It's time for Men's Lib: Why we're witnessing the beginning of a men's movement

By JENNI MURRAY
UPDATED: 07:42 GMT, 26 November 2009
 
For me, it began with a mortgage application. It was the 1970s, and I was young, ambitious and proud of my financial independence. The time had come, I thought, to buy my own home.
I was quickly brought down to earth by my bank manager, who informed me that I would need the application countersigned by 'your husband or father'. 
At that moment, the light bulb of feminism went on in my head - exactly as it was doing for a whole generation of women at roughly the same time.
Men's movement: A growing number of men are seeking to challenge unrealistic expectations of them and outdated stereotypes
Men's movement: A growing number of men are seeking to challenge unrealistic expectations of themselves and outdated stereotypes
How well I remember the shock, horror and ridicule faced by the female of the species when we began to ask society at large whether it was truly our lot to be simply sugar and spice and all things nice. 
That's why we grouped together to discuss our health, our education, our place in work and how to be good wives and mothers without, as the novelist Rebecca West put it, being a doormat. 
How ironic that, 30 years on, it's the turn of men to start asking the same kind of questions about their place in the world. 
We are witnessing the beginnings of a men's movement, with newly-formed groups of young men who have set out to find answers to the vexing question of how modern men are supposed to behave.
Two such groups have recently announced their existence and their purpose. 
At Manchester University, there is MENS Society - Masculinity Exploring Network and Support. 
Ben Wild, who's a history and politics student, has set up the group because he feels young men find it hard to live up to an idealised masculine role.
By that, I suspect he means it's not every guy who can shine on the rugby field, bring home top quality bacon and change a nappy, while rustling up a cordon bleu dinner and ironing a pristine shirt.
The truth is that, in 2009, men are every bit as as oppressed by unrealistic expectations and outdated stereotypes as women.
Mr Wild's plan, he says, is to hold discussions where young men explore what masculinity means, and ask to what extent they contribute to sexism and gender stereotyping.
For his pains, he's accused by his female counterparts of undermining women. Quite how women are undermined by a young, thoughtful man openly contributing to a debate we've long been asking them to consider, utterly defeats me.
Encouragement is what's required, not damnation. Imagine our outrage if that ridicule was directed by men towards women's groups.
A similar organisation has been introduced to Oxford University by a 20-year-old student, Alex Linsley. His Oxford Man Collective (M-Co) advertised for members with the somewhat predictable slogan 'Have you got balls? If you have, how does that make you feel?'
Woman's Hour host Jenni Murray says it's important to address discrimination for boys and men
Woman's Hour host Jenni Murray says it's important to address discrimination for boys and men
He explains he wants to discuss the confusion that faces his male contemporaries, who are struggling to know what it means to be a good man.
He says there are two conflicting examples: the sensitive, all-caring, 'feminised' type, or the hard, 'take no c**p' from anybody figure.
He acknowledges that neither extreme is particularly helpful, but says there may be things to be learned from both. 
Kat Wall, the Oxford Vice President for Women, is said to have accused the group of gender stereotyping, saying she hopes they will work with women to facilitate discussions on masculinity.
Why on earth should they? No women's group would have allowed men to take part in a discussion on what was expected of femininity.
We women have spent the past 40-odd years revising our own place in the world, and have brought about a 'genderquake' as a result.
The home and the workplace have been turned upside down by women's aspirations. 
Surely we should be welcoming the young men who want to work out for themselves what kind of man 21st- century woman wants to share her life with.
The truth is that women have changed, and the world has changed. This is largely something to celebrate, but nobody should ever pretend that change isn't sometimes uncomfortable and confusing.
This is the first generation of men who will come of age without the fixed presumption that they will be the 'breadwinner' and 'head of household'. Some may find that a relief - but undeniably it has left many questioning what exactly their role in life should be.
After all, if their wife is better at running the home, mothering the children and earning money, what use is a man?
Today's young men are going to fall in love with women who have grown up with an assumption of equality, and who are most likely as well educated and ambitious as they are (at least until they have children, but that's a debate for another day).
How do they live, work and love with women like that? What will these girls want from their men? These are important questions for everyone. 
As girls outstrip boys at every stage of education, and working-class white boys in particular rapidly become a lost generation, it is becoming imperative that we address the same issues of discrimination and exclusion for boys and men as we once did for women.
As the mother of two beloved sons, I've done my best to give them the opportunity to be the kind of men they wanted to be, and not feel they had to follow any traditional pattern laid down for them.
I've shared their anger at television adverts that portray their sex as hopeless or just plain stupid, and joined their cries of 'that's sexist' at the TV stereotypes of men who can't even wash their own shirts.
When they've played rugby, I've marched up and down the touchline, yelling encouragement. If they've been hurt or bullied, I've held them tight and wiped away their tears, never, ever saying: 'Come on, son - boys don't cry.'
Because masculinity is every bit as complex as femininity. A woman can play football, run a bank, wear lipstick and sob her heart out over Brief Encounter; but it's only through the long struggles of feminism that the football and the bank job have been permitted.
Now, the Brothers, like the Sisters, need to do it for themselves and find their own way to define their place in society.
Has feminism turned men into second-class citizens?
Has feminism turned men into second-class citizens?
What's fascinating is that it's never really made sense in the past for men - traditionally the holders of power - to examine their own role in the world. Why would you bother when the society you live in endorses a status quo in which a wife is cook, cleaner, child carer and staunch support?
But that society no longer exists, and now it's young men who are floundering far more than young women are.
The founders of the new men's groups are tremendously courageous, given male silence on these issues, to admit that their sex lacks support networks, and that they need to talk to each other about their health, their ambitions and a host of other social issues far more troublesome today than they ever were for their generation's fathers.
Alex Linsley, the M-Co founder, points to the high number of young men between the ages of 18 and 25 who commit suicide. He is right to be concerned. Professor Louis Appleby, the National Director for Mental Health, has referred to an 'epidemic of young male suicide'.
Nine hundred young men kill themselves every year - that's 75per cent of all suicides in the under-35 age group.
This is the group that rarely comes in contact with health professionals. Girls go to the doctor to discuss everything from contraception to difficult periods to jabs to prevent cervical cancer; boys hardly ever see their GP.
We have yet to see the kind of health awareness campaigns, support groups and funding initiatives directed at male issues such as prostate cancer as we have, for example, at breast cancer.
Nor are young men encouraged to seek help when they have worries. Parents traditionally encourage their daughters to talk about their emotions; sons are raised with a stiff upper lip - instructed in a style of masculinity that no longer fits into our changing world.
They hide their misery away in the 'Boys will be boys'/ 'Lads tough it out' culture that is sending far too many of them to an early grave.
When they're older, those who survive still suffer. How many men do you know would rather die than go the doctor with a lump in a testicle? How many men would call a friend to discuss a problem they're having with their family?
A woman would be on the phone right away and find her way through with the support of a pal. A man may well fall through the net unsupported. Three- quarters of people who go missing each year are male, as are 85 per cent of people who sleep rough.
So good luck to these young men who acknowledge there's a crisis in masculinity. It's up to them now to try to sort it out.