Talk:Men's rights movement/Archive 4

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

→

Archive 10

Social security and retirement

I edited the social security and retirement section to reflect updated citations and corrected inaccuracies. I also divided it by country so that it was easier to read and update. LikaTika (talk) 20:46, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Wages

It doesn't really seem appropriate to continue to cite information from the 1980 census. Not only is it outdated, but it is also mis-cited. I suggest the removal of the sentence "Wages are not the only factor in determining spending power. 1984 U.S. Census Bureau data indicates "women who are heads of households have a net worth that is 141 percent of the net worth of men who are heads of households.[70]" Ideas? LikaTika (talk) 06:39, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

I think the entire "wages" section should be removed, as it is covered under the income disparities section and it is not rights related. LikaTika (talk) 03:38, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree and have deleted the section. Although it did have sources, none of them dealt with the issue in the context of men's rights. It would be inappropriate for us, as Wikipedia editors, to attempt to synthesize statistics like that. If reliable secondary sources discuss the content of the wages section in the context of men's rights then it could be appropriate to include, but until those sources are located that section doesn't belong in this article. Kevin (talk) 06:08, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Politicial Representation

It does not seem appropriate to include the letter-writing campaign of a single person under this heading. Plus, the first link is dead. I propose removing these two sentences "In 2009, Reece Wilkes a 16 year old student from Northallerton, North Yorkshire called on the Minister for Women and Equality, Harriet Harman to support the idea of a Minister for Men.[48] Later Reece was to criticise the response from the Government Equalities Office, stating that the response was a "cop-out" and that they did not address the issues that he had raised." LikaTika (talk) 06:50, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Removed this section, see WP:Undue LikaTika (talk) 03:00, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

improving the article

In general, I am going to be removing any section that does not have:

1. at least one reliable source (WP:V)
2. at least one reliable source that explicitly connects the issue to men's rights (WP:NOR)
3. at least one reliable source talking about the issue that does not simply say that the issue is a concern for men's rights activist groups. (WP:FRINGE)

I'm not going to be removing these completely, but will also be looking to repair:

1. Any section where MRA positions are presented as mainstream positions, or sections where most of the section is talking about MRA positions (WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, WP:FRINGE)
2. Any section that talks about issues that are specific to the global north that makes statements like "A primary concern about men's rights is..." (WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE)

In general, I will be repairing sections where possible rather than completely deleting them. Any sections I delete that you believe you are able to repair can be recovered from the history of the page; feel free to readd them, as long as their sourcing problems have been fixed. Under the general principles I enumerated above, I'm about to rewrite the lede because it makes unsourced claims (that are not sourced later in the article, either) that are not supported in mainstream sources as far as I know. The child support section that was just added is also very problematic as it stands. I'm not opposed to the article talking about child support, but currently that section presents a fringe position with no counterpoint using a single source that doesn't entirely support what the section states. A good first step towards making the child support section better would be to rephrase it as "Stephen Baskerville, describewhoheishere, states..." rather than "Members of the father's rights movement state" and then to substantially expand the section with mainstream positions. I'll try to do this myself in the near future, but if I can't get around to it today I may end up taking the section out until someone can bring it in to compliance with WP:NPOV. Kevin (talk) 16:41, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

With WP:NOR in mind, I removed the education section. It only listed gender differences in education and was not tied to men's rights. LikaTika (talk) 18:14, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Should all sections referring to SIF (Save Indian Family) be removed under WP:FRINGE? LikaTika (talk) 18:21, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Just chiming in here - on rereading this again after a few years I'd agree with Kevin's points and wrt parts like those mentioning SIF the references used are gven undue weight and should be removed under that part of teh NPOV policy rather than WP:FRINGE--Cailil ^talk 18:37, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I disagree, SIF is part of Men's Rights and should be included, if not expanded. TickTock2 (talk) 19:01, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

SIF is a men's rights advocacy organization. It is related to men's rights, and their viewpoints can be mentioned in this article, but only if they are given proportionate weight. SIF is not in any way 'part of men's rights.' Right now, they are given undue weight. The problem can be fixed by improving and expanding the article - but in places where it is not practicable to expand the existing material enough to alleviate WP:UNDUE issues, we will need to delete information dealing with SIF. Some of the material currently present in this article may be appropriate in an article about the men's rights advocacy movement or another article like that (as long as we still counterbalance it with mainstream viewpoints) - but MRA claims cannot represent a majority of the general article on men's rights. Kevin (talk) 19:57, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

It's an issue that has relevance to men's rights, so I don't see how you can attempt to say it's not part of men's rights. It's similar to attempting to have a Women's Rights page without mentioning feminism. How are they given undue weight? They are mentioned three places on the page, first in the picture, one in relevance in the Domestic Violence section and then in the links section. I would counter that's not undue weight. Undue weight applies if it's receiving MORE attention then it deserves and it simply does not, and please no one is asserting that MRA are a majority on this article but it is relevant. TickTock2 (talk) 21:26, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

When I first started editing this article, MRA claims were certainly a majority of the article. I (and Lika) have greatly reduced the portion of content in the article that was primarily MRA content with no counterpoint. The article is better than it was, but it is still not fixed - and it's original state, yes, MRA claims were an overwhelming majority of the article. I did not see before posting my latest response that Lika had actually already commented out the section about SIF that I objected to, in this diff. I don't see a huge problem with the remaining mentions of SIF in that article, but that paragraph had to go. It contained no reliable source and made a claim "...With the increasing abuse of Dowry Laws against men..." that is massively POV. There's absolutely no reason why a minor MRA organization warranted a whole paragraph near the start of the article, and the paragraph was riddled with problems (WP:UNDUE included). Kevin (talk) 21:47, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Also, to be clear, I don't intend to leave this article as a gutted shell. I know more stuff needs to be added - I'm just removing everything that needs to be removed first, so that it's clear what is needed going forward. After I've removed or repaired the content in the article that is not compliant with policy, I'll start digging through sources and adding additional appropriate content. Feedback on what kind of content this should be is welcome - I'm not sure what exactly the scope of this article should really be - there's a talk section about it one section up. Kevin (talk) 21:53, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm on the same page. I think a wider scope will be especially helpful. I've included a section on ancient Greece to get started on history, now that we've removed the history of the modern MRM. LikaTika (talk) 23:28, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I would encourage additions such as compulsive military service or punishments such as castration in Ancient Greece and the middle ages. TickTock2 (talk) 13:18, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

With that in mind, I added additional information in the "history" section. LikaTika (talk) 21:26, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I must say the only additions I have seen to the page have been very "lightly" added, mostly been removed. I hope to see some additions, for example your comment about Child Support links being hard to find very disappointing as a glance at say Father's Rights Movement, has plenty of sources that are very easily added here and relevant. I hope to see some useful additions. TickTock2 (talk) 12:46, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I'd also bring up the idea of basing this similarly to the Womens's Rights, as far as page layout goes. Does anyone object to that idea? TickTock2 (talk) 13:20, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

You are right that so far it has mostly been the subtraction and not addition of content. I've pretty much been intending to get rid of all of the stuff that needs to go out, and then add stuff that needs to go in. I am doing this partly because the presence of incredibly unbalanced POV material is, in my mind, worse than the absence of some things that should be here. Once the article is cleaned up of ridiculous stuff, I'll start adding more non-ridiculous stuff. The women's rights article is generally not too far off from what this article should eventually be. Although the treatment of the modern women's rights movement on that page will be different than the treatment of MRA's here - we'll have to make it clear on this page that MRA's are (or at least so far have been) a minor movement that has not enjoyed the mainstream political or cultural success. We also probably won't be able to have the same sections talking about modern international conventions that the women's rights page has, just because there aren't really modern international conventions dealing with the rights of specifically men - or at least I can't think of any similarly big ones offhand. Kevin (talk) 20:22, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I removed a large section of the "violence" topic and retitled it "Domestic violence" which seemed to reflect it more accurately. The section I commented out seems to be a debate regarding statistics, not men's rights. LikaTika (talk) 21:26, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

That's fine, and completely acceptable, although I would leave it open to be converted back to general violence if need be.
I would also point out, to keep in mind this is not an article about Men vs Women, so some of comparisons between women and men are not needed, for example the Athens comment, could instead discuss the mandatory ownership of property and military conscription needed to be citizens. TickTock2 (talk) 04:00, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Reproductive Rights

I'm getting two different sources credited with creating the term "male abortion" - http://select.nytimes.com/2006/01/10/opinion/10tierney.html/partner/rssnyt?_r=1 here, it's Frances Goldscheider, a professor of sociology at Brown University - And in the article it's Melanie McCulley, a South Carolina attorney. I think we might actually have it wrong, that McCulley was using an already existing term. Thoughts? Better citations? LikaTika (talk) 19:29, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Religious Section?

So, I was just wondering how is the religions related to men's rights again? Maybe I am a little confused. TickTock2 (talk) 05:12, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi, I did those additions. I more than welcome suggestions for reorganizing them, but I kept finding men's rights that were related to religion instead of country, and wasn't sure where to put those. It is a right or a freedom set aside for, or affecting men. LikaTika (talk) 16:34, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

I think we need to commit to a certain spelling of Quran - I found on the main article and on apparently all others, it was transliterated as Quran instead of Qur'an - for the sake of regularity I think we should use that spelling as well. LikaTika (talk) 02:08, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

scope of this article

How should we define the scope of this article, keeping in mind especially WP:FRINGE, WP:UNDUE, and WP:SYNTH? Should we talk about things like the magna carta or Constitution that definitely were advances for the rights of men? (Perhaps we should even move this article to something like 'claims of the men's right activist movement'?) Kevin (talk) 06:35, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm developing a separate "men's rights movement" article on my userpage, and it has a 'claims of the men's rights movement' section, so it is probably more appropriate there. That article will be about the modern "men's rights movement" while this should be about the rights of men, and I think should include historical rights for men as you've mentioned. LikaTika (talk) 03:50, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

With that in mind, I commented out the history of the modern men's rights movement, as it refers to the history of those groups and not the history of the rights of men. LikaTika (talk) 07:38, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

We already have the articles masculism and men's rights movement in India so that MRA views of men's rights should be more than sufficiently covered. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 21:21, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Purdah

I'm trying to sort out where to fit in purdah. Suggestions other than a new section of it's own? It doesn't really belong in "history" and it's cultural, not religious. Ideas? LikaTika (talk) 21:44, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

I would imagine that would belong more with the Woman's right article then men's, as I think we will end up having a comparing men vs women article. TickTock2 (talk) 14:58, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

It is, however a right to be free from purdah that men maintain. However, men are still subject to the gender segregation of purdah. In any discussion of men's and women's rights you're comparing men and women, otherwise it's a discussion of another topic altogether. LikaTika (talk) 19:04, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

The right to be "free" from something seems like a strange decision and can make this page infinitely long. TickTock2 (talk) 20:53, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Organization of History Section

So far, it has been organized by country. As it becomes more detailed, we may want to merge it into groups (Asia, Europe and so on). Ideas? LikaTika (talk) 22:57, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

That may be the best idea TickTock2 (talk) 14:57, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Pakistan

I'm thinking there might be some confusing regarding zina and rape accusations. TickTock, if you'd like to revise it, I recommend you read a little further into your own sources, and even the ones available here on wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by LikaTika (talk • contribs) 19:08, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Please explain what you believe I am missing. I'm aware of the difference between the two, and as such she can file the complaint without the necessary evidence to convict, however if the court fails to convict (and they will without the necessary evidence). TickTock2 (talk) 20:51, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

P.S. Please don't forget to sign your comments. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TickTock2 (talk • contribs) 20:51, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Usually I sign, sorry for the oversight this time. Regarding zina and prosecution in Pakistan - of course, it is unlawful to have sexual congress outside of a married relationship. However, the laws against zina in Pakistan are used to protect men from rape accusations, not the other way around. A complaint against a man for rape will lead to a woman's prosecution for zina, and often hear death, not a prosecution against a man for rape, as it is nearly impossible to prove. LikaTika (talk) 21:07, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

New pic?

I'm in favor of new pictures for this article, the only pic coming from SIF seems to give them undue weight. LikaTika (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:18, 4 October 2011 (UTC).

I'll disagree on the simple fact that it was discussed earlier, it's not undue weight to mention them. P.S. Don't forget to sign. TickTock2 (talk) 20:54, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Marriage

It is my understanding that a woman was entitled to support from an exhusband for the iddat, not lifetime. The Hindu Adopt. and Maint. Act only refers to married persons, see the link used at http://www.vakilno1.com/bareacts/hinduadoptionsact/s18.htm - it does have an exception for a woman who is still married but living separately. LikaTika (talk) 22:13, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

That's why it's under marriage section and not under divorce. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_Adoptions_and_Maintenance_Act_%281956%29 for more details. TickTock2 (talk) 20:11, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

Talk page guidelines

Hi everyone, I archived a large portion of this talk page, which makes it more manageable. I advise others to do the same as needed. Just a reminder for those interested in this subject and/or contributing to the article to follow the Wikipedia policy about how to use talk pages. Please visit Wikipedia:TPOC#How_to_use_article_talk_pages to learn more! Thanks so much and for your contributions and interest in Wikipedia! SarahStierch (talk) 03:59, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Section "China"

I deleted information in the "China" section because the source does not support it [1]. The the article "Complementarity and History Misrecognizing Gender in the Pacific" discusses gender inequality in Polynesia. Last time I checked, Polynesia was not China. Moreover, the article does not mention anything about polyandry being a right or being a right until 1960. The only paragraph that mentions anything about women having multiple partners is on page 266:

As there was a group of high ranking women, there was a class of low status male servants, some of whom were secondary husbands, clearly distinguished in status from the primary husband in an elite household. Polyandry was thus embedded in relations of domestic service and is misread if seen as a fundamentally conjugal relation. Male and female servants were me'ie in relation to other people. Between these servants and a group of other dependents who lived as 'tenants' on others' lands, there was an intermediate class of commoners who lived on their own land but had no servants. The fact that only men could eat what was produced by the other sex created a potential inequality which was only systematically realized among this group.

(I hope I'm not violating copyright laws by posting this paragraph here. If I am please feel free to remove the paragraph.)

This is clearly different from "whereas women maintained the right to have multiple husbands until 1960." Please be careful with sources because it takes quite a bit of time to correct descriptions. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 01:19, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I've updated sources for it showing that it happened in Tibet and with the Mouso people. TickTock2 (talk) 14:56, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

TickTock2, I undid you changes [2]. I do not doubt that polyandry has been practiced by some women but you confuse practicing polyandry with having the legal right to practicing polyandry. In Saudi Arabia, for example, polygamy is legal see this OECD source but there is no indication that polyandry is. If you have information that polyandry was or is legal in some countries, please add it. But please do not insert information about elites in Polynesia or matriarchal societies where polyandry is practiced but not legal. This is WP:UNDUE and outside the scope if this article (although it might fit nicely in our article about Polyandry). --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 15:16, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

SonicYouth, With all due respect, you are wrong. You are not reading my sources, or even reading the Polyandry article, that you yourself mentioned

In Tibet, polyandry has been outlawed since the Chinese takeover of the area, so it is difficult to measure the incidence of polyandry in what may have been the world's most "polyandrous" society.[2]

 :::As such, please stop undoing my changes if you have a problem discuss it here. TickTock2 (talk) 15:56, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Your very first source was the article "Complementarity and History Misrecognizing Gender in the Pacific". It said nothing about polyandry being legal in Polynesia at any time and I am tempted to think that you did not read the article. Your second source is this. Is says that the Muoso, a matriarchal society, practiced a form of polyandry, not that this form of polyandry was legal. Your third source [3] says that polyandry has been practiced in some societies but not that it has been legal in those societies. It then goes on to say that Prince Peter of Denmark states that polyandry has been seen in a certain way by the Chinese and outlawed. If polyandry was legal in Tibet at some point, there should be no trouble finding a reliable source to support it. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 16:49, 4 October 2011 (UTC) 

How about this one http://www.tibet.ca/en/newsroom/wtn/archive/old?y=1994&m=12&p=28_1 It says that it was outlawed. It would have to be legal at some point in order for it to be legal would it not? TickTock2 (talk) 17:12, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

If you read more of the source I quoted earlier it says

Traditional villages were disbanded, people were sent to forced work camps and a strict sexual morality of monogamy an aboliation of premartial sex and a one child per family policy were instituted.

TickTock2 (talk) 17:16, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to revert the China/1982 edit in a minute, because it is not supported by the source. All the source confirms is that there was a 1982 law under which it was illegal - that doesn't mean there wasn't a previous set of laws under which it was also illegal. To support the statement as it is currently in the article, we need a source explicitly stating that it was legal before 1982 or explicitly stating that the law in 1982 was the first law regulating it, etc. Kevin (talk) 16:30, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

What would you say would be supported then? How about if I add in this source? http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=blc0AAAAIBAJ&sjid=CcwFAAAAIBAJ&pg=2638,6668094&dq=polyandry+sri+lanka&h which says "In Tibet, Polandry was outlawed by the Chinese..." or this one http://books.google.com/books?id=yDbZ8TsKSJIC&pg=PA149&dq=polyandry+in+Tibet+outlawed&hl=en&ei=rtqNTqrQAcr50gGRmLET&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=book-preview-link&resnum=4&sqi=2&ved=0CEEQuwUwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false which says "The Tibetan Marriage law of 1981 banned both polandrry and polygyny." I'd also question the source of the current article as I don't believe Cantonese Love are a very good source. I haven't been able to find a copy of the source as of yet, but I question it. TickTock2 (talk) 17:16, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

I've actually found the source for the original statement, http://books.google.com/books?id=N70oG-jetxYC&pg=PA95&lpg=PA95&dq=9622092845&source=bl&ots=TLZKosmXm4&sig=1q3eszvrtr-NPk4s_bNS9WfR1Ps&hl=en&ei=_uCNTo3xK6jw0gGLgak0&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false . I haven't read the entire thing but I didn't see any search results for wife, concubines or anything of the sort. It's a English translation of poetry, I welcome anyone looking through if I missed anything. TickTock2 (talk) 17:16, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

I cannot find the sentence "The Tibetan Marriage law of 1981 banned both polyandry and polygyny" in the book China's Ethnic Minorities and Globalisation. This is the third source that does not quite support what you claim.

We've been over this. If polyandry was legal in Tibet, there should be a reliable source. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 21:55, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and every-time you have attempted to discredit my sources for no apparent reason. Please look at page 149, 3rd completely paragraph first sentence and it starts off with "The Tibetan Marriage law of 1981 banned both polandry and polygyny." and continues with "The practice greatly declined since the rebellion of 1959 and even more due to the Cultural Revolution". Another way to find it would be to use the Google search function. Unless you have any further objections I am going to edit the Chinese section and put it in as sourced, since the other source (the Cantonese Love songs) do not cite as sourced unless you found something I am missing. TickTock2 (talk) 13:32, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

As Kgorman-ucb already explained to you we need a source explicitly stating that polyandry was legal before [insert date here] or explicitly stating that the law in [insert date here] was the first law regulating it. Simply stating that polyandry was not permitted under a specific does not necessarily mean that it was legal up until then. We've been over this, TickTock2.

I know precisely what is on page 149 (or, more accurately, on page 175) of the the book China's Ethnic Minorities and Globalisation. The quote "The Tibetan Marriage law of 1981 banned both polandry and polygyny" is nowhere to be found in that book. The book does not support the claim that polyandry has been legal until the Tibetan Marriage law of 1981. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 19:13, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Sonic - do you have easy access to "China's minority cultures: identities and integration since 1912" written by Colin Mackerras, published in 1995? I think it may support TT's claim. I don't have full access to it right away but can probably get it on monday if you don't. Kevin (talk) 19:29, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I do. I cannot find the sentence "The Tibetan Marriage law of 1981 banned both polandry and polygyny" in the book. It does say (on page 175, for example) that the Tibetan Marriage law was introduced in 1981 and that under the law bigamy is not permitted. This does not mean that bigamy was legal until 1981 which would be relevant for this article. Frankly, this article has been in a dismal state for years and now that it's under reconstruction I think we need sources that directly and explicitly support what we say. If TickTock2 wants to say that polyandry was legal somewhere at some point, then he must provide a source that states that directly and explicitly.

Kevin, I'd be very grateful if you kept an eye on the article in the weeks to come. The rewrite is off to a bad start with sources being added that don't support the claims, tendentious wording, and reintroduction of MRA arguments (e.g., the section "Custody" that I hid yesterday). --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 20:02, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I've been quite busy but I am intending to make another pass through the article removing inappropriate content according to the guidelines that I outlined a couple sections above. Relatedly: I'm still not sure how I feel about the proper scope of this article, can you look up a couple sections at the section I had about it and comment? Kevin (talk) 20:18, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Please look at this link - http://books.google.com/books?id=yDbZ8TsKSJIC&pg=PA149&dq=polyandry+in+Tibet+outlawed&hl=en&ei=rtqNTqrQAcr50gGRmLET&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=book-preview-link&resnum=4&sqi=2&ved=0CEEQuwUwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false , and re-read. If you still doubt me please look here: http://i.imgur.com/qaZA9.jpg TickTock2 (talk) 20:21, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

It seems that both Kevin and I are looking at Mackerras 1995 instead of Mackerras 2003. But that doesn't change things: The fact that bigamy was not permitted under Marriage Law of 1981 does not necessarily mean that it was legal up until 1981 unless the source states that this was the first law that regulated bigamy in Tibet. Was it legal all the time before 1981 or were there other regulations banning it in (...) which were then overturned? It would be really helpful if you could find a source stating that bigamy was legal in Tibet until 1981. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 21:06, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

That's why I linked you to the article, did you happen to look? I'd like to precede with this article in a good faith manner. I'd appreciate the same service. I've commented out the entire China section in history, because I believe the rest falls under fringe and the other comment is not supported by source. TickTock2 (talk) 16:26, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

the lede

I am removing the sentence "These rights are determined by many different ways, such as the cultural norms or laws of respective location." It makes a claim that is way too significant to state without disclaimer in the lede of an article. Whether or not human rights are culturally relative is a matter of significant contention and way out of the scope of this article to discuss in depth. Kevin (talk) 19:34, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I am going to have to question that statement that it is outside of the scope of this article as we are address religious men's rights, which would be determined by cultural norms. Furthermore, if rights were not subjective of your current location, then why are we separating the rights by geographical location. Rights (at least in the fashion we are talking about in this article) are not absolute, and as such that should be acknowledged in the article. TickTock2 (talk) 20:01, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Support Kevin's edit.

I disagree with TickTock2's claim that "religious men's rights" are "determined by cultural norms" but I do agree that the structuring of this article by country or region doesn't make much sense to me. Move the info from the section "China" to the section "Marriage", create a section "Property rights", "Military service", "Violence" etc. and move relevant info there. There are almost 200 independent nations, and we can't cover all of them. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 20:11, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

With all due respect, can you explain that logic? That doesn't make any sense to me. How can the rights not be respective of the location, when we acknowledge that each area has their own laws. TickTock2 (talk) 20:15, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

The operative word is religious. There is a Catholic ban on ordaining women, i.e, the Catholic church gives men, but not women, the right to become priests. This ban exists regardless of your country of residence and the "cultural norms" that are found in that country. --Sonicyouth86 (talk) 21:21, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

It's inappropriate to have an unqualified statement in the lede of an article that rights are culturally relative. Legal/statutory rights are relative but this article is not titled "Legal rights of men," it's titled "Men's rights." Even if no one has yet written about natural rights in this article, they are within the scope of this article. The lede is an overview of the subject as a whole, not an overview of the 50% of the article we've already written. We cannot have a lede that makes an incorrect statement about the subject as a whole. Feel free to rewrite the sentence in a way that is correct. As it stood, it was not. (Although if you do rewrite it, please include a source that supports it.) Kevin (talk) 20:16, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

What other rights are we going to discuss then the "legal" rights? What's the scope of the article that you have in mind? As I see nothing of the sort being discussed currently. With all due respect, the article is about what the article is about, As it "currently" has to be right, and can be changed in the future to accommodate those changes right? Look at Women's rights as an example, they start with "In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behavior, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed.", but yet they discuss other rights (natural rights) granting it's a small paragraph, but why would something similar not apply here? TickTock2 (talk) 18:14, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

There is a substantial difference between the lede used in the women's rights article, and the lede that used to be used here. I would be completely fine with something similar to the lede used in the women's rights article here assuming it was supported by a reliable source, but there is a massive difference between "in some places these rights are institutionalized whereas in others they are ignored or suppressed" (the women's rights lede) vs "your rights depend on where you are" (the former lede here.) They mean two completely different things. (Busy day, but I'll respond to other talk sections later.) Kevin (talk) 21:12, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

The lede is completely unsupported and not a good summary of the article as it stands. It only cites a single, non-reliable source and needs a major overhaul. LikaTika (talk) 05:41, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree with you mostly. WND is not a reliable source for factual information (past consensus at the reliable source noticeboard holds this) although it can be an appropriate source for the views of the groups who speak there. But the lede to a major article like this should not be focused on the views of fringe groups (which is all WND can reliably represent.) I haven't changed it too much simply because I am having trouble coming up with an appropriate lede. Kevin (talk) 05:57, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Has this article been vandalized?

I'm far from being an academic when it comes to the Men's Right's movement, but it seems that the History sections is entirely devoted to expressing the POV that Men's Rights are centered around stripping away womens' rights. Though sourced, it seems very POV, and is more in line with a misogynistic form of Patriarchy than what I've come to learn about the Men's Right's Movement.24.85.75.67 (talk) 21:41, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Vandalism is not quite the same thing as you just described: Wikipedia:Vandalism SarahStierch (talk) 21:47, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

My apologies. A lapse in thought precipitated the approximation that one's concern for the authenticity of the views in this article would be abundantly apparent. Evidently, the err was on this IP address's part for which whose owner had omitted from memory that this is Wikipedia, and as such, quibbling over the correct terminology on a Discussion page is of utmost importance rather than a brief few moments wasted on the part of one more knowledgeable than they to peruse the item in question so as perchance to verify whether it (the item in question- that being the article unto which this Discussion page is therein attached) merited closer scrutiny. Again, my apologies dear sir or madame, and one shall resign oneself to the belief that the indicated response to the concern in question which was raised is a confirmation only of this article's most exquisitely balanced representation of the subject of which it speaks. Again, sorry for the trouble. I'mma just keep my fingers off the keyboard from now on. On the plus side, I'm learning tons about women's suffering at the hands of men! 24.85.75.67 (talk) 13:32, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

You should feel free to update the article to make it more complete, as long as you keep our editing policies in mind when doing so. Kevin (talk) 03:55, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

It was more complete. A great deal of content relating to the issues men face in today's society, has been removed since I was last here and replaced with what I can only describe as a feminists depiction of men's rights over women (specifically) historically, culturally and religiously, strategically positioned prior to the legitimate complaints, that have since been watered down to nothing more than a skimming of the content, in what I can only assume is an attempt to garner apathy for the issues men face. I would very much describe removing a good percentage of this pages content and replacing it with very much the opposite intent (IE, changing the definition of men's rights from the movement for men's rights concerns to the phrase defining rights specific to men) as vandalism. It is nothing more than an underhanded attempt to silence an opposing viewpoint. Aspects that have been removed include: Most of the alimony section, Education concerns, Employment concerns, False rape concerns, Custody Concerns (no mention of the Father's rights movement), Health Concerns Suicide, The vast majority of the violence section, Media Portrayal, Sentencing disparities and retirement. What is the point in adding content when it will get washed away, with moderator approval, by feminists that want to control the public discourse. User:Kratch 11 Oct. 2011 —Preceding undated comment added 19:25, 11 October 2011 (UTC).

It was longer before certainly, but the article was so problematic in its earlier form as to necessitate drastic removals. WP:V, WP:NOR, and WP:NPOV are pretty much non-negotiable - a longer more complete article would be awesome, but the original article had far too many problems with those policies to fix. And no, we didn't change the definition of the article - the article is 'men's rights' - not 'men's rights activists'. I have no intention of silencing opposing viewpoints: feel free to add more information to this article that is compliant with our content policies (and please understand that neutrality is a fundamental tenet of the encyclopedia.) Kevin (talk) 01:51, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

The article was problematic, I suspect, largely due to a difference of perspective on what the article contained. The content originally provided for this article was in regards to men's rights, as in the activism (the male version of feminism), as defined in the article upon creation (22:05, 18 December 2006‎ Severa..."Men's rights is a stream in the men's movement."). You, or others like yourself, have defined men's rights as the concept, which is separate from the activism. This difference in perception has caused you to feel much of the content is inappropriate and off topic, when it was not. The reasonable solution would have been to rename the article to men's rights activism, or something akin, and creating a new page for men's rights as you define it. Instead, this page was gutted, leaving it's original content and intent abandoned, despite feminism being granted a page of it's own. This is why the actions perpetrated on this page have been defined as "silencing". The opposing view comes from the content that has filled the page since, with such comments as "outlawing cruelty to women by their husband or his relatives, are being fought" (which has already been addressed), "men maintained total legal rights over women, as though they were children" (is the "like children" necessary? or is it an ideological jab at men?), the entire England Section is a discussion about a man's power over a woman (largely from a feminist perspective), and the islam's section "This is opposed to the women's awrah which can change depending on the circumstances" (this has no baring on men's rights, but is instead an opportunity to note double standards against women. this line is inappropriate for a "neutral" article). Furthermore, the vast majority of the content is written in an advantages men have over women perspective, rather than a right's men have and don't have perspective, irrespective of women. That particular feminist narrative combined with the removal rather than the changing of name/position of the original article makes this page appear more of an ideological tool against men then a "neutral" article.

That said, I will begin adding content shortly, once time becomes available to me (so as not to be simply a troublemaker). I will include additions such as California's current law openly discriminating (as in, they acknowledge it isn't constitutional, yet they proceeded anyways) against men that allows female felons (but not male) to be released early. The recent policy changes to post secondary facilities that have been described as an assault on due process and equal protection laws. CPS unwillingness to even contact, let alone place a child with the child's father when removed from the mothers custody. Mexican Law which states a mother is automatically granted custody of any child under 7 years of age. Indian law which grants mothers custody automatically, period. VAWA STOP funding guidelines which specifically states programs benefiting men (or children) must also benefit women in order to qualify for funding. A US council for boys to men has been waiting on approval for almost a year, despite near instant approval for a council of women and girls a few years earlier. I will not be surprised to experience a serious push back on these issues. We'll have to see. Kratch (talk) 18:57, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

At least some of the content you are complaining about (like the 'outlawing cruelty' bit) has actually been in the article all along, heh. You are right that a separate article about MRA's is probably warranted. I considered just renaming the article, but little of the content would have been salvageable even doing that - the sourcing was godawful, it was riddled with original research, and it was generally poorly written. If I had renamed it, 80% of the content would still have had to be removed. The article as it stands currently is hardly good - but for the most part at least meets our core content policies, which is more than can be said about the original. (Also - I'm too lazy to find the section link again, but somewhere on this page I outlined the general criteria I was using to remove or keep sections the last time I went over the article - take a look at it, it'll give you a good idea of how to write and source content in a way that will make other people unlikely to remove it. Coincidentally, there are definitely some recent additions that don't hold too well to those standards - I'm going to be going through the article on Tuesday-ish and either fixing or removing any recent additions that have problems.) Kevin (talk) 00:25, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

While the line regarding cruelty may have already existed, whoever deleted the sentence leading into it changed the context by doing so. The line leading into it, (IE "The Violence Against Women Act in America is being vehemently opposed by rights groups for discriminating against men.") clearly states the opposition is due to discrimination against men, and by removing it, the context changes from opposition for a justified reason, to simple opposition (as a dedicated editor, I'm sure you are aware of this concept). This is what I'm talking about when describing using this page as an ideological tool. I could understand taking out Vehemently. I could understand requiring a source. But deleting a defining line and leaving it's proceeding sentence without proper context... that's underhanded if done for ideological reasons, or, if performed accidentally, demonstrates a significant deficiency in editing skills and basic language skills. Kratch (talk) 21:01, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't see why we can't argue about feminism of whether or not it believes in equality since after all aren't Men's rights supposed to fight against feminism for believing that they don't? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.253.165 (talk • contribs) 03:58, 11 October 2011

Hello again! We actually have a policy that states that Wikipedia and Wikipedia talk pages are not forums to discuss or argue about subjects related to the Wikipedia pages. You can learn more about that policy at this link: WP:NOTFORUM. Thanks for your understanding and interest in Wikipedia! SarahStierch (talk) 04:03, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Undue Weight on rights over women

I'd like to discuss what I believe to be undue weight on women's rights in general in this article. It was brought up (although might have been poorly done), and I think it's a great point. We need more facts relating to actual men's rights instead of just on women's right. I've been trying to add where I can, but it is being undone by several edits. I'd like to bring this up for discussion, what does everyone think? TickTock2 (talk) 16:29, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

You are right, we do. Please feel free to add sections that are relevant, well sourced, and in compliance with our other content policies. Adding more material is still on my to-do list, I just haven't gotten around to it yet (I have a rather lengthy to-do list.) I outlined the criteria I use to judge additions to this page on this talk page section earlier on this page. (My criteria are not definitive or authoritative or anything, but I think they are a pretty good facsimile of Wikipedia's general content policies. If we disagree about the appropriateness of a section, we can of course discuss it and hopefully come to an amicable resolution.) Kevin (talk) 01:44, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Agreed.

• Ireland discussions when women are allowed to inherit. This is not relevant to men's rights.
• England The sentence containing "this includes almost all of her legal rights". This is not relevant to men's rights. It's wording also implies it was the women's duty to protect and provide for her husband (which is directly contrary to the wiki source). Furthermore, the entire sections "source" links to another wiki article, which I thought failed as a verified source, making this entire section unsourced.
• Pakistan A man not being accused of rape is not a man's right, it is simply that a law did not exist to protect women. This is not relevant to men's rights.
• Rights according to religious tradition Islam. Includes at the end of a sentence "but women are not allowed to have multiple husbands". Is this part necessary? The need to compare is not relevant to "men's rights in a social context". Men can marry multiple wives, that's a man's right, whether women can or not would only be relevant if we were discussing differences in rights or the concerns regarding the loss of or inequity of those rights. I could see it's relevance elsewhere, but not for this section... This same argument follows through to the second paragraph, the sentence involving "This is opposed to the women's ....". A woman's awrah is not relevant. I also note the second paragraph has no citations.
• Christianity Is that a right? or something else? Furthermore, no citations.
• Spousal Notification laws section is written in a purely female-centric manner

--Kratch (talk) 22:56, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Regency England/England and Coveture

A couple issues surrounding this, Coveture is history, it is not current Marriage law and does not flow into current marriage law, unless there's more sources supporting it that I am missing. I am going to edit it to go back up to the "Regency England" section. I also question why my edit is reverting it to Regency England, as we have not separated any other county into "time frames" as Regency England is only a certain period in English History. Furthermore, I am going to add more content from the source to the English Section. TickTock2 (talk) 16:33, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

• Your edit looks mostly fine, but please restore the Blackstone source. Blackstone was formerly used to source both sections that you consolidated, but you took it out. It's hard to imagine a more ironclad/authoritative source on english law then Blackstone, so it's worth retaining (and definitely better than no source...) Kevin (talk) 01:36, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

My Apologizes, I meant to include the source, but I've re-added it. Your right, there isn't much better source TickTock2 (talk) 13:52, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Domestic Violence Section

I am not familiar enough with editing process to comment out the last line "498a in India, outlawing cruelty to women by their husband or his relatives, are being fought by groups such as Save Indian Family Foundation." without deleting it completely. Which contains a subjective interpretation of the stated goals, with only another wiki article as the source. The line establishes the opposition as being towards the "outlawing the right to be cruel to women...", which is nether factual nor supported, even by the wiki article link, which states it is in opposition to the abuse of those laws. If this page is not permitted to be an ideological tool, then that should apply all around. Kratch 22:16, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

You can comment something out by placing <!-- at the start of the section you wish to comment out, and --> at the end of the section. You don't have to comment everything out though, you can just delete it. Nothing is permanently lost, it can be retrieved from the history of the page. (I often do just comment sections out when I'm not sure if I want to rewrite and reinclude them or just remove them, but it's not at all necessary.) Kevin (talk) 01:39, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

A citation was added for the line "Many women's shelters will assist male victims of domestic abuse" that provides a link to a small, VERY small, list of MEN's shelters. This fails to demonstrate ether that women's shelters offer male victims services, nor that it is many of them that offer such. In fact, I would suggest it demonstrates quite the opposite, and that "many" should be replaced with "very few". Kratch (talk) 02:47, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I would argue that a several page document with links to resources all over the world is not "very few" but rather is a good, basic international citation for resources that are available. Additionally, due to the nature of charity work, such as domestic violence shelters, many of them are extremely localized, which makes getting a comprehensive list of all the resources for a given area difficult. For instance, there is no comprehensive world wide list of soup kitchens, but a short list with resources provide leads to a larger number of resources that are regionally, rather than international or nationally based. Domestic Violence shelters are most likely similar. TheAmazing0and1 (talk) 03:08, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

And I would argue that a page that links to a small handful of largely MEN's or generic abuse (not women's shelters, as claimed) shelters per COUNTRY, is actually an insignificant number, given last I checked, Toronto had 23 women's shelters (not just resources, SHELTERS) on it's own, more than any single country on that list. I would also add that, many "women's" shelters are provided government funding, so shouldn't be difficult to find. If they are, that should be of concern to people, but should not be an excuse for a failure to provide a source for a claim.Kratch (talk) 21:42, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Why has this page been changed?

It used to look like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Men%27s_rights&oldid=449138521 Now we have a history section which does not talk about the history of 'men's rights' but instead talks about social laws from ancient times.

Also the Marriage and divorce area has been totally vandalised.

It has gone from this: The right to marry or not has historically been more the right of men than of women. The rights that each partner in marriage enjoy has mostly been determined by other rights such as the right to safety and health. However, due to legal and religious dogma, the right to make decisions and take actions that influence both partners particularly outside of the domestic realm have been with the male partner. Together with the right to marry comes the right to divorce. This is a right available to either of the sexes. With the right to divorce, parental rights come into play. As such the rights of the male to retain custody of children and have access to his offspring, have been minimal. The reasoning for this has mainly been rooted in the ability of the female to provide adequate nurturing and support to offspring, especially during their early development. However, members of the fathers' rights movement state that the outcome of divorce is overly one-sided, divorce is initiated by mothers in more than two-thirds of cases – especially when children are involved, and that divorce provides advantages for women, such as preferred custody of the children and financial assistance from their fathers in the form of child support payments.[13]

To this: Legal and religious tradition dictated that rights to make decisions and take actions that influence both partners have lain with the male

I think someone biased against the men's rights movement has totally defaced the page, and before anyone scrolls down to the issues that face men (custody rights, circumcision etc) they will see this:

In pre-Christian Ireland, men maintained total legal rights over women, as though they were children. Additionally, only men were normally able to inherit unless a woman died without any male relatives. In that case she was able to leave her property to a surviving female relative, a legal right that was otherwise unheard of in 8th century Europe.

What a joke of an article it is now.

Edit: I just want to say, while the example given above about the ownership of Women in Celtic Ireland is indeed a concern, I feel it is a concern perhaps better suited to a women's rights page rather than a men's rights page.

79.97.224.17 (talk) 08:36, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I will be putting a request for semi-protection, permanent if I can get it, on this to avoid such politically motivated editing in the future. The article has been reverted to its former state for now.Hermiod (talk) 11:46, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

@Hermiod I don't think any protection is really needed for the article at this time. It's rare the article has been vandalized or changed in any dramatic manners for quite sometime due to the team of volunteers working on it. I think we can avoid the protection status unless it becomes rampant, and it hasn't. :) SarahStierch (talk) 14:10, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Hermiod for the change, there is probably much room for improvement as an article but I felt it's tone was very anti-men's rights generally. Especially the history section 79.97.224.17 (talk) 15:47, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I question the usefulness of a full revert. such as

Very little has been done to formalize what men's rights are, or to protect these rights. With the increased focus on the rights of women and children, some believe that some of the rights of men have been devalued and overturned. An example of this is the limitations that have been placed on the parental rights of men over their offspring as a result of the rights awarded to women. without a source, or another example being bias; She must have "no recent workforce experience" but she can easily qualify for this well after the loss of her partner by going through a period of underemployment Also, I must ask is this a page for Men's Rights or Men's Rights Movement? Are we going to clarify what we are talking about, as surely "Men's Rights" doesn't have a structure to it. TickTock2 (talk) 14:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

What was the relevance of the history section? By all means tidy up the article but what it was this morning was a total mess and alot of it had nothing to do with men's rights 79.97.224.17 (talk) 15:47, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Are you referring to the Men's Rights Movement or Men's Rights? As I don't see the mess you are referring to. I think a full revert was unnecessary and introduced more NPOV issues, I'm going to revert your revision, I also object you calling it defacement as well. TickTock2 (talk) 16:30, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Im talking about Men's rights. And I'm not surprised you don't see the mess I was referring too, as it was reverted to how it should have been. And frankly, it was anything but neutral. Most if it gave the impression that there are no issues facing men.79.97.224.17 (talk) 17:19, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm double posting here and for that I apologise, but I get the impression TickTock2 that you are confused about what Men's Rights is. I think Men's rights is more about the issues in the legal and modern social systems that sideline men (in other words, men's rights are the concerns of men's rights activists), and is not an Encyclopedia of ALL the rights one has for being a man. Ancient Greek laws have nothing to do with men's rights whatsoever. Obviously the article has to be neutral, thus it is important it does not read like an advert for the men's rights movement. That is my take on it anyway. 79.97.224.17 (talk) 17:40, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

You question the usefulness of a full revert? I question the usefulness of all the changes you've made over the last few months to utterly gut the article, changing it from an article about men's rights to a piece of drivel that has more information on the perceived injustices women have faced in the distant past than it does about men's rights issues today. All you did was sneak around and remove every bit of information that was in the article a few months ago, replacing it with drivel in order to deface it. A full revert would be far superior to keeping what's here. Maybe next time you shouldn't vandalize the page, instead taking some time to deal with any issues you find. But we both know you are politically motivated here, and that's why you destroyed the content of the article on men's rights.Jayhammers (talk) 21:19, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

The right thing to do would be to revert to the version before the defacement, here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Men%27s_rights&oldid=455508406 From there, editors could work on correcting any perceived violations of Wikipedia rules, rather than scrapping the whole thing and replacing it with rubbish.Jayhammers (talk) 21:21, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I am reverting the reversion as soon as I post this. The version of the article that was reverted to is rife with WP:OR/WP:SYNTH problems, as well as a desperate lack of reliable sources. It also had some problems with just straight up misrepresentation of sources. If you think that the article is unbalanced as it currently stands, you can fix that by adding relevant content cited to reliable sources. It's unacceptable to revert to a version that violates so many policies, especially when the problems have been extensively discussed on this page. Kevin (talk) 19:12, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't just think the article is unbalanced, it actually is totally biased against Men's Rights. The entire history section has absolutely NOTHING to do with the subject of the page. The Divorce section has only one sentence: In 2003, a Malaysian court ruled that, under sharia law, a man has the right to divorce his wife via text messaging. What has this got to do with men's rights exactly? The Marriage section is this: In India, under the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act (1956) a wife is entitled to be provided for the rest of her life by the husband regardless of them living together or not.[18] If the wife is widowed the father-in-law is required to support the widow, assuming she has no other way to support herself.

What is the purpose of quoting Indian law and nothing else? The first two thirds of the page has nothing to do with men's rights, and more to do with how men have it easy compared to women. We need to not only ADD relevant content with reliable sources, we also need to remove all of the useless trivia which has nothing to do with the subject. Whether or not the other version of this page was better, from a sources/neutrality perspective, this version is practically empty of relevant information on the subject.

That's the typical tactic used by devious Wikipedia editors. They'll remove all the work that was previously done on a page, then replace it with a small amount of drivel, and when you try to revert it back so at least the page has some meaningful content, they'll tell you that you need to rebuild it from scratch instead. A reasonable approach would have been for the editors to find sources for anything that was unsourced, and add the citations. Instead, they'd rather utterly gut the entire article and replace it with drivel, and then demand that WE go back and re-write the whole thing. Of course, if we do try to re-write it to be neutral, they will fight us the whole way. The end result is that they defaced the page when no one was paying attention, and it will remain this way.Jayhammers (talk) 21:08, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

They did the same thing with the Domestic Violence page, where feminists refused to allow any citations that showed that women commit domestic violence at least as often as men. There is really no arguing against them, because no matter what you do or who you go to, they have already decided what they want the article to look like, and they will scramble for Wikipedia rules that appear to back them up. If it comes to a dispute through moderation, the feminist bias of Wikipedia editors will ensure that the misandric lies remain and that the page remains defaced. And when you talk about these things like I do, you'll actually get warned for it. It's pretty funny, actually. In all honestly, I'm surprised they waited this long to deface the page. It shouldn't be surprising, considering how they treated Thomas Ball. Also see the following for more information on what I've been through: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jayhammers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jayhammers Jayhammers (talk) 21:13, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

You have basically two options here. You can continue to act silly-ly and eventually end up getting blocked for violating WP:CIVIL or WP:NPA, or you can choose to add content to this article based on reliable sources and make the article better and more balanced. Kevin (talk) 05:11, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh I have no fear of being blocked for violating policies here. It's irrelevant to me. Jayhammers (talk) 21:42, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Block me by all means, I'm by no means that interested in editing on wikipedia, but I would be interested to find out where I made a personal attack, and where I was uncivil. I have provided reasons for my concerns and I would like to state it here clearly that NONE of what I have complained about has been directed at the authors or editors. My anger is at the article itself, and the fact it was reverted to a tragic version for no real good reason. The article has nothing to do with the subject. And I absolutely believe that is because it is because of a handful of biased and politically motivated editors defacing the page. Keep on quoting policies at me though, for all these rules I am not breaking. 79.97.224.17 (talk) 22:13, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

It is actually disgusting to see this page defaced so obviously. 79.97.224.17 (talk) 20:23, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree that this page should be locked. As a response to a request for a citation, I provided one and change the wording to a direct quote from the article I sited. In response to this, a list of frivolous "citation needed" request were put up for each and every point made, despite the fact each point is part of a quote from the article provided. This can only be described as an attempt to trivialize the content (as minor as it was) by drowning it in citation needed flags, making it appear unsourced. This is the kind of ideological behaviour that caused you people to tear it down in the first place. And it certainly doesn't inspire confidence in rebuilding the page. Kratch (talk) 02:53, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Then revert and explain in the reasons why the citation needed tags aren't needed. If I put them up in error, please, correct them, since as I saw it, I only saw a citation for the final claim rather than all of them. [User:TheAmazing0and1|TheAmazing0and1]] (talk) 03:47, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Or I can point it out as an example of an Ideological attempt to trivialize the sources added by ignoring them and frivolously flagging content as citation needed, making the article look unsourced, causing the very issues we're seeing with removing content due to being "unsourced". My point is, this article should be locked, so the average ideologue can't vandalize it further, and so the rest of us can get a good handle on which official editors are themselves ideologically driven, rather than the neutral editors they require of others. Until that happens, this article will never be stable.Kratch (talk) 21:10, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Or you could assume good faith, as is stated in the Wikipedia Principles.--TheAmazing0and1 (talk) 16:22, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Having looked at the previous edits made by a small number of users, it looks like they were made by people with a political axe to grind. Let me be clear, the purpose of this article is to describe the areas in which advocates of men's rights believe men do not recieve equal treatment to women in the same way feminism addresses areas that impact women. It is not there to either debunk nor support those claims. It is also not there for those opposed to men's rights to express their views. There are those opposed to the men's rights movement, Wikipedia is not the place for them to express that opposition nor is it to be used by those who support the movement as a soapbox. Hermiod (talk) 11:58, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Let me be clear: you are wrong. The purpose of this article is absolutely not to describe the areas in which men's rights activists believe that men do not receive equal treatment. Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views. Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all. It's perfectly fine for us, imo, to mention men's rights activists in the article about men's rights, but they should not and will not be the central focus of the article.Kevin (talk) 17:41, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

From the link you provided: "Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views" I would argue that this page is an article devoted to those views. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.52.101.104 (talk) 18:18, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Except, it's not. Someone could certainly create an article titled something like Men's rights activism which could be appropriately focused on the views of MRA's (that would still require reliable sourcing and balance) but "men's rights" is a very broad topic with extensive academic coverage that is in no way restricted to simply MRA's. Kevin (talk) 18:28, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Except, as by looking at the original page creation, that was the very intent of this pages beginnings. This page was CREATED for the purpose of describing the areas in which advocates of men's rights believe men do not recieve equal treatment to women in the same way feminism addresses areas that impact women. As mentioned previously, you describe the definition of "men's rights" differently than the original author, and as such, this page should have been renamed to something you could agree on, but still maintained the original authors intent. Instead it was stripped apart and can't even maintain what little it has due to constant edits and frivolous citation demands. Unlike women's rights and feminism, which have different words for each item, "men's rights" applies to both the concept of civil and human rights as applied to men (your definition), as well as the movement to maintain and balance those rights (the original intent of the article). This is in the same manner as the word "probe", which is both a tool used to investigate as well as the action of using that tool. As mentioned by others, the action of stripping this pages original intent from the article, without replacing that intent in a new article (I know one editor is writing an article, but it's barely begun and this vandalism is months in the doing) is the significant cause of the current frustration. I also note, the original editor who added the NPOV flag noted most of the content was OK by him, he just had a concern with a few issues, including weasel wording (IE the use of "some people" etc) which also happens to be rampant in the feminism article, but without complaint. All this combined leads to believe that this is an ideological attempt to silence any attempt to even acknowledge men have civil rights concerns.Kratch (talk) 21:04, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

The page as originally written, besides for drastic problems with undue/fringe issues, didn't follow any of the rest of our content policies, either. It was rife with original research, improper synthesis, and had very few acceptable sources. Even if we had renamed it, 80% of the content would have to have been removed. Kevin (talk) 00:33, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

My suggestion to you would be to do the following, if you have the time to dedicate, and are willing. First try to talk things out and come to a consensus on the talk page. If that fails (which it probably will, since you're dealing with ideologues who do not believe men can be discriminated against) read up on dispute resolution here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution Follow the guidelines there. In the end, you will likely be forced to submit a request for mediation, which in all actuality will probably go against you, since most Wikipedia editors are against men's rights: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_mediation But hey, if you feel like it, go ahead and try.Jayhammers (talk) 21:52, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Would it be acceptable to create a new page named "Mens Rights Movement" containing the content this page used to house? I think that would resolve the issue since the problem seems to be with the definition of the original page.96.52.101.104 (talk) 23:19, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

It's clear that since the claim is that "men's rights" is a different entity than the "men's rights movement", just as "women's rights" is a different entity than "feminism", that a separate "men's rights movement" page must be created to detail the "men's rights movement" (which is not the same as the "men's movement"). I have created such a page.Jayhammers (talk) 00:03, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

A page about the men's rights movement is absolutely fine. It needs to use reliable sources, and needs to avoid original research (as well of needs to conform to the rest of our content policies.) The original content of this page did not conform to our content policies whatsoever, and cannot be used as a baseline for a page on the MRM. Many of the problems were detailed in earlier sections of this talk page. Given the extent of the problems with it, I would suggest that anyone who wants to create an article on the men's rights movement do so from scratch, not try to use the earlier version of this page as a base. (If you want to use the earlier version of this page as a base, draft it in your userspace, and do NOT move it to the main article space until the problems talked about earlier on this page are fixed.) Kevin (talk) 00:33, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the point you are missing, Kevin, is that the actions taken were not the responsible ones to take, given the infractions. Regardless of your definition of men's rights, the intent of the original article was with regards to the movement. What you effectively did, was walk in and delete the feminism page, simply to write one about the basic civil rights women have (Yes, I realize women's rights already exists, it's an analogy). This would have been unacceptable, yet it is precisely what was done here. Can you not see that, regardless of the infraction you believe the old article contained, the solution enacted was irresponsible and inappropriate? There were other ways of dealing with the previous infractions that would not have resulted in such a destructive end result, and would have left the articles original intent intact, as it should have been. Kratch (talk) 00:45, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

If the feminism page had the same number/degree of problems that this one did, I would have done the same thing. If the only problem had been the intent of the article not matching the name, I would have just renamed it. I did not see any way to repair the severity of problems present in this article with any reasonable amount of effort, even with a rename. If you look at the edit history of this article - for the most part sections were removed piece by piece with an explanation of what was problematic about the section. If you see an easier way to repair some of the removed content to be in line with the policies that it previously violated (or even if you don't see an easier way but are willing to spend sixty or seventy hours rewriting it) you are more than welcome to do so - although a lot of it would probably be better off at another article dealing specifically with men's rights activism. Kevin (talk) 00:51, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

The feminism page does have a number of issues, not least of which is the fact it is locked, it contains a number of significant unsourced claims (some of which I've listed on it's talk page), it is rife with weasel wording, and contains virtually no content of the criticism of feminism and feminists, which is a quickly growing discussion (in the real world), leaving the paged biased in feminism's favor. --Kratch (talk) 04:19, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

You claim this article had problems, but you have not pointed them out, and you did not engage in discussion and reach a consensus before removing major sections of the article. Please specify exactly what Wikipedia violations were present and where, with corresponding difference reports of your changes. If you cannot, I propose a reversion to the original version of the article from a month ago before yours and others' changes which never had consensus. Jayhammers (talk) 01:22, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

@Jay If you go through the article history you will see that the majority of article contributors explain their reasons for removing content and often cite policy. If you review the talk page (above and archives) you will find more material as well. There really is no reason for Kevin or other contributors to have to rehash this because some folks came in a little late after gathering men's rights pals up at Reddit. SarahStierch (talk) 01:26, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually, the men's rights page discussed the men's rights movement for years before the last month in which these editors slid in and decided to change the very meaning of the topic, opposing the widely accepted meaning of "men's rights". There is no reason that the hard work over the years of many other editors should have to be rehashed just because some vandals came along in the last month and decided to throw it all away and replace it with unrelated material.Jayhammers (talk) 01:32, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Furthermore, not only was there very little discussion in comparison to the vast number of changes that were made, but any discussion that did take place was between the vandals and... other vandals. People not familiar with the men's rights movement, although it is not popular, do not get to decide what the movement is about. It is the members of the movement who do. And in all actuality, the original page provided plenty of documentation for all claims made.Jayhammers (talk) 01:36, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

As Sarah said, most of the issues are discussed in preceding sections of this talk page already. You have already been warned to stop making personal attacks - please stop labeling me a vandal, thanks. If you continue to breach WP:NPA you will be blocked. I don't really care one way or another if you do silly things and get yourself blocked, but if you want to actually improve this page you would be well advised to stop. Kevin (talk) 01:38, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, please limit discussion to the contents of the article, not the editors who have worked on it. Any further personal attacks will result in a 24 hour block. Kaldari (talk) 02:23, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Alright, let's talk about the contents.

For instance, why does the Men's Rights page now have extensive discussion of historical facts, i.e. "in X country 2000 years ago, only men could vote."?

Why has the page removed the content about actual men's rights issues, such as the fact that men are given longer sentences than women for the same crime (in USA, Canada, England, etc.)?

Why has the page removed content about how domestic violence is equally suffered by men yet the public discourse attempts to promote the lie that only men are batterers?

Please answer these questions, thanks. Celdaz (talk) 21:08, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Just back, was in transit the whole day. I did not write the new contents of this page for the most part, and have not looked at most of it in great detail. Historical detail is indubitably appropriate for this page - it's not just a summary of modern issues in America - but if you feel particular included historical details are inappropriate to include, feel free to bring up specific issues. "Actual men's rights issues" suggests to me that you may be too involved in this issue to edit this page from a WP:NPOV; 'actual men's rights issues' at least as far as we are concerned are those that are discussed explicitly in reliable sources. The previous content of this page was not adequately sourced, so it was removed. The entire domestic violence section was removed because in it's original form it contained improper WP:OR (especially WP:Synthesis.) If you have not already done so please read WP:NOR/WP:V/WP:RS as well as the earlier sections of this page (which talk a lot about why particular things were removed.) Kevin (talk) 04:00, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

With all due respect, the number of Wikiproject Feminism members editing this page suggests much more of a NPOV problem than anything else. There are a considerable number of areas where feminism and men's rights are seen as being in conflict, which leads me to question the mentality and the reasons behind people with a specific interest in feminism editing this page, especially to remove text on areas such as domestic violence. There is far, far too much discussion of rights men do have in specific countries as opposed to rights they do not have and where rights they do have are not enforced in across the world in this article. The fact, for instance, that sharia law allows men to divorce their wives by text message has nothing to do with the greater problems men face with divorce. Hermiod (talk) 07:26, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Hermiod, you must stop speculating on motives. If you have any specific edits that trouble you, then complain about them with the details. Broad insinuations such as these will get you nowhere but trouble, and don't help the encyclopedia one little bit. Slp1 (talk) 20:07, 17 October 2011 (UTC)