Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / Minister for Boys and Men?

Transcript

Minister for Boys and Men? · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:06
Speaker 1: Hello, Welcome to the Happy Family Podcast where we answer
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Speaker 1: your tricky questions every Tuesday.
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Speaker 2: Today it's a doozy.
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Speaker 1: With the upcoming book published by HarperCollins and ABC Books
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Speaker 1: called Boys by Me. Doctor Justin Coulson Building Strong Young
0:18
Speaker 1: Men from the inside Out had a question come through
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Speaker 1: about how boys are doing, how men are doing, and
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Speaker 1: what we can do to turn things around because the
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Speaker 1: short answer is things aren't going particularly well. More on
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Speaker 1: what this means for our country but also for our
0:34
Speaker 1: sons right after this. Hello, Welcome to the Happy Families
0:40
Speaker 1: podcast where you get real parenting solutions every single day.
0:43
Speaker 1: This is Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. We are Justin
0:46
Speaker 1: and Kylie Colson Today. What do we do about the
0:49
Speaker 1: Can we call it a crisis? The men and boys
0:52
Speaker 1: challenges crisis?
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Speaker 2: I'm going to say it. I'm going to go there.
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Speaker 1: The difficulties that we're facing when it comes to the
0:57
Speaker 1: well being, the development and even the behavior have so
1:02
Speaker 1: many boys and men. Every Tuesday we answer your tricky
1:05
Speaker 1: questions about tricky stuff like family and relationships and well
1:09
Speaker 1: being in screens and discipline and boys and men. So,
1:12
Speaker 1: if you'd like to submit a tricky question. We've got
1:14
Speaker 1: a really super simple system. Try and say that three
1:16
Speaker 1: times fastness. Happy Families give it to me now, super
1:20
Speaker 1: simple system.
1:21
Speaker 3: Super simple system, super simplsis.
1:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a tricky one, isn't it. The super simple
1:27
Speaker 1: system is a Happy Families dot com DoD au. Justcrolled
1:30
Speaker 1: down to see the record button you when you're a literation.
1:32
Speaker 2: And start talking.
1:34
Speaker 1: Otherwise you can send us a voice note to podcasts
1:37
Speaker 1: at happy families dot com dot au, just like Neil
1:40
Speaker 1: did with this question.
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Speaker 4: Can I Justin and Kylie? This is Neil from Brisbane.
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Speaker 4: There have been some MPs and commentators calling for a
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Speaker 4: minister from men, which at first I thought was a
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Speaker 4: crazy idea minority groups might benefit from special representation in government.
1:55
Speaker 4: But man, really, but when we think of some of
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Speaker 4: the challenges facing us throughllians violent crime, especially domestic violence, gambling,
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Speaker 4: traffic accidents, workplace accidents and suicide, these topics affect men
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Speaker 4: far more than women, and if we can reduce those
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Speaker 4: things crime, gambling, suicide and accidents, then every Australian could
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Speaker 4: be better off. Justin give them the topic of your
2:17
Speaker 4: new book coming home soon we help. Do you think
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Speaker 4: Austrillians should have administer from n and government.
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Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, Neil, I love this question and I
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Speaker 2: love his accent. Isn't it great?
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Speaker 1: And I think it's the exact right framing. Anyway, missus
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Speaker 1: happy families, You are not politically inclined as general rule,
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Speaker 1: and you still haven't read the book. Does anything come
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Speaker 1: to mind when you hear the question? Is there anything
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Speaker 1: that you would like to divert into and ask about
2:43
Speaker 1: before I just start talking and don't give you a
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Speaker 1: breath for the next fifteen minutes because there's so much
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Speaker 1: I want to say about this.
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Speaker 3: I feel like this is a really tricky one. I
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Speaker 3: think that humankind need help, like I think across the board,
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Speaker 3: and I don't understand why we have to segregate everything.
3:03
Speaker 3: Why it has to be you know, gender related or
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Speaker 3: marital status or whatever. Like we're just constantly trying to
3:10
Speaker 3: segregate and you know, kind of box people into a
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Speaker 3: label as a puser.
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Speaker 2: So let's call it identity politics.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, as opposed to recognizing that as a human being,
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Speaker 3: we all have needs, we all have rights, we all
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Speaker 3: have wants and desires.
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Speaker 1: Let me ask you a question. If there was a
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Speaker 1: house on fire in our street and you're driving down
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Speaker 1: the street, would you pay attention to any particular house
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Speaker 1: more than any.
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Speaker 3: Other the house on fire?
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Speaker 1: Okay, So what I think really matters here, and I
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Speaker 1: actually agree with you everybody needs to be treated as humans,
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Speaker 1: and we need to look after humankind to generally.
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Speaker 2: You are one hundred percent right, totally agree.
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Speaker 1: But if there are a subset of humans who are
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Speaker 1: not doing well, let's let's look at our indigenous population,
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Speaker 1: for example, then would it be reasonable to say, let's
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Speaker 1: an additional attention, let's put let's put some water on
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Speaker 1: this fire and see if we can help that particular
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Speaker 1: cohort that particular population to start looking like the other
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Speaker 1: houses in the street, not necessarily by conforming, but by
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Speaker 1: not being on fire anymore. Is that a reasonable analogy entirely?
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Speaker 3: I think so. Is the reason that men are struggling
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Speaker 3: so much in society today a direct result of this
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Speaker 3: idea around equal rights and women wanting competition with a
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Speaker 3: man's role as opposed to recognizing that we have really
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Speaker 3: distinct and varied strengths on either side that compliment each
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Speaker 3: other instead of trying to fight for equal place.
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Speaker 1: So that's probably a broader sociological and political power question,
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Speaker 1: and people will vary right across the spectrum on that
4:54
Speaker 1: in relation to what's happening right now, which is really
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Speaker 1: where Neil's focused, and it does time very much with
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Speaker 1: my boys, which you can pretty good to right now
5:01
Speaker 1: at bootopia dot com dot au.
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Speaker 2: I my dad.
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Speaker 1: The data show that, so if you look at disadvantaged groups,
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Speaker 1: if you look at groups that are struggling, the person
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Speaker 1: most likely to struggle in Australia today is male. Like
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Speaker 1: if you just look at a gender breakdown, we look
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Speaker 1: at various other breakdowns, we look at ages, or we
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Speaker 1: look at race, and we look at a whole range
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Speaker 1: of other variables, but at the very core of it,
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Speaker 1: it's a male who is much more likely to struggle
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Speaker 1: with things like violent crime, domestic violence, gambling, traffic accidents,
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Speaker 1: workplace death, suicide. They're much more likely to be hurt
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Speaker 1: by another man, So men are much more likely perpetrate,
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Speaker 1: but they're also much more likely to the victims of crime.
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Speaker 1: They're also much more likely to hurt themselves. And so
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Speaker 1: my take on this question is that by addressing the
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Speaker 1: challenges that men are experiencing, we have a crisis hurting everybody,
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Speaker 1: and that is that men are failing to thrive. We
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Speaker 1: have too many non thriving males, both boys and men,
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Speaker 1: and if we can help males to thrive.
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Speaker 2: Then everybody gets lifted up.
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Speaker 1: Everybody does better because when men are doing well, they
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Speaker 1: make sure that the women around them are doing well
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Speaker 1: as well. But when men are not doing well, they
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Speaker 1: hurt themselves, they hurt each other, and they hurt women
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Speaker 1: at vastly higher rates. Men are committing ninety five percent
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Speaker 1: of violent crimes. So that's not just a men's problem.
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Speaker 1: That's community safety problems. You've said all people. But if
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Speaker 1: we can't lift men up, then we're going to have challenges.
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Speaker 1: Men are dying at the rate of three to four
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Speaker 1: times that of women. When we look at suicide, that's
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Speaker 1: obviously horrendously tragic for those men and their families.
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Speaker 2: We've been through that, but look at who's most affected.
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Speaker 3: It's interesting because I don't disagree with anything you're saying,
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Speaker 3: but when you look at society in general, it feels like,
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Speaker 3: and this is I'm acknowledging, it feels like, not necessarily
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Speaker 3: it is, but it feels like men hold all power.
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Speaker 1: Right, I want to talk about pushback a little bit later.
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Speaker 1: That is one of the big issues of pushback.
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Speaker 2: There's men at.
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Speaker 1: Top outnumbering the women, but there's also men form bottom
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Speaker 1: line outnumbering the women one percent. Really really concerning. So
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Speaker 1: this question that is asking, though it's not it's not
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Speaker 1: unique to Australia.
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Speaker 3: So is anything happening like this globally?
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Speaker 2: Yeah?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, So in the UK they've been debating this, get
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Speaker 1: this more than twenty years now. A guy called Lord Northbourne. Northbourne,
7:18
Speaker 1: I feel very fancy saying it, but I can't say
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Speaker 1: it properly. Lord Northbourne first proposed to he said, if
7:23
Speaker 1: there's a minister for women in mine for children, then
7:25
Speaker 1: that assumes that men don't have problems. And then a
7:28
Speaker 1: few years ago there was a Conservative MP. His name
7:31
Speaker 1: was Nick Fletcher. He pointed out that forty one percent
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Speaker 1: of British high school boys were being told that boys
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Speaker 1: are a problem for society's that's the message they were
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Speaker 1: receiving from society. He cited mail underachievement in education, lower
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Speaker 1: university enrollment, and the fact that a huge number of
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Speaker 1: boys and men just feel like they are failing to
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Speaker 1: thrive in my data here in Australia that I've written
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Speaker 1: about in the book. The stats in terms of our
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Speaker 1: young men finishing school and going on the university or
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Speaker 1: even being in employment educational training. It's devastating compared to
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Speaker 1: how the girl's going. We've got a whole lot of
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Speaker 1: other stuff happening in the UK. In New Zealand, they
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Speaker 1: have been making the same argument for quite some time.
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Speaker 1: In the United States, Michigan is one state. There's a
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Speaker 1: couple of other states.
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Speaker 2: I can't remember what they are. I know that Utah
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Speaker 2: is one of them as well.
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Speaker 1: They're appointing ministers for men because they're recognizing that if
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Speaker 1: we can lift men up.
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Speaker 2: They'll do better.
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Speaker 1: But I want to give a counter example, something that
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Speaker 1: I didn't write about in the book because it's just
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Speaker 1: it's so interesting, but it wasn't part of what the
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Speaker 1: book was about is what's happened in South Korea. So
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Speaker 1: cautionary tale for what happens when you ignore young men
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Speaker 1: and the issues they're having. South Korea has had a
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Speaker 1: Ministry of Gender Equality since two thousand and one. But
8:44
Speaker 1: when you translate the Korean name, which I can't speak,
8:46
Speaker 1: but which all the research that I did shows that
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Speaker 1: this is what happens The Minister of the Ministry sorry
8:52
Speaker 1: of gender Equality, translates as the Ministry of Women Affairs
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Speaker 1: and Family, not gender equality, and the young Korean men
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Speaker 1: well like, well, hang on, it's going on here. It
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Speaker 1: feels like we're being left out. A couple of years ago,
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Speaker 1: the presidential election was won by someone called Junsukul, and
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Speaker 1: that was one on an explicitly anti feminist platform promising let's.
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Speaker 2: Abolish the ministry, but the work had already been done.
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Speaker 1: So South Korea currently has one of the worst gender
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Speaker 1: divides in the developed world. In twenty twenty five, they
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Speaker 1: had to add a gender Equity Policy division specifically to
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Speaker 1: address discrimination against men because the backlasher become so severe
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Speaker 1: that you couldn't ignore it anymore. And what the lesson
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Speaker 1: really is is that when you only talk about one
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Speaker 1: gender's problems, you create resentment, and that resentment doesn't actually
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Speaker 1: make anyone safer. It entrenches and embeds the misogyny and
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Speaker 1: the anger and the resentment that we've been seeing in
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Speaker 1: things like Lui Thru's Inside the Manisphere documentary.
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Speaker 3: So where does Australia sit in relation to this ideology?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, so we've taken different approach. I don't think that
10:01
Speaker 1: it's working, and Neil is right to be asking this question.
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Speaker 1: So Victoria is the first place to do something about this.
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Speaker 1: A couple of years ago, I think it was twenty
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Speaker 1: twenty four, they appointed Australia's first Parliamentary Secretary for Men's
10:12
Speaker 1: Behavior Change guy called Tim Richardson his job therefore, think
10:16
Speaker 1: about the title as Secretary for Men's Behavior Change. Focus
10:21
Speaker 1: therefore is changing men's behavior, addressing violence against women. So
10:26
Speaker 1: I don't want to be misrepresented here. When we talk
10:29
Speaker 1: about family and domestic violence, we are talking about something
10:32
Speaker 1: that is really severe and problematic. I'm astonished at how
10:35
Speaker 1: bad the numbers are here in Australia. It is breathtaking.
10:38
Speaker 1: Gob'smackingly bad. So I don't want to downplay anything.
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Speaker 2: That's going on here.
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Speaker 1: It's just unacceptable. But my problem with Victorian approaches as
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Speaker 1: follows it frames men exclusively, is the problem not as
10:49
Speaker 1: people who might be struggling, not as people who don't
10:51
Speaker 1: understand how to deal with their alcohol and other drug addictions,
10:54
Speaker 1: or their emotion dysregulation, all the traumatic events that they've
10:58
Speaker 1: witnessed in experience growing up, all the fact that they're
11:00
Speaker 1: living in this man box that tells them that the
11:01
Speaker 1: beliefs that they have can only be sustained through their aggression,
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Speaker 1: and through their dominance, and through their abusive and subversive behavior,
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Speaker 1: through their controlling and coercive behavior.
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Speaker 3: Well, when you can monetize that behavior, there's no reason
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Speaker 3: to assume that it's wrong.
11:17
Speaker 2: So right, you're right.
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Speaker 1: I just don't like this idea that it's a Minister
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Speaker 1: for behavior change, men's behavior change. If it was a
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Speaker 1: minister for men's well being, if it was a minister
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Speaker 1: for boys' mental health, I'd like it a lot more.
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Speaker 1: But it's a minister for changing men's behavior as if
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Speaker 1: all men are perpetrators in waiting, And for me, I
11:38
Speaker 1: think it's a mistake, even though that will come across
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Speaker 1: as crass and inappropriate to a lot of people, it's
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Speaker 1: a mistake to say that every single man is a
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Speaker 1: perpetrator in waiting.
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Speaker 2: It's just not fair.
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Speaker 1: And I know that there's that whole not all men
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Speaker 1: hashtag that's out there and it gets people up in arms.
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Speaker 1: The reality is, though, and you said this recently when
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Speaker 1: we're talking about a Lui Thru's inside the mana in
12:00
Speaker 1: your bubble in your world. You just don't know any
12:04
Speaker 1: men who are perpetrators the people that you deal with.
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Speaker 2: In your social circle.
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Speaker 1: Unfortunately, for me and for our family mostly it's exactly
12:12
Speaker 1: the same thing, right, We're dealing with good people who
12:15
Speaker 1: are not doing these kinds of things. So we don't
12:17
Speaker 1: need a men's parliamentary, a parliamentary sectory for men's behavior change.
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Speaker 1: What we need is somebody who can work with men
12:27
Speaker 1: on the challenges they're facing so that we can help
12:29
Speaker 1: everybody to do better. New Zealand is also doing it.
12:32
Speaker 1: By the way, I forgot to mention this. So when
12:35
Speaker 1: you see men only through the lens of what they're
12:38
Speaker 1: doing wrong and tell them they need to behave better,
12:41
Speaker 1: you're actually alienating the very people that you're.
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Speaker 2: Trying to reach.
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Speaker 1: And I just it's typical for what so much of
12:46
Speaker 1: what's happened in Victoria over the last few years has been.
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Speaker 1: But if we can have a minister focused on men's health,
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Speaker 1: on suicide prevention, on educational attainment, on positive role models,
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Speaker 1: on emotion regulation, on responsible use or zero use of
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Speaker 1: alcohol and other substances that are getting into their lives
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Speaker 1: and destroying their motivation, their capacity their regulatory capacity and
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Speaker 1: their relationships. That's a completely different conversation.
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Speaker 3: So you've just listed a whole heap of things that
13:11
Speaker 3: you think would need to be in his portfolio or
13:14
Speaker 3: her portfolio in order for this to be effective. But
13:18
Speaker 3: what would they actually do.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, if we had a men's Minister or a Minister
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Speaker 1: for men in Australia, I would want them to focus on.
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Speaker 1: First of all, my suicide prevention. We lose Oh gosh,
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Speaker 1: I hate even saying this and it brings back so
13:30
Speaker 1: much for what we've been through, but we lose over
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Speaker 1: two thousand Australian men to suicide every single year. I mean,
13:37
Speaker 1: we talk about bringing the road told down, but that's
13:41
Speaker 1: more than double the road toll. Those numbers are staggering.
13:44
Speaker 1: I think about the compound effect of the loss of
13:47
Speaker 1: those two thousand lives, the ripple effect, the way that
13:50
Speaker 1: it rolls through friends and family, through mothers and fathers
13:53
Speaker 1: and children and cousins, and the impact is just astronomical.
14:00
Speaker 1: And I don't think that we have equivalent investment. I
14:02
Speaker 1: don't think that we have a national strategy here that works.
14:04
Speaker 1: So I would think that that would be an area
14:06
Speaker 1: that absolutely needs focus.
14:07
Speaker 2: Second, thing healthy masculinity education. I don't think that.
14:11
Speaker 1: Programs in schools work particularly well, and that has to
14:14
Speaker 1: do with sometimes the content of the program. Sometimes it
14:16
Speaker 1: has to do with the quality of the people who
14:18
Speaker 1: are teaching the programs. There are a whole lot of
14:20
Speaker 1: factors that go into it. But I think that we
14:22
Speaker 1: need programs and conversations that teach boys what healthy masculinity
14:27
Speaker 1: looks like, not be less masculine, or be more feminine,
14:31
Speaker 1: or be more in touch with your emotions. Not masculinity
14:33
Speaker 1: as toxic. But and it's just two words, safer and stronger,
14:38
Speaker 1: helping the people around you feel safer and stronger. Like
14:40
Speaker 1: if we could drill that into the mind of every
14:42
Speaker 1: young male in this country, I think we would have revolution.
14:46
Speaker 3: I also think if you abolished alcohol now would change
14:50
Speaker 3: the market as well.
14:51
Speaker 1: We have friends who are police and they've all said
14:54
Speaker 1: eighty to ninet percent of trime would disappear if you
14:56
Speaker 1: could get rid of it.
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Speaker 3: Would you imagine, I mean we're talking almost utopian.
15:00
Speaker 2: Yeah.
15:00
Speaker 1: The third thing that I would say, and there's good
15:02
Speaker 1: foundations out there that are doing this work already, but
15:04
Speaker 1: the fatherhood support we know, we know, Oh my goodness,
15:09
Speaker 1: involved father's one of the best predictors of child wellbeing.
15:13
Speaker 1: But the way that we've got paternity leave happening in
15:15
Speaker 1: this country, and the policies that we've got around dads
15:19
Speaker 1: and their involvement with their children, especially post separation, post divorce.
15:23
Speaker 1: I understand that we need to keep children safe and
15:25
Speaker 1: that there are unsafe men, so I'm not stepping into
15:28
Speaker 1: that territory. But if there is no evidence that a
15:31
Speaker 1: man has done the wrong thing. We have a friend.
15:34
Speaker 1: We have a friend who has been estranged from his
15:35
Speaker 1: children because false accusations were made about his supposed abuse,
15:40
Speaker 1: and he has not seen his children for seven years.
15:42
Speaker 1: He writes them malotters every week. He does everything he
15:45
Speaker 1: can to have some kind of semblance of a relationship
15:47
Speaker 1: with them in conjunction with the court in post orders.
15:51
Speaker 1: But this guy is a good guy. Yes, he's made mistakes,
15:55
Speaker 1: but perhaps the biggest mistake that he made was the
15:57
Speaker 1: person who he married, who has just been disgraceful people
16:00
Speaker 1: live and who has lied and lied and lied. And
16:03
Speaker 1: so by creating better stuff in the courts and also
16:07
Speaker 1: better family support at a fatherhood support, I think that
16:10
Speaker 1: would make a big difference. Also, I know that what
16:12
Speaker 1: I just said is going to upset a lot of people,
16:14
Speaker 1: and they're going to say that all of a sudden,
16:15
Speaker 1: I'm becoming one of those hardcore men going their own
16:17
Speaker 1: way kind of things. That's not what I'm saying. I
16:19
Speaker 1: don't want to be misquoted. There are men out there
16:21
Speaker 1: who should not be near their children, but I know
16:23
Speaker 1: in this specific case, with this particular dad, it's unfair.
16:26
Speaker 1: In fact, we know several people who have been through this,
16:28
Speaker 1: most of them not quite so bad. Two more things, Kylie,
16:31
Speaker 1: and I know we've got to wrap this up. Number One,
16:33
Speaker 1: addressing the educational underachievement of young men, getting them finishing
16:38
Speaker 1: high school, getting them to university, getting them skilled, getting
16:41
Speaker 1: them trades, getting them employed beyond that base level would
16:45
Speaker 1: make such a difference. Currently, I think Australia's got forty
16:49
Speaker 1: four universities. I'd have to double check the manuscript of
16:51
Speaker 1: my book, and women outnumber men in forty two of
16:55
Speaker 1: those forty four universities. Like, the numbers are just staggering.
16:59
Speaker 3: And what again, that blows me away from the perspective
17:03
Speaker 3: that I wouldn't begin to guess what the numbers are.
17:08
Speaker 3: But women are the main caregivers.
17:11
Speaker 1: That's exactly right, yes, And when you've got a sixty
17:14
Speaker 1: forty split, that's what the split is. By the way,
17:16
Speaker 1: in a lot of these in the university secretary generally
17:18
Speaker 1: sixty percent of university students now a female, forty percent
17:21
Speaker 1: a male. What's also happening there has massive social implications
17:26
Speaker 1: because as again politically incorrect as it might sound to
17:28
Speaker 1: say this, women do tend to marry a cross or
17:31
Speaker 1: up when it comes to the socio economic and educational
17:33
Speaker 1: capacity of their partners, whereas men are pretty happy to
17:36
Speaker 1: marry anyone across up or down that don't really care.
17:39
Speaker 2: Let's have this relationship. I like you, you like me. This
17:42
Speaker 2: is a win.
17:43
Speaker 1: And so if women are looking across and up and
17:46
Speaker 1: they're just done any men there, guess what happens. They
17:48
Speaker 1: stay single or they stay single for longer. And when
17:50
Speaker 1: you talk about the economic impact, the growth impact the
17:53
Speaker 1: way our country is going, we actually are going to
17:55
Speaker 1: sound like I'm a politician now, we actually need people
17:58
Speaker 1: to be getting married and having children important socially, emotionally,
18:02
Speaker 1: but also financially and economically for our country.
18:04
Speaker 3: But the research also suggests that when you can be
18:09
Speaker 3: in a loving saved monogamous relationship that you thrive.
18:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's where we get our thriving men.
18:15
Speaker 3: Yeah.
18:15
Speaker 1: And it gives men purpose. I was talking before about
18:17
Speaker 1: non thriving men and boys. What gives them purpose is
18:21
Speaker 1: having someone to protect and provide for. We watched this
18:26
Speaker 1: happen with our first son in law.
18:28
Speaker 2: He wanted to marry our daughter. He didn't really have
18:31
Speaker 2: many prospects.
18:32
Speaker 1: He wasn't going anywhere fast, and he was quitting everything
18:36
Speaker 1: faster than he was starting things like. It was not
18:38
Speaker 1: looking great, but he promised that he was going to
18:41
Speaker 1: get his act together. He went and got an apprenticeship.
18:42
Speaker 1: And we look at the decisions that he's made since marrying,
18:45
Speaker 1: and we've asked him what his other mates who have
18:47
Speaker 1: stayed single have done, and he's just leaps and bounds
18:49
Speaker 1: in front. And it seems that marriage forced a level
18:52
Speaker 1: of maturity on him. Does that work for everybody, No,
18:54
Speaker 1: of course not, but it seems like and the research
18:56
Speaker 1: evidence points that that is directional, if not causal.
19:00
Speaker 3: So I'm going to imagine that there's probably some pretty
19:03
Speaker 3: big pushback year relation to this.
19:05
Speaker 1: There is, and even some of the things that I've
19:07
Speaker 1: said today can be if they're not kept in context,
19:11
Speaker 1: they can be really inflammatory for some people. And I
19:13
Speaker 1: hope that I've been sensitive and I hope that I've
19:16
Speaker 1: throw clear enough and made sure that the caveats are
19:19
Speaker 1: in place where I've said what I've said, because there
19:21
Speaker 1: are exceptions to what I've said, and I'm not throwing
19:23
Speaker 1: a blanket over all of this. Here are the biggest
19:28
Speaker 1: items of pushback. The first one goes back to what
19:30
Speaker 1: you said about men have all the power, why do
19:33
Speaker 1: they need a minister? There's a the.
19:36
Speaker 3: People in the room who are making the decisions around
19:38
Speaker 3: whether or not this would even go ahead predominantly male.
19:42
Speaker 2: Tend to be men.
19:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's a bimodal distribution with the guys at
19:45
Speaker 1: the top and at the bottom. I would also say
19:48
Speaker 1: men with power. Men with power aren't the ones who
19:51
Speaker 1: are dying in workplace accidents. And they're not the ones
19:53
Speaker 1: who are taking their lives in regional sheds and on
19:56
Speaker 1: farms in outback communities. The men who running the country
20:01
Speaker 1: and corporations are not the men that we're worried about him.
20:04
Speaker 3: Know that they're the ones that live in the bubble, correct.
20:07
Speaker 1: I mean some of them have had their challenges as well.
20:09
Speaker 1: John Brogden, former New South Wales I think was he
20:11
Speaker 1: premier or opposition lad. He is quite open about his
20:14
Speaker 1: depression and his attempts on his life and has written
20:16
Speaker 1: a book about it and is doing what he can
20:19
Speaker 1: for men's health because of what happened there. But I'm
20:22
Speaker 1: worried about I'm worried about the boys in western Sydny.
20:24
Speaker 1: I'm worried about the boys in regional New South Wales
20:26
Speaker 1: that I was in a room with a couple of
20:28
Speaker 1: months ago who were just going.
20:29
Speaker 2: What's the point of this.
20:30
Speaker 1: I'm concerned about the regional kids who are getting left
20:33
Speaker 1: behind and just the non thriving Where is my purpose?
20:35
Speaker 1: So that there is pushback, but I think that the
20:37
Speaker 1: power issue can be dealt with. The second issue that
20:40
Speaker 1: comes up a lot is this is taking away resources
20:44
Speaker 1: from women and women need resources, and I think that
20:47
Speaker 1: women do need resources, and there is an argument that
20:50
Speaker 1: it could be but I would also say this is
20:52
Speaker 1: not as zero of some situation. We can care about
20:55
Speaker 1: women's health and safety and we can also care about
20:59
Speaker 1: men's health.
21:00
Speaker 3: I don't think it should ever be a one or
21:02
Speaker 3: the other.
21:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, and when you look at what happened in South Korea.
21:04
Speaker 1: They ignored this and the bottom fell out.
21:07
Speaker 2: It went pair shaped.
21:09
Speaker 1: Last pushback that I hear regularly, and it really ticks
21:12
Speaker 1: me off, is that people say, well, men should just
21:15
Speaker 1: fix this themselves. And it ticks me off because we
21:19
Speaker 1: would not say that about any other group. Go back
21:22
Speaker 1: to the house on fire situation that I was talking
21:24
Speaker 1: about before. When Indigenous Australians are overrepresented in prisons or suicides,
21:30
Speaker 1: we don't say, well, Indigenous people should just fix themselves.
21:33
Speaker 1: We recognize that there are systemic issues and we intervene.
21:36
Speaker 1: I don't think we're doing that very well there by
21:37
Speaker 1: the way, but we do intervene, and the same principle
21:40
Speaker 1: applies here. I just don't think the pushback is strong.
21:43
Speaker 3: I think that regardless of which group we're talking about,
21:47
Speaker 3: if people were capable of fixing themselves, then we wouldn't
21:49
Speaker 3: have an issue. The very fact that we have an
21:53
Speaker 3: issue suggests that help is needed, and wherever that help
21:57
Speaker 3: is needed, I think that it's important for us to
22:01
Speaker 3: navigate it as best we can.
22:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, so, Neil, thanks for your question. I've been on
22:07
Speaker 1: quite a quite a journey. To use your word Khylie
22:10
Speaker 1: in this podcast. But men, men don't deserve special treatment.
22:16
Speaker 1: But there are too many boys and men who are struggling,
22:18
Speaker 1: and when they're violent, when they're self destructive, when they're disconnected,
22:23
Speaker 1: when they're not thriving, Unfortunately, everybody around them suffers. And
22:27
Speaker 1: if we can reduce male suicide and male violence and
22:31
Speaker 1: male disengagement from family and society and education and from
22:34
Speaker 1: one another, if we can just help boys grown to
22:37
Speaker 1: men who make the world feel safer and the people
22:39
Speaker 1: around them feel safer and stronger, not more dangerous, not smaller,
22:42
Speaker 1: then that's going to be not just good for men,
22:44
Speaker 1: it's going to be good for everybody. So that's my
22:48
Speaker 1: response to Neil's tricky question. Let us know what you think,
22:51
Speaker 1: Send us a voice note, send us an email. Podcasts
22:54
Speaker 1: at happy families dot com dot you, or jump into
22:56
Speaker 1: our socials and give us your feedback. The Happy Families
22:59
Speaker 1: podcast produced by Justin Ruhlind from Bridge Media, with additional
23:02
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23:05
Speaker 1: information about making your family happier, or if you'd like
23:08
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23:10
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Speaker 1: go to booktopia dot com, dot you and pre order
23:15
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