There seems to be some confusion here. We are advised that, at this event, men will have "time to reflect on allyship and on the women and trans folks they have learned from". Wait on - trans men are men, right? Should not trans men, sharing as they must the innate masculine gender-evil, be doing the rose-laying and obeisance with the rest of us? I must insist that trans men are indeed men, and so they too must be admitted to the "unique role in working to end gender-based violence".
Or could it be that this mispositioning of "trans folk" is another tell, another Freudian slip - giving away that (whisper it) in the minds of the Correct, trans men are not really men at all. That, in fact, the whole towering edifice of bullshit that is the trans fashion is just a means of moving up the oppression rankings, that preposterous confection of moronic deceit that fools no one of sense and everyone in positions of power.
One of the first clues I had about trans folk realizing they don't morph into the opposite sex was when I noticed that FtMs weren't rushing to register for the draft. (I'm American, and registering is required for all men when they turn 18. They can't get into college or get student aid, without proof of registration).
Just outside the town hall where I worked there is a memorial to the over 30 men and boys killed in a local mining disaster just before WW1. It is not unusual to find such in tte many mining towns in Lancashire. There are of course the many memorials to the men killed in the two world wars and even outside the opulent and massive Trafford Centre there is a small memorial to a man killed during its construction. Nearby is a memorial to men killed during the construction of our massive orbital motorway. Certainly the levels of Male disposability have dramatically reduced in the UK, and been transferred to eastern Europe and the far east as industries have moved abroad. So perhaps its that many fewer men do die. But all these many deaths occurred when "patriarchy" was in full flood, apparently, clearly it was useless at keeping men safe. And had actually reduced risks to women by Victorian legislation to exclude women and girls from mining, steel in fact a list of occupations too hazardous for them but just fine for 14 year old boys up to men.
I wonder what would happen if males were accorded the same protected status as women continue to demand? After all although the number of deaths are mercifully few the number of serious injuries remain stubbornly high. As winter draws in here one can see all the workers essential to our modern life busy in "high viz" workwear building, repairing , maintaining, rescuing in all manner of wet and cold conditions. One difference is that now all this is all but invisible, yet even late last century it was still noticed.
It seems feminism never gets to grips with the reality, for if it is indeed a man made world, perhaps a wiser course might be to say "thank you" and encourage men to do all those many occupations that; despite 50 years of "positive action" are still reliant on men's willingness to get wet, hot, cold, bored, lonely, hurt, injured, exhausted and sometimes killed. As to the shaming, well feminists isn't that just the same as the women's societies of the Victorian age, resolutely convinced women existed on a higher moral plane (as they bossed the "tweeny" about) able to avoid the sordid realities of where the "income" that gave them such privilege came from, and at what cost.
I'm not sure how it will resolve itself but I suspect the younger generation of men will increasingly imbibe the idea of equality and be less prepared to accept the inequality that my generation, imbued with ideas of chivalry, stoicism and puting women first (the fairer sex). Certainly if men insisted on the regulation minimum comfortable temperature for their workplace everything will grind to a halt!
Well said. I hope you're right about the younger generation demanding equality. We definitely need a day to thank men for their many sacrifices, acts of caring, and general hard work to keep our world running.
It is a hope. By coincidence today my mother reminded me that my maternal great grandfather worked on the Manchester Ship Canal . Like many he came from Ireland. " Sadly 130 men died during the construction of the canal. Navies were paid above average for the time and received four and a half pence for a 10-hour day. Their wives and children also lived by the canal in specialist huts". And of course at the time the working week was 6 days. Or for some 5 and a half days. Clearly up until the middle of the last century fathers (in the working classes) were "remote" because most of their lives were spent working, literally.
Indeed. My father's brother died at age 16 in a fishing boat accident in the 1940s. My father was a commercial fisherman, as his father had been. He worked very hard and was proud of what he achieved. Part of my hatred of feminism is based on its sneering at decent, hard-working men like my father and husband.
Of course, when feminist Trudeau says the 'the safety of women must be the foundation of any society', he is merely stating what has always been implicit in the so-called patriarchy that feminists rail against. Nothing novel or radical about the notion at all, at least the case for millennia. Feminists know perfectly well and perfectly hypocritically that any actual concern for the safety of men would expose women to greater danger. By focusing exclusively on their own safety, they entrench and perpetuate a second-class status for women as dependents in need of male protectors. Shaming men as a class for not protecting women enough results in more violence, more deaths, not less. While they hold fast to the belief that they are the sex with greater compassion and desire for peace, they make themselves part of a vicious cycle that inevitably fails at stopping one of the factors leading to war. Only when society begins to view responsibility for the safety of all members as equal in reality will something closer to peace be achieved.
Penetratingly insightful, as ever, thank you, Dr. Fiamengo.
But sadly, even with well-publicized factors such as the vastly disproportionate number of males dying from overdoses, suicide and violence, and ignoring the blatant gender-based injustice of only males being conscripted to fight in wars (and in the US only males having to register for possible conscription), society as a whole still just doesn't seem to give a damn. Sure, men can do all of the dirty and dangerous jobs and sure boys can increasingly fall behind in academia. But where is the true, higher momentum to change this? The women's movement really does seem to have succeeded in its relentless, furious efforts to hurt men, ostensibly in the name of equality (which never will be attained - equality never will be enough and is not, I fear, the genuine agenda), and to viciously and maliciously quell any dissent Sometimes I lament that nothing short of a major catastrophe, in which men suddenly are needed and respected, will change this.
But those few bold and intelligent voices such as yours give cause for hope.
I feel the same way--it often seems quite hopeless. Both men and women care a lot more about harms to women. I write for the sane, fair-minded few. Thank you for your eloquence.
At these rituals of public shaming, men should wear T-shirts with the message "I feel zero guilt for the crimes committed by Marc Lepine or other murderers."
Men shouldn’t feel guilt for something they didn’t do. That doesn’t mean they can’t recognize that, as a class, men commit a disproportionate amount of violence/homicide.
I'm curious. Are you big on public discussion of which races commit more violent crime, too, so that members of those races can reflect on their group's disproportionate criminality? Should there be a day in which Black people reflect on the disproportionate violence they commit against Asians? Not to feel guilty about it, of course, but just to "recognize" it?
I am actually. Blacks commit over half of violence despite being 13 percent of the population. And I think they should mostly just separate from us. I don’t see any point in continuing the relationship. However women and men need each other so we have to learn to co exist. And in order for that to happen, one thing that needs to change is the rate at which men murder women. Don’t you agree?
I am tired of the guilt-tripping, the manipulation. The Catastrophizing.
The reality is as long as these advocates blindly blame innocent men for the behaviour of a few, nothing will change. Focusing only on male behaviour creates a blind spot and perhaps deliberately by shifting or preventing any genuine inquiry into what are the real factors that lead up to these acts of violence.
So I've inherited my father's sins? I wholly resent the insinuation that I have anything in common with Marc Lepine because we both have testicles. His killing spree was terrible, but now it's being turned into a debased anti-male ritual. I would suggest that it is being "milked" and turning people away from addressing mental health issues that might prevent future murders.
Most people who agree with these ideas are middle-class women who need better education, despite their credentials, and can't come up with original or logical arguments. The most annoying thing about their positions is their repetitive and facile nature. They present emotionally pregnant phrases (e.g., mansplaining, patriarchy) and expect the world to change because they might have tantrums.
Violence is the defining characteristic of the human race. We blot out 75-80% of our offspring in the practice of contraception, alone: abortion takes care of another 10% of the population. Both sexes participate in and bear responsibility for this carnage. To what extent one sex or the other is to blame is irrelevant in the face of the sheer magnitude of the loss--all in the name of comfort, pleasure, and ease. It is true, however, that if "violence against women" is ever to be sincerely addressed, it must begin with women. To stop cutting up our daughters in the womb (and sons), and selling their body parts on the black market is a decision that can be made by both men and women; but, to stop flushing them down the toilet before they are even known to exist, is something only women can do.
Will this be done? Probably, it will not. We can (perhaps must) bring the issue to light, however, and reiterate as frequently as our counterparts seek to secure an ever expanding culture of death, that feminism is not merely false, but also explosively violent; and that feminists (both men and women) are not the morally superior enlightened souls they claim to be; but rather they are cruel and selfish and dangerous people who will destroy our civilizations if left unchecked.
This is the perennial question. I think a majority of men genuinely care about women, abhor violence, are not themselves violent, and want that to be known. A lot of young men think that if they show that they are 'not like Lepine' (or not like whomever), they can escape the excoriating condemnation and shaming. If that means accepting feminist myths about female innocence and male villainy, so be it.
Maybe so. I grew up with three older brothers and have three adult sons. The indoctrination that boys get at school is pretty awful. The white ribbon campaign uses the line Boys will be boys with the second boys crossed out and their view of what boys SHOULD be. Imagine the reaction if you substituted Girls for boys.
Could anyone else in Canada, other than Janice, have written this brilliant and humane article? No one else probably could have, and no one else would have had the courage to do so. I wish that this article would be published on the front page of every newspaper in Canada.
I don't think that it is possible for many women to understand the issues and problems that confront men. We are all addicted to our own problems and our imaginations about the world in which we live. Too many men think that women must protect us from women and it is women that must lead reform. This is unrealistic. Nor do I think that a campaign attempting to build understanding for men and their issues will ever succeed.
A better strategy would be to lay out a model for a better society in which men and women each play their part. Multiple variations of this are already apparent as feminism loses its bloom. One that has an ideal that is sympathetic to women's needs as well as mens. Such a structure would not win over the large minority of women who want a lifestyle and not a husband, but the majority is winnable.
Multiple variations of this are already apparent as feminism loses its bloom.
That's a great strategy. I have been thinking over the last month that I would like to do a podcast on that idea in general, something more speculative than my usual essays. One piece of it would be imagining what goodness in women would look like in a better society; and also how society would reorient its attitude to men. But I find it much easier to know what is wrong with the present society than to outline in concrete terms what the better society would be.
One vision of a better society would be a society with radically less violence, and substantially more resources for constructive purposes. How to get there?
A place to start can be by facing the fact that the overwhelming majority of violence in the world is committed by men. We can simply observe this fact of nature without distracting our observation with blaming, shaming and other forms of moralizing. Let's leave that aside and just focus on the challenge presented by violence.
Most men are peaceful. But those who aren't peaceful pose an existential threat to the entire civilization, and are responsible for unspeakable horrors unfolding daily all over the planet. What to do?
Our first instinct will probably be to keep the very many peaceful men while somehow liberating ourselves from the violent men. Another inconvenient fact to face is that nobody knows how to do that. Nobody has ever known how to do that.
A world without men would reduce violence by over 90%. It would also liberate trillions of dollars now needed to manage and respond to male violence for reinvestment in constructive actions like health care and education. Something close to the long dreamed of world peace would be the result.
I realize such a proposal is very controversial and I expect it to be rejected. I expect somebody to yell at me. That's ok, no problem. I'm just asking for this...
The next time we see some unspeakable violence in our news feed we might ask ourselves, what is so important about the male gender that it justifies accepting such widespread suffering all over the planet?
Are we willing to do what is necessary to end this suffering? Or are we going to cling to the status quo until violent men finally collapse the entire civilization?
One of your assumptions seems to be that all of the violence caused by men is without reason, ie, caused by dint of the actors being men. So get rid of the men and there’s no more ‘reasons’ for violence. It doesn’t take much delving into history to see that your assumption doesn’t hold. For example, do you think absent Putin, some twisted version of imperial conqueror Catherine the Great wouldn’t emerge to wage war on Ukraine? Or do you imagine somehow matriarchal power would lead to the dissolution of national identities and the need to protect them? Margaret Thatcher would beg to differ. Yes, men have something to do with physical aggression, but I suspect women without men will still have the need for it. With power comes the desire to hold on to it, to dominate and to defend it. Soon enough, women will be as hardened as men are now. They will, perforce, become warriors. They will no longer have the luxury of outsourcing the dirty work to men.
It's true that there are violent women. That's why I said a world without men would reduce violence 90%+, not 100%. I find a 90% reduction in violence to be a highly desirable outcome, just not a perfect outcome.
Apologies, but delving in to history is not going to help make your case. Most of the violence in the world, almost all of it, has been committed by men for thousands of years, a longstanding consistent pattern. Indeed, these patterns go back millions of years before we were even human. That's why no combination of moralism, religion, politics etc in any time and place has ever been able to end the pattern of male violence.
It does seem likely that a world without men would evolve in a manner which none of us, including me, can confidently predict. But it seems extremely unlikely that armies of women will be invading and sacking cities "soon enough". There's nothing in human history to suggest that this is something masses of women are interested in doing.
In any case, my proposal is based on this insight. A world without men is not optional, unless we're content with the collapse of this civilization. The marriage between violent men and an accelerating knowledge explosion is unsustainable. Once that reality is grasped, radical proposals like a world without men begin to seem rather more reasonable.
Thanks for replying, Phil. Let me explain. The reality of history is as you describe. The way I see it, it turned out that way because of the reality of men’s physical superiority. While I do concede that men will naturally use physical aggression more than women, the fact of men being responsible for the bulk of the violence in history is due primarily to their being used by the powerful. The vast majority of men, as you yourself note, have no desire at all to be actually aggressive and violent towards others. But the reality of their physical superiority, not to mention, their inability to give birth, makes them the natural choice of powerful people to be enlisted in the ‘necessity’ of serving the interests of the powerful, including, say, the defense and expansion of territory. My history pointing to Catherine the Great and Margaret Thatcher suggests it does not have to be men in power for violence to ensue. They follow the same script of the powerful and use the most effective means available to achieve their objectives, which conveniently is the physical superiority of men. Do you think that without men, the nature and objectives of power will substantially change? I contend that is naive. More likely, the newly powerful women will no longer men to use for whatever purpose they have, and will have to use what they have, other women, ie. do whatever it takes to get them to be violent - socialize, condition, propagandize, etc. everything that is done right now to ensure that men are willing (or forced) to fight. So in my view, your analysis is limited by an narrow essentialist view of gender as the determiner of historical outcomes and fails to account for the vastly more significant and fundamentally human power dynamic. For further evidence of how I think things would likely turn out, just look at the trends in popular entertainment today, where women are more and more portrayed as kick ass warriors equal to or stronger than men, ie. men not needed anymore to provide the strength that IS needed, to be as violent as is required. This, one might say, is conditioning, propaganda for a world without men. We already see declining levels of testosterone in men, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if that so-called 'toxic' hormone might start to rise in women. To be sure, this imagined future without men wouldn’t look exactly the same, but you’re naive to think women are just by their nature mostly peace loving. No, to a large extent, they are *allowed* to be, because of the fortunate existence of men.
Thanks for a very thoughtful reply Alan. This is the kind of engagement with this topic I've been seeking for years, and rarely finding. Anything about gender tends to push people's buttons, often lowering the quality of challenges.
I find your points to be interesting, and reasonable over long periods of time. Maybe patterns of aggression now seen primarily in males would reassert themselves in women over a period of centuries, resulting in a world much like what we have today. I don't claim to know of course, but that seems a reasonable theory worth considering.
My concerns are more immediate. I'm convinced that the marriage between an accelerating knowledge explosion and violent men is unsustainable, and could result in civilization collapse at basically any moment. And so I reach for radical proposals that I might otherwise find unacceptable.
In my view, on the present course we are inevitably going to arrive at a world with far fewer men by one of the following methods.
1) Either we reduce male populations by some rational, peaceful, orderly method, or....
2) Violent men crash civilization resulting in far fewer men, and women too, by some catastrophic method.
Point being, from my perspective it's not a choice of whether we arrive at a world with far fewer men, but a choice of how that happens. And maybe we don't even have any choice, could be that too.
The vast majority of people reject (often hysterically) the "world without men" concept based on an assumption that we have the option to continue indefinitely with the same old status quo that we are used to and comfortable with. I find that assumption to be very understandable, but a misunderstanding of where we find ourselves today.
So even if I accept all your points, the threat is upon on us now, requiring some survival response now. Maybe we'd just be trading violent men for violent women over the long run, that could be. We'll have to worry about that later. In order to worry about it ever, first we have to survive.
Nobody is fearless, but you sure got balls, lady! And you're a great writer/journalist, too. I fundamentally disagree with some of your explanatory comments on feminism in your "About" section, but thank you for challenging absolutes and forcing people to think more objectively.
Thought it would be appropriate to join your Substack (paid) today December 6, the anniversary date of Canada'a National Day of Male Shaming. Looking forward to joining the conversation.
Janice how nice to find you on Substack and read your well organized thoughts. I remember when you stood up so well to protesters. There must be something in the Canadian water.
After seeing YouTube videos of an English woman ( Kellie-jay Keen) facing protests for saying “a woman is an adult female human,” I searched you out.
It sickens me that the legacy of feminism has aimed to instill self-hatred in men while silencing all public discourse on the violence and hatred to which men are regularly subjected as a part of "patriarchal" thought. Thank you for providing coherent and cogent counterdiscourse to the misandrist feminist agenda.
There seems to be some confusion here. We are advised that, at this event, men will have "time to reflect on allyship and on the women and trans folks they have learned from". Wait on - trans men are men, right? Should not trans men, sharing as they must the innate masculine gender-evil, be doing the rose-laying and obeisance with the rest of us? I must insist that trans men are indeed men, and so they too must be admitted to the "unique role in working to end gender-based violence".
Or could it be that this mispositioning of "trans folk" is another tell, another Freudian slip - giving away that (whisper it) in the minds of the Correct, trans men are not really men at all. That, in fact, the whole towering edifice of bullshit that is the trans fashion is just a means of moving up the oppression rankings, that preposterous confection of moronic deceit that fools no one of sense and everyone in positions of power.
Another zinger, Rick. One sub-ideology clashes with another.
What is the correct hierarchy for women, trans-men, and trans-women? I like to think systematically, so I need some guidance here.
Metoo!
Maybe this would work:
1. Trans-women of colour
2. Trans-women
3. Women of colour
4. LGBT women
5. Trans-men
6. Cisgender hetero women
The only concern is that straight white feminists might find the ranking disempowering. Is this really what the founding mothers set out to achieve?
Amen Rick.
One of the first clues I had about trans folk realizing they don't morph into the opposite sex was when I noticed that FtMs weren't rushing to register for the draft. (I'm American, and registering is required for all men when they turn 18. They can't get into college or get student aid, without proof of registration).
"... the whole towering edifice of bullshit" LMFAO! Thanks, Rick, I needed that.
Thank you, Janice.
This really means a lot to me.
Some days are really tough and it's people like you that make me feel better.
Your empathy is a soothing salve to me.
I feel like my body has been on the defense, chronically, for a long time.
People like you make me feel like I don't have to keep my defenses up - because I don't feel like I'm being attacked.
You're a good person, Janice.
May the Wind Be at Your Back.
- Edmond Dantes
Just outside the town hall where I worked there is a memorial to the over 30 men and boys killed in a local mining disaster just before WW1. It is not unusual to find such in tte many mining towns in Lancashire. There are of course the many memorials to the men killed in the two world wars and even outside the opulent and massive Trafford Centre there is a small memorial to a man killed during its construction. Nearby is a memorial to men killed during the construction of our massive orbital motorway. Certainly the levels of Male disposability have dramatically reduced in the UK, and been transferred to eastern Europe and the far east as industries have moved abroad. So perhaps its that many fewer men do die. But all these many deaths occurred when "patriarchy" was in full flood, apparently, clearly it was useless at keeping men safe. And had actually reduced risks to women by Victorian legislation to exclude women and girls from mining, steel in fact a list of occupations too hazardous for them but just fine for 14 year old boys up to men.
I wonder what would happen if males were accorded the same protected status as women continue to demand? After all although the number of deaths are mercifully few the number of serious injuries remain stubbornly high. As winter draws in here one can see all the workers essential to our modern life busy in "high viz" workwear building, repairing , maintaining, rescuing in all manner of wet and cold conditions. One difference is that now all this is all but invisible, yet even late last century it was still noticed.
It seems feminism never gets to grips with the reality, for if it is indeed a man made world, perhaps a wiser course might be to say "thank you" and encourage men to do all those many occupations that; despite 50 years of "positive action" are still reliant on men's willingness to get wet, hot, cold, bored, lonely, hurt, injured, exhausted and sometimes killed. As to the shaming, well feminists isn't that just the same as the women's societies of the Victorian age, resolutely convinced women existed on a higher moral plane (as they bossed the "tweeny" about) able to avoid the sordid realities of where the "income" that gave them such privilege came from, and at what cost.
I'm not sure how it will resolve itself but I suspect the younger generation of men will increasingly imbibe the idea of equality and be less prepared to accept the inequality that my generation, imbued with ideas of chivalry, stoicism and puting women first (the fairer sex). Certainly if men insisted on the regulation minimum comfortable temperature for their workplace everything will grind to a halt!
Well said. I hope you're right about the younger generation demanding equality. We definitely need a day to thank men for their many sacrifices, acts of caring, and general hard work to keep our world running.
It is a hope. By coincidence today my mother reminded me that my maternal great grandfather worked on the Manchester Ship Canal . Like many he came from Ireland. " Sadly 130 men died during the construction of the canal. Navies were paid above average for the time and received four and a half pence for a 10-hour day. Their wives and children also lived by the canal in specialist huts". And of course at the time the working week was 6 days. Or for some 5 and a half days. Clearly up until the middle of the last century fathers (in the working classes) were "remote" because most of their lives were spent working, literally.
Indeed. My father's brother died at age 16 in a fishing boat accident in the 1940s. My father was a commercial fisherman, as his father had been. He worked very hard and was proud of what he achieved. Part of my hatred of feminism is based on its sneering at decent, hard-working men like my father and husband.
You're spoiling us with two articles within a week. Thanks, Janice.
I couldn't miss December 6. Thank you!
Of course, when feminist Trudeau says the 'the safety of women must be the foundation of any society', he is merely stating what has always been implicit in the so-called patriarchy that feminists rail against. Nothing novel or radical about the notion at all, at least the case for millennia. Feminists know perfectly well and perfectly hypocritically that any actual concern for the safety of men would expose women to greater danger. By focusing exclusively on their own safety, they entrench and perpetuate a second-class status for women as dependents in need of male protectors. Shaming men as a class for not protecting women enough results in more violence, more deaths, not less. While they hold fast to the belief that they are the sex with greater compassion and desire for peace, they make themselves part of a vicious cycle that inevitably fails at stopping one of the factors leading to war. Only when society begins to view responsibility for the safety of all members as equal in reality will something closer to peace be achieved.
Perfectly said. Thank you.
Penetratingly insightful, as ever, thank you, Dr. Fiamengo.
But sadly, even with well-publicized factors such as the vastly disproportionate number of males dying from overdoses, suicide and violence, and ignoring the blatant gender-based injustice of only males being conscripted to fight in wars (and in the US only males having to register for possible conscription), society as a whole still just doesn't seem to give a damn. Sure, men can do all of the dirty and dangerous jobs and sure boys can increasingly fall behind in academia. But where is the true, higher momentum to change this? The women's movement really does seem to have succeeded in its relentless, furious efforts to hurt men, ostensibly in the name of equality (which never will be attained - equality never will be enough and is not, I fear, the genuine agenda), and to viciously and maliciously quell any dissent Sometimes I lament that nothing short of a major catastrophe, in which men suddenly are needed and respected, will change this.
But those few bold and intelligent voices such as yours give cause for hope.
I feel the same way--it often seems quite hopeless. Both men and women care a lot more about harms to women. I write for the sane, fair-minded few. Thank you for your eloquence.
At these rituals of public shaming, men should wear T-shirts with the message "I feel zero guilt for the crimes committed by Marc Lepine or other murderers."
Or maybe a list of all of the female murderers of men.
Especially the ones that are regarded as heroines by feminists, such as Aileen Wournos, about whom Phyllis Chesler wrote a gobsmacking, gushing tribute: https://phyllis-chesler.com/articles/dear-dawn-aileen-wournos-in-her-own-words
Because female on male murder is an incredibly common phenomenon. Most men are murdered by other men. Most women are also murdered by men.
Men shouldn’t feel guilt for something they didn’t do. That doesn’t mean they can’t recognize that, as a class, men commit a disproportionate amount of violence/homicide.
I'm curious. Are you big on public discussion of which races commit more violent crime, too, so that members of those races can reflect on their group's disproportionate criminality? Should there be a day in which Black people reflect on the disproportionate violence they commit against Asians? Not to feel guilty about it, of course, but just to "recognize" it?
I am actually. Blacks commit over half of violence despite being 13 percent of the population. And I think they should mostly just separate from us. I don’t see any point in continuing the relationship. However women and men need each other so we have to learn to co exist. And in order for that to happen, one thing that needs to change is the rate at which men murder women. Don’t you agree?
Wow.
I am tired of the guilt-tripping, the manipulation. The Catastrophizing.
The reality is as long as these advocates blindly blame innocent men for the behaviour of a few, nothing will change. Focusing only on male behaviour creates a blind spot and perhaps deliberately by shifting or preventing any genuine inquiry into what are the real factors that lead up to these acts of violence.
Absolutely agree. Amen.
So I've inherited my father's sins? I wholly resent the insinuation that I have anything in common with Marc Lepine because we both have testicles. His killing spree was terrible, but now it's being turned into a debased anti-male ritual. I would suggest that it is being "milked" and turning people away from addressing mental health issues that might prevent future murders.
Most people who agree with these ideas are middle-class women who need better education, despite their credentials, and can't come up with original or logical arguments. The most annoying thing about their positions is their repetitive and facile nature. They present emotionally pregnant phrases (e.g., mansplaining, patriarchy) and expect the world to change because they might have tantrums.
Violence is the defining characteristic of the human race. We blot out 75-80% of our offspring in the practice of contraception, alone: abortion takes care of another 10% of the population. Both sexes participate in and bear responsibility for this carnage. To what extent one sex or the other is to blame is irrelevant in the face of the sheer magnitude of the loss--all in the name of comfort, pleasure, and ease. It is true, however, that if "violence against women" is ever to be sincerely addressed, it must begin with women. To stop cutting up our daughters in the womb (and sons), and selling their body parts on the black market is a decision that can be made by both men and women; but, to stop flushing them down the toilet before they are even known to exist, is something only women can do.
Will this be done? Probably, it will not. We can (perhaps must) bring the issue to light, however, and reiterate as frequently as our counterparts seek to secure an ever expanding culture of death, that feminism is not merely false, but also explosively violent; and that feminists (both men and women) are not the morally superior enlightened souls they claim to be; but rather they are cruel and selfish and dangerous people who will destroy our civilizations if left unchecked.
It's depressing that men actually attend such events as this. It sounds horrific. Why do the go along with it??
This is the perennial question. I think a majority of men genuinely care about women, abhor violence, are not themselves violent, and want that to be known. A lot of young men think that if they show that they are 'not like Lepine' (or not like whomever), they can escape the excoriating condemnation and shaming. If that means accepting feminist myths about female innocence and male villainy, so be it.
Maybe so. I grew up with three older brothers and have three adult sons. The indoctrination that boys get at school is pretty awful. The white ribbon campaign uses the line Boys will be boys with the second boys crossed out and their view of what boys SHOULD be. Imagine the reaction if you substituted Girls for boys.
Could anyone else in Canada, other than Janice, have written this brilliant and humane article? No one else probably could have, and no one else would have had the courage to do so. I wish that this article would be published on the front page of every newspaper in Canada.
Eeva Sodhi (vale) now archived on the wayback machine has some very interesting articles
I don't think that it is possible for many women to understand the issues and problems that confront men. We are all addicted to our own problems and our imaginations about the world in which we live. Too many men think that women must protect us from women and it is women that must lead reform. This is unrealistic. Nor do I think that a campaign attempting to build understanding for men and their issues will ever succeed.
A better strategy would be to lay out a model for a better society in which men and women each play their part. Multiple variations of this are already apparent as feminism loses its bloom. One that has an ideal that is sympathetic to women's needs as well as mens. Such a structure would not win over the large minority of women who want a lifestyle and not a husband, but the majority is winnable.
Multiple variations of this are already apparent as feminism loses its bloom.
That's a great strategy. I have been thinking over the last month that I would like to do a podcast on that idea in general, something more speculative than my usual essays. One piece of it would be imagining what goodness in women would look like in a better society; and also how society would reorient its attitude to men. But I find it much easier to know what is wrong with the present society than to outline in concrete terms what the better society would be.
I look forward to this one Janice!
One vision of a better society would be a society with radically less violence, and substantially more resources for constructive purposes. How to get there?
A place to start can be by facing the fact that the overwhelming majority of violence in the world is committed by men. We can simply observe this fact of nature without distracting our observation with blaming, shaming and other forms of moralizing. Let's leave that aside and just focus on the challenge presented by violence.
Most men are peaceful. But those who aren't peaceful pose an existential threat to the entire civilization, and are responsible for unspeakable horrors unfolding daily all over the planet. What to do?
Our first instinct will probably be to keep the very many peaceful men while somehow liberating ourselves from the violent men. Another inconvenient fact to face is that nobody knows how to do that. Nobody has ever known how to do that.
A world without men would reduce violence by over 90%. It would also liberate trillions of dollars now needed to manage and respond to male violence for reinvestment in constructive actions like health care and education. Something close to the long dreamed of world peace would be the result.
I realize such a proposal is very controversial and I expect it to be rejected. I expect somebody to yell at me. That's ok, no problem. I'm just asking for this...
The next time we see some unspeakable violence in our news feed we might ask ourselves, what is so important about the male gender that it justifies accepting such widespread suffering all over the planet?
Are we willing to do what is necessary to end this suffering? Or are we going to cling to the status quo until violent men finally collapse the entire civilization?
What are we going to choose?
One of your assumptions seems to be that all of the violence caused by men is without reason, ie, caused by dint of the actors being men. So get rid of the men and there’s no more ‘reasons’ for violence. It doesn’t take much delving into history to see that your assumption doesn’t hold. For example, do you think absent Putin, some twisted version of imperial conqueror Catherine the Great wouldn’t emerge to wage war on Ukraine? Or do you imagine somehow matriarchal power would lead to the dissolution of national identities and the need to protect them? Margaret Thatcher would beg to differ. Yes, men have something to do with physical aggression, but I suspect women without men will still have the need for it. With power comes the desire to hold on to it, to dominate and to defend it. Soon enough, women will be as hardened as men are now. They will, perforce, become warriors. They will no longer have the luxury of outsourcing the dirty work to men.
Hi Alan,
It's true that there are violent women. That's why I said a world without men would reduce violence 90%+, not 100%. I find a 90% reduction in violence to be a highly desirable outcome, just not a perfect outcome.
Apologies, but delving in to history is not going to help make your case. Most of the violence in the world, almost all of it, has been committed by men for thousands of years, a longstanding consistent pattern. Indeed, these patterns go back millions of years before we were even human. That's why no combination of moralism, religion, politics etc in any time and place has ever been able to end the pattern of male violence.
It does seem likely that a world without men would evolve in a manner which none of us, including me, can confidently predict. But it seems extremely unlikely that armies of women will be invading and sacking cities "soon enough". There's nothing in human history to suggest that this is something masses of women are interested in doing.
In any case, my proposal is based on this insight. A world without men is not optional, unless we're content with the collapse of this civilization. The marriage between violent men and an accelerating knowledge explosion is unsustainable. Once that reality is grasped, radical proposals like a world without men begin to seem rather more reasonable.
Thanks for replying, Phil. Let me explain. The reality of history is as you describe. The way I see it, it turned out that way because of the reality of men’s physical superiority. While I do concede that men will naturally use physical aggression more than women, the fact of men being responsible for the bulk of the violence in history is due primarily to their being used by the powerful. The vast majority of men, as you yourself note, have no desire at all to be actually aggressive and violent towards others. But the reality of their physical superiority, not to mention, their inability to give birth, makes them the natural choice of powerful people to be enlisted in the ‘necessity’ of serving the interests of the powerful, including, say, the defense and expansion of territory. My history pointing to Catherine the Great and Margaret Thatcher suggests it does not have to be men in power for violence to ensue. They follow the same script of the powerful and use the most effective means available to achieve their objectives, which conveniently is the physical superiority of men. Do you think that without men, the nature and objectives of power will substantially change? I contend that is naive. More likely, the newly powerful women will no longer men to use for whatever purpose they have, and will have to use what they have, other women, ie. do whatever it takes to get them to be violent - socialize, condition, propagandize, etc. everything that is done right now to ensure that men are willing (or forced) to fight. So in my view, your analysis is limited by an narrow essentialist view of gender as the determiner of historical outcomes and fails to account for the vastly more significant and fundamentally human power dynamic. For further evidence of how I think things would likely turn out, just look at the trends in popular entertainment today, where women are more and more portrayed as kick ass warriors equal to or stronger than men, ie. men not needed anymore to provide the strength that IS needed, to be as violent as is required. This, one might say, is conditioning, propaganda for a world without men. We already see declining levels of testosterone in men, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if that so-called 'toxic' hormone might start to rise in women. To be sure, this imagined future without men wouldn’t look exactly the same, but you’re naive to think women are just by their nature mostly peace loving. No, to a large extent, they are *allowed* to be, because of the fortunate existence of men.
Thanks for a very thoughtful reply Alan. This is the kind of engagement with this topic I've been seeking for years, and rarely finding. Anything about gender tends to push people's buttons, often lowering the quality of challenges.
I find your points to be interesting, and reasonable over long periods of time. Maybe patterns of aggression now seen primarily in males would reassert themselves in women over a period of centuries, resulting in a world much like what we have today. I don't claim to know of course, but that seems a reasonable theory worth considering.
My concerns are more immediate. I'm convinced that the marriage between an accelerating knowledge explosion and violent men is unsustainable, and could result in civilization collapse at basically any moment. And so I reach for radical proposals that I might otherwise find unacceptable.
In my view, on the present course we are inevitably going to arrive at a world with far fewer men by one of the following methods.
1) Either we reduce male populations by some rational, peaceful, orderly method, or....
2) Violent men crash civilization resulting in far fewer men, and women too, by some catastrophic method.
Point being, from my perspective it's not a choice of whether we arrive at a world with far fewer men, but a choice of how that happens. And maybe we don't even have any choice, could be that too.
The vast majority of people reject (often hysterically) the "world without men" concept based on an assumption that we have the option to continue indefinitely with the same old status quo that we are used to and comfortable with. I find that assumption to be very understandable, but a misunderstanding of where we find ourselves today.
So even if I accept all your points, the threat is upon on us now, requiring some survival response now. Maybe we'd just be trading violent men for violent women over the long run, that could be. We'll have to worry about that later. In order to worry about it ever, first we have to survive.
Nobody is fearless, but you sure got balls, lady! And you're a great writer/journalist, too. I fundamentally disagree with some of your explanatory comments on feminism in your "About" section, but thank you for challenging absolutes and forcing people to think more objectively.
Thought it would be appropriate to join your Substack (paid) today December 6, the anniversary date of Canada'a National Day of Male Shaming. Looking forward to joining the conversation.
Thank you, my friend. I know you will have a lot of wisdom to contribute.
Janice how nice to find you on Substack and read your well organized thoughts. I remember when you stood up so well to protesters. There must be something in the Canadian water.
After seeing YouTube videos of an English woman ( Kellie-jay Keen) facing protests for saying “a woman is an adult female human,” I searched you out.
My thoughts exactly, my first introduction was Canadian Eeva Sodhi and her website.
I should add, when I found the website by Eeva Nojustice, I was trying to find out what the real facts were. Her articles educated me.
It sickens me that the legacy of feminism has aimed to instill self-hatred in men while silencing all public discourse on the violence and hatred to which men are regularly subjected as a part of "patriarchal" thought. Thank you for providing coherent and cogent counterdiscourse to the misandrist feminist agenda.