Bolf - More than a name, it’s a lifestyle.

It has been noted a number of times on r/mensrights that Alimony and Child Support (especially in the US) is very skewed to favour women at the expense of men. Many MRAs feel that this is wrong, as do I.

Here is a simplified version of what I think would improve divorce law and make things better.

1. Alimony is paid only to compensate a lower earning partner whose earning potential has been harmed by the marriage. If the parents mutually agree that one should stay home with the kids, then alimony should amount to the difference in pay the stay at home parent would have had they continued in their previous occupation. For example, the mother and father mutually decide that the mother should stay at home with the child, and this lasts for 5 years before divorce. The mother was previously a registered nurse making $40k/year. Five years of raises in her position might have amounted to a salary of $43k/year. Thus, the alimony is $3k/year. It could also be adjusted to account for the difficulty that the parent may have in finding a job after being out of work for so long.

2. Child support should account for the following: food, clothing and child care. Rent must be managed by both parents, and so should not be accounted for in child support. Both parents must contribute to food, clothing and child care on a regular basis, regardless of which parent has custody. If the child needs day care so that the custodial parent may find employment, then both parents must pay for it. If the child needs new clothes, then both parents must split the bill (or find some way of doing so). Food costs can be approximated based on the amount of time the child spends with either parent. Assuming $10/day, for example, and 20 days/month with the mother, 10 days/month with the father, then the father would have to pay $100/month in food support to the mother. (If the mother had full custody for 30 days/month, this would change to $300, obviously. $10/day was just a rough approximation, it could be $15/day or $20/day to account for other things like toiletries and such.)

The benefits of this system is that it does not encourage one parent to take advantage of the situation, and it encourages both parents to take full responsibility for the child.

What do you think?

Tags: Uncategorized // Add Comment »

Physically, it is the time of adulthood. Different cultures put a specific age on this, whether it is 18 or 16 or 21. But I am more interested in an intellectual and emotional maturity.

Specifically, I have recently been confronted with two definitions. The first, the definition I have used for some time now, is:
- The ability of a person to anticipate consequences/outcomes and accept responsibility for their actions.

However, in recent discussions with someone, it became clear to me that their definition is:
- The ability of a person to anticipate the emotional response of another person.

So which is it?

I guess we could break it down into emotional maturity, intellectual maturity, sexual maturity, etc… But when someone claims someone else is “immature”, in a general sense, which is it?

I still think it is the first.

Tags: Opinion, Psychology // Add Comment »

Or - how I more strongly feel about advertising for more male nurses…

I was recently in the hospital for surgery on my chest and sternum. During my one week hospital stay, I had the following attendants (numbers approximate):
4 helpful female nurses
7 moderate female nurses
7 unhelpful female nurses
1 disastrous female nurse
2 helpful male nurses
2 moderate male nurses

This isn’t a female bashing post, it is a discussion on the nature of the stereotype that men are not caring/nurturing enough for some jobs (like nursing). Specifically, I had one female nurse grab me by the arm to raise me up when I was having problems, even though it explicitly says on my chart that I must be raised by my head due to my surgery. Another one told me to sniff rubbing alcohol every time I started to feel ill. And I had another one tell me that I wasn’t getting up and doing enough, so she wouldn’t help me out - I was bedridden for days due to having my sternum reconstructed with platinum plates. On a number of occasions, I received the “good ol’ family medicine” speech from the female nurses, completely ignoring their training and education.

As for the male nurses, I had a couple that were a little feeble, but all of them were caring and all of them checked their charts. One of them pretty much saved my life, as I had pushed the buzzer many times while in a convulsive phase while they were on their break. None came, and I was in excruciating pain. Finally the male nurse heard my pleas for help and came, even though I was not one of his charges.

So - in my experience with approximately 20+ nurses, the hypothesis that male nurses are equally as caring, helpful, nurturing, etc… qualities as female nurses cannot be neglected.

Tags: Men's Rights Activism // Add Comment »

Wow, just wow…

These are the results of the latest study to come out of the UK.

In summary:
- 34 000 people surveyed
- 60% of domestic violence recipients are male, 40% female
- 60% of injury victims are female, 40% are male

In other words, men deal with more domestic violence than women, but women are injured more often by their partners. Female-on-male domestic violence tends to involve slapping, pushing, etc… more often than severe beatings.

None-the-less, domestic violence definitely has an emotional abuse effect and is wrong, regardless.

Absolutely stunning data that really (hopefully) makes one’s eyes open wide.

Tags: Men's Rights Activism // Add Comment »

The best definition I could come up with was, unfortunately, the one on Wikipedia:
Feminism is an intellectual, philosophical and political discourse aimed at equal rights and legal protection for women.

Really, most definitions I could find said the same thing, but I liked the wording of the Wikipedia version best.

I would like to point out the part where it says “equal rights and legal protection” because I think this is an issue that gets forgotten along the way. Many issues on gender agendas these days seem to be more about privilege than about rights. Programs under the guise of “equalization” are a privilege - this does not mean they are wrong, it merely means that they are not an issue of rights and legal protection. Under the Canadian Bill of Rights and Freedoms, women have precisely as many rights and legal protections as men, and so classical feminism has succeeded.

The difficulty arises in the social aspect where women are treated differently than men, have different social opportunities and certain social stigmas placed on them that result in a barrier to their entrance to certain activities. These include politics, some post-secondary programs, and some jobs. These are privileges that men currently “enjoy”, and are not right because they negatively affect women. Similarly, women enjoy privileges of certain social programs, equalization programs aimed at improving quality of life for women, etc… Most of these do not negatively affect men directly, but many that are able to help a person (regardless of gender) in an identical situation are refused to men.

Then there are certain privileges of women that do negatively affect men - quota policies for employment, equalization programs that favour women in post-secondary education and prevent qualified male applicants from entry, etc… And there are a number of issues of basic human rights that are no longer afforded to men but that are afforded to women. These include issues surrounding marriage/divorce, and accusations of rape and sexual or physical abuse - where men are guilty until proven innocent.

When we talk about Equal Rights, I do not think we have achieved this - and it is the male gender that is now suffering. When we talk about privilege, there are a number of double standards that still exist in society with regards to these. These double standard privileges exist because of the notion that one gender needs their own privileges to counter the privileges of the opposite gender. I disagree with this view, and feel that privileges should be afforded to either gender equally - and should be strictly understood to be a privilege and not a right. My view on this equally condemns the “Boys Club” of politics as it does the “Girls Club” of sexual/physical/domestic abuse, where victimized men are refused the help that is afforded to many women.

For clarity, since there are a number of people who love to pick on my words to try to Straw Man the issue into something else: sexual/physical/domestic abuse programs are awesome and a great idea and very needed in our society, as is education about ending violence period. I am opposed specifically to the barriers in some of these programs, and in our legal system, that prevent males from obtaining the help and support that they need in similar situations. When I say that I oppose the “End Violence against Women” organization, it is not because I believe in violence against women, but rather that I think it should be “End Violence. Period.” or “End Violence against People” - seeing as how 40% of domestic abuse occurs with male victims.

So - let’s get this right. Feminism, as a word on its own, does not describe the current female gender debates, since (at least in Canada), equal rights and legal protections have been obtained. Gender feminism and Equity feminism are still issues to be addressed, as they discuss topics of privilege.

Tags: Men's Rights Activism // Add Comment »

Since this blog seems to be moving more towards Men’s Rights Activism, I thought I would continue with the trend.

I read this article today and it made me sick to my stomach. Apparently, young men at this university who had gone through Women’s Studies 101 had taken from it that the term masculinity is best described as:
-tough
-violent
-machismo
-homophobic
I get the feeling that “sexist” fits in there, too.

This is very disturbing to me, because I don’t see it this way at all. Masculinity is NOT violent, homophobic, etc… Masculinity is the term to describe the parts of a personality or person that come from their male gender. A predisposition towards violence and toughness is common to both genders (40% of domestic violence reports are about women abusing men). In animals, females are just as likely to protect territory and attack outsiders as males. Certainly there is no evolutionary distinguishing feature there. As for homophobia, well I have met enough women that are homophobic to know that it isn’t only one gender, and it certainly is more a product of society than intrinsic.

To me, masculinity is best described with these words:
- physical strength (which is a good thing, and has nothing to do with violence)
- goal oriented (as opposed to process oriented, which often describes women)
- team oriented (team sports, working in groups, etc…)
- stable (emotional, among other things)
- jocular (like to be funny, to laugh often, to have fun)

What is so wrong with this? A sexist is a sexist. A violent person is a violent person. A homophobe is a homophobe. Not all men are sexist, violent, homophobic, etc… We really need to get past these stereotypes.

Tags: Men's Rights Activism // 2 Comments »

I am often confronted with a difficult problem with my Men’s Rights Activism. While I encounter this situation from women, as might be expected by other MRAs (Men’s Rights Activists), I probably encounter it at least as frequently from other men who are unfamiliar with the topic.

The situation I am referring to is the assumption that my activism for Men’s Rights means I am fighting women. It is clear that they do not understand that my views are independent of women, as a gender, though I a may counter argue against a gender feminist agenda.

When I call out a gender feminist law as being unfair towards men, am I fighting against women? When did the defense of victims of a human rights violation become an attack on a gender except through the use of the Straw Man fallacy? Really, this is what it comes down to. Rather than addressing the reasonable objection an MRA such as myself has, attention is diverted to a completely separate issue of women’s rights.

Many years ago, a feminist friend of mine said to me, “Feminism is simply the belief that women are people too.” I agree with this statement, and that is why I distinguish between “gender feminism” and “equity feminism”, as suggested by Christina Hoff Sommers, to represent the group of people who are feminist activists as opposed to nearly everyone in middle-income Western society.

In the same line, Men’s Rights Activism is simply the fight for the recognition that men are people too. It seems silly, considering the history of the subject, that this should be the outcome - but it is.

Right now, there are many organizations that encourage women to join science and math programs in post-secondary education. Good. There are scholarships that focus on encouraging women in traditionally non-female programs. Good. There are secondary school programs that focus on improving the self-esteem and success of girls in grade school. Good.

The fact that:
- boys are falling behind girls in literacy and grades despite a continued push for more attention to be paid to improving the educations for girls,
- men more often lose the battle for custody (when abuse or other serious issues are not a factor),
- and men are generally presumed guilty until proven innocent when it comes to issues of abuse and rape - where as women are presumed innocent until proven guilty in similar situations,
all lead me to the conclusion that good work is being done to ensure women have equal rights in our society, but little is being done to shore up the issue of the rights of men.

Men are generally being demonized for the actions of a few - yes a few - members of the gender who still discriminate, and for the actions of people long dead. As stated here, the wage gap is almost entirely explained now by the unfortunate higher incidence of gaps in work experience and training due to child rearing and similar issues. The solution to this is education that men should take an equal role in parenting so that both parents are share the responsibilities and consequences of child rearing.

Additionally, false rape claims against men appear to be at an all time high - it is important that people feel safe and secure in reporting rape, but there needs to be a curb of this disturbing trend. An accusation alone can be devastating to a person. If the rape did happen, but a conviction is not possible, this is not the same thing as a false rape claim, and so the two issues should not be confused. No one would be punished for lack of conviction, only if details come out proving that it is an issue of false rape.

And, while efforts are in place to encourage women to seek education and employment in traditionally male dominated fields, there is little apparent effort in encouraging men to join traditionally female dominated fields. This would include nursing and the fine arts, where female applicants far outnumber male applicants. In the end, once barriers have been removed from the entry of applicants based on gender, the natural tendencies of genders to enter into the different fields is not an issue of discrimination but one of society norms that can be addressed by further education and advertising if so deemed. Discrimination is not shown simply by a statistic showing 70% (hypothetical) of the graduates in science are male.

In the end, there are two roles that Men’s Rights Activists usually take. The first and most important is to advocate for the rights of men, as discussed above. And the second is to debunk bad arguments and myths from gender feminists that would result in harm to men.

Further reading on that last subject can be found here:
Schrodinger’s Rapist - the argument that all sex with male partners is rape committed by the man, and that women then choose whether or not they wish to report the rape.
Top 10 Myths in Feminist Culture
Who Stole Feminism - by Christina Hoff Sommers
Legalizing Misandry - by Paul Nathanson and Katherine K. Young

Tags: Men's Rights Activism, OC Transpo // Add Comment »

I posted this information on a Reddit comment for the MensRights subreddit, and I also posted this as a comment on the Glenn Sacks blog. I am reposting here also.

There are several plots in the Report, namely Figure 7 and Figure 8, that show a linear trend plotted along with the data (y-axis information found in the Global Competitiveness Report). These linear trends are meaningless from a statistical point of view and show clear evidence of bias in the report. Of course, a least squares regression can be plotted for any data set, but that does not actually mean that the data is linear. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation for information on correlation coefficients.

I have reproduced the plot myself, following the reports that they do, and find a correlation coefficient value of R^2 = 0.167. This is very low - VERY low, indicating a high probability that the data is not linear. There are 124 countries included in the plot (more on this later), and removing Chad, and the Scandinavian countries results in an R^2 value of 0.085 and a drastically more horizontal slope. The statistical significance of these 5 countries (4% of the total) is huge. In a truly linear data set, 4% of the data points should not have this significant of a contribution.

In addition, I would like to point out that there are 124 countries common to both lists, while each of them show about 133 countries. These other countries, like Taiwan in the Competitiveness list, suggest that the political boundaries of countries may be different. Why is Taiwan on the competitiveness while not on the gender score list? Was it included with China? Questions like this make me wary about whether the information on the two separate data sets correspond to identical groups of people.

Also note that there are other bits of information involved in the Competitiveness report. If we plot Innovation Score versus the Gender Gap Index, there linear relationship is even worse. Could we take this to indicate that improved gender equality has little effect on the innovation quality of a country? I would say no, but I think this issue is purposefully left out of the Gender report.

Overall, I think we all feel that equality among genders will improve the economic status of a country, but I think that the economic status of the country is incredibly complex. The first part of that sentence is my bias - it may be founded on good reason, but it is still bias. In any report, bias should be clearly stated, not glossed over. And I denounce this report as clearly biased. If bias is evident in the presentation of the data and is not discussed, it is clear to me that bias could also be present in the data collection. This makes the entire report null, in my mind.

Tags: Men's Rights Activism // Add Comment »

This is a great article about addiction based games:
http://rpgvault.ign.com/articles/986/986323p1.html

They have a really good point, too. Essentially, many RPGs (specifically MMO RPGs) - the kind without coherent, linear story lines - can be classified as addiction based. They present a scenario where a player can feel the chemical equivalent of “accomplishment” simply through attaining the next item/level/stat. And it really works. These games offer repetitive, unnecessary content that people will become strangely and unhealthily involved with, to the point of irritability and aggression towards anyone or anything that gets in the way of that content.

Addiction to MMOs could potentially be entirely explained through the addiction to the chemical release received by the player through their in-game accomplishments. And this type of addiction is most successful in people who are lacking in this very area of their life. And accomplishments in MMOs are much easier to come by! Spend a few hours and you get a release simply by being closer to your next stat/level/item, without even attaining it. Then you have the anticipation until you can achieve again.

I wonder if it would be possible to cure MMO addiction simply by encouraging patients to view other aspects of life as accomplishments - the simple, little things. Cleaning the kitchen, vacuuming the floors, getting groceries, doing a good job at work, etc…

I know that this is how I got out… I filled my life with my own accomplishments. And every time things stagnate in my life, I feel that pull back to the realm of addiction based games. I think the same can be said for alcohol, drugs, etc…

Tags: Gaming, Opinion, Psychology // Add Comment »

This idea came to me as I was going for a walk early this morning…

What I have come to believe, during the past few years, is that the existence of a creator/God that is capable of performing miracles would require a violation of the conservation of energy (and potentially all conservation laws). I argue this from the axioms that nature is governed by fundamental symmetries, and these intrinsic symmetries are not violatable in nature. Furthermore, a miracle is defined as something that cannot be explained as a natural phenomenon - ever. It is not a limitation of our current knowledge, but it must be a permanent truth.

With this starting point, I argue that the best experiment for the possible existence of miracles would be to look at energy conservation. By examining the degree of our understanding of conservation of energy, we would then have a capability of ruling out all events that occur with a larger violation of conservation of energy. And to answer the counter argument that this is not valid because such a God could work over time, due to omniscience arguments, I would say that the experiment would need to be integrated over a long period of time to see what I would call “build up effects”.

With this experiment, then, we could also look at the likelihood of free will, as free will would also require a violation of conservation of energy. This can be understood by examining the cause-effect relationship in nature. In order for a person to have free-will, they would need to be able to change effects from the same cause. This would require conservation of energy.

If our measurements of the precision of the conservation of energy symmetry is smaller than the needed energy for a neuron to fire, then we would rule out the existence of free-will in a natural, material metaphysic. (I am ignoring material-mental metaphysics due to natural, intrinsic inconsistencies with such views. Mental metaphysics are ruled out by observation of lack of control over environment with thought.)

Tags: Philosophy // Add Comment »