A team of women are launching a new section at The Good Men Project focusing on women supporting men and the issues surrounding masculinity.
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Everyone needs allies, even in the battle for gender equality.
And that’s what we want to be to you guys, the men of The Good Men Project.
We’re a team of women who love men: We are women who are friends, lovers, colleagues, teammates and parents of men, and we’re concerned about the wellbeing of our friends and partners and sons.
We want to tell the stories of the amazing men in our lives. We want to talk about men’s health, raising boys, and the issues surrounding men and masculinity today.
We’re not here to put men down. We’re here to help lift you guys up, and that’s why we’ve started a special section of The Good Men Project called “For The Love of Men” – to include women’s perspectives on the gender issues that complicate the conversation around what it means to be a man in the 21st Century.
We’re also a place for men to write about women’s issues from time to time. If you’re a guy and you want to weigh in on an issue facing women today, we want to hear from you.
This is a place for love and support. Welcome to “For The Love of Men”.
What do you want us to talk about? What do you want to ask us? What do you need us to know?
We will answer you as best we can, and since we’re in this together, we want you to be a driving force in this dialogue.
Do you want to write for us? Please send article pitches to [email protected] or contact one of the editors below!
Sincerely,
The editorial team,
Marie Roker-Jones, Associate Editor, [email protected]
Alyssa Royse, Associate Editor, [email protected]
Danielle Paradis, Associate Editor, [email protected]
Joanna Schroeder, Senior Editor
Photo: Flickr/Jennifer Murawski
I wanted to extend both my congratulations and best wishes for your new editorial section “For the Love of Men” at GMP. Not only do I think what you ladies are doing is necessary, but I also admire your courage.
There are multiple initiatives starting with the clear intent of having men and women work together to solve everyone’s problems. Hopefully, the public is beginning to tire of the “gender war” and help initiatives like this one, to take a more prominent role.
Again, my congratulations and best wishes.
Terry Brennan
JS
Do you remember how well you listened to all the men that told you exactly what HS was doing, but you ignored them and continued to support his misandry?
What has changed?
So excited to be part of this with Joanna, Alyssa and Danielle!
Love this idea. Hope to contribute, as I have time and energy. Have had a list of “things to write for GMP” in my notebook for quite a while now, and this sounds like just the right channel for those ideas. Just gotta find the time.
We’d love to have you, KKZ!
Looking forward to it, KKZ.
Having had a list of things to write for quite a while sounds interesting.
Friends, Some of the areas I would enjoy hearing discussed: I’ve had many women tell me they want to hear my true feelings. “What’s going on inside you?” they want to know. But when I share my anger and pain, they back away. Many men have that experience. How can women listen to our tough feelings without backing away? Women often say they want a man who is more sensitive, open, and expressive, but are often drawn to “bad boys.” How can women heal their conditioned attraction to “bad boys” and feel real attractions to soft, gentle men? Let’s talk… Read more »
Big vote for #3. Good topic. #2… hasn’t this been chewed to death already? (A) There’s nothing a woman can say that will convince those men who just want confirmation that the game is indeed rigged against them and that women are liars. (B) Diff’rent strokes. Some women like bad boys. Some don’t. Some like semi-bad boys. Some like to mix it up. Some don’t care. And some don’t know WHAT the hell they want (which may lead to the “says she wants this, goes for that” behavior). There is no list of desirable male qualities that every woman agrees… Read more »
Losely connected to #2,
I would like to see a take-down on the popularity of literature like “50 shades of Gray”, Harlequin novels and other “chic lit”. How they might influence the preferences and expectations of women (since the Harlequin’s been around for, like, generations) and what might be the consequences, obvious and subconscious ones, to male perceptions about female attraction/sexuality around this.
What else is there to say? As a woman I’ve found myself baffled every time I’ve tried to engage in dialogue on that subject, mostly because I run into so many of the men represented by my point A, the ones who aren’t really interested in my perspective and just want to hear me own up to the Great Lie of Female Sexuality. Those seem to be the ones most drawn to the topic and most eager to talk about it, which turns into a pointless exercise pretty quickly. I think guys want to engage in this conversation because of… Read more »
Also the “Would you date me, then?” question.
(Not “me” me, but someone like me.)
Dear Joanna, Marie, Alysaa, and Danielle, Thank you for standing with men who are standing for what is good and glorious and right about being men. We are all in this together and we all need each other’s support at this transformative time in human history. I’ve been working with men, and the women who love them, for more than 40 years and there have been many memorable times of support and understanding: The day the “women got it” when my wife and I did a fish-bowl experience and for the first time many women got to hear the “sound… Read more »
We look forward to working with you, Jed!
This is very refreshing! Most blogs, articles, everything I read online seems to bash men, even if it is on man-friendly blogs. The usual comments even on most articles on GMP end up taking the same position of all-women-are-victims and all-men-are-demons; no matter how gentle a route the conversation takes towards it. It would be actually great to see some support from women 🙂
Thank you for coming to share with us. I’m excited to read and dialogue and ally. 🙂
We have a few great posts in the section already, feel free to peruse!
https://goodmenproject.com/category/for-the-love-of-men/
What a great idea! My husband is not a typical “guy’s guy” in many respects, and I think sometimes he feels that pressure when with his family. I try to help him navigate that, and we are both trying to set a good example for our son. Right now, he is a “boy’s boy” who loves cars and firetrucks and trains…but also cuddles with his snoopy dog at night. I don’t want him to lose the part of him that wants to love and cuddle with his blanket, his stuffed animals, or our dogs.
I don’t know whether it’s my own peculiar psychology, but there’s nothing more humanizing and warm than hearing these exact intentions from women toward men. In a world where I’ve felt my own estimation of women eroding over the years, in order to maintain my belief in gender equality, I’ve had to keep reminding myself there are a lot of men out there who are jerks, too. It’s better to have this positive dynamic, to know that there are women out there who recognize men with themselves as fellow humans. Rock on.
Thanks, Paul.
There are jerk women and jerk men for sure. We want to focus on the amazing stuff you guys are doing, and the ways in which you’ve helped both individuals and society at large.
How about a discussion about what women think about being attracted to and maybe taking the first step in approaching shy/introvert/socially awkward men. I often hear women say either that “If he doesn’t approach me, How am I supposed to know if he’s interested/he’s not worth the effort.” or that they did approach/flirt this guy up but he was totally uninterested or clueless, and they will not put themself in that situation again. However, not all guys fall into the “predator” role of men, thorougly discussed in the “Seeing a woman” thread. Some of us do listen to the frequent… Read more »
@ FlyingKal I like this topic. As a shy guy, I had hopes that by the 80’s when I was ready, feminism would unleash women to be aggressive in the mating game. Of course that never really happened. I think subconsciously women realized it wasn’t such a privilege to be the aggressor. That might have been OK, if it at least engendered some sympathy on their part. Instead, I think, men have been squeezed into a damned if you do, don’t, or dare to breathe situation when it comes to initiating contact, where not only did we not get any… Read more »
Dave, there are lots of us, I promise. And the 4 of us will try to find the voices out there and amplify them to empower all of us. We firmly believe that compassion and communication are the necessary ingredients of creating a community of gender equality. And love. And fun. And freedom to express ourselves without fear….. Thanks. Join us. Talk to us. Ask a question. (And please, give us the benefit of the doubt. Even if sometimes we don’t say exactly what “you” want to hear, our hearts are in the right place.)
This is good because I think as women have challenged centuries of sexism it has become all too common to target all men, which is not unexpected given the energy required to stop sexism’s inertia; but which also becomes counterproductive because it fails to think outside the box. And frankly, a phrase such as “We’re a team of women who love men,” creates a deer in the headlights moment because we really want to believe there are *groups* of women, not just *individuals* who feel that way. This may not be a complete answer, but maybe it’s a starting point.
Cool.