Engaging men and boys has emerged as a vital strategy for ending gender based violence, including in refugee and post-conflict settings. While prevention and response activities are essential, the humanitarian community and host country service providers understand that they must move beyond simply addressing each individual case of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and begin to address the societal, cultural, economic, religious and political systems that either perpetuate or allow for violence based on gender to continue.
Activism & Politics
The role of men in the feminist movement is a constant point of contention on the Sexist (a blog at the Washington City Paper).
Could changes in men’s attitudes and behaviors about health, violence and parenting benefit women, children – and men? Do national policies influence men’s behaviors in relation to child rearing, employment and gender-based violence?
This discussion paper was produced for “Partners for Prevention: Working with Boys and Men to Prevent Gender-based Violence” a UN interagency initiative UNDP, UNFPA, UNIFEM and UNV. This regional programme is a coordinated approach to support primary prevention of gender-based violence in Asia and the Pacific with the deeper involvement of boys and men.
Even if you’re only a little bit of a feminist, getting married can be tough. I knew that some of the more archaic traditions could be nauseating but I found myself affronted with some good ole’ fashioned deep seated sexism when the topic of weddings roles around to last names. Are you taking his? Keeping yours? Hyphenating the two? Or GASP the worst…is he taking yours?
Feminism’s achievements regarding violence against women are a key target for the fathers’ rights movement. This article provides an overview of the impact of the fathers’ rights movement on men’s violence against women. It documents the ways in which fathers’ rights groups in Australia have influenced changes in family law, which privilege parental contact over safety, particularly through moves toward a presumption of children’s joint residence. They have attempted to discredit female victims of violence, to wind back the legal protections available to victims and the sanctions imposed on perpetrators, and to undermine services for the victims of men’s violence.
Male supremacist groups (“Father’s Rights”) have caused unspeakable harm to our country and to our children by encouraging abusive fathers, often with little past involvement with their children, to seek custody as a tactic to pressure a mother to return or to punish her for leaving. The following call for support comes from the US-based National Organization for Men Against Sexism (NOMAS). For further discussions of 'fathers' rights' groups, see some of the pieces in XY's collection on 'men's and fathers' rights'.
NORMA - Nordic Journal for Masculinity Studies
Special issue, Fall 2010:
Men, Resistance and Political Radicalization
Theme editors: Ann-Dorte Christensen & Sune Qvotrup Jensen, Aalborg University
From boxer Mike Tyson to the late superstar Michael Jackson. From O. J. Simpson to more recently disgraced serial philanderer Tiger Woods, everywhere you look, it seems that some Black man somewhere is under the unrelenting public microscope for some sort of personal transgression. Moreover, these personal missteps seem to be magnified by an ever carnal, voyeuristic media all too eager to propagate long held stereotypes of men of color, in particular, black men as deviant, psychotic menaces to the larger society.
... 5. If you are in an elevator and someone else gets in, DON’T ASSAULT THEM!