As head of a group researching Men and Families, Dr. West has an interest in such things as ‘men bashing’, but do most men take any interest in or care about such things?

As a bloke, I occasionally see on TV commercials men acting like morons around washing machines and such other domestic apparatus we are supposed to know nothing about, and being treated with contempt by cute little dolly birds young enough to be the ‘husbands’ daughter. I guess we will see these commercials as long as there are men willing be paid to take part in them, so get over it Peter. It’s not the real world, just the same as Germaine Greer and the type of feminists now doing more harm than good to women are no longer part of the real world. If anyone should take umbrage, it is women, not us men.

It is doubtful that the media pushing ‘male bashing’ is part of the real world any longer. How much of the stuff we read, see on TV and hear on the radio is REALLY relevant to the average person? How many people actually consult the media for hints on how they should think and behave, or how their self-image is going?

The media thrives on getting up the noses of people who read the crap they produce. I don’t think sensible men and women fall for their nonsense. Any bloke who reads the rubbish or worse, believes it, is a bit of a pansy in the first place.

Roping Orwell in to support this tripe is an insult to Orwell.

The example that most clearly articulates this ridiculous situation is that of abortion. Women may comment and decide to kill their offspring, men may make no comment or choices. Arn't children the offspring of both parents, or do people really believe an unborn child is a part of the mother, even though it has different dna?

I can't see any link to abortion and there's plenty of OLO threads dealing with that issue.

"Bias against men is so ingrained and so common that most people don’t even notice it."

Personally, I didnt' think much of the advert of the spanner-wielding wife, but only after I saw it twice. The first time I thought it was funny, but then I thought, can you imagine the furore of a similar advert with a broom-wielding husband? Physical woman-bashing is so off-limits that men do cop the slap-stick physical humour.

However, I do think this article is a bit biased. What about the bashing that women cop in advertising? EG: seen the advert of all the women following two men driving a ute (can't remember the brand of car)..one guy says "why dont' we give em a ride?". I can see the humour in that. But now there's a follow-up ad with a bunch of dogs following the same men in the same car, except this time the response to the same question is "nah mate, they're all dogs". Isn't that bias against women?

Why is the Australian media hostile to men?

Puhlease!

Women are consumers, period.

What is good for women is good for the economy and thus good for global Greenspanian economics.

Have you any idea what accelerating number of upwardly mobile women spend on fashion, makeup, exotic foods, dating, and entertainment compared to men? The only thing men spend as much as women on is the divorces and lawyers.

If the global economy depended on men to do the spending it would collapse to a sustainable but unprofitable scenario. This is not what world governments want or will tolerate. They have the power and will make things as hard for men as they can, through media, sports, the courts and the discos till they fine tune their vision of the optimum bottom line on the balance sheet.

Trouble is there is no precedent for testosteroned men to be anything other than cut throat competetive against each other.

If we can all get together and figure out that governments are subtly working against us, we can use our majority voting powers to reconstruct government priorities through OUR elected representatives.
This Reconstruction must be GENUINELY toward family values. It must be so we learn to respect ourselves, women and each other in a way that transcends our natural testosterone aggression whilst keeping it in its proper place in the sporting arena. It must be so we THINK about a sustainable social structure rather than an uncertain, unproven exponential growth, social structure.
A good place to start would be the removal of HECS fees for tertiary education for Aussy citizens and a long overdue moratorium on immigration in order to determine its requirements, sustainability, equity for the VOTERS and not self serving, self aggrandised and spoiled polititians.

Maybe this is a dreamscape, but if governments, economists and CEOs push us hard enough, eventually we will learn to locate the cerebral muscle we need to bring things back to a fairer balance for ourselves and women, who at the end of the day are just as much, unhappy slaves to this system as we are.

In the rough and tough world of blokes a bit of bashing is fair game.

Girls, of either gender, might disagree but reality is, a requirement of being male is to take the hits on the chin, get over it and get on with life and maybe have a hit back once in a while (metaphorically speaking).

When at college I recall, my “friends” were those who insulted me and I insulted back but without rancour by either party.

So when I see an advert of man being seen in less than flattering portrayal, if it is funny I laugh. I do not get on my high horse and demand fairness and gender equality and all the other piffling nonsense which AWP’s (apologists without personality) throw around.

Fide mae – If it were me who was pregnant, I would want last word on how my body will be used and if I wished to remain pregnant.
There is nothing strange with the male not having final say on whether his child will be aborted on not. Because it is not his body which accommodates the embryo / foetus during its development, it is his female partner's and she should make the decision.