Is Feminism a Healthy Movement for Social Change?

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W​omen’s Studies was Never About Study

For decades, Women’s Studies has held a privileged place in academia. From its earliest days, it was never a neutral or exploratory field—it was born out of activism, not inquiry. The goal was not to ask open questions about gender, but to advance a political framework that saw women as oppressed and men as privileged. It promised to give women a collective voice and to expose the “hidden structures” of patriarchy, but from the beginning, its conclusions were already written into its premises.

From Activism to Orthodoxy

Women’s Studies emerged in the late 1960s as an explicitly ideological project, shaped by the political currents of second-wave feminism. Its founders were activists first and academics second. The programs they built were not designed to test ideas but to institutionalize a belief system—that society was organized around male domination and that liberation required dismantling it. Rather than studying whether patriarchy existed, Women’s Studies set out to document how it did, embedding the theory of oppression into every syllabus. What began as political conviction soon became academic dogma.

A Closed Loop of Certainty

Once the framework of oppression was installed as unquestionable truth, the field began to police its own boundaries. Dissent was not debated—it was pathologized. To question the narrative of systemic male power was to “uphold patriarchy.” To suggest that men face distinct forms of hardship was to be told you were shifting attention away from women — that you were “making it about men.”​ Even sympathetic scholars who urged more balance found themselves marginalized. In time, Women’s Studies became a self-reinforcing system—its theories generating its evidence, its evidence confirming its theories. The goal was no longer discovery but preservation of the ideology itself.

Theory Without Tether

Much of the writing in Women’s Studies rests on sweeping abstractions: “patriarchy,” “privilege,” “internalized oppression,” “toxic masculinity.” These terms are often treated not as hypotheses to be tested but as truths to be applied. Shulamith Firestone declared that “the goal of the feminist revolution must be… the elimination of the sex distinction itself.” bell hooks wrote that “patriarchy is the single most life-threatening social disease assaulting the male body and spirit.” Such claims are not evidence-based conclusions; they are moral declarations — proclamations of belief.

When theory replaces evidence, conversation dies. Instead of exploring how men and women differ in complex, sometimes complementary ways, Women’s Studies tends to flatten the picture into one story: oppressors and oppressed.

The Disappearing Male

Ironically, as the field expanded into “Gender Studies,” men nearly vanished from the picture except as symbols of privilege or threat. Rarely do these programs explore male pain, fatherhood, or the male experience of relational loss, shame, or sacrifice. When male suffering is acknowledged, it’s often reframed as a symptom of “toxic masculinity” — as though men’s pain merely confirms the theory rather than complicates it.

If academia truly cared about gender, it would study men as carefully and compassionately as it studies women. But in the current climate, even suggesting that balance is considered suspect.

Power, Not Understanding

Modern Women’s and Gender Studies have largely shifted from studying what is to prescribing what should be. The core pursuit is no longer knowledge but power — the power to define social norms, influence policy, and shape language. As a result, universities now graduate students steeped in theory but poorly equipped to engage with those who don’t share their ideological framework. The field’s inward focus breeds division rather than understanding.

Why It Matters

This isn’t just an academic squabble. The ideas born in Women’s Studies now drive policies in media, law, education, and corporate culture. They shape how we talk about men and women, how we define fairness, and how we teach our children about themselves. When a discipline insists that one sex’s narrative of oppression defines the truth, it narrows empathy for the other half of humanity.

A truly balanced study of gender would ask harder questions — not how to dismantle men, but how men and women can understand each other more deeply. Until that shift happens, Women’s Studies will remain less a study of truth than a sermon about power.

Men Are Good

Note:
Next week, Janice Fiamengo, Jim Nuzzo, Hannah Spier, and I will be releasing a video discussion titled “The Evolution of Women’s Studies and Its Terms.” We’ll take a deeper look at how Women’s Studies developed, examine course materials and degree trends, and unpack the language it has generated—terms like microfeminism, antinatal feminism, compulsory heterosexuality, internalized misogyny, and kin-keeping. It should be a lively and revealing conversation.​

Reproductive Rights End at Ejaculation: How Men Lost Control Over Parenthood

It’s one of the most unspoken truths in modern life: once conception occurs, men have no reproductive rights. A woman can choose to keep a pregnancy or end it. She can decide to raise the child or place it for adoption. A man, on the other hand, is bound—socially, legally, and financially—to whatever decision she makes.

That imbalance is so normalized that few even notice it. When the topic arises, most people reflexively defend the status quo. “Well, it’s her body.” Of course it is. But what’s rarely considered is that while women have control over their bodies, men have no control over their futures.

“The man’s genetic material, his emotional capacity, his finances, and his lifelong identity as a father or a stranger—all of it hangs on someone else’s choice. A woman’s responsibility is conditional; a man’s is absolute.”

And this asymmetry is defended not as a moral dilemma to be resolved, but as a settled truth.

The Silent Consent Trap

We’ve been taught to think that when a man consents to sex, he consents to everything that might follow. But when a woman consents to sex, she still retains the right to decide afterward whether to become a mother.

This moral sleight of hand is stunning once you notice it. One person’s consent is treated as final and binding; the other’s is treated as provisional and revocable.

And yet this assumption—so old it feels invisible—forms the bedrock of modern reproductive law.

If a pregnancy occurs and the man doesn’t want to be a father, the system tells him, “Too bad. You should have thought of that earlier.” If the woman doesn’t want to be a mother, society says, “She has a right to choose.”

Both positions can’t be reconciled under any serious notion of equality.

The Price of Powerlessness

For many men, the consequence isn’t only financial—it’s existential.

Imagine discovering that someone chose to bring a child into the world with your DNA, against your will, and that you’ll now spend 18 years paying for the decision you didn’t make. Imagine learning that a partner deceived you about contraception, or tampered with protection, and you’re told by the court that none of that matters.

Your body, your consent, your word—irrelevant.

The state considers you responsible for what someone else decided to do with your biology.

The irony is brutal: men are lectured about “taking responsibility,” but responsibility without consent is not morality—it’s servitude.

And while precise numbers are impossible to know, the scale of this problem is enormous. Countless men quietly accept pregnancies they would have preferred to avoid—not because they chose fatherhood, but because the law left them no voice in the matter. For every man who speaks out, many more simply submit to a fate decided by someone else. And this imbalance cuts both ways. Just as some men are forced into fatherhood they didn’t choose, others are denied fatherhood they deeply want. Many have stood by helplessly as a pregnancy they hoped to cherish was ended—not because they were careless or uncommitted, but because the law gave them no voice. For them, “her choice” becomes their grief, and that grief is treated as if it doesn’t exist.

And beneath that larger injustice lies an even starker reality: a measurable percentage of pregnancies begin with deliberate deception. Studies conservatively estimate that 1–3% of fathers are unknowingly raising children who are not biologically theirs. Men who uncover the truth and challenge paternity are often ordered to keep paying anyway, because “it’s in the best interest of the child.”

In other words, the legal system tells men that even being lied to about fatherhood doesn’t matter—your wallet still belongs to the child, and by extension, to the mother who deceived you. It’s her body, her choice—and your wallet, her choice too.

Moral Courage and the Empathy Gap

Why is there so little outrage about this? Because when men suffer, empathy tends to vanish.

We can see this in how society responds to female pain—mobilizing instantly, funding shelters, rewriting laws—and how it responds to male pain—with indifference, mockery, or moral lectures.

A man who feels trapped by fatherhood he didn’t choose is told he’s irresponsible or immature. A woman who feels trapped by motherhood she didn’t choose is seen as courageous for seeking control. And when a man feels trapped by abortion—when he longs to protect the life of his own child but is powerless to stop its ending—his pain is dismissed as interference in someone else’s right.

This empathy gap runs so deep that even discussing male reproductive rights feels taboo. People worry it undermines women’s freedom, as if equality for one sex must come at the other’s expense.

But fairness isn’t a zero-sum game. Equality doesn’t mean less compassion for women—it means more honesty for everyone.

The “Financial Abortion” Idea

One idea, sometimes called “paper abortion” or “financial abortion,” proposes that men should be able to relinquish legal parenthood within a set time early in pregnancy—mirroring a woman’s right to choose abortion or adoption.

Critics say it lets men “walk away from their responsibilities.” But this criticism misses the point: responsibility must follow consent. You can’t demand moral or financial duty from someone who had no voice in the decision that created it.

If women can legally choose parenthood, men should at least be able to choose not to be one.

Otherwise, what we call equality is really a kind of gendered servitude—freedom for one sex, obligation for the other.

Consent and Control

At its heart, the issue of reproductive rights for men isn’t about sex. It’s about consent, autonomy, and the meaning of equality.

In every other area of life, consent without control is invalid.
If someone borrows your car without permission, you don’t owe them gas money because “the trip already happened.” If a doctor performs a surgery you didn’t consent to, it’s malpractice—even if they believed it would help.

Yet when it comes to reproduction, we abandon that principle completely.

Men’s consent ends at ejaculation. From that moment on, everything that follows—the pregnancy, the birth, the lifelong obligation—is out of their hands.

And society calls this justice.

The Deeper Consequence

When men feel they have no control over one of life’s most defining events—whether or not they become a father—it fuels a quiet kind of despair. It teaches them that their choices don’t matter, that their voices are disposable, that their role in reproduction is purely mechanical.

It also weakens trust between men and women. True partnership depends on mutual agency and mutual accountability. When one side holds all the power, resentment grows.

This isn’t just a legal problem; it’s a relational one. Many young men today fear relationships precisely because they sense this imbalance—because they know that in the eyes of the law and culture, they have no reproductive rights, only responsibilities.

A Culture That Values Both Sexes

Reproductive fairness shouldn’t be controversial. If we truly believe in equality, then both sexes deserve the same moral and legal respect for their choices.

That means we need to have the courage to ask hard questions:

• Should men have the right to decline fatherhood when women can decline motherhood?

• Should paternity testing be standard, to protect both fathers and children from deception?

• Should reproductive coercion—like lying about birth control—be treated as seriously as forcing a woman into pregnancy?

Equality isn’t about punishing women or freeing men from moral duty. It’s about aligning rights with responsibilities, and recognizing that both sexes have an equal stake in the creation of life.

Until that happens, we’ll keep pretending that justice exists where it doesn’t—and men will keep paying the price for choices they didn’t make.

Because in our culture, reproductive rights still end at ejaculation.

 

The Engineered Isolation of Men

For decades, society has been dismantling the three foundations that once anchored men: work, identity, and family. What we call a “men’s crisis” isn’t just about depression or suicide—it’s about systematic disconnection. When a man loses his place to contribute, his right to belong, and the respect that once gave him pride, he doesn’t merely suffer; he disappears.

1. The First Cut: Economic Displacement

For most men, work is more than a paycheck—it’s proof of worth. Through skill, labor, and persistence, men find identity and belonging. But modern economies have quietly stripped that away. Factories closed, trades devalued, and risk-taking jobs replaced by automation or overseas labor.

Men were told to “adapt,” but few noticed what they were adapting to: a world that no longer needs them in the ways that once gave them purpose. Unemployment doesn’t just steal income—it steals function. And when function vanishes, meaning follows close behind.

History bears this out. During the Great Depression, when millions of men were cut off from productive work, suicide rates climbed to record highs. A man’s worth had been tied to his usefulness, and when society no longer needed that usefulness, despair filled the vacuum. Yet during the world wars, when men were again called upon to serve, build, and defend, suicide rates fell sharply—even in the face of danger and loss. The difference wasn’t comfort, but purpose.

Research confirms what common sense already knows: long-term unemployment raises men’s suicide risk several-fold. Not because men are fragile, but because usefulness was the thread holding their lives together. When that thread breaks, they fall—not from weakness, but from the weight of purposelessness.

A culture that robs men of purpose is a culture engineering their isolation.

2. The Second Cut: Moral Displacement Through Shame

Even men who keep their jobs often lose something deeper—the right to feel proud of being men.

The term toxic masculinity didn’t just critique bad behavior; it redefined maleness itself as suspect. Strength, stoicism, leadership, and competitiveness—traits once considered virtues—became moral liabilities. Men were told that their instincts were dangerous, their achievements oppressive, their nature defective.

This isn’t self-improvement; it’s cultural shaming.
When a man is told his strength makes him unsafe, he hides it. When he’s told his logic makes him cold, he doubts it. Over time, he disconnects—not only from others but from his own nature.

And shame is the most isolating emotion of all. It tells a person, you don’t belong anymore.
A shamed man withdraws, not because he doesn’t care, but because every gesture of care risks being misinterpreted. His silence isn’t indifference—it’s self-protection in a culture that punishes his voice.

3. The Third Cut: The Forced Separation of Divorce

Then there is the wound that goes straight to the heart: divorce.

In countless cases, it’s not just a separation of spouses—it’s the erasure of fatherhood. Courts presume maternal virtue and paternal suspicion. Even loving, stable fathers are reduced to “visitors,” permitted only fragments of the lives they helped create.

For a man whose identity revolves around providing, protecting, and mentoring, losing daily contact with his children is devastating. It is grief without a funeral—a living bereavement he’s expected to endure without complaint.

The statistics are grim: divorced men have some of the highest suicide rates of any demographic. Not because they’ve failed as fathers, but because the system has forbidden them to succeed. When the law itself enforces separation, the message is unmistakable: you’re no longer needed.

4. The Result: A Culture of Quiet Exile

Take these three together—economic displacement, moral shaming, and family loss—and you get the blueprint for male disconnection.
Each cut severs a man from one of the three bonds that make life meaningful:

• Work (purpose)

• Identity (dignity)

• Family (love)

A man without purpose feels restless.
A man without dignity feels ashamed.
A man without love feels invisible.
And when all three disappear at once, the result isn’t just sadness—it’s annihilation.

5. What the Culture Gets Wrong

Modern culture mistakes this for fragility: “Men just need to talk more.”
But talking doesn’t rebuild meaning.
What men need isn’t therapy in isolation—it’s reconnection to the structures that once made their lives coherent.

A man can’t talk his way out of being unnecessary.
He can only live his way back into usefulness, belonging, and respect.

That requires social systems that recognize men as contributors, not relics; as protectors, not problems.

6. The Way Back

The solution isn’t to “save” men—it’s to restore their place in the human story:

• Rebuild economic paths that value masculine work.

• Reclaim cultural respect for masculine virtues.

• Reform family law so fatherhood is a right, not a privilege.

• Speak openly about the moral injury of being labeled toxic for existing.

Men don’t need saving — they need a place to stand again.
Give them that, and they’ll rebuild everything else.

Men Are Good.