Article content continued

A private business has every right to show only those films they wish to. So I thank Ottawa City Hall for bravely making a venue available on short notice and regret the rude messages some CAFE supporters evidently sent the Mayfair. But why the panic, the disruptive tactics, the persistent attempt not to argue but to silence?

Partly it’s the radical left’s standard extralegal attack on any opinions they don’t share. But paradoxically, it arises in large part from the fact that these MRAs are not stereotypical burly macho throwbacks oozing testosterone. Instead, a surprising number are feminists. And much of the panic arises from what I might unkindly describe as their calling feminism’s bluff.

CAFE, for instance, declares itself “committed to achieving equality for all Canadians, regardless of sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, family status, race, ethnicity, creed, age or disability.” These are not men who want to restore the “patriarchy.” On the contrary, they frequently argue that men have been as much the victim of traditional gender stereotypes as women.

MRAs note that men account for 94 per cent of workplace fatalities in the United States and three quarters of the suicides, and comprise less than 40 per cent of university undergraduates but get 60 per cent more prison time for the same offences. And they blame harmful stereotypes of masculinity that also make men drown their pain in alcohol or work themselves into an early grave.