Perhaps one of the most refreshingly known, legitimate, and controversial movements in today’s day and age is feminism, which is the advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men. However, just when you’d think society’s ignorance towards equal rights for both sexes was cured, another “movement” of sorts has recently arisen: #meninism. Here are a few things to know about meninism.
- It began as a trending Twitter hashtag. In late 2013, the tag #MeninistTwitter began trending with a few jokes written by men, who seemingly had good intentions, at first. Eventually, people (ridiculously) started to take it seriously, with men tweeting about “the hardships of being a man in the 21st century.”
- Meninism isn’t a new concept, it was originally thought up in 2001. In December of 2001, this article was posted to Feminism.com. It states that meninism “is a global organization of men that believe in and support the feminist principles of women’s political, social and economic equality.” The site reads, “this page hopes to convey that a growing movement of men recognize and support the women’s movement, for the benefit of women, men and all of humanity.” Basically, meninism was not created to make a mockery of feminism, but to represent the population of men that support feminist principles and equal rights for both sexes.
- Today, the meninist movement is “a channel for men to express the difficulties of being a man in the 21st century.” Nowadays, meninism has become a force for men’s rights and positive masculinity. It’s a way for the modern man to say, “hey, I genuinely think that, throughout history, men have been given just as hard of a time as women.” In case shouting from the rooftops about how sexualized and objectified men are isn’t embarrassing enough, you can further humiliate yourself by purchasing a limited edition meninist T-shirt.
In short, meninists are making a misogynistic mockery of true activism and misguidedly placing blame. But they’re right to complain. It’s obvious that feminists who want equal rights for both genders are just engaging in a clever trick to bring the male gender down. And that’s not cool bro.
