Civilians killed in the clash in Lebanon

Civilian casualties inside Nahr Al-Bared Refugee Camp. Shelled by the Lebanese Army.

Hot Summer in Lebanon

Possible reasons for the fighting in North Lebanon: from Link T.V.

Nahr El-Bared

Fighting in Nahr El-Bared Refugee Camp in North Lebanon: Lebanese Army and Fateh El-Islam, June 2007

Remember the Men

Since the emergence of the Feminist Movement in the twentieth century, much focus has been placed, and rightfully so, on remedying the conditions that contributed to the mistreatment and neglect of women. National and international laws, including affirmative action, have attempted to narrow the gap between the genders.

Society imposes certain roles on men as it does on women. The negative effects of such roles on the men have usually gone unrecognized. While men, as a gender, have generally not been oppressed by women or by society, they have been socialized into roles that have added to their burden and compromised their physical and emotional health.

The primary responsibility of providing for the family and the socio-economic pressures that ensued have led, over time, to an identity stereotype that is based on a strong work ethic, long work hours, and degree of financial success. There are cultural differences, of course, across groups, nations, and families. Traditionally, farming communities relied on the labor of both men and women. In modern times, and in an industrialized and market economy, the “traditional” breadwinning roles between men and women have become more defined, with the men making most of the money and controlling it and the women staying at home and working on the domestic front.

Gender roles began shifting in the 1960s in a post-industrialized world where the structure and definition of family were changing. Two-parent, male and female, households and extended families are no longer the norm. With such changes, some of the economic burdens have shifted to women, leading many women with small children into the mainstream work force, therefore increasing their level of stress. Most women have, however, entered the work force as a means of independence and self-reliance. Despite that fact, the self esteem of men is still centered on the work place. In a way, the burdens of both have increased in a market economy.

Men have traditionally encountered emotional and physical issues that are peculiar to their gender due to society’s expectations and due to their work burdens. Society tends to be more accepting of less economic achievement and less physical, mental, or emotional “courage” from women than from men. In situations where men have been emotionally, mentally, or even physically, abused by women or other men, society is very harsh in the way it treats the male victim. Men are usually laughed at or asked to just deal with it, actions we would never even contemplate repeating if the woman were the victim.

Some of the jobs that have been held mostly by men include the following: the military (with certain branches being solely theirs), construction and other physically demanding jobs, contractor jobs in war torn areas, rescue workers, presidents, heads of corporations, mining, and critical medicine. Men sometimes bury their sorrows in alcohol or work; they become alcoholics or workaholics. When anger builds up without proper family or community support, they lash out and, sometimes very violently. Suicide is a real issue among men. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

- Suicide is the eighth leading cause of death for all U.S. men;

- Males are four times as likely to die from suicide than females although three times as many women as men attempt suicide (CDC 2004);

- In 2001, suicide took the lives of 30, 622 people, 24, 672 of whom were men (CDC 2004);

- Of the 24,672 male suicide deaths reported in 2001, 60% involved the use of a firearm;

- In 2005, 4 people out of 100,000 in the United States died of injuries at work. Males accounted for 93% of those deaths at a rate 12 times that of women;

- The leading causes of death of men of all races in the United States in 2002 are the following in descending order: heart disease, cancer, unintentional injuries, stroke, chronic respiratory diseases, diabetes, influenza and pneumonia, suicide, kidney disease, and chronic liver disease.

There is evidence to suggest that more women than men suffer from depression. Men, however, are more reluctant to seek help due to the social stigma of mental difficulties. Men do not report such difficulties because they are afraid of losing their jobs or because of self-esteem considerations. That is one reason why men can feel trapped in a society that does not encourage verbal or emotional expression to release tension and why they are more successful in their suicide attempts.

Suffering in silence is the burden that we, as a society, have encouraged by our neglect of the issues that face men in a world that values appearances and materialism over holistic well-being and in a world that emphasizes our differences versus our commonalities.

Men may have historically had the upper hand as a group in most spheres in life. As individuals, however, they have faced horrendous circumstances in addition to their daily responsibilities with the “understanding” that they should “tough it out” because they are men. This is an inhuman and very detrimental outlook and it devalues the other 48% of our species.

People returning from the war zones of the Middle East are mostly men. They are in need of much emotional and financial support. Are we astute enough to notice what they are going through or do we continue to live by the motto “don’t show and don’t tell?”

June is International Men's Month. This is a good website for resources on men's issues. http://www.menstuff.org/frameindex.html.

The Plight of A Grieving Mother and An Advocate for Life

Cindy Sheehan's decision to take a hiatus and her subsequent letter explaining her decision to resign as the "face of the peace movement" have brought attention to the question of the need for a new political direction within the United States. Sheehan, the symbol of grieving motherhood who transcended ideological and party lines to advocate for what is right versus what is Republican or Democrat, or what is Right or Left, has become the newest victim of a movement that has not fully grasped the meaning of activism. Justice and right to life are not values that we can ignore for politically strategic posturing and campaigning. Sheehan's famous statment: "I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of 'left or right,' but 'right and wrong" continues to be misunderstood and ignored.

Partisanship is a very destructive form of activism because it can place party and ideology, no matter how contradictory or illogical, above human dignity, freedom, and the right to life. The Democrats' inability to take a firm stand on the war and their quick willingness to abuse the woman who carried the peace movement on her grieving shoulders despite ailing health and destroyed marriage, point to the complicity of such a movement in the continuation of this war and the killing. Be it in their support of an ongoing occupation, or their inability to form cohesive policies that encourage human dignity in a corporate/military controlled world, they have shown that they cannot handle criticism nor do they have the ability to reflect upon where the movement has come and ways to strengthen it.

Sheehan represented to many the symbol of conciliation and was a major driving force within different groups in the "peace movement." She was able to do it because she succeeded in transcending the partisan hatred and speaking to the mother within all of us.