Michael, on the March
Welcome to the Revolution
When I was young I remember watching the news and seeing women burning their bras. It was a time when Germaine Greer was clearly our era’s Joan of Arc. But while there were men against the rise there were also women.
But the opposition never quelled the fire, instead they inadvertently fueled the flames. That said, I am not an expert on that age, I was just there as a spectator who, the older he grew, saw how clear it was that feminism was not only great and needed but right and unstoppable.
Now though, thanks to among other things my play Marooned I have been allowed to see the depths and breath of a new, rising underground movement.
Men’s rights.
What’s interesting though is the movement seems to be flowering not in the youth but in the souls of middle-aged men and fathers.
https://youtu.be/2173eUDLNmQ
Like early feminism the movement is growing organically. Online it is fractured into scores of different groups, and it’s not all men, many of its most outspoken and articulate advocates are women.
And it appears too, to be fueled by many factors, family law court reform, a hate of the man-shaming term Toxic Masculinity, the high and growing suicide rate, the spading of natural masculinity by political correctness, and a deep social isolation that many men are experiencing which is seeing many of them seek out, find and join these groups.
But all these groups are growing from one communal base, the womb of all revolutions, rising discrimination.
And this isn’t a warning, this is just a statement learned from history, this movement like all its predecessors will not be stopped.
In fact every attempt to stop it will help it grow. Every time one of its spoke persons is publicly vilified the ironic result will be that the word of this will spread and it will be the silent who will be listening and angered and this anger will push them ever closer to speaking up.
The next step naturally, is that the movement will become ever more organized and focused.
So where, as an indie playwright, do I stand among all this?
Personally I am not anti-women, nor am I against feminism, in fact Germaine Greer is high on my list of people I’d most like to meet, I am for equality but to reach there I am becoming evermore pro-men.
I don’t believe that Masculinity’s new handbook, the one we need to replace the now defunct one that John Wayne wrote, should be written by corporations trying to sell razors or by women.
No, it has to be written, or forged by men. As men, who are we in this modern world, what is our place our purpose, our worth? What rights do we want that we don’t have now or have lost?
And we must do this, for I believe this is one of the best ways to stop the alarming rise in the suicide statistics and the reason me must try is not for ourselves but our sons and their sons.
When women are together without men, I am told they often speak differently, likewise when men are together, without women, they too speak differently. There are major similarities between the genders but there are also and always will be differences.
I grew up in a time when men had their own language and rules and the majority of that wasn’t spoken. It seemed to be ingrained in our DNA and honed through interacting with other men.
In my last job I was as tram driver. When I started it was mostly men, mature men. Going by the statistics and the numbers of men who came through we should have had several suicides, but many of the drivers who had been there for decades could not recall one.
I believe this was because of how the men, out of the reach of political correctness, where able to interact with each other in the staff room. But it’s just a hunch. A hunch I used as the undercurrent of the play.
And we must do this, for I believe this is one of the best ways to stop the alarming rise in the suicide statistics and the reason me must try is not for ourselves but our sons and their sons
Now there is a march being organized around my play by a man called Jaimes Walch. Jaimes is a rising voice and organizer in this fractured movement. His want, to bring these different groups together, if only for a few hours behind the banner of a suicide prevention play that is aimed predominantly at men, my play Marooned.
Jaimes sees worth in how the main character only known as 1620 symbolizes the struggles of an isolated father in our current era.
But Jamies main, long term goal is the same as mine and of all those who are rising up, it’s a need to stand up and take care and responsibility, and to be seen to be taking care and responsibility of each other and our issues as men, and by doing so hopefully we will reduce the suicide rate and move towards true equality and a healthier community for all.
~ Michael Gray Griffith
MELBOURNE MAROONED MARCH
21 September 2019
Federation Square
12pm.
In gratitude and to help support Jaimes
$10 from any ticket purchased for the play via this linkgoes to
Dads Who Care
https://tickets.mtc.com.au/promo?sourceNumber=17078
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