But What About the Menz?!

Given my previous four posts today, I am feeling even less inclined to be charitable about this shit than I would be normally, which on any given day would typically range from "profoundly contemptuous" to "overtly hostile," anyway.

Long story short: Some privileged white dudebro at the University of Chicago publishes a "satirical" column about forming a group called "Men in Power" to help men get ahead professionally, since "recent job losses hit men harder" (no, no, and no) and "women earn far more bachelor's and master's degrees than do men" (a pointless observation as long as women still need at least one degree more than their male counterparts to make as much money). Other privileged dudebros then clamored for "Men in Power" to be made real in response to the "satirical" column, the satire of which must obviously be questioned in light of the fact that its author decided to launch the "male advocacy group" in earnest.

There's an infinitesimal part of me that feels obliged to expend an enormous amount of energy explaining everything that's problematic with this idea, but the rest of me has better things to do than waste my time trying to boil down nearly five years of archives into one digestible post to educate members of a group for whom the campus' dozen or so feminist groups and gender-neutral student business groups weren't sufficient to pursue the goals of exploring gender and "help[ing] men get ahead professionally."

("Get ahead" of whom, one wonders? Why not "help men achieve professionally" or "succeed professionally" or anything that doesn't imply competition? Interesting, that.)

Suffice it to say, I hardly believe for a moment that a group calling itself "Men in Power" with an evidently serious belief that men need an advocacy group to achieve parity with women (!) is not "pursuing a sexist agenda." No one with a comprehensive understanding of contemporary gender disparities and a modicum of empathy for the marginalized could found and participate in a group called "Men in Power" with a straight face. Totally ignorant. Positively shameless.

[H/T to Shakers Angelos and Constant Comment.]