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The Men’s Rights Movement.
For a period of time, when people heard of a bunch of guys talking about gender, Men’s Right Activists or MRA’s were usually the first thing they thought of. Regardless of what we think about Men’s Rights Activists (and trust me, I have a lot to say about them— and usually nothing good), they have been part of the men’s movement for over a hundred years now.
Read MoreTo celebrate Next Gen Men’s eighth birthday last week we are looking back on the three trends that shaped last year’s conversations surrounding masculinity.
If you read our discussion of the internet trending to be the next generation’s biggest cultural touchstone and your biggest takeaway was that boys should than spend less time online — you might be missing the point.
Read More8 years doesn’t sound like a lot.
But when you break it down — 2,920 days dedicated to supporting men and boys is nothing to sniff at.
And if you ask me, it’s time well spent.
So as Next Gen Men marks its eighth birthday on November 18th (for context, my longest single tenure of employment before this was probably two years…). As NGM’s Executive Director, and one of the co-founders, I offer some thoughts on how the way we see, act, and think about masculinity has been changing since our 7th birthday – and where I see NGM sailing into our 9th.
Read MoreEvery educator has struggled with the devil-may-care student who is indifferent in the classroom at best, and at worst finds ways to be actively disruptive or flagrantly disrespectful. But let’s be clear: what we see in those moments is not really a ‘problematic’ boy or ‘toxic’ masculinity. It’s relational disengagement.
Read MoreNext Gen Men is featured in a new Canadian documentary called Boys Will Be…Themselves, which explores the questions we’ve been grappling with—both as an organization and more broadly as a society—about what it means to ‘be a man.’
Next Gen Men staff (both current and former), friends of NGM, youth from our programs, and our colleagues in the field of gender justice all took part—and our Community Manager, Veronika, worked on the film as Head Researcher. Today, we sit down with Veronika and Youth Program Manager Jonathon to discuss the making of the documentary.
Read MoreA smoky small-town rodeo arena might seem like an unconventional place to situate an analogy about supporting boys’ emotional lives, but there are three main qualities of pickup riders that have become part of how I envision working with boys.
Read MoreIn a previous episode of Modern Manhood we discussed the 1900s to set the scene for men’s involvement in the suffragette movement; now we’re moving on to the Men’s Liberation in the 1970s.
Read MoreIt is fascinating that ideas of male liberation were being discussed more than a hundred years exactly before Next Gen Men began. It encouraged me to dig deeper from the history that I already knew about male movements.
Read MoreWe all think we know what testosterone is, but where is the line between fact and fiction? Well, it’s complicated. Testosterone has become more than just a hormone — it’s also a commodity and a symbol. How did one hormone become so intertwined with what masculinity is supposed to mean?
To find out, let’s take a deep dive decline into the three sides of testosterone.
Read MoreMen’s involvement in feminism pre-dates our Next Gen Men community by more than a hundred years. From the UK to the US, as early as the mid-1800s, there were men who supported women’s right to vote.
Men’s support for women’s suffrage was certainly slow and sparse to start — and indeed many men found the idea laughable — but it grew steadily toward the turn of the century.
Read MoreSince we’re writing the Status of Boys Report (thanks to the Next Gen Menbers’ support!) we’ve been working hard to understand and unpack the intertwining relationship between adolescents, online trends and masculinity that young boys are navigating every day. All these topics have us reflecting on our very own online Summer Camp we hosted online to connect with the boys we would have normally seen in person. Read all the lessons, Jonathon Reed, Next Gen Men’s Youth Manager, learned while navigating our first version of what is now our free Boys Club hosted on Discord.
Read MoreA man can be as feminine he wants, and still be a ‘strong’ man: Femininity will never make a man weak. So to any comments like ‘be a man,’ ‘toughen up,’ or ‘dress like you’re supposed to’…I say, I shall not! I shall dance, filled with joy. And that does not make me any less of a man.
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