Men's Rights Issues- Where and How to discuss

donfers

surprise, surprise, men's rights forum rejected

why?

"As with all forum requests Admins will have a vote on this and discuss.

From what we see these topics are covered in The Gentlemans Club much in the same way that the ladies lounge covers it for ladies. What was not welcome was these threads turning into women/gender bashing threads regardless if the discussion was relevant or not. The same applies in the ladies lounge.
tGC has recently clarified the context in which these discussions should take place and many of the forum users are happy with this.
On that note, we don't see the need to duplicate something when it is already there."

The part in bold particularly the last sentence "The same applies in the ladies lounge" is simply wrong in my view. Just browsing through their threads today to see if that standard is being applied and it is clearly not being applied, indeed some of the moderators in there are particularly keen to emphasise the gender divide.

So just a few simple queries

1) why the double standard?

2) why is there no bit added to the tll charter saying discussing gender issues is fine but always having a go at men is not? (please don't respond with stock reply that tll is not comparable with tgc, the admin decision to reject mens rights forum directly compares the two in justification for the decision)

3) do you think because of the furore caused by the decision by this forum previously to dump all mens' rights issues into one megathread means that those posters interested in those issues have lost faith in this forum (despite the good intentions of mods/admin and amending of charter)?

I know questions 1 and 2 should be directed to admins concerned but that forum request thread is now closed and I'd like to know what the people who use this forum think as to why and how that decision was made and more importantly where and how should mens rights issues be discussed now especially in light of question 3.

I'd appreciate if this wasn't moved/locked and if the discussions were as polite, cordial, well-mannered, well-reasoned and as insightful as the debate was for the gender issues megathread

Stheno

Having been involved in gender divisive debates both here and in tll, tbh, I can see both as facilitating such debate.

The problem imo comes when those who are fundamentally adhered to one side of the debate fail to take into account any arguments against their particular stance and the debate descends into misogyny versus misandry.

I've taken part in such debates and found some of the conclusions drawn personally insulting and frankly disingenuos. Having taken a position in an debate around gender issues, some participants are unwilling to concede a point and instead attack.

It's made me loathe to actually participate in such topics in either forum.

What saddens me greatly about it is that in recent months, rather than facilitating such debate in tll, it's stopped as many people who used start such topics have stopped, imo due to the hostile outcome of such threads.

So imo, yes debate the issues, but be willing to acknowlege where one is wrong, where attitudes are incorrect, where the law is equal, where it is not, but don't nitpick and deny facts as presented by personal experience.

Edit:

Do I support men's right to guardianship of their children? Yes.
Do I support men's right to maintenance from a wealthier partner? Yes.
Do I support men's right to be considered equal for children's allowance? Yes.
Do I support women's rights to be considered equal to men for a job? Yes.
Do I support non gender based leave following the birth of a child? Yes

But somehow when these topics come up for debate, I'm the middle of the road, non hardliner that no one wants to listen to, and on occasion am attacked!!!

It's madness the gender divide that can exist and tbh, imo it's counter productive!

CDfm

But Donfers its not tll its tgc

Here are a couple of observations.

tgc was set up as a holistic emporium of mandom open to men and women.

The mens rights aspect of it was only a part of it but the forum became a battleground for it.

There was nothing positive about it IMHO and it became very intense and I don't know how to say it but it was unattractive -it was nasty.

On the megathread - the Admins at one stage suggested a sub-forum as a possible solution. Normally when you want a forum -you set up a social group and run it and it gets monitored etc. ( I have one as a fun humour group with aspirations of forumdom and it takes a bit of work and a bit of time).

So having a sub forum on the table for mens rights was a big deal. (I wish I had one for my group). I didn't see the forum request but I think timing and attitude is a huge thing.

(It is also a big thing to have any group on boards(especially a contentious area) and there are legal responsibilities too in running the site just like publishing a newspaper. )

In some ways, for boards.ie life is easier without a mens rights discussion facility so there was definately a missed opportunity by some to listen to those who had ideas and could make it happen. Getting any forum is not a right.

Maybe you should be asking how you can get a bit of dialogue going on guidelines for doing a mens rights thread as a sticky.

I suppose the outcome of the megathread for the future was a bit inconclusive but maybe the reason for that was that was that people were still intent on doing their own thing rather than doing what was possible within the framework & resourses available.

I saw one area where there was an obvious conflict of opinion and that was on people looking to discuss particular personal issues. You need mod input for that & such a facility is time consuming and you need a particular type of mod for it too.

Lots of people would love to see a mens rights discussion group operating but not what was happening which was gender politics threads.A major step in the right direction (and I dont know) would be to say right -others have different visions on how this might work.

So being receptive to different points of view is part of it.

tbh

donfers wrote: »

surprise, surprise, men's rights forum rejected

why?

neither the posters nor the mods of this forum can tell you, so there's not much point in hosting a thread where you're asking people to speculate.

The part in bold particularly the last sentence "The same applies in the ladies lounge" is simply wrong in my view. Just browsing through their threads today to see if that standard is being applied and it is clearly not being applied, indeed some of the moderators in there are particularly keen to emphasise the gender divide.

You should probably take it up with them so. I don't read tLL, so I've no opinion on it's moderation. I suggest if you have issues with the moderation, you address it with them, or stop reading. It's not really aimed at men anyway.

So just a few simple queries

1) why the double standard?

I don't know. I don't even know if there is a double standard.

2) why is there no bit added to the tll charter saying discussing gender issues is fine but always having a go at men is not? (please don't respond with stock reply that tll is not comparable with tgc, the admin decision to reject mens rights forum directly compares the two in justification for the decision)

I don't know. We have as much input into the charter of tLL as they do to ours. And long may it stay that way.

3) do you think because of the furore caused by the decision by this forum previously to dump all mens' rights issues into one megathread means that those posters interested in those issues have lost faith in this forum (despite the good intentions of mods/admin and amending of charter)?

We'll have to wait and see. I'm not sure I would call it a furore, to be honest, the world didn't exactly stop turning, but I do know that the issue has been discussed, resolved, and there's no need to discuss it again.

I know questions 1 and 2 should be directed to admins concerned but that forum request thread is now closed and I'd like to know what the people who use this forum think as to why and how that decision was made and more importantly where and how should mens rights issues be discussed now especially in light of question 3.

Yes, they should be directed to the admins. There's no point in asking the members of this forum to speculate as to the whys and hows - I would opine anyone interested will have had their say on the forum request thread. I don't see what such a discussion would achieve, and it's certainly not within the remit of the forum of this charter. A feedback thread might be interesting tho.

As to how mens rights issues should be discussed in here, we've been through that already.

I'd appreciate if this wasn't moved/locked and if the discussions were as polite, cordial, well-mannered, well-reasoned and as insightful as the debate was for the gender issues megathread

That almost never works I have no problem with the tone of your thread, none at all, but it's just not subject matter for the GC. A thread speculating as to why a group of people did what they did wrt another forum is more of a feedback thing.

I know I'm going to annoy you by closing this thread, and I regret that, but not enough to leave it open.

r3nu4l

Just a quick note to say that I was NOT involved in the decision not to grant the Men's Rights forum request. I made it clear to the Admins that I wouldn't be involved in the decision because of my involvement in this forum.