From the About us page of the Men & Boys Coalition (henceforth MBC):
We will, where possible, assist members of the media to find relevant facts and research or signpost them towards professional experts on gender issues affecting men and boys…
The Coalition will not:
- Provide and promote solutions to individual issues affecting men and boys, that is the remit of the individual organisations and leaders themselves…
This simply begs a question, of course:
How well qualified is the collection of organizations and individuals within MBC, to ‘provide and promote solutions to individual issues affecting men and boys’?
In our 2015 general election manifesto we explored 20 areas in which the human rights of men and boys in the UK are assaulted by the actions and/or inactions of the state. I’ve put in bold text below, the issues where one or more of the 23 member organizations would appear to have some expertise – even if, as with CALM, the ‘expertise’ is delivered by a feminist-run organization. The first three issues affect females too:
Abortion
Foetal alcohol syndrome
Fatherlessness
Male circumcision
Education
Employment
Access to children
Domestic violence
Sexual abuse
Armed Forces veterans’ health issues
Homelessness
Suicide
Criminal justice system
Paternity fraud
Anonymity for suspected sexual offenders
Divorce
Health
Political representation
Company director appointments
Retirement years expectation
By my estimation, then, out of 20 men’s and boys’ issues, MBC member organizations can claim expertise on only six issues. The obvious counter is that individual members – there are 26 of them, most of whom I’d never heard of, before yesterday – can claim expertise in some of the 14 remaining issues.
I’m about to email MBC (info@menandboyscoalition.org.uk) a link to this blog piece, and ask them to identify which organizations and/or individuals they consider qualified to ‘provide and promote solutions to individual issues affecting men and boys’ in the remaining 14 areas. J4MB is qualified to provide solutions in all 20 areas. After all, we did so in our manifesto, which was published in December 2014, almost two years ago.
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