I’ve been following the First International Conference on Men’s Issues (#icmi14 on Twitter) and via the live audio stream and it has been interesting so far. There’s a lot I don’t agree with but plenty I do and despite the best efforts of social media warriors there’s very little that seems controversial or contentious in the talks so far.

Of particular note was a talk by a grief counsellor on the differences between the ways men and women (generally speaking) process emotion – in particular loss. This seemed to me precisely the kind of helpful outcome that can come from examining men’s issues that Men’s Human Rights groups can tackle.

When training he was one man as compared to fifteen or more women completing the course and he noted that the approaches had a marked female bias that didn’t seem to be reaching men. Why? Because we are different in lots of ways – nature or nurture is up for argument – and so the approaches to help us, particularly when it comes to mental health issues (a personal bugbear of mine) need to differ too.

But I digress, I just wanted to point out the kinds of talks that are going on first.

The main criticism I’ve seen levelled at the conference so far is that speaker after speaker has been criticising feminism. The typical argument about this going along these sorts of line:

“They only care about attacking feminism, not actually helping men and boys.”

Narrowly avoiding an ‘argumentum ad Hitlerum’ let me examine the problem with that statement.

“These unionists only care about fighting the confederacy, not actually helping slaves.”

It should be obvious then, that providing a robust critique of NuFem (NGO and internet feminism) IS a way of helping men and boys by challenging the dominant, male-blaming paradigm that these groups create and maintain. This is not equity feminism (mission accomplished) but the gender feminism that ignores or blames male victims of domestic violence, sees no need to address men’s educational or mental health issues, that seeks to criminalise and pathologise male sexuality and the behaviour of young boys.

For men to secure funding and assistance the argument needs to be made for men and against the moral panics that are exploited by NuFem. Moral panics over pornography, sex trafficking, prostitution, campus rape (and rape in general), domestic violence and so on. It is not that these aren’t important issues but that they are often deliberately overstated or divert funding from where it would be most useful, as well as creating problems where none previously existed.

NuFem has what amounts to an uninterrogated and unopposed access to academia. ‘Gender’ Studies is an echo chamber becoming more and more extreme with each generation of students. It needs opposition and analysis just as any field needs opposition and analysis. Either ‘Gender’ Studies needs to truly become Gender Studies, or Men’s Studies needs to exist alongside Women’s Studies as a discipline, preferably not one informed by existing prejudice and theory from feminism, a new discipline, built fresh from facts.

Why attack feminism? Because it blames men, holds modern men responsible for the actions of men in the past, blockades getting the issues of men and boys dealt with, directly protests and tries to censor attempts to even talk about the issues – as with ICMI – and in its modern form presents as an ideological dogma with more in common with religion than reality.

Dogmas of patriarchy, objectification, rape culture and so forth dress men as the oppressor, one who does not need help and cannot ask for help without being mocked – by feminists as much ‘manly’ men. This is why the US has a Violence Against Women Act, but not a Violence Against People Act, despite men being the majority victims of violence. In the UK it comes in the form of a Minister for Women, but no Minister for Equality.

It’s not, particularly, my purpose here to attack feminism. I prefer to concentrate on positive changes we can begin to make for men and boys, but given the persistence of the objection it seems worth taking time out to address it.

TL;DR: Men attack NuFem because it harms and oppresses them. It’s not reactionary, it’s a necessary first step to securing equality for men.