"Man Up" campaign & the continued media erosion of men.

"Safe Ireland...creating safety for women and children"
´Safe Ireland´ sounds inclusive to me, giving the impression that the campaign is targeting everyone´s well-being and safety, but the next line clarifies that safety is only an issue for some people. :rolleyes: I haven´t perused the website but clicked into the ´domestic violence services´ section. The lead question is: What supports are available for women and children? I find this a very backward attitude. By focusing only on male-on-female domestic violence, it ignores safety concerns for more than half the population (i.e. female on male, male on male, female on female domestic violence is all ignored). It ignores the people who have little to no representation and focuses exclusively on a group that is already well-represented. How can they make appeals to men to support their cause, when they demonstrate that men´s safety issues are irrelevant to them, especially given that men have such meagre representation in comparison? That seems kind of sick to me - asking men for help while insulting them and systematically ignoring their needs - a slap in the face to those who are already disempowered.

Maybe they should have to change the name of the website to make it less misleading...safe ireland? no, safe women and children.

I'm a man and I'm sorry.

Blowfish wrote: »

Some of the stuff surrounding this on Twitter is pretty unbelievable, things like this in particular are immediately blaming men only.

I'm surprised at the Rape Crisis Network. As part of a job I had a good few years back I attended a day's training with them (some of those using our services had been sexuality assaulted) and as part of it we heard the story of a man who had been raped. They struck me as humane and even-handed at the time so why they have gotten themselves involved with this cack-handed campaign is beyond me.

Sleepy wrote: »

It's stuff like this that makes me roll my eyes at most feminist organisations these days. I'll be teaching my kids to ignore such organisations and to consider them to be little more than noise pieces that distribute misandrist propaganda.

If a real egalitarian movement that seeks equal rights for all, regardless of gender should start up, I'll consider supporting it. In the meantime, I'll feel fully justified in ignoring everything put out by the womens' rights movement, whether it's sensible or not.

Well, if it's sensible, there's no need to ignore it. There are undoubtedly issues which affect women disproportionately and those which affect men disproportionately, and groups can't tackle everything at the same time. In this case though, both men and went can be the perpetrators and victims of domestic violence and abuse, something which this campaign doesn't seem to acknowledge.

The problem with stuff like this is that refuges and so on do need help and funding, but I can't see too many encountering a campaign such as "Man Up" and deciding to make a donation to the local refuge - it just puts people off and ultimately does no favours to those who are in need of such services.