Danny points out that supporting men does not have to come at the expense of supporting women.
Last year Warren Farrell hosted a Men’s Issues Awareness Event in a University of Toronto lecture hall. People came out to protest his efforts.
Sarah Santhosh, student at Ryerson University, set out to create a group that would offer a forum for men to speak up about mental health, suicide, violence, and other gender inequalities and issues. Sounds like a good idea right? I would think that for male students to have a place where they can gather and work on the things that are harming them would be a positive thing.
It seems that there are those that think otherwise.
Much like the protesters that tried to shut Farrell out from holding his forum, Ryerson Students’ Union seems to have taken the low road.
An effort to guard the empowerment of women’s voices on campus took form Monday when the Ryerson Students’ Union (RSU) swiftly adopted a bold new policy rejecting the concept of misandry – the hatred or fear of men.
Two days before Santhosh was set to have her meeting with the Students’ Group Committee, the Students’ Union has passed a policy that rejects the concept of misandry*. Is denying the ways in which men are harmed an act of guarding the empowerment of women’s voices?
Men must be silenced in order to protect women?
Rather than talking about the issues Santhosh and her group were bringing up, or at least showing how these issues are being discussed in other ways and thus there being no need for forums that focus on male voices (which is common assertion among women’s advocates) they have decided to use official policy as a shovel to bury them.
Neda Hamzavi, a faculty of community services representative on the RSU Board of Directors (BOD), had a few choice words to say when she brought up the policy on women’s issues.
There’s been a lot of work across campuses not only in Ontario but also across the country that have been working sort of [as] anti-women’s rights groups.
And yet there seems to be no mention of how Santhosh’s efforts to create a space for men is tied to these anti-woman efforts.
But what I find really interesting are the three things that are being specifically rejected by this policy:
4. Groups, Meetings or events [that] promote misogynist views towards women and ideologies that promote gender inequity, challenges women’s right to bodily autonomy, or justifies sexual assault
Again where is the proof that Santhosh’s group promotes these things? Surely if she and her group are promoting misogyny there is evidence of it. A blog? An email? A nasty reddit post? In the constitution or other defining documents of her group? But as far as I can tell, there isn’t any.
5. The concept of misandry as it ignores structural inequity that exist between men and women
Most people that actually understand what misandry is about know know full well that it doesn’t exist in the place of misogyny. It exists in conjunction with misogyny. They are both happening at the same time. Hatred and fear of women is misogyny. Hatred and fear of men is misandry. One does not negate the existence of the other.
6. Groups, meetings events or initiatives [that] negate the need to centre women’s voices in the struggle for gender equity.
How many times have we heard the line that equality is not a zero sum game? Well if its not a zero sum game then how exactly does the existence of male voices in the struggle for gender equality negate the need for women’s voices to be the center of that struggle?
The irony the situation is not lost on Santhosh, “The ironic thing is my voice is being silenced right now because I can’t even form a group without having to face this really back-handed deal that’s really attacking our group.”
Marwa Hamad, vice-president equity at the RSU commented, “I think it’s important to remember that when we’re talking about dismantling patriarchy, we’re talking about supporting men, we’re talking about supporting women [and] we’re talking about supporting the entire gender spectrum.”
How exactly does one simultaneously support men, while shutting out attempts at supporting men?
What do you think? Is there room for voices that are supportive of men and women? Or must support for one be pushed to the side for the sake of the other?
* – Just so we are on the same page here let me say quickly what I mean by that. What I’m talking about is the fear, hatred, and distrust of men. That’s it no more no less. There is no “…by women.”. It can come from men as well as women. There is no “…that happens in the place of misogyny.”. They are both happening at the same time. There is no “….that happens in the same ways that misogyny occurs.”. Even though they are both happening they are not exactly the same.
Fear, hatred, and distrust of men and women happens in different ways with different causes and effects. There is no reason, or point, to try to make one out that one does not exist or that one is only happening because of the other. They are both bad and they both hurting everyone.
Also, In case you are thinking that this group and its efforts are being headed up by MRAs and/or is related to the MRM it may be worth noting that, from what I can see from what reading about Santhosh and her group, that is not the case.
Pretty much ALL of the cases of DV I’ve heard of, the abuser was once abused. The bullies I had at school faced violence themselves earlier on from what I understand, I’m sure many violent people have a history of trauma in their past. I just can’t understand for the life of me why this isn’t more commonly discussed? Is it fear of insulting victims? Is it that people want so much to believe rapists, abusers are monsters and not vulnerable humans themselves? Male victims are not palatable to an ideology that posits the male-as-oppressors female-as-oppressed. Ideology must win, and… Read more »
that’s a good article Danny.
Thanks!!!
Drew: That is called circular logic.
A really good example of this is a piece called “Kiss Hanks Ass” have a look at it.
The strange thing, to me, is how the logic always goes: First the claim that Men Are Privileged. Then, if asked for an example, the person making the claim will point out an advantage that men have. But if someone responds with a related and proportional disadvantage men face, or a similar advantage women have, the person make the claim will then say it’s different – because Men Are Privileged. Example: “Men Are Privileged” “How so?” “Well, men make more money than women.” “Its true that traditional gender roles put men in the workplace and women in the home, but… Read more »
Oh don’t forget. “The reason men are disadvantaged isn’t because of a design in the system. It’s happening because of systemic sexism against women. It’s the price of privilege.” I guess the logic is that the system is so sexist against women it is willing to mow down some (read: the vast majority) of men in its wake rather than the system is willing to mow down anyone in order to maintain its own power.
I notice many of this site’s resident feminists are awfully quite about this. Interesting…
Hold on Sol. We don’t want this to turn into a pissing match. They will respond when they respond and if they don’t then so be it.
I also find it fascinating that there is so much silence and so little comment.
I’m not even bothered by people who are labelled resident feminists. I’m wondering about the people who keep saying the are so passionate about men, men’s issues, how they love and adore men and want to hear so much from them …… and the silence there is so deafening as to require investigation and potential surgical resolutions!
It’s like the puppy that arrived for Christmas has stopped being cute and now has to survive on the occasional bone and lap dog antics!
Just had a debate about how teaching ONLY men and boys to stop rape is a bad idea, got accused of being an MRA, a troll, using bad statistics (the CDC ones), and saw quite a lot of bigotry and dismissal of female rapists and male victims especially. The poster did the whole oppression olympics of basically “you can’t compare male n female victims, cuz of gang rapes and internal damage to women”, etc. This is why rape will not stop, because too many are interested in keeping bigotry involved in their narrow-minded ideas of how to stop rape. Anti-abuse… Read more »
Par the course. The people you were dealing with are working on the same premise that the people Santhosh is dealing with. They are so hung up on “women are the victims, men are the perps” pissing match that they are willing to let things go unresolved (and allow people to be hurt) for the chance of sticking it to someone. As for calling them you an MRA just call them out on their attempt at trying to use it as a bad word. If hey want to attack you then make them work for it. I don’t know about… Read more »
What shits me off is they are writing articles specifically about teaching their BOYS not to rape, but not their GIRLS. It really feels like they are continuing to teach the boys not to be bad, and teaching the girls to be afraid of some boys without ever really acknowledging that those girls may abuse boys or other girls. It’s like when we teach boys not to hit girls, meanwhile I got hit at school in front of others BY girls with no one giving a damn, I didn’t see articles written to girls to stop hitting boys. Other boys… Read more »
“This is why rape will not stop, because too many are interested in keeping bigotry involved in their narrow-minded ideas of how to stop rape. ” Boys are not taught about consent properly to begin with. Such right to consent that they do have is presented as always secondary to that of the other party. It’s an obligation rather than a right for them. How can they understand consent if it isn’t something they possess themselves? The notion of “teaching boys not to rape” is something I find quite chilling. I can’t see any way this can be done without… Read more »
“Boys are not taught about consent properly to begin with. Such right to consent that they do have is presented as always secondary to that of the other party. It’s an obligation rather than a right for them. How can they understand consent if it isn’t something they possess themselves?” A Point that has been getting made for over 30 years and shouted down for at least 2 generations – since the 1970’s. But then again, that reality is not hard to uncover if you are open to reality and not just blinded by Dogma and self serving bias –… Read more »
I doubt proponents of the notion have ever considered this possibility or the potential impact of their wares on their subjects. You’re more forgiving than I am Greg. Considering that several proponents of this notion are sympathetic to the difficulties that girls go through its a bit dismaying that they then turn around and won’t extend that same consideration to boys. Its like they are on one hand saying, “We know that there are lots of girls out there being harmed by boys/men, so many that we don’t know how many because so many of them don’t speak up.” and… Read more »
THIS!
As someone who read that thread, that’s not what I saw. Not at all. I saw people with different view getting very upset with each other, and that makes it entirely easy for people to turn arguments into trolling or hatred. I know both people involved, Archy. You and the other person. You are both kind and loving people. You both actually want the same things. Rape isn’t going to stop, but not for those reasons. It’s not going to stop because there are some people who are predators and there are some cultures that reward predatory behavior. My tact… Read more »
There are horrible things happening, and yes there are men involved. The Steubenville case, or the Cleveland case, well, I’ve yet to see identical situations with women as the perps, though I’d be willing to keep looking.
I wonder.
I know for sure that you wouldn’t be the type to say or claim that in order for female against male sexual violence to matter it must be of full equivalence. So I wonder why must there be a case identical to the Steubenville case (BTW which case do you mean by “the Cleveland case”?).
Because I want to see how violence is expressed Danny. Jesus. We all engage in violence. I’m looking at this like a public health model. Steubenville is like a fucking toxic outbreak. Cleveland Texas Gang Rape, please do google it. If men are doing things differently than women, it doesn’t mean that women aren’t violent but that the cause and effects need to be looked at. If women were also gang raping young boys in enough measure to get this attention it would be visible and it would tell us something about how violence is taught and expressed. If women… Read more »
“***If*** women were also gang raping young boys in enough measure to get this attention it would be visible and it would tell us something about how violence is taught and expressed.” The use of the conditional “If” is completely false and inappropriate . The representation that rape myths only apply to women is also false and grossly Toxic against males. I’m a tad shocked to see them being trotted out still! Ever heard the one about how the 12 year old boy should be grateful because that 18+ women used him sexually …. and as we all know (… Read more »
Nope, I’m sure there are cases. They aren’t being reported if they are. I want ALL sexual violence stopped. I’m not at all denying that it could happen. Only that it is not being reported which either means it’s happening extremely rarely or it’s not happening at all or those affected can’t report it. So I’d like to see reports, I’d welcome them. There is toxicity in our culture, Mediahound. There is. It’s a culture of domination and violence and it plays out in race, and class, and gender and until that root is dealt with the rest is all… Read more »
You should know me well enough to know that if a 12 year old boy is raped, he’s raped. I don’t peddle myths, I fight against them. You are picking at my “if” as if it is conditional when I DON”T HAVE THE REPORTS. I don’t have that data. Email me, please.
Julie – all you have to do is google with an open mind. The facts and details of cases have been out there and even brought here to GMP for so long! An excellent resource to start with is ToySoldiers – Jacob is so scrupulous in checking facts and details. If you really want to go your own way just search for “Female Sexual Offenders” – the scholarly articles section of google is a must read – especially those publications which get into analysing not only incidence but also sentencing and served jail time! AH Green – Sexual aggression, 1999… Read more »
Male victims in the UK have been disbelieved more than 98% of the time when attempting formal reports. Among the many male victims I know personally the strike rate for those who’ve tried to report is only marginally better. Good luck in your search. I suspect you’ll be waiting a while. A few quite young boys have been on youtube, facebook and the like being tormented sexually by groups of older girls. Difficult to disbelieve that “something” happened if one stops laughing long enough I guess. “If women are using violence in a more covert way, it tells us something… Read more »
@Greg Allan – I just keep a simple focus as to numbers. O ask if one child sexually abused is too many or too few to be important? I have as yet to find anyone who will claim it’s too few. After that, any attempt to play any form of numbers game is a combination of victim abuse coupled with intellectual dishonesty – and when gender starts being added to the mix it makes it sexism and shows agendas which include total disregard for human rights whilst claiming to support such rights. That Dishonesty is pernicious – and allows a… Read more »
“”So I’d like to see reports, I’d welcome them. “” Odd how things seem to arrive by synergy. I was delving into Juvenile female Psychopathic studies – ref sexual offences/offending when Jacob beat me to one aspect of it! “Sexually abusive girls rise prompts Barnardo’s study – Richard Beckett, a consultant clinical forensic psychologist, who has led research for the Home Office … “absolutely nothing” had been done on the issue of girls anywhere else in the world.” BBC News 12 March 2013. http://tinyurl.com/c7vsurx It gets more interesting when you look back and see that the issues have been known… Read more »
Cleveland Texas Gang Rape, please do google it. I looked it up real quick and I do know about it. Just not well enough for someone to say “Cleveland case” and know immediately what they mean. If men are doing things differently than women, it doesn’t mean that women aren’t violent but that the cause and effects need to be looked at. I can agree with that. And honestly thank you for explaining because most of the time when talking about female against male violence usually the response is “but it doesn’t happen as often as male against female violence!”… Read more »
You don’t hear about it because it’s not called gang-rape when multiple women and girls are the perpetrators. Case in point: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-478781/Sick-happy-slap-girl-gang-sexually-abused-teenage-boy-jailed.html That case involved physically torture as well as rape (or “made him perform depraved sex acts” as it’s called here – see, I told you it’s not called rape – here the victim is the one who is performing sex acts). The girls got 4 to 2 years detention. What sentencing to you think the Steubenville defendants will get? I know at least one of the Cleveland defendants got life. Again, this sentencing disparity is confirmed by a… Read more »
Ah Ha Tamen – thank you for some good quality work. It even address the lack of candour by Richard Beckett (consultant clinical forensic psychologist) and the Home office. One thing that is striking from the content and demographics how the USA is so markedly under represented – highly skewed given the population size of the USA. It makes the whole place look idyllic. Is that caused by just a bad sample, or by a complete blindness to the existence of females as sexual offenders within the US psyche? Grown Women aint recognised as rapists with the same statistical significance… Read more »
I asked for cases and you gave them. So thanks. No need to be nasty to me. These need to be seen, obviously.
Excuse me, but where was I nasty to you?
Sentencing,
“Trent Mays was sentenced to a minimum of two years in juvenile jail, one year for rape, and one year for illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material. Ma’Lik Richmond was sentenced to a minimum one year for rape. ”
They could be in more years, also some are discussing time served at this point.
Do you think that that’s enough? Too much? What about for the cases above? What’s the term you’d prefer for either gender?
Not sure maybe 5-7 years. I’m a bit of a weird one though where I wish we could analyze a brain and see if they have truly understood the damage of their actions where we simply release them once they are no longer a threat and have made amends to the best of their ability. I’d probably add a caveat that they must help raise awareness of the crime of rape to combat it on release. Murder should be a longer sentence though but still rape needs some form of significant justice like all major violent crimes. A basic sexual… Read more »
This is bigger than gender. I’m trying to think as critically as possible about it.
Agreed. But I find it a little odd that when male victims are brought up suddenly people either want to shift it back to women or want to get rid of the gendered focus. It seems like as long as the focus is on female victims its a free for all to make it about gender. Make everything about why he wanted to control her or why he wanted to attack her. But bring in male victims and then no one wants to know why she wanted to control him or why she wanted to attack him. It leaves people… Read more »
It’s called “having your cake and eating it too” – as exemplified by this piece arguing against a gender essentialist approach to rape while maintaining that it’s a gendered crime: http://feministing.com/2013/01/31/the-dangers-of-a-gender-essentialist-approach-to-sexual-violence/
This is a lovely example of the disconnected logic, and all it needs is a paragraph to achieve the disconnect and the collapse of all that is rational! “As feminists, we have a responsibility to address the ways we talk about and do sexual violence work that exclude actual survivors. Rape is absolutely a gendered crime. This is true of how it plays out in the real world, and of our concept of rape – both the act and idea of rape are used to perpetuate a patriarchal gender hierarchy. So as feminists we (Such a massive group ) are… Read more »
Then you saw her continually smearing me as an MRA for daring to speak up, her continuining to deny the statistics and provide none of her own, accusing me of misrepresenting the statistics when I said it was a very rough estimate and gave FULL math and location of statistics I used. I realize we probably want the same things but the level of hatred n ignorance I received from her was pathetic. I admit it was derailing, but that’s the only bad part of the post I did. But the way it is framed is nothing short of sexist… Read more »
Archy – i do admire your tenacity and I also recognise your frustration which derives from your impeccable honesty and courtesy. Unfortunately, you keep having to deal with people who come under the big category of “Bullies” who keep using the recognised defence patterns of Bullies when they are held to account. a) Denial: the bully denies everything. b) Retaliation: the bully counterattacks. c) Feigning victimhood: in the unlikely event of denial and counter-attack being insufficient, the bully feigns victimhood or feigns persecution by manipulating people through their emotions, especially guilt. It’s been textbook for decades, and I’m sorry but… Read more »
I guess I didn’t expect this person to be a bully but it does seem she is acting that way, even if unintentionally. It’s a popular style of argument in some feminist and MRA areas to use the tactics I saw, generalize about the commenter as the “other”, the enemy, the bad guy/girl, the “MRA” or “Feminist” to try dismiss them off as lunatics. What pisses me off the most is the lack of response with statistics, I posted FULL math on how I came to the conclusion of outside prison most perpetrators of rape abuse the opposite gender, posted… Read more »
“The bullies I had at school faced violence themselves earlier on from what I understand, I’m sure many violent people have a history of trauma in their past. I just can’t understand for the life of me why this isn’t more commonly discussed? Is it fear of insulting victims? Is it that people want so much to believe rapists, abusers are monsters and not vulnerable humans themselves?” But Archy – it’s quite elementary. If you recognise such people as human it makes it just so much harder to demonise them. If you see a person as a damaged human it… Read more »
Great post, Danny!
Thanks ballgame!
Note that if it was in Quebec province, here we have: “The [Quebec] Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms (French: Charte des droits et libertés de la personne) is a statutory bill of rights and human rights code passed by the National Assembly of Quebec on June 27, 1975. It received Royal Assent from Lieutenant Governor Hugues Lapointe, coming into effect on June 28, 1976.” which does include private and public both, preventing all discriminations It also lists sexual orientation as a prohibited ground. Here are the 14 prohibited grounds in the Quebec charter: “race color sex pregnancy sexual orientation… Read more »
If they were in Quebec they would probably try to say “sexism against men does not exist therefore this isn’t covered by the Charter”. Because apparently being male means that one is immune to sexism and more importantly being male means that one cannot have their own spaces.
The only sexism allowed is allowing insurers to charge men more for car insurance, if their actuarial data says so. But the insurers can’t charge women more for health insurance because women tend to use health services more (if only for pregnancy, most men’s pregnancy chance is less than 1%, if we count trans and intersex men who can bear children). I’m not certain if institutions are allowed different dress codes, and if so, if its been challenged as sexist. I know the US allow double standards in a different-but-equal way, with zero justification besides company profits “fit our narrow… Read more »
This should be easy for you to prove. Find a case where the courts ruled that discrimination can (or better, has) affected a man or men in general.
If you can’t, then you should consider acknowledging that he’s right. It doesn’t matter what a constitution ‘says’. It only matters what a government actually does. We in America should know that as well as anyone by now.
Schala, my understanding is that sexual orientation had been ‘read into’ the Section 15, meaning effectively incorporated by supreme court precedent?
One can simultaneously support men while shutting out attempts at supporting men by creating an ideological and theoretical framework that allows you to define for men what their issues are. That is essentially what the theory of “The Patriarchy” does. It allows a particular group of people to declare what the issues “actually” are, and then frame any discussion that does not fit within the bounds of the theory as “wrong” or “anti-woman.” Do not think this has to be a zero-sum game, however, I do not think one can have voices supportive of men and women if it comes… Read more »
Also, I think people must be willing to have that conversation, and unfortunately, as we see here, one side is not interested in having it. Agreed. For a while I was trying to have that conversation. But after getting disgusted at the response I got and working on the resulting anger (which is still a work in progress) I’m trying again. I’m hoping that this OpEd will finally drill through to people’s skulls exactly what we face when trying to bring men’s issues to the table. There is no attempt at taking over women’s voices. There is no hatred of… Read more »
“There is no attempt at taking over women’s voices.”
Agreed. However, it seems many women can’t even allow for men to discuss their side of gender issues without “feeling” like the man is talking over them. So this discussion about gender should focus on the advantages men have and the disadvantages women have. And the last one. And the next one. And the one after that.
However, it seems many women can’t even allow for men to discuss their side of gender issues without “feeling” like the man is talking over them. Which is almost deliciously ironic consider how often women accuse men of doing exactly the same thing to them in the form of talking over them. Not feeling like it, but it actually happening. If there is one thing I’ve noticed in my time in the gender discourse its this. Men feel like women do bad things to them. (He felt violated, he felt silenced, etc….) Men do bad things to women. (She was… Read more »
I’m not really surprised that many feminists believe that when it comes to supporting men, it is a zero sum game. I’d go so far as to say that this is the mainstream view in feminism. When it comes to supporting women, I believe that there is almost universal agreement in feminism that it is not a zero sum game. That is one of the reasons why I rejected feminism. There is no consistency in thought. What I sometimes refer to as feminist alterverse where reality shifts to match politics. I do believe and have advocated before especially in the… Read more »
I’m not really surprised that many feminists believe that when it comes to supporting men, it is a zero sum game. I’d go so far as to say that this is the mainstream view in feminism. I can agree with that. Which is why I’m all for feminists who are (currently) not in the mainstream when it comes to supporting men. I do believe and have advocated before especially in the VAWA conversation that the MRM only oppose legislation that oppresses men. That’s not to say that legislation that ignores men should not be criticized nor does it mean that… Read more »
John, I agree there is no consistency in thought. What’s odd, especially on this ‘progressive’ (and use that loosely) male-site, some have suggested that men solve their problems under the feminist umbrella. Word of warning, that’s where men are now in shade of women’s umbrella. Men are trying to raise male issues and make progress under feminist “management” and “rules” and can only go as far as women will allow. Men won’t be able to solve much, unless men start breaking some rules and take some lessons from the current feminist administration. Note that feminism, generally speaking, is unilateralist, lacks… Read more »
It’s not a zero sum game, yet sooo many feminists ARE making it a zero sum game which is annoying. Why is it so difficult to try support both women AND men? Is it because a lot see men as having alll da powers?
Santhosh and her ilk are, ironically, regressive traditionalists in “Progressive” clothing. They piggy-back on the notion that men are tough and shouldn’t express their emotions, working it towards their favor. Plus, many have used the argument of “Fighting for resources” playing up the women are victims only card in order to protect funding (which makes me disgusted even more with human beings). Then again, Santhosh and her ilk can be just plain bigoted. No question about that. The important thing is the tide is starting to turn and they fear it so they’re going to fight it’s upswing by any… Read more »
Santhosh and her ilk are, ironically, regressive traditionalists in “Progressive” clothing.
Are you saying that Santhosh and her group are actually regressing to traditional masculinity by forming this group on campus to address men’s issues? Or perhaps you are talking about Neda Hamzavi, who is opposed to the group?
I’m wondering if you are getting the names switched here.
Oh whoops! Sorry Danny. I got the names mixed up. Thanks for pointing that out.
Yes, I mean Neda Hamzavi.
I dig.
Danny, any chance you have the email address for Marwa Hamad, the Vice President for Equity at Ryerson University? And perhaps the name and email address for the Dean of Students? Could you provide them in a reply comment? I would like to email them a link to this piece and express my sadness.
Their position is Orwellian.
I would like to see a Title IX complaint filed by the students who wanted to start the group. How might that come about?
RU is in Toronto, so that could be tricky. (I don’t know anything about Canadian law, though, so maybe they have something comparable to Title IX.)
There is no Title IX in Canada (and in any event, in the US men are not a protected class per se under civil rights law, is my understanding). Nope. In Canada we have a constitution. Yeah !! And that constitution says in Section 15 subsection 1, that discrimination against anyone on various grounds is forbidden !! unacceptable !! outrageous !! and generally NOT VERY NICE. ( Canadians, eh?) Those grounds include sex. Oh, but …. nothing in the above referenced subsection prevents corrective programs for those groups that are disadvantaged. Including sex. See sub-section (2).(see below) Here is the… Read more »
The Ryerson action is to protect the understanding of women as the historically disadvantaged group, and men as the advantaged group. Discussion of male disadvantage, the development of any generally accepted statistics on such questions, any discussion of misandry as an affront to the human dignity of males, opens a door that many people are not prepared to have opened. Many includes – the bar, women’s groups, feminists, and, bluntly, the left generally as a question of social justice. So in Section 15 terms, men can almost NEVER have their rights infringed as men. So, what exactly in all of… Read more »
“So, what exactly in all of this that you bring says that men can’t get together to work on things like depression, violence, and suicide?” You can get together to work . . ., but not at Ryerson. Now, there IS a bar in the basement of a small establishment, but you have to present your membership card as one of the Patriarchal agents to gain entry… The Ryerson student union is a member of the Canadian Students Union, and they have a distinct political stance. The school administrators have given the SU rights and access on ‘behalf’ of the… Read more »
Sorry Canadian Federation of Students (CFS)
SO you can work on these things, but you may not be able to book meeting rooms, have facilities for guest speakers, etc etc. Sure ultimately they can exclude this group for whatever reason they want, I’m just calling bullshit on their reason. Just as someone would call bullshit on a person’s reasoning for being against gay marriage. Sure they can have their opinion and they can even decide not to have any contact with gay people. Their reasons for it are still bullshit. The reasons this Union are putting forth as to why Santhosh should not have this group… Read more »
Oh it’s definitely bullshit Danny, you got that right. My point is that it is not just purposeless bullshit. Its not like those two (Hamazi and her other friend) got up one day and said, I fell like being a prick today so I’m gonna stick it to this men’s group and then laugh. I am making the point that this is a legal strategy, it is intentional, and I suspect originates with LEAF (Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund). If you saw the percentages of students that actually voted in the elections for these clowns, you would realize that… Read more »
The discrimination (or sexism if you will) is the fact that this Union is actively denying the formation of this group solely because it is for men. Actually let me add to this. It’s not that they are denying the formation of this group solely because it is for men. No that in and of itself isn’t the issue I think. I say this because how much praise women’s advocates tend to heap upon men’s groups that focus solely on the bad things that men do, mostly to women, (and bonus points for minimizing, denyin, or attempting to justify the… Read more »
Head smack.
Yeah, I completely forgot about that dynamic. Toronto is after all the birthplace of the White Ribbon Campaign. Shoulda remembered.
Great point.
6. gender equity has to CENTRE women . . .
“The most common argument in support of differently situated is preexisting disadvantage, or, in other words, historical disadvantage. The easiest way to make this argument is with historical statistics.”
The Supreme Court of Canada has argued that trans women are historically advantaged over cis women, and so can rightly be discriminated against in being a volunteer in a female-only position (in a rape crisis shelter). See Kimberly Nixon vs VRR.
VRR is spearheaded by radical feminist Sheila Jeffreys.
I remember that case. I was just bumfuzzled over the insanity of that response. Speechless.
It simply is a mockery of the integrity and morality of the entire area of law. How on earth could any sane person come to such a conclusion?
Sometimes it seems to me that lawyers reason in such convolutions that they end up with their heads up their asses, ,trying to rationalize the unjustifiable.
Someone commenting the case is afraid that if trans women can be accepted in women’s spaces “where does it stop”. Aka slippery slope. And gives the example of a man wanting to take self defense class in a women’s self-defense place (presumably there is no men’s or unisex one) and how this is horrible that he would be a ‘saboteur’ to this woman’s space by intruding (he filed a legal complaint, and it got thrown off). VRR’s belief is that you must “have been oppressed from birth with the life experience of a woman”. And male privilege would make that… Read more »
Hold on John. Just to be clear Ryerson University, where all this is going down, is in Canada. I’m not sure if Canada has some equivalent of TitleIX though, just want to make sure we all know that this is not happening in America (thus American laws don’t apply).
Canada has the Charter of Rights and Liberties. From wiki: “The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (also known as The Charter of Rights and Freedoms or simply the Charter, French: La Charte canadienne des droits et libertés) is a bill of rights entrenched in the Constitution of Canada.” ” The Charter only applies to government laws and actions (including the laws and actions of federal, provincial, and municipal governments and public school boards), and sometimes to the common law, not to private activity.” (Most universities are public and government-funded) and this: “15. (1) Every individual is equal before and… Read more »
Okay so based on what I gather from that the very least Neda Hamzavi and the folks supporting this opposition need to do is show that Santhosh’s own group and efforts are or support some form of hatred/discrimination. In the article the closest they have come to that is basically say that there are anti-woman efforts and sentiments happening at campuses around Canada. But without anything specific about Santhosh then all they are doing is generalizing and presuming guilty by identity. They are pretty much saying, “Because the focus is on men then it must be bad.” An equivalent would… Read more »
I was more thinking about Neda and the Union itself discriminating against Santosh and her group, rather than the Union having grounds to discriminate.
I don’t think they can discriminate based on sex.
Well, sure they can Schala. There is precious little to stop them. They are NOT government regulated in any way, they are completely private non-profit organization. Sure, perhaps they might be taken to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, but they won;t find against them. IN any event the students launching the claim would undoubtedly be out of school before the case was heard. And the CFS pockets are deep compared to most students. In any event, they can lean on supreme court jurisprudence respecting substantive equality. Here is the CFS Post-Secondary Education Policy . . . ht tp://www.cfs-fcee.ca/downloads/Post-Secondary_Education_Policy.pdf consider searching… Read more »
How is what Rezam describes here ‘better’?
It sounds like the usual ‘Women are special people. They deserve special rights, special protections, special programs and special advantages no one else gets’ feminism you see across the blogosphere, in tumblr, or among the SRS crowd on reddit.
Equality doesn’t mean ‘equality’. Equality means ‘better for women’.
OK, since I am feeling snarky and mean… this university has a nickname. Rye HIgh. Rye because most of the students drank, a lot, and High because it was for a long long time, viewed as more of a high school, than an institute of higher learning. Pretty unfair. They do have a decent technology and technological engineering program. Pretty good theatre school. The girls in the fashion program are great (used to tend bar nearby). Their journalism school, hmmmm.
Oh Danny Boy, this happening in America too! In the US we have Civil Rights whereby, sex is considered a protected class. Protective classes include SEX, race, national origin, religion, veteran status, disabilities, BUT much of the sex-related legislation has been in protection of women. Historically, white men have not been victims of discrimination, thus everybody assumes white men are ‘privileged’ by function of their whiteness and maleness. We also have Affirmative Action (AA) which serves to reinforce Civil Rights legislation and the particular focus is improving opportunities of groups that have been historically victims of discrimination. Many private and… Read more »
Unfortunately I do not have any such contact information.
What I would like to do is contact Sarah Santhosh and let know that while she is fighting an uphill battle it is worth it and to thank her for her efforts.
There are several comments I’d like to make on this post. It would be longer than the post itself so I’m breaking them down. First, did you write the sub heading or did that come from the GMP editors. The reason I ask is that the genders seem reversed. Shouldn’t it be supporting women does not have to come at the expense of supporting men?
Danny points out that supporting men does not have to come at the expense of supporting women. You mean this? Yes it does sound odd so please let me explain. You see when Santhosh came up with the idea for this group think about how her opponents reacted. They passed a policy that denies the existence of the things that harm men in an effort to block a group that is trying to address those things. They are reacting partly on the premise that the mere existence of spaces for men inherently harms women (look at that last bit that… Read more »
“if they passed it out of concern of hatred against women then the least they can do is present the actual hate in her group as evidence.”
When they justify abortion rights they say “trust women”. I don’t know why we should because they obviously don’t trust us.