So the salon has become the drawing room, without the smoke and cigars, but with the talk of the outlandish presumptions of the already well-enough served.

I think the problem is that there is a kernel of truth, and a real grievance to the issues the MRAs are speaking about. This is the unfair and uneven treatment of fathers in family law cases. In states like Nebraska, the father is given primary custody something like 3% of the time. I don't believe that the mother is the best choice in 97% of the cases!

The confiscatory nature of the child support laws, combined with biased courts and outcomes that do not take into account the best interests of ANYBODY are maddening and wrong. Parents can't get back the time and relationship they would have had with their children, nor the influence they could have had on them to help them grow up into well-rounded people. The courts and false accusations really have become, in some instances, weapons unbalanced mothers can use to remove the father of their children from their lives (except for his money) in way too many cases. In fact, 1 case is really too many.

In my opinion, (we know what that's worth!), child support should be set for each child at the amount the state is willing to pay to foster parents to raise a child. That is the amount it costs, right? Then that should be proportionately split between the parents. If either parent wishes to provide a more-enriched upbringing for their children (note that this is a choice in intact families, and for parents with primary custody), they can give gifts, pay for extra lessons, take trips with the child, etc. as they choose.

While I don't think personal background matters, I will say that I was a single mom with primary custody of a child. I have not personally been impacted by these problems that are damaging relationships and separating parents from their children. Nevertheless, it is wrong that it happens. It is wrong that my ex was able to have a good and strong and loving relationship with my son ONLY because I wanted my son to have the love of his father. That should NOT have been up to me.

Can't wait now, till BS and MMM and the "Parson" weigh in to make me sad that I have any tiny point of agreement with them, at all.

would be to recognize that these groups fulfill a need, real or perceived. The second would be to find out what that need is. Then, address and satisfy that need in a positive way so that these groups have no traction, and are eventually out-competed. Think of it like a habitat or a niche: if I hate panda bears, what should I do to get rid of them (assuming I cannot just shoot them all)? Well, you compete for the resources sustaining them, or introduce a competitor (e.g. a beetle that kills bamboo on a large scale).

My intuition is that this need is a part of the alienation of our times and a general feeling of impotence and loss of agency by some, a feeling that seems especially toxic to men. In this specific case, there are probably roles or identities for these men that are being destroyed, removed, or diluted. If that's a bad thing, then we should try to reverse it (to see a reduction or elimination of this movement). If that's a good thing, then we need to provide a place for them. It sounds like they feel as though they are being displaced, and if we can give them an active and positive role to play, that could go a long way to satisfy the need for a lot of these men.

ReganaD is right, the family court system is neutral on paper but biased in favor of mothers. While I have no doubt that these men's groups are ridiculously exaggerating domestic abuse perpetrated by wives on their husbands, I also do not doubt that there are a lot of false allegations of abuse towards children that arise in custody proceedings. And depending on the judge, they might be accepted uncritically.

Having just gone through this process as a father that did all the right things I would say that the angst here is very real and that only having these crazy people expressing it is bad. There is still a very real imbalance between mothers rights and faters rights. Even when the mother's behavior is totally unapropriate there is still a huge amount of leverage and uncertanty for a father to go to trial. I could afford the lawyers fees but many men can't and I am pretty sure I would have lost my daughter completely by her mothers actions with not acusations of abuse of any kind. I think the tone of this article is part of the issue. Clearly abuse can be real. But I have known completly non-abusive fathers that have been falsely acused with only finacial motivations behind the acuser. There is truth that many groups and women are tone deaf inrelation to fathers rights. The truth is that is it generally excepted by our culture that fathers will be providers and not care givers in divided families. All the structures lead to there still.

Abuse is the outlier. It needs to be handled seriously be all invovled. False acusations need to be prevented. Abuse needs to be prevented. These should be the goal of all parties.

These are extremely difficult things to talk about without seeming like you are on the fringe. While my daugther had been kid napped away from me I remember looking online for support groups. The truth is most are so nutty they aren't useful. I chose not to go there but I could see someone having not other options end up right there with the them.

These groups don't have to be anti women but in truth in this area women's rights are far more secure then men's.

I'm in total agreement with the posters above. Ms. Berman's snarky article, though, is very fact-free and sad.

It's a shame, though, that the MR groups have all adopted the stridency of so many feminist groups.

American society culturally and legally values women and girls far more highly than men and boys.

People (and organizations) lose sight of the fact that we are all connected through family and friends.