Article’s author, Sinikka Tarvainen

Spanish MRA Domingo Gonzalez Alonso

Feminism going too far in Spain, “men’s lib” claims
August 31, 2010
by Sinikka Tarvainen
Monsters and Critics.com
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/features/article_1581119.php/Feminism-going-too-far-in-Spain-men-s-lib-claims-Feature

Madrid (dpa) – Women’s rights need to be defended, most Spaniards agree – but do men need their own liberation movement as well?

Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero’s progressive women’s rights policies have sparked a debate on whether his campaign for the equality of the sexes has gone too far.

Spain’s gender legislation ‘discriminates against men,’ who are not protected adequately from female violence against them, men’s rights activist Domingo Gonzalez Alonso claims.

Men also have few rights in situations of separation or divorce, the spokesman for the Ambos association defending divorced men told the German Press Agency dpa in a telephone interview.

The government rejects such arguments and accuses the critics of downplaying centuries of male oppression against women.

Zapatero, a self-confessed feminist, took a strong stance in favour of gender equality by appointing Spain’s first half-female cabinet after his election victory in 2004.

After winning a second term in 2008, Zapatero created Spain’s first Equality Ministry.

Legislation adopted in 2004 turned Spain into one of the most progressive European countries regarding women’s rights, the government says.

The law defines gender violence exclusively as male violence against women. Violence exercised by women against men comes under ordinary criminal law.

Men should be penalized more severely than women for similar acts of domestic violence, the Constitutional Court confirmed in a recent ruling.

More than 100 special courts – as well as special police teams – handle cases of men threatening, coercing or physically attacking their current or former wives, live-in partners or girlfriends.

Around 45 women have been killed in cases of gender violence in Spain so far this year. Despite Spain being known for its macho culture, the figure is not particularly high in European terms. About 40 per cent of the victims were not Spanish, but immigrant women.

The law on gender violence obliges the media to inform the public about cases of women being killed by their husbands or partners.

‘Meanwhile, 18 men, 25 children and 16 grandparents have been killed this year in situations of domestic violence, but the media take hardly any interest in them,’ Gonzalez complains.

He quotes the case of a young man who says his live-in girlfriend pushed him down the stairs in the southern city of Huelva.

‘He broke his collarbone, but she called the police and accused him of violence. He was arrested and ordered to keep away from her. She can continue living in the house, which belongs to him, until the court case is resolved. That could take about a year.’

Some Spanish judges and authors have also accused women of falsely charging men with gender violence.

However, there is little evidence of that happening on a wide scale, and the debate now focuses on fathers’ rights after divorce or separation.

The mother traditionally gets custody of the children in more than 90 per cent of the cases. That entitles her to continuing to live in the family home and to getting alimony from her former husband.

‘Many men have been left homeless, because their wives found someone younger or just could no longer stand the sight of them,’ Gonzalez says.

So far, only one of Spain’s 17 semi-autonomous regions – the northern Aragon – has adopted legislation aimed at generalizing shared custody of children. Judges there can oblige mothers to share custody with fathers in the absence of adverse factors such as violence.

Advocates of shared custody say it allows fathers to be more present in their children’s lives, and also favours women in that it allows them to work more outside the home.

The government has rejected making shared custody the national norm. Irresponsible fathers could claim custody of their children only for economic reasons, government gender violence delegate Miguel Lorente Acosta pointed out.

Critics of the government’s equality policies failed to realize that gender violence was not just a question of some men losing their tempers, Lorente Acosta told the daily El Pais.

It was a ‘problem of patriarchy, of a cultural and social model based on inequality,’ he stressed.

Top 10 Most Powerful Privileges Enjoyed by Women

As a woman, it seems to me that society has been neglecting the fact that females enjoy distinct privileges even as they form feminist movements to demand more. Ignoring the superior rights we enjoy in some parts of society is only going to make us seem weaker as we request compensation for simply being female. The following are ten of the most significant privileges we enjoy as women.

1. Exemption from Social Shaming for Occupying a Lower Status
   Women are less likely than men to be judged based on their occupations and/or incomes. In a New York Times article, Dr. Louann Brizendine from the University of California, San Francisco, used her psychiatry expertise to determine that women who lose their jobs “aren’t going to take as much of a self-esteem hit” as men. The hierarchy of the workplace, she said, provides the majority of self-worth for men. Women, then, are more likely to have self-esteem that doesn’t rely on occupational success.
2. Exemption from Life-Shortening Roles
   Females, on average, live longer than males. According to the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), the average life expectancy for women is 78.79, while men are expected to live to be 71.8. Based on these facts, many women in marital situations have power of attorney and significant control over finances based on the likelihood that they will outlive their husbands.
3. Exemption from Responsibilities of Parenthood
   Women have the option to put their children up for adoption, absolving themselves of responsibility, while men are required to remain responsible for children until they reach adulthood. If a woman releases a child for adoption, this is socially acceptable and others are expected to take responsibility for the child. Additionally, in divorce situations, men must pay alimony and women are given special treatment as single parents.
4. Exemption from the Risks of the Protector Role
   Females enjoy the benefits of a safe and healthy society, but aren’t expected to risk anything to defend it. The military draft applies only to men and women are never required to register, no matter how extreme the personnel demands may become. Even though there are many military positions that are non-combat related, women are not required to participate. With women composing just over half of the U.S. population, they are well protected by men and free of personal safety worries when it comes to the draft.
5. Exemption from the Demands of the Provider Role
   Mothers often have a stronger role than fathers in their children’s lives. Although some women complain that they are required to work harder as parents, they have more influence on child development and especially on children’s attitudes toward their fathers. In most situations, the mother spends significantly more time than the father with children and working mothers who also put food on the table and clean the house are perceived by children as the more powerful parental figures.
6. Exemption from Social Pressures to Cover Emotional Pain
   Females are less likely than males to commit suicide. Society’s expectations of men are so much more stringent that they are more frequently driven to end their lives. In 2001, 67.6 males committed suicide each day, while only 16.3 females ended their lives. It may seem difficult to live life as a woman, but statistics show that being a man is even more stressful.
7. Exemption from Social Pressures to Defer Their Safety
   In emergency situations, women (along with children) are evacuated prior to men. Research is being conducted to support the idea that women should be considered “vulnerable groups” and should have their “special needs” considered in emergency situations or disasters. Disproportionate responsibility for dependent children is cited as a reason for this, although single-parent families headed by males are not considered “vulnerable groups.”
8. Exemption from Harsher Criminal Penalties
   Females are less likely to receive the death penalty and, in general, receive less punishment than males when they commit crimes. Human Rights Magazine acknowledges the gender bias in the execution of the death penalty, stating that capital punishment is centered around the symbolism of “portraying people as devils” and that “women are usually seen as less threatening.” Even women who kill their spouses tend to be seen as victims and are typically presented by their lawyers as being “under the domination of men.” By blaming crime on males, females have historically evaded the legal consequences of their actions.
9. Exemption from Genuine Vulnerability
   Women have a much lower chance of being murdered than men. In 2001, nearly 75% of homicide victims killed by men were male, while 80% of those killed by women were male. Because females are perceived as the fairer or weaker sex, it seems more unfair to kill them. Appearing defenseless as a woman is a natural deterrent to murderers who want to feel that they’ve killed an individual of equal or greater power.
10. Exemption from Suspicion
    Females who interact with other people’s children are less likely than men to be perceived as pedophiles. The Seattle Times reports that, when it comes to pedophilia, “Men are demonized, women are diagnosed.” According to media scholar Matthew Felling, women are often perceived as troubled or mentally ill rather than guilty of a crime. As a result, men receive harsher penalties and it is often less socially acceptable for them to interact with children.

Bio:  Alexis Bonari is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident education blogger and performs research surrounding College Scholarships. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

Photo: Public Domain
URL: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3345/3584237659_37a209969b.jpg

Now I’m not saying that autism solely affects boys, nor do I wish to minimize female suffering. But in this case the proposed solution to autism affects boys uniquely. (Can girls be castrated?)  If a problem (or a problematic solution) uniquely affects boys, then why not acknowledge their pain and suffering as a problem unique (if not solitary) to males? And if the purported fix might itself harm boys, then why not acknowledge the risk as uniquely borne by males? Males are invisible in this culture for their maleness, except when a given problem is perceived as specifically stemming from being male.

Castration drug given to kids as autism therapy
Controversial treatment comes to South Florida
By Bob LaMendola
August 3, 2010
Sun Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/health/fl-autism-treatment-20100803,0,601521,full.story

A Maryland medical group has started treating autistic children in South Florida with shots of a drug used for chemical castration, a therapy widely panned by mainstream experts.

The group gives children the cancer drug Lupron to stop their bodies from making testosterone, saying the drug helps expel toxic mercury and quells aggressive or sexually explicit behavior by kids with excessive levels of the male hormone.

A Boca Raton mother who just put her 18-year-old son on the drug said it seems to help.

But numerous physicians, researchers and therapists insist there’s no proof mercury causes autism, that Lupron removes mercury or that autistic kids have excessive testosterone. What’s more, the drug carries a risk of bone damage, stunted growth and heart trouble, and can render children impotent.

These experts contend that Lupron, costing about $5,000 a month but seldom covered by insurance, is one of many treatments that cash in on the desperation of parents trying to cope with an incurable condition for which medicine has few good answers outside of painstaking behavioral therapy.

“Not only is there no scientific backing whatsoever for Lupron treatments, there are several major concerns for the children’s health,” said neurologist BethAnn McLaughlin, an adviser to the Dan Marino Foundation autism group in Weston and the mother of two developmentally disabled children.

“These people are preying on the fears of parents. We cannot be using these children who are so vulnerable as guinea pigs in a medical experiment.”

Untested autism treatments have flourished while science struggles to explain the disorder, which disrupts the abilities to speak, concentrate, connect with people and control impulses.

For unknown reasons, autism has been on the rise for the past few decades, with an estimated 675,000 children – about one in 100 – now having mild to severe symptoms. Scientists believe it stems from genetic defects that may only cause problems after an environmental trigger.

A vocal subset of parents and activists blame vaccines, especially those with the mercury-based preservative thimerosal, which has been banned from virtually all as a precaution. Numerous studies have found no connection between autism and vaccines or thimerosal.

Lupron therapy grew from the mercury camp. Baltimore researcher Dr. Mark Geier started using the drug in 2005 on the theory – disputed by mainsteam doctors – that testosterone binds mercury in the body and that many autistic kids have high levels of the hormone.

Lupron halts production of the female hormone estrogen, which the body uses to make testosterone. The drug mainly is used to treat endometrial cancer in women and prostate cancer in men, and sometimes to chemically castrate sex offenders.

Geier’s promotional materials said he has treated hundreds of children with Lupron and has launched nine ASD Centers in eight states. In his latest, he teams with Dr. David Clayman, a Boca Raton radiologist who has an autistic teen son and is opening an ASD office beside his MRI center in Tamarac.

Clayman said he would not comment until he treats patients with Lupron therapy for a year. Geier could not be reached for comment despite several attempts by phone. He told one parent he did not plan to comment for this story.

The medical group began recruiting Florida patients in March when Geier spoke at a Fort Lauderdale conference for parents of children with autism.

Teresa Badillo was at the meeting. Her family has searched in vain for a way to help their autistic son, Marco, 18. Badillo said he has little speech or interaction with others, but is doing OK in high school. Lately, though, Marco has grown more aggressive, physical and rebellious.

“We were basically under seige in this house,” Badillo said. “This kind of behavior is more scary at 18 [than] at 3. I had choices to make. If you see there is another option out there that can help your child, most parents are going to choose that option.”

Also, Marco had discovered sex and sometimes touched himself inappropriately in public, a common problem among those with autism.

“The kids don’t understand. They have impulses. It’s what happens when you have high testosterone,” Badillo said.

The family put Marco on Lupron about six weeks ago. He gets two injections a month at a dosage larger than used on adult cancer patients, plus a small daily shot.

“The therapy immediately stopped the aggression,” Badillo said. “This is not castrating a kid. It’s just lowering the [testosterone] levels enough to normal range so the kid is not aggressive.”

She said Geier plans to continue the Lupron for several months to see if it helps Marco’s other autistic behavior. She said she knows the drug has risks but believes Lupron critics do not fully grasp the hard realities of life with an autistic child.

Lupron critics said autism parents may not understand the dangers.

The drug is not approved for children – except a rare few with premature puberty – because it can impair bone development crucial to growth, said Dr. Gary Berkovitz, chief of pediatric endocrinology at the University of Miami medical school.

It’s not recommended for people with heart disease, kidney disease, asthma, depression or seizures because it can worsen those conditions. Autistic children are prone to seizures.

“It has not been tested so there’s no way to know if it has adverse effects in the long run,” Berkovitz said.

Said neurologist McLaughlin: “We have very significant concerns about irreversible damage to sexual function and the brain and sex organs of these children.”

In addition, the Food and Drug Administration is investigating complaints that Lupron causes diabetes in adults.

Geier published a 2006 study contending that 11 autistic children taking Lupron did better on tests of awareness, sociability and behavior. He has since issued other studies finding that mercury leads to excess testosterone and that autistic children have excessive levels of the hormone.

Other doctors said Geier’s studies were small, were not scientifically sound and were published in journals that do not follow the standard practice of having experts review the methods.

The area’s largest autism treatment center jointly run by the University of Miami and Nova Southeastern University, as well as another at Florida Atlantic University, frown on Lupron and other untested therapies, officials at the centers said.

Dr. Judith Aronson-Ramos, a developmental pediatrician in Coconut Creek, said practitioners promoting untested alternative treatments often appeal to parents by portraying themselves as persecuted rebels.

“It’s always just ‘The medical establishment is against us,’” Aronson-Ramos said.

Two doctors said Lupron may be gaining traction, because several families have asked them to test their children’s testosterone levels.

“Parents get desperate,” said Debbie Chanan, an autism program coordinator at Florida Atlantic University. “Parents will spend all their money.”

“Your first instinct as a parent is to try to fix things for your child,” said Carol Nigro, mother of an autistic son and a coordinator at the Dan Marino Center in Weston. “Autism doesn’t have a fix.”

McLaughlin said parents should stick with slow and difficult but proven therapies. Teens struggling with sex can benefit from counseling, rewards for positive behavior, jobs or activities to keep them focused and, if needed, drugs to treat anxiety or sleep issues, she said.

“What we know works is a rough course,” she said. “Yes, we can do better. But what we don’t want is for families to lose faith in science and go off with people who … are violating the first rule of being a doctor, which is ‘first do no harm.’”

Bob LaMendola can be reached at blamendola@sunsentinel.com or 954-356-4526.

The video below applies directly to the concept of disacknowledging uniquely male pain and uniquely male achievements by using gender-neutral language to render maleness itself invisible:

“Misandry — Men Don’t Exist”

The movie depicts an entire urban community in the grip of mass hysteria and fear as they struggle to track down and identify a child murderer. The police throw their full resources into finding the killer, but after eight months they still have nothing to show for their efforts. One of the problems that the overworked police force faces is a deluge of false allegations from a hyper-frightened public. In one poignant scene, a man who is walking down the street is approached by a little girl and asked what time it is. He gives her the time, but this act alone incites a mob of accusing onlookers, screaming that this man must be the child-killer and culminating in the police hauling him off to be questioned. Another scene shows a group of men sitting around a table in rapt attention as one reads them a newspaper article. That article prompts one of the paranoid men to accuse the one sitting directly across from him of being the killer. Threats between them ensue.

This movie was released prior to the rise of the Nazis in Germany, but in historical hindsight I think that it’s easy to spot the ominous precursors of collective hysteria that had suffused the public mind in Germany at that time. In some ways, I see the same influences pervading our own culture today. In terms of gender, note that in the film all of the victims were little girls. Somehow the director of this movie knew that of all the possible victims that could evoke a visceral reaction in the viewer, it was little girls that would resonate more strongly than any other. That resonance — the depiction of female vulnerability — is just as palpable today. What disturbs me about it is the way that such a visceral reaction can so easily be used as a political tool to manipulate masses of people. Female vulnerability can be used as a political tool to manipulate masses of people. Netflix’s description of this movie indicated that the Nazis went on to promulgate this movie as State propaganda in an effort to show the dangers of sexual deviance — namely, male-perpetrated sexual deviance against helpless girl victims. Do we not see the same undercurrent of fear about men throughout our culture today? Aren’t our laws and public response to crime reflective of that fearful feeling?

The uniquely male role of protector of the vulnerable was — in fact — illustrated at the very beginning of this film. Seeing it almost felt quaint. In an opening scene, a little girl was about to cross the street but was startled by an oncoming car. A nearby policeman spotted her and took her by the hand, escorting her safely across the street. When I saw that, I wondered, “Why in our culture don’t we see positive depictions of male uniqueness like that anymore?”

As the film approaches a climax, a crime syndicate decides to organize the city’s homeless population into a block-by-block network of informants who report suspicious activity back to the crime syndicate (the syndicate’s activities have been impeded due to the intensity of the police manhunt, and they want the killer stopped so that their “business” can resume as usual). The crime syndicate finds the killer and ultimately prosecutes him in their own secret criminal-led court, where an audience of criminals screams out demands for the killer’s execution. The killer makes an impassioned plea, describing his mental illness in wrenching detail, but is nevertheless shouted down by the crowd which demands execution as the only permanent and effective solution. At the last minute, the police break in and apprehend both the killer and also all of the members of the crime syndicate, who silently put up their hands in surrender.

What a compelling movie. Watch this, people. Watch it as a looking glass through time, almost 80 years into the past. See if you can spot the cultural parallels between our current paradigm, and the time, place and culture where this movie was released. As you watch, remember what became of that time and place — Germany — less than a decade after this 1931 movie was published. The scary thing is that these people were all urban sophisticates — civilized. But watch it all unravel, a foreshadowing of things to come.

– John Dias

We all know about male bashing on television. Sadly, there is a similar bias in mental health research. This video gives a quick glimpse into three studies which show this anti-male bias.

We have all grown to trust “research” and when we hear that a study shows that “X is correct” we tend to automatically believe that “X” is correct. Research has taken on an almost divine ethos that carries the seal of approval of correctness. If science says it, it must be so. The problem of course is that science, especially social science, is less than concrete and is much more slippery than measuring a distance or the tensile strength of a bar of steel. Mental health research is much more vulnerable to values and ideologies of the researchers. If a scientist believes a certain thing it usually has little impact on his measurements of the tensile strength of the bar of steel. No matter what he believes the measurement will likely be the same. But what about issues in social sciences where researchers come to the table with a large amount of preconceived ideas, allegiances to ideologies that espouse strong opinions about those being studied or have traumatic life histories that bias them against certain groups? Can those sorts of things influence the “findings” of a social science study? You bet they can. Gone is the impartial judge weighing the evidence and sifting through the data to find the truth. In today’s world of social science research the opposite is happening: researchers are starting at their pre-conceived bias’s and then designing research to prove that bias. As bizarre as that sounds it is demonstrably true in some social science research. You will see some of that within this video.

1. Teen Violence, NSPCC — full report
2. Executive summary
3. Conformity to Masculine Norms Inventory (CMNI)
4. Contraception Journal study on reproductive coercion
5. Tom Golden also wrote an article that goes into more detail compared to the video above.

Per an announcement by its author, known online as Factory (whose photo is shown on the left), the men’s rights magazine MRm! now has a home on the Web. Thanks to Paul Elam, Editor-in-Chief of Men’s News Daily, for providing hosting for MRm! on his personal Web site. And of course, thank you to Factory for producing this fine resource! We ask for everyone who enjoys the magazine to download it, print it out and then distribute your own copies of MRm! wherever you can.

Hello all:

This is a semi-formal launch of the permanent home of MRm! magazine. Paul over at A Voice For Men has kindly offered to host the PDF (and the bandwidth it will suck up), and has also provided a means to subscribe to the mag, thereby ensuring you don’t miss a single word of the riveting, and culturally signifigant, articles contained within.

Here is the link:

http://avoiceformen.com/mrm/mrm.php

There are quite a few benefits to taking this approach. For one thing, it provided an easier to remember URL (which can be put on the magazine itself). Secondly, it provides “circulation” information (which will likely be wildly inaccurate, but it’s all I got). Thirdly, it provides a means to notify those who are interested when the next issue comes out.

But most importantly, it’s a quick link on any site that leads to many articles outlining most of the issues we are concerned about, without requiring much effort on the part of the “clicker”.

So, have a look (it’s a simple, text based interface at least for the time being), download the latest issue and enjoy.

As a content aggregator, Misandry Review is especially valuable in that it provides an independent storage of content. This means that the content is stored on our system and remains there, whether or not the original content provider shuts down or is censored. Some of the best writing in our movement is thus preserved.

With 7000 posts and counting, we have an ongoing reason to celebrate. Let this be a big “THANK YOU!” to all of the talented writers on our site who have forcefully advanced the cause of justice and men’s rights by speaking out.

John Dias
Founder, Misandry Review

Re: domestic violence, in an effort to document the disparity between services for male victims and female victims, I have created a Google Map. If you have ever used Google Maps to get driving directions, then you should know what a Google Map looks like. But what you may not have known is that Google allows you to create your own maps, adding locations of your choice which then get displayed on the map as push-pins that people can click on for more information. I am using this functionality to allow people to get a birds-eye view of all of the organizations across North America (and beyond) which provide safe houses to male victims of domestic violence. When the project is completed, you will be able to look at this custom map and see the entire North American continent, peppered with pinpoint markers that show the locations of various safe houses that accept male victims of domestic violence. More importantly, Google provides you with cut-and-paste HTML code that will let you place this very map on a Web page in your own blog or Web site. This could be an extremely useful service not only to male domestic violence victims and their children, but also would have some cultural value in demonstrating a vastly unfulfilled need. Once this project is completed, I intend to create a separate Google Map displaying all of the organizations which provide safe houses that exclude male victims, and the visual difference between these two maps would illustrate clearly just how vast the disparity is between services for male victims and services for female victims.

Safe Houses Only

The map is specific only to organizations that provide SAFE HOUSES, and not just those that provide various other services to male victims. Certainly it will be useful to map organizations that provide other kinds of services to male victims, but this project is focusing on safe houses specifically (also known as shelters).

Please note that we will only be mapping the addresses of the ORGANIZATIONS that provide these safe houses, not the locations of the safe houses themselves (which are secret).

Submitting Safe House Locations Via E-mail

I am asking if any of you would be interested in participating in the project. If you are interested, simply e-mail me with the name and mailing address of the organization which provides the safe house, and I will add that as a new location to the Google Map. You can reach me at johndias@dvstats.org.

Submitting Safe House Locations by Editing the Google Map Yourself

If you know how to add locations to a Google Map, then you may do so directly (I have opened editing access to the public for this particular Google Map). I encourage you to spread the word about this project to the general public and to any blogs or Web sites to which you have access. We need not worry about tampering by our opponents, but in case such tampering might occur and someone erases some safe house locations from the Google Map, then it would be a good idea to e-mail whatever locations you find to me whether you edit the Google Map or not.

Here is the Web site address to the Google Map in question:
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF&msa=0&msid=101580271671011744346.000484902f242aeba66b9

To add new safe house locations to the Google map, you will first need to be registered with a Google account. Then simply go to the Web page address above and click on the link in the upper left corner that says “My Maps.” Next, type the mailing address in the search box at the top of the page for the safe house location that you wish to add. In the search results, the page should be divided into a left half (for text) and a right half (for the graphical map). In the text section, click on the link for the address that you searched for; this should cause it to be visually displayed in the map section. It will show up as a little “balloon” that is superimposed on top of the map. Within that balloon, there is a blue link that says “Save to…” Simply click on the “Save to” link. This will cause some text to appear which says, “Which map do you want to save to?” Directly under that question is a drop-down menu allowing you to select the map entitled, “Organizations that provide safe houses to male victims of domestic violence.” Select that map, then click on the “Save” button to the right of the drop-down menu. This will add the safe house that you have indicated to the Google Map. You’re now done. If you have additional locations, simply repeat the process above.

Thank You!

Thank you for your support, and if you’re willing, please spread the word about this vital project by linking to this article.

John Dias

Here is a brilliant video about the gross injustices (to men) of war, military conscription, and women’s exemption from these. The video is entitled, “Equality — War” and was produced by Man, Woman & Myth.