MenAreGood
On Frank Zappa and moral hysteria; a rant
Moiret Allegiere
August 31, 2022

On Frank Zappa and moral hysteria; a rant:

Back in the 1970’s, the phenomenal musician (and professional grumpy bastard), Frank Zappa, was asked a fairly simple question.

Not only was it a simple question; it was one of such monumental stupidity and entitlement that it could only ever have come from the quivering lips of a ferocious feminist scorned: why was this terrible misogynistic male so mean to women in his lyrics?

Now, anyone who has spent any amount of time listening to Frank Zappa will have noticed a few things about his music, his lyrics and – perhaps – the man himself;

1: he was god-damned brilliant. I would dare say he was a genius, though I admit to being a drooling fanboy of his, and as such very biased in his favour. I even named my first dog after him. (She is a bitch, and a tiny chihuahua. Somehow, it seemed rather fitting.)

2: His lyrics kick in all directions. Nothing is ever sacred and absolutely no-one is safe. He himself stated that “Yes – my lyrics are stupid. So what?”

In the musical world of Frank Zappa, lyrics was a necessary evil – a thing that had to be present in music in order for the music to sell, as so very few people listen solely to instrumental music. They were, in fact, nothing but a means to an end. Thus, silly, absurd and comedic lyrics became his thing. Because why the hell not?

In reply to the question, he answered that women need to learn how to take their lumps, same as men.

And this is absolutely true.

There is the thing of it, I think: feminism may very well preach equality – women in general may very well preach equality; may claim to very much be in favour of equal treatment of the sexes, thank you very much, it is the current year, after all.

Yet what is said and what is done are two quite different things. I believe a thing people have to learn as quickly as possible is that people’s words and people’s actions are quite often not the same. Quite the contrary. They clash and they crash very often. Human beings are complex and intricate creatures, filled with internal contradictions and inconsistencies. This is just part of human nature, I suppose.

It is not always easy to practice what one preaches, though I would sorely wish to see more people do so. This, however, requires a lot of introspection and “soul-searching”. This seems to be rather difficult at the present moment, as narcissism is on the rise and everything is always someone else’s fault. As is so often the case, people are not even aware of their failure to walk the talk, to practice what they preach. Particularly so when feminism has tricked the entirety of the western world into believing that men treat other men with all manner of respect and adoration; with all manner of underhanded deals and preferential treatment and what-have- you’s which they do not grant to women.

This is, as I have come to understand it, psychological projection on part of women in general, and within feminism specifically. They would treat other women preferentially: their in-group bias is way stronger than that of men. So, to their eyes – being unable as all hell to tear their gaze away from their navel – there is no reason why men would behave differently. “We would do this, and so they must also do this”. Add some solipsism into the mix, and you have yourself a cake not fit for human consumption. In fact, it is a cake which they both want to have and to eat.

The fact that Frank Zappa poked fun at men in his lyrics – quite often, and in quite fabulous ways – was forgotten by the feminist scorned, who only noticed women being poked fun at. One assumes that she was quite alright with poking fun at men in general. One also assumes that she did not notice that men were poked fun at because that was a message she agreed with; that this was something inherent to her view of the world and as such was a statement of fact, not a matter of men being ridiculed.

If people were to open their eyes… if people were able to remove their gynocentric blindfolds and see the world proper, the first thing to be noticed would perhaps be a certain elevation – one could almost say deification – of women and of womanhood. Women being sat atop a throne made from delicate and fragile flowers; a throne that would topple and crumble to dust at the slightest breeze. It is not rare to see women – whether blatantly feminist or not – go up in arms at the slightest hint of a joke being cracked at the expense of women, claiming this to be proof definitive of a society that just hates women ever so much, dont’cha’know and so we must have all of this and all of the other to lift women up in this society in which women are hated so much that they get all this preferential treatment… as well as a movement supposedly only for them; a movement that shall hold the monopoly on all things sex and gender; a movement which one must have balls of polished nuclear warheads to dare defy, under pain of social ridicule and death.

Women are hated, so a movement solely for women gets all the say and holds all the sway on all the things.

Makes perfect sense, of course.

And I am the emperor of Norway, keeper of the seven keys and dictator for life in the tiny island nation of Hwat Teh Fcuk.

Poking fun at typical female idiosyncrasies, at female stereotypical behaviour is a big fat no-no, and all who commit this most heinous act are misogynistic poopy-heads whose mother was a hamster and whose father smelled of elderberries. And the feminist hordes will fart in their general direction. All the while saying that we should kill all men and stating with absolute certainty that men, that masculinity, that maleness and whatever else is all that is wrong with the world; that all men must take responsibility for the evil of one man, and so forth and so on. And one can not help but wonder: if merely cracking jokes at the expense of women in general is proof of a society that hates women – what does it say about a society in which it is quite alright for academes to publish deathly serious articles titled “why can’t we hate men”? What does it say about a society in which this article is not only alright to publish, but where the author of said article is being presented as a victim for facing backlash to her blatant hatred of the male sex? A society that hates women and adores men would surely not present a woman that shamelessly presents her hatred of men as a victim of men when men – quite rightfully – react to being hated for nothing but them being men.

Jokes perpetuate negative stereotypes of women, and furthers the oppression of women.

Articles justifying hatred of men – published in mainstream media – is proof that women are hated. I will keep repeating these points until people fucking listen. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

The whole world has gone insane. Completely and utterly insane, locked within a moral hysteria built upon vapid moral grandstanding and virtue-signaling by power-hungry navel-gazers whose values are just as deep and firmly anchored as a loosely knit fart.

Ah, shit, this nonsense is trendy now.

Gotta hop along; social validation is the most important thing in the world, after all.

#MenAreTrash! Am I right, sisters? Now – let me get a crack at that pussy. Shit: men may be trash. But I am the exception to the rule. I consider all other men to be trash because I believe them to think and act exactly like me. Now, let me get a crack at that crack. Maybe some good old fashioned simpering, whimpering and puppy-eyed begging will make it so that she touches my penis….Please touch my penis!

#CancelMen, for fuck sake. What does a brother have to do in order to get laid around here? I’ve been self-flagellating for hours on end, but they’ve only been spitting in my eyes. And I am an ally to the noble cause, for Goddess’ sake. Still permanently othered, of course, being but an ally… but I am an ally to the cause of pussy- power. Even wore the pink pussy-hat, for fuck sake.

Please touch my penis.

Ahem.

Carrying on:

Poking fun at typical male idiosyncrasies – at male stereotypical behaviour – is quite alright. This happens every single day, every which where one should so happen to look. And I am perfectly fine with this, without a doubt. The ability to laugh at oneself is a transformative tool. Empowering, if I may be so bold as to borrow a buzzing phrase from the feminist handbook.

People would do well to not take themselves so damned seriouslyall the time.

What is bothering, on the other hand, is the feminist hive-mind having fits of hysteria whenever a woman is poked fun at. What is bothering is – as is so often the case – the blatant double-standard of the thing; the hypocrisy, the idiocy of it all. Add to this the inability of people to see this for what it is: anything but equal treatment. Can’t see the forest for a bunch of pretty little lies and liars squinting at the sun as it pisses in their eyes. Treating the sexes equally does not mean that women should be a protected class of people, never to be made subject to the same mockery and ridicule that men are made subject to.

Just take a look at your average sit-com for examples of this. Or talkshows… day-time television in general, for that matter. Men are bumbling fools, not elevated moral guardians such as women are.

This notion that preferential treatment of women equals equal treatment of the sexes ties very nicely and neatly into a study done by one Amy Yeung (https://uwspace.uwaterloo.ca/handle/10012/6958 ), in which it is revealed that women consider it to be sexist when men treat women worse than they would treat other men, that women consider it sexist when men treat women just as they would treat other men… considering it only to be equal treatment when men treat women better than they would treat men.

I find this very interesting, as it explains the squeaks, squawks, cuckoos and cackles, moans, marbles, howls and rise of feminism in no small way. It explains perfectly well how a movement can push for preferential treatment and label this as equal treatment. Women view preferential treatment of women to be equal treatment of women. So-called “benevolent sexism” is still detrimental to women, of course. Because what isn’t? Yet they push for it. Who can fathom the feminine mind? Not my wife, that’s for damned sure. By her own admission.

It’s OK, brothers – my wife is an honorary man; a de facto member of the Patriarchy. Our greatest secretary and coffee fetcher, in fact.

Oh boy, I’m going to the special feminist circle of hell for that one.

Not that I believe feminism, or most women, really, able to see this for what it is. I don’t believe most men are willing to see this for what it is either. For women are precious, and must be protected and one can not make fun of women for exactly that reason.

Besides, it supposedly lowers ones chances of getting laid, and men have drives, desires and needs, god-dammit(!) Dick Hardy is a most potent negotiator. Too bad he is fucking brain-dead.

No matter, never mind.

She Said! He said! Chivalry is far from dead!

And if chivalry is dying; if men treat women equally… if men treat women like they would treat other men, articles start popping up from wherever and whatever mourning the death of chivalry and oh and woe-is-me, but where oh where have all the good men gone?

Of course men should pay on dates – women deserve to be taken care of and feel special. But the relationship has to be equal; step up, men, and do your part of everything… whilst paying for everything.


What, women doing their part? Nah, that is just some patriarchal entitlement – yet another unreasonable expectation of women… male entitlement to this and that and the other, as a matter of fact.

Fuck you. Suck my balopticon.

Men should not enjoy their women having an orgasm – that is peak male entitlement right there. Imagine finding enjoyment in ones partner being given enjoyment by oneself. Shock and horror!

Still: women should damned well have at least one orgasm for every ride into funky-town, thank you very much. Just don’t enjoy it while you’re at it, boy. No-one cares if your jaw is frozen solid and your hand is cramping up; get to it, buddy!

What; you want pointers?

Nah, man, you’ve got to know your way around a woman’s body by instinct and intuition alone… Imagine the entitlement in wanting a woman to tell you what she enjoys and how to do it proper… the pure nerve of expecting a woman do something in the sack – goodness gracious, what prime male entitlement this is! Also – fleshlights and sexbots are objectifying women and mass-manufacturing rapists, and so to do porn and masturbation is akin to cheating and, hey, where are you going? Oh, my, why can’t I ever find a good and decent man?

People in glass-houses can not smell their own shit. Instead of listening to what is being said when feminism – when this entitled behaviour – is criticised, they jump into the very same aforementioned hysterics, put words in your mouth and pull strawmen out of their own arse to set on fire. Screaming that women are not hysterical, but perfectly rational and capable of reasonable discussion, fuck you very much and besides, you make her feel threatened and unsafe by your mere presence, fuck-face.

Add a solitary screech about “PATRIARCHY!!?!!?!?!!!” in there, and we have ourselves a winner, ladies and germs. Men have to accept jokes made at the expense of men in general. Televised stereotypes of men? Ain’t nothing wrong with that. To which I would agree, in all honesty. Reverse the sexes, and the shit-show begins. Apparently, men are capable of humour and of laughing at themselves, whereas women are not. Is it masculinity that is fragile, then, or is it perhaps femininity?

#FemininitySoFragile.

Back in my facebook-days, I was part of a Facebook-group that focused on record-collecting and HiFi equipment. As one would expect, men being far more object-oriented than women, this group was overwhelmingly male. I would hazard a guess at it being 98 percent male.

The discussions on records, music and equipment went as one would expect. Typical male banter; friendly insults and the like.

“What the hell kind of piece of shit equipment is that to play that record on? This record deserves tubes blown by the exotic virgins of lala-land and gold-plated cables, handspun by the queen of England, for fuck sake – bunch of amateurs in here.”

You know what kind of friendly banter I am referring to. All in good fun.

And it was good fun, while it lasted.

For, you see, the feminists entered the room; probably smelling a predominantly male space populated by horrible men in dire need of being civilised by the elevated morals of womanhood; a goddess in the guise of feminism come to save these barbarian men from themselves. Come to make sure the good ol’ boys don’t have too much unsupervised fun.

Though I can not prove this, I will dare state that the sole reason for these two feminists being in this group was tone-policing and feminist propaganda, as the only damned thing they posted in there had to do with women and with feminism.

Even when posting pictures of their records or whatever, they always included some fucking feminist “factoid” alongside the picture. Seemed rather planned, if I am to be perfectly honest.

Every day with that shit; feminism me here and pay-gap me there and horrible titties on the covers or on posters on people’s wall over there, making it such an unsafe and non-inclusive group for the women in the group and no wonder there were so few women there and so-and-such and blah-di-blah and shame the male for he is a true bastard-barbarian. How fucking entitled does one have to be to demand people remove posters that are deemed offensive by fragile feminists from their own walls in their own bloody homes? Feminist-levels of entitlement. And fragility.

#FemininitySoFragile

Whenever a woman enters a predominantly male space, it is expected that the men therein shall alter their behaviour so as to not offend her. It does not matter how many men there are in the space or in the group: the word of this one woman has to be law. And, by damn and fuck-me-right-in-the-back-ear: men agree and comply and alter their behaviour to suit the woman, for some ridiculous reason. Female entitlement is enforced by men. There is no denying this. You are allowed to say no to women, you know. Even Dick Hardy is allowed to do just that. In fact, Dick hardy must be encouraged to do just that. So much of this god-damned shit is on our shoulders, gentlemen. You don’t have to put up with it, you know.

So I left this group. After about a week of seeing these two women – might have been one woman with two accounts, come to think of it – constantly posting feminist nonsense, I had just about had it. Then I reached my tipping point, the scales were waxed and the shit slid off and hit the fan, spreading it way more than anyone should accept.

One dude in the group had the nerve, you see, had the unmitigated audacity to refer to Yoko Ono as “the bitch that ruined the Beatles”.

Oh boy.

Oh my.

Oh girl.

Oh fragile femininity supreme.

What a shit-show that turned out to be; a macabre and grotesque cabaret. The feminist footsoldiers came rolling in, floating on the wind by virtue of their bingowings, frothing at the mouth, spittle flying every-which-where, demanding the post be removed, claiming that this group was nothing but a bunch of misogynists; a sorry nest of gender-fascists, in fact.

Yes.

They actually used the term “gender-fascists”.

This, then, was the moment they had been waiting for. Finally, they could spring into action on behalf of scorned women everywhere; women who have to put up with female artists being disliked like male artists are disliked. What horror was this?

Irrational emotionally laden screeching followed. A woman can not be criticised. Not even a female artist. One has to worship the ground she walks on. Any one man can not have any one individual opinion on any one woman; neither the woman nor her caterwauling – that is to say, her art – may be subject to criticism. For any critique of a woman, or her art, necessarily must mean that one hates all women by virtue of their sex. And this has to reflect on the entirety of the group, for men – as we all well know – are a homogeneous blob; a mass of testosterone and brawn and perfectly erect penises that have neither solitary opinions nor individual personalities.

And so many guys in that group simpered and drooled and fell to their knees in abject shock and horror; apologizing profoundly and profusely on behalf of the group. A few brave men dared defy the feminine deity that had entered the space; but the damage was done, the battle was won and the female tyranny reigned supreme that day. All the men had learned of their folly and been given a whipping for their insolence in talking back to their superiors.

Earlier that day, I had posted a picture of Warren Zevon’s phenomenal album “the Wind”. I referred to Warren Zevon as a complete and utter arsehole; a narcissistic bastard with no redeeming qualities except his incredible musical and lyrical talent. He was then, and remains still, one of my favourites. Quite possibly the greatest songwriter to have ever graced this green earth. Second only to Townes van Zandt. Other guys in the group agreed. Other guys in the group had posted similar things about other male
musicians.

No-one reacted with anger or hostility, or claimed that we were just hating on men for them being men. Not even the feminists in the group.

Imagine my shock.

Criticising a female artist, on the other hand, means that the entirety of the group hates women.

Women in male spaces can not help but destroy the male spaces, it seems. Helped very much by the simpering men therein. Much like Yoko Ono, in fact. Women really need to learn how to take their lumps, how to take criticism. Women need to learn that criticism of one woman does not equate to hatred of all women everywhere.
… Much like Yoko Ono, in fact.

Moiret Allegiere

Moiret Allegiere (Born 1986) hails from Norway. A self-described scribbler of lines, juggler of words and weird pseudo-hermit, he became so concerned with the state of the world that he left his long and deliberate hibernation to wreak bloody havoc on the world of fine art and literature.

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From Research to Action — How Finland Helped Its Men
Post 2 in a series on what the world can learn from Finland’s suicide prevention efforts

In the last post, we saw how Finland took an extraordinary first step: instead of shrugging at suicide rates, they studied every single case in the country for a full year. They learned who was dying, where, and why.

But research alone doesn’t save lives. The true test came next. Could Finland turn this knowledge into action?

In 1992, the government launched the National Suicide Prevention Project, a sweeping, nationwide effort that would run for five years. Its ambition was bold: to translate the research into targeted interventions across every layer of society — from army barracks to hunting cabins, from classrooms to church pulpits.

The official goal was clear: reduce suicides by 20% in ten years. But the real innovation lay in how Finland went about it.


The National Strategy (1992–1996)

The project was structured into four phases:

  1. Research (1986–1991) — the “Suicides in Finland 1987” study and its provincial reports.

  2. Strategy formation (1992) — drawing up a national action plan based on those findings.

  3. Implementation (1992–1996) — launching over 40 subprogrammes across sectors.

  4. Evaluation (1997 onward) — both internal and external reviews of what worked and what didn’t.

Unlike typical health campaigns, this was not limited to posters or hotlines. It was a multisectoral strategy, pulling in schools, the military, the church, health services, media, and community associations. Each was asked the same question: What role can you play in preventing suicide, based on what we now know?

This was Finland’s genius. The national strategy was not a blunt instrument. It was a framework that allowed each institution, each community, to shape prevention in a way that made sense locally.


Tailoring Interventions to At-Risk Groups

The 1987 research had given Finland something precious: a map of where suicide risk was concentrated. The next step was to design interventions for those specific groups.

Hunters and Rural Men

Middle-aged rural men were at the very center of Finland’s crisis. Many were farmers or hunters, living in isolation, often drinking heavily, and reluctant to seek formal help. The suicide data showed that licensed hunting rifles were among the most common methods.

Instead of preaching from afar, Finland did something remarkable: they went into the hunting clubs themselves. The idea was simple but powerful — hunters already cared about their “mehtäkaveri,” their hunting mate. So why not train them to look out for each other’s mental health as well?

This became the foundation for what later grew into the Hyvä Mehtäkaveri (“Good Hunting Mate”) programme: peer-support training that taught hunters how to ask the difficult question — “Are you doing okay?” — and how to connect someone with help if they weren’t.

Conscripts and Rejected Recruits

Finland’s system of compulsory military service turned out to be both a risk and an opportunity. The research showed that young men rejected from service for health or psychological reasons faced a sharp rise in suicide risk. The rejection carried stigma — it marked them as different at precisely the age when they most wanted to belong.

So the Defense Forces became a frontline partner. Officers and military doctors were trained to spot vulnerable recruits, offer counseling, and refer them to civilian health care when needed. Rejection from service was reframed, not as abandonment, but as a moment to connect a young man with support.

Beyond counseling, Finland also recognized the practical challenges these young men faced. Initiatives supported by the A-Clinic Foundation and the Finnish Association for Mental Health provided concrete assistance: vocational guidance, social support, and structured activities to help rebuild identity and belonging. These efforts aimed to ensure that rejection from the army did not mean rejection from society. One notable example was the “Young Man, Seize the Day” project (1997), which worked with rejected recruits in several cities to provide vocational guidance, structured activities, and community belonging.

Rural Networks and Gatekeepers

Beyond the army and the hunting cabin, Finland leaned on local gatekeepers — the people already embedded in small communities. Teachers, clergy, police officers, even farmer’s association leaders were given training to recognize warning signs and start conversations. The principle was clear: suicide prevention wasn’t just the job of psychiatrists. It was the job of the whole community.

Alcohol Misuse

Alcohol had long been tied to Finnish male suicide, and the research confirmed its role. The project partnered with the A-Clinic Foundation, Finland’s leading addiction services, to integrate substance treatment into suicide prevention. Men who might never walk into a psychiatric clinic might still accept help for their drinking — and through that doorway, receive broader support.

Suicide Attempters

One of the most striking findings from the research was how many people who died by suicide had already made a prior attempt — but had never received proper follow-up care. The project responded by pushing hospitals to change their protocols: no longer would a suicide attempt be treated only as an emergency to be “patched up.” It was to be seen as a red flag demanding structured aftercare.


Engaging Institutions Beyond Health Care

One of the most radical features of Finland’s approach was the insistence that suicide prevention was not just a medical problem. It was a problem for the whole of society — and so the whole of society was asked to respond.

Schools

Teachers and guidance counsellors were trained to notice the early signs of distress in students. Peer-support programs were introduced so that young people themselves could be allies for one another. The idea was to catch suffering early, long before it showed up in statistics.

Churches

In rural Finland, the local parish was often more trusted than the clinic. Clergy were trained to recognize warning signs, offer crisis counseling, and support families after a suicide. By drawing pastors and priests into the project, Finland tapped into one of its most powerful social institutions.

Media

The project also confronted one of the most sensitive issues: how suicide was reported in newspapers and on television. Journalists were given new guidelines — no sensationalism, no detailed descriptions of methods, and always include information about where to find help. The aim was to prevent copycat deaths and shift the narrative from despair to support.

Workplaces

Though less developed than other strands, workplaces were not ignored. Employers were encouraged to recognize stress and depression among workers, especially men in male-dominated industries like farming, forestry, and manufacturing. Early versions of employee assistance programs began to take shape.


The Male Coping Strategies Programme (Planned but Unfinished)

Among all the subprogrammes Finland envisioned, one stood out for its directness: the Male Coping Strategies Programme.

The research had made it impossible to ignore: Finnish men — especially rural, middle-aged men — were at the center of the suicide crisis. They were less likely to seek help, more likely to drink heavily, more likely to use firearms, and more likely to die by suicide.

The Male Coping Strategies Program was designed to tackle this head-on. Its aim was simple but radical:

  • To help men talk openly about their struggles.

  • To normalize seeking help.

  • To strengthen resilience in ways that fit male culture.

The plan included a public information campaign that would have framed help-seeking not as weakness but as strength. It also envisioned building spaces for men to talk — whether through workplaces, community organizations, or even informal networks.

But the program ran into the one barrier no research can overcome: funding. It never received the resources it needed to stand on its own. Instead, pieces of it were absorbed into other projects, most visibly in the military programs for conscripts and rejected recruits.

Even so, its very existence was telling. In the 1990s, Finland was willing to say openly what many countries still refuse to: male suicide is a gendered issue, and if you want to prevent it, you must address men directly.

And although the national campaign never fully materialized, its spirit lived on. Later, local projects like Hyvä Mehtäkaveri in Kainuu — which embedded suicide prevention into rural hunting clubs — were, in a sense, the Male Coping Strategies Programme reborn in community form.


Results

By the mid-1990s, Finland’s gamble was starting to pay off.

Suicide rates, which had climbed steadily for decades, peaked in 1990. Then, during the years of the project’s implementation, they began to fall. By 1996, suicides had dropped by about 20% from that peak, bringing the numbers below where they had started a decade earlier.

The change wasn’t just in the statistics. Across Finland, you could see new practices taking root:

  • Hospitals no longer discharged suicide attempters without follow-up.

  • Journalists wrote about suicide more responsibly.

  • Teachers and clergy were equipped to recognize distress.

  • Hunters and soldiers had begun to see suicide prevention as something that concerned them too.

An internal evaluation in the late 1990s found that 43% of service sectors reported adopting suicide prevention measures as a result of the project. More than a dozen working models had been developed, along with 70+ publications, training guides, and handbooks.

An external international review in 1999 concluded that the project’s achievements outweighed its shortcomings. The reviewers praised its breadth, creativity, and impact. They noted some gaps — the elderly had been largely overlooked, and the long-term anchoring of prevention into municipal structures was still weak — but the core finding was clear: Finland had changed the trajectory of suicide in the country.

The numbers proved it. And behind those numbers were lives saved.


Why This Matters

The Finnish project showed something the world badly needed to see: suicide prevention works when you meet people where they are.

Instead of waiting for men to walk into clinics, Finland brought prevention to the places where men already lived their lives:

  • In the forests and hunting cabins with their friends.

  • In the army barracks or on the day they were turned away from service.

  • In the pulpit, the classroom, and the local newspaper.

They refused the fatalism of “men won’t seek help.” They built a system that didn’t rely on men crossing the threshold of a psychiatrist’s office. It relied on communities, networks, and everyday institutions to notice, to care, and to act.

And the results speak for themselves: a 20% reduction in suicide rates during the project period. Hundreds of lives saved. A culture shifted.

The contrast with the United States could not be starker. Here, suicide among men — especially middle-aged rural men — is often treated as an inevitability. Our prevention strategies remain vague, underfunded, and detached from the very communities where the deaths are happening.

Finland’s lesson is clear: if you want to prevent suicide, you cannot stop at awareness campaigns and crisis hotlines. You must go out and build support into the fabric of everyday life — in the places where people already gather, work, and belong.


Coming Next: Finland’s Legacy

By the end of the 1990s, Finland had achieved something unprecedented: a national, research-based suicide prevention program that actually bent the curve downward. It wasn’t perfect — some groups were overlooked, funding wasn’t always secure, and not every community took the work as far as it could go. But the results were undeniable.

The project left behind more than lower suicide rates. It left behind a set of models, training tools, and cultural shifts that would ripple across the Nordic region and, eventually, far beyond. Other countries began to take notice. And at the same time, another Finnish innovation — a quiet revolution in psychiatric care called Open Dialogue — was spreading internationally, offering yet another way to reduce suffering and save lives.

In the next post, we’ll look at Finland’s legacy: how their suicide prevention ideas influenced other nations, what worked and what didn’t, and how a small country in the north became a global leader in rethinking how we respond to despair.

Men Are Good

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September 04, 2025
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Who Pulls the Strings of Feminism?
Who Really Funded Feminism -- and Why


Who Really Funded Feminism — And Why

I’ve long wondered how the feminist wall was built. On the surface it looked like a grassroots uprising, but something about it felt orchestrated. What explained that difference? I first found clues in Frank Zepezauer’s The Feminist Crusades, a book that details the massive amounts of money funneled into the movement. That revelation opened my eyes. Later, when I dug deeper into who funded feminism and why, the picture sharpened even more. This post follows that money trail.


When people think of second-wave feminism, they picture grassroots energy: women in living rooms sharing stories, marching in the streets, pushing for change. And that ​may have been true — at first. But by the mid-1970s, something shifted. Feminism stopped being mainly a movement of street-level activists and began morphing into a network of credentialed scholars, policy advocates, and well-funded NGOs.

That transformation didn’t just happen on its own. It was fueled by very large amounts of money — from the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, Carnegie, later MacArthur, Open Society (George Soros), and even the federal government.



The Money Trail

Ford Foundation

In the 1970s alone, the Ford Foundation poured tens of millions into feminist causes. Mariam Chamberlain, a program officer at Ford, was the architect of much of this push. Between 1971 and 1981, she directed $5 million to seed women’s studies programs, feminist publishing, and policy research. At a time when universities were hesitant to invest in such programs, Ford’s grants provided the startup funds that allowed women’s studies departments to take root and flourish. Ford also funded feminist publishing houses and think tanks, creating both a scholarly and popular pipeline for feminist ideas.

By 1979, Ford’s total commitments to women’s initiatives had reached $20 million — a staggering figure for the era (over $85 million today). Most important, Ford chose which voices received institutional backing, embedding them in universities where they gained lasting authority.

The result: women’s studies did not simply emerge as a spontaneous movement. It was engineered into permanence by foundation money. Ford’s investments created credentialed authority that cemented feminist narratives in academia and policy circles for generations. No parallel funding ever launched men’s or boys’ studies.

Fast-forward to today: in 2021, Ford pledged another $420 million globally to advance gender equality in the wake of COVID — proof that its role in shaping gender discourse has remained consistent for half a century. And Ford was hardly alone. Other foundations followed the same path, pouring resources into feminist initiatives while ensuring elite philanthropy shaped the direction of the movement.



Rockefeller Foundation

Rockefeller’s contributions were smaller but highly symbolic. In 1970, NOW received a $15,000 grant (about $120,000 in today’s dollars) — modest in size but significant as a signal of elite endorsement. More broadly, Rockefeller had long funded population control and family planning programs, linking feminist calls for reproductive freedom to demographic priorities embraced by elites.



Carnegie Corporation

Carnegie’s support was less visible but reinforced the same pattern. It funded education and research initiatives that positioned women more strongly in professional life and academia, helping create the pipeline that legitimized feminist priorities.



U.S. Government

Washington soon joined the effort. The 1977 National Women’s Conference in Houston was funded with $5 million in federal money. Title IX (1972) and the Women’s Educational Equity Act (1974) came with federal dollars to advance feminist reforms in education and public life.

The government also invested heavily in domestic violence services. The Family Violence Prevention and Services Act (FVPSA), first enacted in 1984, provided grants for shelters, hotlines, and prevention programs. Since 1994, the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) has been a cornerstone, initially authorizing $1.6 billion for investigation, prosecution, and services. In FY 2024 alone, the DOJ’s Office on Violence Against Women awarded over $690 million in grants. A conservative estimate suggests that since 1994, the U.S. has spent more than $15 billion on violence-against-women programs.

This is striking given that men are far more likely to be victims of violence, yet the government has spent very little on addressing their needs.



Ms. Foundation for Women

Co-founded by Gloria Steinem in 1972, the Ms. Foundation quickly became one of the most influential clearinghouses for feminist philanthropy. Its role was not simply to raise money but to re-grant foundation dollars in ways that seeded and sustained feminist activism at the grassroots level.

By the 1990s, the foundation was channeling millions to women’s centers, domestic violence shelters, reproductive rights campaigns, and academic initiatives. Grants often ranged from $5,000 to $50,000 — small enough to be considered “community grants” but large enough to keep organizations alive and aligned with the broader feminist project.

The flow continues today. Ford, for example, awarded the Ms. Foundation a $4 million BUILD grant (2018–22) to strengthen its capacity. Over time, Ms. became the bridge between elite funders and grassroots activists, shaping the movement by deciding which groups thrived and which withered.



United Nations

The UN has played a central role in globalizing feminist priorities, not just through declarations but through money. The 1975 International Women’s Year Conference in Mexico City and the UN Decade for Women (1976–1985) set the stage by creating institutional frameworks for feminist advocacy. These initiatives legitimized women’s rights as a matter of international governance, with governments encouraged — and often pressured — to align their domestic policies with UN resolutions.

Funding soon followed. In 1976, the UN established UNIFEM (United Nations Development Fund for Women) as a dedicated channel for financing women’s programs. By the 1990s, UNIFEM was distributing tens of millions annually to NGOs, training programs, and policy projects across the developing world. In 2010, UNIFEM was folded into UN Women, which has since become the central UN agency for gender equality.

UN Women operates the Fund for Gender Equality, a global grantmaking mechanism that has disbursed more than $120 million to over 140 programs in 80 countries since 2009. Its annual budget has grown steadily, reaching around $500 million in recent years, sourced from UN member states, private donors, and corporate partnerships. Much of this money goes directly to feminist NGOs, advocacy campaigns, and government programs designed to advance gender-mainstreaming policies.

The UN has also embedded feminism into global development frameworks. Gender equality became one of the Millennium Development Goals (2000) and was carried forward into the Sustainable Development Goals (2015), ensuring that aid flows and donor governments aligned their budgets with feminist priorities.

By contrast, the UN has never created an equivalent agency, trust fund, or global development goal for men and boys. Issues such as male suicide, fatherlessness, and educational decline remain almost entirely absent from UN programming. The imbalance is clear: while feminism was woven into the fabric of global governance and heavily resourced, men’s issues were left invisible.



MacArthur & Open Society

By the 1990s and 2000s, feminism had gone global, with major foundations exporting their influence abroad.

The MacArthur Foundation invested heavily in reproductive health and rights across the developing world. In India, its grants helped expand networks of reproductive-health NGOs; in Nigeria, it underwrote campaigns to integrate feminist perspectives into national health policy. By 2000, MacArthur had committed hundreds of millions globally, positioning itself as a leading private funder of reproductive rights.

The Open Society Foundations, created by George Soros, became another major engine of international feminist philanthropy. In Africa, OSF financed the African Women’s Development Fund, which has since distributed tens of millions to local feminist groups. In Latin America, OSF underwrote “gender justice” and LGBTQ+ campaigns. In Asia, it supported intersectional programs that tied feminism to poverty, ethnicity, and political repression.

Together, MacArthur and OSF globalized the feminist project. What began in the 1960s and 70s as domestic funding for women’s studies and advocacy had, by the 1990s and 2000s, expanded into a worldwide infrastructure of NGOs and policy centers. No comparable global investment was ever made for men or boys.



Melinda Gates (Pivotal Ventures)

In 2019, Melinda Gates announced through Pivotal Ventures a breathtaking pledge: $1 billion over ten years for women’s empowerment — the largest single philanthropic commitment of its kind. The money was designed to accelerate gender equality in the United States by funding women in leadership, promoting workplace equity, and strengthening feminist advocacy.

Through Pivotal Ventures, Gates directed funds into a wide array of partners, from advocacy groups and research institutes to corporate initiatives and grassroots organizations. The aim was to shift entire systems: how companies hire and promote, how political candidates are supported, and how cultural narratives about gender are shaped.

The scale of this investment effectively guaranteed feminist organizations a decade of unprecedented security and visibility. Yet no comparable billion-dollar commitment has ever been made for men or boys.



Conclusion

Taken together, the record is unmistakable. From Ford’s seeding of women’s studies, to the Ms. Foundation’s grassroots re-granting, to MacArthur and Open Society globalizing activism, and finally to Melinda Gates’s billion-dollar pledge, elite philanthropy has engineered and sustained feminism’s rise for more than half a century. Billions of dollars built the departments, advocacy networks, and NGOs that now define public conversation about gender.

Meanwhile, men’s and boys’ issues received virtually nothing. No major foundation seeded “men’s studies.” No billion-dollar pledge launched a global network for boys. The result is not just an imbalance in funding, but an imbalance in culture and policy: feminism is treated as the unquestioned voice on gender, while men’s struggles — from suicide and fatherlessness to educational decline — remain largely ignored.



Why They Gave So Much

It’s tempting to think these were simply acts of generosity. But foundations don’t write checks this big without a reason. Their motives were strategic:

  • Population Control — Rockefeller and Ford had been pouring money into family planning since the 1950s. Funding feminism’s push for reproductive freedom advanced the goal of lower birth rates, especially among the poor and in the developing world.

  • Labor Force Expansion — Encouraging women into higher education and careers expanded the labor pool, fueling economic growth and tax revenues.

  • Cold War Soft Power — Supporting women’s rights projected America’s moral superiority over the USSR, where women’s workforce participation was touted as a socialist achievement.

  • Shaping the Message — By funding universities, NGOs, and professional associations, foundations steered feminism toward credentialed scholarship and identity politics, and away from grassroots demands like wages for housework or critiques of capitalism. Men, once imagined as partners in reshaping family and work, were recast as obstacles. That framing made the movement more marketable and easier to manage.

  • Global Development — By the 1990s, funding feminism had become part of development policy. Empowering women was reframed as “good governance” and a tool for stabilizing societies.



The Big Picture

So what happened? Feminism flourished — but only in the strands that aligned with elite agendas:

  • reproductive rights as population control

  • career advancement as labor force expansion

  • women’s studies as cultural influence

  • and men positioned as adversaries rather than allies

Meanwhile, more radical or working-class agendas — supporting families, addressing men’s challenges, critiquing capitalism — faded from view.

That’s what hundreds of millions of dollars do: amplify some voices while silencing others.

The takeaway: Feminism wasn’t simply a spontaneous cultural revolution. It was shaped, amplified, and institutionalized by massive foundation funding. The foundations didn’t just give money — they set the rules. Grants went only to those advancing elite priorities, with feminist leaders acting as distributors inside those boundaries. It was philanthropy as social engineering: slick, effective, and enduring.

Follow the money, and you’ll see: feminism was less a revolution from below than a project engineered from above.

Is the same thing happening today with men’s issues? Who gets grants? Large grants? From major foundations? It’s worth asking.

Men Are Good.



References

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September 01, 2025
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Male Suicide: Finland Acted, America Shrugs
Part One - How Finland Faced Its Suicide Crisis Head-On


Part One - How Finland Faced Its Suicide Crisis Head-On

Part 1 of 3 in a series on what the world can learn from Finland’s suicide prevention efforts


In the United States, the conversation about male suicide is as predictable as it is shallow. “Men just won’t seek help,” we’re told. And that’s the end of it. Nothing more is asked, and nothing more is done.

But in the 1980s, Finland was facing a suicide crisis of its own. Suicide rates were among the highest in Europe, and the deaths were concentrated in a very particular group: men — often rural, middle-aged, isolated, and drinking too much.

Finland could have shrugged, as America does, and accepted that “men just won’t seek help.” Instead, they made a very different choice. They decided to find out, in painstaking detail, who was dying, where, and why.


The Scale of the Crisis

By the mid-1980s, the numbers were grim. Suicide had become one of Finland’s leading causes of death for working-age men. Rates had been climbing steadily since the 1960s, and by the 1980s they were among the worst in the developed world.

For a country that prided itself on being orderly, sober, and efficient, this was more than a statistical embarrassment — it was a national emergency.

In 1985, the Finnish Ministry of Health convened experts, psychiatrists, and policymakers. Their goal was clear: develop a national suicide prevention plan that would reduce suicides by 20% within ten years.

This was, at the time, a radical idea. No other country had attempted a national, research-based suicide prevention program on this scale.

But the Finns knew that to act wisely, they would first have to understand deeply. And that meant one thing: research.


A Radical First Step — Research Every Suicide

Most countries are content to look at suicide from a distance, through statistics. Age brackets, gender breakdowns, perhaps a line on a graph. Finland chose a different path.

In 1987, the government launched what became known as the Suicides in Finland 1987 study — a nationwide effort to examine, in intimate detail, every single suicide that occurred over the course of one year.

Not a sample. Not an estimate. Every case.

For each of the roughly 1,400 suicides, researchers conducted what’s called a psychological autopsy. They interviewed families, spoke to friends and neighbors, and combed through medical and police records. They asked hard questions: What was happening in this person’s life? Had they ever sought care? Were there early warning signs?

The project engaged hundreds of professionals across the country: doctors, social workers, police officers, even clergy. It was one of the most ambitious suicide research efforts ever attempted, and it immediately began to change the way Finns thought about the problem.

The findings were stark. Suicide in Finland was not a random scattering of tragedies. It clustered in specific groups:

  • Middle-aged rural men, often farmers or hunters, living in isolation.

  • Young men rejected from compulsory military service, who carried the stigma of “failure” at the very moment they were trying to establish their adult identity.

  • Men with alcohol dependence, frequently untreated.

  • People who had never had contact with mental health services at all.

For the first time, Finland could say not just how many suicides were happening, but who was dying, where, and under what circumstances.

This wasn’t abstract theory. It was a roadmap. And it set the stage for something even more unusual: a national plan to intervene, directly and specifically, in the lives of those most at risk.


The Provincial Lens

The brilliance of the Finnish project wasn’t just in collecting data — it was in how they used it.

Instead of keeping the results locked away in government reports or academic journals, the findings were handed back to the provinces. Each region received its own suicide profile: a detailed account of who in their community was dying, what patterns were visible, and where the weak points in support systems lay.

In one province, the data might highlight young men failing conscription. In another, middle-aged farmers drinking heavily and living alone. In yet another, the lack of follow-up care for suicide attempts.

These weren’t abstract numbers anymore. They were portraits of neighbors, colleagues, and fellow parishioners. And the responsibility was clear: suicide prevention would have to be tailored locally.

Provincial health officials, police, clergy, teachers, and even farmer’s associations were drawn into the effort. Instead of a purely top-down campaign dictated from Helsinki, Finland was building a network of local responses, each shaped by the community’s own data.

This was a crucial shift. Suicide wasn’t just a “psychiatric problem” to be handled in hospitals. It was a social and cultural problem too — one that touched schools, military bases, rural hunting clubs, and village churches.

By the early 1990s, Finland had something no other country had ever built: a nationwide, locally adapted suicide prevention strategy, grounded in evidence about real people in real places.


Why This Matters

What Finland did in the late 1980s was extraordinary.

Instead of throwing up their hands and sighing that “men just won’t seek help,” they went out and found the men who were dying. They studied the contexts of their lives, the patterns in their struggles, the systems that failed them.

By the early 1990s, Finland could point to its suicide crisis and say with precision:

  • We know who is most at risk.

  • We know where the deaths are happening.

  • We know the social and cultural factors driving them.

This is the foundation of prevention. You cannot help people you refuse to see.

And here lies the striking contrast with the United States. To this day, our suicide surveillance is patchy, fragmented, and often superficial. We rarely break down the data in meaningful ways, and even when we do, we almost never follow it with targeted action. Middle-aged men in rural communities — by far the group most at risk — remain largely invisible in our prevention systems.

Finland chose another path. They chose to look directly at the problem, however uncomfortable. And that choice gave them a roadmap for action.


Coming Next: From Research to Action

Research alone does not save lives. But in Finland, research was only the beginning.

The findings from the 1987 study became the blueprint for one of the boldest public health experiments in the world: a nationwide suicide prevention strategy that would mobilize schools, churches, the military, the media, and even rural hunting clubs.

And it worked. Suicide rates, which had been climbing steadily, began to fall.

In the next post, we’ll look at how Finland took the data in hand and transformed it into practical, creative interventions — and how entire communities became part of the prevention effort. It should post a week from today.

Men Are Good.

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