[UA] Re: [UA][OT] UA unintenionally sexist? (LONG!)

[Timothy Ferguson]

----- Original Message -----

> Brisbane City library has Manhood; I'll have a look, after I finish
reading all
> these books on organized crime.

Oh, damn, I forgot to mention the very basic "First time Americans read
about the Mafia" book

It's called "Brotherhood of Evil", Frederic Sondern Jnr.  New York, Manor
Books, 1973.  (Actually, the manor print was a later one, the original was
Farrar, Strauss and Giroux 1959)

There's no ISBN, but the author should be a useful keyword for searching.
Your in Brisbane anyway, so inter-library loans from SLQ only take a few
days...
> > > Maybe it's a cultural thing.  I certainly don't feel powerless; I'm a
> > white male
> > > in a society created by white males for the empowerment of white
males.
> > If I
> > > was richer (I live below the poverty line), I'd be King of the world.
> >
> > I take it you don't have children, then?
>
> Christ, no; I can't stand children.  I had a vasectomy when I was 25 just
to
> avoid having any by accident.
>
> >  This is one of the main theses in
> > men's movement books, that the Father is fading fromthe public
conciousness
> > as an admirable role.  It's not a matter of powerlessness in Australia
> > because we have never been the global hegemonic power.
>
> Hmmm.  I remember hearing stuff about this occasionally; men complaining
losing
> access to their kids after divorce.  The main reason I blew that off is, I
> think, that my father easily got custody of all three kids in my family
when my
> parents got divorced.  Hard for me to understand what the fuss is about.
>
> >  In Australia there's
> > more of a defensiveness about the idea that the patriarchy aids all men,
> > when for some of us, it seems far more likely that the patriarchy is
> > actually the Old School Tie network, favouring those who go to one of 10
> > specific high schools and 8 specific universities.
>
> Yeah, I certainly see that.  I look at friends of mine who've been to
Grammar
> school, who have inheritances, who have all these connections, and it's
hard not
> to feel a little bitter.  But I usually chalk that up to wealth rather
than
> patriarchy.
>
> > The other big thread in the Australian form of the movement is that boys
are
> > continuing to slide in schools.  Men have been concerned with the stats
on
> > this for over a decade in Oz, but we were ignored until women said "I am
a
> > feminist and I am going to fight for my son."
>
> I'll have to take your word that this problem exists; it's just not
something I
> know anything about.
>
> > The great leaders in the Boys
> > Education debate are women, because men are not taken seriously when
they
> > claim weaknesses, like being raped, being depressed, or feeling that
their
> > gender as a group needs help.
>
> I've done counselling work for the QLD AIDS Council in that past.  I think
> _some_ elements of society take such things seriously - but you're right,
> perhaps, in saying that society as a whole blows them off.
>
> --
> Patrick O'Duffy, Brisbane, Australia
>
> Some days it's like some bastard nailed a ticket for the bus tour
> down to fucking Hell to the front of my brain.
>
>  - Spider Jerusalem, TRANSMETROPOLITAN #26
>
>
>
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