Men, Stop It!

A friend of mine recently related how she was so over men sending her weird, annoying, and sometimes creepy messages via LinkedIn. I know, bloody LinkedIn, so I assume these are men are just using a "business reason" to get off, or something 🤮

So, the first message of this article, MEN, STOP IT!

If you think you have the right to give a woman mental work by sending any unwanted message, you are wrong. It is so tiring and boring and sad, don't do it.

The second message of this article is, men, atone by reading the next three articles and tell a woman, maybe your daughter, what it meant to you. Ask them what they think of you reading it, you will be happily surprised.

1: Stop praising women’s strength. We need a world where we don’t have to fight to be valued

To change these harmful systems, we must continue radically shifting norms, despite continuing resistance. Second, creating accountable and equitable governance structures is not just women’s work; it is everyone’s task, with those in possession of political and other decision-making power, resources and influence needing to do much more heavy lifting.

So, what will you do? Nothing massive, not asking you to bring down the whole society, but how about changing something regular within your own life. Just one thing. Nothing is too small.

I'm gonna ask, "Why's that?" at least once a month when something happens to a woman that I think wouldn't happen to a man. I may blog my internal q&a, I may do something, but I'll start by just asking, "Why is that?" 

2: Emma Thompson on living in a woman’s body: my daughter thrums with life, my mother is frail – and I’m balanced between

Not perfectly – nothing’s perfect – but, consistently, we change and reset one another’s state. So instead of grieving my mother’s ageing, instead of envying my daughter’s youth, I find I am buoyed up and calmed down by turn.

Read this article with as much love as you can. Women as different with their daughters than we men are with our sons. It's a different relationship that women have with their kids. They grew them, inside themselves. I am only now, at the age of 57½, really getting this basic universal fact. It is different at a cell level., and I am in awe of it.

3: My trans son deserves love and acceptance, like every other kid

 My 10-year-old knew he was a boy before he could say it properly. At three years of age, he would say: “I a boy, I a boy”, insisting on boy's clothes, and keeping his short hair.

Since then, his father and I have navigated being parents of a transgender child and all that means. Many of the challenges are the same: making sure the kid eats vegetables, tidies their room and – most important of all – takes their lunchbox out of their bag at end of term!

Take time to read Fleur Fitzsimons Stuff article on your own. Once you've read it put yourself into her partner's shoes and ask yourself, "What would I do to support my child?" 

BONUS: Do Better at Conference Diversity

Some of us men organise and/or attend conferences - big work meetings, often with a cost, a free party, and for some reason, multiple keynote speakers.

If you're in the organising camp then definitely read this, and then change your conference.

If you're in the attending camp and note a lack of diversity, read this, and share it!