The Good Men Project is more than just a “big tent.” It’s a big universe.
In a different lifetime, I would consider Hugo Schwyzer a friend. I am awed by his ability to tell stories of his personal experiences, experiences many of us might be afraid to even remember. I admire his ability to make an argument, to add insight, to have a seemingly endless amount he can say, especially when it comes to feminism. In a previous lifetime, I would have called myself a feminist, too. But these days, I prefer disposable labels of who I am. Labels that cycle in throughout my life as needed. I look at labels, simply, as performance art—the same way gender can be labeled a performance. “If this is Act 3, I must be a CEO.” And within that framework, I simply act in ways that I see as bringing the most good to the most amount of people.
Were there to be a label that made sense to define the very core of who I am, it would be a “humanist”. Hugo Schwyzer, on the other hand, as he has made clear with his very public resignation from The Good Men Project, defines himself—through and through, to his very core—as a feminist.
At The Good Men Project, we speak from the experiences of men. It doesn’t mean we don’t allow women’s voices, and it doesn’t mean we don’t talk outright about feminism. But it means we also talk about other things. A lot more than we talk about feminism. In fact, at various times in The Good Men Project’s short span on earth, we have been called too feminist, too macho, too homosexual, too heteronormative, too white, too old, too young, too rich, too poor. We’ve survived that all. And we’ve survived it all because, first and foremost, we are about men, but at our core we are also human.
There is no doubt, when you look at men and the stories they have to tell, that change is happening. If we say “men’s roles are changing,” we might as well have Homer Simpson hit his head with a big “doh.” Everywhere you look you can see men in different states of change. Men losing jobs, gaining jobs, figuring out custody arrangements. Men deciding to stay single, or marry other men, or marry four different women over the course of a lifetime. Men bringing their daughters to ballet, staying home to raise the kids, exploring sexuality. Men in jail and men in war. One of our favorite contributors is a man who started life as a women, transitioned to a man, only to then marry another man. Justin Cascio believes in gay rights, trans rights, the full expression of masculinity no matter what the path to get there, and yes, along with that, feminism. And call us optimists, call us whatever you want, but as we look at the men, the stories they tell, the struggles they have, and the honest way they are sharing those stories—well, all we see is good.
♦◊♦
As an individual, I can see how feminism is the fight for all those rights, but as a leader of an organization that revolves around men, I’d prefer to come from a place that doesn’t have a female frame of reference but a human one. We are humanists first, and we have built a website for men to tell their stories. Along with those stories, we talk about provocative stuff: race and prison and war and the sex trade and rape and sexual violence. The Good Men Project allows men to tell individual stories, stories of growth and change and heroism. It also is a place that has deep, long conversations that continue for hours, days, weeks, months. Almost three million people have visited this website.
♦◊♦
The first day I ever met Tom Matlack, we had lunch together, and he told me some of those stories. He had been collecting them to put in a book. He had a half-finished manuscript and wanted some guidance as to how to spread the word.
The stories, Tom told me, were all tied together by the fact that the guys had come to a point in their lives, a “defining moment,” a moment when all that they thought to be true was in question. And as these guys looked at the world around them, they realized that what they wanted was to figure out what it meant to be “good.” Tom didn’t know. Tom didn’t want to help them define the word “good.” He just knew that the stories were stories worth telling.
You could see it in Tom’s eyes; as he was telling me these stories, he was right there with these guys. He was on the battlefield in Iraq. He was stepping over a pool of blood in a jail cell. He was in a hospital room while doctors applied heart paddles to a man’s one remaining son.
Tom handed me the manuscript, and then glanced away, far out the window. He handed me the manuscript and said “Here. You can read my own mess of a story in there. It’s the stuff guys don’t usually talk about.”
I took the manuscript from him and replied, “Tom, don’t you see? That’s not just the start of a book. That’s the start of an idea.”
♦◊♦
Just to set the record straight—and only because I’ve been asked more than once to comment publicly on the situation—I never said to Hugo, “I will not run your post.” I took the post down over what I saw as valid concerns from Tom Matlack, the founder of this Project, the starter of this vision. I talked with Tom on the phone, and I then asked Hugo a question that I wanted answered before the post ran. He told me he needed 24 hours to think about it. I said, “fair enough.” Hugo could have chosen to answer the question. He could have chosen to address my concerns before the post ran. He could have chosen to talk to me about it. He could have done all of the above and then still resigned. But he didn’t. Instead, he answered my question by sending me his resignation letter. I accepted his resignation. When I challenged him on this on his blog, he said, “There was nothing more to discuss.” That is all I will say about the subject, so please address further questions to Hugo.
But if Hugo and I were to walk together into a very allegorical bar, together, as a male feminist and a female humanist, and have a cup of green tea together, this is what I would say to him. I’d say, “Hugo, I get it. I get that you resigned over politics. It wasn’t really about me controlling your editorial direction. We’ve worked together a year. How many times have I tried to control your words, edit your posts? Once? Twice? Never?”
Instead, I understand, Hugo, that you needed to make a very public act of feminism in your departure from The Good Men Project. Because you are a feminist at your core.
And so, I will tell you a story.
Hugo, on the night your post was due to go up, I was at the mall with two of my kids. It had been a hellish day, but I had promised them we’d go Christmas shopping, and damn it, we were going shopping.
And here is a text exchange with my daughter at the mall.
The reason she got “the vibe” from me? I had just gotten an email that Tom Matlack passed along from a feminist who was “hurt” by the words that had been exchanged. He had apologized to the feminist. He had asked her if she wanted to write for The Good Men Project. He had passed me the email because he knew I was the one to make that happen. I did.
♦◊♦
Did I say to my daughter, “Sorry I can’t pay attention to you right now, I have a hurt feminist on my hands?”
No, I said “Sorry, hon, I will put down my phone now. I will take off my label of CEO. I will stop worrying about the hurt feminist. And I will pay 100-percent attention to you.”
Anyone who doesn’t see that as an act of feminism is a different sort of feminist than I am, and that’s OK. Anyone who doesn’t see that for me, as CEO of a men’s multi-media company, being able to put my phone down and say to my daughter: “I will stop being CEO while I am in a room with you”—anyone who can’t see why that act is so powerful and life-changing—in my mind, just doesn’t get it. Because—I am very publically showing acts of feminism every day. I am showing men that switching roles like that—seemlessly, without doubt, without guilt—is OK for men too.
♦◊♦
I get home from the mall, and Hugo’s post is up. And Tom Matlack calls me up. Tom is the person, who, by the way, when we first started working together, called me up to have a conversation about profit margins. And as we’re on the phone, he says, “If we looked at it this way, the profit margins would be … wait a second …” And then in the background I hear “Whhhheeeee! Thanks daddy! Up!” Tom gets back on the phone and says, “Sorry, just wanted to put my son on my shoulders. So the profit margin would be …”
That’s an act of feminism too.
♦◊♦
But the thing that I keep getting back to—and the reason I’m still in this allegorical bar with Hugo, hashing this out—is that The Good Men Project is not about feminism. It’s about men, and their stories.
And through those stories, we also want to be the people who talk about race. Who talk about prison. Who talk about sexual abuse. Who talk about addiction and mental illness and child support and marriage and divorce and life and death. Just tied together under the umbrella of men. Because even if we are moving closer to a “non-binary world,” right now, we still have people we call “women,” and we still have people we call “men.” And we’re here for the men.
♦◊♦
I take 100-percent responsibility for the fact that Hugo resigned. If that puts me at odds with the feminist community, so be it.
I tried to do what was right. What was good. What was respectful. What was human. If I failed to be any of those things, I failed nobly. And Hugo, if you’re still here in spirit, I hope you can see that too.
♦◊♦
Last night, I worked late into the night with Marcus Williams and Joanna Schroeder as we worked on hashing out a clearer and more consistent commenting policy to make the site a safer forum to talk about the issues that men face. Charlie Capen joined our video chat—and gave his views on comment moderation, which he gleaned from howtobeadad.com.
At 3:27 am, I took a glance at the email on my phone, where Charlie had written up some notes on what had been discussed. My head hit the pillow, and I dreamt of comment moderation. For one of the shortest days of the year, it felt damn long.
♦◊♦
Since The Good Men Project started just a year and a half ago, we have had almost three million absolutely unique visitors.
Three million people—any way I look at it, that’s a huge amount of people and a huge responsibility. I’d like to be modest, but that’s a damn “big tent”. In fact, it’s not just a damn big tent, that’s a damn big universe.
And since I’m a visual person, I try to imagine how many people three million is. It’s over 43 Gillette stadiums filled to the brim with roaring fans. No wonder we get people angry sometimes. More people have been to The Good Men Project website than have been in attendance in two-and-a-half years of Patriot’s football.
Late last night, before I worked on the commenting policy but after I had said good-night to my kids, Tom Matlack and I talked for a while on the phone. We talked about where The Good Men Project had been, where we are going, and how to best get there. As usual, I couldn’t contain my excitement. I start pacing back and forth, practically jumping up and down. We talked about core audience, mission, the stories we are telling of men, by men, for men. The stories from men that help define us as human. We talked about how hard it is to talk about provocative topics because we don’t always use the right words. We laughed. We’ve both used the wrong words before. And I found my voice rising as I spoke: “We can’t stop talking about the provocative topics, Tom. Even if we talk about them wrong. Even if we say the wrong words.”
Later that night, Tom sent me one of his favorite one-word emails.
It simply said “Onward.”
About Lisa Hickey
Is the writing on the wall, feminism is not the utopia is has always claimed itself to be and a change of tack had to come, sooner than later, before feminism became a total irrelevance, wandering into a hate fest as clearly demonstrated when the RadFem Hub was exposed and the Feminist world totally ignored it..
Fascinating how a doctrine that professed to be the answer, ignites into hate and malice. Changing this site to be more “Man Issue orientated” than “mangina training” is a change. We await the next step..
I noticed there are complaints against the GMP by a feminist ‘Zorro’ about censorship of comments which are feminist-friendly and pro-Hugo.
It is strange that feminists, who are in favor of a very restrictive moderation policy (agree with us or you are gone!) are complaining about their missing comments in a men-friendly environment.
My request as MRA to the moderators of the GMP: Please publish ALL comments!
Unlike feminist websites, a publication for men should be open to everybody and should always welcome any comment, even if the majority of men and the moderation staff disagree with its content.
Thank you!
I’m not going to comment on Hugo Schwyzer hitting the eject-button because either way, he packed up his stand at the GMP Magazine, and headed elsewhere. It’s a done deal…now…moving on…
So, I have observed that even comments parked under Lisa’s article that is essentially an affirmation of returning this site to its core intent, becomes another demonstration of why that re-dedication is necessary. Both of the comments above (I’m still not sure how the chronological order of comments is arranged in this joint) or below mine seem to revolve around rather intense obsessions concerning the feminist movement and whatever its latest thought- crimes against the male gender are at this moment.
This is as a good a place as any for me to make the following heretical statement:
When it comes to this site, I could not give a rat’s ass about “feminism” being a threat to me, or my masculinity, or how I look at that subject in general. The more radical elements of that movement that have a dim view of men in general will not be swayed by anything said here. Yet far too many of the comments sections following too many of the articles posted here tend to be viewed as the starting gun for yet another useless tug-of-war between points-of-view that can get so deep that they’ve missed the point suggested by the article in the first place.
Despite my semantic displeasure with the phrase “rape culture”, it is for me at least a good example to examine why we’ve heard from both Mr. Matlack and Miss Hickey concerning dragging this site back to what it was intended to be in the first place. These articles (which Mr. Schwyzer participated in contributing an article) examined how men feel and are made to feel when their offer to help a stranded woman is rebuffed out of “stranger danger” fear. First and foremost I was disappointed in my own gender frankly, because there were so few male comments that wanted to talk about positive ways they’ve dealt with that social dilemma. No, the overwhelming majority of comments were bent towards whatever “movement” they felt caused this social situation. I consider that to be bad form in a site that’s dedicated to exploring the definition of good men mostly through the auspices of what men themselves have to say.
As I have stated before, and in a way that has been confirmed by Miss Hickey’s explanation of her relationship with the word “humanist”, I refuse to identify myself as a “feminist”. That’s what good men felt they needed to do as a shorthand way of expressing concerns over the legitimate grievances the feminist movement stated during its “first wave” in the late sixties and early seventies. Frankly, at this stage of my life in particular, I feel no such heavy need to choose that label or be identified by using that word.
Again, we don’t need men claiming male “feminist” status, leveling the playing field for all should be a goal of good men/people everywhere.
I’ve enjoyed reading GMP articles. I’ve not felt it my place to participate, I’m just happy that men are discussing these issues which are theirs. But I don’t know how to make sense of this post. Have I missed something? What is that story about the kids? What is this mocking of a reader – a “hurt feminist”? I can’t believe this was meant as it reads – juvenile. If this is the reply to Hugo’s missive, then the game is over, forfeited actually, because this side showed up without wits.
I’m sorry you didn’t understand some of the points in my story. It is truly how I write — interweaving multiple examples of actual events going on in my life in order to make a larger point. In this case the point was two-fold”:
a) For me, actions define feminism as much as words do. “Equality in the workplace” — which I had always seen as one of the large tenets of the feminist movement throughout the years — has everything to do with embracing a model that accepts both child-caring and a professional life that is thoughtful, action-oriented and results-oriented. That is how I live my life, with the constant fluctuation between the two. But somehow, that meaning of feminism which I have carried around with me is not relevant any more. I see that. The problem is — no one has described to me what the new meaning of feminism should be, in a way that I can understand. It doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, it doesn’t mean it’s not important, it doesn’t mean I don’t want to listen to it. It just means that at this point I don’t understand it, so I choose to embrace a word I do understand. But my confusion is probably causing your confusion when you read this.
b) Part of the reason this whole thing started was because of words. Words that you are or are not “supposed” to use. Wrathful, insane, and now hurt. But what is weird to me is that men have often been called forth to “talk about their emotions”. Wouldn’t you agree? And then when they do use emotional language, they are told they are using the language “wrong.” This is the biggest point of disconnect I can see. I would love if someone could tackle explaining why that is.
c) Your saying that I “showed up without wits” does not do much to advance the conversation. But I am happy to still have the conversation with you if I can understand why some language might be appropriate but other language might not be.
thanks
Merry Christmas every one
ht tp://pandagon.net/index.php/site/comments/the_good_men_project_i_used_to_know
“Personally, I’m a big fan of just banning MRAs. They have nothing of value to add to a conversation, and exist online solely to disrupt any conversation they fear might lead others towards reaching the conclusion that women are people. ”
Amanda Marcotte writes the above comment, in an article where she is annoyed at someone else generalizing, and even posts this “I wanted evidence of how women are not accepting men, and what acceptance would look like. “. Well Amanda, walk to a mirror and take a look, what do you see? Your question has been answered. You’re in fan of banning MRA’s on the generalization that they have nothing to add to a conversation. Isn’t this exactly the generalizations MRA’s are accused of making about feminists?
“When you make a bunch of baseless, unevidenced, generalizing arguments about a group of people—in this case, feminists and women as a group—and when challenged, cannot and will not provide evidence, you’re not making argument. You’re simply being prejudiced.”
Please, provide evidence on this, provide evidence that as a whole MRA’s have nothing of value to add. I could post evidence of radfems who advocate selective gender abortion, who want to abort males and even film “plays” about shooting a man whilst women jump around happy. But this doesn’t mean all radfem’s are like this, so how can you generalize all MRA’s have nothing of value to add?
Basically it truly sounds like Amanda Marcotte has a prejudice against those who want male rights/issues to be known, and would be classed as bigotry. Kinda contradicting if you fight against sexism and bigotry if you perpetrate some yourself. As bad as SOME MRA’s are, and I’ll gladly admit some need to calm their anger and ignorance, I’ve seen plenty of feminists who are 100% the same. Should I suggest that we might as well ban feminists, or even just radfems because they add nothing to a conversation? No, that would be silly.
“The whole mission behind the Good Men Project is presumably to advocate for good men, and while they do publish writings by actual good men, they also publish writings by overt misogynists like Paul Elam, who by definition cannot be good men, any more than members of white supremacist groups can be called “good men”. Differing viewpoints is one thing, but promoting the work of open bigots is just (f word-ed) up. ”
The GMP has posted articles by Amanda, and the above shows she’s openly showing bigotry, and possibly even openly misandrist, is she saying she cannot by definition be a good woman? Is it also “(f word-ed) up” ?
I am quite surprised and shocked actually that she’d write that. I am not writing this to be a personal attack, but simply want to know why get annoyed at x generalizing, then go on to generalize badly in the same article, in the first paragraph no less? Pot calling the kettle black in a classic example…
I don’t know why your ” surprised and shocked” Archy. That quote is the style Ms. Marcotte uses in all of her writings. Dare to even slightly question anything she says (and it doesn’t matter if you are a man or a woman) and you will feel her rath. With people like her,an ” open conversation” goes like this,she tells you the way it is, and you sit there and nod your head in agreement.
I guess I came from the understanding that feminists would be less likely to be bigoted, ignorant, biased, but more and more I’m seeing a bad side to quite a few. I’m glad there are some great feminists but at least on this site, the 2 most popular seemed to be Amanda and Hugo and both quite frankly are the very thing they are trying to fight against, what’s worse is they cannot see it themselves!
You become what you hate. The answer is not to hate.
What’s the fun in that though?
Lisa wrote
“Part of the reason this whole thing started was because of words. Words that you are or are not “supposed” to use. Wrathful, insane, and now hurt. But what is weird to me is that men have often been called forth to “talk about their emotions”. Wouldn’t you agree? And then when they do use emotional language, they are told they are using the language “wrong.” This is the biggest point of disconnect I can see. I would love if someone could tackle explaining why that is.”
Pardon me if I’m incorrect
(I may very well be)
It seemed to me your original header article wrote that you had mailed to Tom the words
“Your post on manliness was hurtful”
Hence my earlier comment.
Now it appears that the feminist in question was the one delivering the hurtful words.
Please clarify that for me, if you will Lisa, thanks in advance.
To answer your question in my quote of you, as to why when men write about feelings the other side considers it hurtful.
*It is because women have always had the benefit of shutting down mens conversation
with the simple accusation that in turn puts the focus back on her,instead of him.
Men are natural protectors.We always have been.
It is never in a mans nature to hurt a woman,the accusation thereof is a tried and true technique successfully used to shut down mens conversation.
The resultant lack of male solidarity
further empowers team woman.
It’s all about keeping men in the role women has designated for them.
As been said in other spaces,mens role transition has been co-opted by feminists.
To be succinct, women want “equality” and old school chivalry at the same time.
To have the cake and eat it too so to speak.
There is no team man, we’ve been working for the women all along,we’re just not appreciated nor allowed to fall out of role.
We sure could use a Presidential council for men, the women have 8 or 12 now..
But then again ours is not to question why, ours is but to…
For whom?
Sorry if that wasn’t clear. It was NOT me that had written “your post on manliness was hurtful” — it was someone else.
I have heard that theory from others that having women say “I am hurt” or “This feels unsafe” or “I feel emotionally unsafe in this conversation” is a way of shutting down the conversation. After all, what good man (or good person) would keep on talking if someone said they were hurt or felt unsafe?
I have been watching for that — it is fascinating when I see it happen. It’s why I brought it up in my post — to highlight this. I just want to be clear — I don’t think women *intentionally* do this (any more than men intentionally stop themselves at those words). So I disagree with your statement “It’s all about keeping men in the role women has designed for them.” As an individual, that is simply not true.
I do catch myself, however, and try to be really conscious of ways I might be “emotionally manipulative” and attempting to correct myself when I see it happening.
Thanks for your comment. While I don’t believe in the generalizations nor in the intention, I do believe that the shutting down of communication happens and I would like to see more awareness when it happens.
I kid you not, but I stumbled across this article as I was looking around the site for a way to contact someone and tell them I thought the site was getting sexist all of a sudden. I had no idea Hugo resigned. And while I don’t know the full story yet, at least now I can say that from this article alone I think there seems to be more favoring of the mainstream feminist backlash than anything else. Extremely disappointing. But like you said, your first CEO phone call was to talk about profit margins. Big shock.
@Paul
Why sexist? Because Hugo resigned? I say it again, HE RESIGNED. HIS DECISION.
It is up to him and not up to the GMP to submit comments and articles, and as far as I know Hugo is NOT banned. His articles are not edited or deleted. His articles are welcome.
However the GMP is willing to publish also other comments – especially those from MRAs – which are not feminist-friendly and Hugo will have to accept that, the GMP is not his website.
Hugo does not like that and so he resigned, and only because Hugo resigned, the GMP is sexist?
Strange logic…
Can you explain what you mean by this: “I think there seems to be more favoring of the mainstream feminist backlash.” It’s not clear.
We do cover a lot of ground and a lot of POVs. It’s odd that this website is being called both “too feminist” and “too sexist” at the same time. Some examples from you would be helpful when calling us out on what you see as bad behovior. We can’t change if we can’t see what you see.
The “profit margin” discussion was to talk about a different point entirely. It happened before I was CEO, and was actually in regards to something else entirely. That said, it is a CEO’s job to run a business as a business.
@Lisa
There is no reason to defend yourself with arguments like ‘it is a CEO’s job to run a business as a business’.
Interesting. Questions about the financial situation – ‘who will pay for such publications?’ – and ‘they should not do that for money’ etc. seem only to be an issue related with publications about men’s rights.
For sure feminists are not known to work for free and nobody says a word about it.
Thanks Yohan. It baffles me the ongoing questions about money, as if the only “pure” way to have a discussion is to not make money. The goal here is to become profitable so we can reach a wider audience and do more good.
Hi Lisa,
As someone who understands the points feminists and MRA’s try to make (and personally know many from both viewpoints), keep on doing what you are doing. You, Tom and the rest of the staff are doing a great job.
No matter what articles you run about this issue, you will ALWAYS receive criticism from people who just completely disagree with the other side. It would be like having a blog that discusses both political parties and having Rush Limbaugh and Al Sharpton writing. I have nothing against either gentleman, but they are just so in to their viewpoint that they will never see eye to eye with each other. The same rings true with this issue as well. Some will say an article is “sexist”, while another will say that very same article “is too feminist.” All you and anything else can do is hold your head up high and realize the magnitude of what you have accomplished in the last year and a half: that this site is really equivalent to a Huffington Post. You publish all articles and welcome diverging viewpoints. Most people who like to read about differing opinions really do like the diversity and melting pot. I really do feel the people who welcome different opinions are the majority, but they usually do not speak out as much.
Thanks Andrew! We’ve had our fair share of criticism lately, so I welcome the kind words. It’s been a fascinating road trip these past 18 months, that’s for sure. And yes, we truly set out to embrace the divergent viewpoints, so it’s nice to hear that is seen from the outside. We are also constantly looking for ways to get better. I’m sometimes accused of being defensive — but that’s only because I’ve got something important to defend. We’re *obviously* doing something important here — the fact that we’ve got so many critics is a great sign, I believe. We’re certainly being noticed.