Men's Rights Movement

The Men's Rights Movement (MRM) also sometimes known as the Men's Human Rights Movement (MHRM) is a pluralistic movement of men and women who have identified certain problems facing men and boys. It is comprised of many organisations and individuals that are loosely affiliated. Despite this, participants within the MRM maintain a largely consistent position on men's rights. The movement accepts robust and frank internal discussions, which are generally conducted in public. Individuals within the MRM are sometimes known as Men's Rights Activists or Men's Rights Advocates (MRAs).

While the MRM has existed for a long time, it is only in recent years that it has been growing rapidly or receiving significant media attention.

The movement started to significantly increase in membership from around 2010 onwards. The MRM has many detractors. Some who want to discredit the MRM claim it is a violent movement. This could not be further from the truth. The MRM goes out of its way to be a non-violent movement. The most popular online sites within the movement such as A Voice for Men and the MensRights sub on Reddit actively exclude censure and ban people who make threats of violence or advocate violence.

The MRM is a movement concerned about problems facing men and boys and focuses on bringing attention to the problems in the wider community as well as discussing ways to alleviate and resolve the problems.

Despite what many outside of the movement think this is not just a movement for men. Many women participate in the MRM and often seem to be among the movement's most active contributors. The movement is pluralistic and inclusive. As well as many women the MRM includes gay and transgender men. Participants in the movement come from across the political spectrum. They are united in their recognition of the problems facing men and boys and agree that these problems need to be addressed. Anyone who broadly agrees with the aims of the movement is welcome to participate.

We acknowledge that women and girls face gender-specific issues as well. This is particularly true for women and girls who live in the developing world.

We reject many of the claims espoused by leaders in the modern feminist movement, such as that women cannot be sexist to men, a belief that men have have systematically oppressed women for thousands of years through the use of violence or that domestic violence impacts women far more than men. The MRM and its participants are routinely subjected to vitriolic attacks and derision by feminist groups and others. Feminists routinely try to shut down public talks held on MRM topic. Sometimes they have succeeded as a result of local authorities declining to enforce the law in the face of feminist aggression. The MRM rejects such attempts at silencing others. While we may disagree with, and even object to, much of feminist ideology we would never seek to silence feminists.

Many of the men who have entered the movement until now have been personally impacted by one or more of these problems. They might be, for example, men who have been dealt with unjustly by the family law courts in their country. After experiencing this they may become aware that their treatment by the courts was common and from there become aware of he broader MRM. Young men may experience discrimination in their high school or University on the basis of their gender and from this may become aware of the broader movement. Increasingly people who have not been personally impacted by these problems are recognising a broader problem in society and are stepping up to make a difference.

The movement is notable for being task focussed. Although there is no one definitive list of the issues that the MRM is addressing there is broad agreement on a core set of issues. Most activists within the movement have certain areas that they focus on.

Many people look at the top of society, to leaders in politics, business and the military and see men. They conclude then that men rule the world. While some men dominate society it is not true that men generally dominate society. This is an example of the apex fallacy - looking at the most successful members of a group and judging the group by that standard.

• • • Explain Redpillers, Pick Up Artists and how they differ from MRAs. Explain that Elliot Rodger was not an MRA and there is no evidence he

had even heard of the MRM.

While it may be true that that men's rights advocacy was perhaps initially more popular among the socially conservative this has long since ceased to be the case. The MRM has participants from across the political spectrum and is in itself an apolitical movement. MRAs are not traditonalists. We are not advocating for a return to the gender roles seen in the past. We advocate for the rejection of traditional gender roles. We want everyone to have a fair playing field on which they can be all that they can be.

The Men's Rights Movement:

• Rejects male disposability as unnecessary in the modern world
• Rejects traditional gender roles
• Is committed to reasoned peaceful advocacy
• Works to resolve certain issues facing men and boys
• Works to eliminate vilification of masculinity
• Works towards equality of opportunity for all

Issues

Bodily Autonomy

Female genital mutilation is now illegal in many countries, and international organisations work to reduce this practice. These same societies often refuse to grant boys the same bodily autonomy that they grant girls - the right to be protected from unnecessary medical procedures. The men's rights movement objects to male genital mutilation (also known as circumcision) on the same grounds as female genital mutilation. Both violate the human rights of the individual being mutilated and both should be illegal. In many countries today (including Australia) all individuals have protection from unnecessary medical procedures except for infant boys. That the foreskin is removed in most cases without anesthetic exacerbates the problem.

Many do not know that the foreskins of infant boys are not destroyed as medical waste but are rather put to a variety of uses. While it is true a few are used for medical research the majority go to cosmetic companies. In some countries the sale of foreskins by hospitals is a lucrative business.

We want: Infant boys to have the same protection from medically unnecessary procedures as are extended to the rest of the community.

Disposability

All societies consider men to be disposable. Men are drafted and can be forced in to combat against their will. Men overwhelmingly take on the dangerous jobs in society. In general men are expected to be prepared to give up their life for the good of the community and, specifically, to protect the lives of women. This is so ingrained that few people, men or women, recognise it. Fewer still object to it.

The MRM rejects male disposability in the modern world. While it may have made sense for a society in the past to be prepared to sacrifice it's men for the survival of the society, the MRM holds that this is no longer necessary. With a population exceeding seven billion that might reach 10 or 11 billion in a few decades, we no longer need the ability to quickly recover numbers and so the original reason that male disposability existed is no longer present.

We want: An end to male disposability.

Domestic Violence

Men constitute between one third and one half of all victims of domestic violence. A similar proportion of domestic violence aggressors are women. The notion that domestic violence is a gender issues simply not supported by the evidence. We object to all domestic violence regardless of the genders of the people involved.

We want: Recognition from society that domestic violence is not a gendered issue and a gender-balanced response from government.

Unnecessary Medication

Children, and boys in particular, are being diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and drugged at an alarming rate. This rate has been increasing rapidly in recent years, which is prompting an increase in the sales of drugs to treat the condition. In the United States, for example, sales of ADHD drugs have increased by 89% in four years.

The long term consequences of ADHD medicating on a forming brain are not yet known.

The MRM is concerned that the normal behaviour of many young boys is being considered abnormal and medicated.

This is not to say that all diagnosis for this condition are invalid, but when the diagnosis rate is changing as rapidly as is currently occuring more needs to be done than simply prescribing more drugs.

We want: A proper analysis of why ADHD diagnosis rates are skyrocketting and a rationalisation of the need to medicate rather than use alternative therapies to those genuinely in need.

Education

The performance of boys in primary and high school education system has been declining for decades. Decades ago boys tended to consistently perform better in primary and high school than girls. Educators set out to change primary and high schooling to improve the results for girls. The problem is that they continued to do this even after it was clear that boys were falling behind.

Education research clearly shows that boys tend to do better in exam assessment and girls tend to do better in in-class assessment. Relative performance in male and female students can be tracked with changing assessment. There has been a clear move away from exams and towards in-class assessment in the last few decades. One notable exception was a recent reversal of this trend in the UK. As expected the performance of boys in the UK improved with the increase in exam assessment.

Increasingly students have less and less time to burn off energy and are expected to sit quietly in the classroom for hours at a time. This is sometimes characterised as the incredible shrinking lunchtime. While this is probably impacting many students negatively the evidence suggests this is more of a problem for boys. It is interesting that this should be happening at a time when office workers are entreated to stand and move around more for their long term health.

Alarmingly research shows that in recent years teachers have been academically marking down students with behavioural problems. This has overwhelmingly impacted boys.

The men's rights movement objects to significant gender biases primary and high school education systems and seeks to reform the system in to one in which boys and girls can benefit.

The problems don't end there. Men have been abandoning the dream of a university education in droves.

Father's Rights

The family court system in many countries is heavily biased in favour of mothers. In many countries courts still show a strong preference for granting custody to mothers over fathers. Non-custodial fathers often find themselves with very limited access to their children and routinely find that breaches of court orders by mothers (such as not allowing visits in accordance with court orders) are ignored or receive only a token response. Many men fight in court for years to get reasonable access to their children, only to give up in dispair when they realise the system has failed them.

Health

• Males have higher mortality rates at every age
• Life expectancy difference by gender was small in the early 20th century
• It grew during the 20th century, peaking in the 1990s
• Female specific health problems have far more govt investment than male specific health problems

State Discrimination

• The state enforcing gender neutral laws in a gendered manner
• Rates of arrest, charging, incarceration and length of sentence

Reproductive Rights

• Today men have very limited reproductive rights compared to women
• Focus on an Australian context

Suicide

Men and boys have suicide rates several times higher than women and girls. Male suicide rates have grown at a far faster rate than female suicide rates over the last century. While recognition of high levels of suicide rates among men has gained recognition within the last few years there is still a long way to go in addressing this serious problem.

Vilification

We live in a society that routinely vilifies masculinity

• Vilification of masculinity
• Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them
• Airlines not placing unaccompanied minors next to men
• UN not allowing men or boys in to food collection areas
  • The UN actually claims that men will not distribute food to their families as readily as women will

Violence

• High levels of violence against men
• Lack of support or empathy for male victims

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See Also

• Problems facing men and boys

External Links

• What are we really talking about
• The Men's Rights Movement versus The Feminist Movement... Necessary conflict?

References

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