You missed the bit about the pipes and basset hounds.

What a load of cliche ridden tripe.

Gotta love the endurance of the repeated feminist narrative of every family pre 1970 involving a domineering lazy slob with a drinking problem who beats his wife and has no real emotional connection with his kids and is tragically fallen to an obsession with proving his masculinity, and a poor downtrodden martyr of a wife in a loveless marriage powerless to flee the abuse and totally unfulfilled in the role of carer for her children.

Somehow I think the reality is much more nuanced, seeing as how I know so many old couples where they are still as madly in love as ever and have enjoyed the wonderful partnership and the Family they have nurtured.

I also note the absence of any recognition of the modern day harried neurotic couple in their McMansion with the 4WD in the 3 car garage, the wife rushing from Pilates straight from Uni to rush home to pick up Byron from little athletics and Ava from Japeneese classes and their 6 month old from Gymbaroo, meeting later for a 20 minute meal with her husband in that wonderful Tuscan style cafe while she follows up on work emails and he reads his Facebook and wonders who she's sleeping with at the office and which Lawyer he should use to ameliorate the damage in the forthcoming divorce.

Times change good and bad, but this rewriting of history by the dominant feminist narrative is just as credible as the paragraph above.

Depicting Abbott as a misogynist is Gillards attempt to continue the gender war which ultimately only takes place in the minds of 50 something plus academic Lefties who have successfully marketed themselves as society's freedom fighters for years.

The article reflects a 1970's view of the world which is no longer shared by the populus. Unfortunately the marketers of this idea haven't realised the world has moved on and they look like disoriented WWII Japanese soldiers wandering out into the 21st century still fighting for the emperor or those who spout the nirvana that Communist philosophy can create.

Yet the myth of male dominance lives on. Its all getting a bit ho-hum.

Atman,
The Feminists and the broader Left of 2012 are a disgraceful pack of bigots and hatemongers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhvM3BKuWvg&feature=BFa&list=HL1354609887

Socialist Alternative's critique of the public response to the murder of Jill Meagher :

http://www.sa.org.au/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=7577:jill-meagher-reclaim-the-night-and-the-political-right&Itemid=542

This is a reply to Louise O'Shea from an Anarcho Socialist, the only sane and decent faction of the Left still in existence:
http://slackbastard.anarchobase.com/?p=33085

Identity politics came together elegantly in an episode a few years ago when the appointment of Clarence Thomas to the US Supreme Court was being hotly debated.

It was alleged (but not proven) that he had harassed his female secretary. Sides gelled on identity-political lines. If you thought he harassed his secretary you were a KKK lyncher (Thomas is black). If you thought he hadn't done so you were a male chauvinist. If you wanted to know if he really did do it, or if you wanted to know what kind of judge he'd be, you were copping out from the "real" issue - sympathy for black people vs sympathy for women.

As for the Obama hug, the author's point was what the picture symbolised about personal relationships, not the totality of Obama. Maybe a photo of a mother in Pakistan screaming over her incinerated infant as the drone recedes in the distance would say more about who Obama is (and Romney and McCain and Bush too for that matter).

Whilst I agree with some of the gains cited in the article I was left with anoverriding impression of politically biased cherry picking in the article.

Others have already pointed out the difference between the nice Obama image and the reality on the ground in countries where the US has military operations underway. I don't think Obama is worse than his predecesors in that regard other than the pretence that he is different.

Gillard's speech may have resonated with some, for others it looked like a coward playing the gender card and relying on gender to protect her from a response in kind.

Houellebecq has already made a great point about the difference between the popular stereotypes and the reality that many of us experienced seeing our parents and grandparents interacting as we were growing up.

There were and are some men who are domineering and treat those around them as a means to personal ends with no regard for the wellbeing of those others. Convenient for point scoring but not representative of the majority. There are also women who treat those around them as a means to personal ends, again I don't think they are representative of the majority.

I'm a big fan of removing forced compliance to gender roles. People should be free to live lives of their choosing within the bounds of meeting reasonable expectations of responsibility.

I support Houellebecq's campaign to be recognised as the mother of his children, I support both parents being responsible for providing for their children regardless of their personal work preferences.

I'm not a fan of gendered cherry picking nor of the regular one sided attacks on masculinity.

R0bert

Gee, us men are just slobbering Neanderthals...always nice to see the same old terms of endearment..how I adore the old, 'tolerant' progressive, scientific terminology.

Oops, I think the author may have forgotten to mention why there are so many men in China as compared to women..I'm sure the unmentioned aborting of females by socialists there was strictly an oversight. I wonder, would the 'new male' such as Obama, agree with such a policy?