19th November is International Men's Day

[Lalgarh]

https://www.indy100.com/news/when-is-international-mens-day-2674308198

Mention some international men HERE to celebrate 🥂 🎊

Everyday is mens day

Me and my female friends celebrate IWD. Men don't do it for us.

I'm fairly sure men can celebrate and don't need MummyNet to do their celebrating for them.

What i used to do, with a group of feminist friends, was to tweet resources for women's health, VAWAG etc etc, on 8th March.
And all the manbabys would be "wah wah when is men's day" "how come you don't do anything for men's day" (WTF?) and "wah wah nobody does anything for men's day"

So. We used to tweet resources (mostly about men's mental health and the CALM (Campaign against living miserably) type of thing. And sometimes we would contact the "wah wah wah" accounts and say "LOOK! it's your day, what are you doing for it?"

And you know what? some men, clearly, were taking notice and doing things. But mostly? either crickets or more abuse. Or complaints that women hadn't organised anything.

So this year? I've retweeted a couple of things. But meh. They need to want to do it themselves. Start something themselves. Get off their backsides.

There is a reason married men live longer and single women are happier, on the whole. But i am now leaving men's day to men. And concentrating on women. Women's health. Women's rights.

My DH was once talking to me and my mum about domestic violence that a man in his family had experienced at the hands of a woman, and asked why men's refuges don't exist. My mum's answer: "well, women set up women's refuges... Men need to set up their own". Men seem to expect women to do everything for them 🙄

Good luck to them. Men have lots of issues in life and I wish them well with dealing with them.

One of the big challenges facing boys and men is toxic masculinity: the extreme stereotypes that limit boy's emotional growth and are toxic to their development as full human beings.

You'd imagine that freeing boys and men from toxic masculinity would be seen as an important way to improve their lives.
Bizarrely, challenging toxic masculinity is taken as an attack on boys and men - even mentioning it is bad because it makes men 'feel bad about themselves'

Like 'toxic masculinity' is a good thing, which sons and brothers and husbands are entitled to, rather than something negative and dangerous which damages boys and men.

IMD would also be a good day to promote groups like the White Ribbon Group
Our campaigns — White Ribbon UK

Artmumcreative - your mum hit the nail on the head! Women's refuges and rape crisis centres were not presented to us on a velvet cushion, and men wouldn't face a fraction of the opposition and abuse that women had to go through.

Any particular reason for posting that here in particular? Maybe you should put it on the Dadsnet board?

I'm OK with it being here - men are a major factor in women's lives, even if, like me, you don't have close relationships with them.
If men sorted themselves out a bit, it would make our lives better!

Wait. There's a Dadsnet?

Completely agree, I think there are lots of challenges in life women have that men won't face either to the same extent or in the same way but there are also quite significant concerns that affect men moreso than women so I see no reason not to have a IMD to highlight those issues. My workplace do events for both every year and use it as an opportunity to platform key issues that affect men and women according to the event. Today was focused around positive masculinity, men's health, men's mental health and positive male role models in society.

I also fully agree with this, but then equally I am raising a son and I'm very conscious I'm raising him into a society that doesn't currently have the infrastructure in place to support and equip young men to make healthier or safer choices (because men haven't created it in the way women have for themselves) and I don't feel it's my place as his parent to sit back and say that work isn't for me to do. I think that's a hard balance to strike because no its not SOLELY womens problems to fix, but we also can't pretend we're not affected by it and in the ideal society men and women will pull together to better support one another as equals. I don't think stepping back necessarily is the right option either.

There are also about 1000 other topics. Why Feminism?

I do fully understand why you're asking this question because IMD has been co opted and weaponised at times over the years by misogynistic movements but in its essence IMD is aligned with the feminist movement as a movement that strives for equity and equality between both genders and recognises that there are certain areas men need support with that tie in to womens issues.

If you feel this is just a goady poster then I wouldn't give them the opportunity to derail what's otherwise a really positive opportunity for promoting equity between genders and I'd just ignore them.

I've been quite shocked in the past by the 'why doesn't someone do something about this?' attitude from a fair number of men and no longer hesitate to say 'why don't you do it?'. It's not always been a sex-based thing as in they expect a woman to do it for them, though often it is precisely that.

It's always a joy to point out to the 'where's the IMD?' moaners that it does indeed exist on November 19th and nobody's stopping them from organising anything they want.

Well it didn't fit on TV & Film...

Unless international men meas Austin Powers.

Sorry!

It’s ok - as others have said, men doing things for men is something feminists are entirely in favour of! But maybe not the best target audience.
dadsnet can be a bit tumbleweed, I’m not sure many people do know it’s there. If you want to engage with a wider audience on MN then Chat may be the best option. Better luck next year!

and is his dad having these same thoughts? I mean it's great that as a boy-mum you are thinking these things and raising him right and all that.

But it is just more of the same ol' same ol' - women doing the thinking for men.

The problem with IMD, men's groups, 'men are victims of domestic abuse too!' [yes but not violent abuse to the same extent as women], 'You've given the Women's Aid helpline but not the Men's Line!' etc etc etc is that it often feels like it's not being done in good faith.

It's not coming from a place of helping men grow and develop emotionally and get over the damaging stereotypes that result in disrespectful attitudes, and even violence, towards women. It often feels like a swatting aside of the facts about male violence in order to dismiss women and in particular those awful manhating feminazis women...

That's why I admire the White Ribbon group, they understand that toxic masculinity is toxic to men and boys, not just to women
...promoting healthy expressions of masculinity - allowing them to express themselves emotionally and eradicating limiting ideas of what it means to be a man.
We need you to be a part of creating a society where understanding and respect underpin all of our relationships and interactions, so all members of society can thrive.
Allyship: The key to real culture change — White Ribbon UK

It is the same as everything else though. VAWAG is no issue until it's "Pakistani grooming gangs targetting our women"

Or "men are victims of domestic violence too"

Or "more men commit suicide"

etc etc ad nauseam ad infinitum.

They don't care about anything or anyone - and if another group is getting attention or sympathy or empathy they have to try to make themselves victims.

Instead of: addressing VAWAG perpetrated by men
Instead of: setting up helplines and safe spaces for male victims
Instead of: encouraging their friends to talk, to set up organisations like CALM etc (AFAIK that was set up by a woman?)

etc etc etc

(disclaimer: not all men....)

What I want to know is when is International Wonen’s Day, huh?

Lol

It's always on at around the same time as world book day.

I keep expecting to see parents sending their kids to school dressed as Germaine Greer, but no 🙂‍↔️

Wrong. The day you're talking about may claim to be international womens day but its really international anyone who identifies as a woman day (not as snappy though).
What id like is a day for women not men, not anyone who identifies as a women just for those of us who were born female.

Actually, men should welcome a cohort of men who were socialised as women before transitioning. They’d probably get stuff done.

I'm a lone parent for reasons beyond our control so it falls to me. When his dad was still around these were regular conversations we were having about how we both actively step up in that way and his dad would have stepped up in the community in this respect.

Also, I do think this goes beyond women doing the thinking whetoit comes to parenting. To me, this is about embedding these principles into the next generation so young men are empowered to take these steps. I work alongside lots of men who really do step up in this way and are real community leaders in this respect so it does happen - but its harder to spread the word, it's harder to get real engagement from other men and a lot of times that's coming back to the core issues of gender stereotypes that block men from accessing appropriate support. And gender stereotypes are a social issue that harms women massively. There's also a massive issue in that this work tends to be started from grassroots community level - women are predominantly the key players and employees in the community and voluntary sector and often that's due to issues with childcare/ caring responsibilities falling to them so they need the flexibility the sector provides in comparison to other sectors. So demographically there's an expectation on men to earn more/ be the full time working parent etc and it would be tough to have two people in a couple working in the community sector now because of the col and lack of salary uplift and insecure funding climate. There's a real concern for future generations that this won't be seen as a positive career option unless you're looking for flexibility specifically.

Obviously that's tied in to the issues around why are women the ones doing the lions share with childcare and caring workload but it has to start somewhere and the social pattern we're working out of in terms of infrastructure is very female heavy. That will take a lot of time to phase out.

Coincidentally, or not, today is Trans Remembrance day.

one day after

I only realised this as a thread on Reddit popped up that's been colonised by seething TRAs

sorry, @Lavender14 - i shouldn't have assumed your son has a man in his life.

For the rest of your post? yes but i am focussing my efforts on improving the lives of women and girls. I am a 2nd waver. I am not expending more effort to improve the lives of men as A Thing. If it is a side effect of improving women and girls lives? All well and good.

But i am over it all now. Really honestly over it. Gender ID is reinforcing the harmful stereotypes we thought we had done away with. Clearly a woman's work is never ever done.