I was going to write up something today about International Men’s Day, the me-too what-about-the-menz holiday that’s so meaningless that even Men’s Rights activists can barely remember to celebrate it. Do we really need a day to “celebrate [the] achievements and contributions” of men? Don’t we get quite a lot of that already? Do we need a day given over to “highlighting the discrimination against [men]” as if this is really a thing?
But then I discovered that today was also World Toilet Day, and realized it was probably more worthwhile to promote this event, as the lack of toilets and proper sanitation — a widespread problem in parts of the developing world, particularly in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa — can have devastating public health consequences.
Some disturbing facts, from the UN, which I clipped from this CNN story:
- 2.5 billion people — one in three people in the world — do not have a toilet or access to sustainable sanitation
- Diarrheal diseases are the second most common cause of death in young children in developing countries
- They kill more than HIV/AIDS, malaria and measles combined
Learn more at the official website. Also, Al Jazeera has a useful infographic.
And just a note to the MRAs who have somehow concluded from this post that I am comparing men or men’s issues to toilets (!?), let me try to make my point very clear: I am contrasting a sharply focused activist campaign aimed at a very real problem — lack of toilets and proper sanitation in large parts of the developing world — with large consequences — disease and death, of adults and children alike — with a badly thought out International Men’s Day that seems largely driven by jealousy that “women get a day so why can’t we have one too.”
How halfassed is International Men’s Day? Here’s a screenshot of the International Men’s Day website’s “resources” page.
Generally speaking, you would expect a “resources” page to list facts and figures and possibly link to relevant other groups. All you get at the International Men’s Day site are some posters made from stock photos.
What I found on the site’s “about” page was much more troubling. The site was put online by a group called the Dads4Kids Fatherhood Foundation, working with the founder of International Men’s Day, Dr Jerome Teelucksingh. The Dads4Kids Fatherhood Foundation, as I discovered with a bit of Googling, turns out to be a virulently homophobic and transphobic organization that is also behind a site called Gendermatters.com. A quasi-manifesto on the site titled 21 Reasons Why Gender Matters asserts, among other things, that:
Transsexuality signals a deceptively fierce disorder. Elective castration, mastectomy, hysterectomy, etc., are futile non-solutions. The cruel, permanent disfigurement of so-called gender reassignment is not the answer. Transsexuals need psychological and spiritual insight that frees them to celebrate the chromosomes they received at conception.
So, yeah, a halfassed men’s “day” that’s associated with transphobic assholes. Not exactly a winning combination.
Look, if you’re concerned about making a difference in the lives of men, pick the issue that matters most to you, and work on that. If you want to increase funding for prostate cancer research, work on that. If you want to raise money to help male victims of domestic violence, work on that. Actually do the hard work of activism. Don’t just have yourself a “day” and pretend that it means something.
EDIT: Rewrote part of the first paragraph and added all the stuff after the Al Jazeera link to clarify the point of this post, because clearly some people have missed the point entirely.
kittehs – On my Amazon wish list! I’m giggling like I’m a seven year old.
Now there’s a coincidence, I was just thinking about Witches Abroad and your avatar this morning – specifically the bit when Greebo chooses his mask for the ball, with the comment “Always wanted to be ginger.”
Alice – huzzah! It’s good to spread quality Australian literature around the world. 😉
kittehs – XD I have no shame in displaying them on a bookshelf in a future house.
Which made me laugh twice as hard this time through, as someone now familiar with Doctor Who, because the Doctor says the same thing at some point. Coincidence? Probably, but I like to pretend it’s not.
Warning: Do not pet the baby stingrays.
You can pet stingrays. You just have to not pet the sting part. They have a ‘petting zoo’ part at Seaworld with rays in it. They feel really nice.
“Did anyone else look at those pictures of stingrays from below and think, “moisturize me”?”
Well thanks for ruining that for me!
And I kinda doubt it’s a coincidence, they seem to have paid homage to a lot of sci-Fi stuff, so why not Prachett? (The most obvious being “who ya gonna call?” When he’s going to catch a “ghost” and the episode “42” which could’ve been any number)
Alice – under a heading of Oz Literature, I hope! 😀
emilygoddess – yanno I can’t recall if I’ve ever seen that episode (I only sporadically watched #10 and gave #11 a miss), but the question has been asked on many a blog if that was a nod to Pratchett and Greebo!
kittehs – But of course! That and a copy of Lolita. 😛
Jeez, don’t blame us for that one! 😯
Kittehs, it’s in Ten’s first episode. He’s just regenerated and it disappointed that he’s not ginger.
I was assuming it wasn’t a Pratchett reference because it seems so obscure, but IDK, maybe whoever wrote it had read Witches Abroad recently and liked the line, or something.
celebrate the chromosomes they received at conception.
Oh please. Boy, do you even KNOW what your chromosomes are? They are WAY more fluid than you think, bucko.
RE: lauralot
Uh. I mean, hello. How is everyone?
LAURALOT! 8D YOU HAVE RETURNED TO US! TODAY IS A HAPPY DAY!
RE: Warren
as a typical citizen of the US of A, the amount of time you have spent in any third world country is about 0.
Ohhhh, you picked the WRONG Boobzer to try that on, son.
Well “men’s rights” like domestic violence etc don’t really need that much attention (and neither do women’s rights btw, you ladies just make more noise). But we agree on that, toilet rights much more important than the hurt feelings westerners think constitute “civil rights”.
(and neither do women’s rights btw, you ladies just make more noise)
oilet rights much more important than the hurt feelings westerners think constitute “civil rights”.
You realize that people OTHER than Westerners are fighting for civil rights, right? It’s not something we just INVENTED, Jesus.
Didn’t know it was safe to pet a stingray. I will have to go try it.
I wonder what part of the word “violence” Dumb&Dumber doesn’t understand?
katz – The Aquarium of the Pacific has sting rays in their petting pool. So long as you don’t touch the stinger, it’s okay. They have sharks in there too—same idea, just pet the top of the shark, not near the mouth.
@kittehs
i’m guessing all of it. Language seems to be something that our trolls have a lot of trouble understanding.
auggziliary – Ask the Dark Lord? Not sure if he’s done anything ban worthy though.
hry,
“Except white people have literally zero ways in which they have it worse. Men do disproportionately face a few serious issues, like suicide and homelessness”
Not necessarily. In many parts of the world especially blond white women are heavily objectified. They have had rape riots happen in places in which they’ve seen blond women. The blond woman is stereotyped in a lot of cultures as being the ubiquitous American and they stereotype American women as being very sexually permissive.
“Men do disproportionately face a few serious issues, like suicide and homelessness”
Women attempt suicide more often, men commit suicide more often. I don’t think we need to genderize homelessness and suicide. I think it would make sense to have a ‘suicide prevention day’ or ‘homelessness awareness day’ but not try and genderize it and just focus on the issue. If you don’t make it gender neutral than the specific issues that homeless women face (many are running away from domestic abuse and female soldiers are more likely to wind up homeless) will be overlooked if not female homelessness in general. Everywhere in the world except China the suicide rate is higher for men, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, ect. It is because they are more likely to use methods that have a low rate of intervention like shooting themselves as opposed to women who are more likely to use drugs which has a higher rate of intervention. So the stats on suicide are quit deceiving and you’d be missing the full story. Also ‘mens days’ would be ridiculous because it isn’t men who are the de-privileged in society’s around the world. Would you support a ‘heterosexual day’ as well because heteros do suffer some specific problems such as AIDs? I would think it’d be problematic. If you’re sitting in a café in Saudi Arabia on ‘mens day’ you’ve got to be rolling your eyes at the concept. White southern men committed suicide at a higher rate than black Americans but does that mean they need a white hetero mens day? You seem to have forgotten the issue of privilege.
AIDS is now something that only happens to straight people? What a fascinating new development.
Someone should contact the Red Cross and let them know that sexually active gay men can donate blood now.
I think that was a wording glitch; I read it more as heteros suffer problems such as AIDS, not that it’s specific to them (at least I hope I’m reading that right). Still, that’s one sentence and I think Moma Sita makes a good point.
Does anyone feel up to tackling the racist bullshit in the “omg blond women rape riots” part of that comment? Because I already got gently reprimanded for being too mean to this commenter last time she said something clueless.
l,mamofo,
” mentality on the part of men and denying that there is any discrimination against men ”
I think that’s ridiculous. Women aren’t the privileged in society anywhere in the world so who is discriminating against them? You need some privileged class to discriminate to keep a lower class down. Are they being hated because they are men or for other issues and then if they’re hated because they are men its by men.