Fighting Back, Going Galt or Both?
Revolution is a process, not an event.
—Anonymous
I was a victim who became a victor.
—Carnell Smith, a victim of paternity fraud who took his case all the way to the United States Supreme Court
So you’ve read the preceding pages and hopefully understand why men (and women) need to fight back. The time for silence and hand-wringing is over; the time for action has come. In this chapter, I will tell you how you can change your own life and, in turn, change society. I will be giving you tips and ideas of my own, but also I will be interviewing men and experts who have taken steps to reclaim justice for men and their pursuit of happiness as individuals in a free society. Some have taken small steps, others are large, but they are all important in winning the war against men that our society has been waging for so long. You can learn from these men and the following information or you can blaze your own path that will open the doors of liberty for all men. Our sons, brothers, husbands, fathers and friends deserve no less.
Changing the culture and political landscape is hard; it takes patience, determination and an Army of Davids to gather steam to change the tide of injustice and prejudice against men that has been brewing now for more than forty years. People don’t think of men as entitled to change; they believe that men have had it too good for too long, and that retribution is not only justified but also necessary. Though this is a myth, and society is willing to throw men under the bus for the “good of women” and the white knights who support them, we cannot let one type of inequity substitute for another.
Equality is not a zero-sum game where if one group has power, the others have less or none. We can strive for equality so that all people, including men, can live more productive and autonomous lives. Even in a politically correct article in the Guardian on how boys and men must be included in the conversation on equality (to help women, or course!), the author acknowledged, “there’s something dangerously retributive about an approach that simply flips an inequity around and approaches power as a zero-sum game.”1 Men can’t sit back any longer and let our female-privileged society continue down this road of revenge and retribution, for it will not end in a good place for men or society, as discussed in Chapter 5.
So let’s get started on an action plan with tips for fighting back in each of the areas that were discussed earlier in the book. These areas included marriage; paternity rights and forced fatherhood; education; advertising and a culture that portrays men in a negative light; and the decline of male space. The following tips may seem very general and they are, but the war against men is a very complex topic that requires some guidelines; these should be tweaked by individuals reading this book to fit with their own lives and abilities. It is beyond the scope of this book (which is meant to be a call to action rather than a research study) to address every area of discrimination against men, but I have highlighted what I think are the most important points from the book. Let’s start with the most important tip.
TIP 1. Stop letting women run the agenda by controlling the dialogue on sex, gender, relationships and reproduction.
Men have just given the realm of sex, gender, relationships and reproduction over to women and left them to make the rules. No more. You must understand how powerful controlling the narrative is in these areas. If women make the decisions, men will be the ones living with these decisions. Men have no reproductive rights, and it’s no wonder. If men concede that power exclusively to women, don’t be surprised when men have no power.
Professor Jim Macnamara, in his study on men in the media, found that “the discourse on men and male identity reflected in and propagated through mass media editorials, opinion columns, features and letters, as well as comments quoted in news media articles, is largely contributed by women writers, academics and researchers. Furthermore, male voices given resonance in mass media discourse are, in most cases, pro-feminist men.”2
When female-centered women and the Uncle Tims who go along with them are the only authority on men, fatherhood and sexuality, the agenda quickly pushes aside men’s needs or rights, and allows injustice to flourish. I am not saying that all women present gender in unfair ways, but many are liberal academic types who are trying to set an agenda that keeps women’s needs at the forefront and overlooks those of boys or men. Of course, there are women who are fair or sympathetic to men’s needs, in addition to women’s, but they are few and far between at this point in the media arena.
Takeaway lessons: Stop being silent. Silence leaves issues of sexuality and reproduction to be decided by women and the Uncle Tims and white knights who support them. If speaking up feels unnatural and is difficult, do it anyway. Remember that if people mock you, hate you and call you names when you speak out, that just means your message is working.
If you need help on speaking out, check out Richard Driscoll’s book You Still Don’t Understand,3 which discusses communication techniques between men and women, or get a general book on how to communicate effectively, such as the old, but still relevant Quick and Easy Way to Effective Speaking4 by Dale Carnegie. Other books that might help you are those that focus on how to get involved in government or politics and work at the grassroots level, and good ones to try are science-fiction writer Robert Heinlein’s Take Back Your Government,5 David Horowitz’s How to Beat the Democrats and Other Subversive Ideas6 or Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals.7 Though Heinlein’s book was originally written in 1946, it still has some good tips that are relevant, like “just show up.” It’s amazing how few people it takes on a local or state level to get things done. The latter two books are good from an overall tactical standpoint. Horowitz’s book is obviously for Republicans and Alinsky’s more for Democrats, but it’s good to know both angles. In the war on men, though Democrats might be more likely to pass laws or engage in unjust laws and cultural norms against men, Republicans can often let their chivalry and white-knight impulses take over. So, plan on understanding what is involved in going after both sides.
If you feel you can’t speak out, write. Go to blogs that discuss relationships, like TheFrisky.com relationship section,8 or the men’s section at YourTango.com9 or other sites that focus on issues of men, women and relationships, and offer your comments. If these sites are filled with men’s voices instead of just women’s voices, other readers will find a different perspective instead of just the same old “men are bad, women are good” theme. Believe it or not, this small change can help change people’s minds and open themselves up to other ideas if they see it enough. Remember what Mahatma Gandhi said: “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
TIP 2. Fight for better treatment of men in marriage and relationships.
This book is not a marriage or relationship manual, but there are a few things you need to know that I am going to tell you. First off, relationships are now all about emotional interactions and women are said to be better at controlling the emotional narrative. It doesn’t have to be this way. Men are not the emotional wastelands that the media and culture would have you believe. Often they are just too afraid or pragmatic to say anything for fear of upsetting a woman. Also, many men are afraid they will not get laid if their wife or girlfriend is upset. Placating her, however, will probably have the opposite effect. So why put up with emotional abuse and go sexless?
You don’t have to be rude, but set boundaries with your wife or girlfriend. The sooner, the better. If she is disrespectful, call her on it, even in front of friends. Women hate to be called out in public. Do this by saying that you will not have her act in a disrespectful manner toward you and that it is insulting. Talk to her later in private and tell her that you are happy to discuss problems or issues between the two of you, but insulting you or demanding that you follow her wishes is not acceptable.
You know the saying, “If mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.” Well, it’s not true. Your happiness matters too. Don’t be an emotional hostage; start speaking up to your significant other about issues that concern you. Quit hiding in the basement with a beer and swallowing your anger or hurt over something she said.
As far as change in the laws of marriage and divorce to make it more equitable for men—this is a very tough one. Right now, women hold the cards in marriage, reproduction and divorce. Until change is implemented, men have a few choices: don’t marry and stay single; live with a woman without marriage, but keep your eye on the common law or palimony laws, if any, in your state; or get married and learn how to get decent treatment in your relationship.
If you decide to get married, here are a few tips. Be sure. Date for a long time and live together if that goes along with your values. Two years or more is a good length of time to find out if you are compatible and to get a sense for her true personality. Find someone who earns approximately the same amount you do, or more if possible. That way, if you divorce, you will not be the one left holding the financial bag. If you work and your wife stays home with the kids, you must realize that you are more vulnerable if things don’t work out. If you spend equal time with the kids, it makes it more likely that you will have a better case for more time with them if divorced. It’s not great to have to think this way about what should be a trusting and loving relationship, but given the high divorce rate, protecting yourself throughout your dating life and marriage is just the reality for today’s men. I have talked to men who were successful in getting divorced, meaning that they got custody of their children or kept at least half or more of their possessions. Those who won their cases did not let pride stand in their way. Pride is usually an excuse for doing nothing.
One divorced man I talked with said that his wife had cheated on him. He got the best recommendation for a lawyer that he could, had his wife followed by an investigator, got evidence that she was cheating and said to her face, “I will fight you for everything—the kids, the house, and the bank account.” She backed down and he won his case and got custody of the kids. Many men think that they did something wrong or that if they had been more of a “man,” the wife would not want a divorce. This type of pride will keep you from acting. Lose the pride.
In another successful case, Jerry, a forty-two-year-old African American male, who works as a personal trainer, told me that his ex-girlfriend tried to trap him into marriage by getting pregnant, though she said she was on the pill. They had broken up when she discovered she was pregnant, and, rather than wait until she went after him for child support, he took action. He went down to the child support agency after the child was born and showed them checks he had written for the child’s care and asked to pay a reasonable amount of support himself. When the ex-girlfriend tried to go after him for more and then threatened him with domestic violence charges, he hired a lawyer and went after her. He found that she had an order of restraint taken out by a past boyfriend and used this to show that she herself was dangerous. He denied charges of domestic abuse and fought her every step of the way. The judge gave Jerry visitation and kept his child support the same. Jerry did not back down and won his case. Many men give up too easily. Don’t be one of them.
Takeaway lessons: Set boundaries with your girlfriend or wife as early as possible. Once bad behavior starts, it is hard to change. If you find yourself in the middle of a divorce, lose the pride. Fight back, get a good lawyer and don’t be afraid to take back what is yours. Quit the chivalry and inferiority complex that tells you that you weren’t man enough and made the wife leave. It was her choice. I am always shocked by the men who tell me they lost everything in the divorce, but then find out that they never fought hard in the first place. If you try and still lose, at least you didn’t sit back and do nothing.
I asked men’s rights activist Glenn Sacks for some more tips for men on a state and national level, and here is what he said:
It is important to understand that the system is not going to change by itself, or because it’s unjust, or because it hurts children. It is only going to change if fatherhood and shared parenting advocates organize themselves into a strong, national organization that can compete in state capitols and DC with the National Organization for Women and its numerous allies. The Boston-based national group Fathers and Families has employed full-time legislative representatives and engaged in the political process on a professional level, and has had significant legislative success. They are organizing grassroots efforts in many states.10
Join and support some of these grassroots groups.
TIP 3. Fight for better laws, including those on paternity and forced fatherhood.
I contacted Carnell Smith, who runs a paternity fraud website at http://www.paternityfraud.com/ and his own website at CarnellSmith.com.11 This man is a nonstop activist who has fought tirelessly for the past ten years on behalf of men who have been victims of paternity fraud. His story is a tragic one with a happy ending. From his website:
Smith discovered that the child he loved and supported for 11 years was in fact fathered by another man. Surprisingly the courts did not speak of restitution nor of assigning responsibility to the biological father after hearing that the child’s mother knowingly and willfully withheld material facts from Smith.
Instead Smith was told that it was his fault for not discovering the truth earlier and was bound by the courts to continue paying child support.12
Smith took his fight all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court. His long fight took him from engineer to entrepreneur and activist for men’s rights in paternity fraud:
As Carnell Smith sought justice to save his family from poverty and homelessness, he also unearthed a desire to help others facing a similar situation.
As the devastating numbers of children and parents affected by paternity fraud became more evident, Smith began to push for legislation that would protect Georgia’s families. With the support of the Honorable Representative Stanley Watson, women, men, clergy, military victims, other law-makers, Smith successfully spear headed Georgia’s first paternity fraud legislation in one year.
Determined to protect children and parents around the world, Smith also launched U.S. Citizens Against Paternity Fraud, a grassroots organization that educates and mobilizes voters around paternity, child support and custody laws.
Carnell Smith founded 4TRUTH Identity’s DNA Center, providing genetic (DNA) tests similar to the one that transformed his life for maternity, paternity and immigration services.13
In an interview, I asked Mr. Smith how it was that he was successful in changing the laws in so many states to give men who were not the biological father the ability to disestablish paternity and stop paying child support for a child who was another man’s. He responded that he approached the problem of paternity fraud to the courts and legislature as a “civil rights issue.” That is, forcing a man to pay child support for another man’s child whom he is not willing to adopt is defacto slavery. Smith also told me that he did not do it alone. “Women have got us beat socially. Men tend not to get out and make social connections the way women do.” But Smith told me he had a great deal of help from others who cared about his cause. He was able to reach out and get them to help. In an email follow-up to our interview, Smith gave me more details on his case that readers might find helpful:
I used a two prong approach of continued litigation of my personal case while exposing “fact that family court does not operate as a court of law” while simultaneously lobbying for GA reform. Originally, I thought that winning my case at USCT [U.S. Supreme Court] would help other paternity fraud victims in other states. And believed that getting a new law in GA would help fellow Georgians overturn cases of paternity fraud. I was attempting to circumvent the need to lobby individual states to establish legal DNA testing to vacate cases of paternity fraud. Sadly, we are left with the only option to lobby individual states to reform paternity laws since USCT [U.S. Supreme Court] has refused to hear paternity fraud cases for more than ten years.
1. I took my case all the way to the USCT [U.S. Supreme Court], believing that “subject matter jurisdiction” is a proper defense to overturn a paternity judgment obtained by legal fraud or constructive fraud. The high court had two meetings about my case as representative of a national issue where states are allowed to disregard facts (mother’s testimony/documents) and scientific evidence to forcibly maintain a fictional order of paternity.
Results: USCT [U.S. Supreme Court] denied my appeal on June 9, 2002. Smith vs. Odum.
2. Due to continued lobby activity, national/local PR and majority public support, we were successful in getting GA House vote 163 to 0, GA Senate vote 45 to 5 and our Governor Roy Barnes signed HB369 (OCGA 19-7-54) into law on May 9, 2002.
3. Poetic Justice: I became the first victor to win his case using the new GA law 19-7-54 on Feb. 6, 2003.
I believe that no person should have to face discretionary appeal where “prima facie evidence” proves the accused male did not cause the pregnancy as sworn by the child’s mother.14
Takeaway lessons: Find one legislator or politician or individual who is sympathetic to your cause, contact him or her and meet with them to discuss what can be done to change a specific law. Be willing to work with others and don’t discount people who are willing to be involved. Smith said that 80 percent of the people who reach out to his organization are women: the mothers, wives, sisters and even grandmothers of men who have been deceived about the paternity of a child. Be inclusive.
What about forced fatherhood through trickery; what can you do about that? If you are long past caring, what about your son? I went to the University of Tennessee to meet with Professor Higdon, who specializes in family law, to get some tips. What I got also was a great hour-long discussion of the uphill battle that men are facing in terms of responsibilities for kids whom they didn’t consent to having and a lesson about the lack of rights men have for a child who is his own.
Professor Higdon discussed the idea of coverture that now, he says, pertains to men instead of women. Coverture was part of the common law in England and the United States throughout the nineteenth century and was a “legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman’s legal rights were subsumed by those of her husband.”15 “Whatever rights a man will hold is now held in her hands,” Professor Higdon says. He gave examples of how men are financially liable for children who were conceived by trickery or even through child rape (a young boy assaulted by an older woman). He gave other examples of how a woman can give up a baby for adoption without consent; she does not have to name the father because of her right of privacy. The man can get on a putative father registry if he thinks that a woman is giving up his baby for adoption, but he must file in each state and it is easy for a woman to go to another state and give up his child. The registry is supposed to notify the man to tell him if the mother is coming to give up her child for adoption, but it is up to the man to track her down state-to-state. Professor Higdon shared a website, www.babyselling.com, about a father and his emotional roller coaster of trying to track down and keep his own child from being adopted.
According to Higdon, “we have reverted to this old system that feminists used to complain about where one gender held all the cards over the other . . . now we have reversed the genders. That’s the irony to me. It also makes women look like lying harlots and teaches men to feel that way. It teaches men—always get a paternity test, even if you dated this woman since high school. It teaches men to stalk your ex-girlfriend so she can’t move away and give the baby up for adoption because women are the type who will do this. That is the message it sends.”
I asked Professor Higdon what advice he would give men to keep from getting tricked into a pregnancy. Here are some of his suggestions:
1. Don’t have sex.
2. Get a vasectomy.
3. Use protection.
4. Keep said protection and destroy it when you are finished. Flush a condom and make sure it went down. There have been cases where women fished condoms out of the garbage or took the condom and used it to impregnate themselves.
For example, Joe Pressill is now the father of twins after his girlfriend stole his sperm by keeping a condom after they had sex and taking it to a fertility clinic to have them impregnate her. Then she sued him for child support.16
In another case, which was mentioned in Chapter 2, a man named Emile was visiting his sick parents in the hospital. A nurse, Debra, offered to have oral sex with him but only if he wore a condom. After the sexual encounter, Debra offered to dispose of the used condom. Nine months later, she gave birth to his child.17
I even read an article at AskMen.com entitled “Sperm-Jackers: The Five Types,” which describes women for men to watch out for when finding sexual partners. Apparently, nonconsensual insemination is not all that rare.18
Takeaway lessons: Stop ignoring the fact that the new coverture is for men. Your life and decisions in many areas of reproductive and family life are now in the hands of women, whether you like it or not. The current laws and family courts dictate it. I hear men discuss how “manly” they are as they “do not care” about such things, it’s “women’s stuff.” As author Michael Walzer, paraphrasing a quote by Leon Trotsky, once said, “you may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.”19 A man doesn’t put his head in the sand. Denial can mean enslavement down the road.
Learn the laws in your state about what your reproductive rights are and educate yourself. Yes, it is difficult and complicated, but it is worth doing as no one else will do it for you. Hopefully, as men demand more for themselves, educators on reproductive rights will come forward to educate the average man. Once men are educated, it seems hard to believe that they will allow themselves to be basically wage slaves and second-class citizens.
Demand a paternity test and make sure you are the dad if you are not married. And if you are married and not sure, do it also. Perhaps men should press for laws that mandate a paternity test at birth for all children, though some people (men included) see this as an invasion of privacy. However, given how few rights men have and how important paternity rights are, maybe it is not a bad idea.
TIP 4. Fight back in education.
Robert L. Shibley is the vice president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), an organization that is dedicated to fighting for freedom in colleges and universities. From their website, more specifically, FIRE’s mission is:
To defend and sustain individual rights at America’s colleges and universities. These rights include freedom of speech, legal equality, due process, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscience—the essential qualities of individual liberty and dignity. FIRE’s core mission is to protect the unprotected and to educate the public and communities of concerned Americans about the threats to these rights on our campuses and about the means to preserve them.20
I contacted Shibley to get some advice for men who are dealing with misandry, discrimination and a lack of due process in colleges today. I had corresponded with Shibley before for my blog, so I contacted him by email21 and asked if he would answer some questions about how men are doing in college. Here are my questions and his answers:
HELEN SMITH: What do you think of the Office of Civil Rights curtailing the due process rights of the accused in sexual assault cases on campuses of those colleges accepting federal funds?
ROBERT SHIBLEY: FIRE has been opposing the curtailment of due process rights in the April 4, 2011, “Dear Colleague” letter from OCR from the very beginning. The letter requires that all universities subject to Title IX institute a low “preponderance of the evidence” standard for cases of sexual harassment or assault, and also requires that those accused be subjected to double jeopardy. Both fly in the face of centuries of American legal tradition and of justice itself. The proper way to address sexual assault on campus is not to make it easier to convict anyone accused of sexual assault, but to improve procedures so that when someone commits a sexual assault, students can be confident that the person being caught and punished for it actually committed the crime.
HS: What can men do to fight back against this?
RS: Men and women should engage with campus administrators to make it clear that students want to be treated as if they are innocent until proven guilty and that they do not want to be tried twice or more for the same offense. In addition, people who have been unjustly convicted of sexual assault by campus courts should get a lawyer and/or contact FIRE.
HS: What is the worst case you have had at FIRE that involved a man who was denied his rights? How was it handled?
RS: The worst case was that of Caleb Warner, a student at the University of North Dakota, who was convicted by a campus tribunal of sexual assault using the preponderance of the evidence standard, suspended for three years, and prohibited from taking classes at any North Dakota public college. Only a couple of months after he was thrown off campus, however, the Grand Forks, N.D., police department charged his accuser for making a false report about the alleged assault to law enforcement. (She is still wanted on this charge and has reportedly fled the state.) When Warner’s lawyer brought this up to UND, UND refused to rehear his case. When they contacted FIRE and FIRE wrote to UND about it, UND stated that there was no new evidence and that they simply determined that Warner was guilty of sexual assault using the very same evidence that the police used to charge Warner’s accuser with lying to them. Only after FIRE exposed this outrage in the Wall Street Journal did UND relent, reconsider the case, and “vacate” the punishment. But UND has never apologized or even acknowledged that they got the case totally wrong.
HS: How can men in general fight back in an atmosphere in colleges where they are discriminated against with the authority of the college administration? For example, forced sexual harassment training, etc.?
RS: The best way is by exercising their right to protest and organize on campus against these measures. Universities rely on their students meekly complying with their rules, no matter how Orwellian or intrusive. If students are aware of their rights and demand that they be respected, it is much harder for a university to intrude upon them. This is particularly true because universities cannot defend in public or in the media what they do to their students in private.
HS: Do you have any ideas or advice for men on how to speak up in colleges or universities without fear of getting their grades cut or expelled?
One excellent way is by contacting FIRE and letting us know about what you plan to do, so that if it results in punishment FIRE can go into action more quickly. Generally, though, organization and numbers are important. It’s easy to punish one student, especially if that student doesn’t know about FIRE; it’s much harder to silence a student organization—even a small one. And going to the press in cases of censorship always makes a university much more careful about what it’s doing. Universities rely on good PR for their donations, and they therefore take bad PR quite seriously.
HS: Do you have any thoughts for how parents can protect their sons from colleges that discriminate against men?
RS: Parents should demand answers from colleges who have policies that discriminate against men (or anyone else). College administrators take the opinion of parents seriously, and a call or letter to them will certainly be read. And if they don’t like the answers they’re getting, they should seriously consider talking with their children about switching to a new school and letting the school know why they’re doing it. Money, as always, talks the loudest.
HS: Do you think it helps for men to speak out freely in schools where they may face repercussions? Or is it better to lie low until one is out of school? Is there a middle ground, such as writing stealth papers, research, etc., that tackle a topic such as men’s issues in a more indirect way? E.g., do a research paper on the effects of paternity fraud on men’s feelings and emotions, rather than tackle writing on why women who commit paternity fraud should be punished, etc.?
RS: What helps the most is for men to be educated on the issues about which they’ve chosen to speak. Simply expressing crude or “un-PC” opinions makes it easy for a university to characterize a man as sexist or outside the mainstream. But it’s very difficult for administrators to come down hard on those with good, well-formed, reasoned points. While colleges would often like to pretend that all “right-thinking” people must agree with their viewpoints, they are aware that off-campus, there are literally millions of Americans who disagree with them on virtually any given issue. And many of those dissenters pay taxes or tuition to support their campus jobs! It’s one thing to pick a fight with a largely powerless student—it’s another to be willing to tell the public at large that half of them are sexists, racists, or bigots of some description.
Takeaway lessons: Don’t sit back and let the university dish out whatever politically correct regulations it decides on. Start a small, vocal group and get the media involved if possible. Notice that it was only when FIRE exposed the Warren case in the Wall Street Journal that the University of North Dakota relented. If you need guidance, contact FIRE at 215-717-FIRE (3473) or visit their website at http://thefire.org/about/contact/.
TIP 5. Fight back against negative portrayals of men in the media and culture.
First off, control your own behavior. Stop laughing when men are beaten and bruised by women for things like cheating or just because some women are violent. It’s understandable that comedy skits like slapstick are funny, but when you laugh at another man who is going through hell, you make the situation worse and perpetuate the stereotype that it’s okay to abuse men, especially when women do it. I once wrote about a story of a college guy who was beaten with a baseball bat by his girlfriend, also a student, for breaking up with her. Everyone thought it was hilarious, even other men. That’s disturbing, and if you think it’s worth laughing at, you have no one to blame but yourself when men are treated badly.
If you see other men laughing at such things, say something. You don’t have to be a wimp about it. Mock them mercilessly. I often call them Uncle Tims for selling out their own gender. Men don’t like being made fun of, but sometimes it’s the only way to get them to stop male-bashing and belittling other men.
Takeaway lessons: If you see shows or ads that bash men, go to the website or find out the phone number of the sponsor of that ad and email them about your concern. Tell them you will not buy their products because they are misandrists who bash men. Don’t buy their products or services. Money talks. You would be surprised how effective a dozen complaints from men would be. Men’s rights advocate Glenn Sacks has organized campaigns against a number of shows and ads that bash men and has been quite effective.
TIP 6. Reclaim male space.
Men’s groups have been marginalized to the point where men are often afraid to have any group that is specified as a group for men. Think of universities where they often have a women’s center but almost never a men’s center. I was surprised to learn of a men’s law group at one of the large public universities and tracked down the president, Matt. We met at the law school one day and I asked him how the men’s law group came about.
“A couple of years ago, we noticed that there were all these groups at our school—the Black Law students, the Women Law Students, the Latino Law Students—so we decided that the administration could not turn us down when we went to set one up. They didn’t seem to like it but they let us have it. It’s like they judge it in some way.” Even though the group is not about men’s rights, but mainly for men to do charity work and get together for some male bonding activities such as dinner, shooting and golf, there were some people at the law school who did not like the fact that the men had a group. “Our group rubs people the wrong way,” Matt stated. “Some of the liberal women find it demeaning.” When I asked why, Matt said he didn’t really know other than they might be seen as sexist. “We have to be really careful about what we say or we could get disciplined. I have heard of other male undergrad groups having that happen to them.”
“Wow,” I thought, “these universities are real treasure troves of free speech”—but on with the story and the stealth way that these law men have asked for their male space and put it to use. Yes, women can join, just as men can join the women’s group or any other group. There are about eighty-six members, with two women who occasionally come to some of the dinners or go out for drinks. The law group does some charity work for other men, such as collecting cell phones for veterans or helping to raise money for a local young men’s group that has an after school program that provides recreation to keep boys from joining gangs. The group even ran in a 5K to support heart disease research because one of the male students had died from a heart condition. Their outside activities also include doing guy things, such as going to restaurants for large portions of steak and going out to smoke cigars. In this group setting outside of the university, they could joke and have fun without worrying too much about saying the wrong thing. “You don’t want to say the wrong thing or stick out at school. If you don’t say anything, it’s hard to interpret.”
There are very few men’s law groups in the nation, but there should be more. I was dismayed, though not at all surprised, that a men’s group had to watch what they said in the law school, but the amazing fact here is that a group of men wanted to have a presence in the school and they got the administration to act on their wishes. Just the presence of the group is a statement: “We are men and we are here. This is a space carved out in this school for us.” One reason that Matt felt there weren’t more men’s law groups is that men don’t ask. If you make a case to the administration, they typically have to let men have the group if others already do. Though they may not like it, they typically must let students set one up.
Takeaway lessons: If you want more male space, ask for it. Even if it is not ideal, a male presence will make a difference and start on the road to men being fully back out in the public sphere. As far as home goes, don’t slink down to a man cave unless this is a space that you truly want and desire. If your wife demands that you take the dirty garage or some dingy basement while the rest of the family enjoys the run of the house, make it a point to talk with her about your need for space. If she balks at you, let her know that this is important to you and if you need space and it is not available at home, you may have to be in the office more or out in your car to get some decent space.
Remember that in the introduction I talked about going Galt, which is a metaphor for withdrawing your talents from the world and turning inward to keep from being exploited. In today’s modern world, going Galt may be a bit different than what Ayn Rand had in mind in Atlas Shrugged, but the idea is similar. Why should you put out your best effort only to have it taken from you by the government, the state, women or by the matriarchy-by-proxy set? By the latter term, I mean those politicians and legislators who may be male but who carry out what women’s groups or their supporters want in terms of the law or special privileges that are generally unfair to men and put women in a protected or privileged position.
Many men have started to go Galt by refusing to marry, thereby not being involved in that particular group of laws and system by opting out. If you are living with a woman, do make sure that you watch out for laws in some states that have common law marriages or palimony laws so that you don’t end up being caught by surprise with legal responsibilities that you did not intend. This is one possibility.
Another way to go Galt is to live on your own terms, make enough money to get by, and stay out of the system’s way. I have noticed a number of men in my hometown who get joy out of driving around, drinking beer, and working on their own hobbies in peace and tranquility in their own homes or in homes they share with other guys. They don’t have to worry about going down to the man cave as they have the run of the house, or that their hobby will be shelved or stopped because of a spouse’s refusal to allow it. For some men, this works. For others, it may not. But even married men can go Galt within reason. Of course, if you have a family, you will have to consider everyone’s needs in your decision to go Galt.
I asked men on my blog for some examples of how they might go Galt in a female-centered society. Here are some responses.
Stephenlclark wrote in:
There are still many jobs for men. You want something hands-on then look at the energy boom in places like the Dakotas and elsewhere for example, the world still runs on machines that need servicing; most working at these jobs are men and likely to remain so. There will always be a need for welders! These jobs pay well, and if you know a second language and are willing to travel there’s that too. One of [the] busiest guys I’ve met here in rural Missouri worked on helicopter engines [and] traveled to jobs all the time. At least in the rural areas, there are opportunities for small businesses that service homeowners and always will be.
If the university is your thing then focus on engineering degrees—for all the desire to increase female engineering enrollments it’s still no higher than about 30% except in rare instances. Employment of engineering grads is still good and will continue to be so and the comment about language ability and travel applies here particularly.
Lastly, open your eyes and look beyond the boundaries of the US: it’s a great big world out there, a frontier where PC-mavens neither rule nor exist. Learn a skill, learn another language and go: You are endowed by your Creator with the unalienable right to pursue happiness. Pursue it.22
JKB says:
Not every way of “going Galt” is workable for every man. I would say, though, that men should adopt the habits used traditionally by Jews as they lived and worked in societies that were or had potential of becoming hostile to them. These are, in fact, survival skills of any group not secure in their surroundings.
Concentrate on mobile wealth, pursue independent businesses rather than jobs that leave you at the whim of some individual or small group of individuals, develop journeyman skills (journeyman in the original sense of working by the day or contract), and focus on marketable skills that depend on your knowledge, which can’t be seized, over credentials which can be rendered worthless.23
One other thing men could do to go Galt: Don’t enlist in the military. Why put your life on the line for a system that treats you as a second class citizen?24
Armageddon Rex says:
I agree with Eric R. but his idea is incomplete. Carry it a step further. In every traditional society men are the protectors against external and internal enemies. Since men no longer enjoy full and equal citizenship in our society, it’s time society reaped the crop they’ve planted. I will encourage, and I urge all other men in western societies who work with and train boys and young men to likewise encourage the males they encounter to NOT join the military, NOT to become any kind of peace officer or work in Law Enforcement or Corrections in any way, and NOT to become a firefighter, EMT or Paramedic. I would encourage them to boycott studying obstetrics as well, but our current usurious, litigation happy society is already taking care of that. . . .25
These are just some suggestions. Think of some of your own and see what comes to mind. One point I want to make on the latter two suggestions by Eric R. and Armageddon Rex is that some men are already thinking about no longer allowing themselves to be placed in positions that are dangerous in order to protect others. Why should they fight and possibly die for a culture that sees them both as expendable and like second-class citizens? Like the Concordia shipwreck captain and crew that was discussed in Chapter 4, men are heading for the exits and asking “Dude, where’s my lifeboat?” When society viewed men as important and heroic for taking on these roles and treated them with more fairness and respect, men were willing to step up. Many still are, but I wonder for how long?
USE A COMBINATION OF APPROACHES THAT WORK FOR YOUR PERSONALITY TYPE
You can use a combination of one or more of these approaches—either fighting back, going Galt or both, or individualize them and find out what works best for you based on what type of person you are. Are you a behind-the-scenes kind of guy? Perhaps yelling for your rights won’t work for you, but you could write for, or work for, a political campaign that you believe in, or write opinion pieces for the web or other media. Find some that are inclusive of men’s points of view but don’t be shy about trying to get to those that frown on such things. A bit of controversy might up their readership and they might be willing to take a piece on gender and sexuality from a guy.
If you are a person who likes being in the spotlight, use the media to your advantage. This is what Carnell Smith, the paternity rights activist, did, and it worked beautifully for him. He told me he once got men from all over the country to come to the state capital in Georgia with signs that read, “Why does our government want men to be homeless?” in response to unfair paternity fraud cases where men are going broke trying to pay for kids who are not even their own. He then sent out press releases and called the media to come down and film the protest.
If you have a local community-access television station in your town, go to the city hall or school board meetings and ask to speak. They will usually give you a few minutes of air time and you can share your grievance on a local men’s issue that may concern you. For example, if the schools have incorporated some kind of propaganda against males in the curriculum like the Miss Representation film presented in Chapter 4 and your son or daughter is being affected, go and tell them about it. Ask the school board members why your local school (call the school out by name) discriminates against boys and give some examples. If you also shame the board members by calling them out by name, so much the better. Anyway, you hopefully get the idea and can come up with some ways, no matter how small, to improve the lives of yourself and other men and boys in your community.
DEALING WITH ANGRY WOMEN, WHITE KNIGHTS AND UNCLE TIMS
Since these groups are so prevalent, they require a section all to themselves. These three groups are the biggest deterrents to men standing up for themselves, so how do you deal with people from these groups? If you can understand them and find out their motivations, it will help you figure out the best course of action.
Women who are angry and complain a lot seem to get help—both in the media and in their relationships with others. Women tend to be more willing to “initiate relationship conflict, more willing to escalate conflict, better able to handle it when it occurs and quicker to recover from it.”26 Men tend to be more stressed and confused in angry confrontations with their significant others and tend to withdraw and stonewall.27
The problem with this approach is that it leads to marital dissatisfaction and possible divorce because the man’s stress is a leading indicator of dissatisfaction with a marriage.28 If you are dealing with an angry woman whom you care about, try talking to her about what you feel. Let her know that you feel upset by her words and need some time to cool off. Once you feel better about things, talk with her, stay involved and try to talk it out. Women often get angry because their anger is their power with a man. He will try to do what he can to placate or help her. This was perhaps necessary in times past as women had little in the way of power and they needed their husbands to listen. Now that women hold the power, maybe they need to try to listen a little bit more.
What about all of the angry women in the world, like the vicious types who think of men as enemies that are belittling and abusive? Call them on it. Women hate being called out in front of others; if a woman is rude to you or belittling in public, call her an emotional abuser in front of others or in a blog comment. Nothing will bother her more than being told she is acting in an abusive manner: Most women like to think of themselves as an emotionally competent person who could be a victim, but not a victimizer. Use your own form of operant conditioning, meaning that there are some consequences to making belittling, sexist statements with little thought. This could be a cold stare, withdrawing from the conversation, or thinking of a clever comeback such as “gee, you’re a real treat”—something that lets her know her statements are out of line. At work, it’s a different matter and it’s probably best to avoid these types if possible or work in an all-male industry if you feel you cannot be around women like this.
White knights and Uncle Tims are both types of men who elevate women to a privileged position in different ways, often for different reasons. The white knight wants to take care of women and sees her as a damsel in distress who needs his masculine protection to get by. His status rises because he is seen by some men as chivalrous and by women as a protector. If he is a politician, he might be more conservative and will see certain unfair laws against men as necessary to protect the little women from the big bad wolf—men, of course. Realize that this guy wants to be seen as a hero, but you must treat him as a fool. This will humiliate him and get him to rethink his chivalrous tendencies, which often lead to men being harmed and women gaining privilege. If you encounter a white-knight type in Internet chat rooms or out in the world, call him out for being a tool of women, for that’s what he is.
An Uncle Tim is generally a sellout to his own gender who is more than likely either a politician type—usually liberal—or just a guy trying to get laid who thinks that his PC behavior will get him laid more often. Point this out as frequently as possible and make fun of him for it. Shaming him is vital. The Uncle Tim type might just be a young guy who has been brainwashed into believing that he must dance to the “female as superior” tune as men must be punished for discrimination against women in the past. In this case, try to educate him or give him some reading materials on the Internet or elsewhere to show him where he is going wrong, or pray he grows out of it. If he continues past the age of thirty, shame him also. Once the mocking reaches a level where it is uncomfortable to speak up about how men must pander to women, he will probably stop or at least think twice about it.
TIPS FOR WOMEN ON HOW TO HELP
While working with men and working on this book, I have met many women who really care about men and about justice. Though the media would have you believe that any man who dares speak about his rights is a misogynist and all women are victims with few rights and a list of grievances that have never been resolved, not all women feel this way. Many are open-minded and love their fellow man and want things to be fair. For example, my friend and fellow blogger, Amy Alkon, speaks up for men on her blog, www.advicegoddess.com. She gives advice to women and men, and her blog is straightforward and helpful to both. If women try to act like victims, she calls them on it. If men are having issues in a relationship, she doesn’t assume he’s the bad guy. We need more women like Alkon in the relationship arena who stand up for both genders.
So what can women do to increase positive interactions with men? Here are my top three suggestions:
1. Stop your natural tendency to complain to him so much. Yes, the culture tells you to do it and the media exacerbates female victimhood and misandric behavior, but stop it. If your husband or boyfriend has flaws, you don’t have to always point them out. Try to focus on his more positive qualities. If he fixes things around the house or acts as a bodyguard at night, remember that those duties are just as, or sometimes more, important than washing the dishes.
2. Do not go out and complain about him to others. This is a killer for your relationship, and if he finds out you are hanging out with your girlfriends and dissing him, his feelings of trust will break down. And if your girlfriends constantly complain about men, tell them that you don’t appreciate it. If you fear they will ostracize you for that, they aren’t very good friends. And if you care more about your friends’ feelings than your husband’s or boyfriend’s feelings, then how important can your relationship be?
3. Listen without judgment to what your guy has to say. People are always saying that men don’t speak up, but they often don’t because of the negative reaction they get, especially from women. Men are terrified of angry, judgmental women. So, no matter how weird or disturbing you think of what your husband or boyfriend says, listen and don’t interrupt with how he should feel. Just let him talk. At the same time, don’t try to get him to talk about your relationship constantly; this is a relationship killer.
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
This short book has taken a look at why men are on strike in our society and tried to provide some solutions. However, while fighting back on an individual level is good, there is much more that needs to be done on a system-wide level. Many of the young men I talked with, and even the older ones, seemed to have no clue about their lack of rights in the areas we discussed. They were shocked to learn that they had no or very few reproductive rights, that the family court didn’t care if their wife cheated in a divorce or that they could be held to a fairly low standard at college should they be charged with a sexual assault.
And as for what complex legal terms like coverture mean? Forget it. Most men, even educated ones, have no idea. But they should, because they are living the modern twenty-first century version of it, just with the genders switched. Now women (and the state) hold the legal and psychological cards, and men are just now figuring it out. A man may pretend that it doesn’t matter or that he is too “masculine” to care, but his denial doesn’t make the truth—that he has little control over his legal fate in reproduction, sexual harassment law or marriage—any less real.
The first thing that needs to be done is to educate boys and men about their legal rights (or lack thereof). This could be done through boys’ and men’s organizations or private means. Parents should agitate school systems by high school for health classes that provide speakers who can talk explicitly on what men and boys face in the legal arena and how to protect themselves. We need more classes on men and the law to educate future lawyers and others about men’s issues who, in turn, would provide guidance to other men on how to navigate the system and fight back. Education is a start, but it is only a beginning.
There has been talk of a White House Council on Boys and Men, but one has to wonder if government involvement might cause more problems. If this council is done correctly, it might be effective in providing a large-scale study of how boys are doing in education, college and the community and provide some guidance to schools about how to more effectively engage boys and young men. The proposal for the council was put together by Warren Farrell, who is indeed a friend to men and boys, so it just might be okay. There is a website that describes the council at http://whitehouseboysmen.org/blog/. You might want to look at it and see what you think.
We need more systematic studies that look at how men actually cope with many of the issues that we have touched on. For example, how are men dealing with paternity fraud? Carnell Smith, the activist described earlier in this chapter, is working with a sociologist on such a study of men’s emotions and feelings when finding out they are not the father of a child. These studies need to become part of the conversation and input when deciding paternity or family law, just as women’s attitudes and feelings about rape have a huge impact on public policy.
Why is there no extremely active National Organization of Men or American Association of University Men? There should be. Warren Farrell is the co-president of The National Organization for Men29 but I had never heard of it until I looked it up on the Internet. It should be a household word. Maybe in days past there was no reason for such an organization but there is now, more than ever, for men are in the minority in colleges and many aspects of American life. Yes, I know; there are some men in high positions. Seriously, though, there are very few in comparison to the entire male population. As Scott Adams, the author of the Dilbert cartoons, says of men in top positions, “THOSE ARE OTHER MEN.”30
The average man has no lobby and few advocates. This needs to change. With individuals fighting back and lobbies to advocate for men, only then will we begin to see change. As men’s rights activist Glenn Sacks told me in an interview, “Men must have effective, well-funded, professional organizations that lobby for them at the state capitol and in Washington, D.C., just like the feminists.”31 I wish it could be different and that men could just get a fair shake because the country was fair. But it’s not, and wishing it so will not work. So far, everyone is just telling men to “grow a pair” or “man up,” which are just buzz words for “do what we want and don’t give us any trouble.” Don’t listen. Speak up. Fight back. Support a good men’s-advocacy group. Men in a free society deserve no less.
This book is meant mainly to be a wake-up call about the need for change and advocacy in the area of men’s rights and men’s issues. If you would like to discuss or read more on this topic, visit my blog at www.pjmedia.com/drhelen or email me at askdrhelen@hotmail.com.