Page five starts out with the comment that men are only evictable guests in their home. And that when a domestic violence situation arises, that it is almost always the man who is taken out of the home. Perhaps that is because it is almost always the woman who is the primary physical and emotional support for her children. (Physical in the sense that when they get hurt, they run to mommy and not daddy, not in a financial means, although this too is sometimes true.) And in most instances, it is the father who is violent, which is why he is the one to leave the house. For the safety of the children, it is the violent person who is removed.

Mr. Doyle goes on to compare the family to a three legged stool. I suppose this would be an acceptable allegory IF men, women and children had equal rights. But they don't! Actually, if the family is a three legged stool, women and children (to a much lesser degree) are not trying to take away the leg that is the man, but simply to add on to their legs so that stool is even and not so lopsided.

Here is another of those statements that made me want to reach through my new monitor with both hands. "To any reasonable person, being raped in the back seat of a car, as happens to very few women, is far preferable to being raped in divorce court, as happens to many men." (p.5, TMM) I don't even know what to say to that statement. It is so patently absurd and utterly ridiculous. It can only have been made by someone who has not been physically raped, because a physical rape is not only physical but mental and emotional rape also. When I started reading this manifesto, I took it with a grain of salt and was simply going to let the whole thing slide by, labeling it, in my mind, the rantings of a "good ol' boy" who wanted to turn back the hands of time to where men ruled the world. When I read that statement, my entire attitude changed. This man is not only ranting, he is dangerous. Ideas like this one are what has kept women in a state of oppression for so long. Fear of men like Mr. Doyle and his belief that divorce is harder than undergoing the trauma of a rape. It still amazes me that there are people out there who believe that.

Again, it is not the divorce courts preventing fathers from seeing their children. It is, in my experience, the choice of the fathers.

Divorce probably is one of the leading causes of poverty. Why should that surprise anyone? Whereas before it took two people to support one household, you now have two households being supported on the same income. Of course the standard of living is going to go down. And considering the average income in this country is not that far above the poverty level, any dip in income will cause many to slip below that line. Add to that many men who do not pay child support and the women tend to experience a much bigger drop in their standard of living than the man, whose standard often rises. I'm supposed to get $326 a month to raise two boys, ages 7 and 11. Yeah, right. However, for my ex, who used to contribute half to the living expenses, he now only has to give up 20% of his paycheck to support his kids. Who makes up the other 30%? Mom, of course. And I wouldn't have it any other way....

The statistics regarding men's suicide rate after divorce is revealing. It is the women who has the job of being a single parent on a smaller income, with more pressures and responsibilities, yet is the men who commit suicide more often? Interesting.

The institution of marriage needs a major overhaul too. It has, for centuries, kept women in financial servitude. It is patently in favor of the man and until recently, a wife was considered a man's property. The term rule of thumb came from an old law that said a man could beat his wife with a stick no thicker than his thumb. Unfortunately, in most states today, men still get in more trouble for beating their dog than raping their wife.

The funny thing is that Mr. Doyle admits that most men don't fight for custody. How does he know what motivates most of those men? He might have tried and run into prohibitive costs, but he is also a man who believes that it is better to be raped than to go through a divorce. So perhaps the judge saw good reason to award custody of his kids to his ex-wife. From my personal experience and the experience of those I know who are divorced, most men do NOT WANT custody of their kids. And those that try are usually motivated by spite-- they do it to hurt their ex-wife, not because they really want the kids.

Again, from personal experience, the estrangement that occurs is not because of a male-prejudiced justice system but the choice of the man. I kept a log for two years of all the contact my kids had with their father after we told them we were getting divorced. (We'd already been separated for about six weeks at the time.) There would be weeks on end when the only thing written in between biweekly visitations was "No contact with the boys today." It is sad to look at. But it was his choice. They were always available to him. They had use of the phone and after several months of calling their father, gave up even trying to keep in daily contact with him. The same situation holds true for most of the people I know who are divorced. If there is no contact with the kids, it's not because the mother prevented it but because the father chose to break off contact.

While 75% of prisoners in jail may come from female headed households, in many cases, the absent male was abusive. Could this have anything to do with the fact that their children end up in jail??? Hmmm...don't know....OF COURSE IT CAN!!!!!! But instead of presenting both sides of the issue, all the blame is laid on the woman. Children who grow up in abusive homes often grow up to be abusive themselves. Children who see their father disrespect and abandon their mother will think nothing of abandoning and disrespecting something they do not care about, like the property of another. Or another's life. IT IS A LEARNED BEHAVIOR!!!!!!!!!

I have no idea where Mr. Doyle gets his facts that men suffer more financially than women after a divorce. Again, no woman I know, other than maybe someone like Ivana Trump, and I don't know her anyway, has profitted from divorce. Those who have divorced have had their standard of living drop, sometimes drastically so. While the man, on the other hand, usually experiences a rise in his standard of living.

There are more deadbeat dads, proportionately, than deadbeat moms. So men have the same disinclination to pay support as the admittely rare non-custodial mother.

Here is another one...One of those statements that gets the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. "Women who fail to prepare for careers, promise to live with a man for life, have their children, throw them out, expecting support from them or from taxpayers - and then plead poverty - deserve no sympathy." (p.5, TMM) Where to start!?!?!?!? Again, even in my mothers generation, and she is only 60 (sorry Mom), women were expected to stay home after they were married. Those who were not married before they were 21 were considered old maids! When is one to prepare for a career between the age of 18 and 21 when one starts having the children they were expected to have. Or maybe Mr. Doyle is referring to the secretarial classes offered in high school. Certainly he wasn't referring to a woman attending medical school or law school. Why, they'd be...*shriek* 26 or 27 before they were out of school!!!!!! What an old maid!!!!! after a women had a child, SHE was expected to stay home and take care of THEIR child, giving her no time to further her career. Why couldn't the man stay home half the time and allow the woman equal time to further her career? Because IT JUST WASN'T DONE! WOMEN WERE EXPECTED TO BE HOMEMAKERS AND MOTHERS AND GOOD, QUIET, OBEDIENT EXTENSIONS OF THEIR HUSBANDS. And NOWHERE is it said that women have to allow themselves to be doormates and whipping posts for their husbands. If men had more respect for women and didn't use them as personal valets and/or beat them when they came home angry and/or drunk/high, maybe women wouldn't have to leave so often.

Yes, the child is father to the man. A son who sees his father abuse his mother will most likely grow up to be an abuser. A son who's father believes it is easier to be raped than to go through divorce will grow up having little respect for women. A daughter who sees her father do the same things will grow up believing that women are supposed to be treated that way. That women deserve to be raped rather than put a man through the pain of a divorce. Sad, but true. The correlation between mother-headed households doesn't take into account that the mother has to usually work two jobs in order to support her family and is often not there. And the father is usually never around either. It is not as clear cut as Mr. Doyle would have us believe.

Poverty is a state of mind?????????? Geesh! Where do people come up with statements like this????

I'm seeing so much red now I can't type straight. I'm gonna take a break....be back later.

It's a LOT later, but I'm finally back. Now where was I?

As far as the welfare system is concerned, let's not look to those who are victimized by this self-perpetuating trap for answers. Let's look to the legislative bodies on both state and federal levels, who are mostly MEN, to fix what they have screwed up!!! Yes, there are those who take advantage of the welfare system. But that is a very small minority and the vast majority of those on welfare would LOVE to be out of that trap. But when a single working mom who takes a job that pays just over minimum wage must give up her health care and food stamps as well as pay for child care now that she is working, it is simply asking too much. No mother would risk her child's ability to get medical care for a job that pays $6 an hour. And if she works more, she has to pay more child care and on top of that is never home for her kids. It's a no-win situation for the single mom. At least on welfare she is there for her children and knows they're going to have food and medical care should they need it. And you wonder why so very few make it off the welfare roles? Remember, the MALE DOMINATED legislature made the rules....Could it have been to keep women in subjugation???

Okay, now on to page 6....This should be a doozie because here is the opening lines of this page. "Anti-male prejudice is a square dance of officials and assorted other fools. What motivates them? Reasons include a massive perversion of chivalry, fad, self-aggrandizement, and Freud's discovery - penis envy." ROFLMAO!!!!! Geesh, this is bordering on the absurd!!!!! I can't believe there are actually people who believe this crap!

*trying to get serious again*

Mr. Doyle claims that judges, police and social workers are taking over the jobs of fathers. Well, someone has to! When the father runs off and abandons his family, or leaves his wife for some younger woman in search of that ultimate fantasy during a mid-life crisis, someone has to step in to fill that role.

Mr. Doyle decries the funding of shelters for victims of domestic violence, claiming there is no justification that such shelters are needed and that helping victims is a secondary function of shelters. Their primary function is to advance the feminist agenda. I challenge Mr. Doyle to spend one week in a busy shelter and tell me there is no need for them. Have him meet the police at a neutral location (some shelters don't even give their location to police bc they often have the wives of officers in their care) at two o'clock in the morning in the middle of winter and then have to take the victim to the hospital bc her nose is broken, spend five hours there than have to go back to the shelter and do all the paperwork. Have him try to get someone an affordable and decent apartment in 30 days when the waiting list to get in is 6 months long. Have him try to find someone a job that pays enough to support the woman and her children when she has been denied access to an education by a controlling spouse. Then have him say that helping the victims is a secondary agenda.

"Feminism is irrational and socially destructive. Consider: Spokeswomen profess to seek equality but demand special privilege. They demand the advantages men have earned without the disadvantages, like having to earn them." I hate to disappoint you, Mr. Doyle, but women HAVE earned the privileges. They've earned them by subjugating themselves to men for the past 2.5 million years. They've earned them by raising the children virtually by themselves while the men worked. They earned them by managing household budgets. They earned them by making home repairs when they couldn't afford to call in repairmen. They earned them by sacrificing their careers for their children and their husbands. And they earned them by doing all this FOR NO PAY!!!!!!!!!!

"They demand equal representation in the boardrooms of industry, but not in the grubby jobs or among the burned out inhabitants of skid row." Take a look at the demographics of the housing projects and you will find that the majority of residents are single mothers or the elderly. That many women don't end up on skid row is not because they don't have the opportunity, but because they don't wallow in their self-pity and turn to alcohol to drown their sorrows as many men do. Women take what has been handed to them and work with it to make the best of the situation. That is something we've learned how to do after being subjugated for so long.

"They [feminists?] consider women too fragile to be pinched in an office, but tough enough to engage in combat!" WHOA!!!!!!!!!!! We're talking two completely different situations here!!!! Being pinched in the office has to do with being respected as a person, not degraded to status as a sexual toy. Being pinched in an office is sexual harrassment and has nothing to do with the ability to withstand adversity in combat. Women have long fulfilled military roles without the benefits. During the colonization of this country women fought side by side with the men. During the Revolutionary War and the Civil War it was much the same thing. Trying to compare sexual harrassment with ability to fight is utterly ridiculous!

"Prime purposes of feminism are to establish a lesbian-socialist republic and to dismantle the family unit." Ummm...someone actually believes this??? This is too far out to even comment on.

"Men's more legitimate gripes and philosophies are censored as if heresy, although balance is feigned by publication of writings from anti-male male authors, under the guise of "masculinist" material." "More legitimate gripes and philosophies"?????? What the hell does that mean? How egotistical and chauvinistic. It appears what Mr. Doyle wants is a return to the time when women didn't question what a man told her to do. She just did it. Often out of fear of being beaten if she questioned him as to why. Sorry, Mr. Doyle. It will NEVER happen. Women deserve to be treated as equals and that is ALL the women's movement is about. The MDA is not seeking justice but a return to the time when men ruled and their word was obeyed without question. The MDA is MUCH more mysogynous than the feminist movement is misandrous. At least women have a reason to be misandrous after being subjugated for so long. Men's only reason to be mysongynous is because women are finally beginning to get some of the rights they deserve.

"Greed is a primary cause of divorce." Now that makes sense. I make more money than my ex-husband (who is currently unemployed and rather than look for another job, is collecting unemployment and unable to pay his childsupport). I get no alimony. My ex and I amicably split up the things we'd gotten as a married couple. And yet I'm still falling deeper and deeper in debt after my divorce. This is greed? It's greed that keeps men from paying their child support. Greed or spite. And it was my ex who initiated the divorce. Perhaps eighty percent of women initiate divorce because eighty percent of husbands beat their wives or cheat on their wives or lie to them or walk out on them????

"As Liberator writer Muldoon X says, AFDC seems to be a heaven for bums and brood sows." This comment doesn't merit comment. But it does go to show how low Mr. Doyle has stooped.

On to page 7...If I can stomach any more of this that is....

Page seven opens with the obvious statement that men and women are physically, emotionally and psychologically different. Yes, we need to celebrate the differences. On this, I have to agree. However, when those differences are used to keep men in power OVER women, then something needs to change. Men could not have accomplished all they have accomplished without women keeping things moving on the homefront. All women are asking now is that men take an equal share of that homefront work and give womean an equal share at outside opportunities. What is so wrong with this? Why should men have "all the fun" while women do all the "drudgery"?

82% of all saints are men. So what? All that proves is that the church is as patriarchal as the rest of society. There has been no female Mozart because women have not had the leisure time to sit around and compose music. There has been no female Jack-the-Ripper because women, who have been the victims of violence for so long, do not have the urge or desire to inflict such pain on others. That Mr. Doyle claims male achievements are the result of testosterone is an insult to men. It is saying that men have no minds to accomplish anything just this instinctive drive they have no control over.

"In the lion species, females doing the hunting has been cited as disproving this contention, but actually it proves our point. Lionesses hunting are like housewives marketing. Lions are the undisputed authoritarians." And it also proves my point. Men reap the benefits of the work that women do but still want to rule the roost and get the "lion's share" of the bounty. At least the men who share Mr. Doyle's point of view do. It also goes to show that the female species is sometimes more capable of providing nourishment for their offspring than males.

Mr. Doyle tells us to look to nature for proof that there are certain roles that females are to fulfill and certain roles that males are to fulfill. What he fails to acknowledge is that in many species, once the mating has occured, the male is out of the picture. It is the female who provides the nourishment AND protection for the offspring. Very similar to today's society.

Now Mr. Doyle is showing his homophobic side. True men cannot be gay. So now in addition to women-bashing, Mr. Doyle will be gay bashing too???

Homosexuality is unnatural? Then why do male dogs try to hump everything that moves? Why does a colony of monkeys use sex, even homosexual sex, to solve conflicts in their group? Why are some animals, when faced with an overabundance of one sex, able to change their sex? Homosexuality IS found in nature. Yes, heterosexuality is needed to procreate, but humans have already overpopulated this planet, so that need is gone. We now have the "liesure" time to explore love in its fullest potential. The only limits on love are the ones we place on it. There was once a time when marrying between races was considered abnormal too. Yet different "breeds" of horses or dogs or cats can mate, so why not different "breeds" of humans?

"...decent people are simply revolted by their disgusting sexual practices." No comment. Doesn't deserve it.

Here's a good one. Mr. Doyle wants to require a higher standard of morality for women because they can "surreptitiously introduce extra-familial children into their families" while men cannot. Ok...correct me if I'm wrong, but DOESN'T A MAN HAVE TO GET THE WOMAN PREGNANT???????? A man might not be able to surreptitiously introduce extra-familial children into his own family, but he can certainly do it onto someone else's family!!!!!!! What a double standard!!

A male professor of sociology making a compelling case for a patriachal society? Gee, that's a surprise. Not.

Okay, so a matriarchal society is savage and we need to turn to the ghettoes for proof. Was it a woman who started the Crusades? Was it a woman who started World Wars I and II? Was it a woman who started the Inquisition? Was it a woman who started the Civil War? Supposedly the Trojan War was fought because of a woman, but it was the men who "stole" her. As for the ghettoes, see my earlier comments on the welfare system.

Yes, the Bible is replete with references to husbands authority over wives. It was also written by men. Need I say more?

Rolling on to page 8....

"So, until justice is restored, it would be wise for men to avoid both marriage and parenthood." ROFLMAO...That would mean men would have to avoid sex! Yeah, right!

"The Men's Defense Assoc. feels that to finance an evil system by paying unfair alimony, support and attorney fees is more immoral than is refusal to pay." That's the spirit! Make the kids suffer! How chivalrous! (NOTE: For those who might have missed it, that was sarcasm.) Sounds like a lame excuse to get out of having to fulfill a responsibility men assumed when they became fathers.

"But if society, through its judicial system, denies these rights to men and aspires to control their families; then society, through its welfare system, must assume the financial responsibilities." Ok, correct me again if I'm wrong, but wasn't Mr. Doyle just complaining about how the welfare system is leeching off the average taxpayer? Now he wants to rely on that system even more because he doesn't want to pay his share of support to his kids? Something's wrong with this picture.

"It is only common sense that no one, man or woman, has a right to bring children into this world unless they have the means to support them." And what happens when situations change? What happens when a child is born with disabilities that the parent's can't afford to handle on their own? We're getting to the point where more than half of our children are uninsured. Who takes care of these kids when they need medical assistance?

"Because marriage is a lifetime contract, spouses aspiring to terminate it unilaterally without very good cause would thus be prevented from absconding with the fruits of marriage. More men, who seldom need outside financial support, would gain custody." OK...what's very good cause? Mr. Doyle doesn't believe that as many women are beaten or abused as they claim to be. So that's obviously not a good cause. And men don't often need outside financial support because THEY MAKE MORE MONEY THAN WOMEN BECAUSE WOMEN ARE DISCRIMINATED AGAINST IN THE WORKFORCE! Now Mr. Doyle wants to use that discrimination to take children away from their mother, who in most households, is STILL the primary emotional and physical caretaker of the children even if she is working outside the home!!!!! A bad case of having your cake and eating it too.

"If judges continue misinterpreting that term [fairness is the term to which he is referring], as they probably will, Prof. Amneus' suggestion - outright prohibition of alimony and maternal custody - may become necessary..." Just try it. You want to see how good women can be in combat? Try taking our kids away from us to soothe a male's shattered ego. Then you'll see the natural female urge to protect her young kick into gear big time. And it won't be pretty.

"Discipline is not normally a maternal quality." Since when? Who did/does all the disciplining when Dad is at work? Or out with the boys? Who does all the disciplining in single parent homes headed by mothers? Who did all the disciplining so that when Dad got home from work the kids were clean and well-behaved and didn't distrub dad while he sat down and ate and read the paper and did his thing? Disiplining has ALWAYS fallen on the woman more than the man. The old "Wait til your father gets home" was a last resort.

"Women become pregnant through voluntary acts and omissions, and should not ask taxpayers to finance the consequences." What about rape? An incest? And sexual abuse? And what if it is the man who "omitted" something? Yet it is only the female who must suffer the consequences. Until very recently, a male could deny his paternity. Blood tests could only prove who was NOT the father, not who was. "Therefore, abortions should be funded by taxpayers only in cases of danger or deficiency, or in cases of rape or incest that are reported to police within one week of occurrence." And how kind of them (MDA) to give a woman who has been traumatized by rape an entire week to report it! Some women NEVER report it because of the shame heaped on them by society and their families, especially in cases involving incest.

Why should women have more say in whether or not to have an abortion? Because it is their body that is going to carry the child, not the man's. Plain and simple. If a man were to get pregnant, then it would be his choice. That's only fair.

"Because only females get pregnant, the responsibility for contraception and sexual non-participation lies more heavily with them." SAY WHAT??????????? A woman can ONLY get pregnant with the help of a man!!!!!! So why don't the men stop asking? And for hundreds of millions of women, contraception (other than natural family planning or abstinance) is NOT an alternative because of a patriarchal church! It takes BOTH sexes to make a baby, so the responsibility for NOT making a baby should fall equally on both of them.

"In view of the widespread availability of contraceptive devices and except in the rare[italics and emphasis mine] cases of actual rape, pregnancy results from voluntary choices by females;..." Geesh....here we go again....It is a voluntary choice by a man to rape. It is a voluntary choice by a man to ask for sex. Where the hell is the male's responsibility to prevent pregnancy??

"The Men's Defense Association deals with more temporal realities." Personally, it sounds more like pipe-dreams to me...

On to the final page......Thank God!

This page opens with what appears to be an attempt at resolving an obvious conflict-- how can MDA argue FOR gender-specific roles then argue AGAINST them in other situations? Resolution of this seeming paradox is simple! Just accept Mr. Doyle's version of how things SHOULD be and there will be no need for this paradox to arise! And if we don't? Read on! "But if society, especially judges, continues to prove incapable of reasonable scrutiny, our only salvation may lie in resort to the Amneus prescription of invariable paternal custody, no alimony or child support, men in all arduous jobs, women in the kitchen." Why not just put metal collars around a woman's neck and chain her hands and feet?

Finally, it seems in addition to forced slavery, MDA is also advocating a form of terrorism. Or at least threatening it. "We will no longer counsel self-restraint." He then goes on to quote JFK..."Those who prevent peaceful revolution necessitate violent revolution." Doesn't he see the irony of this quote?? It is because of the male dominated social/political/economic structure that women have had to become so "militant" to get any sort of respect or rights!! There unwillingness to grant women what they have rightfully earned and naturally deserve has led to the need for a feminist movement! And now women are getting blamed for all the problems in society.

A few closing words...

Anytime there is a push for social change, there is a reaction from those who stand to lose the most. Witness the Revolutionary War when the English stood to lose enormous tax revenue from the colonies. Witness the Civil War when the southern plantation owners stood to lose their free labor supply. Witness the Civil Rights movement when whites stood to lose jobs/housing/power by granting blacks the rights they should have had all along. Witness the current GLBT (Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgendered) fight for equal rights and the backlash it is causing in the various Judeo/Christian churches (don't know enough about the Islamic stand on homosexuaity to comment) who stand to lose control of their congregations if homosexuality is no longer a "sin". So it is for the Women's movement. Men stand to lose the most-- power, money, control. So this backlash is to be expected. And, in truth, a good indication of how successful a movement is is how strongly the other side fights back and how much they twist the truth to make it fit their agenda. So for those who support equal rights for women, take heart! We must be succeeding!

With Love and Light,
Rainbowlady

people are really brave!