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The Forum > Article Comments > Male champions of change > Comments

Male champions of change : Comments

By Sarah Russell, published 24/4/2015

The aim of 'Male Champions of Change' is for men in positions of power to advance gender equality. Let's hope they have more luck than women have had in that task.

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Posted by Craig Minns, Saturday, 25 April 2015 9:57:40 AM

I think Craig, that Dr Russell will only hear;"ΜισÏŽ τους άνδρες".!
Posted by Wolly B, Saturday, 25 April 2015 11:20:02 AM
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Craig,

Thankyou for revealing that about yourself. It is only hard evidence like this, stories from real life, that might show activist females and unworldly legislators just how out of touch and hypocritical they are.
Posted by ttbn, Saturday, 25 April 2015 11:59:50 AM
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Wolly, I don't think that's a fair characterisation of Dr Russell's approach or her views as put forward here. She seems to me to be sincere and authentically concerned about something that is undoubtedly a serious social issue.

As a father of a daughter and the brother of no less than 6 sisters I would like to be able to call myself a "pro-feminist", but there are a few things that stop me.

The first is that I have watched the failure of a feminist approach to social construction over about 40 years, largely because it has been promulgated on a "crash or crash through" approach in which ideology is the primary informant and negative feedbacks are excluded.

The second is that feminism is largely promoted in entirely reactionary terms: female success is cast in terms of mid-twentieth century definitions of male success. As a result, gender equality has been cast as a "zero sum" game, in which success in promoting female outcomes has been almost entirely offset by degradations in male outcomes at every level.

The feminist movement could do with a great deal more of Beauvoir and a great deal less of Friedan in its cultural oeuvre.

The problem for policy-makers today is that they have been very successful in promoting female tertiary education, albeit at the expense of males, yet the females who are so educated don't choose to go on to do the same things that educated males might choose to. As a result we have a huge unpaid HECS bill and a lack of qualified people in some of our most productive fields, as well as a high level of social expense to keep the whole tottery edifice from falling over.

For most women, their personal vision of success is not the same as for most men. It is that fundamental failure to grasp the importance of intrinsic motivation that is at the nub of the problem. A social constructionalist approach emphasises extrinsic forces, but unless they align with the intrinsic, they will always fail.
Posted by Craig Minns, Saturday, 25 April 2015 12:19:26 PM
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I will respond to comments on this Op Ed when I return to work on Tuesday. For now, I would like to apologise for any errors I made about the One in Three Campaign.

I included the paragraph about domestic violence in this piece after dane dismissed domestic violence as “a myth” (in his comment about another recent opinion piece)

I visited the One in Three website before writing the article. There is a section titled “LATEST DATA FROM THE ABS AND AIC”. In this section the statistic “75 males were killed in domestic homicide incidents between 2008-10” is cited. I wrongly attributed this to ABS not AIC.

I have seen the AIC statistic incorrectly used to claim: “One man is killed every 10 days by a woman”. This is incorrect. I apologise for mistakenly attributing this incorrect claim to the One in Three campaign.

According to National Homicide Monitoring Program annual report:
Throughout 2008–09 and 2009–10, 194 victims were killed by an offender with whom they shared a principal domestic relationship, 39% (n=75; 39%) of these victims were male, while 61% (N=116) were female. http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/current%20series/mr/21-40/mr21/04_homicide.html

I agree that all victims of violence – both male and female – should be supported, as should their families.

The intention was not to imply that anyone who is a victim of violence, or indeed murdered, is well off. The term “well off” came from The Prince, Chapter 6, as a warning to the Male Champions of Change: “And let it be noted that there is no more delicate matter to take in hand, nor more dangerous to conduct, nor more doubtful in its success, than to set up as the leader in the introduction of changes. For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new.’
Posted by Sarah Russell, Saturday, 25 April 2015 1:06:41 PM
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Sarah, to be honest, if the arguments are as specious as they are, people will pay as little attention to those two men you cited as to anyone else. They are just playing a political game as they know that feminist ideology is extremely powerful and they have to advocate it if they want political favors.

In my opinion, it's you that are threatened by change. For instance, you can't even acknowledge that a large minority of DV involves male victims and female perpetrators. Just to cite the Australian Institute of Criminology stats that you refer to. You are correct in that although 38% of victims of domestic homicide in 2010-12 were male, a lower proportion were victims of intimate partner homicide. But then you tactfully neglected to state the actual percentage of males killed by their intimate partners. It's 24%. And around 83% of that 24% were killed by women.

So yes, I agree with you that more women are victims. But to you, does "equality" and "anti-discrimination" mean to completely ignore the one quarter killed by their partners who happen to fall within a demographic minority?

How is that equality? How is that anti-discrimination? Where is a single feminist willing to speak out for that 24% (or 38% in the case of all male casualties of domestic homicide)? When you do and only when you do will we (the politically disenfranchised) take you seriously.

You live in an Orwellian world, but one that is unfortunately becoming more prevalent in our politically correct but factually incorrect society.
Posted by rogindon, Saturday, 25 April 2015 2:36:11 PM
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"I will respond to comments on this Op Ed when I return to work on Tuesday." - Sarah Russell

Does your work know they are paying you to write articles and post comments on OLO?
Posted by ConservativeHippie, Saturday, 25 April 2015 3:04:19 PM
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