorous (5 May 2017)

Between 1920 and 2005, men in USA increased their unpaid housework contribution x 3. Haven’t seen that acknowledged in any one of those countless articles about how men are such slackers around the house.

We Need More Balance In The Media’s Depiction Of Men (13 April 2017)

When did men (particularly dads) become so idiotic? (3 March 2017)

Why I won’t let any male babysit my children, by Kasey Edwards (23 February 2017) Australia. My subsequent blog post concerning both this article, and various follow-up articles, can be found here.

The myth of white male supremacy (14 February 2017)

Husbands Are Deadlier Than Terrorists (11 February 2017) USA. Wives are too, but saying that won’t get the author a tummy scratch from the feminist lobby. The thing is, even if the author had titled this piece ‘Spouses are deadlier that terrorists’, it would not have detracted from the main thrust of the article one iota … ie. completely superfluous sexism. (My readers comment is here)

‘Women kicking balls, I’d like to see that’ (22 January 2017) New ad campaign promoting women’s sport. How about ‘Men grabbing pussy, I’d like to see that’. Hmm, still not funny.

Son, let me tell you all about how dadsplaining works (13 January 2017) Whether this piece was a weak & inappropriate attempt at humour, or a serious bid for a tummy-scratch from feminists, it undermines the role of men/fathers at a time when we need to be doing the very opposite.

Cab firm is forced to pull ‘derogatory and sexist’ ad campaign featuring an overweight model with the slogan ‘If I start to look sexy book a taxi’ (4 January 2017) No complaints about sleazy man poster – you can portray men any way you like.

Advertising Standards Board rules Allpest commercial ‘vilifies’ husbands (29 December 2016)

An open letter to men, who can help female runners feel safe (6 December 2016)

Sell a sticker like this that says anything other than “men” – I dare you (undated)

Misandrist advertisements (1 December 2016) Reddit discussion thread

Stock photographers have all got the same idea of what it looks like when things go wrong in bed (17 November 2016) Reddit discussion thread and linked article.

Hating men is mainstream (23 September 2016)

Social Justice’s Punching Bags: Men, White People, Straight People (17 September 2016)

White men are being blamed for everything‘ by Mark Latham (30 August 2016) Australia

The all men (and only men) are potential serial killers meme: ‘What mass killers really have in common’, by Rebecca Traister (17 July 2016), and ‘One group is responsible for America’s culture of violence, and it isn’t cops, black Americans, Muslims or rednecks. It’s men‘, by Melissa Batchelor Warnke

Andrea Leadsom suggests men should not be nannies because they may be paedophiles (15 July 2016) UK. This gender bigot is a senior member of the newly-appointed British cabinet. A subsequent article regarding the reaction to Ms Leadsom’s odious comments.

Doting dad’s hilarious approach to housework (2 July 2016)

Can’t you take a joke, love? Why the ‘banter’ isn’t funny any more (20 June 2016) This article listed here as a further example of how feminist journalists are so wonderfully adept at describing problems affecting both genders as female-only issues. Meanwhile ‘jokes’ about men continue to go unchallenged.

Michelle Obama urges men at women’s summit to ‘be better’ (14 June 2016)

Top 10: Worst male-bashing ads (undated)

War On Women? OK, But What About The War On Men?  (10 May 2016) USA

Scientists show how we start stereotyping the moment we see a face (2 May 2016)

“Although the participants didn’t personally endorse those stereotypes, it’s clear that they affected the participants’ unconscious thinking. Stereotypes can be like poison in the water we all swim in, and the brain, like a sponge, absorbs them, Freeman said, even when we don’t want it to.”

Hot Fuzz comes to Plymouth as women beg to be arrested by sexy new Chief Superintendent (29 April 2016) UK

Anyone seen the new TV advert for BT? I’m sure a woman slaps the man. Gender violence? (24 April 2016) UK

Chilling  Australian PSA shows how boys learn domestic violence (21 April 2016)

Charlie Bloom: Advertisers cash in on the feminist thirst for male humiliation (22 March 2016) UK

What’s the value of that item? Walmart does the #ManMath (16 March 2016)

Powerful Ad Urging Husbands To Help With Chores Goes Viral (2 March 2016) with related Reddit discussion thread here

Branded for life? Sending the wrong message to young perpetrators of family violence (24 March 2016) Typical feminism-inspired ‘education’ campaign that piles all the sins of DV at the feet of men/youth. The value of such campaigns is dubious to begin with, but it should have featured some female perpetrators. Naturally this article, in pro-feminist The Conversation, conveniently ignores that issue. Here is a video of a similar campaign now underway in the UK – again no hint of there being any female perpetration.

Heineken’s ‘Drink Responsibly’ TV ad (January 2016) Only men drink to excess. ‘Good men’ don’t drink to excess. ‘Good men’ get to go home with a hot girl. The subliminal message here being that men’s irresponsible behaviour is best addressed through a combination of shaming and dangling the carrot of sexual gratification. This not-so-flattering portrayal of men dreamt up in the (I’m guessing) feminist-sodden environment of some ad agency or another. Sure they score a point for making an effort to reduce over-consumption of a pernicious legal drug, but they lose two for lacking the courage & conviction to produce a companion ad for the ‘I’m so drunk!’ millennial female set.

Men have it tough in the social minefield, writes Jess Leo (7 February 2016) Australia

Advertisers now portray men the way they portrayed women in the 1950s: as either dumb or pretty, by Martin Daubney (27 January 2016) UK. Related reddit mensrights discussion thread here

When Gender Hatred Is ‘Funny’, by Mark Dent (20 January 2016) Australia

It’s comic schtick, not sexism: Why it’s OK for Julia Morris to drool over Dr Chris (18 January 2016) Australia

A poor start to the year for the Men of Australia (6 January 2016) Australia

You’re going the wrong way (2 January 2016) Australia

On Hating Men (16 December 2015) USA

Pajama Boy Redux: The Male in Modern Society (20 November 2015)

Emma Freedman: The terrible dates we can all learn from (16 October 2015) Perhaps there have also been similar articles about women who were terrible dates, but I can’t remember seeing them

How to stop mass shootings (2 October 2015)

The feminization of America accelerates as universities shame men for being men (20 September 2015)

Australians, horror fans and 80s kids will understand this. The descent of masculinity from hero to evil (14 July 2015)

The depiction of dads as schmucks by ad agencies (June 2015)

Astute Dr Elizabeth Celi UNRAVELS Truth about Men in todays Feminist world (11 June 2015) Video. Australia

Why this is the end of the dumb dad era (7 May 2015)

Society’s Contempt For Men – Barbara Kay Explains – Men’s Rights Feminists’ wrongs (5 May 2015) Video

Too many young men with negative attitudes to sex and violence, survey finds (7 May 2015) And what of the attitudes of young women? We’re not told, and increasingly surveys don’t even bother to explore that side of the equation. This article is typical of the one-sided (anti-male) hit-pieces continually being fed to the public by left-leaning progressive journalists, eagerly supplied by obliging local feminist advocacy groups. Agenda? What agenda?

Study: Men are lazy to their core (7 May 2015) and related reddit mensrights discussion thread

The denigration of men: Ridiculed, abused and exploited, by Peter Lloyd (18 April 2015)

Norwegian TV commercial (Youtube video dated 12 July 2010) and subsequent reddit mensrights discussion thread (March 2015)

Men are now objectified more than women (9 February 2015)

‘Men Are Good’: the Facebook group that says men aren’t all bad (4 March 2015)

BBC Woman’s Hour hides the fact that male voters are more supportive of women leaders (7 February 2015)

Sorry, it’s a boy” – Superbowl advertisement (2 February 2015)

Man-slamming: another reason to slam men (10 January 2015)

Proved at last: Men really are idiots (12 December 2014) and of course Jezebel gleefully jumped in with a companion piece. Related reddit mensrights discussion thread here which discusses the flipside of this issue. And here is a related article by ‘Inside Man’ magazine that’s well worth a read.

Wet wipes blocking Sydney sewers as more men flush them down the toilet (7 December 2014) Yeah sure, and the sample size of the survey that determined that men were flushing wet-wipes, was how small? This article would have been worth writing if it had suggested promoting the use of Asian-style ‘bum-guns’ in Australia, but they chose to waste bandwidth with another hit-piece on men instead.

Parents warned of dangers of Santa’s lap (5 December 2014)

Men need to stop taking up so much room on public transport by Janet Bloomfield (16 September 2014)

Most advertisers keep up with ever-changing family roles (24 August 2014)

Men still hidden as victims of violence in the home (24 November 2014)

The internet hates men, and no one’s a winner (13 November 2014)

YouTube video of men trying to take ‘drunk girl’ home with them receives nearly 3 million views (12 November 2014) All articles admitted that the video was probably staged but were content to promote it anyway, because it was “shocking” and “disturbing”, and perfectly supports the dominant ‘all men are pigs’ trope. A subsequent article confirmed that people were recruited to ‘star’ in the video.

Miranda Devine: Stop your bitching about poor Bachelor Blake Garvey (12 October 2014)

It’s Time to Retire the ‘Dumb Dad’ Joke Once and for All by Mike Cruse (7 November 2014)

Casual misandry (4 November 2014)

Misandry in the media A video series on Youtube

Why do television shows belittle the feelings of men? (2 November 2014) Reddit mensrights discussion thread

It would have been disingenuous at best to pretend that a male subject could represent such systemic abuse” (27 April 2012) Because men are never victims so how could they ever understand?

The “real man” dogma (15 October 2014)

I hate this insidious trend for belittling men, says Melissa Kite (23 October 2014)

When it comes to depictions of men, gutter glossies and ivory tower feminists are on the same page (16 October 2014)

How to get kicked in the nuts (October 2014) Because assaulting men is soooo funny!

Nine out of ten people pictured in charity posters are women (25 September 2014) As people have no sympathy for men

Don’t take pot shots at fathers (24 September 2014)

For Father’s Day give us men who aren’t shown as fools and clowns (5 September 2014)

When is ‘Violence against men day’? (1 September 2014)

Ad watchdog dismissed complaints against ‘Man-proof your car’ ads (4 August 2014)

Michelle Obama says women are smarter than men (6 August 2014) and here are Jessica Valenti’s bigoted views on the matter

http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/mans-penis-mistakenly-amputated-during-routine-circumcision/story-fneuzlbd-1227001450218 (25 July 2014) Oh look at the funny pictures that accompany the article! Why is it that I doubt they would use the same pics if the article was about a women who had one breast removed by mistake? Oh, that’s right, because it wouldn’t be funny then.

Are advertisers finally beginning to take dads seriously? (14 August 2014)

The Early Learning Centre’s ‘funny’ Facebook post (17 August 2014) Companies contemplating similar sexist advertising might want to read some of the comments on the ELC Facebook page.

Make men better (such pigs) (September 2014)

Do men start wars? (7 August 2014)

If men acted like feminists, by Thunderf00t (28 June 2014) Video

When gender hatred is funny (10 June 2014)

Retire the bumbling husband: He isn’t helping (21 July 2014)

Ad watchdog dismisses complaints that White Ribbon anti-violence campaign is sexist (26 September 2013)

It’s Time to Stop Treating Dads Like Idiots (25 April 2013)

Double Standards? Representation of Male vs. Female Sex Offenders in the Australian Media (2009)

http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/2b9vet/vicks_directs_flippant_disdain_toward_mens_health/

Is there anything good about men? (2007)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFZat3oIbhU

After seeing so many commercials where men are portrayed as bumbling, clueless idiots, this ad by Dove was refreshing (Reddit discussion on 12 June 2014)

Why are men on TV always such fools? (13 March 2014) Note the 433 readers comments – clearly many people are fed up with the current situation of rampant double-standards

http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/27gk4i/men_in_schoolmale_representation_in_media_in_an/

Sexism? Pah! The real reason why Channel 4 didn’t put women on Bear Gryll’s island (12 May 2014)

Why do advertisers portray men as idiots? (25 April 2014)

No more dumb old dad: Changing the bumbling father stereotype (15 June 2012)

http://www.avoiceformen.com/just-plain-crazy/feminists-stoop-to-a-new-low/

http://www.f4e.com.au/blog/2014/01/26/stop-picking-on-our-men-top-australian-journalist-argues/

http://cnsnews.com/blog/suzanne-venker/what-americans-need-know-about-feminist-bias

http://www.avoiceformen.com/misandry/misandry-and-emptiness-masculine-identity-in-a-toxic-cultural-environment/

http://sozziesocks.tumblr.com/post/79167707595/ceneca-qui-antibadstuffprogoodstuff

http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7gvl/firestone-good-nap

http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/snickers-teams-up-with-aussie-builders-for-new-ad-try-not-to-take-it-too-seriously/story-e6frfmyi-1226865529268

https://twitter.com/Femalefedupwith/status/450910549468250112/photo/1

http://forums.avoiceformen.com/showthread.php?9424-Bill-Maher-mocks-men-coerced-into-sex-by-women&p=85528

Lay off men, Lessing tells feminists (14 August 2001)

And now for some good news:Move Over, Mom, It’s Dad’s Turn In Ads‘ (27 January 2015)

In the days in which Dusty Springfield performed (1960’s) women were happy to express affection for men. Ah, the old days

And finally here are two representations of men, one from a country where feminists ‘call the shots’, and one from a country where they don’t. Can you guess which one is which?

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